Thanksgiving

Here are some pictures from Thanksgiving. I know we are late getting them up but this has been a month full of sick kids and at our house that means they are very needy kids! Plus two kids getting teeth at the same time is no walk in the park either! But three teeth and all well later I am finally getting some things done that have been neglected!

Thanksgiving was a time with family both His and some of Hers too! :) Our Big Guy sure enjoys watching Cousin play games on his computer but the big day finally got the best of him!

Li'l Britches enjoying some Auntie time.

Sadly enought this is the only picture we got of the table! This was after supper even. :(

Somtime around Thanksgiving day we had this delicious pizza. It is ham and asparagus alfredo pizza. Yum!

Stay tuned for Li'l Britches 7 Month update.

A Gift for Grandparents!

We made a bean bag toss out of this gift box. Little Britches had fun playing with it too.

We have a video of the older kids throwing their bean bags but I have not had much luck in posting videos on the blog. If anyone has some advice on the matter it would be greatly appreciated!

kitchen 'makeover'

We 'put in' new counter tops a couple weeks ago to give our kitchen a face lift!

What these counter tops actually are is paint! Now if we were in a house of our own we would put in real counter tops but since this is a temporarily permanent house it has been fun to play around with different colors and themes throughout the house. So far I really like my black counter tops. And our new stove is black also! Would have liked stainless but will keep that for another day another house. I have been toying with the idea of what to do with the back splash on these counters. Should they be black also? Or would you go for another color altogether? The walls in these pictures are kind of washed out. In real life they are a bit darker and more of a tan color. The sunflowers on the cupboards have a dark green in them but have wondered if that would be to dark to go behind a black counter. There is not much for light in the kitchen. Would love to know what our readers think!

Tea at Ten

The other day the kids and mommy had 'tea at ten'. Ten is our normal snack time.
We pulled out a fun table cloth, fine 'china' and fun little cupcakes.
It is fun to do things 'out of the ordinary' once in a while!

I love the expression on their faces when they were pouring their cream in their tea!

6 Months!

Little Man is now 6 Months old!

He is currantly 20lbs and about 26"long Sure is hard to measure a squirmy baby!
He is into EVERYTHING which is normal! His favorite place to go is either Sisters room or the bathroom (yes he goes to these places by HIMSELF!!!) Not actually crawling yet but can move quite fast dispite that fact! Love his little dimple in the middle of his chin!

His first word! You remember how much this kid likes food? Well it is not uncommon for him to get his first bite at mealtime and say Num-num!!! No it is not just a coincidence because it happens everytime he is really hungry!!!!!!

Just a fun picture! We have one like this of Big Guy that I will post also so you can see how much they are alike and how they are different.

Miscellaneous Fun

Little Man loves to take baths in the sink with his little rubber ducky. He likes to put the ducks head in his mouth, let go and wave his arms all around. Makes quite a silly sight!

And yes for any who are wondering Big Brother does love his little brother and Little Brother pretty near worships his older brother! Big Guy can get our Little Man to smile all the time! He does not even have to be silly...just walk into the room and little brother grins!

We have had snow a couple of times and one time even had enough for Daddy to build this snow man. He has already melted however so will be building another one when we get another decent snow.

Here Big Guy has rigged up his tractor and dumptruck and is giving Little man a ride. Little man was quite happy to be pulled around most of the morning!

Sweet Rolls

Sweet Rolls Texas Roadhouse style!

We have had a couple requests for this recipe so here goes! Before we get started though just want to point out the importance of NOT skimping on raising times. This recipe usually does take most of the day and they are well worth the wait!

1 pkg. yeast
1/2 c. warm water
2 c. warm milk
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. honey
2 quarts flour
2 TBS melted butter
2 whole eggs
2 tsp salt

Soften yeast in warm water with one tsp sugar. Add milk, sugar, honey and enough flour to make medium batter. Beat thoroughly. Let stand until light and foamy (minimum of one hour sometimes will take two). Add melted butter, eggs and salt. Beat well. Add enough flour to make soft dough. Sprinkle small amount of flour on the counter. Let dough rest. Meanwhile clean, dry and grease bowl. Knead dough till smooth. put in bowl turning to grease. Cover and let raise until doubled in size. Punch down, divide in half. Let raise until doubled in size. Shape dough. Place on greased baking sheets. Let raise until doubled. Bake at 375degreese for 10-15 min. Reduce temperature to 350degreese and bake for 10-15 min more. Cool on wrack. Makes 5-6 dozen.

For the Cinnamon Butter

Beat 1 c. butter
1/2 c. powder sugar
1/2 c. honey
1 tsp. Cinnamon

Serve at room temp with hot rolls.

disclaimer: Texas Roadhouse has no idea who I am, I have never worked there and don't know if this is actually the recipe they use or not! This is my best guess at accuracy :)

5 Months

We are a little late updating you on our five month old but guess it is better late than never! It is hard to believe that he is five months and almost six months now! He is sitting up much better than this now and rolls everywhere! A very determined young man who gets frustrated if he does not get what he wants!

He loves to snuggle and falls asleep usually when cuddled up next to someones face.

Big brother is adored by Little man! All BG has to do is walk up and smile at Little man and he gets a grin and often a giggle.

Our Little Man LOVES food. He has yet to reject anything that goes in his mouth even peas! He is the same length as BG was at this age 26 inches long! Well Little lady just said UhOh so better go see what is going on!

A handy little trick...

How many of you like crock pot meals? They are so easy to just turn on and forget about and supper is ready when you are ready to eat...however, we have a problem in our family: our crock pot is way to big! If we fill the bottom of the crock pot with a dish then we eat it for a week. Someday in the not to distant future we forsee this NOT being a problem with two growing boys in the house but for now we needed a quick fix soooo.... This is what we did: on a day with time to use up we made casseroles and put them in foil lined casserole dishes then froze them. They look somewhat like this:

Then at a later date we could pull them out of the freezer and then lift the foil out of the casserole dish and plop it into the crock pot!

This makes it possible for us to have just two meals out of one dish instead of a week of eating the same thing! (note to self: make sure and freeze the casseroles in something SMALLER than your crock pot! :) lesson learned the hard way!)

We put this Fiesta Chicken Casserole in the crock pot one day because we wanted to be able to focus completely on making these delicious rolls! Any of our readers ever been to TexasRoadHouse? Any who have been there know that these scrumptious little bits of paradise can be a meal in and of themselves! Who needs the casserole! They take all day to make but are more than worth the effort!!!!

You pull the rolls out of the oven, break one open, then spread (or pile) on this little treat of cinnamon butter (also a duplicate of the restaurant) and Mmmmm soooo good!!! (so next time you see us if we have all gained weight you will know why!) We went through two batches of these in a week! Every time we ask Big Guy what he wants to eat he says "more rolls please!"

Travels

We (being the kids and mommy) went on a long trip. To see this wonderful couple tie the knot! It was a beautiful wedding with lots of fun details. They had cupcakes of all different flavors and a little card telling which cupcake was which. My favorite was the strawberry lemonade! (not that i tried them all :) )

After the wedding we went to the park and played on this wagon. We spent the days prior to this and after this with aunt K.

We had many fun days with Auntie!

On our way back home we visited Great Grandpa. Did not spend to much time there but was good to see him!

For Grandpa

This post is for Grandpa :) The shirt that Lil britches is wearing is one that Grandpa B. picked out for Big Guy and now Lil Britches fits into it! Sorry the photo is a little blurry...this is one of the best ones we could get as he seems to have to wiggle his whole body when he smiles! His smiles definitely are genuine...they come all the way from his toes!

And some pictures of the building we are putting up...the bottom two pictures are day one of the operation. This top picture is day two! They are now putting the siding on. This will just be a shed to store equipment in.