Radio Flyer

Logan has had a little bit of trouble since he had his tubes put in. He's been having trouble keeping his food down after I nurse him. Several times since his tubes he has thrown up all of his food immediately after I nursed him. I couldn't figure out what the deal was. Well, it turns out that he has some gas issues do to the anesthesia. He is currently on some stomach medication. Hopefully it will solve his problems soon.

We had one REALLY bad night. Last Thursday night he cried and threw up his food almost all night. He threw up about 4 times and could not get content, even when we held him. Logan is always happy when you're holding him so we knew something was wrong. We thought maybe he had a bug/body aches, but it was his stomach issues. That night was a rough night for Gabe and I both. Gabe was sick himself, but helped me out a lot. I drove Logan around twice in the middle of the night trying to get him to fall to sleep. The first time we left the house it was 2:00. I drove by Shipley to see what time they opened and they didn't open until 3:00. The second time we left the house it was 3:30. So, where did I head to first? Where any normal mother would head...the donut shop! :) I hope we never have a night like that again!

Logan looks a little different in these pics. He had just woken up from a nap and his hair had gotten sweaty and curled up in the front. The lighting is also a little off because his hair looks a little red.

Madison is a mess these days. What is her favorite thing to do? CLIMB! She climbs onto everything...up on the barstools, onto the sink, into Logan's baby bed. You name it, she's probably climbed there.

Her other favorite things to do are...

TALK & EAT, of course! She calls her Grammy, Papa, Grandma, Grandpa, & Me Mommie on a regular basis...just to talk! If she doesn't get an answer she moves on to someone else.

Gabe and I ordered Madison a Radio Flyer wagon for her 2nd birthday. We just picked it up from Wal-Mart last night. I think Madison and Logan will LOVE riding around in this thing. I especially love it because it has seat back with seatbelts so the kids can't fall out and I also love the canopy to shield the sun. I look forward to the pretty weather we are supossed to have this week so we can hopefully try it out!

Logan's New Friend & WW

My friend, Melissa, welcomed her second baby boy into the world on Wednesday. She had a quick labor & delivery! I've joked with a couple of people that I'm so glad she had a good delivery that way she'll want one or two more! ;) Gabe and I took Logan up to the hospital to meet his new friend, Cooper Lee, Wednesday night. Cooper is a handsome little thing! So cute and tiny.
I had my third weigh-in for WW last night. I lost 2 pounds this past week! Whoop! Whoop! And the two weeks before last week combined I lost 1 pound. So, I've lost a grand total of 8 pounds so far. So far, so good. As long as I keep losing each week, I'm happy. I exercised quite a bit more this past week than I have been able to before due to sick kids and busy schedules. Exercise really does help majorly!

I found a great website called skinnytaste.com. A woman named Gina has made up tons of recipe's for cooking light. She has also listed the WW points for each recipe. Spinach Lasagna Rolls was my first recipe on her website to try out and Gabe and I both really like them. You should try them out. Very simple to prepare and yum-o!

Spinach Lasagna Rolls
Gina's Weight Watcher Recipes
Servings: 9 • Serving Size: 1 roll • Old Points: 4 pts • Points+: 6 ww pts
Calories: 224.9 • Fat: 5.1 g • Fiber: 3.4 g • Protein: 13.0 g • Carbs: 31.5

9 lasagna noodles, cooked
10 oz frozen chopped spinach, thawed and completely drained
15 oz fat free ricotta cheese (I like Polly-o)
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 egg
salt and fresh pepper
32 oz marinara sauce
9 tbsp (about 3 oz) part skim mozzarella cheese, shredded

Preheat oven to 350°. Combine spinach, ricotta, Parmesan, egg, salt and pepper in a medium bowl. Ladle about 1 cup sauce on the bottom of a 9 x 12 baking dish.

Place a piece of wax paper on the counter and lay out lasagna noodles. Make sure noodles are dry. Take 1/3 cup of ricotta mixture and spread evenly over noodle. Roll carefully and place seam side down onto the baking dish. Repeat with remaining noodles.

Ladle sauce over the noodles in the baking dish and top each one with 1 tbsp mozzarella cheese. Put foil over baking dish and bake for 40 minutes, or until cheese melts. Makes 9 rolls.

Happy Birthday, Madison!

Our baby girl turned 2 years old this past Saturday! Can you believe it?! We hardly can. It is so true that time flies, especially with baby number 2. Madison woke up on her birthday to find this 3-story dollhouse in our living room. Her Aunt Tom & Uncle Joe decided she needed this on her birthday! They even drove it down the day before her birthday so it would be here in time.

Here is a look at the dollhouse from the front.

I was a little skeptical of the dollhouse at first. I really thought it would be too mature for her and I just KNEW these little pieces of furniture would spend most of their time spread out all over the floor. But...

Madison LOVED it! She immediately started playing. I guess all little girls just know what to do. I must say, this is quite the dollhouse. Even I played with it a little the night we put it together. ;) (shh, don't tell anyone!) Thank you so much, Aunt Tom & Uncle Joe. She loves it!

I decided against inviting friends to Madison's party this year and just invited family instead. Mostly because there is simply not room for numerous toddlers in our house, plus just thinking about that scenario makes me really uptight, nervous, and just downright scared. All of the party places in town were way too pricey for a 2 year old birthday party, so I decided on just family thinking it would be low-key and way less work. Well, not so much. We cooked a huge meal and boy was it good. We had barbeque chicken quarters, rolls, macaroni and cheese, green beans, baked potatoes, deviled eggs, and a salad with lots of great toppings.

Grammy was VERY generous and made turtle cheesecake and Italian Cream Cake for dessert. I made some homemade vanilla ice cream to go along with it. The cakes were delish! They were worth every single WW point!

Uncle Ryan feeding Madison her birthday cake. Madison loves her Uncle Ryan!

Finally, it was time to open presents. Madison got several books...The Itsy, Bitsy Spider, The Wheels on the Bus, and several Dr. Seuss books.

The highlight of the party was watching Madison play with her Baby Alive doll from Uncle Ryan & Aunt Melissa. To say she loved it is an understatement. The baby is super cute. It talks and asks for bananas and juice and you feed it. Madison did not want to stop playing with this doll. Finally, we convinced her to unwrap the rest of her presents.

Madison also received an adorable baby doll bed from Grammy & Papa.

Mema gave her a baby doll to put in it. It makes baby noises as well and moves it's arms. Logan enjoys playing with it, too.

Uncle Chad, Aunt Becca, and cousin William gave Madison this adorable polka dot dress, along with a few other things. This dress has a razorback on the chest. So cute!

Grandma & Grandpa gave Madison this CD of Bible songs. She loves it. They also gave her a couple sundresses, a Minnie Mouse shirt, and Minnie Mouse panties (for the future.)

Uncle Ryan gave Madison this cute dress with houses around the bottom.

Ryan's girlfriend, Joanna, gave Madison this baby doll that came with a doctor set. Madison enjoyed listening to everyone's heartbeat...

even Logan's!

Even Logan enjoyed the party, and looked cute doing it!

A great time was had by all. Thanks so much to everyone who came and celebrated with us!

Tubes

This precious baby boy had tubes put in his ears this morning. It was a rough night and rough day. Logan couldn't have anything to eat or drink after midnight last night, so I nursed him one last time at 11:30pm hoping he would sleep until morning.

Wrong. He woke up crying and hungry at 4:15am. Talk about one nervous momma! I turned the t.v. on in the living room and we watched t.v. until Gabe walked in the room and suggested that I take him for a drive to help him fall back asleep. Sure enough, he dozed off after just a few minutes of driving around.

We arrived at the new surgery center in Russellville, which is very nice by the way, at 6:30am and were pulling out by 8:00am. Logan was a lot fussier after his procedure than Madison was. He cried a lot more and wouldn't eat anything or nurse. He seemed to calm down after I just held him for a while. I guess he was just scared and confused. I think he will feel much better tomorrow. I felt so bad for him. I just hate for him to hurt, but I know these tubes will make everything better!

Tomorrow is a big day. A very special little girl in our household will turn the big 2! She knows it's her birthday tomorrow and knows that everyone is coming over for her party. I'm sure she will just eat up all the attention! Can't wait to celebrate her big day!

Valentine's Day

Monday night was my night to cook for Gabe. We enjoyed filet mignon, grilled shrimp, and grilled veggies and topped it off with Chocolate Melting Cake. It was pretty good!

Gabe surprised me with this bouquet of roses. I told him he didn't have to order me flowers this year, but he did anyway. Who is to complain? ;)

Madison's Aunt Tom sent her the cutest little backpack in the mail for Valentine's Day. Madison also got a backpack from her Uncle Chad & Aunt Becca for Christmas and is really into backpacks right now. I think they make her feel like a "big kid!" She has been carrying her new backpacks to church and school.

Trying it out!

Tonight is my weigh-in for WW. Last week was canceled due to the snow, so I'm curious to see how much I've lost since my first 5 pounds. We shall see...

Valentine's Date...a few days early

Gabe took me out to dinner for Valentine's on Friday night. We went to my favorite resturant in Conway...Mike's Place. I love everything about it! If you haven't been, you should go. It's elegant and the food is great-all of it!

Gabe's parents kept the kids. It was definately nice to have some adult conversation! Madison had a blast at Grammy and Papa's house since she's been cooped up in our house since Tuesday, due to getting sick first thing at MDO and then the snow. I was about to go a little crazy in the head as well!

Monday night I will be cooking Gabe his Valentine dinner. I'm thinking steak and his favorite dessert, Chocolate Melting Cake.

This Friday is Madison's 2nd birthday. I really cannot believe she is turning 2 already. Gabe and I are cooking dinner for all of our family this Friday night for Madison's birthday celebration. We are going to have a barbeque. Looking forward to a great meal!

"Skinny" Snow Ice Cream

So, the recipe I posted the other day for snow ice cream is LOADED with WW points, aka sugar!!! I found this "skinny" version of snow ice cream.

1 teaspoon vanilla
5 oz. evaporated milk, NOT condensed!
1/4 cup sugar
amount of snow desired

1/2 cup= 1 WW points plus (for those who care!)

My Girl, Megan McGlover

This girl is my newest obsession...Megan McGlover. She does her own weather updates each week in Atlanta, Georgia and she is hilarious. You can see more of her by googling her on youtube.

Snow Day

It is officially a Snow Day here in the state of Arkansas! I think we have about 6 or so inches so far today. It really looks beautiful. I have to admit that I am sick of snow because it cancels everything that I love and look forward to...(MDO, Fit Kids, etc.) Hopefully this will be our last bit of snow, so I'll just enjoy it for now.

Pictures taken of our back deck.

I'm boiling a chicken for a big pot of homeade chicken noodle soup. I've also got the ingredients for a big bowl of snow ice cream! If you've never had it, you should try it. It's delish! Especially with the fresh, powdery snow that we have right now.

MeMommie's Snow Ice Cream

8 cups CLEAN snow, (I added closer to 10)

1 can sweetened condensed milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

ENJOY!!!

Just a Fluke?

Well, I was really looking forward to MDO today, especially since we probably will not have it on Thursday due to the snow. It sounds like we may get a pretty large amount of snow on Wednesday. All was well, until my cell phone range at 10:15 in Wal-Mart. It was the MDO Director saying I needed to come pick up Madison because she threw up. Ugh! Madison just got over an ear infection, but seemed to have felt perfectly fine this morning. In fact, she was in a pretty good mood.

So, here we are...all at home together! (Sigh!) She seems to be feeling okay, just a little clingy that's all. So, who knows if it was just a fluke or what. Maybe she was just a little nauseous. It's a little hard to communicate with her and find out exactly how she feels so, I guess we'll see...

ENT

Well, it looks like little Logan is going to have to have tubes put in his ears. Poor thing has had an ear infection for about a month. He's now on his 4th antibiotic and we have an appointment with the ENT Wednesday morning. I hate that he'll probably have to have tubes, but I so want him to feel better soon. Despite his infection, he's still such a good baby, but I know he just doesn't feel good!

She said YES!!!

My sister-in-law, Holley (Gabe's sister), got engaged last night to Josh Shepard. She met him doing travel speech therapy. Bet she highly recommends travel therapy. ;) They are getting married September 10th, I believe. Isn't her ring gorgeous?

Congrats Holley & Josh!!!

Holley, you will make a beautiful bride and amazing wife!

Weight Loss & Crescent Hotel

This past Thursday, I had my first weigh-in after doing WW for one week. I lost a grand total of...

5 pounds!!!

Yes, I was thrilled! I followed the rules to a T. Actually, each person gets an extra 49 points to eat anytime during the week and I only used a few of them. So, I guess that helped. My first week actually went really well. I didn't starve. You can as many fruits and vegetables as you'd like, along with anything fat free, so you really shouldn't ever be too terribly hungry. WW actually has a new program out called Points Plus, so the program is a little different now. It simply encourages you to eat healthier and rewards you for it.

Okay, some of my favorite low-fat foods/snacks are:

WW ice cream bars (snickers ice cream bar & oreo ice cream bar)

Kroger brand fudge pops/no sugar added (these taste normal)

Kroger brand creamsicles/no sugar added (taste normal)

Jack's fresh salsa (in refrigerated section at Kroger by specialty cheeses) & baked tostitos

bananas

94% FF popcorn

Progresso Light Soup

english muffins with egg & cheese

Pepperidge Farm deli flats
If you've never seen these deli flats before, you should try them. They are a great replacement for hamburger buns. Great with burgers, deli meat, tuna, chicken salad, etc. Much better for you than all that bread and good, too! They are wheat so they have a little bit of a sweet taste.

And now, for the good stuff. (Sigh!) I've been relaxing all weekend at the Crescent Hotel in Eureka Springs. Gabe has a PT convention here at the hotel and I came along for the weekend. We left the kids with a babysitter Friday morning and then Gabe's parents picked them up Friday afternoon. I'm sure they will be good and spoiled by the time we pick them up. ;) It snowed all them way up here and Eureka got 4 inches! It's beautiful. It was so fun watching the snow fall as we drove up.

As we were driving up, we saw a 4runner flipped over on it's side on the side of the interstate, just outside of Fayetteville. We stopped to help, and figured out they were the parents of Spence, owner of Italian Gardens in Russellville. I worked at Italian Gardens for 7 years, and told Spence's parents that I knew him well. Small world! Neither of them were hurt, and they waited in our car until the tower arrived. We arrived in Eureka a little late, but I'm so glad we stopped to help out the parents of a friend.

If you're not familiar with The Crescent Hotel, (I wasn't), it is said to be America's most haunted hotel. Gabe's PT group all went on a ghost tour in the hotel last night. The tour guide led us through the hotel and told us many "hear say" ghost stories. Of course, I don't believe any of that hog wash! It was entertaining though. I'm sure some people get all worked up over those sorts of things.

After we check out of the hotel, we're going to head to Fayetteville to do a little shopping and then eat at our favorite Italian joint...Mama Z's. Mmm, homeade rolls & pasta. Makes my mouth water just thinking about it!

Sweet Note & Skate Party

I saved this sweet note from Madison's MDO teachers. I think it's from last week or the week before. I see and deal with every one of Madison's temper tantrums throughout the day. Although she has many sweet moments, I see many sour moments as well. It seems as times that the sour outweigh the sweet, but maybe that's just me! It's encouraging to get sweet little notes for her teachers. This one says that Madison is so sweet & polite. At least we've mastered "thank you" and "please!"

I've slacked a little on blogging and wanted to post some cute pics of the kids at their Aunt Holley's 30th birthday day bash back around the holidays. Holley had a skate party and Madison was lucky enough to get a pair of her own skates. The smallest size they carry is a size 6 and they fit. Now, don't get worried...the wheels did not roll. Whew! So, she had fun "walking on wheels" around the rink. Her Papa and William have really taken to the rink and go their many Saturday mornings.

I'm sure it was a lot of fun, but her Daddy led her round and round the rink.

Watch out...here she comes!

Too cute! The Future Ms. Kristi Yamaguchi!

Doesn't get any better than this cute little thing!