9 Months

Chloe, it's February 28, 2011 and you are nine months old today!

You are still napping pretty good and sleeping 12 hours a night. You were recently sick. We made your first trip to the doctor last Monday. You had a virus which caused a LOT of drainage. You were pretty miserable and running a pretty high fever. Since your illness, you've decided that you want to be rocked to sleep for your naps. I enjoy it but I'm afraid it will develop into a "I only sleep when you rock me" attitude.

You are feeding yourself now. You started refusing purees this past week. That threw me for a loop and I had to get creative with your foods. You now eat small pieces of whatever we are having. In the morning, you have egg yolk, toast and fruit. For lunch, you usually eat turkey, carrots and a slice of wheat bread. At dinner, you will eat pieces of whatever your dad and I are having or the leftovers from the night before because I usually don't have dinner ready by 5:30 which is when you want to eat dinner. You are only having 3 bottles a day now: 8 oz around 10, 8 oz around 3 and 8 oz before bed.

You have 8 teeth now (4 top and 4 bottom)! 


You are now crawling everywhere. You know how to crawl up the stairs, but you're so clumsy that it's NOT ALLOWED. You attempt to climb onto the couch. You are pulling up now and standing all the time. You love to stand in your crib and yell at me. I've caught you trying to stand without holding onto stuff. I'm sure by the end of the month you will be. You also think it's fun to climb over things (like me when I lay on the floor).

You are starting to show a lot of interest in your books. You get very upset when you want us to read to you and we're not. You will sometimes open your books and read to yourself...that's so cute. I love hearing your little voice and made up words while you explain the page to yourself.

We love you, Miss Chloe!

Grilled Italian Skirt Steak

I know this is probably boring to most of you, but I thought I'd share one of our favorite new healthy recipes. Chloe likes it! She's been eating pretty much whatever we eat. She started refusing the spoon and the mushy food earlier this week. So I guess we're done with Gerber.

feeding herself...she used the back of her hand to push the food further in her mouth.

excuse my food photo taking skills and my plating skills

We've cut most of the red meat out of our diet (in fact, we're doing two days a week as vegetarians), so this is a special healthy treat! The recipe was found in Men's Health magazine and is made to serve two. Plus is takes about 20 minutes to prep and cook...sooooo easy!

580 calories/serving

56g of protein

41g carbs

8g fiber

21g fat

140mg sodium

What you Need:

1 lg red onion

1 T olive oil

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 can (15.5oz) cannellini beans (white beans)

2 T balsamic vinegar

1 t dried rosemary (1 T fresh)

Juice of half a lemon

salt and pepper

12 oz. skirt steak or flank steak

What you Do:

1. In a medium pan over medium heat, cook the onion in half of the olive oil for 10 min., until it's soft and slightly brown. Add the vinegar and cook another 5 min.

2. Heat a pot with the remaining olive oil over medium heat. Add the garlic, beans and rosemary and cook for 5 min. Use a potato masher or fork to roughly mash the beans. Add lemon juice and salt and pepper to taste.

3. Heat grill, grill pan or skillet over high heat. Season steak with salt and pepper and grill 3-4 minutes per side for medium rare. Slice and serve over beans and spoon the onions on top.

See...easy peasy.

It's delicious...I promise. The beans are delicious substitute for mashed potatoes. You can also use cauliflower instead of the beans.

Where have I been?

Busy. I have a lot going on. Chloe does, too. She's now crawling full force and she pulls up on everything. Yesterday I caught her trying to crawl up the stairs (baby gate is going up) and trying to stand without support.

What else is going on? We spent some time in Houston with Shorty and Pop. I don't have any pictures but my mom does. Edited to add pictures from my mom! AND...I need to get better about taking pictures of Shorty with Chloe. Shorty, you escaped this time...next time you won't be so lucky.

Feed ME.

Crawling through her tunnel.

Relaxing with Pop.

Chloe, who did your hair? 

We're getting things in order to replace the windows in our house and paint the exterior (possibly replacing siding). We just paid to have a new water heater installed since the bottom rusted out of ours. And, tomorrow we are having four oak trees trimmed and treated to prevent Oak Wilt.

On top of this, I work 20 hours a week from home.

Add on to my plate, the fact that we joined a gym. I was troubled (understatement) to find out that my BMI (Body Mass Index) is 32% fat. Are you kidding me?!? That's 1% away from being considered obese! I now fall into the overweight category. I am on a mission to lose 9% body fat. That's 20 pounds, friends. So in a desperate attempt to curb this issue, I have been busy planning our meals. I sit down every week and plan healthy dinners for our family. That takes a lot of work. The foods that appeal to me are buttery, starchy, fatty and DELICIOUS.

So far, all this planning has paid off...I'm down to 148 from 156. Now to build some muscle and burn some more fat.  And, I have to brag on my husband for a moment: the man has lost about 25 pounds! He starting working out months ago. He gets up every day at 5 a.m. and heads to the gym. Guess he wants to get a head start on keeping the boys away from Chloe.

In all this mess something had to give, blogging was it. So maybe, I'll incorporate my new mission into my blog by posting some of my favorite healthy recipes and such.

Chloe will be 9 months old in three days....I promise to post the usual summary along with photos.

Why?

Why was I in such a hurry to have

this?

Now I have a whole lot of

this and

this.

Maybe it's because I needed to use

this and

this.

I don't care what they say about sliced bread or the light bulb (sorry, Thomas Edison). The greatest invention EVER was indoor plumbing.

Thank you, God, for my super-awesome husband who fixed our broken water line himself and for running water and indoor plumbing.

Snow Slams Central Texas?

Really? That was the headline on the KXAN (local news station) this morning. Let me show you what they mean by 'slams.'

Looking down our street from our front porch.

Our car.

I think the news was being a bit dramatic...who am I to judge? I'm pretty dramatic myself. However, even coming from Amarillo (where snow is not rare and blizzard is not unheard of) I would hardly call this being 'slammed by snow.' I guess it's just a classic example of 'Where you stand depends on where you sit.'

I will say this: I am STOKED that Chloe gets to see snow! It's something I thought she might never experience (at least in childhood). I know she won't remember it but she'll have pictures!

looking concerned...I would be too if I had socks on my hands.

She can hardly move with all the layers I put on her.

contemplating getting out of here

time to go inside

'Snow' Day

It hasn't snowed here...yet. It's supposed to tonight. They say between 1-3" and I'll believe it when I see it. Maybe the snow will make our misery worth while (I would love for Chloe to experience some snow!).

It was 70 degrees here just three days ago and on Sunday the temperature is supposed to be in the 60s. But yesterday and today, we haven't been above freezing. ~~~CrAzY TEXAS wEAthER~~~

Yesterday morning we woke up to frozen water lines and they remain that way. I'm praying our pipes don't burst. We've busted out the bottled water for Chloe's bottles, firewood for warmth and a space heater, too. Our house won't get above 66 degrees with the heater, fire and space heater going. I haven't taken a shower since Tuesday morning and I'm not expecting our water to work until Saturday. Gross, I know. What can I say, my northern friends? Our house was not built for this weather (nor were we). I would find it easier to deal with this nonsense if we had running water. We'll be renting a hotel if things don't improve soon.

While we wait for the Central Texas warmth to return, we are keeping ourselves entertained.

Texas girl wearing her daddy's boots!

The nasty weather has given the dogs an opportunity to spend some time with Chloe. Chloe is LOVING it. She keeps crawling (as fast as she can) into the kitchen hall (where we keep them) to play with them. If they get within eye sight of her, she yells at them as if saying, 'hey dog, get over here.' When they get close enough to touch, she tries to pet them but she gets so excited she can't control her arms and they flail around.

Pepper loves Chloe Chloe's toys

Trying to pet the puppy.

Clyde wants nothing to do with Chloe. He just stares at her...so I've been keeping a close eye on him.

Hope y'all are keeping warm.