Mommy Memo

Ok, so for those of you that do not know this about me - I am co-publisher of a local family magazine here in Dallas/Fort Worth. It's called Modern Babies & Children. I just started this "Mommy Memo" thing this month and I think it's a great way to hear from local moms. Below I have pasted this month's "Mommy Memo of the Month"!!

December's Mommy Memo is brought to us by:

Meredith Liewehr of Lantana. Mother of 1 with one on the way!

TIPS

When making dinner, to "entertain" my 2 1/2 year old and make her think she's "helping" I let her pull up a chair by the counter next to me (but far enough away from the hot stove of course) and I give her a big bowl. I fill up another small bowl with water, give her measuring cups, a spoon and spices from my spice rack that I never use (who really uses mustard seeds?) or that are about to expire. She then "makes dinner" using everything in front of her - she makes a killer "spice water soup" :)


LAUGHS

This one happend just today. My daughter loves Elmos World. Today, she and I went and did some Christmas shopping with my mom. Everywhere we went and for everything we did, she came up with a version of the Elmo's World song - "La, la la la, La la, la la Dada's Tie" "La, la la la, La la la la SoSo's chicken!" My favorite - "La la la la, La la la la, SoSo's shopping!" When are American Idol auditions...???


EATS

Quick and Easy StirFry

1 lb boneless, skinless chicken - cut into chunks
I bag frozen stir fry vegetables (any kind you like)
instant rice

for the sauce:
2 TB honey
2 TB balsamic vinegar
1 TB soy sauce
2 TB orange juice
1 TB corn starch
1 TB brown sugar

make rice according to package directions (and make as much as you'd like)
In a large skillet, saute chicken chunks in a little olive oil until cooked through (about 3 minutes per side)
Once cooked, remove from skillet
Add vegetables to hot skillet (may need to add a little more oil)
Saute until soft (about 5 minutes)
While veggies are cooking, in a medium bowl, whisk together the ingredients to make sauce - set aside
Add chicken back to skillet with veggies
Push chicken and veggies to sides of skillet, leaving a small well in the middle of the skillet
Add sauce
Stir and let sauce come to a bubble to thicken
Mix in with chicken and veggies
Serve over rice!

If you would like to submit your MOMMY MEMO, please email ONE tip, ONE recipe and ONE laugh to Misti@ModernBabiesAndChildren.com

Keira Crawling!! Lord help me!

I have been terribly busy lately and realized I haven't posted IN OVER A MONTH!! yikes, sorry :( Good news, Keira Boo started crawling over Thanksgiving weekend - just in time for her 8 month bday. Not sure if I should be excited or what. Now I will be chasing Ryleigh around while Keira is crawling around the floor with Roxy. Say a prayer for me, would ya :) Love you all and hope you had a great Thanksgiving with all of your fab fams!!

that's all I got, how'd ya like that?

p.s. funny vid of Keira to come shortly as soon as I can figure out how to get it off my phone and onto this blog :)

Keira Boo is 7 Months Today..

just sitting here watching SNL realizing that I haven't blogged in a while and that Keira is 7 mths old today! Brief update:
*sitting up
*army crawling
*says "DaDa" and "RyRy" - not "MaMa" yet :(
*favorite time is bath time
*favorite food is sweet potatoes

Ry is doing well, too. The most recent thing she has learned is how to spell out her name (verbally, not writing it out) It's pretty cute hearing her spell it. She is a great big sister and loves Keira so much, she always asks me "what Keira doing" and she always wants to kiss her. Ok, that's my brief update. Hope all is well! Love you all

How I wonder what you are....

I Love My Husband

He amazes me every week. Everyone who knows Jake knows that he is not a social butterfly. When it comes to chatting, there is only one thing that really gets him talking and that's sports. When I see him interact with his students whether on the field, on the court or in the classroom I am reminded that the Lord has placed every detail in our lives for a reason. Not only has God given Jake a passion for loving his 2 little girls so much that he can't stand it BUT he has also given him a passion for his students, his players and for coaching. See the most recent photos below of Jake coaching the Vikings football team here in big D..and I don't mean Dallas (sorry, had to type it)

Tag, you're it..Kendra I don't know how to do this :)

Ok, Kenners sent this to me and is making me do this. I tend to think I am fairly internet/computer savvy until Kendra sends me something like this and I have NO idea how to tag people on my blog, so here we go:

Here are the official rules:


First, the rules.
1. Post the rules on your blog.
2. Write 6 random things about yourself.
3. Tag 6 people at the end of your post.
4. If you are tagged, DO IT and pass it along.

Obey the rules or there will be serious consequences in the blogosphere. Ha. Just kidding.

Here are my 6... 6 things you may not know about me, that is:

1. I am a celeb gossip junkie. Not something I am proud of! I watch TMZ before bed every night. Jake makes fun of me :)

2. I love to sing. I sing at home to Jake and the gals, I sing in the shower, in the car and I am not quiet about it! It's usually praise and worship songs or rap songs, random, I know.

3. I've been to Russia..on a mission trip like 8 years ago!

4. I like studying. I sometimes want to go back to school just to study. In fact, I am about to take a class (for work) to learn the indesign software to create ads and I am soooo excited about taking the tests! haha

5. I am a horrible cook..wait, everyone knows that!

6. I LOVE playing softball and still play to this day (well last time I played I was 1 mth prego with Keira but am playing in another league this summer with the church!)

I would like to tag the only people I know who have a blog. I "officially" tag: Kendra, Heather, Emily, Keri

Oh Goodness..

I am really tired and want to go to bed but am waiting to feed K her last cereal bottle so I thought I'd blog - haven't done so in a while.

DAYCARE - is going well. Ryleigh is getting used to it and loves her teacher, Mrs. Rie. For the past week she has pee-peed on the potty at school for every potty break, go RyRy! She is strictly in training pants now and every once in a while we try the panties. Sweet Keira is doing just fine at daycare - the ladies say she is the happiest baby until she gets hungry, hahaha, sound like another Floyd gal you all know?

UPDATE -

Keira is around 17 lbs. now and wearing 9 month clothing. Love her rolly lil legs!! She is rolling over, kicking her legs like she wants to crawl and of course talking up a storm and mainly in high pitched versions :) Her favorite things are the bumbo chair (we didn't have one for RyRy), her big sister, any baby food (minus the sweet peas) and she LOVES Roxy!

Ryleigh, like I mentioned is almost completely potty trained. She is really into coloring now, which I love because I could color all day and we have put good use to her time out chair lately. Some of her favorite things right now are: Barney and Micky, reading her Bible and looking for the "Noah story", singing songs out loud and at random and she loves her new kitchen she got for her bday.

Funny things Ryleigh has said:

"be careful mama that choke you"
"Goda (God) made trees, Jesus made poopy" (not kidding - this one came out of nowhere!!!!!)
"no, Roxy, go to kitchen"
"no want time out, no want fankin (spankin)"
and before bed time, in order to stall she says "wanna go sit couch dada, watch football"

Jake:

School just started and that means football. The next few months are going to hectic and no offense to the Ryan Raiders but I am hoping they don't go too far in the playoffs so I can have my hubby back! :)

Mis:

I'm doing the same ol same ol - hanging out with my lil precious girls and working on the magazine. Our 2nd edition comes out October 20th,excited about it! I'm also excited to see what the Lord has in store for this year's home group. We start our group back next week and Jake and I are looking forward to it - that's mainly our night for just us two during the school year! Ok, I have typed way toooo much, that's all I got, how'd ya like that???

p.s. still doing that stinkin' bootcamp, Emily/Veronica if you are reading this, my arms and legs are on fire from Mon night work out with those weird discs!!!!!!

Happy 5th Anniversary!!

5 years ago today Jake and I said our I DO'S and then headed for our bahamas cruise - I wanna go to bahamas, again!

Neways, little did we know that when we got married....just 5 years later we'd have two sweet little girls. The Lord really does work in mysterious ways! Thank you, Jesus for my handsome, Godly husband and for my Keira Boo and Rylz :)

2 years ago....

Our precious lil Ryleigh is 2 years today! I know it's very cliche but it really does seem like just the other day we were celebrating her 1 year birthday. Here are some Ryleigh quotes to get you laughing:

"ring, mama, bling bling"
"how bout it"
"look at me"
"I need more kisses"
"look I got"
"wanna have some lip gloss, mama?"

And now here are a couple of photos to see how much baby girl has changed over the years :)

Summer!

Summer, to me, is when Jake is off work and we get a chance to go on a vacation. Well, we just got back from our summer vacation and let me tell ya,it was fun but I would not recommend traveling further than an hour away with a 3mth old and a 23mth old! Yikes - tiring but fun.

We got to see Bo for the first time in a long while and we visited DisneyLand and the San Diego Zoo!

For those of you that didn't see the snapfish I will post some pics below.

Now, we are 2 weeks away from summer ending. Jake starts back with coaching stuff at the end of this month and the girls start their first daycare on July 21st(Jake's bday). I am kinda sad - no, actually VERY sad that they are going to daycare but a working mom has to do what a working mom has to do. I'm finding myself calculating how many hours of "awake time" I am getting with them vs. how many hours of daycare time they will have each week. All I can do is pray that this is what the Lord wants for K and R and pray that he gives me strength each day to deal with it. Ok, I am off my soap box now and back to work. Just wanted to take a breather and post for a moment. Hope everyone is doing well and enjoying their summer!

That's all I got, how'd ya like that?