3 Cheers for 3 months!!!

on january 25 my little jack turned 3 months old!! i can't believe he is 3 months old. it's crazy how fast time flies! i'm trying to enjoy every stage of his growth. i love the baby phases, i love holding him and watching learn and discover things!! every month on the 25th i have taken his picture so that i can keep up with how much he is growing. it's been so neat and i look forward to that day every month!

my jack,

i can't believe that it has been 3 months since you came into our lives. it has definitely been the most fun, crazy, exhausting, demanding, rewarding and sweetest time of my life. i can't even remember life before you. being your mom is the best job ever! you are so sweet and very cuddly. you love to talk, coo, stick out your tongue, giggle, kick and flail those arms. in the past three months, you have had your first halloween, thanksgiving and christmas! you have been to lolli and poppa's, mamie and granddad's, target and church! we've had to protect you a little bit from the outside world because of the RSV virus, you are a preemie baby and are vulnerable to so much. but our friends have been wonderful and they have all come by to love on you and visit with mommy and daddy! you love to play on your activity mat and kick those little legs. cousin nichole gave us a baby swing and you absolutely LOVE it! you take all your naps in it during the day! the bumbo has been so much fun, we sit you on the kitchen counter and you watch mom cook and clean the kitchen! you are such a good night time sleeper too. you usually sleep from around 11pm-6am, im' so proud of you! you have already showed us so much of your personality and we love you more everyday! you are the greatest blessing of our lives. we can't wait to experience life with you. we love you sweet boy! happy 3 months!!!

Chicken n Dumplins

so. i found this GREAT recipe. from allrecipes.com. it's a home made chicken n dumplins recipe that you make in the crock pot. it is amazing!!! i altered it a little bit. it needed a few things, but it is great, and it's really easy. it cooks all day and it makes plenty! ben and i LOVE it!!! i love finding new recipes and trying them out. so i thought i would share the love! enjoy.

3-4 FROZEN boneless skinless chicken breast ( this makes more than enough for 2 people)
2 cans cream of chicken soup
1 14 oz can chicken broth
1 1/2 cans water. ( i just use the chicken broth can after i empty it!!)
2-3 tbsp butter/margarine
chopped onion. ( i just use the chopped onion pieces you can buy in the spice aisle, ben doesn't like onion, so i try not to overdue it) the original recipe calls for 1/2 an onion.
1-2 8oz cans biscuits (depending on how many dumplins you like)
** seasonings. i just use garlic powder, season all, black pepper, salt, oregano. i just sprinkle to taste.

* place frozen chicken breast in crock pot
* pour soup, broth, water, butter, onion on top of chicken
*sprinkle seasonings on top and stir. you can use any combination of seasonings you want. i would recommend the season all.
*cook on LOW 8-9 hours

** you add the biscuits the last 2.5 to 3 hours. make sure you push them down in the soup mixture so they absorb the juices.
** i use 2 cans of biscuits b/c i like extra dumplins. otherwise it seems like too much chicken. **take the biscuits out of the can and pull apart into small pieces before placing them in the crockpot. it will seem like a lot of biscuits to put into the crock pot, but they shrink down.

** you could use thawed chicken but i've found that the chicken is a lot more tender if it starts out frozen. it will just sort of fall apart!! plus, you don't have to wait for it to thaw!!

*** let me know if you try it and like it! i would love to hear about some of your favorite recipes!

Guilty Pleasures

don't we all have them? i definitely do. since i've had a baby and i'm home a lot more (which i'm not complaining about!!!) i have developed even more guilty pleasures. one of them is tv. it's weird how you can just get sucked into a television show.  i mean you really feel like you know these people and you start to care about what's going on in their lives!! you feel for them, defend them and hope for them. it really is kinda sad. i mean, i know there are better things to do with your time. but it's like an addiction! ben and i have always had our favorite shows. but lately it seems like we keep adding to the list! we just love to have our family time at home. we sit on the couch, cuddling jack, eating dinner and watching our favorite characters on tv. now for all of you who are thinking we are lazy or couch potatoes or may think down on us b/c we do get so addicted i say to you " cast the first stone". j/k! i know tv probably isn't the best thing we could be doing with our time, and if it starts to interfere with our relationship with Christ, then we have a problem. but we have so much fun together indulging our guilty pleasure! besides, it's super cold outside, not like we can do anything out there! once spring and summer comes, we will be a lot busier and we won't have time for tv! but that's what dvr is for!!! 

so here are a few of our faves:

 

i mean, seriously. this show is amazing! we got into way after it started! we had to start by watching the seasons in order to catch up! the season premiere is tonight, and we are SO excited!!! 

another one: 

we just got into this one. like 2 weeks ago. but we love it. it's hilarious. and we actually really like the guy, even though he's mean! i definitely recommend it!

can't forget:

we all know jack bauer is incredible. i mean, he's like the man. we TiVo him every week! and no, we didn't name Jack after him!!! but not a bad idea. just kidding.

i absolutely LOVE this one. it's more my show than ben's.

i've been watching this one forever. it's so good. by far the best law and order series!

everyone loves this:

the funniest show on tv right now. we would all love to work at dunder mifflin!!

and my ALL time fave. ben really loves it too.

i have probably seen every episode 10 times and it NEVER gets old!!! it's hilarious. the best comedy that's ever been on tv. 

so there we have it. a few of our favorite shows. we also really like The Mentalist and American Idol. we don't watch all of these every day. but we try to keep up with them and watch the current seasons. they are just too good. FRIENDS isn't on tv anymore, but we own the seasons! so, we can indulge whenever we want! i really hope people don't think we are terrible b/c we enjoy tv. we do have lives, friends and family. and tv never comes before them. we just enjoy vesting a few hours each week into fake people's lives! what are your favorite shows?

Jack's First Christmas

october thru december is my favorite time of year. i love everything about it. i love the smells, colors, sounds, food, decor, music, gatherings and the weather. i look forward to it every year. i count down. i get excited and even start some planning over the summer. i get out on black friday with the masses, and christmas shop. ask anyone who knows me, i'm a little crazy for the holiday season!!! so when i found out on march 20, 2008 that i was pregnant, i did the math and knew that i would be due in november. i couldn't have been more excited! i was thrilled about having a sweet baby in the middle of my favorite time of year. nothing goes better with all the joy of the season than a newborn baby at thanksgiving! we had so much to be thankful for and excited about!

we were expecting Jack the day after thanksgiving. turns out, he came 6 days before halloween. (i'll post his birth story later). we got to experience halloween, thanksgiving, and best of all Christmas with our little boy. jack was born a preemie so we couldn't go and do as much as we wanted or planned but it was still perfect. i have never enjoyed the holiday season so much. everything was sweeter and more magical because of Jack!  we spent all of our time with both sides of the family. 

we have yearly christmas traditions.  we spend the whole week visiting our parents and siblings. christmas eve day, if we don't see my parents then we go to ben's parents. ben's mom cooks a huge christmas eve feast. which is unbelievably good. seriously, we get excited about it months ahead of time! then after dinner, we all pile in the car and deliver cookies to close friends of the williams' family. then we spend the night at their house. christmas morning we get up, eat breakfast and go through our stockings. then we play a game, the winner gets $100!!! this year the game was about christmas songs. we had to come up with the lyrics to a familiar christmas carol. tripp and i pulled it off, clinching the prize money!! thank you, silver bells!!  next we open presents. Jack got some toys, stuffed animals, a blanket and some clothes. my favorite gift was a chi ( an amazing hair straightener!!) it was so much fun to have Jack sitting with us as we shared another Christmas morning with them. i think we all enjoyed loving on him more than any money or presents we received! he looked so cute in his christmas pajamas and santa hat! after all the fun we packed up and headed home for a little rest.

after some much needed downtime, we packed up the car with presents, the diaper bag and our little elf and headed off to my parents. this year with them was especially fun because my family was hosting an australian family, who came to America on a 6 week tour of the country. they chose to stay with my parents the week of Christmas, which made everything a little hectic, but a lot of fun. it was so neat to hear their accents and learn about their culture. they are such a sweet christian family. we loved getting to know them. we opened presents and then had dinner. my dad always deep fries a turkey. i am not exaggerating when i say it's the best turkey EVER. he is a master at frying turkey. he fries one for us every year at thanksgiving and we get so excited! dinner that my mom made was so good. this christmas was also very special because both lindsay and katie were engaged! so much fun! we can't wait for next year when they are married and we will have 2 new family members. everyone loved oohing and aahhing over jack. and he was the source of competition between mom, lindsay and katie. that little boy is very loved! Jack did so good handling all the traveling and passing around he endured!

it was so very special to have Jack with us this year. i loved that he was so little. we were able to hold him and love on him all day. he is such a snuggle bug, and everyone enjoyed cuddling with him. i'm so excited about the coming year with Jack, especially the holiday season!! i can't wait to watch him walk, talk and get excited about presents (or probably the wrapping paper and boxes!)

only 9 months until it starts all over! let the countdown begin.....

   

  

The One with the First Post

so i finally decided to create a blog.

i'm actually really excited about it. i've been telling myself that i would sit down and do it for at least a year. i kept saying i would do it when i was pregnant with Jack so that i could log so many pregnancy memories and experiences. but of course, i put it off. there was always a reason not too! but now that Jack is here, i'm determined to keep up with this. i want a digital way to look back over all his little moments in life. i LOVE that eventually i can create a book that comes straight from this blog! (i've been working on a digital wedding book for forever, i'm not very good at this!!!)

so, here it goes! my first post. i was hoping i would have something exciting to write about, but i don't. today's events have been filled with holding a fussy baby and a long trip to Walmart for groceries. i am excited about tonight. we are staying at home, out of the cold, and spending time as a family. i love these nights, they are my favorite way to wind down. we usually just sit around together on the couch watching tv and loving on jack. then tonight, we'll crawl in bed, feed Jack, and snuggle with him while we watch House. then i'll lay Jack down, and hopefully he'll sleep through the night!!!

the most newly exciting thing about my life is being Jack's mommy. i LOVE it. i have always dreamed of being married and having a baby. but i never dreamed it would be this wonderful. he is such a good baby. lately, he's had some bad gas and some terrible abdominal cramping, but dr bubba gave us some drops and put him on hypo-allergenic formula. he seems to think he may have an allergy to the cow's milk protein. but WOW, that stuff is expensive!! i'm so glad he only gets a bottle twice a day!! the drops and new formula have been so good for him. he's such a happy little boy. he loves to swing, and lay on his activity mat! he's "talking" and smiling so much now! and he is constantly kicking those legs and flailing those arms around! he always has been a busy baby, even in the womb. i find myself just staring at him during the day and thinking about how blessed i am to have him. he is such a sweet little gift to us.  

i guess i could write about christmas and new year's but i'll do that later. i've got to get started on dinner. so i'll just leave you with some fun pictures of my sweet boy.