Trees of Christmas 2010

Okay, here are the pics from our outing yesterday to the Trees of Christmas. It was totally empty when we were there (and I was so thankful because I was afraid a busload of schoolkids might be there). So, my kids literally had the "run" of the place...and oh, did they run! Anytime my kids find any relatively wide open space then they go nuts running around.


This is when we first got there, and Luke's already off and running! So hard to get pictures!



Taking a moment to ponder the beauty of the trees.




This upside-down tree was Owen's favorite!







Luke was very fascinated by the roping.







Last ditch effort to get a good pic of both boys together. Sigh, maybe next year:)

Trees of Christmas Past

When Owen was a baby, I started the tradition of taking him to see the local "Trees of Christmas" display in our town. It's nothing elaborate, maybe 20 small trees. But, every year it's a different theme, and it's a great way to start of the Christmas season. Today I'm taking both boys. Last year I didn't take Luke, so this will be his first time. We'll see if I can get any good photos! Anyway, thought it would be fun to revisit the pictures from our past trips. Enjoy!




Owen in 2006



Owen in 2007



Owen in 2008




Owen in 2009

This year's pictures to come soon!

Yummy Chicken Noodle Soup Recipe (and Easy!)

Over the Thanksgiving holiday, my sister-in-law Jennifer passed along a great chicken noodle soup recipe to me. It is so yummy and so easy! Be forewarned--it makes a ton of soup so you may want to halve the recipe!

8 cups chicken stock (not broth!)
6 1/2 cups uncooked wide egg noodles (I use no yolk kind)
2 cans cream of chicken soup
cut-up chicken (I use rotisserie chicken from grocery store)
1 cup sour cream

Boil noodles in stock, do not drain...
Add cream of chicken soup and chicken. Heat until heated through.
Remove from heat...add sour cream...
and yum it up!

Luke at 15 months

I can't believe how fast my baby boy is growing up! He turned 15 months on Sunday.





--Wearing mostly 24 month clothes
--Not sure how much he weighs. I'm guessing around 25 pounds. I think he has actually LOST weight since his 12 month appointment. He's getting pickier and pickier about food.
--Constantly on the move! Running, climbing, crawling, bouncing, you name it! Which, of course, means he's constantly getting hurt. He's either tripping over something, falling into something, smashing his fingers, etc. So glad the Lord made these toddlers with tough noggins!
--Starting to jabber a lot but not really saying actual words. However, he LOVES to point at things and have you tell him what they are called. Especially in books. All of a sudden, he's obsessed with books and will bring them to you all day long and want you to read it to him.




--Luke LOVES clocks! Everywhere we go he will point them out and gets very excited.
--Still takes 2 naps a day and sleeps about 8-9 hours at night. Usually, the last half of the night is spent in our bed, and then you're up for the day about 5 am.
--You can clap, wave bye-bye, and know the signs for bath, light, and stars.
--You are the happiest when you're playing outside or in the bathtub splashing. You are the fussiest in the car. We dread taking you for car rides longer than 15-20 minutes because you just pitch a fit and scream no matter what. Sometimes snacks help, but anytime we try to give you a toy you just immediately throw it down with all your might!




--Oh, and Luke loves flowers! Every time he sees a picture of one in a book he will sniff and pretend to smell it. So cute!

Fall Family Pictures

We hadn't taken any formal family pictures since Luke was born. In fact the last time was when Owen was 2, so it was time! We met the photographer at Cannonsburgh in Murfreesboro on a beautiful fall afternoon. The boys loved running around and exploring everything. Owen was shy for the first 15 minutes and then he became a real ham! Luke was the troublemaker. We could not get that child to stand still and look at the camera, much less smile, for anything! So, I was shocked at how beautiful the pictures turned out! Christina always does a fantastic job, and I think she is amazing. Anyway, she sent me a preview of some of the pictures, so enjoy!

I'm Happy Today

When I'm out and about with the kids in the van, I often find myself singing church or devotional songs to pass the time. One of my favorites is "I'm Happy Today." Well, yesterday I caught Owen singing it with me, so when we got home I decided to video him singing it. And, of course, Luke couldn't be left out of the fun so he makes an appearance near the end of the video as well.

Been Meaning to Blog...

I won't even try to recap what we've been up to for the last month or so since I last blogged. Seems like every day is a whirlwind of dishes, dirty diapers, and, uh, playdates. Sorry, I couldn't keep the alliteration going there. Anyway, several times as I'm just drifting off to sleep, I'll think "Oh, I should blog about such and such..." and then I never make it past that thought. So, here are a few things (that I can think of right now) that I've been meaning to blog about.

--Found this great new website with recipes for moms.

Easy Meals for Moms

So far I've made the chicken salad and the tilapia. Both were very good and very easy! Next, I'm going to make the Tex Mex Slow Cooker Chicken.

--Preschool starts in 1 week! Hallelujah! This will be Owen's final year in preschool. He'll be in the 4 1/2 class and goes 2 days a week. I'm going to send Luke 1 day a week. He'll either be in the nursery or toddler class. He's kind of in that in-between stage. I'm so looking forward to having some free time again! I feel like the house has been piling up around me all summer, and maybe now I'll have the time and energy to tackle some of the clutter and to actually clean.

--SLEEP!!!! We are finally getting some sleep around here! Yay! Once we weaned Luke off the bottle, he's been doing much better at night. Still not perfect, but better. He goes to bed around 8:00, usually starts fussing and stirring around midnight or so and then he sleeps the rest of the night in our bed till about 5 or 6 am. I can't tell you the difference this makes in our sanity around here. We are all much happier people.

--Family pictures--I've scheduled us to get family pics made in about a month and I'm already stressing about it! What to wear? I hate to go out and buy us all new outfits, but I don't know if we have anything already that will coordinate. Plus, I'm wondering how Luke will do. He is Mr. Busy! He won't stand still for a second!

--Can't think of anything else right now and I must tackle the dishes before Luke wakes up. Oh, and I'm reading Cold Sassy Tree for the first time! We have book club on Thursday so I'm in a race to finish it before then. Very good so far!

Luke's 1st Birthday: A Polka-dot Pool Party

Yes, my baby boy turned 1 this past weekend! I wish I could say I was sad to see the baby days pass by, but I love the toddler stage much more than the baby stage. I'm ready to say bye-bye to bottles for sure! Anyway, we had our families over to celebrate the occasion on Saturday night. Oh, and we had 2 other birthday parties to attend this same weekend as well! Whew, can you say TIRED?



Luke Thomas in his "1" shirt


The theme of the party was polka dots. I loved his cake!



Grandma Joan feeding the birthday boy some icing. We attempted to put him in his high chair to do the traditional "smash cake" thing, but he was NOT having that at all. I had conveniently forgotten that this time of day was Luke's fussiest time of day....


Luke also had absolutely no interest in his presents! We tried to open a few, but he kept running off and then crying when we brought him back. So I opened the rest for him later. He got lots of great new toys, which he has been enjoying immensely today.


Once dinner, cake, and presents were over, we let all the kids outside to splash in some pools in the backyard. This was definitely Luke's favorite part of the party! He loves water!



See those chunky legs:) Any guesses on what he'll weigh at his 1-year check-up this week?


Owen and his cousins had a blast playing outside. I think their favorite activity was sliding down into one of the pools.



Cousin Kaeley, Luke, and Owen


SPLASH!!!

11 Months

This blue-eyed, "big-un" (as we call him) is now 11 months old. To mark the occasion, Luke decided to start WALKING!!!! I stood there stunned as he sauntered (okay, really toddled) all the way across the living room. He's still crawling 80% of the time, but he's getting more confident with walking every day. And, boy, is he BUSY! He never sits still at all. He's constantly moving and getting into everything. Sometimes I have to contain him, so I put him in his playpen, which illicits shrieks of displeasure. He really hates it, but sometimes it's necessary just so I can eat lunch or do something for Owen.

Here's a few other tidbits about Luke at 11 months:

--Wearing size 4 diapers, but getting very snug, will have to move up soon
--Weighed 24 pounds, 4 ounces at last weight check 2-3 weeks ago
--Had his first ear infection last month
--Has 2 teeth
--Still not talking much. His response to pretty much everything is "DA!"
--Down to 1 bottle at night now. Takes it around midnight and then is awake for the day around 4 or 5 am

Lullaby and Goodnight

This post is for all those sleep-deprived parents out there. I soooo feel your pain! I have two boys, neither of which would I call "a sleeper." Especially as babies. Now, my 4-year-old has very much improved. He still takes a good 2 hour nap on most days, and once he's asleep at night he will normally stay asleep all night and wake up for the day around 6:30 am. However, as an infant he was terrible. Even at 2 years old, there were several months were he would only go to sleep if we laid down with him in the floor and then he'd wake up several times in the night and we'd go back and dutifully lie down in the floor till he fell back asleep and then sneak out (yes, I know, that's crazy!), but we did whatever we had to do to get any sleep.

Well, then we had our second son. Everyone promised "Oh, he'll be the opposite of Owen. He'll definitely be a sleeper. He'll be sooo easy!" Wrong, wrong, wrong. In fact, he's worse. He's now 10 1/2 months old, and we're still lucky if we can piece together 4-5 hours of sleep a night. I've decided my kids are just not sleepers and there's not anything that can be done except to just get through it. So, I decided I'd post a timeline of a typical night at our house. I know that someday my boys will be teenagers and will have to be drug out of bed. So, then I can look back at this and remember how bad it was and appreciate how good I"ll have it then! And, all you parents out there whose kids ARE "sleepers," be thankful and count your blessings!

The Night of June 14, 2010
(Owen-4 years old, Luke-10 1/2 months old)

7:00 pm-Buck takes Luke to his room to give him his bottle and put him to bed.

7:50pm-Buck emerges and declares Luke is finally down for the night (ha!)

8:15pm-I take Owen to his room to read bedtime stories

8:30pm-I leave Owen in his room to play and promise to check on him later.

8:55pm-My first attempt at laying down and going to sleep

9:00-Owen comes and informs me he's ready to be covered up

9:10-Owen is back because he's afraid of monsters. I check for monsters. Then, he needs a drink of water. Then, I cover him up again.

9:20-Owen's back AGAIN to inform me he changed himself into different pajamas. Yeah, yeah, whatever. I instruct him to go back to bed.

9:30-I vaguely recall Owen in our room yet again. I punch Buck and tell him to take care of him this time. I think a stern warning was given, and Owen finally stays in his room and goes to sleep.

10:30pm--I think Buck got up once because Luke was crying on the monitor. Paci was given and Buck returned to bed.

11:55pm-I hear Luke stirring on the monitor and know it's about time for his bottle. (Yes, we still give him a bottle at night. Bad, bad, I know.) I wake Buck up to go check on him and I go fix a bottle. Buck feeds him and I go back to bed.

12:45 am-Buck returns to bed after putting Luke back down.

***Now I'm on "duty" with Luke. Buck takes care of him if he wakes up until 12 or so and then he's mine until 5am.

1:30 am-Luke starts crying. I give him his paci. Readjust covers. Watch to make sure he's okay for a minute and then stumble back to bed.

2:30am--Same thing as before. Paci, covers, back to bed.

3am-Luke sits up in bed and cries looking around the room. Now, I'm in trouble. If he ever, sits up or stands up, he becomes wide awake very quickly and won't go back to sleep. I scoop him up and put him in our bed next to me, where he sleeps blissfully for an hour.

4 am-Luke starts knocking around in our bed and keeps sitting up and saying "Uh, huh, Uh". I scoop him back up again and return to his room, where I rock him for an hour.

5 am--Luke is wide awake. He won't let me rock him anymore. He's now officially up for the day. I wake Buck up, give Luke to him, and return to bed. I sleep till 6:15 am and then have to get up because Buck's got to go to work and both boys are now awake and ready for breakfast.

So, that's a typical night at the Baskins.

What's for Dinner

Here's the recipe for my family's latest favorite meal, Baked Ziti. I'm always on the look-out for meals that are easy to prepare and kid-friendly. This one was both, so I thought I'd share.


Baked Ziti

Ingredients:
1 box ziti noodles
1 can spaghetti sauce
1 can alfredo sauce
1 Cup shredded cheese
*Can add 1 lb browned ground beef, sausage, or meatballs

Directions:
Boil noodles. Mix alfredo sauce and spaghetti sauce together. Add noodles. Pour into baking dish, top with cheese. Bake for 20 minutes at 350.

Our Month in Review

Well, May is almost over, and this is my first blog post of the month! Here's a little recap of what our family has been up to.

--Luke turned 10 months old a few days ago. At his 9 month appt, he weighed almost 23 pounds!

His favorite thing to do right now is pull up on everything-the oven, the trashcan, toilet, etc. And then of course gum all over whatever he's pulled up on. I feel like I am constantly chasing him around just to keep him safe. It's exhausting, but I know it'll probably be worse once he's walking.


And he loves outside! He gets so jealous and mad when Owen gets to go outside to play and he's kept indoors.



--At the beginning of May, we bought a new truck (well, not "new" exactly, but new to us). We said goodbye to Buck's Dodge Dakota of the last 7 years and got a Ford Sportrac. Now, he can fit both kids' car seats in his truck, which is a huge plus.




--Summer is officially here for the Baskin family. How can you tell? Well, Owen's preschool is over till the fall (sniff, sniff), and another big sign of summer is blowing up the inflatable pool!




--I celebrated my first Mother's Day as the mother of 2 children. Here's me and the kids posing in front of the peonies.





--Last, but not least, Buck and I celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary on the 25th. We took a trip to the Smokies and left the kids with the grandparents. It was wonderful! We saw 2 movies (Babies documentary and Ironman 2), ate out a lot, did some shopping, took a nap, and toured the new Titanic museum. It was so hard to come back to reality after all that fun. We're already planning what we should do on our 10th anniversary. The countdown starts now...



This was one of our new favorites of the trip--Mama's Farmhouse Restaurant. And, yes, I asked, apparently there really is a "Mama" that it's named after.



This was the Titanic museum. It just opened a few weeks ago, so the lines to get in were crazy! We got there at 9 am when it opened, and it was sold out till noon. You have to "board" at certain times. We liked it okay. Definitely not something we could have done with the kids.



And, here's the flowers Buck sent me on Tuesday, our actual anniversary date.


I'll try to do better in June and post more frequently. However, I make no promises!

My Nine-month-old Chunky Monkey

On Saturday Luke turned 9 months old! He's been going through the milestones like crazy lately. Got his first pair of shoes, his first tooth is finally starting to break through, and he even climbed the stairs for the first time the other day! Not sure how much he weighs, but I know he is HEAVY! Taking him and Owen to the doctor tomorrow for checkups.



Still not progressing much past pureed baby food. Anytime we try giving him something chunkier he gags and throws up. Not fun for anyone! He can't even eat the puffs that dissolve in your mouth. I mean, c'mon! I hope he gets over this soon.

Below I posted a picture of Luke and of Owen both at 9 months so you can compare. Everyone always tells me "Oh, he looks JUST like Owen!". I definitely see similarities, but I think Luke looks a lot different personally. They both have the crazy hair that sticks up all over their head, but Owen's face was much longer and Luke's seems more round-shaped.




Luke in the playpen at 9 months (He's lovin' it, right?)


Owen in the playpen at 9 months

Easter 2010

Okay, this first pic is not really Easter-related, but I had to post it because it's so cute of Owen with his new scooter. He got it for his birthday.





Luke, looking a little loopy, in his Easter bunny ears




Getting ready to hunt eggs at Gran's house on Saturday




Luke at 8 months on Easter Sunday





Hope everyone had a great Easter!

Happy Birthday Times Three

March is all about birthdays for our family. Buck and I both celebrated our 32nd birthdays this month, and Owen just had his 4th birthday a few days ago. Of course, the grown-ups don't get as much fanfare for their birthdays. I made a cake for Buck, and he bought one for me. Presents were exchanged. It was nice, but Owen couldn't understand why there wasn't more hoopla. On the day of Buck's birthday, Owen informed me he would have to be absent from preschool today because he didn't want to "miss all the fun." He seemed perplexed when I explained Daddy was going to work like always and he would indeed be going to preschool:)

However, Owen's birthday was a much bigger deal!


Can you tell Luke is excited about Owen's birthday?




Owen had a party at the Bounce Barn. Pizza and cupcakes were eaten, kids bounced, Mommies chatted, and fun was had by all.




Unfortunately, Owen got very sick the night after his party. Luckily, it was just a 24 hour stomach bug and he recovered very quickly. Still, it was a bummer. We had to postpone his family birthday dinner from Saturday till Monday night.



Here's my boy on his actual birthday. That night we got together with family at my parent's house for dinner, cake, and presents.



Here's Owen getting ready to blow out the candles on his Curious George cake. Anyway, I think we're all partied out around here. Thank goodness Luke's birthday is a few months off so we can recover.

On the Move...

My boys are keeping me very busy these days. Seems like life just keeps getting more and more hectic. And, now I'm very afraid for my sanity, because Luke is officially CRAWLING!!! He's been "sort of" crawling for weeks, but in the last few days he literally took off and is now all over the house. So, now I'm hearing lots of "Hey, Luke, that's mine!". Can you guess who is saying that? Hmmm.


Here he is crawling out of his room.



Oh, and he also discovered how to sit himself up as well. Looks pretty proud, huh?



Time for a silly face:)