Back to Blogging about Food

I took a pretty long vacation from blogging about food, but I have found my love for cooking again, and want to share some new recipes with my friends and family. My friend Kattrina and I are posting recipes on our website Macaroni Mamas. Just click on the picture on the side of this blog to get there. We don't have a ton on there yet but hopefully you all will send us recipes that you love and we can post those too!

Jack and Anna's Photo Shoot

Our good friend, Christin, took some amazing pictures of the kids when the leaves were really beautiful. We posted a few already but here are some more of our favorites. You can visit Christin's photography website here.

Picture Dump

Well, its almost the end of January and we still have a Christmas theme up, so that means it's time to do a little updating. Here are some random pictures of the last few weeks.

Anna has barely enough hair now to make pigtails.

Jack's big news is that he's potty training. He has an accident now and then, but for the most part has been really good about it. He goes in there, sits down, and picks up a magazine until he's finished. Pretty hilarious.

He also got a haircut.

Anna makes the funniest faces sometimes, here she is reacting to Daddy making a weird face at dinner:

Nothing better than a two baby blanket!

Here are a few new Jackisms as well:
He likes a Veggie Tales song called "God is Bigger than the Boogieman" except he leaves out the word bigger and just sings, "God is the boogieman." We have tried to correct him but he just doesn't hear the difference or something. The real problem is that he sings it loudly at church since he doesn't know the words to the hymns.
His new thing is to say "kind of really" when describing anything. So Anna is "kind of really loud" when she cries and ice cream is "kind of really yummy." It's pretty cute and it makes me smile when he says it.

Anna has become pretty chatty herself. She learned to say cracker yesterday and loves to throw things and say uh oh. It is fun to watch her expressions as she tries to say new things. She gets pretty happy when she gets it right.

They are both a lot of fun right now and definitely keep us on our toes!

New Pictures

Here are some random pictures from the last week. Things have been pretty quiet since all our company went gone home, but Jack is potty training and that has kept us pretty busy!!

Jack took this picture. He is getting pretty good with the digital camera. Most of his pictures are of random things like the table and his toys, but sometimes he surprises us.

Fun Times Kirsten and Grayden!

Jack and Anna got to spend four days with their cousins Kirsten and Gradyen and they had a blast. Kirsten and Jack are two days apart and Anna and Grayden are four months apart, so while they toys were practically flying at our house, the kids all really enjoyed each other. Christian and I got to spend some good time with Lizanne and Stuart too. We ate Chinese food and peacefully rang in the New Year while the four kids slept upstairs. Here are some pictures and a video of the kids:

These two were almost joined at the hip!

Anna has become quite the climber. Sebastian's face on the TV is a pretty good mirror of my reaction to Anna's climbing exploits.

Merry Christmas!

We had a whole lot of fun during the week before Christmas. Em and Dave drove out on Saturday and we tried fit in as much as we could while they were here. We had a major Gingerbread House building competition. Our next door neighbors, Christin and Colby came over and made one too. The jury is still out on the winner but they all turned out really wonderful.

This one is titled "Mountain Haus", a traditional Swiss ski chalet. Notice the balcony out front which allow for enjoyment of the sweeping mountain vistas and yodeling. The licorice skis in the front kind of fell down, but you get the idea.

Next up we have "Christmas Village", a exact and detail oriented construction. The frosting icicles and individually cut roof tiles show an unmatched eye for detail. Precise indeed.

Lastly, we have the "Love Shack", and architectural accomplishment. Notice the cantilevered second story, pirouette pillars and mosaic necco stonework. The designer has obviously had professional training. Impressive.

We went downtown on one afternoon to a children's museum, and the kids had a fantastically good time.

This is Jack's new smile. Can't get him to smile with his eyes fully open it seems!

The rest of the pictures are from Christmas Eve and Christmas day. Jack took this one which actually turned out pretty well. Em and I spent Christmas day cooking and it turned out pretty nice. I am eating yummy leftovers right now!

More Holiday Goings On

I have realized it is an impossible battle to keep our ornaments evenly placed on our tree with two toddlers running around. It looked nice when we put it up, but as you can see from the bottom right corner, it is slowly getting stripped. Oh well! Jack has been making up for it and decorating it with other things like a dirty sock, my dish towel, and an old stocking.

As I have mentioned before, Jack loves to put on crazy outfits. Here are some fun ones inspired by the cold weather outside: