With Daddy, granola & a 'recycled' soaker and longies

These are a couple pics from the other day.

I made some granola! I've been wanting some for my yogurt and strawberries, but didn't want to buy some because I think it's expensive. So I finally made some and it's really good! So glad I did it, plus it was pretty easy.

Here is what I made from an old wool sweater of mine. This was my first attempt at recycling a sweater and I'm pretty happy with how they turned out. I can't believe I didn't try it sooner. I also made another pair of longies (pants) and some shorties (shorts) with an old gray sweater too.

bread & outside

I switched and tried the regular white artisan bread recipe and ohhh it is good. It's so good if you like bread at all. I had forgot what it was like and I wanted to compare it with the wheat bread. The wheat is ok, but this is so much better. Maybe I'll do a little less wheat flour next time, but still some to get some of the whole wheat in it. The brown wave in the bread is from the whole wheat dough leftover in the container, a little marbling (couldn't taste it though).

It was pretty nice yesterday, so we hung out a bit after doing chicken chores. Jackson found the vegetable garden and loved playing in the soft dirt. Inside the house he is always trying to play with the dirt in our palm tree, so of course he likes this too.

Love the little hand under the fence.

I played with photoshop some with these pics just for fun.

11 months!

Jackson is 11 months old now!

It was great he did his cheesy smile for the pictures, I wasn't even trying to get him to do it.

Here is what he is doing.

• Started walking (see previous post for video). He took his true first step earlier this month and then every once in awhile would take a step. Then on 2/22/10 took 4-5 steps at a time multiple times walking to me.
• Stands up unassisted (like in the middle of the room with no toys or help)
• Climbs on and off the couch unassisted, he used to need a toy or kaeli to help climb up, and now can do it by himself. And he has taken our advice on going off the couch feet first instead of head first. He's really good at it now too. (See video below.)
• Says baby, sounds a little like beebee, along with mama, dada and uh oh and other mumbles.
• Signs "more" and "eat" along with shaking his head "no" and waves bye. Will also sign elephant, kitty, milk, diaper and bath now after I do it or ask about it.
• Is becoming a picky eater. he will always eat fruit, but other stuff it depends.
• Pats on Kaeli and Kitty.
• Gives kisses to Dan and I. Half the time open mouth and half the time closed mouth.
• Still loves pulling hair, climbing on everything and dancing to music.

Here he is climbing off the couch.

more walking

Jackson isn't walking everywhere yet, but when I set him up to walk he likes it and does it, still falling a bit and off balance but pretty good I think. Here are a couple more of him tonight. (Oh and notice his new pants!! I made them out of an old sweater (thanks Cheryl!). They are wool, so they act as a cover for his cloth diaper and he doesn't need pants or babylegs! The pants Jackson has on in his first steps video are new too, same thing, made from an old wool sweater of mine.)





Here I got a video of him doing his cheesy smile.

Walking!!

Jackson took a bunch of steps tonight! It's like it just clicked for him and he wasn't scared anymore (hopefully he remembers tomorrow!). Before he has taken like 1-2 steps only a few times this month, but would then immediately sit once he realized what he did. And other times when we would try to get him to walk he would just sit and not even try. Lately he has been pushing his walking lion toy everywhere and holding onto out hands walking a lot too. But tonight was the first time he really attempted at walking! Today he is three days shy of being 11 months old.

It's too bad Dan was at work today. He missed out and so I had to try to video it with one hand and get Jackson to walk to me. So sorry the video isn't that great and that it's sideways (I normally remember to do them horizontally since we don't have a program to rotate it).

at the park

We went to The Cove Palisades today with Wyatt and his parents. We had a nice time. We had lunch and the kids got to play around on the grass. I tried to get some pictures and this was the best of the both of them. Jackson wouldn't stay still, he kept trying to crawl away.

This is what Jackson kept doing. Amy and I kept having to pick him up and put him back trying to get a decent picture.

I did get a couple cute pictures of them by themselves.

Quilting and Playing

I've been wanting to make a quilt for awhile now. I see all these neat quilts online (I like her style here), but I'm overwhelmed with the idea of doing one too. I saw at Joanns, they have a couple quilt kits that has all the fabric and step-by-step instructions for making a quilt. I finally got one with a coupon the other week and started on it a couple days ago. It's super quick and easy to do. The instructions were great. However the instructions have you make it without batting. I thought about adding some, but figure since summer is coming it will be fine to have a lighter weight blanket. I still did some quilting after this picture, so this isn't the final product but pretty close. It was fun to do. I learned some things and think I'm ready to try one on my own now.

Jackson has always loved to play and climb under the chairs. He climbs over the rods and all around under them. It's like his own climbing gym.

I made some bread

Here is how the bread turned out. It is pretty good. Definitely has a whole wheat taste to it, so pretty different than the regular white artisan bread from their first book. I do like it though and Jackson had some and seemed to like it too. I'll try some of the other variations next.

bread

I finally got the Healthy Bread in 5 mins book from the library. Started my first batch today. Here is a before:

Here is after a couple hours letting it rise. Then it goes in the fridge and to be used when wanted. I'll probably cook a loaf tonight, hopefully it's good! I love their first book and definitely recommend it. I'm sure this bread will be good too, just with more of a whole wheat taste.

It's hard to go without posting a pic of Jackson. Here he is eating breakfast this morning. And I haven't done any B/W for awhile either.

cheesy smile

Jackson no longer does the breathing-fast-through-the-scrunched-up-nose-funny-face, he now does this cheesy smile where he still scrunches up his nose but squints his eyes as much as possible. It's very similar, he just doesn't breath funny and smiles with it now. He does it a lot, on his own and copying us (to get him to do it). I don't know what started it, but it's cute.

climbing again