Tagged by Adam

I still have tons of pictures to post from Emmas school program and her field trip to the Teddy Bear clinic but, Adam has tagged me to a post. So, here it goes.

Ten Things I've Learned From Being a MOM

1. I can clean all day and the house be just as messy as when I started.

2. Therefore, I can skip a day to play and not be any worse off than the day before.

3. My mother knew way more than I thought she did.

4. I like my self more at the end of the days that I took the time to give her the princess hair do to go along with the costume.

5. All kids hate a spit shine as much as I did.

6. Single moms don't get the credit that they deserve.

7. Little girls need their daddy's maybe more than their moms and Adam does a great job of filling this role.

8. Waking up in the middle of the night to feed the baby is an honor, not a chore.

9. It seems as if a year passes about as quickly as a month.

10. Having a child is having your heart walk around on the outside of you.



Ok, now I tag, Julie,Susan,Becky,Hannah

Five Months

Every month when I make this post, I marvel at how fast time is flying. It's bitter sweet. I can't wait to see who she becomes but I'm sad that she's growing so quickly. Just in time for her five month mark, Chloe has began to roll over. She is also babbling what sometimes sounds like words. She has a smile that will steal your heart.

Kids Say the Darndest Things Update

I have lots of pictures to update but not lots of time. So, I'll get to those soon. But, it's been a while since I've done a post including some of the funny things that Emma has said and I've forgotten a couple of them so I wanted to get these down before I forget them too.

Emma loves getting mail. She anxiously waits to get the mail every day. The other day, we had received a bulletin from our old church. Emma asked if it was for her. I told her that it was kind of for the whole family and that she could open it if she liked. She opened it and looked at it and then said, "well, this doesn't interest me at all".

She also has a new favorite song. I'm assuming from the words that the title must be "When the Spanks Come Marching In" At first, I thought that maybe this song was a critique of my discipline. However, when I asked her what a spank was, she informed me that she wasn't sure because they were extinct.

Chloe News

Chloe was five months old yesterday. I will post a 5 month update complete with picture soon.

Blessings!

Recipes

Thank you all for the recipe contributions. I also had a couple e-mailed and even someone tell me at church that they had some good ones. I have my grocery list ready. I'm going to try some of these out and then I'll report back to you all in a week or so and let you know how they went. Also, let us know if you try any that you saw here. I also took a look at the websites that were mentioned. They are really good websites so I'll be trying some from there eventually. www.kraftfoods.com is a great one. They've got weekly menu's planned out where all the ingredients will fit in one grocery bag and you can even print a grocery list. Other websites that I've used for recipes are. www.recipegoldmine.com and www.campbellskitchen.com.

And here, are a couple of my faking baking recipes. I laugh every time someone asks me for one of these recipes because I know they are about to find out my secret.

This is Emma's favorite. Many people already know this one.

Poppy Seed Chicken Casserole (except I never use the poppy seed so maybe I should change the name)

Ingredients:
Four chicken breasts
2 cans of cream of chicken soup
8 oz container of sour cream
ritz crackers
tablespoon of butter

Boil chicken, drain and cool and cut or pull into small pieces. Cover the bottom of a casserole dish with the chicken. Mix soup and sour cream together. Cover with crumbled crackers. Melt the butter and pour over the crackers.

Bake at 350 degrees for around 20 minutes or until it bubbles just a little.


Breakfast Casserole

Ingredients:
Unbaked crescent rolls, Walmart brand is fine.
Sausage
1 dozen eggs
1 bag of shredded cheddar cheese

Brown sausage. Spray the bottom of a casserole dish with cooking spray. Cover bottom of dish with crescent rolls laid flat. Add sausage. Whip all 12 eggs together and spread over that. Bake at 350 until the egg is firm. Take out of oven and add shredded cheese. Cook for five more minutes to melt cheese.

Keep them coming guys. Thanks to everyone!

Blessings!

January 2008

Ok, so I'm in a rush to get some pictures posted because my mom's going to my Aunt Nancy's tonight so she can see all the pictures and videos that I've posted. They live so far out in Easta Boga that they only just recently made DSL available in their area. So, when I go visit, I'm going to get her set up. Can't wait till we see you mom. Enjoy the pictures! We love You!

The following are random pictures from January:



This day, she fell asleep in the jumparoo. I was sitting there watching her and she would wake up and jump a little and then drift off again. It was really funny



Sunday morning before church outfits by Aunt Denise. Unfortunately, Chloe's didn't make it to church due to an explosion.
Now if I can just train her to do the laundry
She knows she's living the easy life



Another Sunday morning before church outfits courtesy of the Aunts. Emma's- Aunt Denise, Chloe's -Aunt Jan.

We had a couple of unseasonably warm days and by warm I mean 60 degrees but hey, we'll take what we can get. We were starved for vitamin D so we spent lots of time out doors those two days. We even had our friends the Lombard's over to cook out. I'm ready for spring!!




Four month pictures



At this point when I was taking her pictures, she just looked up at the ceiling and started dying laughing. I don't know, I think she has an angel.

Calling All Cooks- Or not

Since we had a baby in the fall and then launched into the holidays, My lack of sleep and our crazy lives of ministry and traveling had gotten us into some bad habits. One of those bad habits was eating out. Once the meals stopped coming from church and my mom's club (which by the way was wonderful, they just kept them coming and coming). It seemed that it was always time for Chloe to eat when I should have been cooking or whatever so since it was so easy, Adam would run and grab something and so the story goes... Well as most everyone knows, this is not good for our health nor my budget. And since I'm trying to play catch up to cover the cost of all the hospital stays and every item that we owned breaking last year, I have banned eating out at least for a little while. One day, I'd like to compile a recipe book of easy recipes and call it, "Spend Your Time With Your Kids Not In the Kitchen" because I've kind of become the queen of what I call "fake baking" and I'm not talking about the tanning bed. I have compiled a few recipes that make me look like I'm a fairly decent cook when in fact, I'm horrible at it. But, the few recipes that I have are slowly burning us out. I burnt Adam out on spaghetti before we were even married. If I find something that I can cook that doesn't taste horrible, I tend to run it in the ground. Anyway, this is what I would like us to do: In the comments, leave your easiest, my family loves it recipe. Casseroles, crock pot meals, anything; even cooking tips! If you have time, leave more than one. Then, hopefully we all can help each other out! I' ll come back later and leave the ones that work for me. And believe me, if I can cook it, anyone can!

Blessings

Emma as Barbie Island Princess

Since I recently gave Chloe some air time, I thought I would make sure I was fair and give Emma some air time also. We are huge Barbie Island Princess fans at our house. Seriously, Barbie has really improved her image. She is no longer the snob with the unattainable figure that we envied we were young. She now has a wider waist and smaller umm... chest. Of course she's still beautiful but come on, what little girl wants to play with an ugly doll. Anyway, her movies portray, love, loyalty and friendship. So come on, give Barbie a second chance. I forgive you Barbie!

So in honor of our reinvented friend, Emma sings Barbie Island Princess. I'm thinking that she should probably keep pursuing her dream career of being a doctor. This will make for some good black mail somewhere down the road.

VICKS VAPOR RUB ON FEET TO STOP COUGHING

I recently got an e-mail explaining that if you had a persistent cough, that you could put Vicks Vapor Rub on your feet and the cough would stop. Well, Emma has a cough so I decided I would try this little beauty out. As I was putting it on her I told her that the worst that could happen was that she'd get a foot massage. She looked at me like my hair was on fire but agreed that it felt nice. She was coughing about every minute. I rubbed VVR generously on her feet and sure enough... About five minutes later, the cough was gone and she was sleeping soundly. I don't understand the science of it but hey... it's worth a try.

Blessings,
Dana

What Does the Perfect Church Look Like?

I wanted to share with you a piece of a blog post from a fellow blogger. So... introductions first... Alexis: Alexis was one of the first students to approach me when Adam and I began our ministry at the church we worked with in Florida. She approached me with such confidence and I remember immediately thinking how beautiful she was (she still is). Unfortunately, Alexis' family moved and she was unable to stay with us for her Senior year. However, in the short time that we were there together, I got to know her fairly well. After being her room mate on several different trips (mission trips, camp etc), I learned quickly that she was beautifully complex and quite more than a pretty face. After moving, she came back and visited and even stayed at our house a time or two and we've some how managed to get in and at of touch since we've been living at two opposite ends of the country. She is now no longer a beautiful teenager but a beautiful adult. Having said that, what I'm about to share with you doesn't surprise me at all but I thought it was quite beautiful and definitely worth passing on. I realize that I've used the word beautiful several times here but that's just the word that keeps coming to mind.

So here's the set up. On her blog, Alexis asked friends to ask her any question with the promising of answering. My question was something to the effect of, "In your mind, what would the perfect church look like?" This was her answer.



I read a story once about a man that was allowed to see both heaven and hell, guided by an angel. The angel took the man to hell first, where all the people were at a long table piled high with scrumptious, delicious looking food. But because all the people were chained and heavily shackled, they couldn't eat and looked absolutely miserable, skinny and starving. So then the angel took the man to heaven, where he saw the exact same thing, people at a big feast chained together. But this time all the people were laughing and smiling and full of joy, everyone looked healthy. The man told the angel he didn't understand, what made the people in heaven different so that they had such joy despite the chains and shackles? The angel told the man he needed to look closer. When the man did so, he saw that the chains allowed the people to feed the person next to them and everyone served their neighbor at the table, so everyone got to eat their fill. That's what I think of when I think of the perfect church, everyone serving one another and not consumed with themselves. Where the focus isn't on programs and "supposed to." A place that is really accepting and open...and not political. And everyone would be unafraid to bring their song, their words, their gifts to the table for worship because no one would say that they weren't allowed to use what they have as an act of glorifying God. It would be cool.

Amazing question...a little tough though!

Alexis, thanks for sharing. I agree, that would be very cool!

Blessings,
Dana

Our Bouncing Baby Girl

This gives new meaning to a bouncing baby girl. If you know me very well, you know that I love garage sales. I seriously have a problem buying stuff in stores because I always think I can find whatever item at a yard sale for like 10% of the price. Well, this was the best garage sale find ever. I had planned on getting Chloe a "Jumparoo" for her first Christmas because they are like $70 but, before she was even born, I found one at a yard sale for $12. She loves it. At the time we took this video, this had gone on for like an hour. Enjoy!!