NOPI Nationals

Jason looks forward to NOPI every year now. Last year it was just him and Ayden but this year the entire family went along. Fast cars are daddy's passion and we wanted to be a part of it. NOPI is held at the "prestigious" Atlanta Motor Speedway.Daddy and Ayden cruising the Mustang lane.Holy Cow! Check out that big truck! Ayden was totally impressed.Another big truck, but not quite as cool as the last one.I was finally able to get a picture of Jameson...he wouldn't stand still long enough all day.

Ayden: Super cool car mom! I wanna drive it.

Me: NO! Don't even touch the car.

So just to spite me, he touches the car anyway...go figure.

Another fun day enjoying one of daddy's favorite things...cars.

Founder's Day Festival

Every year Tyrone has their Founder's Day Festival the 3rd weekend in September. Nothing like spending a ton of money trying to win toys that are worth $2. It's always fun though and this was the first year Ayden was big enough to go on most of the kiddie rides.


For his first ride, Ayden chose the choo-choo train.















Next, daddy took Ayden on the Berry Go Round. They were spinning around so fast that I couldn't get an actual picture of them on the ride. Mommy would've puked.



Mommy dared the feris wheel with Ayden. I can tell I'm getting old...I'm starting to be afraid of heights! It wasn't that bad until Ayden kept leaning forward to see daddy and brother at the bottom.



Next Ayden tried out the rocket ship ride....







and the merry go round. It was a fun night!

Happy Monday!

And it really is a happy Monday. Besides Jameson waking me up twice last night and Jason's farts being so bad they woke me up and made me leave the room a few times, we're doing pretty great. It was supposed to be an uneventful weekend, but we ended up being very busy. The boys both got haircuts, Jason worked on and off, I got some serious cleaning done, we helped (mostly got in the way) my parents move a couple of loads to the new house, played outside, took the boys for a walk in the wagon and got almost all of our errands done. I'm exhausted.

I have a dentist appointment tomorrow afternoon, I need to take Jameson back to the doctor (not sure if his ear infection is gone since he won't sleep through the night) and have the Kaiser Corporate Run after work on Thursday. Now those of you who truly know me, know that I'm not a "runner". The girls would be smacking me in the face if I actually ran. The way to make it through the 5 mile run is to walk the first 1/2 mile, cut through Georgia State with the excuse of having to go potty and walk out the opposite doors that just happen to be about 1/2 mile away from the finish line. I'm talking 30-45 minutes flat. Ayden also has school pictures on Thursday...I'm so excited! I'm totally swamped at work...month end, planning our Christmas outing and doing research for our new FMLA/ADA policy. My DVR starts working overtime on Wednesday with all of my favorite shows starting back up! Oh, happy times.

I swear I'm going to get the pictures from last weekend posted this week as well...promise!

I'm Feeling Lonely...

I know...boo hoo hoo. I live in a house with 3 males and 2 dogs so how in the hell can I be lonely? There are a few things contributing to my loneliness.

1. Jason has had one of those super crazy schedules again this week. He worked all day Tuesday, came home to eat dinner, take a shower and fit in a quick 2 hour nap before leaving the house around 8pm for a Chick-fil-A job. He didn't get home until 2am so wasn't about to get up at 6:30 to see his family off for the day.

2. Yesterday was the beginning of the big Rector move. Yes, they're finally moving to the new house. Normally my mom and I chit chat on her way to work every day from 7:45am - 8:15am. Every day! Not yesterday though. I left her 2 messages to see how the move was going and if we were still going to meet up for our bi-weekly nail appointment. I never got a call back. I'm sure you can envision the tears swelling up in my eyes at this point (no, I'm not being sarcastic).

3. Jason left work around 4pm yesterday to make it home for a longer nap before leaving again at 8pm for yet another Chick-fil-A job. Since daddy had to work, I picked up the boys (who were both in the middle of a melt down at Marguerite's) and took them to McDonalds for a nice nutritious dinner before Judy's (my nail guru). Mimi was nowhere in sight...this is where we ALWAYS go for dinner if I have the boys for nail night. The tears at this point were starting to crest my eye lids.

4. I got to Judy's and my mom wasn't there either. Oh well, I was on my own for the evening. The boys were relatively well behaved and we made it home by 7:15 for their bath and snuggle time before bed. Daddy got up at 8, gave us a kiss goodbye and left for Chick-fil-A. The flood gates were officially open. I put my babies to bed and went in the living room to sulk. I got so sick of myself that I went to bed at 8:30. I heard Jason come in around 2am again but didn't get any hugs or kisses this morning since he was still sleeping when I left with the boys.

5. The only other thing that could be contributing to my weepy mood is that my period should start any day now...can we say PMS???

I'm hoping for an awesome weekend of family bonding time. Maybe I'll fit in some much needed scrap time. Being creative always gets me out of a funk.

Divine Casserole

I finished editing last weekend's photos but ran into some trouble with Blogger so had to give up on my post. I'll try getting them up tonight but I've been up since 2am and am making no promises. Sooooo, I decided to post one of the boys favorite dishes. This is super tasty and is even better the second day.

Ingredients:

1 (8oz) package egg noodles (I buy the mini size for the kids)

1 lb ground beef

1 (6oz) can tomato paste

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

2 drops hot pepper sauce (I use about 6 drops)

1 pinch oregano

2 tablespoons butter

1 onion, chopped

1 (8oz) container cottage cheese

1/2 (8oz) package cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup sour cream

1/4 cup butter, melted

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bring a large pot of water to boil. Add pasta and cook 8-10 minutes or until al dente.

2. In a skillet over medium heat, brown the ground beef until no longer pink, drain. Stir in tomato paste, Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce and oregano, set aside.

3. In a seperate skillet, melt 2 tablespoons butter over medium heat. Saute the chopped onion until translucent. In a medium bowl, combine cottage cheese, cream cheese, sour cream and sauteed onions.

4. Place 1/2 of cooked noodles in the bottom of a 2 quart casserole dish. Drizzle with 1/2 of the melted butter. Cover with cheese mixture. Spread remaining noodles over cheese mixture and drizzle with remaining butter. Cover with meat mixture.

5. Bake in preheated oven for 40 minutes or until bubbly.

Enjoy!

Swoon...He Said My Name!

I'm sure most of you have heard me go on and on about the differences between Ayden and Jameson. For example...by 16 months Ayden had developed quite the little vocabulary. He could say choo-choo when he saw a train and moo when he saw a cow. Sippy, mama, daddy, puppy and cheese (way to go my little Wisconsin man) were a few other words he knew. Jameson is a completely different story. At 16 months he can say dada, uh oh, oy...yeah that's about it.

When I got back in the truck this morning after buying my precious bottle of Diet Pepsi from our local Shell, Jameson screamed out MAMA! This one word practically brought tears to my eyes! Mama...he knows my name. All is better in my world.

Also, I have to quickly share this picture with you. I found this onsie on sale at Old Navy and already know that it will become part of Jameson's wardrobe this weekend. It's so appropriate for him. Again, another Ayden/Jameson difference. At 16 months Ayden was going into 2T's and at 16 months Jameson is still wearing 12 months clothes with no sign of being able to keep anything larger on his body for a while yet.

Tonight I'm going to do my best to get our pictures from this weekend downloaded so that I can show you all of the fun stuff we did. Last night it was more important to buy fire ant and roach killer at Home Depot.

Tree Love

I may not love everything about our house, but I certainly love our trees. Jason may have a different opinion since he's the one that has to rake up the leaves in the fall, but I think they're beautiful.
This is our beautiful black walnut tree. Every other year it produces hundreds of black walnuts that we have to pick up. Fun!


This pine is perfect for our tree swing. Ayden has spent so much time swinging here...Jameson could take it or leave it.












This is our super scary tree. We really have no idea what it is, but we think it's scary because we're convinced that one of these days its going to crash onto our house during a storm. We've seen some pretty big limbs fall off...


What makes it so cool is this weird moss/fern that grows on it. It normally looks brown and dead, but when we get a lot of rain it perks up. We had a pretty violent storm roll through last night so I had to snap these pictures while I have the chance.


You will probably be seeing a few more pictures in and around our house this month. One of my assignments for the Scrap Etc event that I'm going to next April is to take pictures of the things around our house that I want to remember down the road. For those of you who haven't had a chance to visit, this is the perfect opportunity to get glimpse of our home.