4 year old Check-Up

Ty had his 4 year old check-up on Friday. He is getting so big! Poor thing had to get 3 shots plus the flu mist. He was limping last night because his thighs were sore. It was pitiful! After the first shot he said "that hurt" and started whimpering.

He weighs 43 pounds and is 42 1/2 inches tall. He had a hearing test and did pretty well on that. He missed the lowest tones but most likely due to some congestion from his allergies. He is often stuffy nosed, congested, and snores. So we are going to add an allergy nasal spray to his Zyrtec to hopefully clear up the allergies even more.

We are seeing glimpses of more independence which is nice! He often wants things done for him and we often remind him that he isn't a baby. :)  Friday night before we went out to dinner he wanted to change his shirt by himself. He said he needed privacy. Here is the video...I was laughing the whole time Andy was recording. Hilarious. Listen for him to say "right" when he checks to see if his shirt is on the right way. Once he spots Andy you see a smile...ADORABLE!!!

Ty loves his preschool so very much. He asks when his next school day is all the time. He just marches in by himself when Andy drops him off. He is very proud of his projects when he comes home from school and is excited about choosing a book from his very first book order.

Happy 4th Birthday Ty!

 Ty turned 4 on September 12th. He had been planning his birthday party for at least a month. He talked about it so much before it actually happened. It was quite fun to see his excitement! 

 Don't you love his birthday crown? It's from preschool and he wore it at home on his birthday and the following Friday night at his family birthday party! It was just so adorable. I love it! Luke did the same thing with his preschool hats.

 One of his gifts from Mommy & Daddy. A remote control car from the movie Cars. 

 Ok. Guess who made the cake?! ANDREW! Made the ENTIRE cake. He used a box mix but he also used fondant and mocha flavored icing for in between the layers and for the dirty icing. Wow! Impressive! Everyone loved the cake and it was delicious. I was so proud of him. He is very creative. I love the license plate. He modeled it after the yellow car above from the movie CARS. Ty said this was the best cake EVER!

 My big boy blowing out his candles. We had family over for pizza, veggies, and cake/ice cream. Lots of cousin play time and opening presents. This little guy had a GREAT birthday!

T-ball Player

Luke is playing Fall T-ball again and LOVING it! He is one of the oldest (and tallest) on the team. He is confident and having fun. He has a great coach who is really working with the kids at practice to teach the kids some skills. It's nice! Luke is learning a lot on the Leaping Lizards. The games go through the end of September. Our neon green shirts are hard to miss. :)

 Nice swing!

Playing 2nd base.

Tyler starts preschool!

Tyler had his first day of preschool this morning! He is SO thrilled to be going to school now. He was beyond ready. He will be 4 in just a couple of weeks but we started him in the 3 year old class for many reasons. He loved his teachers, his "projects", and was all smiles when Andy picked him up. He had no trouble going into his class which is wonderful news! We are so proud of our Big Boy!

Back to School

We have finished our first week of school. The boys had a good first 3 days. Luke loves 1st grade and already made a new friend. Wilson said 3rd grade is "awesome" and is in class with his best friend! I was absolutely exhausted but have recovered this weekend. :) Luke is still recovering...he has been pretty grumpy!

Our school is still under renovation so I just started unpacking my room on Friday. I don't have students yet so it wasn't a big deal. I am happy to have a place now and am going in this afternoon to work on setting up. The main corner of my room looks something like this:

Tyler sure misses his "bruders" when we are gone to school. He starts school after Labor Day. He is so ready! I can't wait to see how he likes going to school. I think he will love it.

New recipes

Chili's Queso Dip - Have you ever had the queso at Chili's? It's good. But in a really bad for you way I'm sure. This recipe can be made lower fat and that is what I did. It call for 1 can of hormel chili so I used turkey no bean hormel chili, 1% milk, and reduced fat velveeta. It was still pretty yummy!

Crockpot Cashew Chicken- Yum. I liked this but it was a bit spicy. I had even halved the 1/4 teaspoon of red pepper to an 1/8th of a teaspoon for the boys. It was still spicy for them. I used chicken breasts ( I don't cook with thighs or tenders) and this definitely had a thai food feel to it for me. I served it with white rice and snow peas.

Sweet & Spicy Cucumbers- I have not made these yet but my sister brought them last weekend to my dad's birthday celebration. They were delicious! I would definitely make these! Yum!

Quinoa Salad - Here is the other recipe Cara brought last weekend. This quinoa salad has mango, avacado, red pepper, black beans and cilantro. It was so good!

Microwave popcorn- This is a way to make air pop popcorn in your microwave without all the chemicals and stuff that is added to microwave popcorn. All you need is popcorn kernals and a brown bag. Easy and tasty. The boys love popcorn and they thought this was really good. I melted a little butter for them and drizzled it on the popcorn and salted it a little bit.

Raw Energy bites- Just made these last night for breakfasts the next several days. Tried them this morning and Wilson and I really liked them. There are a lot of variations you can use to tailor these to your taste buds. Here is the version I tried: (adapted from fooddoodles.com)
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/3 cup honey
1 cup old fashioned rolled oats
1/4 cup ground flax seed
3/4 cups oat bran
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 cup mini chocolate chips

Follow the link to see recipe directions and all of the other options for mix-ins.

5K Race

I've been running this summer, completing my Couch to 5K program. My friend Heather and I ran a 5K race together last weekend. It was an evening race and the weather was perfect!

Here we are pre-race. It was crazy busy with people downtown. During the whole run we were surrounded by lots of runners.

Post race! We make great running partners. We kept a great pace together. 

 Our stats: We placed 2,016 in the almost 5,000 finishers. 

For our age division (30-34) we were 117 and 118 out of 393 runners. 

Our official chip time was 30:46. Yay!

Our goal for the next 5K is under 30 minutes.

When I got home Ty asked me if I won. LOL!

My tailbone :(

Refresh your memory on this injury. It has come back to haunt me numerous times in the past two years. I guess you could say it flares up from time to time...nice how we're talking about my rear end. Anyway. Long car rides = achy tail bone. That has been the most common recurrence. Recently, (last 6 months) it was bothering me so much I asked about it when I was at the doctor. My options were slim. A waffle cushion for car rides, an x-ray, or Physical therapy (which I gather from her brief description that it is unpleasant for the PT and the patient- no more info for you there). I didn't do the x-ray that day because I didn't think I needed to have an x-ray done on a 2 year old injury. She said it could have even turn into arthritis...now that makes me feel old! Who wants arthritis in their butt?? So now if I say my tail bone is bothering me Andy laughs and asks me if a front in moving in. Quite comical indeed!

I've been running for the last 7 weeks about 3 times a week. Mostly on the treadmill due to hot temps. This past week I had run twice outside. The other night my tailbone hurt so much. Ibuprofen didn't help the pain and I was taking as much as I could. I sat on the heating pad and slept horribly the first night because of the pain I was in. I obviously didn't run for 3 days and kept taking the ibuprofen. Yesterday I was mostly pain free. I ran today on the treadmill and did fine during the run. It is a little sore now but I'm really hoping that I can keep running.

I will stick to running on a treadmill if that is what it takes. Lesson learned.  Getting older sucks.

Dark Chocolate - Cherry - Coconut Granola

YUM. I had bookmarked this recipe ages ago. I was a little unsure of the coconut but went ahead and added it anyway. This granola is delicious. I ate it plain and mixed into greek yogurt for breakfast. I had gotten a HUGE brick of dark chocolate from a co-worker at the end of May. She had received it as a gift from a student and didn't want it. It's been in the freezer since then.

I saw dried cherries at one of my recent visits to our new Trader Joes and picked them up. With two of the ingredients on hand I had to make this granola! Follow the link for the recipe. I left the flax seed out this time but will add it in the future. I wanted to make sure we liked the granola and would be making it again before I bought it. This granola base is so good- you could mix any any combo of nuts and dried fruits that you like. But this mix is delicious! It makes a lot of granola...

Also I baked mine for 20-25 minutes to dry it out a little more. I think I used 1 1/2 cups of dried cherries and it was plenty. I thought there was a lot of chocolate in there so I might reduce it to 6 oz next time.

Two new favorites!

 
I'm having fun watching Cake Boss with Andy after the boys go to bed. They make some crazy cakes! We are enjoying our new Netflix subscription. Andy is working his way through Lost.



This is a wonderful book. I really loved reading this one. So very good!

Trip to Tennessee

 Ty & Rori

 Captain Luke!

 Lily & Luke

 Wilson jumping in the lake!

 Luke's jump!

 Working on my tan. Don't worry- I jumped in several times too!

 Wilson at the pool.

 Ty watching from the sidelines but NOT missing out on the action!

 Wilson & Sarah Beth. He loves his baby cousins!

The SCARY tree house. Craziness! I made it half way up and came down to wait for the others. Yikes!

Summer Continued!

Summer rocks. What can I say? We have had some HOT days where the boys and I had to stay inside. But otherwise we've hit the pool a lot, I've been running regularly, and the boys have a great chore routine! Overall, life is good! This week we are doing Vacation Bible School. All three boys get to participate this year which is great! I help with the preschool VBS and that is going well. Wilson is in the Mad Science Camp and Luke is in soccer camp. They are loving it!

I've had some fun with my friends meeting at the pool with our kids, having lunch together, etc. I miss my sister terribly. This is her first summer to be working full time and I'm not seeing her like I usually do in the summer. We used to meet at the pool a lot. I. Miss. Her.

Our family took a trip to Crossville, TN to meet up with Andy's side of the family. We stayed at a Fairfield Resort and each had our own mini town home. We spent a day on the lake with a pontoon boat, went to a SCARY tree house, swam at the pool, saw the best fireworks show I've ever seen, and had lots of fun together! It was a great getaway. I'll post more pictures separately. I also got to meet my newest niece, Sarah Beth. She is precious.

Last week our family drove up to Ohio to shop at Ikea. We made a day of it and went to Keehner Park for hiking. We shopped at IKEA and then had icecream for our first time at UDF. YUM! It was a great day.
The boys wanted to play in the kids area so Andy and I had an hour to shop alone! Much easier!

We bought the two tall bookcases and a sofa table.

I love them! I had a lot of fun buying things to set on the bookcases too! 

Some new recipes!

I keep meaning to update but we are staying busy this summer! I've tried several new recipes and some are keepers.

Stuffed Peppers Enchiladas- These were delicious to me...they are stuffed with quinoa, black beans, diced green chilies, cheese, and drizzled in enchilada sauce. Andy liked the filling but didn't so much care for them in the peppers. I have since made the quinoa filling as a side to go with honey lime grilled chicken. I like scooping the quinoa up with tortilla chips. Yum!

Lemon Dessert- This was so good! I have made this with chocolate pudding countless times (aka Mountain Mama Mudslide, one of Andy's faves) but wanted to try the lemon for summer. It was delicious! I want to make it again!

Homemade Oatmeal Creme Pies-  Oh Yes I Did! I saw this pin and had to make them for my dad. Growing up oatmeal creme pies were always in the cookie jar.  The cookies were delicious. They were thin which was good when you are stacking two with frosting. Dad thoroughly enjoyed these as did the boys. I didn't actually eat one made into a pie. I did try a bite of one with frosting and they were good! Loved the plain oatmeal cookie though.

Ranch Potatoes-  So I actually changed this recipe more than I realized. The link is Zesty Italian Potatoes. But at the grocery I was thinking Ranch...so I bought a packet of the powder ranch dressing. After cubing the potatoes and dumping them in a large ziploc bag I drizzled some olive oil on them. Then sprinkled the ranch powder on. I baked them at 400 for about 30-40 minutes until they were done. YUM! I've made this at least 3 times...didn't add parmesan cheese either. They don't need it!

Staying Busy

The boys and I have been staying busy with trips to the pool, library, and playing outside. We are thrilled!!! to have Andy back home after he was in Costa Rica for 12 days leading a mission trip. The big boys went to Grand(parent) Camp at Aldersgate for 2 nights with my mom and their cousins Madelyn and Caroline. They had a blast. Thank you so much mom for taking them on such a wonderful adventure. I know they are making great memories!

Luke just got a new green bike. He was ready for a bigger bike and is doing really well riding it! Here is what it looks like. It is from Wal-Mart. Green is of course his favorite color. My mom just got him a bell for his new bike. He is pretty happy!
 

I kept myself busy while Andy was away by watching Season 1 & 2 of Downton Abbey. I LOVE the show and am terribly dissapointed that Season 3 doesn't begin until January 2013!!!



We have started some a new chore routine and behavior system. It seems things have to change up quite often around here. The boys are all starting out with several dollars worth of quarters in a jar. Each has his own jar. At the beginning of the week they get all of their quarters. As they complain, whine, don't follow directions, etc they lose a quarter. I'm hoping this will encourage some behavior changes...we shall see!

The new chore routine is something I saw online but didn't repin. It was a link I followed from a pin. ANYWAY it was an idea from the Duggar's (who I know nothing about other than the fact that they have a ridiculous amount of children). Here is my adaptation to their idea:
I wrote on small pieces of paper different chores the boys need to do. A set for each. I wrote their name on an envelope and each day I will choose which chores they need to do. They can't have tv, electronics, or free time until they are done. As they finish a job they bring me the slip and I go check the work. Wilson and Luke were very independent with their chore cards! Here are some of the jobs I included:
Wilson- pick up toys (there is a separate slip of paper for different rooms), clean up floor in bedroom, make bed (or strip sheets), put dirty clothes in hamper, walk Lottie, read Jesus Calling Devotion, read 15 minutes for summer reading, do 3 pages of summer workbook, scoop Lottie's poop
Luke- pick up toys (separate slip for different rooms), clean up floor in bedroom, make  bed (or strip sheets), put dirty clothes in hamper, take out recycling, read daily devo with mom, read 1 book, do 3 pages of summer workbook
Ty- pick up toys (same as above), put dirty clothes in hamper, make bed (just putting animals & blankets on the bed)
And this pin fits me perfectly! :)
 

Pizza Quesadillas

Pizza Quesadillas- Yum and EASY! I made these for dinner last week. We had leftover pizza ingredients from making pizza so all I needed was tortillas. These were a hit and super easy!

New Med

A little update on my guy. We've been on the new medicine for two weeks. We have worked up to a whole pill now each evening before bed. I have noticed some positive changes. He is still very anxious about many things - poison, death, cancer, breaking his neck, earthquakes, etc but he is needing reassurance about these things less often. Before it was constant, multiple times an hour. Now it kind of comes and goes throughout the day. So while we are still dealing with those issues they are less frequent. I'm trying to focus on the positive changes however slight they may be at this time. My heart is breaking for him and I just continuously act like everything that worries him is NO BIG DEAL. Every night at bedtime he also wants to tell us what worries are on his mind. Usually it is the same ones I've already heard through the day but it gets them out of his mind so he can sleep. So I think it is safe to say we are on the right path this time to helping him. :)

Zoo!!

Wilson's class went to the zoo in May and our family tagged along! We had such a GREAT day. All of the animals were out and about. The only exhibit not open was the penguins because they are renovating. We watched a sea lion & seal demo (some of my favorite animals at the zoo), watched them feed the bears, and toured around the whole zoo. The boys had a great time. Wilson rode up with the 2nd graders on the charter bus. We had one of his friends travel around the zoo with us. We met up with all of the classes for lunch and the rest of the day we were on our own. We stayed after the school group left to finish and then met up with some friends for dinner.We had a great day! Enjoy the pics!

/

Summer = Awesome

Updated 20 in 2012 post!

I'm reading!
I'm exercising! - Cute story- I started back on the C25K today. Luke said he wanted to run with me and Andy joined in as well. Luke was a trooper. Today was easy but he hung in there! It was so sweet to have him running with me.
I'm sleeping more!
Lots of time with the boys!
Life is good. :)

A  couple recent recipes:

Pretzel rolls by Pennies on a Platter - I read this blog but am trying to pin recipes I've bookmarked so they are all in one place. I finally made these and they were good! I actually took a picture of one I made just for you all to see!
Honey Lime Chicken- Oh. My. Goodness...we love this chicken! We've had it twice. I drastically reduce the cayenne pepper so that the boys can eat it too. I just shake a little in the gallon size bag I marinate the chicken in. The chicken is juicy and delicious on the grill! Make this!

Pinterest Project #3

I wanted to do one more nice thing for the boys' teachers before school let out. I saw the cutest pin on Pinterest and decided this would be it. I started by getting some glass jars at Hobby Lobby. I happened to go on a day that they were all 50% off!  Thankfully on the pin there is a link so you can print the tags for the jars. I made a double batch of our favorite Chocolate Chip Cookies from Annie's Eats. The the boys filled the jars with cookies. I was super excited to use by baker's twine I found in the clearence bin at Crate and Barrel after Christmas. These turned out so cute!

Hello, Summer!

What a wonderful Memorial Day weekend we had! It was busy to say the least but a lot of fun. On Friday I had dinner out with my aunts, mom, & grandparents at a local italian place. It was delicious. Plus it was great to hang out with family sans kids! I actually was able to have whole conversations without being interrupted! We went to hear the live music which was exceptional. A friend of my dad's plays at the restaurant 3 nights a week. He played clarinet, flute, sax, bari sax, a wind instrument, steel drum, keyboard, and maybe even a soprano sax. He played them all well too! Saturday was our first pool day. We all had a blast. We were able to stay for about 3 hours. It is so nice to be in the first summer where I have no kids that need a nap! Amazing! The pool was easier this time around too. Wilson and Luke were fairly independent and Tyler stayed close by me the whole time. Cara & Jason were there with the kids so the cousins all swam together. On Sunday we had a picnic at church in the evening. We were having such a good time with our friends that we didn't drag the kids out of the sand/water/playground until about 9:15pm. It was fun! Monday my family came over around 5 for a get together. Andy worked a lot in the backyard and I worked a lot on the house. We had BBQ in the crockpot, I made chocolate cake, and everyone else brought sides. We mostly stayed in the house because it was so hot. I got to see Anna-Grace a lot this weekend and that was great! She is the cutest thing ever. She smiles so much and is such a happy baby. Today I finished up at school! Summer is officially here at our house!