If At First You Don't Succeed, Try, Try Again

We just knew that Hampton would like his Baby Einstein toy, but he had other ideas. We think it's a stimulating toy with so much to do and see, so we were determined for him to enjoy learning with it. So we just kept sticking him under it until one day he didn't cry when playing with it! Now his face lights up and he kicks and swings his arms at the lights and music. He still won't play with it for long periods, but we've definitely made progress. That's the power of perseverance, baby!

Eat From The Pantry Challenge

Inspired by Tanner's favorite blog, we decided that January was going to be "eat what you've got" month. It's so easy to buy stuff that you think you'll eat and then it just sits in your pantry taking up space forever. So we decided that we'd just eat what we already had from our pantry & freezer, and the only things we were allowed to add to the mix was fresh produce, dairy, and meat. It was quite an adventure coming up with recipes with only what we had at home! **

The most creative ingredient that we worked with was 2 pounds of vanilla yogurt that was left over from the big family get-together. We don't like vanilla yogurt, but we were determined to find something to do with it! We tried 3 different recipes....yogurt brownies, orange crumb cake, and waffles. The brownies were TERRIBLE! You know it's bad when sweet-toothed Bo votes to throw them out. The orange crumb cake was quite good, and we made several substitutions to that recipe. The best thing we made, though, were the waffles. They were delicious! Plus, we made Paula Deen's yummy praline syrup to go with it, so we were loving it!

We also had tons of potatoes to use, so we fried potatoes for the first time, and we came up with a taco potato recipe that was awesome. We also made an interesting version of potato soup that had us throwing everything but the kitchen sink into the pot, including a homemade roux at the end to thicken it up. We didn't think the soup was going to be able to be salvaged, but it ended up delicious!

The Eat From The Pantry Challenge was not nearly as tough as we thought it would be, and we came up with some new and interesting recipes that we'll use throughout the year. We actually are looking forward to doing this challenge again in a few months!

the delicious yogurt waffles with praline syrup

**By the way...if you're wondering what about all the bargain groceries we've recently bought, they're sitting in our guest-room closet waiting until February to be used!

Who Lives In A Pineapple Under The Sea?

Oh, yeah. That's right....Spongebob Squarepants. Grandi introduced Hampton to this wonderful new world, and he is infatuated. All you have to do is turn it on and he'll sit mesmerized by the bright colors. Of course, we do NOT want him to be raised by the television, but it is nice to be able to get some things done while Spongebob acts silly on the TV. The major downside? The theme song gets stuck in our heads for the rest of the day!!

watching the show intently

Raining Buckets

Since it rained all day here yesterday, we took the opportunity to start organizing the garage & Hampton's closet. We pulled out all of the clothes he's already outgrown to store, and Hampton decided he wanted to help!

"Look at this one, mommy! I think it still might fit!"

"I'll hold the divider while you do the work"

"Whew! I'm tired of all this work. Let's take a nap!"

Shake, Rattle, and Roll!

We're so excited that Hampton is reaching some big milestones! He can now finally play with a rattle! He can grasp it and sort of shake it. Of course, he eventually tires of it and drops it, but hey, we're just glad that he's going to be able to play with his toys! As for the rolling part, he can roll over on one side. He actually rolled all the way over the other day, but judging by his reaction, we don't think he enjoyed it that much!

Cute Cousins

We hadn't seen this super-cute picture of Mira and her cousin "Hampy", as she calls him. We just couldn't resist stealing this picture from their blog & sharing it with you!

Weekend Fun with P&J

This weekend, P&J (Bo's parents, or Grandma & Grandpa as they're now called!) visited from TN. Jan had a long weekend due to MLK, Jr day, so they decided to trek down here to visit us....oh, who's kidding? They came to see Hampton!

We had a great weekend visiting, roaming the county, and grilling out. We especially loved being off of diaper duty! Luckily, President's Day is coming up, so Hampton will get to see Grandma & Grandpa again very soon!