Whoopie!!

I have posted about my love of whoopie pies before, but I'm posting about it again. My mom gave me this cookbook last year for my birthday, and I am just getting around to using it. If you remember, we kinda had a major event happen the week of my birthday last year. You know, becoming parents. Anyway, at the time I looked through it, and then put it on the shelf with all the other cookbooks and stated busy being a mom.

Well, last week one of the blogs I read posted about making whoopie pies. It reminded me about my cookbook and made me really want to bake some. So I got out the book and looked through all of the recipes, and decided I would go with the original whoopie first. I made my list of ingredients I needed to purchase and Saturday afternoon while Michael took a nap (3.5 hours!!) I baked whoopie pies. They turned out so good. I used some cocoa I had in the pantry, but I'm thinking they might have turned out better if I had bought some new/fresh cocoa. Also, the icing had a little too much crisco in it for my taste. Next time I will cut that down and add more if need be. I can't wait to try some of the other favors in the cookbook. Like gingerbread or chocolate chip or jalapeño cornbread.

Thrift Store Friday

I've not had too much luck lately finding anything for Michael, but I have been able to find a lot of stuff for my nieces and nephew. And all of the clothes I find for my nephew I know will be passed down to Michael in a couple years anyway, so it works out good. There just seems to be a lot more girl clothes than boy clothes. And usually the girl clothes are in way better shape.
So, here is what I found this week:
- Super cute Old Navy Sweater - $1
- Red sparkle long sleeve shirt - $1
- Cute jeans with embroidery - $2
- Brand new Old Navy shirt - $1
- xhilaration jeans - $2
- OCI long sleeve shirt - $2
- Old navy swim trunks (for Michael) - $1

Then, I went to the thrift store again today and hit the mother load! I got a scrap booking storage bag that was completely full of scrapbook paper! You can see in the picture how tall the pile of paper is.
Price: $20!!
What a deal! I'm so excited about this buy. Now I just have to sort through it all to see exactly what the paper looks like.

You can check out the Miracle Hill Thrift Store Facebook page here:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Miracle-Hill-Thrift-Stores/198560993495720

Million Miles Designs

I opened up an etsy shop, and I would love for you to go take a look.

I'm selling prints for nursery's and Children's rooms. I can customize any of them to match your specific theme or color decor, just ask.  

Thanks for looking and Happy Shopping!

16 Months

Michael is growing and changing so much these days. His little personality is so fun, and he is in full blown toddler mode. Here is what he is up to:

- He runs everywhere and keeps me on my toes.
- His vocabulary is growing daily. Some of the new words he is saying are: No no, Mimi, Papa, Baby
He doesn't tell us no, he just repeats it when I tell him no, or he tells the dogs no, when they are licking him. It's very cute the way he says it. Also, if you ask him where the baby is, he points to himself.
- He knows where his head, eyes, nose, mouth, ears, belly, and toes are and can point to each of them when asked.
- He knows who Mickey Mouse is, and will point to him in pictures and to his stuffed Mickey. He has even tried to say Mickey a few times, but not consistently. We are really working on this one, since he will be seeing Mickey on the cruise in 3 weeks.
- He is eating like a horse. He eats all day, everyday. We will finish eating a meal, and within 5 minutes, he is signing the word eat to us. I'm happy that he has a good appetite and will eat most everything we give him. He does eat better for Andrew than he does for me. I will try to give him something and he won't take it, so I hand the fork to Andrew and when Andrew tries, Michael opens his mouth and takes a bite, and then asks for more.
- He is 26 pounds and getting harder to carry around. As far as how tall he is, if you lay him down and measure, he is 34 inches but when you stand him up and measure he is 31 inches. So, not quite sure how to measure him.
- He loves to help with the laundry and the dishwasher. Anytime he hears me open the laundry room doors, he comes running. He has the very important job of shutting the dryer door after I load the clothes in it. He loves to watch it fly up and slam shut. Same thing with the dishwasher. After I get it all loaded or unloaded he is there to help shut the door.
He is so much fun, and keeps us laughing all the time. We love him so much, and often, after he goes to bed at night, we sit and talk about how cute he is and what a sweet boy he is.

Thrift Store Friday

I found some great buys this week, but didn't find anything for Michael.
Here is what I found:
Girls Old Navy shirt (niece) - $1
Girls Old Navy pants (niece) -$1
Boys Old Navy shirt (nephew) - $1
Boys Oxford shirt (nephew) - $1
DVD (One Night With The King) - $1
Total spent - $5

Thanksgiving 2011

We had such a wonderful thanksgiving. We traveled with Andrew's family to Blue Ridge, GA again this year and spent 4 nights in a cabin together.

Thanksgiving day we went over to "uncle" Doug and "Aunt" Breda's house for a huge meal. There were close to 40 people there and we ate and ate and ate some more.

Friday morning, we went on the Santa Express again. Michael kinda knew what was going on, but still wasn't too excited. We saw Santa, Rudolph, and frosty the snowman. After the train ride, we ate lunch and then headed back to the cabin so Michael could take a nap. After his nap, we headed back over to spend time with the family at Doug and Brenda's.

Saturday we had an unexpected trip to get some new tires on the van. We knew we would need two new tires on the front, but didn't expect it would be so soon. So after we dropped off the van at Walmart, we went to lunch and than some shopping. After a couple hours, we went to pick up the van and headed back to spend some more time with the family.

Then we headed home on Sunday morning. It was a nice weekend spent with family and we are looking forward to doing it again next year.

Here are a ton of pictures from the weekend.

House Guest

For the past 5 days, my friend from college was here visiting. Kathleen and I have stayed in touch since college, but really haven't seen each other in almost 8 years.

It was so great to have her here and we had so much fun. We didn't do anything exciting, just hung out and kept doing life like normal. Michael loved her! Every time she was in the room, he was right next to her and trying to get her to hold him, or play with him. She did great with him, and I know he loved having her here. She also fell in love with Toby. Every time she would sit on the couch, both dogs would jump up to sit with her, but Toby stayed especially close.

We love you Kathleen, and you can come back anytime!

I have some more pictures, but these are the ones from my phone.

My New Ride...

Yep, we did it. We joined the mini van club. We've been looking for a new car for a while and finally decided to get a van. After looking, we found this one and got a killer deal on it. It's a 2003 Honda Odyssey. Yes, a little older but, it's a Honda and should last another 150k miles, at least. It has a DVD player and leather seats. It also has power doors, which will be great when I have my hands full with Michael. Looking forward to our first road trip in it next week.

Handprint Turkey Shirt

I wanted to make Michael a cute shirt for Thanksgiving so I started looking around and found this:
http://morganmoore.typepad.com/one_more_moore/2008/11/a-turkey-for-me-and-a-turkey-for-you.html
(sorry, blogging from my phone and I can't add link.)
I wanted to do it a little different so I searched how to appliqué, and found this great post. www.Girlythingsbows.com/applique_shirt.html
I knew I could do it, so I went to Joanne's to buy all of the needed supplies. I'm not going to write down all of the steps, since she did a good job of that already.

The hardest part of this project was getting a good handprint from Michael. It required help from Andrew to hold Michael still and his hand flat, while I traced it.

I love how it turned out and I can't wait for him to wear it on Thanksgiving day.

Girls Just Want to Have Fun

This past weekend, my friends and I spent a weekend in Charlotte, NC, away from our kids and husbands . We went to the southern Christmas show on Saturday and then to Ikea on Sunday.

It was such a nice relaxing time away with friends. We went to bed early and slept late. We went out to eat and didn't have to worry about entertaining a child or deal with feeding a little mouth. One of the best parts? We were able to go 48 hours without changing a single diaper. I love michael more than life itself, but sometimes it is just nice to get away with the girls and be able to relax.

Thanks so much to my wonderful husband, who stepped up and took wonderful care of Michael all weekend long. I know he was in wonderful hands, and I know they both enjoyed the time together. I love you and appreciate you so very much, Andrew.

I am so blessed to have these ladies in my life, and I love them all dearly.