Apple Picking at Homestead Farm

The Oates family invited us to go apple picking which is a must do Fall activity around here. We haven't taken Macy so jumped at the chance. We couldn't have asked for better weather. I mean, look at this! It was a beautiful day!

taken with iPhone!

the apple of my eye 

Macy and Halle taking a ride in the apple wagon

Success!

On daddy's shoulders to get the high apples

more success

Sloane- the protector of the apples. Or the eater of the apples.

Couldn't resist juggling the apples

Yummy apples!

taking a turn to push the wagon

playing on the straw bails

Jump!

Coaxing Macy to pet the goats. 

After picking our 30 pounds of apples we ate lunch then took a hay ride over to the pumpkin patch to pick a pumpkin.

Ja's stand-in son

Then, because we didn't have enough Oates time they came over for dinner. We put the exhausted kids to bed and us girls went off to Pinkberry then to watch the General RS broadcast. Quite a day!

Grandma's Visit

My parents came to see Anna and that weekend also happened to be Ragnar so my dad and Ja ran while the rest of us stayed home.

However, we didn't stay home much! We showed Grandma some new places to play and our first stop of Frying Pan Farm. We took a stroll around the Farm to see the cows, goats, chickens, ducks, turkeys, and rabbits. Although Macy loved the animals she really loved the little tractors to play on. We could have spent hours playing on the little tractors.

We took a wagon ride around the farm. 

Playing with Grandma

 On Saturday, PwC had a special Zoo day for employees and their families. Ja was busy running but we took my mom to the National Zoo. We spent a lot of time watching the orangutan and the other monkeys. They were very entertaining.

Fixing her hair in the mirror.

 Macy's favorite thing was the mister. Since it was only a mist there was enough for her to play in and not get scared. She would walk up to it and say, "I take shower mommy" and pretend to wash her hair.

We meet up with some friends who also work for PwC. This is Halle and Macy sitting on a frog.

Grandma brought Macy gifts and let her open one each day. Like all other children, Macy loves presents and loved opening them. You can see the excitement on her face as she found a present that magically "appeared" in the living room. The gifts were clothes, a necklace, princess plate and bowl, and a fairy book.

Thank you Grandma for the shirt and Dora necklace!

Grandma photo shoot.

 The runners finished strong at the Ragnar race. They were tired but not sore! Go Team Freeloaders!

We also took my mom to Clemyjontri Park. It was her last day so we decided to have a special treat of McDonald's for lunch and then had a great time running around the whole park as it was pretty empty.

It was so nice having my mom around to help with Anna and Macy. Macy loved all the extra attention and I loved having someone around to play and help with my kids who loves them as much as I do. We really want grandparents to move closer to us!

Anna meets her grandparents

Anna has met all 4 grandparents now. I consider that a big accomplishment in her short 4 weeks of life since they all live so far away in California.

Papa (Greg) was the first to see and hold Anna. His first stop from the airport was to come and hold her. He commented on how tiny she was and how she was still holding her legs in the fetal position that he sees to often in his ultrasounds.

Granny Dot came next. She had recently seen Anna's cousin Ryan and couldn't wait to hold another newborn. She was glad she hadn't missed Anna being a tiny newborn. I think Anna will be small for a long time so no need to worry there. Macy quickly dressed Granny Dot up in a cupcake bow and a bracelet.

The next day my parents arrived. They too were excited to hold little Anna. I think my mom held Anna every second she could. Anna was in Grandma heaven. She did give my dad a few chances to hold Anna too. I'm glad they didn't come until Anna was almost a month because she was more awake and alert. Although, she still sleeps a lot but it's better than at 2 weeks old.

One happy Papa.

Bow provided by Macy.

Looks can be deceiving

Wednesday night Ja mentioned he was craving cookies. He left for a while so I thought I'd surprise him with cookies when he returned.

I got the sugars and butter mixed and then I discovered we had no eggs. I texted Ja letting him know if he wanted cookies he'd have to pick up eggs on his way home. He kindly went to the store at 10:20 pm.

When Ja returned I had to feed Anna so he ended up finishing the cookies. So much for surprising him. His cookies looked perfect. He used my new cookie scoop so they were all the same size and they were perfectly cooked. They looked like bakery cookies and we were so excited to eat them.

I love cookie dough so I had to try a bite. Despite the perfect appearance of the cookie, something was off. The dough was REALLY salty. We hoped that maybe it was just that one spot of dough but when I bit into a cookie we found out it was really salty too. My only reasoning was Ja put in double the amount of salt. He was pretty sure he only put in one teaspoon like the recipe says. He distinctly remembered only putting one.

Since the cookies looked so good we hoped that dunking them in milk would help with the saltiness. Sadly, this only compounded the salty flavor and made things worse.

We were so sad that these seemingly perfect cookies had to all be thrown in the trash. We were both looking forward to them and I felt extra bad since I made Ja make a special trip to the store.

Just as we decided that Ja must have put in extra salt a light bulb went off in my head. Earlier that day I put some sugar into our sugar canister so I stuck my finger in to taste the sugar. The first taste was sugar. The second taste was salt! Turns out I added salt to our sugar canister! Let me tell you how this happened...

Sometimes when I refill the sugar container with the bag of sugar from the grocery store there isn't enough room so I put the extra into a sandwich bag. When sugar gets used I pour the extra from the baggie into the container. That's what I thought the baggie was this time. After I dumped it into the sugar canister I thought to myself, "I probably should have tasted that to make sure it's sugar. Oh well."

Go back to the kitchen with Ja and I trying to figure out why the cookies are so salty. Luckily he's laughing at my realization. He's glad it was my fault because then I couldn't get mad that a whole batch of cookies was ruined. And to realize he wasn't going crazy because he did only add one teaspoon of salt.

Now I'm trying to figure out why I had a baggie of salt laying around. Its not like I have a salt container I have to fill. Then it dawns on me that I used the salt for an object lesson for primary a few months ago. There was close to a cup of salt in there! Finally we had our answer as to why the cookies were SO salty!

Lessons learned:
Don't pour "sugar" into the container unless I'm 100% sure it's sugar.
Don't leave unlabeled bags of salt around.
Don't make cookies with almost a cup of salt.

Tonight Ja asked me what he was craving- salty cookies. I don't think I'll live this one down for a looong time. I'm sorry for blaming you Ja when it was really my fault!

2 weeks old

Anna has only been with us two short weeks but it feels like she's been with us forever. She fits in perfectly to our family so well it hasn't seemed like an adjustment adding another child into our family.

At her 2 week appointment today she weighed 6 lbs 14 ounces. She's in the 50th percentile for height (20.5 inches) and 15th for weight.

Macy's Personality

I've been trying to ask Macy questions to figure out what she likes:

Favorite color: purple... And pink!
What food do you like? Pizza
What kind of fruit do you like? Watermelon
Who are your friends? Halle, Ollie, Sloane
What's your favorite movie? Elf

Macy's most frequently used sayings:

One minute, k?
Macy too busy!
I want (fill in the blank) right NOW!
Macy doctor now. How are you?
I want baby sister in my room!
Be right back, k?
This book mommy?
I gokeing.
Where my sisser go? Mommy say that. Where my sisser go?

Macy is turning into a very silly girl. It's funny now when we ask her to do something and she replies with, "Macy too busy." She picked that up from an Arthur library book. D.W. asked him to do something and he said he couldn't because he was too busy.

We have no idea how this one started, it's just Macy being her funny self. Every night after saying family prayer Macy hops off my lap and goes to give Ja a kiss good night. At the last second she veers towards the crib and kisses it instead. She giggles then runs back to me so Ja can't grab her and give her a kiss. She teases Ja like this every night and she thinks it's so funny. She got a toddler bed yesterday and she kissed it last night instead of Ja.

She still LOVES to read. She will read books to herself, to me, and to Anna. In fact, since she's been in a toddler bed (going on 2 weeks now) she will sit in her bed and read books to herself for a couple of hours every morning and after her nap. She can get out to get more books to read so it keeps her occupied. I've been going into her room to get her at 10 am. It's been a huge blessing while I've been adjusting to having Anna around. I get a early morning nap which is so nice.

I think this is well known by now, but she still loves snuggling with Anna!

At random times Macy will say "I goking (joking)." It always takes me awhile to figure out what she's saying because it's hard to understand and it doesn't always come at a time when she's actually joking. But it sure is cute.

One day Macy and Anna were "playing" in Macy's bed (that's what Macy calls it when they lie on the bed) and Macy left to do something else. Anna started making noises so I said, "Anna is saying "hey, where did my sister go?" Little did I know Macy would really latch on to this. Now almost anytime she leaves Anna (sometimes just a few feet away) she makes me say "where my sisser go?" and Macy will say something like "I'm right here baby sisser" or "I'll be right back baby Anna." Its very cute. I'm trying to get her to just tell Anna where she's going without me having to be Anna's voice and ask Macy. We'll see if that catches on.

She is constantly pretending to be or do something. Most recently she pretends to be a princess, doctor, teacher, ice cream lady. In the picture she is pretending to paint the tree.

Perspective Changes

It's funny how different events in your life can change your perspective. Pretty much all of Macy's life I have been the one to put her to bed at night. Except for the occasional babysitter or night when I would go out. She was always good for the babysitter or Ja when they put her to bed. But if I'm ever home I must be the person to read and sing to her.

After 2 1/2 years of this I was growing very tired of the monotony. Reading the same books, singing the same songs twice a day. For a while the whole process was taking 40 minutes. I only wanted a break and I didn't want to leave the house in order to do it. With some answered prayers we've gotten it down to about 20 minutes of reading and only one song.

Now that Anna is here I cherish this special bedtime routine with Macy. It's a time when I get to spend uninterrupted time with Macy and my full attention is on her. She likes to cuddle while we sit in her rocking chair together reading books. I spend a lot of time with Anna since she eats every 3 hours. I'm so glad I get the fun cuddle and story time with Macy twice a day. I love that my final daily memories are putting her in bed, kissing her good night, telling her she is a good girl, telling her I love her, and hearing her sweet voice say "love you mommy." Now I never want this routine to stop.

Yellow Arm Pit Stains Be Gone!

I'm blogging this in case anyone needs it but also for my record. I don't want to forget this!

I found this link on Pinterest on how to remove yellow arm pit stains from shirts. I had plenty of white shirts that needed this treatment so I figured I'd give it a try. The stains were so bad we were thinking about throwing the shirts away so I was really hoping this would work. It totally did!

The mixture is Dawn dish soap (I used Palmolive and it still worked), hydrogen peroxide, and baking soda. For about one shirt the recipe is:

• 1 tsp Dawn
• 3-4 tablespoons hydrogen peroxide
• 2 tablespoons baking soda

Scrub the paste onto the stain with a scrub brush. Let it stil for awhile (I did overnight) then wash as usual. 

Make sure to use plenty of the paste on each stain. I didn't the first time and the stain got better but didn't come out completely. I used more the second time and the stains came completely out.  

I didn't take any before and after pictures because I was washing *unmentionables* but I was quite pleased with the results. I also tried it on a white dress shirt and it worked great. Since I had a bunch of shirts to try it on I didn't really measure the ingredients. I put everything into a bowl and went to town scrubbing. Macy even helped a little.