Menu Monday

       This week's menu includes some new recipes and some old favorites. I am still enjoying trying out recipes from my new Pioneer Woman cookbook and of course, Skinny Taste has tons of great healthy recipes for fall. I can't wait to try her most recent recipe which is a turkey potpie with a sweet potato crust. It sounds really yummy. My in-laws are coming to visit this weekend for a pre-Thanksgiving get-together so we'll be having a "Thanksgiving" type meal, though not a traditional one since we'll both be having turkey later in the week. 

• Monday: Chicken spaghetti casserole. This is an older recipe from Pioneer Woman's blog that I haven't made since we lived in Washington. It was one of the recipes that I made when we were expecting Owen and froze a bunch of it for after he was born. It is really tasty. Or at least my version of it is. I leave out the green peppers and pimentos in exchange for chopped green chiles to give it a more mexican-type flavor and some heat. It is really warm and comforting and will be great for our parenting class's casserole night where each couple brings a different type of casserole to share. 

• Tuesday: Italian meatball soup. This is a recipe included in Pioneer Woman's new cookbook. It looks really delicious and is packed with vegetables. This will be the fourth of the seven soup recipes in the cookbook that I will try. We are soup fanatics at this house and could eat soup pretty much every day of the week once it gets cold. Even Owen loves eating soup, though we mainly have to feed it to him because he still doesn't understand why gravity doesn't hold the food to his spoon even when he holds it vertically. I also love making soups on Tuesdays because Tim always has to work late and I never know when he'll come home so I can have the soup made if I have to feed Owen early, yet the soup will still be warm and ready for whenever Tim comes home. 

• Wednesday: Leftover soup.
• Thursday: Skinny chicken enchiladas. Enchilada perfection. I have never made this for someone and had them not say that they were the best enchiladas they had ever eaten. And they are relatively healthy! This is one of my favorite Skinny Taste recipes and one that I will continue to make forever and ever. Amen.

• Friday: Chicken pot pie soup with easy garlic cheddar biscuits. This is a really easy and tasty soup from Skinny Taste and a way to have the chicken pot pie flavor without as many calories. Also, the biscuits are a copy of the Red Lobster cheddar bay biscuits which are delicious too. I am curious to see if Owen will like this soup and if it will allow us to sneak some more vegetables into his diet. He's been pretty vegetable skittish lately, though he did eat brussels sprouts twice last week. Weird, huh?

• Saturday: Tangy tomato brisket with mashed potatoes and roasted garlic brussels sprouts. This will be our Thanksgiving-ish meal with Tim's parents. It is a Pioneer Woman recipe and one that looks super easy and super delicious. Only three ingredients for the brisket and then you just let is roast away in the oven for seven hours. Since there will only be the three adults and one toddler, I didn't plan to make a ton of side dishes or anything. We will most likely have my apple pie for dessert because Tim requested it. I am a little nervous about the brisket because I know that the ideal brisket is smoked and I've never made this before. But I have never been severely disappointed by a Pioneer Woman recipe and hopefully the first time won't be while my in-laws are visiting. 

• Sunday: Homemade pizza night with side salads. For an easy dinner the night before my in-laws head back home, we will have a homemade pizza night. I can make a few pizza dough balls early and then we can top them however we like and clean-up should be pretty easy too. I am thinking that we will make a plain pepperoni pizza, Pioneer Woman's steakhouse pizza, and a third that will feature whatever toppings my in-laws enjoy best. The last time we made pizza at home, Owen had a great time helping put cheese and toppings on. Though for some reason, he wasn't able to put pepperoni anywhere but in his mouth! 

Random Friday

1. Downton Abbey.

      After hearing so much about the television series Downton Abbey, I finally decided to check it out last weekend when I was sick. It is my new favorite show and I am busily trying to catch up on the first two seasons before season three begins in January in the U.S. The show begins in the years leading up to World War I with the drama centering on the wealthy Crawley family of the estate Downton Abbey and their servants. If you are a fan of period drama or of Pride and Prejudice, then chances are you will love it too. I love all the characters and the forbidden romances, and the great writing (particularly the biting one-liners of the Dowager Countess, played by Maggie Smith.) If you're interested in trying out this series, Netflix Streaming has the first season online and you can rent both seasons through their mail system, Hulu Plus has both seasons online, and you might even be able to find them at your local library. The third season (which is already underway in England) begins on PBS on January 6.      

2. What I'm reading now.

      I am currently reading "Broken Harbor" by Tana French. Here's the synopsis from Amazon: "On one of the half-built, half-abandoned luxury developments that litter Ireland, Patrick Spain and his two young children are dead. His wife, Jenny, is in intensive care. At first, Detective Mick Scorcher and his rookie partner, Richie, think it's going to be an easy solve. But too many small things can't be explained. The half dozen baby monitors, their cameras pointing at holes smashed in the walls. The files erased from their computer. The story Jenny told her sister about a shadowy intruder who was slipping past all the locks. And Broken Harbor holds memories for Scorcher as well. Seeing the case on the news sends his sister Dina off the rails again, and she's resurrecting something that Scorcher thought he had tightly under control: what happened to their family one summer at Broken Harbor, back when they were children."
     I first started reading Tana French with her first novel "In the Woods" several years ago. I also loved her second book "The Likeness." This is her fourth novel and her signature blend of police procedural and psychological thriller is really fascinating to read. I have never been able to guess the ending of one of her books before I read it. She is a writer that truly surprises me every time.        

3. 31 Days of Loving Your Husband

      I finished my 31 Day challenge, but I haven't had the time to blog about it. It was definitely a challenge toward the end when I started having trouble coming up with something to do for every day. But rest assured, I figured it out and I think Tim had a really great month. A few of the things that I did in the last week were preordering him Halo 4, renting him a "man" movie full of explosions and guns instead of another romantic comedy, and putting away his clean laundry instead of just folding it and waiting for him to put it away. The whole experience has been really fun and I have seen improvement in the way that Tim and I both take time for one another even when we're busy. 

4. 45 Days...

     Not to stress you out, but there are only 45 days until Christmas. I have been starting to buy presents for our family to spread out the spending over a longer period of time and scouring the Internet for deals. I have already bought gifts for my father-in-law, my brother-in-law, and one of my sisters-in-law. And a couple for Owen. Hopefully this weekend, I can sit down with Tim and brainstorm some ideas for our own Christmas wishlists and also come up with some ideas for the rest of the people in our family. 

5. Coffee Lovers Cravebox

      Drawings for the limited edition Coffee Lovers Cravebox are now open. I signed up in hopes of winning one for my coffee-loving husband. You have to fill out a survey when you sign up and it gives you a few hints as to what is in the box. I think it will come with coffee (of course), flavored syrup, cereal, and maybe some other type of coffee related snack like biscotti or something. Cravebox has two other boxes currently open if you're interested: the holiday spruce-up box of cleaning supplies and the Ultimate Thanksgiving box. You can click here to check them out. 

Owen's Christmas List

     At the request of several people, here is Owen's Christmas list again this year. He is of course always in need of new clothes and shoes. Books are always a good idea for our little reader. And of course, I put some ideas for toys. We love Green Toys, Hape Toys, Plan Toys, Melissa and Doug and Skip Hop brands.

1. Clothes- size 18-24 months or 24 months

2. New books - Owen loves books about animals and vehicles (The one below will fit in great in our bedtime routine so I plan to buy it for him myself)

3. Monthly subscription box for toddler - Citrus Lane or Stork Stack both offer gift subscriptions and you can typically find discounts on their Facebook pages particularly when a holiday is coming up. Owen loves our subscription to Citrus Lane (which runs out in December) and comes running to open his box whenever it comes in the mail. It's a great way to discover new products.

4. Green Toys Tool Set

5. Green Toys My First Blocks set

6. Shoes - Owen currently wears size 6.5 Wide. He needs shoes to wear to church and he will of course need larger sizes for next year.

7. Winter accessories - mittens, hats (maybe something with a snap or velcro under the chin to make Owen keep it on), jackets, coats, etc. The one below is from L.L. Bean, which has some affordable, well-made ones. 

L.L. Bean fleece critter hat and mitten set

8. Pajamas and slippers - size 18-24 months and slippers size 6 to 7

Children's Place sells my favorite pajamas. 

L.L. Bean Animal Paws moose slippers

        I have already bought Owen a couple Christmas gifts from us. I bought him the Green Toys dump truck and a boxed set of the books "Little Pea," "Little Oink," and "Little Hoot" by Amy Krouse Rosenthal. 

Owen is nineteen months old!

      No official doctor's appointment this month (or until he is 2!), but since he has to get a second round of his flu shot soon, I may be able to find out how much Owen weighs and I can update here later. He is about 25 pounds though, if I had to guess. He continues to impress us with his ability to learn new things every day and we frequently have people comment on how smart and cute he is. 

Eating:

• Owen eats three meals a day and an afternoon snack normally. 
• He still eats basically whatever we eat unless we are having something spicy. 
• He is not a big fan of most vegetables, though he did surprise us by eating all of his brussels sprouts the other night. What?!?!
• Owen's favorite foods are pizza, Goldfish crackers, turkey sausage, my homemade veggie pasta, and yogurt.
• Owen loves to "dip" his food, fingers, and pretty much anything else in ketchup or other sauces. He frequently asks to "dip it?"
• Owen drinks whole milk with each main meal and water in between. He has also enjoyed some apple cider this month.
• If you ask Owen what he wants for breakfast, he will most likely say, "Uh, sausage and uh, muffin?"

Sleeping:

• Owen naps in the afternoon and generally goes down just after lunch around 1 p.m and sleeps for between an hour and a half to two hours.
• Owen goes to bed at night at 7:30 p.m. 
• He wakes up at around 8 a.m., sometimes earlier, sometimes later.
• Owen has gone back to sleeping through the night now that he is done teething for the time being. 
• Owen's going to bed routine consists of a bath, pajamas, reading a few books, and then snuggling and rocking in the chair with either mommy or daddy for a few minutes before putting him in his crib. We have about 5 books we alternate between for our bedtime routine and Owen basically has most of them memorized now. 

Things He Knows:

• Owen has a super large vocabulary. 
• Owen is a champ at stringing together words to communicate. Some of his frequent phrases are: "Daddy at work," "Don't want that," "Want my mommy" "Thank you mommy" "Sit on printer" "Read book?" 
• Owen still says "I sorry." 
• Owen will say "Bless you" whenever someone sneezes. He will say "thank you" if you say bless you when he sneezes.
• Owen can count to 10. He can even do it when we take turns filling in numbers for him.
• We have started teaching Owen the alphabet. He fills in a few of the letters when we say the alphabet, including I, P, and Z. 
• He still occasionally uses sign language, but knows the words for all his signs now and uses words more often or in conjunction with the signs. The signs he uses most are thank you, all done, and please. 
• He can say "Love you mommy" and "love you daddy."
• Owen says "bye bye" to many things. Trucks we pass on the road (bye bye truck), pumpkins on display outside the grocery store (bye bye pumpkin), pretty much anything... 
• Tim has taught Owen to "tackle" him and it's so cute. 
• We are continuing to teach Owen his shapes and colors. So far, he can recognize a circle, triangle, square, star, rectangle, and oval. He is a pro at the shapes sorter.
• Owen definitely knows his name and will refer to himself by name now. For example, he will point at pictures of himself and say "Baby Owen." 
• We are practicing obedience with Owen now and it is a daily struggle. He is a sweet boy, but can be super stubborn. 

Other Things I Want to Remember:

• Owen is wearing size 18 month and starting to wear size 18-24 months clothing. Although he is supposedly above the 50th percentile in length, most of his pants are too long and I have to roll them up. 
• Owen wears size 6 and 6.5 shoes, depending on the brand. His boots are size 7's and without a couple pairs of socks, they will fall off his feet.
• Owen is mainly in size four diapers though we are still working on using up our size 3's.
• Owen has 12 teeth completely in now (four in front on top and bottom and two top molars and two bottom molars) with three canine teeth for the most part through, but not completely. The tip of his bottom right canine tooth has just popped through recently. 
• Owen loves when we read to him and looking at books by himself. His favorite books are anything with trucks or animals. He really loves "Trucks Go," "The Going to Bed Book," and "Fox in Socks." He really loves Sandra Boynton books. He can even finish or fill in the words to some of the sentences of certain books when we're reading to him. 
• Owen's favorite songs are "Baa Baa Black Sheep,"  "Row Row Row Your Boat," "Hush Little Baby Don't You Cry," and "Old MacDonald." If you wait for him to fill in the animal when you sing "And on that farm, he had a..." he will 99.9 % of the time say sheep. He can also sing the EIEIO part. 
• Owen loves to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, which we allow him to watch about once or twice a week. He knows most of the characters' names and seems to prefer Mickey and Goofy. He adores the "hotdog dance" at the end of each episode. 
• He frequently talks about members of our family and friends. We're not always sure what he's saying, but we catch Papa or Grandpa or David or other names in his babblings. 
• Owen loves playing with trucks and cars, balls, his shapes sorters (he has two now), and his music table. He has recently shown interest in his Poppity Pop Dino again.
• Owen enjoys playing outside and frequently asks to "Go owside?" While outside, he plays on his slide, picks flowers in the yard, and climbs up and down the stair off our front porch over and over. He also enjoys standing on the printer in the corner of our living room and peeking through the blinds to talk about what is outside. 
• Owen still displays some separation anxiety and fear in certain situations. When we leave him in nursery, the workers generally tell us that he calms down pretty quickly after we leave and plays happily the rest of the time there. He refused to ride the mechanical horse at the grocery store the other day, which was strange since he's ridden it several times before and talked about it the entire time we were shopping. 
• Owen is a major animal lover, particularly dogs and cats. He talks all the time about all the ones he knows, like my parent's cat Pumpkin and Katie and David's dogs Lexi and Cooper. A neighborhood cat comes to our house pretty much anytime we are outside nowadays and the two are becoming fast friends. 
• Owen is still a big music lover and will dance anytime he hears music. He loves country music in particular and danced up a storm at my cousin Johanna's wedding because they played a lot of country music. It was so cute!
• Owen loves playing with the children's apps on either my Nook or Tim's Nexus. His favorite is one that shows pictures of various animals, vehicles, and music instruments and plays the corresponding noise when he touches the screen.
• Owen still loves to put our shoes on now and try to walk around in them.  
• Owen is a daddy's boy the majority of the time and loves to do whatever daddy is doing. Everything daddy does is super fun. Owen typically only wants mommy specifically when he is sad. 
• Tim and I make a big production of hugging and kissing with a lot of noise because Owen loves to squeeze in between our legs whenever we do it. He generally goes, "Mmmm.." when he does it. It is so freakin' cute. 
• Owen will give "eskimo kisses" and rub his nose on yours if you say "Nose, nose." It's so funny watching him concentrate really hard on bringing his nose to yours and his eyes cross. 

     Here are some recent pictures I took of Owen playing in the yard while Tim was raking leaves. 

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Waving "Hi Daddy" as Tim took the leaves to the far side of our backyard to dump them. 

Helping daddy rake leaves.

Sporting his new Gymboree shirt and sweater and The Children's Place jeans I bought him recently. Great sales right now at both places!

Random Friday

1. Operation Christmas Child

        One of my favorite Christmas traditions that Tim and I began when we were first married is participating in Samaritan Purse's Operation Christmas Child program. Essentially, the program encourages people to pack shoeboxes full of toys, personal hygiene items, school supplies, and clothing items and then they ship them to children around the world. This year the nonprofit anticipates reaching the milestone of having passed out more than 100 million shoeboxes since the inception of the program in 1993. How amazing! I love shopping for Christmas presents in general and I really enjoy shopping for all sorts of little goodies to pack into our shoeboxes. Some of my favorite finds to include this year were cute water bottles, animal-shaped bath mitts instead of plain washcloths, jump ropes, and little wooden buses and trucks. I shopped for items at the Dollar Store and Walmart. I also highly recommend Target because they generally have a lot of great things in their dollar section this time of year. Unfortunately, we live an hour away from Target (I know, it's a travesty). Now that we have Owen, my plan is to continue this tradition with our children by having them pack a shoebox each year for a child their age and gender. So the first box we packed was a 2- to 4-year-old boy box (the youngest age group). We also packed a box for a 2- to 4-year-old girl and a 5- to 9-year-old boy. And then because my MOPS group is packing even more shoeboxes today, I have another shopping bag full of random extra items to help make up a few more boxes. Because we paid for the shipping for our three boxes online, we will receive tracking information in an e-mail once they are shipped and we can see what countries the boxes are shipped to. Once Owen and any future brothers or sisters are older, it might be fun to then research those countries a little. If you're interested in participating in Operation Christmas Child, you can still put together and turn in a box through the week of November 12-19. If you check the above link, you can find more instructions as well as local drop-off sites for your area. 

Here are the contents of our little girl box.

Here's our little boy box. 

Owen helped to "pack" a box for a boy his age.

2. Halo 4

       Because I am the best ever a pretty great wife, I headed over to Gamestop yesterday to pre-order Halo 4 for Tim. As a college student, I am pretty sure Tim played through all the previous Halos (well, except Halo Reach which came out the year after we got married) and I think he's pretty excited about this newest installment which will be released next Tuesday. I have enjoyed playing Halo over the years too and we have a really fun time playing through the cooperative campaign together. Tim also plays online multiplayer with friends across the country. It's a fun way for him to reconnect with old college roommates, former coworkers, and others that we don't see often. I, as a girl, am really excited about the story that will be told in this game, particularly that of the relationship between Master Chief and Cortana. Tim, I'm sure, is mainly excited about killing things. 

3. My little pumpkin

     Owen and I made Skinny Taste's Pumpkin Cupcakes with Pumpkin-Spiced Cream Cheese Frosting yesterday. The recipe is super easy and uses very few ingredients. Just a box of cake mix, canned pumpkin puree, pumpkin spice, cinnamon, vanilla, cream cheese, and brown sugar. It doesn't use any eggs or oil and is actually fairly healthy (for a cupcake.) Owen helped me by stirring the batter and putting the paper liners in the muffin pan (over and over). We shared one after they finished baking and then I said "all done." Owen went off to play (I thought), but then just a minute later, I feel a little hand grab mine and plop another cupcake in it. Then he gave me a big grin and I laughed for about five minutes. He had reached up and grabbed it off the counter and was so proud of himself for finding more. How could I refuse him?

My little helper. 

Mine didn't turn out this pretty, but they were tasty!

4. Influenster Goodies.

     I was recently chosen for another free box of goodies from Influenster. The company allows you to fill out some information so they can find out more about your lifestyle and interests and then you are chosen based on qualifying criteria related to the information you provide to receive free items in exchange for your honest review of the products. I previously received the Summer Beauty VoxBox and this time I got the Palmolive Fresh Infusions box. I received three full-sized bottles (one to share with a friend) of Palmolive's new Fresh Infusions dish detergent. There are three scents: lemon thyme, ginger white tea, and lime basil. The box also included several coupons for me to hand out to friends. My favorite scent is the lime basil and I am really enjoying using it. You know, as much as you can enjoy anything that involves washing dishes. The scents are really fresh and unique though and a lot better than most dish detergents. Particularly that normal yucky fake lemon scent of most detergents. The bottles are also a lot prettier than typical dish detergent bottles and I don't mind leaving it on the counter for all to see.  If you would like to join Influenster, let me know as I have a limited number of invites to send out to anyone interested. 

5. Trader Joe's Finds.

    On the way out of town last weekend after my cousin's wedding, Tim and I stopped at Trader Joe's for a little shopping trip to stock up on some of their fall products. We bought spiced apple cider, pumpkin pancake and waffle mix, pumpkin bread and muffin mix, pumpkin butter, and apple cranberry butter. There were tons more pumpkin and other fall-flavored items that I would have loved to buy, but they all needed to be refrigerated or frozen. I have yet to use any of them so far because I know I can't replace them. They will probably be used for a special occasion or when we have company. If you have a Trader Joe's in your area, I highly recommend their pumpkin cheesecake. It's delicious! 

6. Bye bye baby. 

    My baby is getting so big. Now that the weather is firmly set in the fall weather temperatures and wind, I stored all of my favorite spring and summer outfits of Owen's away for future babies or friend's babies. It always makes me so sad when I have to put away a certain size because Owen outgrows it. I'm actually really lucky though because Owen was born in April and fits into the size that matches his age, he always gets to wear a certain size through a complete pair of seasons. By that I mean he wore 12-18 month all through spring and summer and will wear 18-24 month all fall and winter. So I don't have to buy him a certain season's clothing in two sizes. It's pretty awesome. And to make myself feel better about packing away some of my favorite outfits (I'm talking about you alligator seersucker shorts), I went on a shopping spree for Owen at Children's Place and Gymboree. Now he has several new pairs of jeans, a bunch of new tops, a couple new sweaters, an overalls outfit, and some new pajamas. 

7. Christmas Book Advent update

     We are making a lot of progress on collecting Christmas books for the advent activity that I want to do with Owen this year. You can see my most recent updated list of the books we have here. I have started giving credit on the blog to those who have graciously donated books to Owen for this Christmas. And I am happy to report that we are eight books away from having a total of 24. I most recently purchased three new books from the new website Bookworm. If you are in the market for some new books, I highly recommend this company. They have ridiculously fast shipping and their customer service is really helpful. When putting in my information, my books were accidentally shipped to our old address (2,000 miles away - oops!). When I discovered the error after I received an e-mail telling me that my books had shipped, I called the company and they reshipped new books to my current address no problem. They were great. I currently have three promo codes for Bookworm. Use BOOKSABOGO to buy one book and get one free or use the code BOOKWORM30 to receive 30 percent off up to three books in your first order from the company. If you use my unique code JESS833854, you can receive 15 percent off your entire order and the company will donate up to $45 to an assortment of charities.  

8. November Julep picks. 

    My November pick for my monthly Julep Maven box should hopefully be shipping any day now. This month's theme was suede nail polishes, which have a unique matte look. I chose the It Girl box, which included Nora (silver aubergine suede), Hailee (khaki green suede), and a matte topcoat. I also added on an additional color: Minka (copper red suede). I was able to receive all my items for free using my referral and rewards credits (now called jules). The new program rewards you for purchases in addition to referrals so there are now more ways to earn free products. If you're interested in trying the program, click my referral link of the righthand side of my blog to head over to the Julep website and sign up. Use the code COLOR2012 to get your first box for a penny. 

Happy Halloween!

       Happy Halloween! My mom bought Owen this Halloween costume while we were in Georgia last week and I was really happy. He's only going to let me dress him as a cute squishy animal for only a few years and he has plenty of years to be a superhero. The final choice was between tiger and dinosaur. Owen hated the hoodie, but once I took him outside he forgot about it eventually and stopped tugging on it. Getting him to sit still for pictures gets harder and harder by the day and this photo shoot was no exception. What finally worked was making him sit down in front of a pumpkin and then throwing leaves onto my head with one hand while I took pictures with my other hand. Whatever it takes, right?