happy birthday, scotie!

kristen's middle kid, scotie, turns 5 tomorrow guess i should post about her tinkerbell bday party. she's such a sweet little girl.. likes to hang out with adults instead of kids.. always greets me with a hug... and says she wants to be a breastfeeding doctor when she grows up!

we arrived a bit early.. i was hoping to beat most of the guests so that oscar didnt get scared like last time

scotie wore a special tinkerbell costume that her grandma brought down from wisconsin

she got two tinkerbell cakes. kristen's mom made this one.

kristen mentioned that scotie would love a breastfeeding tshirt from noodle soup, but i didn't see any in her size that i liked. i got a little purple (her favorite color) tank top with a cute ruffle on the top and made an iron on for on it. it had the international breastfeeding symbol and said 'future breastfeeding doctor - dr. scotie'

fun with the sprinkler and slip&slide - oscar didn't care for the slip&slide, but loves a good sprinkling

oscar trying to figure out how this sprinkler works...

oscar in all his arm flapping glory.. we weren't sure if he was trying to fly or trying to swim, but he kept putting his arms up like this and flapping his hands up and down.

worn out! he zonked out shortly after getting on the road

whisk-master

oscar tried out his apron while we made blueberry waffles friday night..

he loves to dump stuff in and stir...

and make silly faces...

father's day

well, the reason i started making myself an apron was because i had secretly been working on one for jeremy and i accidentally left a pattern piece sitting on the desk screaming "CHEF'S APRON POCKET". i had to throw him off the scent, so i made one for myself. but i also made one for jeremy and one for oscar as a father's day present..

here they are trying on their aprons - i need to take up jeremy's neck strap

posing with grilling utensils..

i also made a heath bar cake as seen on designmom. they didnt have a small jar of butterscotch topping at the grocery, so i used caramel. i also used extra candy bars.. mmm. jeremy says it's the best cake in the whole world and i might have to agree. we keep trying to come up with excuses to make another. yesterday he said 'hey! it's sunday! we should make one of those cakes...'

this is about how we all looked while eating the cake..

baby shower

last weekend oscar took his first shower. he was very hesitant to join me (it took a few showers worth of asking), but once he got in i practically had to drag him out kicking and screaming. i think water is one of his favorite things... i'm hoping to go swimming soon. i wish there was a public pool.. i'd love swimming without seaweed and alligators for once.

this is the alligator we swam with last 4th of july...

apron making

tonight i finished up an apron i'd been working on.. it turned out pretty good, but right as i was finishing it i remembered i wanted to make straps that criss cross in the back instead of having the loop around the neck.

it can be reversible.. the backside is a patchwork of whatever i could find in my stash. i saw they still had lots of that fabric on the sale table at walmart, so i might get more and try again. there is a la leche league picnic on august 1st and they're looking for things to sell in a silent auction... i was thinking about just donating this. i'm not sure how much they could get for it.. maybe $15?

giggles and storytime

jeremy was not needed at work today, so he came back home to hang out with us. we went to the bank and opened a savings account for oscar. i think he thought there was going to be a giant piggy bank somewhere that he was going to get to put his money in.. good thing he was distracted with suckers... then we came home and jeremy and oscar read a couple books in bed:

breastfeeding classes

i finally remembered to take my camera to one of our breastfeeding classes...

here is kristen (wayne county's lactation specialist) with our snacks. i made a batch of boobie cupcakes. i think we need to start serving healthier snacks at our classes.. i think maybe i'll make muffins next time... any suggestions for healthy goodies?

and here are the tables set up and kristen with aiden. we found aiden at walmart in a mangled box with the bottle ripped out of the packaging. since we didn't want the bottle anyway, kristen asked if we could get a discount on him and i bought him for $8. i made him a new outfit. now that i'm thinking about it, it'd be nice to have a baby doll for each person to use so we could do the positions together...

i like this table setup.. we can fit 9 people (plus us) at the tables and it's informal and good for group discussion. for our game at this class we had a box with all sorts of different things in it. we passed the box around and each person would pull something out and tell how they thought it related to breastfeeding. (such as: play money = saves money, syringe = breastmilk provides baby's 1st immunization against disease, garbage bag = breastfeeding leaves a cleaner environment.) it was lots of fun and they came up with some really good answers that i hadn't even thought of.

since world breastfeeding week is in august and our next class is in august, i'm trying to come up with some extra fun ideas for that class. we usually give a tshirt as a prize for our game, so i ordered this one.

daily activities

we like our kids to be washing the dishes before they're out of pull-ups...

not really, but oscar LOVES to help with the dishes.. you can barely drag him away from the sink if someone is washing dishes.

he played in the dish water for a long time.. i wish i had taken a picture of him after he finished. his shirt was so wet i had to wring it out in the sink.

building a tower after getting into dry clothes. i think we need to send one of these pictures to aunt margy..

silly oscar

i was working at the computer on some things for our next breastfeeding class and i heard oscar behind me, "where's that website?" this is what he was doing.. i guess the broken generic magna-doodle also works as a laptop?

and here he is after jeremy said, "say website!"

other silliness: i was looking at cameras at best buy today, and he was scolding me to "put that down!" and i told him not to talk to his mother like that.. so he tapped me gently on the arm and said, "sweetie, put that down"

blueberry time

this evening we drove down to pawpaw huey's (oscar huey jones jr.) house to check on blueberries. there weren't a lot ready, but we managed to get about 10cups and still left a lot on the bushes. we had lots of fun and now i get blueberry pie for my birthday!! (which is a good thing because i already bought some ice cream for on top of it). i feel a bit guilty at my luck because i know robyn is the real blueberry pie fan in the family.

here are the yummy blueberries

and the not so yummy stink bugs. these bugs are the reason jeremy wont eat cucumbers.. he says that's what they smell like

oscar was very good at picking blueberries when he found them in reach

of course he ate every single one he picked... (and quite a few that we picked, too)

he also picked me a flower. he loves to pick flowers for his mama.. i'm so lucky!

here they are trying to get some high-up ones. we thought about taking the step stool if we pick more next weekend. i'd like to get a nice supply in the freezer for muffins and pancakes and such.

something for skylar

my favorite client had her baby 10 weeks early and i wanted to do something to help out, so i made him a little preemie kimono using this pattern from care wear. it has velcro on the sleeves and shoulders to make it easier to put on with tubes and IVs and such in the way. there's an owl for her and an owl for her husband so that they can watch skylar even when they have to be away from him.

she also likes to write things down a lot, so i got a little notebook and added some cuteness to it.

and a little envelope to put little things in. i also put in the patriotic booties i made awhile ago and some stickers and such from noodle soup.

quesadillas!

last night i tried out this recipe for black bean and corn quesadillas and we thought it was wonderful! i made a few little changes and used some hints from reviews other people gave. jeremy and i both thought this would be a great one for robyn and mike. he suggested serving some kind of meat that mike could shove in if he wanted...

i set out the rest of the salsa, some sour cream, onion and avocado for topping. the boys ate theirs with the goodies shoved inside, but i piled mine on top. i'm sure there's lots of other yummy stuff you could put on top... i was trying to think of a side dish to serve with this, but it's really got just about everything IN it (or on it).

oscar thought it was delicious... but was too tired to make it through dinner. he did wake up and finish off that bean and piece of avocado later...

Black Bean and Corn Quesadillas

• 2 teaspoons olive oil (i didn't use all of this.. probably will just spray w/ pam next time)
• 3 tablespoons finely chopped onion (i probably used about three times as much)
• 1 (15.5 ounce) can black beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 (10 ounce) can whole kernel corn, drained (i used a 15.5oz can of corn)
• 1 tablespoon brown sugar
• 1/4 cup salsa (i used 1/2 cup - since i had added all that extra corn and onion)
• 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes (i just used a pinch.. i didnt want it too hot for oscar)
• 2 tablespoons butter, divided (sprayed with pam instead)
• 8 (8 inch) flour tortillas (i want to try whole wheat ones next.. i was worried about them cracking though)
• 1 1/2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese, divided (used cheddar b/c i had it on hand, also, i didnt use that much - just shredded a bit on there to help glue it together)

DIRECTIONS
Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Stir in onion, and cook until softened, about 2 minutes. Stir in beans and corn, then add sugar, salsa, and pepper flakes; mix well. Cook until heated through, about 3 minutes.

Melt 2 teaspoons of the butter (or spray w/ pam) in a large skillet over medium heat. Place a tortilla in the skillet, sprinkle evenly with cheese, then top with some of the bean mixture. Place another tortilla on top (or fold over), cook until golden, then flip and cook on the other side. Repeat with remaining tortillas and filling.

(i followed other suggestions that said to fold it in half rather than stack another tortilla. as much as the corn and beans wanted to escape out of one side, i'm sure it would have been a huge mess to try to flip it otherwise. but maybe my runaway beans were because i used a lot less cheese? i dont know.. but it was yummy.. is it still a quesadilla if it's folded in half?)