My Littlest Model!!!

I have acquired a new little model for my shop and she sure is a cutie! Lillian is now modeling for me and although she sure is cute, she needs a little practice! I did manage to get just a few pictures of her smiling that weren't blurry from her moving around too much!

She looks thrilled, doesn't she!

She kept looking at Jacob probably wondering why he isn't doing this!

Then she kept lifting her leg and I realized that baby needs some bloomers! But hey, she was doing pretty good for a beginner!

All the modeling must have made her hungry!

Of course Lindsey will still be my other model but the only bad thing about using Lindsey is that she spends most of her day at school. Lindsey seen Lillian's new dress and loved it, she suggested that she would rather have a skirt to match. Now I can dress my girls up in matching clothes how fun! They both have matching ruffle pants and now I need to start making them matching dresses for summer! You will be able to find this cute little "Sweet Meadow" boutique dress in my shop really soon!!!! Blessings, Lisa

One Thousand Blessings

101-110

101. Slowly moving things to the other house

102. The kids having swimming lessons during school

103. Scoring a great deal on a new stroller for Lillian

104. Being able to take Jacob to preschool for a few weeks

105. Being able to leave Jacob at preschool

106. A warm, sunny spring day in the 70's

107. Watching the kids ride their bikes

108. Going on a run for the first time in over a year

109. How fast all of my flowers seem to be popping up

110. Seeing that we have yellow daffodils blooming in the yard

To learn about One Thousand Gifts, visit Ann's blog, A Holy Experience and take the dare to count as many blessings that God has given you!!!!

She's a Happy Baby!

Finally after about two weeks of being grumpy Lillian is back to her normal happy self! With being sick for about the past two weeks she has cried way to much. I'm talking, she seemed to have colic kind of crying, she would cry for no reason on end! I was starting to think that maybe my little girl was going to be grouchy for the rest of her life and that I would need to send her off to boarding school for babies as soon I could! OK, maybe a slight exaggeration, but really she was frustrating and I only seemed to like her best when she was asleep! I know that sounds horrible, really all she did was cry and cry and lets see, whimper a bit then cry! I knew she didn't feel good at all, she had a fever, gunky eye and horrible cough, but now that is all history!

Now my Lillie Pie is squealing in delight, sometimes for no reason and smiling sooo much more! She's a happy baby! Finally! Yesterday she really started to get back to her normal self and today too! We have started to give her some Little People to play with and she loves them so much she wants to eat them! Pork chop anybody!

Lillian is starting to sit up somewhat by herself now, she hasn't figured out that when she leans back she falls back! (I'm surprised she didn't fall back while I was taking her pictures!)

Deciding which animal to eat next! Mmm, they all look so yummy!

How about some puppy chow!

Jacob loving on her as usual!

Jacob started preschool on Wednesday for just a few weeks and he seems to enjoy it once he becomes busy. He didn't want me to leave at first but thankfully he became distracted and so I sneaked out! The picture below cracks me up, he looks so serious at his desk, here at home, doing his "homework" he wants to be like the big kids!

I do a homeschool preschool curriculum for him during the week here at home. We had decided not to send him to a regular preschool this year with everything that we have going on and with moving. I love the preschool curriculum I have for him here at home, in fact they even have curriculum for tiny tots as small as 10 or 12 months old! That may be too extreme, but I haven't really looked into yet! What we do is somewhat of a Montessori/Christian based/Charlotte Mason style if that makes any sense at all! I will have to do a post on that sometime in the future! Anyway, I am just glad to have my happy baby back!!!! Blessings, Lisa

One Room Done!

I would have blogged about our spring break, but it was horrible! Two little ones decided to become sick and then share the love and get me sick! So I shared it with Chad! Not to mention the weather was yucky cold and didn't feel like spring! Things did turn around for us and we managed to get one room completely finished! How exciting is that! (Unfortunately everything is now being stored in that room until we get the others done!)

When we first put the varnish on the floors the wood really sucked it all up, and ended up putting three coats on the floor. They look really pretty now, for being about 130 years old! We used a glossy in Lindsey's room and we decide to use a satin in the rest of the house, the glossy is really pretty but will show every piece of dust and scratch on the floor! We had finished varnishing the floors in Lindsey's room and then put up her bed and new bedding set that she had in the closet for a over year! She was excited to get started decorating, we still need to put her desk, dresser and some more pretties on the walls. I think what we are wanting for that room is more beachy chic with a touch of whimsy, but we'll see what we come up with!

Her comforter set came from Target, the Shabby Chic children's line. The walls are painted Sandy Oasis by Dutch Boy. (I think this is the only room that doesn't have a Benjamin Moore Color in it!) The bed frame was given to us from someone locally and the signs are from a cute local shop!

Slowly, I am starting to pack things up and take over there and hopefully we will be moving in about two weeks. OK, we will be moving in about two weeks, because I am tired of waiting! Chad finished putting the last coat of varnish in the other bedroom that has wood floors tonight so we can start to decorate in there in the next few days! I'm thinking tractors for that room! Now we have four more rooms to varnish and then the floors will be done!!!! Blessings, Lisa

One Thousand Blessings

91-100

91. Spring Break!!!!

92. A new cook book

93. Planning my first garden (Yikes!)

94. Cutting the boys' hair in the kitchen

95. Pretty wood floors

96. Rest

97. Lindsey excited to decorate her new bedroom

98. Preschool time with Jacob

99. Jacob trying to feed Lillian

100. Seeing the 100 blessings I have in my life so far and still counting. . . .

To learn about One Thousand Gifts, visit Ann's blog, A Holy Experience and take the dare to count as many blessing that God has given you!!!!

One Thousand Blessings

#71-80

71. Pretty kitchen counters

72. Get in and out of the doctors office in under an hour!

73. Making cute cupcakes for Kyle

74. Baking bread with my girls

75. Meeting someone new and having a great conversation with them

76. Eating freshly baked bread

77. Varnishing the floors at the other house

78. A bright and full super moon

79. My pretty pink lily flowers are staring to sprout (I wasn't sure they would make it as many times I had moved them!)

80. Spring

To learn about One Thousand Gifts, visit Ann's blog, A Holy Experience and take the dare to count as many blessings that God has given you!!!!

Baby Food

Today I decided that I would start feeding Lillian some baby food, in hope this helps her to sleep better through the night, 5 or 6 hours would be perfect! I have been researching baby food for awhile now and decided I would rather make my own. I found a few really good websites that are all about homemade baby food, which I will have links to at the bottom of this post. Lillian is ready for some good stuff!!!!

Today I mashed up about 1/4th of a ripe banana for Lillian to eat, she loved it! I didn't mix it with anything and tried to mash it as much as I could with a fork, she did have a few bigger chunks but that didn't seem to bother her any! I froze the rest of the banana so that she could eat it the next few days before we move on to advocates! I was planning on feed her advocates first but since I just bought them at the store yesterday, they are not ripe enough to eat. I figure once we get through the banana, the advocates will be ready to eat. Yum! Yum!

I also chopped up some brown rice for her that I can mix in with the bananas and other foods. Just a simple box of whole grain brown rice that I already had up in the cabinet and poured some in the blender and chopped it up really fine. I may have made it too fine but I figure that should be OK for Lillian. I then poured it in a storage container ready to be cooked. (I may do that with oatmeal too, it's got to be better than the Gerber cardboardish flakes she doesn't like!)

I do plan on cooking or steaming many other fruits (and veggies once we get to them) that I will give Lillian. I figure that with making her own baby food I can give her what I want and not have fewer selections when it comes to the food at the store. I can expose her to much more and I can give her what we eat at dinner once she gets old enough. Not to mention I know exactly what is going into her food, a lot of baby food at the store has other additives and such in them that are not necessary. I think my blender will become our new best friend!

I did see/drool over this HERE really nifty baby food maker in my William Sonoma kitchen catalog, but really for the price and only using it for one last baby, not worth it! I do like the freezer trays they have, but an ice cubed tray wrapped in aluminum foil works too! Here are some links that I have been reading and loving!

Homemade baby food recipes

Wholesome Baby food

I have looked at buying a baby cookbook online, but not sure which one I would want or if I would really need one. The above websites have so many different recipes and filled with great information, that they should keep us going for awhile!!!! Blessings, Lisa