Southbound

Sunday afternoon Blake and I decided to make a very spontaneous decision and head to St. George for the week. I was nervous how the kids would do on such a long (emphasis on LONG) drive but they did surprisingly well. We left town around 4pm and rolled into town around 10:30. I spent the last 4 hours of the drive sitting in the backseat with one hand giving Porter a bottle and the other hand holding Brooke's hand (I think she was feeling left out)

DAY ONE: Brooke and Porter saying hello in the morning
Went on a walk with Lady along the river
Porter snoozing on Honey and Pinch's bed
Chris' family stopped by on their way to the airport. Cousin Henry is only 8 months older than Brooke and although they hardly ever see each other, they hit it off and were so cute to listen to their conversation. Love cousins!
That night, we had some friends of ours that live in St. George over for dinner. Their baby, Sam, is about 3 weeks older than Porter. Colby and Blake were best buds growing up and got into all sorts of mischief, I am not sure the world is ready for round two!
I love how both babies are yawning in this picture
Brooke LOVED this bowl chair. It was just the right size to swallow her and she loved watching TV in it. (sorry for the crappy cell phone pic)

DAY TWO: Honey watched the kids and Blake and I went on our first date since Porter was born to see The Hunger Games movie. After that, it was SWIM TIME!

Getting a ride on daddy's back:

DAY THREE: We spent the majority of the day at SandHollow Resevoir. We packed a picnic and did some amazing four-wheeling!

Brooke rode with Blake most of the time...

Unless he was doing crazy stuff...Then she rode with me :)Sadly Porter missed all of the action by hanging out in his carseatWe had a nice dinner that night with our friends again and Great Grandma Riley (Brooke's namesake) came over

Four Generations of Rileys: Great-Grandma; Honey aka Grams; Blake; Brooke & Porter

Brooke talking about how much she loves a** cream (that is how she says ice-cream)

Brooke takes a fall while pushing daddy in the pool

Brooke can swim!

We had such a good time being spoiled by Honey and Pinch and can't wait to do it again soon!

Food Fabulous

As I have said before, I have discovered a love for cooking. I especially love baking new treats and making freezer meals. There is nothing better than pulling out a meal from the freezer and having it ready by dinner time. It's so worth the time putting them together for future use.

I just thought I would compile a list of some of the things I've made recently:

• First I made a Dulce de Leche Banana Toffee Pie That was technically my first pie but I kind of cheated because it calls for a store bought crust and it doen't go in the oven. But it is OH SO DELISH!!
• Then I made these Lime-Coconut White Chip Macadamia-nut cookies I didn't have macadamia nuts, so I used pecans and they were super yummy. They sound weird, but it was fun to make something different than the usual chocolate chip cookies.
• And I have been wanting to make this Creamy Pear Pie for a long time now and finally did it! I was very pleased with out it turned out.

My first homemade crust!
Pears with the yummy filling on top:
My attempt at a lattice top:
The finished product:
It turned out great, despite how ugly it looks. I accidentally forgot to set the timer, but luckily after some time had gone by thought to myself, "why haven't I heard the timer go off?" and went to check on it. If it had burned beyond eating, I would have been really sad. Blake said that this is the best pie he has ever eaten :)

Other Cooking Ideas (yet to try, but will soon):

• Freezer cooking ideas
• Healthy Kid Muffins
• slow cooker lemon-lime rice and chicken
• Watermelon-strawberry lemonade

Also, my friend Mandi started a cooking blog. Nothing fancy...she is just posting yummy recipes she tries and likes. She does a lot of cooking with her boutiful basket too. She is always talking about different recipes she tries so I am excited she is sharing them all in once place!

6 Weeks later

I feel like I just wrote my first 6 weeks later post and now here we are again. The past 6 weeks have been crazy, I'll admit. Going from one to two has been a real rollercoaster for me. I remember after Brooke was born that I was so surprised how much harder having a baby was than I thought it would be. They are so tiny but demand so much attention! It was so nice when Brooke would want to eat 6am, then go back to sleep until 9am. That meant I could sleep in that late too. Not so with Porter. After I feed him in the morning, I am up and the day starts because Brooke is awake now too. My friend Cara wrote a hilarious (and acurate, I might add) post about trying to shower with two kids. Another thing I am discovering with two kids is even when Blake is home (which as been a lot lately, thank heavens!) and one of the kids can go with him, I still have the other one, so it's not a true break like it was when it was just Brooke. I know that sounds really bad, like I don't like my children. But really, I would just like some peace and quiet without crying, whining, or someone needing something. It's an adjustment for everyone. Especially Brooke. I am not sure if it's her age (I've heard 3's are worse than 2's) or the adjustment or both but she will go through spurts where for a few days at a time she has a major attitude: talking back, telling us "no", being super whiney, and just having a huge meltdown when the littlest thing doesn't go her way. It's those days when Blake and I look at each other and are like "That's it! We're done having children!"

And to be quite honest, Porter has become sort of a demanding baby. Thankfully not at nighttime--although he is still waking up about every 4 hours to eat. But during the day he eats about every 2 hours and can be pretty fussy. Brooke and I do a lot to TV watching because most of the time I am holding/consoling a fussy baby. We've watched both season of "Downton Abbey" together and I have discovered a liking for "Revenge" and "Once Upon a Time" (those I save to watch while Brooke is napping-- they aren't really kid appropriate).

But aside from all that, there are days (sometimes just a few moments in the day) when no one is crying and we're in a good mood and I am feeling like I can actually do the whole two-kid thing.
At 6 weeks, Porter now weighs around 11 lbs! He's not sure what to think about tummy time..

Brooke is a mommy too. I loved it when I went to put Porter in his swing and found this:

St. Patrick's Day: Wearing our green

Although we did have cornbeef for dinner, I didn't really plan anything beyond that. Then as I was reading on FB about all these creative things moms were doing to celebrate I felt guilty and quickly came up with a few things for us to do together. I got both craft ideas from the website No Time for Flashcards.

Craft #1:Making a rainbow out of colored marshmallows (thankfully I had some going stale in the cupboard to use) First, I had Brooke sort all the marshmallows by color into smaller bowls.

Then we glued them onto the paper and Brooke colored the clouds and sun

We added some sparkles and ta-da!

Craft #2 was doing a springtime wall mural. During Brooke's nap I taped the paper onto the wall and cut out some flower shapes and separated them into different bowls.
I put the glue on th pieces for her and handed them to her one by one. She stuck them on the paper herself. Then we did some coloring.
And yes, I know Brooke is in her jammies. During her nap she changed into them.
Love my boys! Thanks, Blake, for all you do!

I have to also mention that on Wednesday Brooke went to the dentist for the first time. She was so excited! She was especially happy when she realized you got a bag full of goodies after they checked your teeth. She's been talking about it nonstop! I love the simple things in life that get kids excited--she's been more than happy to use her new toothbrush and floss she got :)

I Admit...

...my life is not all butterflies and rainbows (shocking, right?) I thought I would take a break from the usual and post some thoughts I've had recently:

• I let Brooke watch more TV than I should
• I spend more time online than I should
• I have raised my voice (that's nice talk for 'yelled' btw) at Brooke..The Power of Positive Parenting is helping me change that.
• I have been known to say the occassional swear word when frustrated, angry, or stubbed my toe on the way to the bathroom in the middle of the night
• I have thrown two things at Blake. One was a cup (plastic) and the other was tupperwear (full of greenbeans) Both were thrown while I was pregnant (once with Brooke and the other with Porter.) If I get pregnant again, Blake better buy a helmet!
• A lot of our vacations involve at least one argument between Blake and I. I think traveling stresses us out. Now I can't remember for the life of me what they were about.
• I hate when I am copied. And I'm not talking someone occassionaly borrows one idea or reposted my pin on pintrest. I think most people know when ideas are there for the taking and when they're not. And when I say being copied: I'm talking all.the.time. by the same person over and over. I know that sounds terrible and that I should be flattered and I know that not all my ideas are original but it still bugs me...hey, I never said I was perfect.
• I buy prepacked dinners for us to eat
• I honked at a car repeatedly because it wasn't moving when the light turned green. Then I realized it was stopped for an ambulance coming down the road. Oops.
• I like to be right and have a hard time admitting when I'm not...which is usually never, so that hardly ever happens ;)
• I detest exercising, if we had the money I would solve all my problems using plastic surgery
• I want my children to be better than I was/am

wow...that sure feels good to get off my chest ;)

Eldest

One of these days I think I shall wake up from my dreamy stupor and will be back living with my parents and in high school again. How did I get to be so old? How did I get to be a parent? Okay, I know how that happened, but just the general idea that I have children sometimes seems very surreal.

Brooke, no matter how old she gets, will always be my baby...my first baby. I realized that there are only 2 1/2 years until Brooke is in kindergarten. She is growing up so fast and I don't want to miss a single second of it!

Although she is a the epitome of a girly girl- she still likes to get out and get dirty in the garden and ride the tractor with Pinch.

We made smoothies for Family Home Evening one night:
My beautiful girl:
Brooke has gotten over her aversion to "baby Porter" as she calls him. She no longer is scared that he will pee or poop on her :)


I left this picture in here because this is typical at our house: Brooke touching Porter's face; namely his eyes.
Little smiles: Brooke says, "Mom, Porter's tongue is dirty!"
Brooke volunteered to hold Porter for this picture, no coaxing necessary. Two seconds after I took the picture she says, "Okay, I'm done!" and just lets go of him and starts to move away. Luckily I was right there to keep Porter from falling over onto the floor.
This was my attempt at self portrait. Don't we look lovely? Heaven help us!

Brooke at 3 years 3 months:

• loves reading books, even has a few memorized so she can "read" them to herself. She especially likes "green eggs and ham" by Dr. Seuss.
• Has to say her own prayer after we say one. They range from being very sweet (blessing the spirit, blessing family members) to very funny (blessing the Christmas ornaments).
• Still loves to sing and dance and make up her own songs
• loves to wrestle and ride the 4 wheeler with daddy
• we play matching games and candyland together
• loves to paint and color
• is super talkative--during dinner she talks nonstop! We have to ask her to stop talking so she can take a bite of food.
• hates to wear pants, especially jeans. It's nothing but leggings and skirts for this girl!
• says "He's my baby!" when talking about Porter and "Porter is my friend"...oh I hope it stays that way :)