Happy Thanksgiving

I have only been away from home on Thanksgiving 2 other times. The first time I was in Sydney, Australia celebrating with my best friend, Abby. The second time Matt and I were in St.Louis and I was very pregnant with Emma Caroline. This was #3 and we are in Wichita Kansas celebrating with the Tappans. We may be in Kansas but we at least celebrated with Southern friends who make cornbread dressing. All jokes aside, we have been so blessed by our friendship with the Tappan family. God has always been faithful to provide us with good friends wherever we have lived and he has done that again with the Hugh and Beth. As Hugh prayed before we ate, God gave us new friends who have become family. The 3 little monkeys
A spread even my mama would have been proud of. There was so much food for only 9 people, we hardly put a dent in it.

New Haircut

Well, I have had it. I can't take it if one more person calls my little boy a girl. No matter how much blue clothing with trains, footballs, and animals I put on him, he is still called a she. So I did it and I didn't cry...... at least not at the salon. He looks cute, just so totally different. He aged before my eyes. OK, I need to stop typing before I start crying.

Great Big Turkey

So, I am rather proud of myself. I made these cookies for EC's Thanksgiving party and they turned out cute if I do say so myself. But if you ever decide to do this, buy your candy corn at Halloween. Because if you go looking for them the week of Thanksgiving you will be out of luck. Thanksfully, my kids had some left over and it was just enough. I also thought I would share a little song with you that I grew up hearing my mom sing. It is a family favorite:

There's a great big turkey on Grandpa's farm and he thinks he's very gay.
He can stretch his tail into a great big fan and strut around all day.
You can hear him gobble at the girls and boys
cause he thinks he's singing when he makes that noise.
He'll sing his tune another way
up on Thanksgiving Day.

Hot Apple Cider

A lady from my Bible Study brought a crockpot of cider one morning and I think I had 2 or 3 cups. It was wonderful. I LOVE cider but am always let down by the packets or store bought jugs of cider. This recipe is great. I actually half the recipe. Then after Matt and I drink a cup or 3 I pour the leftovers back into the apple juice jug and store in the fridge. Then all I have to do is warm it up a cup at a time in the microwave. Enjoy!!
1 gallon apple juice
2 cups pineapple juice
2 cups orange juice
6 Tbs lemon juice
7 whole cloves
2 cinnamon sticks
1 cup sugar
-Mix and simmer 20 minutes

Dragon Tales

So ever since Halloween, Knox has wanted to wear his Spiderman costume everyday. His "sissy" has about a dozen costumes to wear but unless he wants to be a princess he only has the one, Spiderman. I was telling this to a friend of mine and so she surprised me with this cute dragon costume for Knox. He wanted to put it on immediately. So what is up with that face, you ask? I have no idea. But he had the most pitiful look on his face the entire time he was wearing it. I kept asking if he wanted to take the costume off and he insisted, "NO". The next day he wanted to put it on again but this time no sad face. Who knows what goes through the mind of a 2 year old. Thanks, Julieanne, for the costume.

Oh, The Things They Say

So, I'm walking into Walmart this morning with Emma Caroline and Knox when we pass a place in the parking lot where someone had spilled an entire can of white paint. Emma Caroline saw it and loudly said, "Mommy, that is the biggest bird poop I have ever seen!" Oh my.

Another EC Update

I realized today that I never did post the final diagnosis on all of Emma Caroline's tests. After having CT scans, MRI, blood work and an upper GI she was diagnosed with Cyclical Vomiting Syndrome. I can't quite explain the range of emotions that went through me when I was told that. My first thought was "no duh". But that isn't nice to day to a doctor (right, Jonathan). I am, of course, so glad that it isn't something terrible. There are no tumors in the brain or tears in the stomach. But to go through all the pain, time and expense to find out that she just throws up from time to time is, well, a bit frustrating. But we got some new drugs and plan of attach for the next time it happens. If that doesn't help we will consider a daily medication. The best hope given is that this is not something rare and crazy. Our doctor treats other kids with this. Plus, she should grow out of it.

About the same time as all of these tests, EC had a new speech evaluation. That went really well. We have seen such improvement over the last year and she is doing really well in school. The speech therapist recommended 3 to 6 months of therapy just to "tweak a few things". But thinks that may be all she needs. We then had her parent teacher conference and it couldn't have gone better. All in all she is doing good and we are so happy to see her growing into such a sweet young lady. Thanks to everyone for your prayers and words of encouragement.

It's a boy!!!

For those of you that I have talked to about this baby, you will know that today was a shocking day for me. I have been so sure that this baby was a girl I even told people that I was going to have an ultrasound to confirm it was a girl. Imagine my surprise when we are told it is a boy. Matt actually spotted "it" before the lady told us. My first response was, "what"? I am thrilled to be having a boy, just surprised. Emma Caroline on the other hand was not so pleased. She has been saying since day 1 that she wanted it to be a girl. When I asked her if it would be OK if God gave us a boy and not a girl she said simply "no". But she enjoyed seeing the baby today and was easily appeased with the promise of going to Panera for lunch and having Sprite.
One of the coolest parts was getting to see the baby with the 3-D ultrasound. It was like looking right at him. That is the picture above. The ones below are the regular ultrasound. Sorry these aren't real clear but I don't have a scanner hooked up.
All in all the ultrasound went good. He looks to be healthy and growing as he should. Now the hard part starts...... deciding on a name.

Pumpkin Muffins

I got this recipe off the blog of a friend of mine here in Wichita. It looked too easy. My kids love muffins and EC keeps talking about pumpkin soup, pumpkin pie etc.... The problem is, Matt does not like pumpkin in any form or fashion so I thought this would be a great idea for us. The kids and I can eat the muffins and then I don't have tempting pumpkin pie sitting around my house calling out to me to eat it. So here is the recipe:
1 box yellow cake mix (or butter or whatever you feel crazy enough to try)
1 2/3 cups of Pumpkin Pie filling (NOT plain canned pumpkin)
-Mix the DRY cake mix and the PP filling together. The batter is thick, just keep stirring to get it all incorporated. Then fill muffin tins 2/3 full and bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.
Makes about 18 muffins.
THAT'S IT!!
If you wanted to jazz them up even more, you could add nuts or a cream cheese frosting. The other great thing is that the can of Pumpkin Pie filling has enough to make this recipe twice. We will be having these again next week. Thanks again for the recipe, Sharon!!

Fall Family Festival

This past Sunday was our church's Fall Family Festival. There was a car show (for those reading who don't live in Wichita, rebuilding old cars is a big thing here), face painting, pony rides, a petting zoo, lots of inflatables, a hay ride, prairie surfing (another one I should explain but won't do it now), a chili competition, bonfire and smores. It was a lot of fun and the kids (I'm including Matt in that - see below) had a blast.
You can't see it but this is EC and Knox sitting on a pony. EC took a ride and Knox said he wanted to do it too. I doubted him so when EC got back we just sat him up there. He immediately started yelling "no Mommy, no". So we got a quick picture and moved on.
Here is Matt in an intense competition with 2 other men in our church. If you want a good laugh, click on the picture to enlarge it and take a good look at their faces.

Trick-or-Treat

Here are my 2 cuties dressed up for some Trick-or-Treating. I was thrilled that EC wanted to be Snow White again (one less costume to buy) and that a friend gave us the Spiderman costume for Knox. Am I cheap or what? Actually, Knox was not at all interested in his costume and a little freaked out about the mask when we first got it. So I put him in front of the full length mirror and helped him put it all on and then wondered if I would ever be able to get him to take it off. I thought he was going to try and eat dinner with that mask on. He LOVED it. Honestly, I don't even know how he knows who Spiderman is. I think little boys are just born knowing that stuff.It was a fun night. Probably my best Halloween as a mom yet. We went to a friends house and ate dinner together and then the Daddys to all the crazy kids out while the Mommys stayed at the house to hand out candy (sitting in comfy chairs, eating candy, and having uninterrupted conversation - it's a tough job but someone had to do it.). But I am glad to report that the kids had a great time, were polite to other trick-or-treaters and said thank you. I'm so proud.