Come Here Beautiful...

If you are my Facebook friend, you may have already seen this, but I am LOVING this story and never want to forget it, so here it is again...

Tonight my cousin and her son were here for a wonderful visit. We got the girls all ready for bed and were about to tuck them in and say their prayers, when Lilly did the cutest darn thing....

She told Eric, "Come here, beautiful", and then grabbed his ears so she could pull him close and kiss him goodnight. It was the sweetest thing. I heard her say it the first time, but had my back to them. Then she said it again and I almost melted. I'm not sure where she heard that phrase, but she does love her Daddy!!

The big 3-0 and 20 months!!

Tuesday I turned 30 years old! Woohoo, I guess. It just felt weird. I realize that 30 is not old, but as a kid, I always thought that 30 meant adulthood and I don't feel like a grown-up yet. :) You'd think the husband, 2 toddlers, and the mortgage would make me feel like a grown-up, but I feel the same as I did in high school.

Anyways, my favorite thing about my birthday is that my girls share the date as their "month" birthday. So they turned 20 months old the same day. AND Eric's 30th birthday was the next day. It was a big week, even without the sick kiddos.

Eric was a doll and didn't make me cook all day on my birthday. We got Subway for lunch and then we went out to Cracker Barrel for our joint birthday dinner.

The birthday girls LAST year...29 years and 8 months

The birthday girls THIS year...30 years and 20 months! Lilly is still on the left and Lexi is on the right. We thought it would be fun to take the same picture exactly 1 year later.

Daddy and his sweeties!
Lexi then Lilly...

The family all ready for pancakes...

Lilly kept herself busy coloring and pointing to the fireplace saying, "Fire, Mommy!" until the food came...
Lexi had fun coloring too....
She also loved watching other people...
Lilly started getting fussy when her biscuits took too long to get to us...

Back home...Lilly and Daddy!

Miss Alexis...they are growing up too fast!!

"Oopsie"

I thought maybe my sweet, happy girls had disappeared this week...turns out they have ear infections. I wish I had caught it sooner, but I thought it was just teething pain. But there have been a couple of things that made them happy no matter how they were feeling. The biggest one is a game we have named, "Oopsie!" Once they discovered that their crayons fit perfectly down the umbrella hole in their picnic table, the fun was about to begin...they take turns dropping crayons down the hole and say "Oopsie" every time a crayon hits the floor. :) We have several variations of the game, but mostly because it keeps mommy from getting bored as I pick up crayons off the floor and give them back to the girls. One variation is naming the colors as the crayons drop. Last night we played this game for 35 minutes. As long as they have fun, right? :)

Please excuse Lexi's little farm girl look...she had gotten something all over her shirt so I just let her run around in her overalls 'til bath time. It's kind of cute though.

See, total cuteness!!!
They also love to wrestle A LOT!! In this picture, there is a lot of laughter going on...about 3 minutes later, someone won't get off of the other one and then the biting and crying starts. Then I put the camera down and pull them apart. Gotta love it!

Lilly thinks playing games with her sister is the best!!!

I have so much to post, but will stick with this for now. I'll try and catch up this weekend. Two sick, non-napping, and crying toddlers are keeping me pretty occupied. :)

Stain Removal Tip

I was introduced to the cleaning properties of hydrogen peroxide back when I was at UMHB. One of my housemates showed me how it gets blood stains out of clothing. This was great to know for the time when Sneezy got a bad cut and Eric's pants had blood spatters all over them.

Last week, I got took a pair of the girls tan pants that had a couple of unknown stains and got them out. These are the same pants that I had tried cleaning 3-4 times with Oxi-Clean and had no success. I just put them in my sink, poured some hydrogen peroxide over the spots, and left them for 3 hours. The stains are almost completely gone!! Yea!!

I read that it works on carpet too...Someone put a spray nozzle on an inexpensive bottle from the store and sprayed the peroxide on the stain. They left it on for about ten minutes, took warm water with a dish liquid containing lemon and blotted it up. It took the stain out of the carpet. I will have to try it sometime.

I can tell you from personal experience though that it works so great on blood stains, even when they are set in. It just may take more time and effort if they are set. I read that it might damage delicate fabrics, but I haven't had any problems yet.

WOW!

I just listened to a JJ Heller song that I hadn't heard before and WOW!!! It is awesome! If you have a chance, check it out sometime. It's worth it.

In Love With Cooking...

I am cooking from scratch more often these days. Don't get me wrong, I still take shortcuts when I can, but am trying more and more things. This has led me to a wonderfully fun discovery....I am starting to...*gasp*...LOVE COOKING!!!!

It is truly exciting to me to serve my girls a warm slice of bread that I made....with my own hands! This also means that I am addicted to food blogs. I used to get frustrated when I would get a good recipe from a website that was complicated and had poor instructions. Not anymore...I cannot imagine how excited my mom would be to have access to food blogs. She might have even started one, come to think of it. :) Anyways, I am only saying all of this, because Eric and I are trying new recipes every week, and while he is way pickier than I am, we have found some definite keepers. My goal in the next few weeks is to include some of those awesome recipes on here.

Tonight, I am just going to link you all to a recipe that we tried last week. Do any of you have a secret love for Taco Bell?? I sure do, just ask my dad!!! I found this recipe for homemade Taco Bell Mexican Pizzas and they were truly better than the originals, plus super easy to make. We thought they had the exact flavor of the Taco Bell ones, but didn't leave you feeling overly full and heavy after eating them. :)

Eric wanted to help me out and cooked the tortillas on the grill instead of frying them. We used uncooked tortillas that you can find in the refrigerated section by the eggs at most grocery stores. And it was sooooooo good!! The girls even gobbled one up. :)

So if you like mexican pizzas, check out this amazing recipe and FABULOUS blog that I check regularly.

http://stolenmomentscooking.com/homemade-taco-bell-mexican-pizzas/

Black and White

I adore black and white photographs, but I really like sharp, contrasting ones. The other night we were having our girls night and because we missed our nap, the grumpies were here too!

I put on a Veggie Tales movie for the girls to calm down with before bed and managed to get some cute pictures...at least of Lexi who was sitting still. Lilly was suddenly energized and wiggly. :)

My little Lexi cheeks....

She played peekaboo with Bob and Larry...

Later I managed to take a few of Lilly while she played. She is so funny...Her new favorite thing is to get a few different shaped blocks and put them in the right hole, over, and over, and over again! She sat on the floor like this saying, "Circle, square, circle, square" for about 20 minutes.

And last but not least, my sweet girls! Lilly giving me the best smile she could muster and Lexi not paying attention. :)