A Trick-or-Treating We Will Go

I posted a little bit about O's first real trick or treat expedition over on the O'Baby Blog, but I wanted to share this little bit of video too!

I know he's my kid so that influences me on the cuteness factor, but seriously, this kid is cute. All dress up in his puppy-with-no-puppy-ears-because-I-won't-wear-them costume and his big blue eyes just make me melt!

pumpkins and potatoes

Today we took a trip to the Arboretum with friends to visit their pumpkins. Then later this evening we went to the local church pumpkin patch with the Colvins, which has turned into quite the fun tradition. We also enjoyed a nice bowl of potato soup before we left tonight, and thought I'd share a few pics and the recipe.

Hearty Potato Soup
1/4 c. Butter
3 green onions, finely chopped
2 carrots, grated
1 10-oz. Can chicken broth (you can add more to thin out)
2 10-oz. Cans cream of potato soup

2 potatoes, mashed
2 c. Shredded cheddar cheese (medium or sharp)
1 c. Sour cream
Salt & pepper to taste
Milk (optional - to thin out)

Melt the butter in a 3 quart sauce pan or Dutch oven. Add the green onions and carrots, and sauté until tender. Add the chicken broth and simmer, covered, for 20 minutes.

Throw in your baked potatoes and mash to desired consistency. Then stir in the potato soup, cheddar cheese, and sour cream. Cook low over heat until the cheese melts, stirring to mix well. Season with salt and pepper. Add milk if needed for the desired consistency. Serves six.

Happy Fall!

Fourth Fun

The Fourth of July was so much fun this year.

So, this is parental supervision?

Last year...I was stuck inside with a brand new baby trying to keep my sanity.

This year, we were in a field eating out of the back of a truck and enjoying the plane show and fire works! All with a smiley, bubbly one-year-old!

The plane, boss! The plane!!

 So much fun!

Kaboom!!

Happy Belated Star Wars Day

I forgot to put this on the blog last week, but it still makes me smile. Without further ado...

Happy Star Wars Day!

May the 4th be With You!

artwork by handz

I Spy!

I spy something fun!

I spy something tiny!

I spy something PERFECT for this Easter season!

Have you guessed?

WE HAVE BUNNIES!!

Tiny little baby bunnies (and their mama) have taken up residence in our side yard. How did we discover this, you ask? Well, thanks to our trusty RykerDog, he sniffed out that something was afoot, and started poking his nose around. When his nose led him to a little patch of roughage that started squeaking, Joe quickly picked him up (because that was the only way of dragging him away) and threw him in the house. I however, went to work discovering what our little noisy hole was!! With a small stick I peeled away the leaves and fur and discovered 4-5 tiny little fidgeting bunnies!

They are so cute and small, and have already increased their size since we discovered them on Sunday! With the tiniest ears and, and they just bounce and pop when you peel back their cover. And no, we don't do this often, just to check to see if they're still ok! So, here's a little video to see the guys in live action!

Valentine's Crafty Fun

So,I like to craft, but with short one, my craft time is few and far between.

I need something easy and fast these days. Enter the t-shirt wreath.

I saw this on a blog a while back and decided, yep, that's my skill level these days. Cut, stick and glue!

What you will need:
- t-shirt material - about 3/4 yard or an XXL t-shirt
- scissors
- glue gun
- cardboard
- ribbon

Step 1: Cut out a LOAD of squares. And when you think you have enough, cut out more. Trust me. My squares were about 1.5"x1.5"

Step 2: Cut out your desired shape out of a sturdy cardboard. It needs to be able to hold weight, or reinforce a thinner cardboard with wood or plastic pieces on the back.

Step 3: Scrunch up with a point at the bottom like you would do with tissue paper. Place a dot of glue on the bottom point and glue to your shape.

Step 4: Place pieces right up close to one another. This will give you the fluffy look and hold up your material as you go along. KEEP GLUING!

Step 5: Glue, staple or pin your ribbon on the back of your shape to hang.

Step 6: Step back, and enjoy!

2010: A Year in Review

2010! What a Year!

January:

We announced to the world that O'Baby O'Brien was on his or her way!

I had a super 28th b-day.

Ryker ate his dog house that Joe just finished..blah.

February:

The Groundhog saw blue - O'Boy O'Baby O'Brien made his presence know, and the elusive quest for a name began!

It snowed glorious, beautiful snow!

March:

We made a quick 11-hr road trip to NM to say goodbye to Joe's Grandpa O'Brien. He was a wonderful father and grandpa, and we miss him very much.

I got to take a trip to Palestine to see my buds, Lydia and Caleb and finally get to see the blooming Dogwoods.

My sister and I enjoyed all the beautiful flowers at the Dallas Arboretum!

April:

Not much to report in this month...just making it through pregnancy and taking pictures of the cutest dog ever.

May:

Enjoyed another month, but so tired of being pregnant.

Had a beautiful shower with family and friends to celebrate still unnamed O'Baby!

Finished the nursery with the help of neighbors and Joe's wonderful mom -- complete with custom dresser that was NOT from Pottery Barn!

Read some books, celebrated Jennifer's bday, and did some other wonderfully interesting stuff that I can't quite seem to recall!

June:

I had a fight with the vaccum cleaner, and at 9 months pregnant, that's NOT what you want.

We found out that O'Baby was a wee bit on the large side, and we decided to schedule and induction.

Owen Daniel O'Brien (who's name was decided when we saw him) was born June 15th at 3:05 p.m. after a hard delivery.

We then went through a little health scare with Owie and he hung out a bit in the NICU.

Joe's Grandpa Williams passed away after a long health battle, but not before getting to see a video and pictures of his first great-grandson, and gave a great smile.

The rest of the month, was a blur...

July:

Owen grew and changed so much in one month

On July 4th, he celebrated his first holiday!

We began to adjust to a family of 4...yes, I count Ryker.

August:

Ryker turned 3

We celebrated our brothers-in-law's birthdays

We watched Owen grow!

My dear friend Lydia welcomed her second son, James Elliot, into the world. (and all our hearts grew 3 sizes that day!)

September:

Owen learned to flip over - something he doesn't like to do anymore

I confessed to the world that I ran into a van while trying to read and ride a bike

October:

My friends, Hillary and Jeremy, took some beautiful photos of our family, which I will forever cherish that we got back this month!

We visited the pumpkin patch with the O'Bear and the Colvins.

November:

Owen got cuter and fell in love with jumping in his bouncer

We celebrated Thanksgiving with the O'Brien Family

December:

Owen turned 6 months

We prayed for Sweet Baby James and his family as he underwent heart surgery

We celebrated Christmas in Kingwood with the O'Bear

We celebrated Christmas #2 and New Years in Coppell with the O'Briens

We fell more in love with our son!

Here's to a new year and new adventures! Cheers!

Frustrations in the Ease of Home Delivery

It's Christmas time.

That means for most of us that we are dabbling in the trend of online shopping. Oh, it sounds so promising. Search, find, click, save, ship. You can find bargains online, true, and sometime score the occassional free shipping too if you do it right.

Sounds so great...

THEN comes the Dance of the Delivery Services.

You don't know if it's coming FedEx, UPS or USPS. For some reason, some will be left on the door step, some require signatures, some get hung up in customs. And of course if you're not there when those dudes come, you gotta start tracking them down before they take your package back ever so rudely!

Why can you not schedule when you get delivered to. And why do they think someone will always be home on a Tuesday at 2 p.m. to sign for something?

Ugh, what a lovely little holiday tradition.

But it saves us time, right?

Right?

Is this thing on?

Oh well...Merry Shipping

Thanksgiving Anecdotes

A few Thanksgiving thoughts to put you in the holiday spirit:
(thanks dad)

"When I was a kid in Indiana, we thought it would be fun to get a turkey a year ahead of time and feed it and so on for the following Thanksgiving.
But by the time Thanksgiving came around, we sort of thought of the turkey as a pet, so we ate the dog. Only kidding. It was the cat."
- David Letterman

"At Thanksgiving, my mom always makes too much food, especially one item, like 700 or 800 pounds of sweet potatoes. She's got to push it during the meal. 'Did you get some sweet potatoes? There's sweet potatoes. They're hot. There's more in the oven, some more in the garage. The rest are at the Johnson's.'"
- Louie Anderson

"We're having something a little different this year for Thanksgiving. Instead of a turkey, we're having a swan. You get more stuffing."
- George Carlin

Everyone Needs a Little WT...

Ha!

Well, maybe you don't need it, but it does seem to creep in every once in a while.

We had a fantastic weekend! My parents rode into town for 4th festivities and more wedding activities.

Thursday we took Jennifer's bridal pics, and what a marathon that was with hair and makeup, flowers and photos. I was one tuckered kiddo, and it wasn't even about me. I chalk it up to ME being the one running around getting, positioning, snapping and so on. I was a bit bummed with my own photos I took. Jenni's photographer is fast and has a super huge lens. I am not and I do not. Enough said. Oh well...practice, practice, practice.

Friday was an excellent day spent with the hubster and the pupster. We just had fun, and got things done around the house. THEN it was time for Kaboom Town in Addison! I LOVE IT!

Usually, we set up shop in Joe's parents' office overlooking the Addison Airport, but this year, they changed office locations to the side of the building, so no more straight shot. Instead, we set up camp in the back of our pickup. Chips, dip, sandwiches, cake, brownies, beer, cokes, trash, blankets, purses, chairs, dog, family --- ALL IN THE BACK OF OUR TRUCK at some point in time. See where the WT comes in??? Oh, but it was fun.

And as we were eagerly anticipating the start of the show, staring at our watches, commenting, "Yep, it's 9:30, they should be about to start..." SPLOOOOUUUSSHHHHH!!!!

YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING!

The office sprinklers set off, dousing everyone down the edge of the parking area. Food gets wet, people get wet, chairs get wet, dog gets wet, guitar and music get wet. Do you see a theme here? Sadly, our camp got separated with half in the back of the truck and half further into the empty, weedy field. Oh, but the fireworks were great and we did have a fun time.

The 4th we did in style with a pool party and grilling topped off with the city fireworks viewed from our neighborhood sidewalk.

Man, I love this holiday! Freedom is precious and fireworks are awesome!