Nine Months Down.

Nine. It's really blown by, especially this summer. Guess when you have three kids that's what happens. 

Jonathan is now nine months old and into everything. He crawls, eats, babbles, sleeps in his own bed, stands with help and is trying to pull up on his own! 😲 

As for the girls, they claimed major game around here when they wrestled a crocodile the other day. Ok, kidding. But I'm not kidding about the front one going into first and the back one starting kinder on Monday! I am going to miss the sweetness of this summer (but won't, for the record, and already don't, miss the hundred-million-degree heat). These two girls aren't babies anymore! 😢

This summer, as you're probably aware, a mobile game known as Pokèmon Go was launched and quickly exploded in popularity. I held off at first on downloading it until my two olders randomly began speaking of random Pokèmon around the house, without even knowing the game existed. 

Needless to say this game has become a staple in our household and the girls and I go on hunts as often as we can. 

I've connected with these girls way more that I could have ever imagined over a game! The Number One (pictured above) watches the show and collects the cards as well, and has taught me so much about the characters and the game.

Moral of the story? When something new comes along, run with it. You might just get a pleasant surprise out of it. And if not, keep trying. Life is full of these little surprises that have a way of jumping out at us and saying, "Hi, I'm here." Some you can ignore and put off, but others, no way. Be in the moment. 💕

October. Hi-bye!

I must've blinked too many times or something. Because here I sit, due date tomorrow with our little boy, still trying to grasp that it is now the end of October. 

Sister-in-law arrives Friday night (hopefully no weather interference- the forecast calls for tons of rain!) to help out for the week. Hopefully he makes his arrival before she leaves! 

J started kindergarten two months ago and is doing wonderfully. I just had my very first-ever parent-teacher conference on Monday! It was a bit scary not really knowing what to expect, but we breezed through it with a good report for Jessy and all my questions answered before I even asked them! 

I am now off-work until about three months after baby arrives. That's right. Three months. Paid. Time. With both the girls I did not get to experience paid leave , and with J was forced to return to work entirely too early, long before I was close to ready- physically or emotionally. Right now I'm sprinting my time getting the house ready (as much as I can; baby is so low this time it's difficult to get anything done!). Baby will sleep, for now, in mommy and daddy's bedroom in the bassinet used by his older sisters. He has a ton of clothes, diapers and a changing pad, among other things, all ready and awaiting his arrival. 

Some of the ladies at work threw me a surprise shower a couple of days before I left. So sweet! 

This will be little boy's first blanket...

...and his Christmas outfit!

Look at that cake. It was yummy!

...and the diaper cake!

And of course, his name! After much contemplation we decided on Jonathan Keith. It's a strong name that goes well with the sibling set of his, and the middle name is daddy's name. 

Let the perfection begin!

Slice and Dice Sunday- an Enchilada Story

Wash, wash, wash, chop, chop, chop. Cut, cut, cut, munch, munch, munch. It's been a slicing and dicing day in our household since I actually had a burst of energy. Knife went to carrot, lettuce, tomato and even watermelon. 

Perhaps I should say "knives," instead of knife, as my original one but the dust whilst carrot-chopping. 

Whoops. Thankfully I have many reinforcements at my beck and call that were able to help. 

Lunch and snacks were made for the next day. 

(In case you're wondering, the black and gray things are chia seeds.)

Next up was a delicious dinner in the oven. Since we had company over I decided to try my hand at another enchilada casserole. Having made it before, I remembered the basics of what I needed. Ground beef, enchilada sauce, onions, corn, black beans and of course good ol' tortillas!

I quickly began to piece everything together. 

Sauce and tortilla pieces (I used beef enchilada sauce and corn tortillas):

Then the (red) onions and beef:

Then I threw in beans and corn:

And I kept layering until I was finished. I them threw on some shredded cheese and covered with foil and placed the pie in the oven. 

Baked it for about 25 minutes and after that, I took off the foil and threw on more cheese, and baked for about another 5 minutes, and ended up with this:

It was a tad messy to scoop out and onto the plate, but very tasty! We tossed some fresh tomatoes, avocado and sour cream and very quickly devoured it. And my picky kids ate it as well!

This pie will definitely be consumed again, once this heat wave passes. 

Oh BOY! A bedroom makeover, of sorts.

Recent times have been occupied by our bouncing, rolling, kicking and punching baby BOY, and his bedroom is no exception. Granted, he probably won't be in it until he is about five or six months old, but I have a feeling time will be too fleeting to start getting it ready then.

I should probably disclaim this before we go any further, and advise that this is not a sponsored article; just all my opinion. I'm receiving no reimbursements from the maker of the product about which I am about to gush.

Our little Gummy Bear has taken over the Firecracker's bedroom, and the Firecracker is now back to sharing her room with the Snowflake, as they did in our old home. Surprisingly, they don't mind a bit! (They actually asked for it!) I'll take what I can get, though, if it makes life simpler. As an added bonus, our bedrooms are large enough to fit two twin-sized beds, two dressers and a book shelf, and the beds are not bunk beds.

Now, here's the bonus:
Firecracker's room used to be pink. And by pink, I mean BRIGHT pink on two walls and a more-subtle (but still obvious, not Pepto pink) shade on the other two. Most paints would require oodles of primer if not at least two or three coats of colored paint on top of that to cover bright or loud colors with a lighter color, but not our Behr Premium Plus Ultra!

However, to paint this room over to the start of the Gummy Bear's theme, this is only one coat of bright blue, on top of dark pink. No extra priming step needed as the primer is mixed right into the paint, making painting a breeze. One coat and some touch-ups later, the Gummy Bear's room is nearly complete!

Now, to add the furniture back in and get some decorations in there... We may do monkeys and trees here; it would be very fitting for this little tornado boy.

One coat, y'all. I think the Firecracker is just as excited as I am! 

~~CrazyMom

Eons gone by

Here we go again!! 

Has it been a while or what? I can't believe it's been six months since my last post- and that 2015 is nearly half-over. Whoa. 

Where to begin?

I'll start with our crazy-cold winter. Ok maybe not quite as cold as 2014's winter, as our highest gas bill was only in the $80's as opposed to the $140's. That said, we had a chance to go sledding, which rarely happens in Dallas! We bundled up, buckled up and carefully slid/drove up and down some hills over to a hill next to the middle school we live near, pulled out the hubs' old childhood sled and let it rip! I didn't get any pics of the sweeties sledding as I was busy running up and sledding down with them, but suffice to say we got in a good workout. 

The girls ended up enjoying it thoroughly but we're ready to go home pretty quickly. But not before I grabbed some cool snow pics. 

Snowflake, as seen on the rear side window of our car. Taken with an iPhone 5s. 

As was this one. 

But it's probably a good thing we didn't run around too much, as a big surprise was in store for us the next day. 

Here we go again!! Baby Gummy Bear is due 10/28. Assuming baby cooperates, we will find out if our newest tornado is a lad or a lass next month. 

We are very excited! 2015 is turning out to be an exciting year for us.