1st 6 months...

6 months

How can my baby be 1/2 a year old? How is it that my baby is scooting from baby it toddler right before my eyes? All the time now i'm seeing him learn and grow. He is this super sponge that is taking everything in and learning so fast!

Here's our 6 month stats:

1. he's like a week away from crawling. He just gets frustrating and gives up so quickly! but I can see him getting stronger each time he's in the crawl position.

2. when we walk into the room his arms immediately go up in the air toward us. He wants and LOVES to be held.

3. He sits up on his own. Anytime we lay him down he struggles to sit up.

4. Anytime we are drinking from a cup or can his hands find away to help us hold it and his mouth usually ends up right by ours as we drink- he know there's good stuff in cups :)

5. He's in size 3 diapers!

6. He's wearing 6-12 month clothes

7. he finally loves taking walks in the stroller- he'll cry and cry if he's in the stroller in the house, but as soon as we get outside he's all smiles and has these eyes that are so expressive and just say that he wants to explore everything.

8. he'll laugh at us just from looking at us. He easily laughs when we tickle him but now he's started laughing when we make funny faces.

9. he's sitting in high chairs at restaurants and we're trying grocery carts- he's still a bit tiny :)

sippy cup

watching baby einstein while mommy and daddy get ready for church

sleeping at cousin maggie's bday party

high chair boy :)

we did a little photo shoot...

grilled pizza

So along with cooking for thursday nights, i've also challenged myself to start being more creative with my meals with a very limited budget! Sure its easy to cook like Rachel Ray and Guy Fieri when you can buy ALLLLL those ingredients for one meal, but if you're like me- buying fresh fruit and veggies weekly is a delicacy! So Friday night instead of buying a pizza (because that sounded so good) I decided to make some. And because our utilities have been charmingly expensive, NOT using the oven might help a bit! So pizza on the grill was made... and it became a new staple for our weekly meals!

Here's the recipe:

for the dough

2 cups of flour (wheat or white)

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp sugar

1 TBLSP EVOO

1 pkg active dry yeast

3/4 cup warm water (110 degrees)

Combine the 1st 4 ingredients

dissolve the yeast into the water until activated (about 10 min)

combine in mixer until it becomes a sticky ball-ish

let sit for 1 1/2 hours until about double in size

doubled :) Then roll it out until flat (makes either two or 4 depending on the size you want!)

then put on grill for 5 min (leave top open). After you flip it...

... add ingredients (we did bbq sauce chicken and cheese)

cut and serve!

here's the real beauty of the recipe- according to the website i found this the dough is not as bad for you as other bread products- it said to have about 100 calories per pizza crust- so depending on what you put on it, it could be good for you! YUMMY!

Tyler's-at-Grad-school meal of the week the beginning!

Tyler started Grad school this last thursday night and I quickly discovered what a 16 hour day with just me and Roman looks like... YIKES!

I think it was about 5 in the afternoon when a panic snuck in that I wasn't gonna get a break for at least 6 more hours ;) The good new is i'm TOTALLY exagerating! it wasn't as bad as i thought it was going to be. We did go one 3 1 mile walks. we went to the library and we went to walmart.

I decided to try and make thursday nights a blessing by cooking a supper that I know Ty wouldn't really like if he was here. So the first night of cooking for one was an oriental chicken salad. I've had variations of this recipe before (my mother-in-law makes one that is TO-DIE-FOR-DELICIOUS!) I wanted to try and make something that I can tell how many calories are in it because i made it and also to try and keep it super cheap! so the challenge began! :)

I found a basic vinegar and oil salad dressing recipe that I just tweaked to work for this recipe. All I needed from walmart was some ramen noodles and vinegar. Everything else I had (which makes this a super cheap recipe- right under $1.00!)

Here's the ingredients (I just made one serving):

1. 1 cup lettuce shredded

2. 1/2 package of ramen (baked at 350 for 10 min)

3.1/2 cup chopped chicken breast

4. sprinkle of parmesan cheese

For the dressing I went ahead and made up a big batch so I can make a bunch for later salads:

4 T vinegar

1/2 cup EVOO

one package of ramen flavoring

6 packages of splenda (or 2 T of sugar)

pinch of salt and pepper

I only used about 2 T on my salad (it covers a lot!)

This has been all i've been eating for the last few meals! haha! it's pretty addicting!

Here's a pic of the finished project :)

ABCs with Roman

Last night Tyler played his guitar while we sang some songs. After about an hour Rome got a little tired and started crying. Ty started singing some Roman friendly songs- then this one was born :) Sorry for the crazy unstable recording- i was recording in one hand and had Roman in the other :)

Benton CO Fair!!

On Saturday night Tyler, Roman, and I went to the Benton Co. Fair. I grew up going to the fair back in NE and it was always a big deal. It's a little different down here :) This was Ty's first time to go to this fair. It was so much fun! The traditions that we had back in NE were going to see the antique tractors, looking at the animals, seeing the exhibits by all the different vendors and people's businesses, and riding the carousel. I was so excited to see that all of our traditions were at this fair as well just in their own way! There weren't as many antique tractors as there was in NE but with a 5 month olds' attention span that worked out just right!! We had a blast! and Roman was content to ride in his stroller a majority of the time!!

walking so the sun wasn't in his eyes.

Driving the antique tractos.

Lookin at the bunnies

the turtles

the cow.

Daddy playing the basketball games...

... and winning a great big ball!!

we got a bottle of diet pepsi to share, and while mommy was taking a drink, Roman hit at it and nailed it with his hand causing the pop to spill all over mommy's shirt! we had a good laugh at it. He just SMILED after he did it. :)

waiting for the carousel

riding the horsey

so sad because we were leaving :(

sitting up

Roman LOVES standing and sitting up. Laying down is just to calm for him as of late. When he's standing he just jumps jumps jumps!

here's some sitting pics.

making baby food

The other day at Walmart I was shocked and excited about the price of peaches, nectarines, and plums. They were down to 29 cents a lb! I've known for awhile that i've wanted to make my own baby food to try and save some money and this new price locked in that decision. I talked to my gma who has made her own baby food for years (she runs a day care from her home-awesome woman!!). She gave me some advice and gave me the "how to." So I bought about 4 lb of fruit (for about 2 bucks! WOW! and when a jar of store is about .75-1.00 i'm gettin a steal!

here's my process...

I let the fruit ripen for a few days before I cut it up and blended in in my bosch blender :)

It was SO easy!

Then I used my ziploc containers (freezer safe) that I got with a coupon for about 30 cents for 6.

I ended up with 12 full containers that are now in my freezer!

I'm off to walmart later to see if there are any other fruits on sale for so cheap!