Recent Griffin Happenings

Griffin is every bit of two years old these days and I am loving this age. Two has really not been a terrible age for us, but I think it's because three is worse (from what I've heard). I guess time will tell. 

I wanted to write down some of the things Griffin has been up to lately, what he's been saying, and just little pieces of information I don't want to forget. This post won't be interesting to anyone but Griffin's grandparents and his great aunt Mary Ann, but that's okay! He makes me so happy and entertains me every single day.

Griffin... 

• You call Veggie Tales "Debbil Tales". I'm not sure why, because you can clearly say the word veggie, but the pronunciation just kills me.

• You love going to story time on Wednesdays. You are a little timid and you sit on my lap most of the time, but your favorite part is when you get to shake the maraca eggs. You're very sweet and you always bring me one to shake.

• Playing outside is a big favorite these days. You like to help me water the flowers and you will mow the lawn with your little mower in the backyard when I'm watering our vegetable garden. You love playing with your basik-ball (basketball) and going for walks.

• You like being a big help to your daddy. You love helping him take the garbage cans down to the curb and back on trash days.

• You have a set of Duplo blocks that you play with everyday. When Daddy is done with work, the first thing you always ask him to do is make a tower with blocks. "Tower! Blocks!" Daddy makes way better towers than I do. When you knock them down, you wind your arm back so far and slap the tower all the way across the room.

• You sleep with a million stuffed animals. Right now you have your two Wubbies, your small blankey, your big blankey, Elmo, Cookie Monster, Mickey, Papa Bear, Christmas Dog, Vacuum the Monkey, a stuffed shark, Momo the Elephant, and your small "Ment Mixer" (cement mixer). They don't seem to affect your sleep, but you know if one is missing. Sometimes after nap or in the morning, you will throw them all out. You always keep your Ment Mixer with you though. That's the one you can't live without.

• You sleep at least 12 hours every night and you take a 2-3 hour nap each day. Your most recent thing is asking for one more kiss as we're leaving your bedroom. I say ask, but what I really mean is demand. You also dictate how many times we need to come back in for "one more kiss". Your dad and I talked about this today and we're going to need to break you of this soon. I'm sure that'll be fun for everyone!

• You do love to rock before bed and have one of us sing to you. Your favorite songs right now are "Goodbye Babies" (Rockabye Baby), "Jesus of the World" (Jesus Loves the Little Children), "Jesus" (Jesus Loves Me) and "Trust Jesus" ('Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus). I can't decide if you love the cuddle time more or if you just like stalling bedtime.

• Your very favorites shows right now are Bubble Guppies (Gups or Guppies) and a cartoon about a badger named Frances (Fas-Siss) on Netflix. Frances' little sister's voice makes your dad and I want to put our heads through a cement wall, so we try to limit Fas-Siss, but you do love it so much. Elmo, Super Why and Mickey Mouse Clubhouse are a very close second.

• I can't say that you have a favorite food because you're a pretty good eater, but you love fruit like your daddy. You also inhale sweet potatoes in any form, love hummus and crackers, and cinnamon school book cookies from Trader Joe's. You call them cinnamon cookies and they're a very effective bribing tool. You only drink milk and water and you're a big fan of both. I think you'd drink half a gallon of milk everyday if I'd let you. 

• You still love Cheerios. I keep them in a Tupperware cereal container in your cabinet that you're allowed to play with and often, I will find that you've stolen them away to the family room and you're happily munching away.

• You love puzzles! Your three favorites are a Melissa & Doug ABC sounds puzzle, a M&D transportation puzzle, and a puzzle that spells your name that Mimi and Papa got you for Christmas. You would do puzzles with me all day if you could.

• Your name puzzle plus a water bottle that you have with your name on it have really helped you with learning to spell your name! You can't spell it all, but you try so hard. I was watching you in your bed this morning on the monitor and you were just talking to yourself saying, "G-F-I-N spells Giffin!" You're so close! 

• You're very good at identifying family groups of people. For instance, some of our dearest friends are Annie and Nick and their daughters, Lydia and Violet. You will usually start by asking for Miss Annie (because you're in love with her) and then follow up asking for "Miss Ick (we're working on Mr. Nick), Eee-Ya, Baby Vi-Yet". You do that with your grandparents and uncles, too. 

• You still sleep in a crib, take a paci for nap time and bed time, and seem to have no interest in potty training. I am 100% okay with all of this and don't feel like we need to push you to change any of that in the near future.

• You are so funny! You have a great sense of humor. The other day, I was holding you while you were going to town on a whole apple and you held it up to my mouth and said, "Taste it!" 

• You are a very well mannered little boy. We have worked so hard with you on saying please and thank you. You are pretty consistent, but we all have our moments. If anyone sneezes or coughs, you usually follow it up with "besh you!" 

• You are a huge fan of the vacuum. You absolutely LOVE it! You hug it, you kiss it, you talk to it, you tell it good night... you are our vacuum's biggest fan. When we go to Target, the first thing you ask is "Facuums?" and we must go to the vacuum aisle. When we get there, it's truly like you're meeting a long-lost relative. "HI FACUUMS! HELLO FACUUMS! I LOVE YOU, FACUUMS!" It cracks me up every time! The interesting thing is that if I turn on the vacuum at home, you keep your distance. You don't like it coming too close to you if it's on. Silly boy.

• You're big on saying hello to people. Sometimes you'll walk into the kitchen and just say, "Hello!" and keep on going like we haven't seen each other in hours. You also say goodbye to different things when I take you up for a nap or just upstairs in general. "Goo-bye, flashcards! Goo-bye, dump truck! Goo-bye, water!"

• You can't get enough of construction vehicles, big trucks, and emergency vehicles. It amazes me what you can spot while we're driving. If there's a police car, a cement mixer, a backhoe, anything... you will find it. You have a good daddy who will take you to watch construction sites from time to time and you just love it! 

• You ask for the garbage truck every single morning. It's a highlight of your week. Our garbage man usually smokes a long cigar or cigarette and if you notice it, you'll tell me he's having a sucker. Haha! 

• You've had over 10 haircuts in your lifetime and you still scream bloody murder every single time. I have tried everything I know to do. I hold you, try to give you milk, give you a lollipop, they put on a show for you, but you always scream like I never hear you scream. It's always a workout. I'm going to make Dad take you next time. 

• You have a few chores that you do. You hand me the pillows when I make my bed, you help me unload the silverware from the dishwasher, and you put away socks when they're clean from the laundry. You love to help me and you also love to help me bake. I can't use the mixer without your help! You also like to get the cupcake tins out and pretend like you're baking "dupcakes". This is off topic, but you also say "dupstairs" for downstairs and upstairs. I love the way you talk! 

• You will say your full name if we ask you to say it: Giffin Ty-ur Day-fid Han-ee. You've recently started saying it as fast as you can and you think it's soooo funny! If someone asks what your name is, you'll respond with Giffy since we call you Griffy a lot.

• You love running errands with me. You really love grocery shopping and I think it's because it's so much uninterrupted time together. We chat, I let you hold different items and my list, and we just have a nice time together. One of your love languages is definitely quality time. I love that about you. You also love going to Trader Joe's together, but I think it's because of the sucker you get. :)

• You are a mama's boy and I love that about you. You're friendly, but you love being with me. You ask me to "Mommy, hold you" many times during the day and you always like to snuggle up on my lap and chest when we watch your shows. You are so snuggly and I don't take that for granted! You're big on your daddy, too. 

Griffin, words can't express how much I love you. It overwhelms my heart and makes my eyes filled with tears. I know your dad feels the same way. I love spending my days with you and I know I will never regret these years. You are the joy of my heart and I can't believe God chose me to be your mommy!

But as much as I love you, I hope you always know that your Heavenly Father loves you so much more. That's hard for me to comprehend, but I sure am thankful for it. I will let you down from time to time, but He never will. I pray you come to know Him at a young age and never know life apart from Him. 

I love you, my sweet Griffy boy! 

A Not-so-Confident Momma

I'm linking up again today with Kelly, Erin, Jennifer, and Courtney for Build 'Em Up! The topic this week is being confident in motherhood.

Before I was a mother, I was a perfect mother. 

Before I was a mother, I was an extremely confident mother.

I had big plans for my unborn son and my family. We were going to have an amazing natural birth (which we did, but only by the grace of God), I was going to exclusively breastfeed, I was going to have him on a flawless schedule, and on and on and on. 

But on a cold March night in 2011, that all changed in an instant as Tyler and I welcomed our beautiful curly headed boy into the world. It took me awhile, but I would soon figure out that I was as far from a perfect and confident mother as they come. 

I was hit with that reality in the hospital room the next day when Griffin wouldn't latch to nurse. Little did I know that this was the beginning of a breastfeeding nightmare, but really, that it would begin shake any confidence I thought I had as a mother. 

We had a scary few weeks with Griffin where he lost a significant amount of weight, almost enough to have to be hospitalized. That shook my confidence. 

I had to supplement with formula (which is fine and was a lifesaver for us), but I was met with some adversity from a friend and eventually lost that friendship because of FORMULA. It was her choice, not mine. Ridiculous, but it shook my confidence. 

It was hard for me to get Griffin to nap consistently and for any length of time. It took me the better part of 6 months to figure it out while my other friends seemed to have their babies on perfect schedules almost instantly. That shook my confidence.

Griffin was still taking a bottle of milk before bedtime when he was 14 months old. I was criticized for that, and it shook my confidence.

I could go on and on about what shook my confidence as a mother, but really? Those are my issues, no one else's. Plus, because of all those factors, I learned what was the best thing for my confidence as a mom.

I needed time. Time was what helped me to figure out what my little boy needed. Not what my friends thought he needed, not what the random lady at the grocery store thought he needed, but what I knew he needed. 

All I needed was to get to know Griffin better, trust my instinct, seek help from those I wanted to seek help from, and seek the Lord's face in the process. 

Griffin doesn't have a hump on his back from formula and he dropped that bottle of milk without a second thought. He takes naps and he doesn't have any problems with his weight. 

I wish I could go back, hold new-mom Rachel's face in my hands and tell her that everything would be okay. I'd tell her to relax, go with her gut, and do what's best for her baby and her family. I'd tell her that God and Tyler would help her and guide her to make good decisions for Griffin. I'd tell her not to worry about unsolicited advice because she's not mothering for that persons affirmation or glory. I'd tell her a lot of things, but knowing her, she probably wouldn't listen. Ha! 

I don't know when I truly started feeling confident as a mother, but I know I'm much better than I used to be. Everyone is different. Everyone makes different choices for their family and their children, and that's okay! We need to support one another, not tear one another down. And we certainly don't need to be tearing ourselves down for our choices. 

I don't want Griffin to be raised by a timid mom who questions her decisions because of someone's opinion or because of the way another mother is doing something. I want him to see me as confident and sure of myself because I'm seeking to glorify the Lord in all that I do, and that includes the big and small of motherhood. I want him to know that I'm confident in him as a child of God. 

The one thing I'm completely confident about is that my son knows I love him. That's what really matters! 

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.

Colossians 3:23-24

Menu Monday

I'm linking up again with Rachel this week for Menu Monday!

We've had an erratic few weeks, so my cooking has been spotty at best. These are a few meals we've had during that time.

Slow Cooker Chicken Enchilada Chili

We love this chili and the fact that it's made in the slow cooker makes it that much better! It has great flavor and it really couldn't be easier to put together. Nothing peeves me more than a slow cooker meal that you have to prep for 30 minutes. Doesn't that kind of defeat the purpose? We load ours up with avocado, shredded cheese, and Fritos. Tyler loves sour cream on his. I always make cornbread muffins to eat with this meal. I also leave the celery out because I truly believe it's a sin to enjoy celery. Amen.

Grilled Tortellini Chicken Caesar Salad with homemade dressing

This salad is delicious, easy, and filling. It's my friend Emily's recipe and I love adding things to it. I like to marinate chicken breasts in Lawry's Herb & White Wine marinade, grill them, and slice them up for this salad. I've always used the "dressing" recipe that comes with the salad recipe (Caesar dressing and lemon juice mixed together), but I have started using Cristina Ferrare's recipe for Caesar dressing because it's the best I've ever had. I use anchovy paste instead of anchovies. It's the perfect Caesar dressing and surprisingly, not mayonnaise based. I top this with big shavings of Parmesan cheese. It's a great summer meal!

Warm Steak and Asparagus Salad

There's nothing bad about this meal. I'm sure I've included it on Menu Monday in the past. It's easy and it's out of this world good. This was our meal for supper on Mother's Day! We add a little bit of blue cheese opposed to gorgonzola. We had slices of Kroger's Whole Garlic Clove bread on the side. This will always be a favorite in our house.

BBQ Chicken, Roasted Sweet Potatoes, and Zucchini & Squash Sauté

Wow. That's a terrible picture. Anyway, this is one of my new favorite meal combinations. Tyler is a fantastic griller and makes some of the best BBQ chicken you'll ever have. I paired it with roasted sweet potatoes which we love. These melt in your mouth! Griffin loves them too. 

I also added my favorite summer vegetable sauté. I slice up one half of an onion, one zucchini, and one yellow squash. I sauté the onion in some olive oil until it's becoming tender, then I add the sliced zucchini and squash. I add a little bit more olive oil and sauté it all until it's soft. In the last minute of cooking, I add a few shakes of soy sauce and a little bit of garlic salt. Mix that together, remove it from the heat, and add a few tablespoons of grated mozzarella cheese. Toss and serve hot! My mom made this a lot growing up. Try it! I bet you'll love it. 

Fig and Prosciutto Pizza at A TAVOLA

Obviously, I did not make this pizza. We went out for a date and we tried a wood fire pizza place that we just loved! The atmosphere was perfect and the pizza was so, so good. Our server recommended this fig and prosciutto pizza and he was spot on. It had fig jam, prosciutto, fontina cheese, and an arugula salad on top. I am excited to recreate this at home! If you're in the Cincinnati area, this is a fun and delicious place for a great date night! 

Hope you all have a great week!

Five for Friday

My friend Rachel (who I sometimes link up with for Menu Monday) does a fun little thing called Five for Friday. It's just five short little blurbs about five things she's loving. I thought I would join her today to let you know about five things I've been enjoying lately!

1. These Gilligan & O'Malley nightgowns from Target. I picked up one of these before our trip to Florida and after sleeping in it for a few nights, I had to grab a few more. Now that it's summer time, I am living in these. They're comfortable, soft, and cute! I do love a full coverage nightgown; they're surprisingly hard to find!

2. Seche Vite Fast Dry Top Coat. I'd been hearing about this for a long time, but I really liked my generic Sally Hansen top coat. It didn't dry fast, which was a huge pain, but it was a good top coat. On a whim, I decided to grab the Seche Vite and my nail painting has been forever changed. This stuff dries SO incredibly fast! I can do my nails everyday because it takes hardly any time. If you do your own manicures, I would highly recommend this. I've seen it at Target and at Sally's. 

3. Griffin and I had lunch at Chick-fil-A yesterday and I wanted to try one of their new salads. I couldn't decide so I did what I do when I can't choose-- I ask Twitter. Ha! I ended up taking my friend Jenn's suggestion and trying the Cobb salad with the avocado lime ranch with a little bit of buffalo sauce. It was SO good! I love a good Cobb salad and since I wasn't a fan of any of CFA's old salads, I'm happy with the change. I'm extremely bitter that they didn't bring back their banana pudding milkshake, but that's another rant for another time. Here's a picture of my darling lunch date. Aren't you jealous??

4. Chobani Flips. Rachel talked about these too, but I just can't help myself. I don't fancy myself a yogurt lover. I don't hate it, but I don't love it. And random pieces of fruit and other things floating around in my yogurt? Absolutely not. But I can't explain it... I love these! They are delicious and the flavors are perfect. They were $1 at Kroger this week, so as you can see, I stocked up. I've been limiting myself to one a day but I could easily put down 2 or 3. Even if you don't like yogurt (even Greek yogurt-- GAG), try these. I bet you'll be surprised.

5. I pinned this awhile ago, but I still think it's the funniest thing I've ever seen on Pinterest and I've seen a lot of funny things there. Ryan Seacrest... bless your heart. This is totally something I would do. 

Have a lovely weekend!

Trader Joe's Thursday

Can you believe it?

I'm actually blogging about this again.

Will wonders never cease?

Anyway, I wanted to share a few more favorites this week. I tried a few new things this week and boy, am I glad I did!

Mini Brie Bites with Hot Pepper Jelly

A few weeks ago, I discovered these mini Brie bites in the cheese section. I love Brie, so I threw them in my cart and I can't tell you what a good decision that was. Five come in a bag and I wasn't sure what to expect when I opened the first individual Brie, so I wanted to show you. I was thinking it was just going to be a little cup of creamy Brie, but it's an actual tiny individual cheese with a rind! It is a perfect snack between lunch and dinner! It holds me until dinner but doesn't fill me up so I'm not hungry. 

I put pieces of the Brie on TJ's equivalent to Wheat Thins and smear a little pepper jelly on top. If you don't like spicy, you will probably still like this jelly. It's got the sweetest heat and it's perfect with the Brie. Do yourself a favor and grab this combination the next time you're at TJ's! 

Wine Country Chicken Salad

Listen, I'm kind of a chicken salad snob. I didn't even like it until about a year ago and now, I really only like my homemade kind. I like the perfect seasoning, lots of grapes for sweetness, and pecans for crunch.  And NO CELERY. Gag. Celery is of the devil. I'd heard that this was delicious and was hungry while we were in TJ's yesterday, so I picked some up for lunch. I really liked this! It has big pieces of chicken and the cranberries add the perfect compliment. Of course, I love the pecans. I think chicken salad tastes best on club crackers, but I just used some TJ's Ritz crackers yesterday since I didn't have any club crackers. Delicious!

Sea Salt & Turbinado Sugar Dark Chocolate Almonds 

These are crazy good. The salt is perfect and I think it's just what the dark chocolate needs. Keep these in a secret place so you don't have to share with anyone. Does my kindness inspire you? 

Summer Watermelon Salad with Sugar Snap Peas

I can't take credit for this, but I did want to share! This was what they were serving at the sample station. Both Griffin and I had two samples... each. The sample lady kept giving them to us! It would be the perfect compliment to anything you might throw on the grill this summer or would be a great side to any type of luncheon. I can't wait to make this soon!

I also picked up the May edition of Trader Joe's flyer. If you shop there, grab one! They highlight different items in the store and I hadn't tried a lot of them! I spent some time browsing the flyer yesterday during Griffin's nap and I marked some new things to try. We'll see what I find!

I do apologize to any of you who don't have a TJ's. I know I've been torturing my poor aunt with my TJ's recommendations! I will pray that Trader Joe's comes to a city near you soon. 

And this has nothing to do with TJ's, but I hope the cutest boy in the world brightens your world this Thursday. He thought he was big stuff in Daddy's glasses! 

Happy Thursday, friends!

Griffin's Sesame Street Second Birthday Party :: Decor & Food

On March 6, my baby turned two. Two!

How did that happen?

March was a really busy month in our house. We had a lot going on plus we spent two weeks in Florida, which was glorious. We decided to hold off until April to celebrate Griffin's birthday. We decided to celebrate with a Sesame Street party since Griffin is all about Elmo, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, and their other friends lately!

One thing I was quite sure about this year was that I didn't want to have it at our house. We did that last year for his first birthday (which I really do intend to post about someday-- last year wasn't my best blogging year), and although it was a blast, I wasn't in a position to have a party at our house again.

We decided to have it at OZO Play Cafe. If you live in Cincinnati and have young children, I would highly recommend OZO! It was a perfect place to have a party. The kids were able to run around and play and there was plenty of room for the adults to visit. 

The chalkboard wall was all ready for the party! Jodi, the owner of OZO, did this herself. Isn't it fantastic?

I loved setting up this little station where our guests arrived. I brought my little chalkboard from home (I made it with chalkboard paint and a large from IKEA) and set up the balloon wreath. I recycled the wreath from Griffin's first birthday and painted a number 2 to sit inside of it. That wreath was a labor of love last year, but I think I will pull it out for his birthday every year whether we have a party or not! 

A few months ago, I'd found Sesame Street books in the dollar spot at Target, so I picked some up for party favors. I was planning on those being the party favors for Griffin's friends, but the day before the party, Target restocked the dollar spot with some darling Sesame Street cups! I picked some up, filled them with goldfish crackers (for Elmo's goldfish, Dorothy, of course!) and we set those out with the books. For the adults, we attached a "Me Love Cookies! Love, Griffin" tag to individual packages of Chips Ahoy! cookies. Who doesn't love Chips Ahoy?? 

I recycled Griffin's first birthday banner and hung that up as well. I highly recommend using the same color scheme for your child's first and second birthday parties. It made this year so much easier! I also used some of the tissue poms from his first birthday and created these Sesame Street characters. I loved how they turned out and they were so easy to make. I thought about doing a tutorial, but I just opened up a picture of their faces and used some card stock to make the faces. Easy peasy! 

I love our little birthday Elmo. One of my dear friends saw him at a shop and texted me to see if I wanted her to pick him up for the party. If you squeeze his hand, he says, "Happy Birthday!" He was the perfect addition to our pom poms. 

And how cute is that sign? I had been browsing Etsy for printable collections and came across Amanda's Parties to Go. I fell in love with her stuff and was planning on ordering. Then I found out that my friend Meredith had ordered her daughter's party printables from Amanda and had been so happy with it all. I was sold! I loved everything Amanda included in the package, especially Griffin's invitation. 

I really enjoyed putting decorations together for his party! The printable package combined with the primary color choices that are readily available at any craft store made it easy. This is a horrible set of pictures, but I made some easy decorative pieces with some primary colored tin buckets I picked up from the Target dollar bin. Yes, I'm borderline obsessed with the dollar bin. It was so helpful. 

I printed the large character faces onto adhesive paper and stuck them on a tin. I put some floral foam in the base of each tin, covered it with shredded colored paper, and then poked a thin wooden dowel into the foam. I printed and cut the personalized circular designs from the party package and attached them to the top of the dowel. They were a cute, quick addition to the food tables. The decor was one of my favorite parts of this party. I love bright, fun colors-- they're perfect for a birthday party! 

 We kept the food simple and did a lot of easy snacks. We ordered a Chick-fil-A nugget tray and had cheese and crackers. We put out some different kinds of cookies (including my mother-in-law's fantastic snickerdoodles) and my mom and I made cake pops. We had chocolate cupcakes in lieu of a cake and gummy worms for Oscar's worm, Slimey! Of course, we had plenty of Elmo's goldfish, Dorothy.

One of my absolute favorite parts of the party were the fruit and veggie trays. I'd seen an example on Pinterest and just knew that we had to have these at the party! My mom worked really hard to put these together. Didn't she do the best job? I couldn't get over how cute they were!

It was such a fun day with our family and friends! 

Up next? Pictures of the birthday boy and his party pals!