Outside, Hats, and Getting Dirty

Hey Friends! I am back, so soon!  Hard to believe.  In between the freezing weather and monsoons, we have been spending a lot of time outside these days.  The weekend before last, I went to a baby shower in Birmingham for one of my best friends, Ashley, who is having a baby girl in April!  I am so excited and can't wait to meet baby girl! (No name yet and I can definitely relate.)  When I returned from Birmingham, little man was at Mimi's house playing.  He has learned to swing on the big kid swing and does a pretty good job of holding on.  However, every now and then he will just jump off so I don't let him go too high even though he is saying, "high" "high".

I have mentioned us spending some time out playing on our land and the surrounding areas.  Mason, the dogs and I decided to go exploring one day and had a great time!  One thing I love about the land is that there are a lot of HUGE trees on it AND Spanish Moss (the tree above is on the land behind ours). 

There are a lot of things I miss about North Alabama (besides family and friends) like catfish (whole catfish, not fillets), bar-b-que (I'm looking at you, Bunyan's), and the Tennessee River.  However, the fact that the lower half of Alabama has Spanish Moss at least helps their lack of catfish places.  

On this particular day, Mason wanted to hike up every hill he saw.  He would say "hill!" and up we'd go.  I pointed out all of the big trees and he'd walk up to them and wave and say "Hi!".  (He still says "hi" to everything inlcuding dog poo, his legs, clean diapers, and my mom's glasses.) Since he was wearing his boots he tripped about every 2 steps but wanted to do everything by himself.  I made him hold my hand most of the time.  Then, when it was time to go back, when we were pretty far back in the woods, he was ready for me to carry him the rest of the way.  Awesome. When we got back to the barbed wire fence that separates our land from the land behind us, I lifted him over it to the other side and he got mad saying that he wanted to "do eee." Like I am going to let him crawl through a barbed wire fence.

One cold day I got out some huge paper we saved from some packaging that came with a shelf we bought for the play room.  I let Mason lay on it and I traced him and then gave him markers to color it in with.  He doesn't really "get" coloring yet.  He spent most of the time looking at the marks that he made on his hand and when I gave him a brand new box of crayons he spent all his time dumping them out and then putting them back in the box.  We'll try that again later.

Wow! The bunnies look so clean and fluffy in this picture.  Sometimes they are nearly black from going EVERYWHERE and being used as a napkin, snot rag, passenger in trucks and tractors, companion in the dirt and mud, etc.  I feel so bad when Mason drops it and a stranger picks it up and hands it to him.  I am thinking, "so sorry you had to touch that."  It is all I can do to sneak the bunnies away to wash them without Mason noticing they are gone.  He thinks it is fun for us to put the bunnies on his back and will walk around like that for a while. He will come up to us with bunny and say "back" and we are supposed to tuck them in the back of his shirt.

Oh, and he is obsessed with that train table that Nana and BopBop got him for Christmas... more on that later.

One Sunday the weather was really nice and mild so Ben and I took Mason out to Shakespeare Park after church (I think it is really called something else but everyone calls it Shakespeare).  We had a good time playing soccer, looking for fish, and pointing out all of the fire ant piles.

Mason discovered dandelions for the first time.  He had a little trouble blowing the "feathers" off and got a mouthful once or twice.  It was so cute watching him try to figure it out.

As we were leaving he spotted a remote control air plane.  We almost never got him to leave after that.

He was obsessed.

My mom and dad kept Mason for us last Friday night and let Ben and me have a date night.  This was Mason's first time to stay at Nana and BopBop's new house over night and he had a great time!  It has been so nice having mom and dad close by! Ben and I almost didn't know what to do!  We already had dinner planned with some friends from Auburn who were passing through town.  After that we were like, uhhh, now what?  We ended up going to Books A Million and looked at house plan books and had coffee, which was really fun and relaxing. We actually found a house plan we liked, too!  After that we came home and watched (I slept through) a movie we had rented from Red Box a week before! I was so tired that I fell asleep in my clothes and jewelry and didn't wake up until 9:00 the next morning.  It was really nice!

This necklace was a birthday present from my parents.  I have been wanting one for a while and mom and dad gave me money to pick out which one I liked.  It was a hard choice!  When Ben saw it, he asked me why the "B" was so small.  Haha!  I love it and wear it with everything!  I have already informed Ben of exactly which locations he can find more charms for future reference.  We will have another initial that I will need to add very soon, after all.

I keep my beaded necklaces in a jewelry hanging bag in my closet and they are just within Mason's reach.  He likes to get the beads out and play with them so the other day I put some on him.  He would look at them on his neck and say "more" and this is how he ended up.  He didn't like them on there for long, though.

He has a new obsession with hats.  He loves to wear his daddy's hat, so I pulled out his Auburn that my grandfather and aunt gave him before he was even born.  He thought it was so great and insisted on putting it on all by himself.  This is how it ended up.

Then, he wanted Pete to wear it and thought that was the greatest thing ever.

And this is how he rocks the backwards cap.  No one could help him.  He slept with the hat that night and asked for it as soon as I came to get him out of his crib the next morning.

Here he is the next morning having his breakfast.  Spoiled much?  I am sorry, Mason's future wife. Can't help it.

 

So, yesterday the weather was nice so I took Mason down to the creek in the front of our neighborhood.  The goal was to see the "tractors" that were working nearby but we never made it that far.  He wanted to throw a million rocks into the creek so we made a ton of trips from the rocky area back to the creek. Then we climbed on rocks, then we crossed the street to the other side of the bridge and found Heaven on Earth, tons of rocks right beside the creek at a flat area where I didn't have to worry about him falling in the water.

Here is his muddy booty after sitting down in the creek.  If you look closely, you will see that there is actually a snail stuck to him, right by the leaf. I mean, do little girls get muddy snails stuck to their hineys??

Here is the video of the progression of dirtiness.  And the Lord feels that I need two of these....  :)

Little Stinker.  He was NOT ready to go home and stalled the whole way back.

When we got to the car I had to strip him down in the back where the floor is a plastic mat and then wrap him up in my sweater.  Everything went strait in the washing machine.  Can you see the specks of mud on his face?

Here are a few snapshots from the gender reveal that I finally got downloaded to my computer.  This is the only shot I got of the cake pre-cut.  Since I thought I could see through the icing in some places I didn't want to take it out of the box and ruin the surprise.  My sister-in-law, Tori, took the following pictures for me and I love how they capture our expressions!  I just hate that I didn't have the presence of mind to get a group shot!

And here is a re-try of the video.  

Best buds, Caden and Mason, enjoyed feeding each other snacks at the party.  Caden's mom and I were laughing so hard at this.  Caden would say, "Hey Mason, give me another one." Instead of handing him a goldfish, Mason went strait for the mouth.  Might as well eliminate unnecessary steps, right?

The dads hanging out in the play room.  It's basically a man cave.

Mason insisted on his giant loader sitting on the couch with him while he watched the iPad.  

Once he falls asleep for his nap there is no waking him up! He fell asleep yesterday just as we pulled into the Publix parking lot.  I tried to keep him awake and then tried to wake him up several times but to no avail.  So, I propped him up like this in the cart and piled all the groceries around him.  He finally woke up when I started checking out and then didn't take another nap for the rest of the day.

This shot is from lunch today.  He refused to let me put pants on him because he had already started putting on his boots and they were not about to come off. Thank goodness he got them on the right feet this time.  I have to pick my battles these days since he wants to do everything himself (like put on his own diaper). So, this is his outfit of choice and the shirt was even a battle.  Then, he pushed the chair up the the fridge all by himself.  Why, I am not sure, but I know one thing: I am in for it now.

And I am going to leave you with this Beef Stroganoff recipe that I made last night.  I tweaked it from a couple of recipes I read and it was super easy, dirtied up minimal pots, and turned out awesome!  I don't have pictures because I am not that good....

You will need:

1lb ground beef
1 red onion diced (I call them purple because they are.) I used about 1/4-1/2 of a huge onion but you would probably use 1/2 to a whole small onion.
1 pkg baby portobello mushrooms chopped (optional but recommended) I used 1/2 the package because Ben is not a huge mushroom fan and I am going to use the rest for a roast later this week.
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1/2 stick of butter
1 cup of sour cream
1 teaspoonful of minced garlic
1/2 cup of milk (I used heavy cream because I had some)
2 tablespoons all purpose flour
garlic powder
salt
pepper
1 pkg of Egg Noodles

Start by browning your ground beef (seasoned with garlic powder, salt and pepper to taste) with the onion until it is cooked through and then drain and set aside.  I used beef from THE COW so it has very little fat therefore, I cooked mine in 1/4 stick of butter. I also used a pretty good bit of garlic powder and pepper because I like those.

In the same pan you just cooked the beef in, add the remaining 1/4 stick of butter, minced garlic, and mushrooms.  Saute mushrooms until done (maybe 5 minutes? can't really go wrong here, just taste them if you aren't sure).

Once the mushrooms are done, add the cream of mushroom soup, milk, and flour and mix well over medium heat.  Add the meat and onion back to the pan.  Add the sour cream just before serving and heat through.  At this point you might want to taste it and see if it needs any more seasoning.  Then serve it over egg noodles.  It is delish!

I served it with asparagus that I rolled in olive oil, salt, pepper, and minced garlic and then baked at 400 degrees for 8 minutes.

Let me know if you have questions.

Lent, 7, and It's a BOY!

 I am going to stop playing "catch up" for a little while so I can talk about the here and now. Otherwise, I may never get there!  So, here are some recent iPhone pictures that I got uploaded today!

And as a side note, I have given up Facebook and Instagram, which you might be here because I posted that on Facebook, and I will write more about that later in this post.

I think I mentioned that we bought a piece of land back in January that we plan to build a house on one day in the not-too-far-away-future.  Both Ben and I would like to be a little more out in the "country" and the lot has 95 acres of undeveloped land behind it.  I have a feeling that will be a fun place for little boys to play one of these days!

 We have spent a few weekends "cleaning up" the land, getting rid of dead limbs and trees and burning them in piles.  Oh and by "we" I mean Ben.  Ben has done A LOT of work making the land look really nice!  Mason loves helping Daddy work.  He would drag sticks to the burn pile and then say "more".  You might have seen him in action on the video I posted on Facebook a little while back.

The land also provides many digging opportunities and you know, that is what Mason does best.

It only takes a couple of baths to get all the dirt out from under those little fingernails.

Pinterest (surprise surprise!) inspired me to get a little crafty and I modpodged those photos onto canvases.  It is a much cheaper alternative to the gallery wrap and I was pretty pleased for how they turned out.  I hung them in the playroom and my wall could use about about 6 more!  I was just proud of myself for printing pictures, period. 

We have had some craaazzzy weather around here lately.  It's warm, then it's freezing, then it is a monsoon. I don't know how to dress, or dress Mason, from one day to the next.  When the weather was nice we enjoyed some time with friends on the playground and also hanging out with cousins out at Mimi and Pop's!

Mimi and Pop's house is every little boy's dream.  They have a lot of tractors and trucks nearby, cows across the street, and a playhouse next door.  I think Mason spends most of his time (and Mimi's) outdoors when he is there.  Doesn't he look like he could be Adalyn and Bentley's little brother? He loves his cousins so much!

As you can tell by the bare feet, we had weather in the 70's!  We definitely took advantage of this time to dig in the back yard.

Mason really likes clothes and shoes, which I did not expect.  He likes everything he wears and he has recently started putting his boots on by himself, usually on the wrong foot.  DO NOT try to help him. Boots are definitely his favorite accessory.

I hope this video works when I publish this post!  We found out the gender of Baby #2 on January 30th.  You probably know by now that it is a BOY and we are so excited!! 

At the very last minute, we decided to do a gender reveal. We invited our family and some of our close friends to come over and join us as we cut the gender-specific cake.  Ben and I found out at the same time as everyone else!  Publix didn't really grasp the whole "gender reveal cake idea" and when I went to give them the envelope that revealed the sex (so they would know what flavor to make the cake: chocolate for boy/ strawberry for girl since they don't die cakes blue) they said they had already made the cake half strawberry and half chocolate.  I was like "Ummm, no. I am having one or the other. It cannot be both."  So I re-explained the whole thing and they agreed to make me ANOTHER cake with the specified gender that only the baker and the ultrasound tech knew.  Thank goodness I had a control envelope so I could check it with the cake to make sure they did it right! So, we got the cake and you could see through the icing.  On top of that, they left the "chocolate" sticker ON THE CAKE!  Only my mom saw the sticker so everyone else was surprised when we cut it!  The whole thing really was so much fun even though it was very last minute!   Mason really has no idea what is going on, but he loved him some cake! The days following he kept asking for cake at any opportunity.

We hear "I dooo eee" about a thousand times a day around here.  That is Mason telling us that he will do it.  He wants to do everything from putting on his boots to fixing his plate to brushing his teeth to putting on his own Resinol (diaper rash cream, the best stuff ever).  I have to say, "No, Mommy do eeee." In the picture above he is feeding himself his own baby food (he still wants to eat baby food and picks it out and asks us to feed it to him) and is doing a fine job.  He is hit or miss with feeding himself.

Somehow I convinced him that hats are a lot of fun to wear and so he will agree to wear them when we go to the playground.  I love the way he looks in his little hats!  Here he is going down the big curly slide at the park.  A lot of the time he wants me and him to both go down the slide together which is pretty funny to any neighbors walking by, I am sure. 

I thought it would be fun and festive to make this little Valentine's Day Banner for the mantle. Obviously, I got the idea on Pinterest and my friend Lindsey cut the hearts out for me with her Cricut.  Ben never commented on it and when I asked him what he thought of my banner, he laughed.  He said it would be good if I was decorating our house for our 7 year old daughter. Haha!  Oh well, I like it anyway AND it is staying through February!!  Then in March I am making one with Lions and Lambs on it!! Ok, just kidding about the lions and lambs. 

(When I think of March I think of a bulletin board we had in elementary school that said "In like a lion and out like a lamb". That is where the lions and lambs came from in case you were wondering.)

Oh yeah, I don't think I mentioned that I pulled everything on the mantle down on top of me including a super heavy piece of a wrought iron gate, shattering lots of odds and ins as they busted on the hearth, while I was decorating for Christmas.  We are in the process of replacing stuff and I am lacking a candle.

The other morning I woke up and looked to my left.  Laying in Ben's spot on the bed, flat on his back with his head on the pillow was Berkley, our 55 pound poodle.  I tried to get a picture, but this is all I could get since he is solid black and it was dark in there.  I was laughing so hard. You know Ben was thrilled to hear about that.

And speaking of Ben and Berkley, we made these no bake chocolate peanut butter oatmeal cookies (don't know the name of them) and Ben was so excited.  The very next morning, Berkley snuck in the kitchen while I was still asleep, drug the cookie bag off the kitchen counter, and ate most of the cookies.  Ben was furious and banned Berkley to the crate for every night for the rest of his life.  That lasted 2 nights.  (This was after the night that Berkley and Pete ate an entire bag of honey wheat bagels and then pooted for the entire day afterward.)

When I was going through my pictures I saw this picture of pizza from Marco's pizza buffet and man, it looks so good!  I took the picture to send to some of our friends because everyone I invited to come with us after church seemed very unenthused about my restaurant choice (they had never been there), but I am 6 months pregnant and I wanted Marco's pizza buffet, dang it!  So, we went by ourselves.  I sent this picture to let them know what they were missing.  We will be back there this Sunday. Thanks.

This pregnancy is going really well for the most part.  I am finally wanting to eat at home again after a stint of not wanting ANYTHING home cooked or fresh vegetable related.  I don't know if you remember that I had subscribed to a CSA (where they delivered farm grown fresh fruits and veggies every week), but I would not touch the veggie box AND I gagged when I saw the email that contained the week's menu of what would be in the boxes. I cancelled the CSA after one month. (Sorry, Grow Alabama, don't take it personal.)  I also spent Christmas Eve morning in the ER for pregnancy/urinary related issues that were a mystery to my doctor and miraculously resolved on their own after week 17 (thank goodness!).  I was having to set my alarm to wake up every 2 hours at night to go to the bathroom and the lack of sleep in combination with holiday craziness was really taking its toll.  I am now feeling more like a normal person, except I want to eat all the time.  The other night I woke up at 3 in the morning and fixed myself a BLT.  I eat at Schlotzky's about twice a week ( I get the same thing every time, a #4 combo on jalapeño cheese bread) and if I don't eat there I eat at Moe's (nachos big enough to fill up a large man).  Somehow I have only gained about 7 pounds.  I credit this to the little 21 month old that I chase.  However, my new appetite is really not jiving with our new "eating out budget."  

When we bought the lot and started planning our future home, we decided that we needed to tighten up on our budget.  Man, budget talks are THE WORST! I get in a bad mood every time and will put it off for days.  Thankfully Ben is pretty persistent because he loves to save some money.  Not that I am a big spender, but I don't like thinking about it.  Anyway, I found an amazing iPhone app that has been extremely helpful (or a massive pain depending on how you look at it) that will keep up with how much money we have for each category in our budget and how much we spend out of each category.  We can both access the same envelopes so that we can better see where our money is going.  This has been great because I hate carrying cash and it is hard for me to keep up with what I put on the credit/debit card.  The app is called EEBA and I believe that stands for "Electronic Envelope Budget App", but I could be wrong.

And last but not least, regarding Facebook and Instagram... I gave them up for Lent.  I am not Catholic, but I like to observe Lent because I think it it beneficial.  I chose those two social media outlets because I feel that they tend to suck up most of my time that I could be spending doing other, more important things.  Not that I think they are bad... I miss them already because they connect me to a lot of family and friends I wouldn't be connected with as easily otherwise.  I just find myself scrolling aimlessly through the news feed reading what someone I haven't seen in 15 years ate for breakfast when I could be doing something more productive with my minutes. So, there ya go.  I'll be back around Easter, but until then, I plan to do a much better job keeping up on here and taking care of a lot of other things I have been neglecting to accomplish lately.

Also, remember when I wrote about the book "7"? Well, they are doing a study group on the book at my church on Weds nights and Ben and I, along with my mom, are participating!  I am really looking forward to this study!  I didn't even know that the book had a study guide!  I will update how it is going as it all unfolds.  

And, thanks for reading the longest blog post of the year.