Stone Mountain..again

While Ryan and Julia were here we went to Stone Mountain again. The weather was absolutely beautiful. I hope we have weather like that when my family comes out in a week and we go to the beach. Kyler actually participated this time, it was SO fun to watch him climb and explore. Brian of course loved it too. Ryan and Julia had a great time on the ropes course, then we enjoyed lunch together at Miss Katie's....mmm...fried pickles my FAVORITE!! We also enjoyed the 4 D movie (Kyler only survived it), the ball barn and the tram ride. Great times....can't wait till we go back again.

Favorite low fat side dish

Seasoned Potatoes

Approx one potato per person
Seasoned Salt
Cooking spray

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line large cookie sheet with foil. Peel (or don't peel) potatoes and chop into small pieces. Spray cookie sheet very heavily with cooking spay. Spread potatoes evenly onto cookie sheet. Spay potatoes with cooking spray and then sprinkle with Seasoned salt. Cook in oven for approx 30 min, depending on how big your potato pieces are. Stir and sprinkle with season salt half way through cooking. They are done when you can pierce them easily with a fork. Yummy!

Lemon Cashew Chicken

Lemon Cashew Chicken

3 4 oz chicken Breasts
Lemon Pepper seasoning
Juice and zest of one lemon
6-9 cashews
1/2 Tbs Olive oil

Heat olive oil in large skillet over medium heat. Sprinkle chicken on both sides with lemon pepper seasoning. Add chicken to skillet. Cut lemon in half and squeeze juice from both sides over chicken, remove seeds. Grate zest from both sides of lemon onto chicken and into pan. Cook about 20 minutes turning chicken occasionally, until chicken is no longer pink. Chop cashews finely, add to top of chicken and serve!

So.....tired...

So, the bliss of Kyler making the transition to his toddler bed only lasted one week. THIS week has been the longest week of my life. Kyler has stopped taking naps and has been waking up several times at night, and it takes FOREVER to get him to go back to sleep. We started doing the silent return to sleep method suggested in "Healthy sleep habits happy child" and nights are starting to get a bit better, but naps are still a nightmare. I end up spending two whole hours walking him back to his bed! The book says that 90 % of kids are still taking naps at his age, I just wondered what everyone thought. I added a poll in the right column to see if I just need to work harder, or is it really more common for kids this age to be napless. Also, any suggestions would be welcome! :)

Quinn

Quinn is doing so good. He's now 2 1/2 months old. Crazy huh. He's such a happy baby and smiles all the time. In fact one of my favorite things is putting him back to bed after his nighttime feeding. I swaddle him up and he gives me these huge smiles, I give him a kiss and he goes to sleep ALL ON HIS OWN!!! It's so great. He's not much of a cuddler so he's put himself to sleep from the very beginning. At his two month check he weighed 11 lbs 10 oz and was 23 1/2 inches long. That's the 75th percentile!!! GO QUINN! (Kyler is still under the 10th percentile)

Our favorite nick names for him are Quinnickers, and Kyler's Quinny Quinn. Here are some of my favorite pics of him ranging from 7 weeks to just a few days ago.

New Bed!

We finally took the initiative to get Kyler into a toddler bed. YEA!!! I've been reluctant to move him out of his crib, just because I'm worried nap time will go away, and we WOULD NOT be surviving without nap time. So far (today's nap time) he has done fine. So lets hope he continues to take naps....here's to hoping.

We got the bed from some friends of Brian's brother. It was in perfect condition, came with the mattress and was a stellar deal. So it's been sitting at Phillips house until we were really ready to make the switch. Kyler LOVES it! He was so sad this morning when Brian explained to him that he couldn't take it down stairs with him, but that it had to stay in his room for sleeping times. :) He went to bed just perfectly last night. He loves the light that really works in the front, and the toy box up front as well. So far this change has gone smoothly....lets hope potty training in a few weeks goes just as smoothly.

The Zoo

We have a membership to Atlanta's zoo, so when the weather was BEAUTIFUL last Saturday we jumped at the chance to spend it outside as a family! We love the zoo, Kylers favorites are of course the carousel and the train. Quinn did so good, I know this picture is terribly overexposed, but it was the only one we got!