Gracie w/ Santa!

Monthly Video Update!

Matt and I have been doing monthly videos ever since Gracie was born w/ updates not only about her but about whats going on w/ us and the church. We thought that we would start uploading them on the internet just in case anyone else would like to hear as well. So here's a link to our church blog w/ the video. Enjoy:) (Next time I'll try not to be so cheesy... no promises though!)

Gracie- 2 Months!

Well, Gracie turned 2 months old yesterday! It really is hard to believe that she has been w/ us for 2 whole months already! I got to weigh her on Tuesday and she is up to 11 pounds and 3 ounces! That's almost exactly 3 pounds bigger than she was when she was born!

In other news.. Matt and I made a big decision. We had been praying for some time about my work situation. I was scheduled to go back November 23rd but this past Monday I turned in my resignation. We aren't exactly sure what the Lord has in mind but after weeks and weeks of praying, neither Matt nor I had a peace about me going back to work. Matt has been looking for another job to work in addition to the church. Matt finding a job has been at the top of our prayer list, although Matt and I were both convicted on the same day this week that God's plan for our family might not include another job.. so instead we just keep praying that God will provide for our needs. So I guess we will just see what happens...

Here's a couple pics of our little sweetie: (If you can't tell Gracie was a lady bug for Halloween!)

Gracie- the past 7 weeks...

I can't believe that I haven't posted on here since September 7th! Gracie was only 3 days old at the time and on Friday she just turned 7 weeks old! The past 7 weeks have literally flown by as we are getting to know our little girl and how to better care for her. She is such a joy. (I say this as she is screaming at her dad! ) Real fast I'll just try and share some of the "highlights"...
She is getting so much more social. A couple weeks ago she started smiling a whole lot and making all sorts of adorable sounds and "coos". I love how she will just stare right into our eyes.
She is literally growing like a weed. Her birth weight was 8'4.5 and when we took her to the doctor for her appointment this past Wednesday she was 10'10! She really likes to eat!
She had to get some shots at her last appointment and lets just say I think she took it better than I did:)
She still isn't sleeping through the night. She'll only go 3-4 hours before she wakes and wants to eat but then she'll go right back to sleep which is nice.
We took our first big road trip this month. We went to Wichita for the week and then on to Arkansas for a meeting w/ a church who is wanting to partner w/ us. She did so good and slept practically the whole time.
She LOVES to listen to her daddy play guitar. She will just lay and kick forever while the music plays:)
Her and Aldo (our dog) have become fast friends:) Aldo adores her and spends a lot of time by her side.
I could go on ( and on and on) about her but I suppose that's enough for now.. and more importantly here are a few pictures... they are all at least a couple weeks old.. I have newer ones that I still need to upload!

Gracie Irene

I'll post more pictures and details later.. but Gracie Irene was born September 4th at 6:45 AM. She weighed 8 lbs 4.5 ounces and was 20 1/4 inches long.
We couldn't be more excited!

A few recipes...

This month I have also been trying to keep preoccupied by doing some baking. I tried a few new recipes and so far everything has turned out great!

I don't have any pics of the first couple.. but if you are looking to make some great strawberry scones you should definitely check out Katie's recipe on Good Things Catered. I made them to have for breakfast this week and they were very tasty!

I also tried a new homemade pizza dough recipe. We used it to make cal zones. We even made our own pizza sauce w/ homegrown tomatoes we had been given. Everything was soooo good!

The recipe for the pizza dough was from a great blog Annie's Eats, go here to see recipe.

Yesterday I also made very my very first pie from scratch! It really wasn't all that difficult. The crust came together so easily, I don't know why I always thought making my own pie crust would be so difficult! Here's the recipe that I used for the pie and crust, I went w/ peach.. Matt's request:)

Both recipes are from Katie's Blog at Good Things Catered.

Summer Sweet Peach Pie

Ingredients:
1 recipe basic pie dough
8 large, fresh ripe peaches
1/2 c. brown sugar
juice of 1/2 small lemon
1 tsp cornstarch
1 pinch ground cinnamon
1 pinch ground nutmeg
1 egg white
granulated sugar for sprinkling

Directions:
-Preheat oven to 425 degrees and prepare pie dish.
-Roll 1/2 recipe of pie dough out and line bottom of pie dish.
-Place in refrigerator.
-Using a pairing knife, slice peaches into 8 pieces, peel skins, and slice into thin slices.
-Place peach slices into large bowl, add brown sugar, lemon juice, cornstarch, cinnamon, nutmeg and stir well to combine.
-Remove pie plate from fridge, brush bottom with egg white, and transfer peach mixture to pie.
-Roll out remaining dough and top as desired (lattice or traditional).
-Brush top with egg white, sprinkle with sugar for a crunch and place into oven.
-Bake for 20 minutes, then tent top with foil and reduce heat to 375 degrees.
-Continue baking until golden and juices are bubbling, about 30 more minutes (50-60 minutes total)
-Remove from oven and let pie cool completely on wire rack before serving.

Basic Pie Dough
America’s Test Kitchen

Ingredients:
2 1/2 c. unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
2 Tbsp sugar
1/2 c. vegetable shortening, chilled
12 Tbsp (1 1/2 stick) cold unsalted butter, cu into ¼ in pieces
6-8 Tbsp ice water

Directions:
-Process the flour, salt, and sugar in a food processor until combined.
-Add the shortening and process until the mixture has the texture of coarse sand, about 10 secs.
-Scatter the butter into the flour and cut the butter into the flour until the mixture is pale yellow and resembles coarse crumbs, with butter bits no larger than small peas, about ten 1-sec pulses.
-Turn the mixture into a medium bowl.
-Sprinkle 6 Tbsp of the ice water over the mixture.
-With a rubber spatula, use a folding motion to mix.
-Press down on the dough sticks together, adding up to 2 Tbsp more ice water if the dough will not come together.
-Divide the dough into 2 balls and flatten each into 4 in disks.
-Wrap each in plastic and refrigerate at least 1 hour and up to two days before rolling.

Well.. I guess that is all for now. I've made a few other things that I'll try and post recipes for later and currently I'm making homemade hamburger buns! We'll see how these turn out:) Matt and I are off to take a walk.. got to get this baby out!

Random pics

Just for fun...
This picture is from the end of May...

And this is me just yesterday (same shirt), about 3 days before my due date on Tuesday...

Crazy how HUGE I felt back in May!

I also wanted to say a late Happy Birthday to my husband on my blog. He turned 28 August 19th! He was very happy our little girl decided not to come that day. He's not quite ready to share:) He was also very excited about his ice cream cake:)