sweet 16

The little giffords ventured to Buffalo Wild Wings to watch Florida take on BYU in the Sweet 16.  And, being the diligent blogger I am, I forgot my camera.  Of course.  But I snapped a few shots with my phone.

Our friends Darsi and Ben, who live nearby, came to join us.  It was great to see them, even if they do cheer for the [ahem] wrong Orange and Blue (they're Auburn fans). 

Elliott, as you can see, was incapable of being still.  ALL evening.  I'd like to say it's the Gator spirit in her just bubbling over, but more likely it was the red icee she drank pre-game.  

Baby Cade, on the other hand, was the opposite of a handful. This is what he did the entire game:

The evening ran a little long when the game went into overtime, but the kids were troopers.  Now it's on to the Elite 8! Goooooooooo Gators!!!

milk!

All of these kinds of milk are currently in my refrigerator:

 Let's see, that's: dark chocolate almond milk, organic skim milk, coconut milk hazelnut coffee creamer, vanilla almond milk, single-serve organic chocolate milk, rice milk, Mayfield 1%, and oh-so-yummy Homestead Creamery chocolate milk (literally THE best milk in the world).   That's a crazy lotta milk. 

The reason for all this variety is my baby Cade.  He's milk and soy allergic, and since he's nursing, mommy has had to remove all milk and soy proteins from her diet.  That's why the almond milk (for drinking), coconut milk (for my coffee) and rice milk (for cooking).  It's been a few weeks now since we got this all figured out (after a trip to the ER for yellow/green bile in his vomit.  I know.  Gross.) and now I can talk about it without getting frantic.  It was a little - or actually a lot - overwhelming at first.  There was even a trip to the grocery store involving almost no purchases and some tears (mine).  Milk allergy is not new to us, but avoiding soy is H-A-R-D.  I spent a couple hungry days eating practically nothing.  But I've been doing my research, and there are great sites out there for folks enduring the same challenges (Intolerant Offspring and MSPI Mama are a couple of my favorites).   And this book is my new best friend. 

Dining out is next to impossible - especially fast food - so I pack my own meal a lot.  Luckily I love to cook and bake though, and once I got my pantry appropriately stocked, modifying some of our favorite recipes became pretty simple.  Quick fix meals are out the window (since pretty much all of them involve cream of chicken soup for some reason), and desserts have to be made from scratch as opposed to boxed mixes, but I'm getting used to it.  On the plus side, the baby weight's making a more rapid exit than predicted.  Maybe those skinny jeans are in my not-so-distant future after all.

don't try this at home

I have kind of a do-it-yourself attitude.  I cut my kids' hair, book our own travel and make our birthday cakes.  I've even laid tile and hardwood floors (LOTS), and hung crown molding and base boards.  Still, there are some things which are simply better left to professionals, and that's how I feel about newborn photography.  Luckily, my BFF Adrienne is married to one such professional.  He took some pics of my sweet baby Cade when he was a little over a week old.  I should've shared these here before now, but better late than never right?  (You notice that's a recurring theme with me.  Cut me some slack - I have a newborn after all).  I can't begin to pick a favorite...

 (No, this isn't a smaller picture below - it's just a wider shot with lots of white space.  I'm not a great blogger, but I do know how to size photographs.)

In addition to being a talented photographer, Eric also knows a thing or two about cameras.  You can check him out in action at Photography Bay.

st. patrick's day/our week

It's been a good week here for the little giffords.  First and foremost, our husband/daddy is back from Chile.  YAY!!  Second, my mac is back (it had crashed.  again.).  The boys, or I guess I should say the "big boys" since they're not the only boys in the house anymore, had their annual standardized testing Monday through Wednesday of last week.  I'm sure they did well.  They are, after all, exceptional children.  :)  Thursday their mean teacher-mommy made them do school, but we also did a little St. Patrick's Day celebrating.  

We didn't go as overboard with St. Pats as last year, but we did start our morning with green pancakes.

We followed that up with green mac'n'cheese for lunch.

 

Cause, you know, everyone in Ireland eats green food all the time.  We were all decked out in our green shirts, and I had every intention of getting a picture of the brood at some point during the day.  But by the time I got around to it, Elliott had her green T-shirt covered in dirt because she had been "planting" in the front yard (in other words, playing with the weeds and dirt in our flower bed). 

Friday we went to our monthly science class at AMSE, and because the weather was so beautiful, we met some friends at Cedar Hill Park in Oak Ridge for a picnic.  

And THIS pretty much sums up my Saturday:

a (big) little gifford in chile

I debated about whether to post this, since some might think it's not a great idea to be advertising on the internet that my husband is in another country, but I'm so excited about what he's doing that I couldn't wait to share it.  Sean is in Chile on a scouting trip for mission work, and he took along blogger, photographer and friend (and BFF Emma's dad) Eric Reagan.  They've only been there a few days, and have a lot more to see, but Eric has posted a little review of where they've been so far.  Check it out on his blog: Photography Bay.  

 

elliott is THREE!!!!

My baby girl is 3 years old!  She had her 3-year check-up  today, and I'm happy to report she's perfectly healthy.  She still hasn't hit the 30-pound mark yet (she is 28 3/4 lbs.) and can wear the same shoes she could wear a year ago.  So she's not gonna be a runway model or a Rockette.  A gymnast maybe?  Who knows.  All I know is she sure is cute.  

She started her birthday with some chocolate chip pancakes.

Followed by a bath (necessitated by the pancakes) and her FIRST EVER hair cut.  That is, unless you count the little trim her BFF Emma gave her a few weeks back, but that was only a strand.  (Apparently the girls are aspiring hairdressers - Elliott also gave Emma a trim.  I *shudder* when I think about how bad that could have been...)  Here's the before pic:

During the trim...

And after.

The finished result.  (And yes, those are the same hot pink cowboy boots she was wearing in her 2-year-old birthday party pics.  But she is growing.  I think.)  

She wanted a Princess Aurora and Ariel birthday party.   This is the pose I got pretty much EVERY time I asked to take her picture.  Such a priss.

I think she was a tiny bit excited about opening presents.

Cousin Cohen had SO much fun at the party that he couldn't hang.

Elliott and her princess cake.

Happy Birthday, Elliott!!

kellen's sweet, teenaged par-tay

What does a 13-year-old do to celebrate his birthday?  Chuck E. Cheese, Pump It Up and Laserquest are all in our past (whew!), so instead, Kellen decided he wanted to have a few friends "hang out."  When "few" turned out to be more than a dozen, we decided to let his friends get together at Aurora, the family pool business.  We were thinking they could swim, play pool, foosball, air hockey, ping pong... Nope.  Know what they did?  15 or so 12-15 year olds spent an entire afternoon playing hide-n-seek - and apparently having a blast. 

Kellen and his friend (and twin) Alex.

 Elliott made the rounds with Kellen's girl friends.  That's girl [space] friends, people.  Not girlfriends.  Just making sure we're all clear...  :)  Here's a pic of her hanging with Christine.

Kellen with his cookie cake (post-swimming, which is unfortunately when I took most of the pictures.  These kids all look like wet dogs.  Ha!)

Autumn giving Kellen not one but TWO sets of bunny ears.  Who put icing all over Kellen's face??

Cake time!

Abby has the exact same smile in both of these pics.  Very nice, Abigail.  

Madison and Elliott jamming to some Taylor Swift.

LOVE the blue icing coating on your braces, Jacob!!

Shea got to snuggle with Baby Cade for a bit.

Here's a pic of Kellen opening presents, which I mostly included only because Mikey said I couldn't get a picture of him, and I did.  So there. 

This is a great group of kids - er, young people - or whatever.  We definitely missed a few folks who couldn't make it, but we had a lot of fun!  Kellen is truly blessed with some fantastic friends.