Monday, May 27, 2013

Menu Plan Monday - Week of May 26th

We've had an eventful holiday weekend thus far.  Saturday brought a fun birthday party at a park (even though it was a touch chilly at the end of May!  What is with this crazy weather this year?  It goes from 80 degress to 50 degrees overnight, it seems.).  Sunday was nicer and we got to spend some time outside, Mark smoked some ribs (yum!), and we bought some plants for our garden (here's hoping this year is our year for a green thumbs).  We were hoping to get things planted today, but looks like it's going to rain on us. Fingers are crossed that it clears up.  We're also headed out to my parents' house for a visit later on.  So thankful for a 3 day weekend!


Sunday:  Smoked Ribs with Mac and Cheese (I stashed half of this recipe in the freezer for a future meal!) and Grilled Veggies

Monday:  Memorial Day!  With family for dinner

Tuesday:  Leftovers/Freezer Meal

Wednesday:  Grilled Sausages with Potato Salad and Grilled Veggies

Thursday:  Creamy Chicken with Black Beans and Corn (CrockPot) over Cilantro-Lime Rice

Friday:  Homemade Pizza

Saturday:  Hosting a cookout


I'm linked at Menu Plan Monday hosted by OrgJunkie.com

Monday, May 20, 2013

Menu Plan Monday - Week of May 19th



We have been busy, busy, busy around here!  Nothing special, just the day-to-day things, but with only one of me and two little ones, plus other tasks to do, it's enough to keep me busy all day long!  The weekend went by far too quickly (it always does!) so alas it's Monday again.  Here's what we'll be eating this week:


Sunday:  Grilled Burgers with Zesty Oven Fries

Monday:  Cobb Salad

Tuesday:  Grilled Steak Fajitas

Wednesday:  Mom's Night Out!

Thursday:  Leftovers/Freezer Meal

Friday:  Smoky Tex-Mex Sloppy Joes with Baked Sweet Potato Fries

Saturday:  Out


I'm linked at Menu Plan Monday hosted by OrgJunkie.com

Monday, May 13, 2013

Menu Plan Monday - Week of May 12th




Sunday:  Out for Mother's Day

Monday:  Mexican Quinoa with Chips and Salsa

Tuesday:  Grilled Burgers with Oven Fries 

Wednesday:  Asian BBQ Chicken with Lime-Cilantro Rice with Pineapple

Thursday:  Leftovers/Freezer Meal

Friday:  Asian BBQ Chicken Pizza

Saturday:  Out


I'm linked at Menu Plan Monday hosted by OrgJunkie.com

Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Molly - 3 months



Little Miss Molly has turned 3 months old!

Not too much to report this month as we've pretty much been doing more of the same.  Molly is growing like a weed, I swear she looks bigger every day!

She's still doing great with night time sleep.  The last handful of days she's slept clear through the night!  And not textbook sleeping through the night (6 hours), which she has been doing for a long while, but REAL through the night meaning like 8pm-8am.  Blissful!  And this little lady is starved when she wakes up in the morning!  It's no wonder with going that long between feedings, but I guess she likes her beauty sleep more :)



She's still taking about 4oz of formula at every feeding.  She tends to eat every 2-3 hours during the day.  When she was still getting up once overnight she would typically take a 5oz bottle then and when she wakes up in the morning after sleeping ~12 hours she's taking more like 6 oz.  This 12 hours of sleep thing is still new and this momma forgot just how much she was eating first thing this Monday morning (and just how quickly she was eating it) and I accidentally let her suck her whole bottle down without a burp.  She's fine with this when she's drinking her daytime bottles, but 6oz is just FAR too much at once on an empty stomach and before I knew it she was spitting up all over herself, me, and the fresh sheets that had been put on the bed a mere 8 hours ago.  I'll bet I don't make that mistake again!

Naps are still okay.  I think my babies just aren't early nappers.  Molly just eats and sleeps whenever she wants still (although she has put herself on a pretty regular schedule/routine) and she tends to nap for about 30-40 mins at a time.  Seems pretty typical for her age though.  I would like to see longer naps, but I'm pretty thankful for what we have.  Jack would nap for about 30 mins at this age, but he would only sleep ON me.  At least Molly takes her cat naps laying down on her own!  I'm sure this will evolve into longer, more regular naps just like it did with Jack.


Now that she's sleeping a 12 hour stretch she's waking around 7-8am, taking a bottle, and then going back to sleep for a couple of hours, which is similar to what Jack used to do.  It's nice, except I can't go back to sleep with her :)  She's usually up by 9-10am and eats again, then is up for a while.  Around 11am-12pm she naps again.  Then again around 1-2pm.  Then she's usually up for quite a stretch and sometimes takes a little cat nap around 4-5pm and then is ready to start winding down for bed around 7-8pm.  It's a pretty great schedule we're working with right now!  

Also on the topic of sleep, we've finally hit the point where she's more aware of what's going on around her while she's sleeping.  Used to be that she would just sleep through anything, but she's more easily disturbed now.  I know this is developmental.  So I've started recently putting her back in one of the bedrooms for her naps and last night she slept in our room before we headed to bed rather than out in the family room with us.  I miss being able to just look over and see her sleeping, but it's better for her this way! 

Something new this month is laughing!  She first laughed a couple of weeks ago, but I wasn't really able to get her to do it again.  She's doing it a little more frequently now, but she has to be in the right mood.  I can't wait for those huge belly laughs that I know are headed our way!

Right now, Molly is still wearing her 0-3 month clothes, but she's close to outgrowing them.  This month I picked up some new, girly cloth diapers and they're just adorable and I'm way too excited about them :)

She had her 2nd and 3rd vaccines recently and she seemed to do better with them than her 1st.  Not sure if it's because they were different vaccines or because she's done it before.  With her first shot she was just out of sorts for a few days.  With this round she was out of sorts for the rest of the day, but seemed back on track after that.  I sure hope that's how subsequent vaccines go as I really hate to see her affected by them.  I'm always worried about what's going on in her little body after an injection.

Catching some extra sleep snuggles after she got her shot.

She's so much droolier than Jack ever was and she always has her hands in her mouth.  Jack was never big on chewing on things (including his own hands), but that kind of presented problems down the road a bit when he was time for him to start feeding himself.  I know he was the atypical one, but it's just different now that we have a baby who does put things in her mouth!  She also tends to suck on her hands and fingers as she goes to sleep.  It will be interesting to see if she ends up being a thumb/finger sucker.

Molly has definitely started to reach and grab for things.  It's not super intentional at this point and she doesn't seem to quite be to the point where she's intentionally reaching for things to bring to her mouth yet, but she's getting there!  It's so fun watching her development.

She's still very content and seems to still really like to watch me do things.  Even if she's starting to get fussy, if I bring her seat outside while I'm hanging laundry, or into the kitchen when I'm working on something, she's happy to just watch what's going on.  I hope daily minutiae is entertaining enough for her :)  And she still loves to catch a snuggle in the wrap.  She often surprises me by not falling asleep while being worn, but just being quietly watchful of what's going on around her. 

I was able to interest Jack in getting his picture taken as well!

Overall she's still just a happy, smiley baby.  She loves to catch everyone's attention with a big, bright gummy smile!

Monday, May 6, 2013

Menu Plan Monday - Week of May 5th



Sorry it's been so quiet around here.  We've been busy living life and I haven't been able to keep up with documenting it :)  We've had some lovely weather {finally} so we've been spending lots of time outside!  Mark spent a good bit of the weekend working on our landscaping out back and it looks great!  It's a little drizzly here today and I'm actually thankful for a break in the nice weather.  Gives us an excuse to have a lazier day and get some things done around the house.  Here's what we're eating this week:


Sunday:  Grilled Burgers with Baked Potato Wedges

Monday:  Pork Carnita (Crock Pot) Tostadas

Tuesday:  Kentucky Hot Brown Panini with Salad

Wednesday:  Chipotle Chicken Pasta

Thursday:  Leftovers/Freezer Meal

Friday:  Grilled Sausages with Cheesy Potatoes

Saturday:  Out


I'm linked at Menu Plan Monday hosted by OrgJunkie.com