happy birthday oli!

oil turned 2 a couple weeks ago! and his mommy put on quite the shindig!
she thought of allllllll the details. the theme was "little man".
so, so, so cute!

my sweet & silly friend, audra, is preggers, too. we are a few weeks apart.

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backtracking

i thought she was doing pretty well monday and tuesday....
wednesday she went 1 time and then on a #2 she freaked and yelled,
"no more panties, i want diapers!"
i guess i rushed her into potty training. i feel like the past 3 days were a waste.
....we'll try again

(britt had to save me and bring over some diapers b/c i told paytie when all the diapers are
gone we start potty training. thanks, britt!)

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crazy in love with bows!

britt went crazy making bows once she found out she was having a girl.
the day iris came home we went a little bow crazy trying them on paytie!

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potty training time!

we are on day 2 of official potty training!
yesterday was interesting. she went through 12 pair of panties!
(i never knew a kid could go that many times a day)
i opted for her to wear panties instead of no clothes. she is very proud of them!
once we hit 3:00 in the afternoon she realized she wanted her stickers for her potty chart the next thing i knew, she ran to the bathroom, slammed the door shut, and yelled,
"i go potty, mommy!"
so, of course i ran in there with her and helped her out. she now has about 8 stickers on her
chart and is doing great! i'm proud of her!

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little iris is growing

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cooking co-op

i am trying out a cooking co-op for the first time!
it is a way to have meals ready to eat and save.
they can be done in different ways, but we are doing it like this....

*there are 8 families total in our group
*2 shoppers and ingredient organizers(big job)
*meet one day and divide up all the food
*each of us take ingredients for 2 main dish meals
*prepare and bag into freezer bags and lay flat in freezer
*meet back up in a week and pass out all the meals

we all end up with 16 meals that are ready to go(with minimal prep time) we all paid
$100 for 16 meals. it will be a little cheaper next time b/c we bought a lot of spices that we
will continue to use. i am excited to try out new meals! there are lots of marinated chicken dishes, mexican ones, and a few noodle meals.

my 2 meals are pizza casserole and meatball subs. i brought home 8 pounds of turkey meat (we decided to use turkey than beef) 5 pounds of cheese. 20 12" subs. over 9 pounds of sauce and lots of freezer bags to pack it all in.

i'll let you know how it goes!

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iris amelia blanton

wow! what a morning!
britt called me about 5:00 this morning and said contractions are 3-5 minutes a part.
she said come over in about an hour.
i was so pumped and got my things together! jord went to work to get some things
so he could stay home with paytie and then britt was calling me about 5:45 asking where i was!
by 6:00 contractions were on top of each other so they headed to the hospital and i was right behind them. she was up in her room by 6:10 and had her at 7:16!!!! it was sooo fast! they checked her and she was at an eight and ready to push.
britt had about 8 pushes to give and with out any intervention baby iris was here!
the dr. almost didn't make it, he arrived at 6:50.

iris is 7lbs 1 oz and 19 in long.

eli is very proud of his sissy!
they kiddos were literally fighting over her!
we had to let them hold her one at a time.
eli has an i heart iris shirt on :)

i had to include a pic of elijah...they look sooo much alike!

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ball of laughter

if you want a good laugh click on the below youtube link and see jordan rolling down a hill
in a blowup sphere! you mainly hear patrick because the flip camera is zip tied to his strap, but it is sooooo funny to here grown men squeal!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnNsXT0P1H8

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i take that as a positive!

you guessed it...we are expecting #2!
we are about 7 weeks and so far feeling great!

paytie is so sweet, we just told her a few days ago and she tells people,
"mommy has a baby in her tummy" and then she rubs my tummy.
or she lifts up my shirt looking for the baby.
she even reminds jordan, too.

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cousins+park+mcdonadls=lots of smiles

jord and i took the kiddos to the park with the very first happy meal!
it was a blast!

time for the water!
in san gabriel park there is a great little spring that they had so
much fun playing in.
(note-in the background there was a whole group of teenagers practicing for a quinceanera, it was very entertaining!!)

she jumped in!

he belly flopped in!

and finished off with popsicles in the bath tub and lots of giggles.

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