Baby has a new name!

I don't know how many of you have seen this book, but I want to share it with you because it is one of Lyssa's favorites. It's an adorable book about a little girl named Bitsie who has trouble getting out bed. She rolls over, but "OVER IS NOT UP"! When her Daddy calls "in a bigger voice, 'Get up Bitsie!'", she yawns, stretches, and slips out of bed to run into Daddy's awaiting arms.

Just to show you how much Lyssa loves this sweet little girl, she has officially named one of her babies "Bitsie". This is a first since all of her babies up to now have been "Baby". Last night in the car she asked us, "Where's Bitsie?". We had to ask a few questions and discovered she was referring to her latest favorite dolly. And one more note; while she was with Bitsie, my mom heard her saying that she had to go to the nursery because her baby was crying. My Sweet is playing like she is at church, how precious is that?

What to do on a freshly made bed!

Like mother, like daughter

Today for snack I let the girls share Madeline's strawberry yogurt. Lyssa was so excited to have "mo-get" she was jumping for joy when I gave it to her. I resisted the temptation of picking out soggy strawberries in an attempt to keep my daughter from having the same aversion as myself to chunky yogurt. She happily ate a bite or two before discovering the chunks herself and exclaimed, disappointedly, that she did not actually want the "mo-get". I rescued the soon-to-be wasted snack by offering it strawberry-free. She agreed. Daddy meanwhile was trying to convince her that if she liked strawberries she should also like them in her yogurt. To this she replied, "I don't like fruit in my mo-get!" While secretly smiling, I continued to not offer my opinion. Daddy, on the other hand, laughed and roared, "You're weird!" To which she giggled and replied, "No YOU'RE weird Daddy!" She catches on quick. ;-)

Love It!

Now that I'm posting again I have the opportunity to tell the world my thoughts and inspirations! (Okay so the world being the 2 or 3 people who are reading this) It's just good to have them written down somewhere for future generations, right? Well whatever the reason here is my new favorite thing: hiding nutritional boosters in my recipes. It's actually been a new favorite for a while but since I'm just now writing about it, it is new all over again! I love the peace of mind it gives me to know that there is actually a nutritional value in the things my family chows down on! It all started with making my own baby food. After Elyssa started eating finger foods and wouldn't touch the puree, I had a bunch of veggie cubes in my freezer. Well there was no way I was throwing out something I'd worked that hard on so I just started tossing them into scrambled eggs. I was met with success! Lyssa loved those veggie eggs. (Yes after she had already devoured several I discovered that eggs aren't necessarily supposed to be introduced before a year, oops) Then my eyes were opened to other possibilities by the cookbooks; "Deceptively Delicious" and "The Sneaky Chef" (It's an old idea and several people have written about it). Lyssa isn't a veggie lover. She will eat carrots, soy beans, and corn. Sometimes she'll surprise us, but most of the time she convulses after her obligatory couple of bites. As much as I hate to admit it, I don't eat all that well either. So for starters, I've made it a habit to add a little cauliflower to my eggs, a little sweet potato to my waffles, and I make lasagna with both of those plus some spinach, and whole grain noodles. I added a little cauliflower and white bean puree to cheese sauce for mac and cheese and you could hardly taste it. That is not one I do all the time, however, because I don't have time to make my own sauce very often. If I weren't so lazy, I would also have tried a million others, but alas...

My recommendation for you is to add a "booster" to your own recipes. The Sneaky Chef makes it easy by categorizing them by color, like orange puree has several ingredients rather than just carrots or sweet potatoes. A booster might just be switching whole wheat flour instead of white, adding ground flax or wheat germ, or adding obvious ingredients like dried fruit and nuts to oatmeal. The names of the books are misleading. You are not devious or deceitful if you make your family's meals healthier, you are SMART! Like I said, start by making your own meals healthier then experiment with new recipes. I found that the recipes I tried in the books weren't all that fantastic but that doesn't mean I should toss out the idea altogether. Both books are filled with useful info on nutrition and make a great starting point. Let me know what your "boosters" are. I know some of you are way ahead of me in this area!

Have I mentioned MY crush?

Longing to see a friend in "Hi-da-ho"

I promise Chris and I haven't brought the subject up once! She is still enamored. "I go to Ryan's house!", "Yes we saw Ryan in Idaho", "Who else did we see?", "I saw Gram-Grams, and Dennis, and Dresia..." The girl has a good memory!
She still talks about him almost daily. I love the sweet innocence of it! She is also showing her affection more and more to those she loves here, hugging friends on a whim, kissing her daddy, climbing into my lap for a cuddle. Today she kept grabbing the end of my braid and rubbing it on her face, even kissing it. I can see why, she has held that hair in Mama's embrace since she was old enough to wrap her tiny fingers around it. It was her "lovee". It is so amazing to watch her learn how to love. And being the recipient of it is beyond words! They say it only gets better but how can it? I'll have to wait and see. ;-)

I know...It's been a while...

Well I don't know if anyone will even notice that I have updated this blog or not but the time has come for me to face my fears and POST! I say fears because I guess I never realized the expectations that I had set up for myself to have the perfect blog. Shortly after my last post, my sweet aunt passed away and I was determined to write something clever in honor of her. In my failure to get that put together I just kept putting it off, and off, and off....until... Suddenly here we are almost two years later! I will let that go for now, but perhaps in the future I will tell you about how I miss her gentle spirit and genuine laugh.




The reason I decided to write something now is due to the latest achievement in my ever surprising little daughter's life. Seeing how the last few posts were about her eagerness to jump ahead of the expected developmental milestones, I want to tell you of her latest feats. Just to catch you up on the last year and a half, not only did she crawl at six months but she walked at 8 1/2 months, potty trained herself by 20 months and probably now thinks she's ready for kindergarten! But her latest thing is cracking us up even more! She has her first crush!!! When we went to Boise two weekends ago we visited our friends, the Mahoneys. Their oldest boy is none other than Ryan who I started watching at the age of 2 months old when I lived in Boise. Now he is eight (hard to believe!) Lyssa played with Ryan and his younger brother Michael for an hour or two and apparently that was enough. We got home and several days went by without any of us mentioning a thing... Then one day she said out of the blue, "I love Ryan!". (I'm not talking about a statement of fact, I'm talking about that way you say you love someone with your eyes twinkling, your head tilted, and your voice sighing the last half of their name." I just thought how cute it was that she remembered him, but that was only the beginning. Several times a day she asks to look at the pictures of him we took on our trip, giggling and dancing when she sees them. Not a day has gone by that she hasn't sighed and said, "Mommy, I love Ryan!". We just smile and say who else do you love? Sometimes we're on the list sometimes it's just "Gamma", "Boppa", and Maddo.

My little 6 month old is crawling! I can’t believe it. Wednesday, the day before she turned 6 months, she began to move her hands forward but wasn't quite sure how to keep going. Then Saturday night she just crawled towards me without a second thought! Today she actually got into her Dad’s video games! What a little explorer!
She’s been a busy little girl. A couple of days last week and three days this week, Keenan (the son of one of my friends) has been spending the day with us. He is two years old and loves his little buddy Elyssa. He loves to play with her and even read one of her books to her! They are so cute to watch together!

Happy 1st Mother's Day

I hope all of you had a good mother's day. My first Mom's Day was awesome! Elyssa had my favorite watch fixed and she bought me a beautiful Asian cast iron tea pot. Isn't she fabulous? Well ok, Chris helped her out a little. Anyway, for lunch we all went over to my aunt and uncle's for some of his amazing cooking. I mean YUM! Elyssa even got to see some chickens and she loved watching them run around. She also rode on Grandpa's shoulders and boy was she proud of herself! Did I mention My Aunt and Uncle's unbelievably beautiful garden?

My aunt told us of her encouragement from her own mother in law. She had offered her the greeting "Happy Mothering Day" because, though she has never given birth, she has nurtured many different creatures all the way from animals to humans in her lifetime. I find it fitting as I think of so many dear ones who long to have children of their own. These beautiful women should not be made to feel sad on a day the rest of us celebrate. I've been there, I know the pain of not receiving a carnation at church when so many others are. You're in my prayers!

Hind Sight

During those times that we walk through the "valley of the shadow of death", I really wish we could see the way God uses it for His glory, even if only a glimpse. I imagine that's what faith is, knowing He has good things in store for us, a prosperous future. "Lord please carry us through this valley and use this time to prove your power over the evil lies of this world, amen."