Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down 2012 #39.5

Up:

• Mike has officially been home a whole year! He returned from Afghanistan on Sept. 27, 2011 and while he has been gone most of the time since returning from deployment, we are sure happy to have him with us.

• While Mike's schedule is always hectic, we did actually get to have dinner with him a couple of nights this past week which is always nice. Wish it could happen more often.
• Kennedy is already 11 months old. The time is seriously passing way to quickly. She has 5 teeth and loves to eat. She is happy all the time unless you she thinks you are depriving her of food. She adores her big brother and misses him terribly on the days he goes to school. We are so blessed to have our sweet baby girl!

My Fashionista!

Adorable!

• Love that Autumn is here! This is my favorite season! It means we can start making heartier food, wear jeans again, and have pumpkin everything! I love the changing of the leaves, which we don't really have here, and the crispness of the air! I've also gotten quite carried away stocking Kennedy's closet with her new fall wardrobe! The funny thing is though Mike acts slightly upset when he looks at the credit card expenditures, he loves that little girl to pieces and how cute she looks in all her outfits! I also found some absolutely adorable jack-o-lantern underwear for Jackson at Gymboree on sale that I couldn't resist!

Can't wait to see Kennedy in this!

and Jackson in these!

• Speaking of heartier food, I made my Nana's famous Acorn Squash recipe this week. Mike is not a big fan of vegetables in general especially squash, but Mom used to make Acorn Squash for us in the fall and it brings back memories. My sister actually created the recipe from my Nana's chicken scratch of a little bit of this and a heap of that. I've posted the recipe in a separate blog entry for anyone interested! I also made biscotti for the first time ever and it turned out very well - much easier than I anticipated!

Down:

• In case you didn't know September has the most birthdays of any other month of the year! This past week(ish) we've missed 4 family member's birthday: my sis-in-law, niece, mom, and bro-in-law. Every year I get more and more distraught when I think of all the life events and happy times we miss out on with our family. I so wish we could move Mike's work to Texas and reunite with everyone.

Jackson with his friends at school getting their guns up! My friend Kara also graduated from ttu and has begun brainwashing her twins too!

Getting in some playtime before bed.

Very rare that Daddy can read bedtime stories.

Kennedy is not at all interested in story time.

Kennedy taking over the neighbor's car! 

The kids playing with our neighbor Abby!

Favorite Thing:

Unfortunately this item is only available in West Texas. Anytime we made anything growing up that called for chili powder, my family would use Morton's Chili Blend. It is a much more intense flavor and makes any recipe better! I stock up when I'm at home and store it in the freezer so it will last longer. If you are ever in the area it is a must have item!

Stuffed Acorn Squash

Stuffed Acorn Squash 

originally Marietta Britten's (Nana) recipe, adapted by Carey Major Lindemann

3 med. acorn squash

1/2 cup margarine

1 can cream of celery soup

36 (or one sleeve) Ritz crackers

1/2 cup finely chopped onion

2 cups grated cheddar cheese

1 tsp. Italian seasoning

dash salt and pepper

1/2 tsp. paprika

Wash squash and cut in half. Scoop out all seeds. Place on cookie sheet. Put 1/2 tsp. margarine in the center of each squash. Bake at 350 degrees for 35-40 minutes or until squash is tender. Meanwhile, saute onion until tender. Remove squash from oven. Scoop squash out of shell and into large mixing bowl without puncturing shells. Add soup cracker crumbs, remaining margarine, onion, and 1 1/2 cups cheese to warm squash, mix well. Add salt, pepper, and Italian seasoning and mix thoroughly. Spoon squash into shells. Smooth tops evenly. Top with remaining cheese and sprinkle with paprika. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Can also be frozen for future use. Just freeze prepared, unbaked squash.

I made the above recipe just as it says but with 2 squash instead and it turned out great!

Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down 2012 #38

Up:

• Jackson's neck has miraculously healed! There is only some discoloration left that I'm sure will go away in time. So thankful that he doesn't have any more pain and we are no longer getting dirty looks from passer-bys!
• I'm super proud of my hubby! On Friday Mike began the instructor upgrade course. It lasts about 2 months and is extremely hard, but when he is finished he'll be an instructor! I think it speaks very highly of him that they think he is good enough at his job that they want him to teach others. The only downside is that the upgrade requires a lot of studying and reading, so we won't be seeing as much of him over the next couple of months. Everything has it's price!
• I've been crazy productive this weekend and cleaned the whole house and cooked a bunch of yummy stuff from our bountiful basket! Literally I don't think I sat down at all on Sunday until dinner that night. Speaking of dinner, Mike smoked a yummy brisket (as usual) and Kennedy literally shoveled it in her mouth. I could not get the bites on her plate quick enough! Glad she is such a great eater!

Down:

• This whole past week, as I mentioned in my last post, there was an 'exercise' going on here on base. During the exercise sirens and fake bombings would go off periodically through out the night as well as the jets doing night flights. Mike is super off schedule due his shift changing to 11:30pm-11:30am and then back to a regular schedule on Friday and this week. My sleep was so interrupted from Mike leaving right when I would get to sleep and all the sirens etc. Let's just say I was more than ready for the whole thing to be over. I'm pretty sure I can speak for everyone else on base too whether you have children or not!
• While I'm super glad I cleaned the house, honestly you wouldn't even know it if you looked around today. I think it is entirely impossible to have a clean house with children! Yet another parenting lesson for this neat freak to absorb!

Girls are so much fun to dress up! I wish she would leave her headbands/bows in all the time!

Game day!

Get your guns up!

Just like a guy to watch the woman to all the work!

Playing with the new addition in the backyard.

Jackson pretends it's a drive thru window!

Trying on Daddy's chemical mask that he had to wear for the exercise at work this week. Too bad I don't have video of Mike wearing it and seriously scaring Kennedy like a horror film!

No more monkeys jumping on the bed!

Reading...still one of his favorite activities.

Jackson's neck almost completely healed!

My mischief makers looking very guilty!

innocent

not so innocent!

Love those beautiful eyes!

Favorite Things:

My Dad and I are both big connoisseurs of kitchen gadgets. Between the two of us I'm sure we could stock a Bed Bath & Beyond! Last year for my birthday he gave me this apple slicer, peeler, corer. It has been great for many reasons. It's perfect to cut up apples for the kiddos that are peeled and also to make delicious apple pies like I made yesterday! This is a picture of this magic gadget in action. It retails for $19.99 and can be used for potatoes too!

Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down 2012 #37.5

I've got to get better about posting on time!
Up:

• Although I'm not working, I do still have too keep up my dietitian certification. This requires me to obtain 75 continuing education units over a 5 year period. My 5 years wasn't up until May of 2013, but I had 83 credits, so I went ahead and submitted. They approved all my hours! Yeah! This is seriously such a load off to not have to worry about getting these hours for a while. My next 5 years for recertification doesn't even begin until June of 2013! 
• Kennedy had her echo yesterday for the hear murmur they found at her check-up. The doctor said she has ASD (Atrial Septal Defect) which basically means the hole in her heart was bigger than normal and didn't close up after birth. She felt like it wasn't anything to worry about since Kennedy is growing so well. We will just monitor it with yearly check-ups! Such a relief to know that my little girl is gonna be just fine :) Small world too, our doctor went to med school at Texas Tech, so I knew we were in good hands!
• I found a fabulous deal this week! On a local facebook site, a lady on base was selling two plastic playhouses for $20 each. If you've ever priced those things, you know that is a steal. I'm usually the last to find these great deals, but in this instance I jumped on it and one of the houses was still available. After we negotiated pick-up with the owner, she said that the other house deal fell through and asked if we wanted the other one as well. We only needed one, but I figured my neighbor (who has a little girl) would want it. We both ended up with great deals! Our play house retails for $550 new and we paid $20 for it and another $20 to replace broken or missing parts. My neighbor's house retails for $200 and she paid $20 with another $20 for replacement parts. Honestly how could a deal get any better! The kids have loved playing with them!

Its' really cute with a kitchen, table and chairs, bay windows and fun shutters. I ordered a door bell to go with it!

Mike reassembling it!

• We had a great time at the Annual Air Force Appreciation Day parade in Mountain Home this past weekend! It was the 52nd annual one and also the biggest parade in the state of Idaho. Mike's squadron always has a float (although this year we just followed the squadron bus) and throw candy and beads to the crowds. Even Jackson was trying to throw beads! Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures this year - bummer.

Down:

• Well if you haven't already seen my update on Facebook, Jackson had a bit of an accident this week. He went golfing with Mike on Monday afternoon while Mike was putting decided to turn on the golf cart, grab the wheel and put both feet on the accelerator. By the time Mike realized it, Jackson was going too fast for him to catch him on foot. Jackson hit a tree and flew over the steering wheel through the plexi-glass windshield and into the weeds. Thankfully, he escaped with minor injuries: he chipped his front tooth, bit his tongue pretty good, has a few scratches and some really nasty road rash from behind his right ear around the front of his neck. The neck bothers him the most, but honestly it could have been so much worse. We are so thankful that he is ok. Mike is of course in the dog house for that one and lesson learned, won't be leaving the key in the cart the next time he takes JP golfing. Now I just have to tell the story over and over and deal with the dirty 'you beat your son' looks!

This is a view of the road rash. It's one of those things that has to look bad to get better?!

Poor guy, here is more road rash and you can see the chipped tooth.

• The guys are doing an exercise on base that is taking it's toll on everyone. Poor Mike is sleeping in the day and working basically 11:30pm-11:30am daily. Meanwhile, during the night there are sirens going off on base, jets taking off multiple times in the night, and to add to that Kennedy's smoke alarm ran out of batteries at 3:30am! Never a dull moment at our house and certainly not any notable sleep for any of us!
• Can't believe 11 years has passed since 9/11. Still difficult to think about that day/moment in time and how many lives have been affected by just one day.

Favorite Thing:

  So I've been seeing all these Nutella recipes on Pinterest, but didn't want to try them. I tried a generic version of Nutella once and thought it was disgusting. I decided to give the real thing a try and see if it really was as good as everyone says - OMG - IT IS DELICIOUS! I've been eating it daily to get my chocolate fix. It's not super fabulous for you, but it's not as bad as eating a candy bar, so it could be worse :) Now I am going to go try all these Pinterest recipes that use it - I'll let you know how it goes!

Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down #36

My apologies for the much belated post! I'm going to do something I don't usually do and start with 'downs' first.

Down:

• Mike and I had really been looking forward to a non-work related vacation this Labor Day weekend in Spokane, WA. Mike really enjoyed SERE(survival school) when he was there in Sept. of 2008 and has been wanting us to go together ever since. It's a fairly long drive from Mountain Home, but not bad for a 4 day weekend. We arrived there on Friday night, had a great time Saturday and then in the middle of the night Kennedy woke us up - she had vomited all over her bed. We cleaned her up and calmed her down and put her back to bed, 45 minutes later she vomited again. This cycle continued until the next day when she seemed to be doing fine. Since none of the rest of us felt bad, Mike and I decided it must have been he food we fed her that night being too rich for her system. We went to church that morning and were going to head out to Coeur d'Alene afterwards. We stopped by the mall to pick something up and Kennedy puked all over Mike in the middle of the mall - it was awful. We headed back to our room and stayed there the rest of the day. On Monday we drove home and things had been going great for Kennedy. Literally 15 minutes from home (on an 8 hr. drive) Jackson threw up all over himself and in his car seat. It was so gross, but we booked it home and cleaned everything up. I stayed up all night with Jackson on Monday and by Tuesday he was doing fine. Tuesday morning Mike felt bad, but thankfully never threw up and by Tuesday evening I got it! All of us were doing much better yesterday with the exception of a few diaper blow-outs from Kennedy until last night when Kennedy decided to throw up some more. So far all is well today, but I'm so exhausted and needless to say our vacation stunk - literally! Maybe we just aren't meant to travel.
• With all of this going on we have definitely relapsed on the potty training for Jackson. He did do fairly well on the road trip and always went when we took him at a rest stop. The problem is the miles of nothingness between here and Washington. I suppose we could have just let him go on the side of the road, but we were lazy and just let him go in his diaper. Hopefully we won't be starting back at square one with him.

UP:

• On the positive side of things the one day we did spend in Spokane we had a great time. They had a festival called Pig Out in the Park going on where local restaurants and food vendors gathered in the Riverfront Park. Jackson had fun riding some of the kiddie rides and we enjoyed walking around down town and seeing all the beautiful architecture of the old buildings. 

Didn't think we were ever going to get Jackson away from the big wagon!

Yes, we're the cheesy tourists that took the 5 minute gondola ride!

Who needs a vacation when you can just play in the playground!

Backseater just like his Daddy!

This was the only size available - what a waste, we only ate like an 8th of it.

Seriously!

I just thought this display in the mall was neat, so I took a pic!

Eating at the Rusty Moose!

• For every one thing I don't like about the military (i.e. deployments, TDYs, long work hours) there are at least three things I love, so it more than evens out. We stayed at the TLF (Temporary Lodging Facility) at Fairchild AFB in Spokane instead of a hotel this weekend. It was literally a two bedroom furnished house with full size kitchen, laundry room, dining table with high chair everything you could think of needing for $52/night! Despite this awful illness, we were so blessed to be in a facility with laundry and separate bedrooms so some of us could sleep. There is nothing worse than being sick when you are away from home, but it's much better to feel like you're in a home instead of a confined hotel room.
• Kennedy is walking all over the place and her two top teeth have finally broken through! Such a cutie!

Favorite Thing:

  Last year we joined the iphone movement. I seriously love having a smart phone and all the cool things you can do on them, but it seems like every time I'm talking to someone and try to hold the phone against my shoulder so I can multitask, I end up muting them or three way calling someone else. I found this handset at Bed Bath and Beyond for $15 (I used $5 off a $15 purchase coupon to make it $10) that you plug into the headphone jack. It has a volume up/down and call button on it. It makes it so much easier to talk to everyone! I even like using it in the car!