Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday

Monday we made pinecone bird treats with peanut butter and birdseed. The birds got one peck before a slinky squirrel nibbled off the string and stole the pinecone all for himself.

Too bad they aren't the magical kind of squirrels like in Narnia and Snow White's story where I can whistle, sing, or politely ask them to help scurry up these attic stairs and rennovate that space for us in one big wave of a magic wand.

Tuesday Peeps and Grayson wore matching hoodies and she spent the night at "toe-da" (Toad Hall) so Justin and I could begin to wave our not-so-magic-but-still-productive wands up in the attic.

Wednesday involved some snuggle time. We've been battling mild colds this week, so its hard to beat a good book, a good daddy, a good thumb, and a good pink leopard print woobie.

All week this week we've been hearing "uh-oh" and "ah-ga" (again). Two favorite new words. And if you say anything about cake, she starts singing happy birthday.

Firsts...

First haircut. If you can call it that. I barely took off anything but she was quite concerned.

First time playing at her new table. She has her apron on from cooking in the kitchen, and apparently needed to put her feet up and rest a while. I snapped this shot because she was coloring so sweetly by herself. I figured our crayon tasting days were over.

Until I came back in a few minutes later to check on her and found half a black crayon chomped into small pieces in her mouth and promptly whisked her to the bathroom to start excavating.

Black, of all colors. Justin came home just in time to find me in the bathroom and saying "you're sure these are non-toxic, right? I mean, she can't be the only child who's eaten a crayon, right?"

Beach Weekend

(first row: cereal on the balcony, tons of shells, coffee binoculars bible and porch for breakfast, peppermint joe joe's,
second row: "will you take our picture?", what a view, ocean that redneck girl fell in, "am I a dork if I take a picture of our shadows?"
third row: obligatory pose, fried pickles are even better the next day, cheapskate pb&j's for lunch, what a beautiful day,
fourth row: mil in her pink pj's and overcoat "glassing" some birds, the kid's table and fabric we bought)

We went down to Wrightsville for Mil's birthday and Valentines. Somehow I'm lucky enough to have a wife that will still love me if I don't shower or shave and take her out to a place called "SOMETHING FISHy" on Valentines. God bless you Millie.

haaaaapuuhhh burd mama (Happy Birthday Mama)

Mil's birthday was earlier this week and since we've had a few other birthdays here in the last week, we've been practicing singing with Grayson. What happens is something like this:



Mil and Me: Happy Birthday to you
Grayson: haaaa
Mil and Me: Happy Birthday to you
Grayson: haaaapuh
Mil and Me: Happy Birthday dear Mama
Grayson: haaaap mama
Mil and Me: Happy Birthday to you
Grayson: [smiles and claps]

One time she got all the way to "haaaapuh burduh". Now when you ask her if she can sing, she goes into this high pitched quiet voice and throws together some combination of the above.

The pictures above are from our strawberry/strawberry cake. It was a family affair. Grayson and I mixed the ingredients and baked the cake (from a box) and made the buttercream icing (from scratch) . . . then we pretty much sat back and took pictures.

Millie's been taking a cake decorating class so she went nuts. First she was just going to do it plain . . . then she added the border around the bottom . . . then around the top . . . then, even though she hasn't even learned it in class yet, she went for the WILTON ROSE (note: when you say "WILTON ROSE" in our house, you have to say it in kind of a low, drawn out whisper because of its awesomeness.) I got to hold the rose stand thing while she was switching out the icing tips out of her cake decorating tackle box. It was pretty awesome. She rocks.

Oh and, yes, the cake tasted as good as it looked.

Snack Time

Yesterday I gave Grayson her snack, and went to the sink to wash some dishes. I turned around a minute later and found her like this.

Kanga and Baby started out on the table but then she felt like Kanga needed a better seat so she could share her snack. The onesie was on the table where I threw it after picking it up off the floor. She drags her dirty clothes out of her hamper and leaves them scattered throughout the house where she "tries" them on. She ate her snack with this on her head for 10 minutes straight like it was the right way to wear it or something. She is a funny child.

Then she got tired.

Then I got a close up of those big brown eyes.

Another member of our family

We keep our blog to update family and friends on our lives, which mostly includes stories and cute pictures of Grayson. Below is a member of our family that doesn't get blogged about very often. Its not as cute as Grayson, but it sure does save us some money. I present to you, my coupon binder...

The looks and comments, especially from the cashiers, when you carry one of these around is a whole other post in itself. I can't remember exactly when I started all of this, but it did start with the Grocery Game. I do recommend at least trialing it for the $1 deal to get the hang of it, and then you can make the call depending on how much time you have, on doing it yourself or paying for the Game. I stopped the Game because I then found my favorite money saving blog: Money Saving Mom. Who knew we would never have to pay for toothpaste again? Or never pay over $1 for cereal? I had no idea. But she knew. Put her in your Google Reader and check it out.

Then enter Harris Teeter's triple coupons. I know many of you share my love, I mean hate, I mean love, of triple coupon weekend. I did snap a shot of one (of many) triple coupon runs this last weekend below. $20.23 people. That's it. Before coupons was around $60. Now you do have to use the 'stock up' theory where you buy ahead on things that you use frequently when they are on sale. Which is why there is an undisclosed number of cereal boxes in every corner of our kitchen right now. But its worth it.

The other thing I love about all of these money saving blogs is that they post great frugal recipes. Here are some current favorites:

How to freeze bananas and make the best peanut butter banana smoothie (scroll down for the smoothie recipe and follow the link about how to freeze the bananas. Most HT's here in town have bunches of overripe bananas, often organic ones, bagged into discount deals for $1, perfect for freezing)
Banana Crumb Muffins (great to bake a bunch and freeze, I used brown sugar for the sweetener, same amount, crumb topping is optional but yum, and I did follow the 1/2 applesauce tip)
Pumpkin Oatmeal Muffins (also good to freeze, sub all applesauce for the oil)
Spinach Rice Casserole (I added a little more cheese, halved the w. sauce, and used brown rice for a little more protein)
Money Saving Mom's Whole Wheat Waffles (Justin loved these, Grayson and I thought they were ok..I think next time I'll add 1/2 whole wheat, 1/2 all purpose flour. MUCH cheaper though to freeze and reheat for our waffle-eating-one-year-old. I also added blueberries to some).

I've got some more recipes but I'm now procrastinating on cleaning the house.

And if you're still hanging with me on this post, please head over here to check out the love at the park today.

Little Helper

Pigtail girl loves to help take out the trash. And no, this is not our stinky-dirty-leaky kitchen trash being dragged all over our floors. This is the neat and as-clean-as-trash-can-be-clean trash from the random trashcans stashed in all other rooms except the kitchen. She also will immediately pick up any "tra" she sees when we play outside. Environmentally friendly yes, but ewe for the germ-fearing mama.


Pigtails loves to help dust too, but does not enjoy 'helping' with the vacuum. Actually, she cries. Hard. I think it's too loud. She cries too when I make smoothies in the blender. I'm starting to think I maybe should have skipped that Faith Hill and Tim McGraw concert when I was pregnant where I had to sneak out periodically and take a break because the bass was making my stomach rattle. Just kidding Tori, that concert was fun times. At least Gray likes to listen to the country radio station in the car and will 'dance' to good ol' Tim and Faith any day.

Pigtails!

I know I'm partial, but I'm just not sure it can get much cuter...

Hugging baby

Kissing baby (she kisses everything these days)

Feeding baby

Reading books (still a most favorite activity)

Uber Handy, Part 2

Uber handy husband has been at it again. And here his in in all his 'please don't make me shave on the weekend' glory. If all it takes is a little half-'stache on Saturday for projects to get done, I'm all for it.

Here's our hallway and laundry doors beforehand. Back when we moved in, we painted these white. Sort of white. There was a mural to cover up, but we got tired of coat after coat of primer and paint. The top doors cover a storage area, the bottom doors cover the washer and dryer on one side, and the water heater/cleaning supply cabinet on the other. Quite handy for an old house I must say. I'm really thankful my washer is not in the basement. If we had a basement.

Bifold doors were my original wish so I could open it more easily to do laundry, until I found out that we'd have to pay for a custom fit. No thanks. And then I figured out (smart girl that I am) that I didn't have to store the laundry detergent in the right side cleaning cabinet, but I could just put it on the floor next to the washer instead (see in middle picture). Duh. Now I only have to open one door to do laundry. I can't count the times I swung both of those semi-heavy doors back and forth trying to get one load of laundry done. But again, at least it wasn't trekking down to a basement.

So we started talking about what to do to spice them up. Enter chalkboard paint. Originally we were going to paint the entire space of both bottom doors in chalkboard. Thankfully we got nervous that it would darken up the hallway before we tried it. So after much dreaming, 2 trips to Lowes (which is actually pretty good for us), and uber handy husband's skillz, we now have two chalkboards for Grayson with one side dueling as an easel for crayon drawing and (future) painting. We also decided the yellow of the hallway would be much better as the main background color, and I'm still wondering why we never did this part sooner.

I must point out and brag on uber handy husband's skillz : two perfect coats of chalkboard paint, custom made moudling cut to size per wife's requests, two spare curtain holder ends and a wooden dowel spray painted white for the paper roll holder, perfectly cut slits in the top and bottom moudling on the paper side to feed the paper and tear off the masterpieces in a straight line, and then, even though you can't see it, screws and blocks to hold the doors in place to keep them from swinging while little Picasso is at work (they're not on a track so they used to swing freely). Impresivo if you ask me.


I think when she gets a little older we might add a tray with supplies underneath the paper roll side like a real easel. But right now she would just take everything out and eat it. And whenever we get to painting, it will be the perfect time for me to finally get around to sewing oil cloth into some splat mats to protect the floor.

The improvement has been a big hit. She's very much in love with the chalk. She knows the color "blue", says "ga-ga" (?) with enthusiam in response to "would you like to color?", and when she is trying to decide on a color, she says "uhhhh". Apparently I taught her that one. Who knew I even said that when trying to make a decision.

Thanks Shu-Shu!

Welcome to our house Kitchen Helper! Gramashu ordered this fun little gadget so I can wash Gray's hands without breaking my back and so she can help with all things kitchen. Although it looks like it in the picture, I haven't trained her yet on washing dishes, but boy would that be a fun trick. I just gave her the plate and spoon so she'd stand still for the picture. It has 3 different heights so it can adjust as she grows, it pulls right up next to the counter, has a chalkboard on one side and a whiteboard on the other, and best of all, it folds up to only about 7 inches wide. What a fun gift!

It also doubles as a fort.

And also from Shu-Shu, her very own pair of bubblegum pink Converse One-Stars. I tell you, it doesn't get much cuter than these. We sure are thankful for grandparents that spoil us! (and yes, her feet really are that big. her right foot is a full half inch longer than her left, so she wears a size 6 in these and a 7 in her other shoes!)