Baby Verst's Baby Shower!

Our good friends Austen and Heather Verst are welcoming their first baby in November this year. They are being blessed with a boy, and are too excited for words. Saturday we hosted a baby shower for Heather, and it was such a good time! The theme was sports, and we had "Take me out to the ball game" center pieces! Everything turned out adorable, and Heather was glowing from beginning to end. It is always so sweet for me to be able to see new moms-to-be opening gifts, looking at clothes for their newborn, asking questions about births and deliveries. These kinds of conversations and events remind me of when our girls were born. And when I was pregnant with them. The years are flying, and I tired to remember the joy of it all when I was celebrating with Heather on Saturday. Here are some photos!
Congratulations to Austen and Heather, and may the rest of the pregnancy go wonderfully! We cannot wait to meet him!!!!!!!!!!!

Our Summer Vacation 2010!!!!!!!

Every summer we plan a little family vacation, and this summer we were blessed to be able to go and visit with friends and family up in central and northern CA. We stopped off in Fresno to see Grandma and Grandpa, and even were lucky enough to leave the little ones for a few days so that we could go and visit our friends Jason and Melanie up in Sacramento. They were the best hosts ever, and we had a great time out on their boat, eating great food, and being shown the beautiful sights within their area. From there we went back to spend the week with Grandma and Grandpa, and of course the girls too! It was great to visit with everyone and the girls were able to use their new pool whenever they wanted, so they were happy as can be. For the second week of our vacation, we headed up to Mammoth, CA, which is a mountain town with amazing things to see and do. Our friends Danny and Julia were gracious enough to let us in on their family vacation and we all were able to stay in a great condo right in town. They have two adorable boys, Ben and James, and the girls had such a blast with them! We went to different lakes and tourist attractions, and kept busy with a lot of fun activities for everyone. It was such a great two weeks, and we took many pictures to capture the memories!


It was such a great time for our family! There are many more pictures, but not enough space to show all of the fun we had. We owe our friends and family a giant thank you for everything! It is truly a blessing to have friends and family that are loving and caring, and I know our girls find such joy and comfort in them.
Cheers to our Summer of 2010 vacation!

Stella turns 2!!!!!!!!!!!!

Stella turned two on July 20th, and it has taken me this long to blog about it! Perhaps I just don't want to accept that my "baby" has officially exited the baby and toddler phase and entered the preschool years (although I think she still has some toddler months left...). Here are some pictures from her special birthday!

Here is Gracie getting ready for swimming!


Here is Stella checking out the cake!
This is one of her and her uncle Colton; I think it captures her personality perfectly! We all had so much fun celebrating her day, and I know she did too. Stella has been such a blessing to us, and such a wonderful addition to our family.
Happy birthday baby, we love you so much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A Healthy Lifestyle

I often post about living healthy, eating healthy, exercise, etc. Some of my friends and family think I focus too much on this, or that it is not really that important. I disagree. The life we are living may be short, but I would like my family and myself to live it with quality. Most of our friends have turned 30, or may be a little older, a little younger. This is the age where the women begin the "anti-aging" talks, and the men begin to complain about their backs hurting or their hair loss. Each year that passes will just be making us older, and in turn we may have some health problems (and wrinkles!) coming our way.
I refuse to be older than I am, and when you eat poorly, sleep poorly, refuse to exercise, etc., you begin to feel older than you are. Your body will not function properly, you will be fatigued and injury prone. Keton and I do not believe this is a way to live, and when you have two little energy-loaded children to look after, you have to be on a health kick to keep up.
The idea for this post came to me after another one of my friends and coworkers asked me (yet again) how I can possibly live as a vegetarian. Well, I do eat fish, so technically I am a pescetarian. This question has been asked of me several times, and by both friends and family. There were even people that believed I would pass out during my half marathon because I was simply not eating right.
Perhaps I should set the record straight, and maybe even rub off some of my non-meat-eatingness on one or two people (yes, I realize that this is not grammatically correct, but just go with it). I have been a vegetarian for four years now, and prior to giving up all meat I stopped eating beef a good nine years ago. Yep, no burgers or steak for nine years. When I was a meat eater I had various digestive issues frequently, and was a good 15-20 lbs heavier. I ate out at fast food places without too much thought. When I had Gracie, I did not want meat any longer and so I gave it up and changed my diet. All of a sudden, I wasn't eating fries too often since there were no burgers or chicken sandwiches being ordered. Fast food seemed kind of silly, since there were not many vegetarian options (and those salads are not really good options!). We ate at home more, and I learned to cook new meals with various kinds of vegetables and proteins. Not only did I drop the weight, but I began to feel so much better! I was a vegetarian all throughout my pregnancy with Stella (and she came out at 8lbs!) and I did not pass out during my recent half marathon.
Case closed. No meat required! Truthfully, I do not view meat as "bad", although certain kinds and fat percentages should always be avoided. But taking meat off of my plate has forced me to make the rest of my diet healthy, and in order to get the fats and proteins I need, I have to really concentrate on what I am eating. This automatically creates an awareness of what you place in your body. That is where I believe the real health benefit is.
So, here is a typical summer meal for us:
This is a yummy salad with baby spring mix lettuce, butter lettuce, fresh blueberries, pecans (unsalted), feta cheese (with a light hand), cucumbers and basalmic vinegarette dressing (light). The side dish is frozen cherries. If I have beans on hand I throw in some garbanzos or kidney beans too. The cheese, beans, olive oil in the dressing, and pecans (0r any nut) is where I get the good fats and proteins. The veggies and beans are a great source of fiber and vitamins. You can make a salad a meal! Just toss in your favorite veggies, a little cheese, nuts, beans, and some dressing (careful to keep it light; the nuts and cheese have a lot of calories) and you are good to go! Avocado is another favorite that I add when they are in season. Hummus is another staple in the house as well. We eat a lot of Mediterranean food (hummus, veggies, pitas, olives), pasta with veggies, soups, veggies enchiladas made with three different kinds of beans, salmon, etc. Leeks have become a favorite veggie of mine and they are loaded with good for you vitamins! We are also getting to like various chards sauteed with lemon juice. The salt is low in our household, the water consumption high, and we try to get in exercise wherever possible. No one is deprived (we have dessert often!) and everyone is feeling healthy. Of course, we have a glass of wine now and then as well, which is a treat for us stressed parents!
I included this picture to show what I have recently learned. This glass of wine is about 4 ounces. Which is around 90 calories and is a "serving" size of wine. I was shocked to learn that the wine I am having at restaurants is a good 8-12 ounces of wine! That is a lot of wine and calories in one glass. So at home, I use really small (you'll have to find these at antique stores or thrift stores; they don't make wine glasses small anymore!) glasses to be sure that I am not being heavy handed with the wine.
I am sure most of you have stopped reading at this point, but since I was getting so many questions, I decided to answer a few and pass on some healthy tips. If you have any, please share them and post a comment!

Our New Project

Alas, it has been quite some time since I have written, but I am sure you all can understand since you too have busy lives! We took on a new project this weekend, with the help of my wonderful mother (thank goodness!). Our backyard, or sideyard here at our apartment is rather spacious and a great space for our family. Since moving in, we have only stared at it, freed it of weeds, allowed weeds to grow again, stared at it some more, ignored it, and thrown our hands up at it often. Finally, we decided that it was time to get our hands dirty (and boy did we!) and get this yard put together. It was a weekend straight out of HGTV! Shopping was done, bags of materials purchased, loaded, unloaded, etc. The three adults worked hard, and the girls played hard. They were thrilled with the activity, since something "new" was in the air. Everything came together nicely, and aside from a few sore hamstrings, the weekend went really well. Here are the before and after pictures!


A thorn in the side has turned into a wonderful little gem. We plan on enjoying this as much as possible this summer....
Now, on to another project....hmmmmm.

The Sweet Life

Our family has been very focused on "good" food for a few years now. As I have stated before, we have tried to maintain a healthy kitchen, and in order to do this I have had to research and educate myself quite a bit. My most recent book, is Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. It is very informative and creative, with just the right amount of how-to. There are endless recipes and descriptive chapters on how to grow your own garden. This week I have embarked on a journey of trying to create new and delicious recipes that we have not yet had. I have been very Greek this week with lots of tapas meals and tons of veggies and hummus with everything. Keton has been rather pleased, which I think is a good sign. I have a sense of purpose when I am food shopping and preparing meals for my family. To me, this part of my "job" as a wife and mother is a very important responsibility. I rest at ease when I know that my family is eating well, and I feel good that I am passing healthful cooking and eating on to my girls. For about a month Gracie was running around telling everyone that what they were eating had "bad sugar". Kind of annoying, but cute at the same time. We are eating at home more now than ever (although, with two little ones, eating out is a rarity!). After a weekend of original mediterranian meals, I decided to have a baking evening with my girls! Keton was off to watch the Lakers, and we set in to bake some cookies. This particular recipe came from the above novel, and it is called "Zucchini Chocolate Chip Cookies". They are made with half the regular amount of butter, and only 1/2 cup of brown sugar and 1/3 cup of honey as sweeteners. The other health benefit is that half of the flour used is whole wheat. I added some ground up flax seed to add more fiber and omega 3 fatty acids. Gracie helped stir and poor, and Stella hung onto my leg waiting for chocolate chips to fall.
It was going well, until I discovered that I did not have a shredder to shred the zucchini finely. Without this key tool, I figured the zucchini would just not work in the recipe so the cookies turned out to be just healthier chocolate chip cookies. They came out fluffy, and had a nice sweet taste to them that definitely took care of your sweet tooth, but also assured you that you were eating something that is healthy too.
I usually have to put the paper down for grease absorbtion, but it was rather minimal with these cookies. We loved making them, but we certainly loved eating them more...
It was hard to keep the girls to just one cookie, but the batch does provide us leverage for tomorrow! Gracie was so helpful and attentive, I think she might love cooking one day. This little project just reminded me of how fast the girls are growing. While waiting for the cookies to bake, Stella was busying herself with the computer (which of course, is hands-off....). As I glanced at her, I was taken back by how much older she seemed. I grabbed the camera in order to preserve her at this age, since I know by tomorrow she will look different.

I love how in the last picture here you can see her little chipped tooth. She took a spill while jumping on the bed. Stella is rather fearless. Both of the girls have features that seem to age and change with the sun rising and setting, and we are so amazed at this. What a wonderful reminder this is to slow down and count your blessings. That is what I will be doing tonight. Along with counting the cookies, as I am sure when Keton gets home there will be several missing....
If you have not baked with your little munchkins in awhile, jump on in and try this recipe!
www.AnimalVegetableMiracle.com

Changes

I wonder what life would be like if nothing around us ever changed. It sure would be boring, but I do find myself wishing and praying that certain aspects of my life would never change. For instance, take the moment I am currently witnessing. Gracie is on the floor coloring and writing her name (still shocks me that she can do this!) and Keton is hanging out with her while playing with the various gadgets on his can-do-all Blackberry Curve phone. She is telling him how much she loves him, while he is making his phone "talk" and say things that make her laugh. It really is the small things in life. Stella is finally asleep, and sometimes it would be nice if time would stand still for a few more hours while she is doing that. The one thing I miss (besides being able to finish my coffee while it is still hot) the most from my former non-kid life is the sleep. But, as you all know, once that one little one makes its appearance, goodbye sleep! That is a change that is still a little tough to deal with. Change is just part of life. A big part. One moment you are a little one yourself, and the next you have little versions of yourself. Seriously weird, even after years of raising a mini-me. Our family has had some recent changes, all good, but still changes. One being that I have been blessed with work for the summer, which was not the plan. Super great! Another change here is that Brooke and I will be running another half marathon. Yep, we are crazy. And asking for pain. It is in October, so we hit the pavement next week for training. The goal is to beat 2 hours! I will keep you posted on how that goes...
The girls have had a big change this week too. We got rid of the crib and put in a bunk bed type system! They are both officially big girls!
Here is their room now:) They LOVE the beds, and of course during the day they double as a fort. Who knew? And for those of you that see Keton's little bunny ear fingers on the right hand side, go ahead and chuckle. Obviously some things never change....but I do love him so. We have done some work and rearranging in their room and so far I am pretty happy with it. Although I am a little sad that we have no baby in there anymore. But once I do not have to carry a diaper bag anymore I will forget all about that and be thrilled that they are big girls! We are also in the process of trying to put our backyard together. Our plan is to plant an above ground garden, full of greens and herbs for cooking! I will definitely be blogging about that when the time comes. I cannot wait to see Keton out there being Tim the Tool Man Taylor. Haha. Anyone that wants to come and check out that scene is welcome to visit! On a side note, we went to Ikea to get the beds and took the girls too. Has anyone ever taken their children there? Their YOUNG children? There is no way out; it is like one giant maze. Just terrific if your little ones throw a wingding fit and you cannot get out of there. I might have nightmares about that place soon. Oh, and another major change....Gracie ate a bean tonight. Amazing. For all of you who know Gracie, you know how lovely her food issues are (yes I know, like mother like daughter, shush!). We convinced her to eat a chickpea (and I am pretty sure she ate it only because it had a cute name) and we both thought that this might qualify as a milestone. How come that is not on those charts at the doctor's office? OMG. Gracie just came up to me, pointed at her gums and told me that she hurt her "nipple" up there. Uh, those are not nipples kiddo. Not that I am going to show her what nipples really are....hmmm. Funny how children's books don't really prepare you for everything. I suppose that is a lesson for another time of change in the future...
The last change that has happened around here in the recent weeks is that Gracie has become an artist. She drew beautiful pictures of Keton and me. Of course she told Keton that she had to add his yohoo, because after all, that is what he has. Girls have hoohoos, boys have yoohoos. We are not a technical term family.
Here is Picasso's artwork:There is nothing like seeing yourself through your child's eyes. Too many Pixar movies maybe? Oh well. At least she is loving art, reading, and writing. I feel that she will be attending school soon, and that is a change that I am just not ready for. Not that I ever will be.
Bring on the changes...
Might as well try to flow with them, and enjoy the amazing things that are happening around us.