A prayer for Stellan

If you are a Confessions of a CF Husband follower then you have recently seen the post about praying for Stellan.  I'm his friend on facebook and he's been making several status updates about Stellan for the past few days and I've become very interested in the story and have been praying for the family for the past several days.  My heart goes out for this family and I'm just asking you to please please please say a prayer for Stellan, the family and friends.  You can check out the entire story at MckMama's blog.  She's been updating several times and she's on twitter and her last three twitter updates are on the sidebar of her blog.   I don't know this child from Adam, but a part of my heart aches for this mother - I just think that once you become a mother your heart goes out to moms in situations that are our worst nightmare.  I admire MckMama for her courage, strength and faith.  Our God is an awesome God and it shows through this mother.  

WOW - it's been a long time

Now that I can access the Internet from my cell phone and I have the facebook application along with email on my IPhone, I NEVER get on the computer anymore - thus not blogging either.  I actually miss it.  I enjoy blogging as well as keeping up with several other blogs, but it's just fallen to the wayside lately....I promise it's going to make a comeback!

Not a lot has been going on lately - I'm going to give a quick update...Christmas letter/New Year letter style!  

Jack has become a much more enjoyable child!  He's fallen into a better routine, he's eating foods now, he's sleeping through the night and he's doing a lot less crying - PRAISE THE LORD!!!  There for awhile I was ready to pull my hair out! 

He's not one for baby food so I've been giving him regular food all mashed up - he's completely opposite from Olivia - she couldn't stand any bit of texture in her foods until she was well over a year old - Jack on the other hand doesn't like the puree variety and he now has two teeth on the bottom to help out with eating.

He's on the move now and quickly!  He can roll across the room in a few seconds flat!  He's started getting up on his knees and rocking - this is something new for us because Olivia never crawled - in fact, she really didn't discover she had knees  until after she walked.  I have a feeling he will be crawling before too long!  He's not a very vocal child though - except for crying - he's said mama a few times and a few dadas, but nothing consistently.

Olivia is enjoying him much more now that he actually is doing more than just laying around and crying.  She enjoys playing on the floor with him and loves to get him laughing - it's such a joy to watch the two of them play together.

Olivia is visiting memaw and papaw in Indianapolis right now during her first spring break!  I tried talking to her on the phone last night but she told me she just didn't have much time!  She is enjoying being spoiled by her family and visiting with her cousins.  She has had an incredible year at Wholehearted in their preschool program and she will be attending kindergarten there next year.  She's really become interested in drawing and journaling - she will go through a spiral notebook in a weekend with pictures - it's hilarious to sit down and let her explain it to you - she likes to come up with "stories".  

I had my gall bladder surgery 3 days ago and am recovering from that - I am no longer stoned...which isn't a great feeling!  The doctor was pretty impressed with the size of my stones, but he wouldn't share them with us.  I've got three small incisions that aren't bothersome at all, but I have a larger incision in my belly button that hurts like hell.  Each day has been a little bit better - Brian goes back to work tomorrow AND Olivia comes home tomorrow so I'm hoping that I get much better between now and then.

Brian has been working a lot of hours lately and the job has been a bit stressful at times, but we are so thankful that he has a job - anything is better than nothing right now.  He's an incredible husband and father and he surprised me with a get-away for the two of us at the end of next month - this time next month I will be packing for Naples, FL - it was a huge surprise and MUCH needed - I am so excited to spend 3 nights alone with my hunny!  

There, all caught up now!  That's all that's been going on here...mostly.

New Recipes

I recently came across three great recipes that I had to share.

The first is Chicken Enchiladas with creamy ranch sauce. I discovered the recipe from my friend Susan's blog who got it from a blog named Poop on Jelly. You have got to try it! It's super easy and EXCELLENT! Brian and Olivia are not fans of what I call "sloppy enchiladas" - meaning enchiladas that are smothered in sauce so for half of the pan I did not add the cream sauce over the top of the enchiladas and I added a very little bit of the red enchilada sauce so they weren't too dry.

The second recipe is another Mexican dish. It's called Santa Fe Foldover . I got it from the Eat Better America website and I added grilled chicken to it. The recipe is supposed to be 3 servings, but I doubled it - it was plenty of food, but there's no way one serving would have been enough! I also didn't make it as one whole meal - I separated the dough and made three separate foldovers. I gave one portion of the dough to Olivia and she was in charge of making her own - this is a wonderful recipe to have your kids help out with. I find that she eats better when she is involved in making it. I told her that she had to have beans, chicken, cheese, lettuce and tomato but she could arrange it all the way she wanted. She made her foldover with beans and cheese, had the chicken on the side and made a salad with her lettuce and tomato. I made a side of brown rice and mixed in salsa for a healthier version of Mexican rice. In addition, you can make your own bisquick alternative - this is cheaper and excludes all the preservatives that are added to bisquick. Try this bisquick substitute at wikiHow.

The third recipe is pasta dish. It's called Southwest Fettuccine Bowl. I got it from the Eat Better America website and I added grilled chicken to it also.  This is by far the easiest recipe I have made in a long time.  Make sure you use the chili sauce in the recipe because it adds a great taste!  I thought about just using some extra salsa instead of buying an entire jar of chili sauce for two Tablespoons.  If you do not have chili sauce, or don't want to buy it, then you can make your own.

ENJOY!!

Keep in mind that I have a VERY picky husband and he hates to find out that I'm trying out a a new recipe, but he actually was impressed by all of these recipes...you know it HAS to be good now!!