Spiffy new duds

Hmm, looks like the helmet is having issues,

after getting adjusted again, he is still having pin

point red spots, not good…..

New high chair!

Loving sitting up high!

Still not a fan of the cereal though

And baby has graduated to bigger carseat

Looking pretty spiffy kid!

And teether binki

Looks like it tastes good

Shaped like a blackberry!

Apple Pie

Finally finished!  Only took me two days…..

First I had to sort, wash, peel, core, and slice a bag of apples

Then I had to make the butter crust, it needed to chill over night

Nick bought me a pie pan yesterday!

Yummy gooey filling, mostly sugar

Pouring the filling over top, Tristan looks excited!

All ready to bake

And an hour later….

Voila! Tasty, buttery apple pie

All American

Ok I'm going to bake an apple pie.  I'll let you know how it goes in a bit!!

First time using a baby spoon

Today, we tried rice cereal for the first time. Haha, I'm pretty sure he didn't like it, because most of it cam dribbling down his chin.  Then 5 minutes in he started screaming and throwing himself backwards out of his bumbo.  It didn't help that I had to hold him upright as well.....he is getting better.  He can sit up by himself for like 30 seconds, then he crumples over.  Tummy time is getting a little better too, he is rolling all over the place, back to front, front to back. I leave him facing one direction, come back and he's completely turned around.  I can't wait till he starts crawling and stuff.  We really need to work on his arm strength so he can pull himself up on things.  So that has been my main thing the last week, working on him holding himself up with his arms.

He was super cute today before his nap, I gave him his singing seahorse and he pulled it over to himself and cuddled it to sleep.  Cutest thing I've ever seen.  He is also very interested in his surroundings all of a sudden.  Nick was explaining something to me with a packet of paper, and Tristan kept trying to grab it.  He also likes to roll to the foot of our bed and grab onto the metal bars with his hands and feet, what a monkey!

Nana (Nick's mom) sent a package of Halloween treats today, and in it she sent an outfit for Tristan.  It's a little shirt and pants with a monster on it, very cute, but a tad too long.  He'll grow into it soon enough though the way he has been going!!  He is a big baby.  He will be 6 months next week, how insane is that???  I can't believe how fast my little baby is growing up!

Complete Success!

Zucchini boat dinner was amazing.  Nick said "I have absolutely no complaints about that!  It's great!"  And, he said my cinnamon rolls were exactly like cinnabons.  He liked them soo much he called Will to tell him to come home to try them.  Wow, I feel awesome.  They even tasted great blended.  Ah, I feel so accomplished, started cooking around 5, finished up around 8.  And I even did all the dishes.  Not bad for being sick, eh?  Good thing all the germies got cooked out.  (or at least I'm going to pretend they did......)

Tristan gets to go in again on Thursday for another helmet adjustment.....so exciting.  I took it off yesterday to give him his break, and his head smelled like feet.  No surprise there, it's been stinking with the helmet.  But he had some scabs on his cheek where the pad is and there was discharge on the pad.  So I called his doctor, and he wants to see him to have it adjusted.  If he develops any sort of infection, he can't wear the helmet, and that delays treatment.  So we're trying to get all the kinks sorted out as quick as we can so he can wear it for the 3 months he needs to before his skull won't respond to the pressure therapy the helmet provides.  I'm sure we'll get it right this time!

Ricotta stuffed Zucchini

Just out of the oven

Moist and gooey goodness!

Crazy lady, I'm naming her Azula

Big boy (Nick has yet to name)

Nice calm pretty lady (still no name as well...)

Long Night

Ulgh,

I hate being sick.  Here I am, again, awake at 6 in the morning.  Well, I guess that's pretty normal for me actually, but I didn't go to bed until 2.  Last night I didn't sleep at all.  I just laid awake, staring at the clock.  It sucks when you can't take a dang thing for your congestion, and the fact that you can't breathe is keeping you from falling asleep.  Nick said we could switch to formula, but I thought that was a little silly for a cold.  After all, I have made it 6 months even though a lot of it has been a struggle.  Oh, for those of you who don't know, antihistamines and decongestants can dry up your milk supply.  And I don't really want to risk that one.  So instead I'm snuffing saline spray which isn't really working and coughing up my lungs.  And Tristan, just woke up.

He was really cute before he fell asleep this morning though.  I had the hiccups, and apparently it was funny because he was just giggling his little butt of at me.  Which of course made me laugh and perpetuated my hiccups even more.  I decided to try his light mobil, but he got so excited about the colorful pictures he started screaming.  So that one didn't work.  I put new batteries in his singing seahorse, but that didn't work either, he just wanted to play with it.  Finally I stuck him in the bed next to Nick to fall asleep, which he eventually did around 2 AM.  Then after I took another hour to fall asleep, the little booger woke up at 5:30.  Fair?  Not so much.

Nick and I did go grocery shopping last night, and he bought me a thing of brown sugar.  So as soon as I've at least gotten a nap, I'm going to go bake some cinnamon rolls.  He also got me a thing of ricotta cheese, which I'm excited about, because I'm going to be making spinach stuffed zucchini for dinner.  Man, I'm thinking about going vegetarian.  Cooking with fresh produce is sooo much easier than working with nasty dead meat.  I don't have to disinfect everything after chopping up an eggplant like I have to with a piece of chicken.  Of course, Nick wouldn't like that too much, haha, so we keep eating meat.  "What do you mean he don't eat no meat????  Oh, ok, that's ok, I make lamb."

Now I shall go attempt to make Tristan sleep.  He's laying on the bed making his "ehhhhhhh" noise, which can go on for hours.

Cake bites, yea I've been nibbling…..

Playing on the floor

See, I told you you were sleepy!

But something is too funny to fall asleep

He will lay there for hours making this silly noise,

no idea why, you'd think he'd get tired of it but he sure doesn't

Pudding makes everything better

My secret baking weapon?

Pudding.

You can add it to anything!  Cookies, brownies, cakes, breads, it makes amazing cinnamon rolls as well.  Ever had a pistachio flavored cookie?  It's fabulous.  This past week we had a family dinner before my mom went home to Alaska.  I was in charge of dessert.  I always get so excited to cook for a lot of people because it's one of my passions.  So I went a little nuts and baked two types of cookies, strawberry bars and pound cake.  The one I wanted to talk about was the bars.

Awhile back I found a recipe for brownies that calls for instant pudding mix.  Well, I've always used different flavors to make my chocolate chip cookies (like banana, butterscotch, pistachio, coconut….you name it!) so I thought, why not for brownies?  I used a thing of instant strawberry creme pudding and made a pan of pink brownies.  They smelled amazing, and Nick told me they were rich and moist.  I wish I had taken a picture, they looked super cute as well.  But here is the recipe for you all to try!

6 tbsp butter
2/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 small package pudding mix (your choice, be creative!)
1/4 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Cream butter and sugar.  Beat in eggs until fluffy.  Add milk, vanilla and pudding mix.  Mix together well.  Add flour, powder and salt.  Mix until smooth.  Spoon batter into well greased 9'' baking pan and bake for 30-40 minutes or until toothpick inserted comes out clean.  Allow to cool and set before serving.  Sprinkle with powder sugar if desired.  Enjoy!

Mommy visits!

I love it when I get to visit family, and it's such a treat to see my parents.  My mom came down from Alaska to visit all her children in Utah, as well as attend the wedding of one of her nephews.  She spent her first week with Jacob and then Becky, and then spent the beginning of her second week with me and Nick.  We picked her up when going to my cousin's wedding.  All my sibs and us got together for dinner beforehand at olive garden, and then the reception was super ritzy, and a lot of  fun.  Mom just left us to spend the rest of her time at Faith's.

It was great to have her here, I love having her around.  It makes me sad though, that she and my dad live so far away from us.  But that's how it is, you go where you need to, where you can find work, where you go to school.  And having them still in Alaska is also nice because it means when I go visit them, I can go home.  I miss Alaska so much, and knowing they are there is comforting to me, even though I still wish I could see them more.

Tristan absolutely adored my mom.  And of course she played right into it, giggling with him nonstop.  It was incredibly cute.  I'm glad she got that opportunity, I know how much she loves little babies, and her grandchildren especially.  Being so far away, she doesn't get to see them very often, so I bet it really is a treat for her to spend time with them.  Not to mention it gave me a break!!!  I love my little one, but ever since he got that helmet, his head butts are starting to leave bruises.  Haha, I was joking with my mom that people are going to think my husband beats me and I'm going to say, nope, it's actually my baby....

Sunday, she went withus to church and got to experience a student single's ward.  We made it through all the meetings just fine, I guess Tristan was ok cooperating.  Then later, we had Phil over for dinner and stayed up playing games.  Monday, mom and I went shopping in the morning after  taking Nick to school.  We wandered around the mall, got Cold Stone, and then went to Costco.  Phil needed some new clothes, so we got him, went to the other mall in Provo and he looked at some clothes at Penny's.  Tristan had an appt for his helmet, so I dropped mom and Phil off at campus so he could give her a tour.  Tristan got his helmet adjusted, so now it fits a ton better, and he has pads for his cheeks so he's not getting red marks every night.  Tuesday, mom and I cleaned up a lot in the house and then we went shopping again, I took her to the Sweet Tooth Fairy and she got me some cakebites!  Yum!  And I also mentioned to her that I was working on curtains for Tristan but hadn't gotten enough fabric.  It was because we moved and the windows here are bigger than the last place.  So we went to JoAnns to get more.  That night we stayed up watching Cinderella movies "The Slipper and the Rose" and "Ever After".  We also played Battleline.  Wednesday we hung out, did laundry, watched musicals and lit Christmas smelling candles.  It was wonderful.  Then we got Nick and headed up to American Fork.

My nephew Davis had a football game, and it was a ton of fun to watch.  The scored was close, 22 to 21.  They just kept going back and forth the whole game.  Tristan did ok for most of it, minus the fact it was freezing and we were all huddled in blankets.  Haha then he got scared every time the crowd erupted in cheers, but he got over it and slept the whole way home.  Thanks for the visit mom, and thanks for every thing!  We can't wait to see you again soon!!

My cousin Jeremy's wedding reception was at 

the mansion house in SLC

Daddy and baby

Mommy and baby

Daddy got a couple new geckos to breed his females he has

now, and thought putting tinfoil over the lamp would turn

it into a good heat lamp.....we woke up to nasty burning smell

in the morning.....he melted it

Me, mommy and Tristan

New man gecko

New Lady gecko

Ah, true love

Tristan loved to giggle with Nana

And she loved to cuddle with him

Having a great time together!

Tristan likes spending time with Uncle Will too

Football game ends, Riverton wins!

Daddy and baby watching the game

Auntie Faith keeping baby warm on the way to the car