Reading!

So, I told you last week that Jack loves his Look and Learn ABC book.  Well, he's totally branching out lately...I think he's found a few new genres.

One of this favorite things to do lately is to "read".  Jeff lays out a bunch of his books in front of him and Jack chooses on that he wants us to read, picks it up and hands it to whoever is closest!  He is still loving Look and Learn ABC, but also is loving Touch and Feel Puppy.  Lots of verbs involved in these titles...Touch and Feel Puppy has fur and things for you to feel, and it's really very cool to see him know which part of the page to touch.  He loves to turn the page...and sometimes you have to read really fast to keep up with him...and it's pretty amazing to see him sit still for more than 2 seconds and listen to us read!


Since he's totally rejecting his bedtime bottle, I think it's time to start story time before bed.  That will be fun!!!

Construction

For some unknown reason, on Thursday they tore up our street just to repave it.  There was really nothing wrong with the street.  Seriously.  Nothing at all.  And I watched them.  It wasn't like they were tearing up the street to get to a pipe or anything.  They literally tore it up and repaved it.  And I thought to myself...can I recommend a few Fort Worth streets terribly in need of this? 

Anyways, Jack was quite fascinated with all of the commotion...especially during nap time. 

Thank you, city of Fort Worth.

He spent a good part of the day just looking outside at all the big things going on!

Fetuccinii Alfredo

I've actually cooked lately, which is maybe why there are exactly 3 recipes in the recipe section and two of them came this week. 

Sometimes I wonder what we eat...because I don't feel like I ever cook anything.  But this week, I've really cooked!  For Sunday's family lunch, I made fettuccine alfredo, Monday I made spaghetti with beef mushroom sauce, Tuesday Jeff cooked steaks, Wednesday...we had our Bible Study over and Sarah cooked yummy cashew chicken, and last night I made fajitas (with the help of Central Market and their delicious guac and pico...and the tortillas, their tortillas are to die for and I honestly think you could put literally anything inside them and they would be absolutely divine).  I do love to cook, it's just that some weeks get away from me!

 
Today I wanted to share the Fettuccine Alfredo recipe I used for Sunday family lunch this week.  It was super easy and super yummy.  I took dinner to some friends of ours who just had baby #2, so I pretty much doubled it...which made ridiculous amounts of sauce...but really, there can't be too much of this sauce! 

So here's the recipe:

Fettuccine Alfredo
24 ounces dry fettuccine pasta
1 cup butter (Yeah, that's right, a cup of butter...)
3/4 pint heavy cream  (And lots of cream!)
salt and pepper to taste
1 dash garlic salt  (I actually minced up a few cloves of garlic and tossed it in...can't have to much garlic)
3/4 cup grated Romano cheese  (And cheese!)
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese  (Oh, the cheese...)
(I also grated up about a half of a cup of Asiago cheese and added that to the mix)

Directions:
Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add fettuccine and cook for 8 to 10 minutes or until al dente; drain.
In a large saucepan, melt butter into cream over low heat. Add salt, pepper and garlic salt. Stir in cheese over medium heat, constantly stirring until melted; this will thicken the sauce.
Add pasta to sauce. Use enough of the pasta so that all of the sauce is used and the pasta is thoroughly coated. Serve immediately.

I made a few other additions to this delicious sauce.  Before I started the sauce, I seasoned a few chicken breasts with salt and pepper, seared them on the stove, and tossed them in the oven for about 30 minutes.  Before I served the dish, I sliced up the chicken breasts and chopped up about 15 fresh basil leaves to tossed with the sauce and pasta. 

Pretty easy, right?  And it basically has everything fatning good.  Butter, cheese, cream, garlic, basil...what else could you want!  Enjoy!

Unlikely favorite....

Jack's current favorite toy is....


a ladle.  that's right, a ladle. 
I was fixing dinner one night and pulled out a few things for him to play with.
It was love at first play. 
He loves the way it sounds when he bangs it on things.
He puts it in his mouth and crawls around like a dog.
If you don't know where he is, listen for the hollow bang of a ladle on tile floor...
and there you will find him. 

Infection!!

We survived 10 and a half months with out a dreaded ear infection, but this week, the battle was lost.

Over the past week or so, Jack has been a little fussy.  Not too terribly fussy, just a little fussy.  Just fussy enough to attribute the fussiness to teething (grabbing his ears, too...surely it's teething!), growing, or just being in a down right funk.  Something we just knew he'd be over soon.  His naps were shorter than normal, he was waking up earlier...all bugger type things, but nothing we were too concerned over.  He was downright refusing his night time bottle, but we were just thinking he's doing a little self weaning here!  That's my boy, doing things ahead of schedule!

Until Monday night.  Monday night, I planned to go out to dinner with some girls from church.  Good times, right?  Who doesn't love a night out with the girls!  And dinners are great, because you get to feed the kid, bathe the kid, get the kid ready for bed and then head out. 

So, we're going through our evening ritual with the eating and the bathing, and Jack was straight up not happy.  We thought he might be overtired, so we put him to bed early, at like 6:15 or something.  I know, early!  But he was acting like he was tired!!  What's a mom and dad to do!

Well, I walked out the door at 6:30 and I knew it wasn't going to be an easy to bed night.  No way, no how.  Jack was fighting it, hard core.  But not a typical fight, not standing up in his crib, knocking pictures off the wall (yeah, that happened last week), but lying down, trying hard to sleep, and just couldn't!  I mean sobbing.  Break your heard sobbing.  I went in before I left, rubbed his little back, and knew if I wasn't carpooling with someone, I'd be taking off the heals and staying home. 

My ride arrived and I headed out the door, HATING to be leaving, but knowing Jeff could handle it.  And surely he'd be asleep soon!  I texted Jeff at around 8:15 to see how it was going.  He texted back and said he thought he might be asleep this time.  My poor baby!  Jeff had kept going in to check on him all evening, picking him up to soothe him and he would have none of it.  Jack's not a cuddly baby so that's not surprising...but it was a cry that he could tell something was wrong.  He said that he watched Jack fall asleep momentarily, only to be awake a second later crying.  My poor baby!!!!

We made a doctors appointment for Tuesday morning, still kinda figuring that he was just teething...but once we got there and the doctor whipped out his little ear scope thing, I think his exact words were, "Oh, yeah.  We've got a bad one here!"  He even said he couldn't believe Jack was just sitting here and not screaming because it looked that bad. 

Oh, my poor baby.  I hate hate hate that we didn't go sooner!  Apparently Jack has a high pain tolerance...

He sent us home with some amoxicillian  and directions to give him Tylenol as needed. 

Jack has been a much happier baby these past few days, and is even kinda enjoying his first round of the pink bubble gum flavored meds!  Now, the night time bottle?  I don't think that had anything to do with the ear...I think he's done with his night time bottle.  Kinda sad...just kinda. 

Jack LOVES his sippy cup and gets soooooooo excited when he sees me filling it with water or shaking up some formula in it! 
 He's growing up.

Spaghetti with Beef Mushroom Sauce

I wanted to share a recipe with you guys...one of Jeff's favorites!  Yes, it seems suited for more of a cold weather day, but that makes no matter to the man who would eat a pound of ground beef in one sitting or devour a tub of mushrooms sitting on the couch.  Only thing I change is I do drain the can of tomatoes before adding it to the mix, and add in a little extra water if it gets too dry.  I also tend to go a little liberal on the parm and toss in any romano or assiago I've got lying around...can't have too much cheese, right? 

Enjoy!




Sooooooooo funny...had to share.

If you are a mom, going to be a mom soon, or wanting to be a mom some day in your life...you HAVE to read Rants from Mommyland.  Kate and Lydia are absolutely histarical...they're best friends who love their wine, have their own vernacular, raise 6 children between the two of them, and are constantly making me laugh out loud.  Kate refers to her kids as "indoor homeless people"...because they have no jobs and beg her for everything even though they live inside...and they love their T-Box time...their term for the Target box wine.  Hilar!

This weekend they composted a list of "When I'm a Parent I'll Never..." submissions from readers and I couldn't not share them.  I mean, I laughed out loud more than once!  You've got to check it out...

10 Months

So, Jack is 10 months now.  TEN MONTHS!  That's just so hard to believe.  Like, it's time to start planning his birthday party!  Who am I kidding...it's basically planned. 

Jack's discovered all kinds of new things with the freedom crawling brings.  One of his favorite past times is crawling down our "hall to nowhere" as fast as he can, screaming all the way.  The hall is random, has a low ceiling and tile floors, and is pretty long...which makes for a pretty awesome echo-y crawl!  He takes off, crawling a few feet, turns around to make sure you're still following him, and then repeat until he makes it all the way down.  He also LOVES if you jump out one end of the hall and yell  BOO!  I mean, loves it.  He jumps, smiles, and shrieks all at the same time before turning around and crawling with all of his might. 



He also loves to "play" with the curtains.  There is a big picture window in our living room with long curtains and he loves to crawl over to the window, pull up on the window frame, and "get lost" in the curtains.  Which includes lots of shrieking and banging on the window.  That window needs to be cleaned like no other. 

This week Jack has started sharing.  Weather it's a Cheerio at breakfast or a paper he picked up from the coffee table, he wants to share...which is soooooo adorable!  He also loves to put random things in his mouth, but with the introduction of this sharing thing, if his hand is headed towards his mouth and we say no, instead of running over to pry something out of his hand or mouth,  he just hands over the offending object!  Now that's progress. 

And newsflash, Vincent and Jack are getting along!  With sharing, comes playing!  Jack's new favorite game, and dare I say, Vincent's new favorite game, is picking up Vincent's ball and holding it out so Vincent can take it ever so gently out of his hand.  Um, loving this.  I'm loving it (my two boys getting along), Jeff's loving it (keeping Vincent occupied and out of the way), Jack's loving it (Vincent is actually coming towards him and not running away) and Vincent is loving it (some one's actually playing with him)!  Everyone wins!

Jack has discovered his first favorite book!  It's got a great plot, the characters are really developed...
ok, maybe not.  This book is the first toy he takes out of his basket in the morning, and he loves for Jeff and me to read it to him!  He gets so excited when we start reading and counting and he claps and tries to sit on the book.  We also have Look and Learn ABC but that one just goes on and on and on...

I'll end with this picture just because it's so cute!

Oh, appendicitis.

For the past year or so, every few months, Jeff has been having these terrible "gas attacks" that would render him useless for 6-8 hours at a time.  We'd pump him full of Gas-X and any other type of stomach soother and wait it out, Jeff curled up on the couch or in bed, trying to sleep it off. 

One attack lasted a pretty long time...it might have been one of the first ones...and included me driving to Wal Mart at 3am to clean out their supply of everything claiming to cure any type of stomach ache.  Milk of Magnesia (or MOM as we call it around here), Gas-X Ultra, Tums, AlkaSeltzer, Pepto...you name it, it was in the basket in my freakishly late run to WalMart. 

Over the months, Jeff decided that Gas-X worked the best, so that's what we stuck to.  As the episodes continued, I'd frequently ask if we should go to the doctor.  That was met with much resistance, as how embarrassing would it be to go to the doctor for gas!  My thoughts were, maybe there's like a Gas-X ultra-ultra-ultra we could get prescribed or something!  We would always think about what he'd eaten the meals before the attacks and could usually trace it back to some kind of sausage (no, we don't have sausage a lot, I don't know where that decision actually came from) so he did his best to avoid sausage.  Good enough.

Now, let me take you back to last Monday, a week from today. 

Monday afternoon, Jeff's stomach started to hurt.  I remember him sitting on the couch, saying that he thinks his stomach is starting to hurt...like the episode kind of hurt.  I rushed to the bathroom and dug into our stash of elixirs and popped him a pill, thinking this would surely do it, we'd gotten it so early! 

Um, not so much.  Jeff went to bed early Monday night with a stomach ache, thinking he could sleep it off, as he'd done before.  Well, 2:30 am rolls around and Jeff gets up for work.  Or maybe I should say, writhed in pain while getting out of bed for work, and headed to the bathroom to get ready like he always does.

Now, let me introduce Vincent the Wonder Dog.  Vincent pretty much thinks he rules the house.  Does what he wants, when he wants, and doesn't really care if he'll get in trouble about it.  Each morning when Jeff gets up, he closes the bedroom door so his bathroom light doesn't shine in my eye while he's getting ready.  Frequently, Vincent bumps the door open, allowing the searing bathroom light into my sleepy slumber (much like the time I had a sleepover with a friend where she woke up before me and decided to shine a flashlight in my eyes in order to wake me up and I dreamed I was looking directly into the sun) and gets in trouble for it.  Well, Vincent usually gets in trouble, but this time he was like Lassie.  Knew there was a problem, and in his lazy attempt to get to his doggie bed in the bedroom, woke me up so I could check on Jeff...who was now writhing in pain on the bathroom floor, white as a sheet, and clammy. 

Should we go to the doctor?  No, gotta get ready for work.  Ok.  I patted his back over the toilet, just like any good wife would, got him some crackers and water and sent him on his not-so-merry way. 

Jeff came home from work at around 9:30am, still in extreme pain, and headed to the bedroom to take a nap.  He got up around noon, still doubled over in pain, and it was then that I decided we were going to Care Now.  No questions, I'm web-checking you in, calling your mother to watch Jack, and we're going. 

The surprisingly adept doctor at Care Now mashed around on his stomach and told us he suspected Jeff had appendicitis.  But what about the gas?  Well, apparently the two are frequently confused...appendicitis and gas.  Who knew?  Can I get a refund for our 90 year supply of our Gas-X?

Down to the hospital we went.  They put in an IV (which I watched them put in and literally almost passed out...like, I was looking for a place to lay down...and if my only choice hadn't been an ER floor, might have gone ahead and done it) drugged Jeff up, gave him a CT scan, determined it was appendicitis, which meant surgery that night! 

It was a whirlwind of a day that ended up with Jeff in surgery at midnight and our first night spent away from Jack.  I was picturing a much more romantic way to spend our first night away from Jack...not with Jeff hooked up to an IV and me sleeping in a torture device style "recliner" at his bedside.  But thank goodness for grandmas who will drop everything to take care of their beloved grandson and leave the refrigerator full of food, and the laundry done and folded!  We're so blessed.

Jeff's doing great now, laid low for a few days, and is back at work this morning.  Since his appendix hadn't burst and wasn't overly inflamed, they were able to take it out with a laparoscopic surgery, meaning less intrusive, and quicker recovery. He took the bandages off of his scars on Friday and although I almost passed out while watching (why do I watch?  Don't I remember being 2 breaths from passing out when I watched them put his IV in?) they look good, and he's well on his way to a full recovery. 

I'll leave you with Jeff's facebook post right before he went into surgery:
What a beautiful night to have my appendix removed. See ya appendix, I hardly knew ya..except when you crippled me with pain.

I need to clean...

First, look how cute he is!!! 
And so sweet to hold that washcloth so strategically. 


Second, look how dirty his knees are. 
I'm going to mop the floors.

Or maybe I can attach mop pads to his little knees this afternoon?

Walking

This past Saturday, we took a family trip to Walmart..we don't take family trips to Walmart.  And ya'll know I brave Walmart only at 8am on a weekday morning.  So, this was a Saturday, and an afternoon.  We were crazy.  I warned Jeff before we even went in (he is prone to Walmart breakdowns when the larger than life people are taking up the whole isle or when the throngs of children are running in circles all around him...understandable, I know) that he needed to put on some patience and know it's going to be terrible, basically, suck it up and let's go. 

We grabbed a few grocery items for our 4th of July get together the next day, and headed over to the toys section.  I was thinking that Jack's next toy should be a walker.  He's pulling up, cruising around, so it seemed like that would be natural.  We found our walker (decided on the $14 rather than the $44 one...do we really need one more toy that sings and blinks?) and headed for the checkout line.  Where we walked right up to the checker.  And were out in a matter of seconds.  What?  Did I blink and miss it?  Apparently.  We decided it was probably one of the most pleasant Walmart trips of all times and decided we'd never go to Walmart again, and just have positive thoughts about that one time we spent less than 9 hours in a Walmart checkout line.

Anyways, Jack is loving it.  Jeff calls it his shuttle because he just grabs on walks to the couch, where he grabs on to the couch, cruises on down to the table, cruises around the table, then back to the walker where he walks across the room to the other couch and latches it on.  Pretty cute! 

And yesterday we went walking in the backyard, which he really loved!

Of course, first we headed to the table...


And then a little stroll down the sidewalk...


p.s.  PLEASE excuse the ridiculous outfit.  The onesie is one of the cutest onesies ever, it has sheep on it and on the back it says "PEE EWE" on the bottom.  Adorable!  But, not adorable with tennis shoes.  A onesie with tennis shoes goes in the category of a girl wearing a bathing suit with running shoes.  It should never be done.  Ever.  And if I would have known he'd be so adorable walking around outside (I should have guessed) I totally would have changed him, spruced him up...but here he is, rockin' the onesie and tennis shoes and still looking pretty freaking adorable!

Backyard Fun!

We've been spending some time in the backyard lately.  Jack is lovin' his little table!  Maybe one day his feet will touch the ground...