2015 goals

Another year has gone which means it's time to reflect and see if I reached all my goals for 2014! Here's what my goals were: 

• Lose all pregnancy weight after Selah is born (and hopefully before Amanda's wedding in August!) Completed! I gained 50 lbs in my pregnancy and lost all 50 of that 2 weeks before Amanda's wedding in August. I lost an additional 33 lbs, too, making 83 lbs lost since June 8! 
• Stay on top of organization around the house. Completed! I never let the house get unorganized or completely disastrous. The last few weeks of my pregnancy, I wasn't really on top of laundry or dusting like I should've been, and nesting didn't kick in until after Selah was born. But everything was always in it's place and tidy and nothing got too messy!
• Read at least 5 books. Completed! I used to think 5 books a year was a big goal for me because I wasn't a big reader, but, when I get a new book I usually finish it within 3 days (if it's good!) so this was easy!
• Be a Godly wife and strive to "out-serve" my husband. This is something I continue to strive for each day, and I keep getting better at it!
• Raise my children the way God desires. This is also something I strive for each day, and I really try to be consistent with my parenting and think of the long run when making parenting decisions with my husband. We try to teach them about God and the raise them to be polite, respectful, God honoring adults.
• Have FUN with my growing family! I definitely feel like I did this. We played outside with Ezra, took him to parks and softball games, went on family walks, went to farmer's markets and pumpkin patches, read books, played, swam...
• Take a vacation (hopefully to somewhere warm!) We are leaving tomorrow for the Mall of America, and we went a couple hours north to a cabin on the lake in August. No big vacations to a beach this year, but hopefully soon! I miss the ocean!

My goals for 2015 are nothing huge, but here they are: 

• Continue to maintain a healthy lifestyle and reach my ultimate goal weight and stay there! 
• Do Whole30 at least once this year with Marcus. Probably in a summer month when we can get cheap fruits and veggies at the farmer's market! If we like it and it isn't too difficult, do another one!
• Read at least 1 new book each month (12 books is a lot higher than my usual 5 books a year goal!) Preferably books that help me grow in my walk with God rather than just "fun" novels.
• Continue to make my bed daily, keep the house tidy and organized and clean.
• Learn how to do something new this year, like cook a certain food, learn how to sew, learn how to keep a garden and grow tomatoes... something!
• Try new foods, like edamame, sweet potato, brussel sprouts... nothing gross like eel or buffalo, though. ;)
• Continue to blog!
• (Hopefully) breastfeed Selah until she's at least 14 months. That's how long I nursed Ezra until he weaned due to my pregnancy, but I'd like to breastfeed her even longer!
• Be on social media less; be with the people I'm with, not the people on my phone.
• Complain less.
• Watch my tongue. Be slow to anger. Don't be snippy. Yell less. Scold less. Be sarcastic less. (Ha! Yeah right!) Speak uplifting, encouraging words.
• Find joy in the little things.
• Be a respectful, selfless wife.
• Be a loving, gracious, consistent mother.
• Save more, spend less.
• Continue to learn ASL and introduce it to Selah.
• Grow closer to God, learning to listen to His voice in every moment and situation, and pray about what He has next in the plans for Marcus and I and our children. Spend quality time in prayer each day, remembering to lift up those I love who need prayer.

What are your 2015 goals? We'll be ringing in the new year at the Mall of America - so excited for this mini trip with my family! Happy New Year!

rainbow snack mix crunch

I made some delicious snack mix for a game night we're having with a bunch of family at my parents' house tonight. It's so simple & delicious that I had to share the recipe! 

All you need is some mini pretzels, white popcorn, rice Chex cereal, white chocolate, m&m's and sprinkles. You can add nuts if you want, too. It's a very customizable recipe - add or leave out anything you want, make as much or as little as you need!

I started by mixing the mini pretzels, popcorn and Chex cereal together. I put them in a 9x13 dish at first but before moving on to the next step, I decided a big bowl would be easier for mixing. I didn't measure any of this, but just put equal parts of the three until they filled this baking pan. 

Then I melted the white chocolate (I had about 0.85 lbs) at 50% heat until it was all melted (about 3 minutes, stir, then 3 more minutes).

Then I just poured it over the mixture and stirred carefully and slowly, a little bit at a time, until all the mix was evenly coated with white chocolate.

After that, before the chocolate hardened, I poured in some m&m's (I used almost all of a medium bag) and put on some rainbow sprinkles and stirred it all together. After everything was evenly mixed, I poured it all onto a jelly roll pan to set.

Once it was dry & hard, I broke up all the big pieces and put it into a bowl. And that's it! 

You could customize this to go with a holiday, like red and green sprinkles and m&m's for Christmas, or pink and red for Valentine's day, or use school colors and make it for a graduation party. This would be great to make with all your leftover holiday m&m's and snacks! You could throw in Reese's Pieces, leave out the sprinkles, add a different kind of cereal, use colored candy melts or milk chocolate... it's easy to make it your own! 

I'm trying not to eat this before our game night tonight... hopefully it doesn't all get eaten so I can bring home the extra! ;)

Christmas 2014

I hope you all had a very merry Christmas! 

Like I mentioned before, we had 5 family Christmases this year, starting last Saturday. Christmas Eve morning was when we celebrated with Marcus' parents and his siblings plus their spouses and children. 

My brother-in-law and his fiance made these blankets for all 5 of the little ones! Selah's has owls and Ezra's has cars on it. He now sleeps with it every night. 

We had monkey bread, delicious breakfast bakes, stockings, movie quoting, laughing and quality time together, all of which are the best part of the Christmas season. The small humans got some awesome new toys and books, and Marcus and I got nice things, too, including a few gift cards which are always a favorite to receive.

Then we headed home for naps before Christmas Eve service at church in the evening. After the service, we went to my parent's house for dinner & gifts with my dad's parents and my dad's two sisters who live in California. Ezra & Selah had fun playing with my little cousins Suri & Soleil, who are 3 & 1. Selah wore her second fancy Christmas dress of the year and got a picture with her best friend, Gwen! 

Selah is always pretty chill and Gwen is always smiling and happy, so this picture pretty much sums them up perfectly. And yes, Selah is a beast. (Gwen is almost 2 months older)

Ezra & Selah got these adorable Dumbo and Mickey Mouse stuffed animals from their Great Aunt Meredith and Great Uncle Praveen, which Ezra calls "Dodo" and "Me Mouse". I think that he thinks both of them are for him.

We got Ezra just one present for Christmas this year since we knew he would get tons of gifts from other relatives. We just had to give him Chase from Paw Patrol since we gave him Marshall for his birthday. He loved it, of course.

On Christmas morning, after we gave Ezra his gift, we let him and Selah open their stockings, which just had some animal crackers for him and a rattle toy for Selah but animal crackers for Ezra are like cheesecake for me - pretty much the greatest thing ever and always a welcome gift. So, he was a happy camper, as you can tell by his cheesy grin.

Then we went to my mom's house for breakfast: french toast bake & danishes, and of course lots of coffee. 

Ezra was in pretty good spirits despite having a cold. He really loved sitting in the box of all the wrapping paper scraps!

Obviously while reading his new book about vehicles. This kid is obsessed with trucks.

Selah napped through pretty much all of the gift opening, so I got to open all her stuff for her. My mom got her a spring wardrobe and some pink toys since everything she plays with currently is blue because it used to be Ezra's. She really loved her pretty new light-up mirror once she finally woke up! She even helped Gramps open a couple things.

Ezra got a nap in, too, before we headed to my uncle's house for celebrating with my mom's side of the family.

We had a yummy ham dinner and then a gift exchange. We ended up with some essential oil soaps/salves and a gift card to the movie theaters. I think it's safe to say that we are gift exchange pros by this point; we always leave with something awesome.

I think you know you're officially grown up when your favorite gifts at Christmas are an essential oil organizer and guidebook, a new coat, new clothes, gift cards, and a power drill, which were what Marcus and I got that we're most excited about. (Oh, and a ticket to the Packers game this Sunday!) They say Christmas when you have kids is even better than Christmas as a kid, and it's so true. Watching Ezra's and Selah's faces light up when they saw new toys, and seeing Ezra excited to rip open the wrapping paper just filled my heart. Huge thanks to all of our family that spoiled our kids with gifts this year! 

We had such an amazing Christmas, and we couldn't celebrate anything without the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Now that I have a children of my own, I more deeply understand the sacrifice God made by sending his only son to earth to die for us. I'm so thankful and so blessed.

Merry Christmas!

our Christmasy weekend.

We had a fun, full weekend! 

On Friday we had Marcus' work Christmas party, which was different than past years because it was for the whole family! We got to bring Ezra & Selah and they had face painting, cookie decorating and Santa, and each kid got a present. The food was wonderful and we all got to wear ugly Christmas sweaters. Each employee was given raffle tickets for door prizes, and we won a gift card to a grocery store for the second year in a row! This is also only our second Baker Tilly Christmas party, so... we're 2 for 2 on raffle prizes. I think we'll keep this tradition of winning going. There was a game of Bingo before we left and we won some cash playing that, so I'd say it was a successful party! 

Ezra's sweater found here

Marcus' sweater is from the women's section at Goodwill... periwinkle and penguins look good on him, don't you think?

Outfit: sold out // Headband

Selah pretty much stole the show with her festive little outfit.

She & Ezra both loved opening their gifts! Ezra's was a Lego Duplo garbage truck, which is perfect because he loves vehicles and doesn't have any garbage trucks. He looks outside for the garbage truck every day... I don't think he realizes yet that trash day is only once per week. ;)

We got three uses out of our ugly Christmas sweaters this year, and I was told numerous times that mine wasn't even ugly, so I guess I could wear it all winter long if I wanted to! 

On Saturday morning my mom and I went to get our nails done for the holiday.

Then in the evening, we had the first of our "M Christmases"... we have 5 family Christmases each year and all start with M - Mosley, Meiklejohn, Magee & Myers. Mosley is Marcus' extended family Christmas with all of our cousins which is where we went Saturday night. Meiklejohn Christmas is with his parents and 5 siblings and our niece and nephews. Magee counts for two Christmases - one is Christmas with my parents and brother, and the other is with my dad's parents and sisters (so my grandparents and aunts). Myers is Christmas with all my mom's family, so my grandpa, uncles & cousins. Whew, that's a lot of celebrating! 

Leg warmers: sold out // Onesie // Headband: similar here

Mosley Christmas is always fun because we do a gift exchange where each person brings a gender specific gift (girls bring girly gift, guys bring guy gift) and then we draw numbers to determine order and when it's your turn, you can open an unopened gift or you can steal a gift someone else has opened as long as it hasn't been stolen 3 times yet. Once it's stolen 3 times, that person gets to keep it. For the girl's exchange, I got a 2-cup and 4-cup angled measuring cup and some pretty new measuring cups & spoons in fun colors! My turn was second to last, so I was glad I got to steal this gift from someone. I'm constantly measuring my foods as part of counting calories so I needed more measuring cups and spoons! Win.

Marcus ended up with a $25 gift card for Olive Garden, which he said he had his eye on (he got to pick last) so he could take me on a date without spending anything. Such a sweetie. <3 We usually end up with the best gifts from the exchange each year (in our opinions) so I'm pretty happy! We had yummy food & dessert and got to hang out with family that we don't get to see often enough. Ezra and Selah got to play with their cousins and second cousins (I think that's what they're called?) and they each got some nice gifts from their great grandma. 

Ezra asked to "go nigh night" with Selah while I was trying to take her picture. He loves climbing in her crib with her. You can barely see his shirt, but it's a retired Gymboree dinosaur shirt that my mom bought secondhand. 

On Sunday, we went to church like usual where Selah wore her first ever Christmas dress. I'm pretty sure my mom found this beauty on eBay. Then we came home to watch the Packers win! Ezra & Selah both took long naps and then we ate dinner & played until bedtime and the Marcus and I watched Avatar because I haven't seen it in forever. 

Selah is practicing acrobatics as usual.

It's a 2 day work week for Marcus due to Christmas so I have a lot to check off my to-do list before Wednesday comes and we get busy celebrating! I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas! 

doctors & play dates.

Yesterday the small humans had their 2 year and 6 month check ups. We knew they were close in size even though they're 18 months apart. Ezra is officially 6 pounds and 6 inches bigger than Selah! 

Ezra: 26 lbs 12 oz; 33 1/2 " // Selah: 20 lbs 9 oz; 27"

The doctor said he was impressed with Ezra's size, he expected him to be a tiny little thing since he was so small as a baby (always less than the 10th percentile for weight, sometimes too small to even be on the chart). Z has had quite the appetite lately, asking for several snacks and eating more at meals than usual. He talks in several word sentences which his doctor said is great for his age. He's impressed that he responds well to verbal cues (like when we say don't touch that, he puts his hand back down and walks away) and will tell us what he wants with more than one or two words and we can understand him. He said the fact that his words aren't crystal clear isn't a concern at 2 years old and by age 3, we should understand at least half of what he tells us (which we already can, he just has his own little language - like "school bus" is "coo buh" and "red truck" is "rehh truhh"). Ezra has had some trouble with his tummy (read: poop issues) lately. You may remember than in October (I think, I can't keep track of the months anymore!) we cut out dairy to try and eliminate his chronic diaper rash, which pretty much worked, but then we reintroduced it except for straight up cow's milk (he's on almond milk). And since we reintroduced, he has green stools sometimes. Yuck. It could be his body just doesn't digest certain foods well and it's basically a shot in the dark which food it is. It could be dairy, it could be gluten, so we have to watch the frequency to see if we need allergy testing or more elimination diet trials. Hopefully he just potty trains soon so we don't have as much concern with his diaper and the contents of it anymore!

Selah impressed her pediatrician as well. She's the size of an average 12 month old and has good core strength and motor skills for a 6 month old. He said that second children are more likely to be more advanced in motor skills and delayed in verbal skills than the first child because they don't get as much one-on-one verbal attention but are copying their older sibling in motor skills. Both Z and Selah started the army crawl before 6 months. Ezra was saying "mama" and "dada" at Selah's age (not knowing what it actually meant, just repeating the sounds) and Selah just says "gagagagaga" and "ahhhh" and "oooooh". According to the doc it's totally normal, it's just something to get used to when you have two different children that develop and do things at different rates. 

Ezra doesn't need shots until he starts school (5 years old) but Selah got her boosters. She barely even whined, probably because her thighs are so chubby that she couldn't even feel the needle!

Before their appointments yesterday, Ezra's BFF came over like she does every week to play. She's 8 months older but she and Ezra love playing together, looking outside at garbage trucks, spinning in circles and reading. 

We'll show them these pictures again in high school when they're dating each other. ;)

We had another play date with her and some other friends from church at my mom's house this morning! Coffee, muffins, a fire and friends. Gotta love it.

We have an ugly Christmas sweater/cookie exchange party with other couples tonight and then Marcus' work party is also ugly sweater themed on Friday. Thanks to Goodwill, we'll be looking fly. Pictures to come. ;)

Happy Thursday!

Christmas cookie saturday

My best friend came "home" (she lives just over an hour away) this weekend to bake cookies with my mom & me - it's been a tradition of ours to do in each December for a while now! We were each other's maids of honor and I definitely don't get to see her enough. 

We made five different kinds of cookies and I'm so excited to eat all of them one of each kind! 

Get ready to drool.

First up was gingerdoodles (or snickersnaps) which is just snickerdoodle dough and molasses cookie dough smashed together to form one glorious cookie. They look delicious, they taste delicious and they're fun to say. They're also toddler approved. Ezra asked for one as soon as he saw them.

Then we made turtle cookies (we left off the chocolate drizzle). These require several steps to make, including chilling the dough, but I assure you they are worth it.

A classic that my mom has been making for as long as I can remember were what we call "Nanny cookies". There is no recipe for these, they're extremely simple: take two Ritz crackers. Slap some peanut butter in between them to make a sandwich. Melt some baking chocolate. Dip the peanut butter cracker sandwiches into the chocolate and then place on wax paper. Let the chocolate dry and then eat up! They're so simple and so delicious. We call them Nanny cookies because Nanny is my mom's mom. She passed away two summers ago but I only ever remember her having white hair. So when we made these cookies, before the chocolate hardened we topped them with coconut for hair and red hots for eyes and made a little smile on them so that they looked like Nanny. I remember taking them to kindergarten for treat day. I happened to make seven dozen of these bad boys today for my husband to take to work on Monday for a cookie exchange. I love that you can make as little or as many as you want with very little work and no need for an oven!

We made these cranberry Noel tea cookies (colorful cookies) but we subbed almond slivers for pecans. I have yet to try these but aren't they beautiful? I basically just want to have a tea party now.

The final kind we made which are probably my favorite: peppermint crunch dark chocolate cake mix cookies. All you need is a box of cake mix, some oil, some eggs and some peppermint chips! These were super quick to whip up (plus 20 minutes to chill the dough) and they are super delicious. They taste like Christmas. My husband doesn't like peppermint or dark chocolate, so it looks like I get these all to myself. You're welcome, thighs, because these cookies are going straight to you. 

Overall, it was a successful day of baking plus a trip to Hacienda Real for Mexican food for lunch (obviously) and I got to see my best friend, so today was awesome. I can't wait to tuck the kids in bed, cuddle up on the couch with a movie, a glass of milk and some cookies. Happy baking!