Growing Up

Today was awful. Kayla screamed and cried almost all afternoon and evening, and we could NOT figure out how to make her happy. We also had no clue what was wrong. She acted as if something hurt her, but what it was we couldn't figure out. Our best guess was that her throat was hurting, so she cried about it, but in crying and screaming it hurt worse, so that just made her mad and she continued to cry...a vicious circle. In an attempt to keep her at least somewhat happy, we gave her a bottle. I'd been told by both Jason and our babysitter that she could feed herself, but I'd never actually seen it. But it's true! Here's proof!

Tea, Anyone?

This morning I had a couple of ladies over for a Nativity planning session. We'd been trying to schedule something for several weeks and finally decided that Easter morning was about our only chance. So, since I was making them come over on a Sunday morning when they could be doing other things at their own homes, I decided to put together a nice little brunch for them. It ended up being a mini-tea and was a lot of fun. We had applesauce puffs (pictured above), bagels with cream cheese, Blueberry Slump (blueberries and sugar cooked with sweet dumplings) and homemade applesauce, along with orange juice and a variety of teas. I even set the table nice and pretty.

This afternoon we went over to Jake and MB's house for Easter dinner with them, MB's mom, sister and brother-in-law, and MB's four nephews and niece. Kayla had the perfect Easter attire.

MB had even set up an Easter egg hunt for the kids, and included Kayla and Chloe, as well. Their "hunting" consisted of MB placing a bunch of large Easter eggs on the grass and us putting Kayla and Chloe in the middle of them. Kayla grabbed several, but Chloe just wanted to socialize.

Finger Food

Kayla has started the process of feeding herself. Last week we determined she could eat Cheerios, so we've been letting her enjoy that every evening. It's fun to watch her; she has pretty good pincer grasp technique, but often the Cheerios get pushed to the inner part of the space between her index finger and thumb and then get all slobbery and soggy and squished into the palm of her hand. Watching her try to extract the Os and put them in her mouth in that fashion is pretty entertaining. She really enjoys feeding herself. And she actually gets almost all of them in her mouth; I've never found more than one Cheerio on the floor and one in her high chair.

Watercress Soup

Tonight we made watercress soup. It was something we hadn't tried before but boy was it delicious! It was easy soup to make; you pretty much just cook some potato and onion for a bit, then add broth and watercress, cook that for a while, blend it up, add a few more watercress leaves for texture and then serve it with a dollop of sour cream (or not, Dad!) in each bowl. Absolutely delicious! We enjoyed it with whole wheat sourdough bread. This is Jason stripping the leaves off the stems of the watercress.

Tofu & Croquet

If you look closely at this picture, you might see Noel's head. Between the two trees there, he's in the grass, playing croquet by himself. Don't worry, Jason, Aric, Jared and Adam eventually joined him for the "Gentleman's Game" as Jared called it. We were at Jared and Damie's house for a Spring Break BBQ with Jared's homemade tofu burgers. It was relaxing; we sat on blankets and talked and enjoyed our food...Kayla even liked the burgers (I broke off a few small pieces of the tofu and let her eat them).

Happy Birthday, Jason!

That pizza there is ours. It's the Margharita Pizza from the Olive Market restaurant (formerly Merchants Deli) in Walla Walla. We intended to go to Sweet Basil Pizzeria for Jason's birthday, but they are, apparently, randomly closed on Mondays. So we opted for the Olive instead. We hadn't been there yet since the switch-over from Merchants, so we chanced it. It's quite an improvement, surprisingly. Merchants was a nice atmosphere, but it was a bit dark and needed some updating. While the new owner kept a lot of the enjoyable atmosphere, he classed it up a bit and brightened the interior with new paint and better lighting. We sat upstairs where you can look down into the kitchen as they prepare food, and this chef was making a fruit, cheese and bread platter. It looked beautiful when he was done, with the apples all fanned out and the cheese placed "just so." We enjoyed watching them in the kitchen while we ate. (The food was delicious, by the way.)

Peruvian Table?

Today after church Kayla slept for a couple of hours, so I got the chance to make the Sabbath table look beautiful. Jason's mom chose the tablecloth and found matching napkins; I thought it looked like something from Peru (having never been there, though, I can't speak with much authority).

Chillin'

This afternoon Jason and I were invited over to our friends' house. Damie is an excellent cook, so we NEVER pass up an opportunity to enjoy her food. And we were not disappointed. Delicious pasta with homemade tomato sauce and a salad with what was most likely a homemade vinaigrette dressing was the fare. While we ate, we had fun watching the little girls hang out on the floor. Here's Damie and Jared's daughter, Ryann, relaxing in the swing.

Closet Ice Cream-holic

At the grocery store today I found these adorable baby-sized tubs of ice cream. I just had to take a picture of Kayla with one. Anyone want to try their hand at writing a caption for this shot?

A Day in the Life

Today I will take you on a short journey. Just a little trip through our lives on a very A-typical Sunday. (Usually we laze around until about noon, when we finally get showers and dressed before doing something about food, maybe cleaning something and then hanging out with the Nickoloffs.)

This was breakfast. I made blueberry muffins (for the first time ever) from scratch, we opened a jar of pears we canned in 2008 and I decided to set the table nice and fancy. Not sure why, I just thought it would be fun. (It was!) The muffins were delicious. Jason has the best recipe ever.


While we ate, Kayla played on the floor. We spread a large blanket out, gave her a few toys, and let her have at. She enjoyed every minute of it, including using her moose, Lumpy, as a pillow as she lounged around playing with her pacifier. And yes, she's still in her PJs. No need to rush these things on a Sunday, you know.


When Kayla went down for her morning nap, we ventured outside. We have a real estate agent coming to take pictures of the house for the listing (yes, we're selling - interested?) in a couple of days and we need the house to look GREAT. So we were going to conquer the backyard. Fortunately, God blessed us with wonderful weather, so although it was cold, it wasn't windy and the sun was out, so it made being outside working enjoyable. This is what our back patio looked like before we got to work.


...and this is what it looked like when we were done! It was very wet under those leaves...it had started to decompose and there were worms enjoying every inch of it. Blech. We used the dirt and leaves and mud to fill in some holes Raina had dug in our yard. (Bad dog!)


Next step: The shop. Here's the storage half of the shop. We hadn't done much but dump boxes in here for a while.


Here it is after we cleaned and organized it! Yay!


The other side of the shop BEFORE...


...and AFTER, though you may not see a whole lot of difference, it really does look better and more organized and spacious!

Whoo for a productive day! I feel so great after getting all of this done today...now to finish the little things around the inside of the house so the agent can hopefully get our house on the market by next weekend.

Useful Gifts

So since we didn't make it to the grocery store last night, we went this afternoon instead. As a result, Little Miss was wide awake and raring to go, so we decided to take her out of the car seat and let her sit in the cart like a big girl. Now that she can sit on her own, this worked out just fine. She seemed to enjoy it much more than simply staring at the ceiling of the grocery store and getting bright lights in her eyes. And it gave us a chance to use the awesome shopping cart cover my mother-in-law made me for Christmas. I love it! So did Kayla, apparently!

Not Yet Car-Trained

Tonight Jason and I had planned to go grocery shopping. So instead of driving all the way home, eating, and coming back into town to get groceries, we opted for eating out, calling it our Valentine's Day dinner. It turned out to be quite the fiasco, and Jason was forced to drive home sitting on a pile of newspapers. (You'll want to click the link for the full story, trust me.) It made me laugh, so I took a picture. I've never had a date quite like this one.

Pea Face

In the past, I remember myself wondering how on earth babies get so messy while eating. I mean, there's a tiny amount of food on that tiny little spoon, and you just slip it in their mouths and voila! They're eating! Then I tried it. Babies have hands. And they like to use them. And this new big weird plastic thing hooked around their necks and draped across them is so incredibly fascinating....we must examine it to see what it tastes like! Plus, they don't tend to hold their heads still enough to necessarily get the spoon in their mouths the first time. So between drips on the bib, the bib coming up to the face for examination, and their squirmy nature as babies, I've finally figured out first-hand how babies get so messy while eating. My daughter is proof positive of that experience. This is how she looked after dinner tonight. And even after cleaning her up I found some on her ear.

It's....Green!

Today Kayla had her first taste of veggies. We started her on rice cereal at the beginning of the month, and now it's time to move on to vegetables. The first one we decided to try was peas. She made a couple of funny faces (as can be expected) but she came back for more and ate almost all of the bowl we'd prepared. I'm excited about trying new veggies with her every week now. Not sure what we'll do next; maybe squash?

Blue or Yellow?

We tried a new recipe tonight: Broccoli and Potato Soup. It was a creamy soup that used blue cheese instead of just cream or sour cream. TASTY!!! We'd never cooked with a full brick of blue cheese before, though; it was wrapped in paper and then in a layer of yellow wax. Weird stuff, but it broke right off. Kind of fun to do, actually. Here's what the soup looked like before we blended it (note that the blue cheese was crumbled into the pot):

Jilted

Today I had a date with a former colleague of mine to catch up, network, chat, have fun, whatever you want to call it. We were scheduled to meet at 9:30 this morning at the patisserie downtown. I got there about 10 minutes late, but she wasn't there yet. I ordered, slowly enjoyed my gelato and spiced cider, and then left. Come to find out her boss' best friend had died of cancer that morning, throwing the whole office for a loop. My friend simply forgot in the hubbub that ensued. I, of course, forgave her, and admittedly still very much enjoyed my pineapple gelato, coupled with grapefruit vanilla gelato and hot spiced cider. Even while admitting that getting a hot drink with ice cream makes me weird.

"Say Cheese!"

Kayla got the idea...Auntie Britt came somewhat close. But at least she's recognizable...I'm not sure many pictures exist of her making a face different than this. Alex and Brittany joined us for a haystack dinner tonight, along with Joe and Toni, who were in town for a baby shower some friends are throwing for them. It's tomorrow evening and I'm excited about seeing what Toni will get. Between dinner and dessert, Britt decided to get on the floor and play with Kayla. Kayla thought it was a grand idea.

Overdone

Tonight Jason and I went on a much-needed date night. We are trying to save money, so Jason packed a "picnic" lunch (sandwiches, crackers, fruit) and we went to Starbucks to eat. We used a gift card from Christmas to order hot chocolate with our oh so fancy dinner and enjoyed our indoor picnic in a Starbucks all to ourselves. (Really!) Afterward we went to Applebee's and ordered fries and a monster cookie sundae, totaling $8.48. We didn't leave a tip because the service was terrible (that was the first time I'd ever done that), so our entire date cost us under $8.50!!! How cool is that?!? Afterward, however, I decided a hot apple cider (and a smaller size) would've been a better choice for a dinner beverage, because the chocolate got to me after we left Applebee's. I need some water just thinking about it. But this picture is of the monster cookie sundae: Giant chocolate-chip cookie, double scoops of vanilla ice cream, Oreo cookie chunks, and hot fudge drizzle. Oh man. Not as delicious as I'd hoped, but perhaps if I'd not had hot chocolate prior to the dessert it would've been better. Still VERY yummy. Date nights are fun, but they tend to be a bit more creative in the winter months. It's difficult to do cheap dates in the winter here, when it's cold outside and it gets dark before I get off work. But tonight was fun! I love spending time with Jason and having a conversation that lasts longer than thirty seconds without interruption.

Daddy's Turn

Jason got to try his hand at feeding Kayla this evening. We're going to alternate feeding her, just like we're alternating putting her to bed. We don't want one of us to be preferred over the other for either task, just for those rare occasions in the future when one of us isn't available. So far it's worked well. And Kayla still loves her rice cereal. (She even wants to help us feed her!)

Pretty in Pink

We had Summer and Michael over for lunch and games this afternoon, and while we were enjoying a card game I got out some chocolates we'd gotten in a gift exchange over Christmas. They were all packaged fancy and looked delicious so I figured offering them to guests was an opportune time to try them out. Part of the packaging was a bright pink bow around the top. Summer took it off and tied it around Raina's neck. She looked so purty! (And the chocolates weren't very good, by the way.)