the lunch room - September

lunch 1:
100% juice, fruit snacks, pudding, cheetos (Jericho), 

flaming cheetos (Annicka), apple slices, ham/salami/cream cheese

wraps, mozzarella/cheese bagel bite mini kabobs, & soy nut/craisin mix!

lunch 2: 

(close up of "sweet rice")

 

 sweet rice (in thermos); 100% juice; fruit snacks; sunflower

kernels; mini cheese sticks; bugles; edamame; apple

slices & peanut butter

lunch 3:

(goldfish crackers are in the cute snack containers)

100% juice; asian cracker mix; mini chicken strips; mini

cheese sticks; ham & cream cheese bagel sandwich; 

pistachios (shelled for bubba); & clementine sections

lunch 4:

100% juice; cheese nips; fruit leather; applesauce; 

celery sticks & peanut butter; chicken fingers; pizza;

and edamame

lunch 5: 

100% juice; fruit roll up; bugles (for bub); flamin
cheetos (for Annicka); applesauce; peanut butter &
honey puzzle sandwich; raisins; cheese stick

lunch 6:

100% juice; fruit leather; asian cracker mix; celery

sticks & ranch; 1/2 cheese stick; cheese nips; chicken

nuggets (ocean shapes); graham fish crackers

lunch 7: 

100% juice; turkey & cheese elephant sandwiches; mini

donut; frozen raspberries; cheese nips; grape fruit rolls (like fruit

by the foot); apple slices; gogurt

lunch 8:

(close up of the yogurt raisins that were "hiding"

under the regular raisins!)

100% juice; frozen blueberries; gogurt; graham

fish crackers; applesauce w/cinnamon; 1/2 fiber

one bar; raisins (with yogurt raisins hiding

underneath); triscuit crackers; bbq chicken/cheese

mini kabobs

lunch 9:
gushers; peaches & cream cup; 100% juice;
rainbow goldfish crackers; cinnamon donut; apple
slices; clementine sections; big pretzels; mini
corndogs (ketchup for Jericho, mustard for Annicka);
and 1/2 fiber one bar!

lunch 10:
fruit twists; pudding; 100% juice; frozen blueberries;
bagel "pretzels" for Annicka; cheez-its for Jericho;
turkey and cheese sandwich

lunch 11:
(sweet rice in thermos)

100% juice; asian cracker mix; turkey/cream cheese
roll ups; strawberry cheese cake muffin; apple slices;
fruit leather

lunch 12:
fruit twist; 100% juice; fiber one bar; piece of
pizza; 2 oreo cookies; apple sauce with
cinnamon; and bugles

still nothing super creative ... but being able to look back at the lunches is
still awesome for me!!!  sorry if it's boring to everyone else!

random round-up, August

and here's the last of the August pics!!! now to get all caught up with September, my goodness!!! 

 oh my goodness, my little Liam and those eyes ...

oh those eyes!

Nana and Grandaddy brought down a very special

hand me down - WOW!!!  he loves it, of course!

I adore the pigtail look ...

and her "what" gesture is hilarious!

pretty awesome yard sale outfit your sportin

there sweet stuff!  oh yes, mama is becoming quite

the yard sale queen!!!  I love it!!!

the lunch room - August

I know, right, you all think I'm crazy!  now I'm taking pics of the kids lunches.  cause, ya know, my schedule is pretty open and I have nothing better to do than constantly photograph random things!

no, but really, it's just sort of a fun little "project" I came up with after getting engrossed in some super fun blogs that are on this very subject.  homemade lunches.  "bento" style lunches to be exact.  let me tell ya, there are some super creative folks out there giving their children masterpieces every day in their lunch boxes.  so far I haven't really made the effort to do anything elaborate, it's right at the level that I can both have fun and provide a pretty healthy meal for my kiddos.

so, I decided to make this goal to take a photo of every lunch I make this year.  see, crazy!  but, hey, it's just for fun and I'll have all these cool photos to look back on someday ... not to mention I'll have photographic evidence that, yes, I did make an effort and send home packed lunches!  in case my children's memories are anything like mine and they forget these little things that all us mommies do!

so here, in no particular order, are the August lunches:

first day of school lunch:

celery and carrot sticks; raspberries; raisin/craisin/yogurt raisin mix;

mini oreos; green olive mini cabob (for Annicka); soy nuts; 

crackers; ham; & cheese!  add a 100% juice; fruit roll up;
pudding; a banana

lunch 2:

applesauce; fruit snacks (Jericho); fruit roll up (Annicka);

100% juice; cake fish crackers; clementine slices; yogurt parfait;

pepperoni & cheese mini kabobs (with green olive for Annicka);

pumpkin seeds; sunflower kernels; pretzel sticks; breaded chicken bites

lunch 3:

nectarine slices; celery & carrot bites; goldfish crackers;

pepperoni & cheese roll ups; strawberry cream cheese cracker

sandwiches; 100% juice; soy nut/craisin/yogurt raisin mix;

applesauce; fruit leather

lunch 4:

100% juice; fruit roll up; applesauce;

clementine slices; cheese nips; ham & cheese penguin 

shaped sandwiches; craisins; pumpkin seeds; mini oreos

lunch 5:

100% fruit juice; buddy fruits; fruit roll up (Annicka); 

fruit snacks (Jericho); cheese nips; nectarine bites; 1/2 fiber

one bar; ham & cream cheese roll ups; soy nuts (Jericho);

pumpkin seeds/soy nuts (Annicka); mini reeses peanut

butter cups; sunflower kernels

utensil time ...

so, there are a few things that I'm supposed to be working more with Zoey on.  one of which is using utensils.  the other is drinking from a cup and a straw - no sippy cups allowed, per the occupational therapist - and to that I say hmff.  I mean, I'll listen and all - but it sort of stinks.  anyway, I've been trying to remember to let Zoey use her little fork - we haven't tried the spoon, I think I'm a little scared of all the mess, but we'll get to it!  and, you know how it goes, I decide to take a pic and I just can't stop, ha ha ha!!!

happy birthday daddy!

as you can see, it was nothing fancy.  my hubby isn't into all that!  but Annicka made him a card and I gave her some games (yes, he has to actually get his own gifts - because I always get it wrong - and then he gives them to me and we take it from there ... I know, lame) to wrap up for him!  so, we had dinner and then the kids swarmed around to watch and help him open his presents and then we had some cake (my mom picked the writing - lol).  we celebrated a little more friday night with TWO cakes and our friends (plus, my parents were here)!  so, hopefully it was just enough to make him feel special and still be along the lines of what he enjoys, simple!  love ya babe ... and now we're the "same" age for a few months!!!

my baby

 just a little bonus post today:

the big girl my baby is amazing!  she stands up constantly now!  she'll have little "stand up sessions" where she just stands up, balances (while looking around with a big grin, waiting for someone to get all excited), and plops down over and over - it's great!

I still can't believe she is standing up completely on her own, now I'm just waiting for her to take that first step!  she cruising like crazy - with furniture, gates, chairs, whatever is around!  so, I know that the day will be here in the not-too-distant future, and then I'll be amazed all over again!

here she is mid-fall, on her way "to plop"!

however, it must be noted, that she sometimes falls

forward now too!  a little scary to watch, but

she really gets a kick out of it!

I love the kneeling pose!

SUPERSTAR!

I love it when she does this too, too

bad I didn't catch a smile - but she's still

cute as ever!

yuck.

so, yah - the photos pretty much speak for themselves.  back in August it seemed as though someone had driven by our house and left behind some sort of ant army to absolutely invade us - it was seriously crazy.  like, one day nothing - the next day four different rooms had ants.  never before has it been anywhere near that bad!

I spent one day searching and cleaning in the garage - only to discover that the ants had found the little (sealed) container of sugar water I had saved from the NICU.  they use it to dip the baby's pacifiers in and I guess I thought I needed to keep it to remember ... darn my sentimentality!

anyhow, days of the battle eventually led to terro.  our new best friend.  and I'm happy to report that we are currently ant free!

jack-o-lantern boy!!!

I had never heard the smile of a toothless child described as jack-o-lantern like, until I met my husband. surely many people notice the resemblance, but it just had never occurred to me. but we sure do have a little jack-o-lantern boy in our house right now!

Jericho has been losing teeth like crazy! in fact, last week was back to school night and I noticed that the teacher has a little "who has lost a tooth" chart with little teeth note papers to keep track each month. Jericho's name is on both August and September. he lost one tooth sitting in our van after school one day the very first week (I was having a conversation and suddenly I hear "Jericho pulled his tooth out" - lol). 

if I'm not mistaken, he's lost four teeth since July! everything changes when those adorable little baby teeth go away, but in the meantime I absolutely adore that toothless grin! 

 being stubborn about letting me see the cute smile!

come on, bub, please???

there it is - I LOVE it!

(August 27, 2011)

and now, if we could only convince him that he really is too old to suck his thumb ... and that if he continues, he's definitely gonna be having braces later!

smile!

just wanted to give everyone an 

extra smile today!

Nana & Grandaddy ...

first of all, I've decided that maybe my logic behind spelling it as Granddaddy was off ... and maybe it really should be spelled as Grandaddy??? but that is so beside the point! anyhow, my parents are here and I'm going to fix up a post and have it all ready - then I'll publish it once they've gone back home.

September 1 ~
my dad had gone up with Liam at nap time and ended up having a nice little nap ... Liam, on the other hand, never did go to sleep and had come down stairs and by nearly 4pm was playing video games. it was then that my dad came down and said "where's the trickster?". I assumed he was talking about Liam and told him he was in the garage, then he said "I was going to do that to him". I guess the plan was to lay with Liam until he fell asleep, but it seems "the charmer" was charmed and instead, Liam laid with grandaddy until he fell asleep! once grandaddy was asleep Liam was free to continue with his playing and such. oh so funny!!!

September 2 ~
so it's our fun friday night with our best buddies (love you R. family - you're the bestest) and the kids started dressing up, they have lots of fun with all our dress up clothes. Liam dressed up as a transformer. Nana asked him if he was her lovely and at first he said, "no, I'm a transformer" ... then she said (with a sad voice) "awww, you're not my lovely any more" and I guess he changed his mind, cause then he said "I'm your lovely transformer". it was just so sweet and cute!

and, that's about as far as I got before everything became a blur of fun!  in fact, we were so busy either running around or just relaxing at home, that I never even pulled out my camera for pics with Nana and/or Grandaddy ... how sad is that!  the below pic is it.  I mean, it.  I know - shame on me.

Zoey's got crazy hair - from her pony tail!

she's adoring Nana and her jewelry!

but, we all had a great time together, and that's what really counts in the end.  we shopped, we visited friends, I had a built in nanny and didn't have to take the littles to the school - boy do I miss that!  so, yah - here I am, finally posting this and my parents left two weeks ago!!!