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Winter Ravioli

I made this (from a real simple mag. recipie) our first christmas together, and i still love it. i've added our favorite things along the way.

-frozen ravioli (love the trader joes portabello mushroom)

-canelli beans (one or two cans, depending on how much you want to make)

-canned diced tomatos

-sauted spinach (with garlic, onion & mushroom)

mix altogether for an easy, filling, delicious meal! ummmm

Kalas- they must be greek

Whenever we go over the bridge to edgewater (3 or 4 days out of the week) I have several sweet memories of my parents.
Kalas Funeral Home despite it being a funeral home brings a big smile to my face. Whenever my parents visited- every time we drove by my dad would say "Kalas, they must be Greek." I am talking every time. I think my mom would get irritated, but eventually just laughed as did I. We loved the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding, so I think some of the joking came from that.

Another Edgewater story involved road trips to new york YEARS and YEARS ago. We ALWAYS took the back roads when traveling- so instead of I95 for 9 hours we traveled via 301 to Nana's house. I do remember all of the car dealerships in waldorf (we have a picture of Ivan with the hummers & palm trees) and the playground equipment at the Maryland welcome center with the powerplant in the background.
One of the first times my parents came to our townhouse in Edgewater they kept saying- we can't believe that you live near the baseball bat! Baseball bat huh? And sure enough- near the burger king & annap. seafood restaurant there is a giant concrete baseball bat. There must have been a batting cage or mini golf or something there back in the day. And our house was right behind that.

I love how something from my past is relevant and can give me something to smile about in the present.

sweet thing

Charlie continues to grow and change at a considerable rate every day.
She started walking on new years eve- that will be easy to remember.
Since then we have been ON THE GO. we don't sit still for a moment and i am tired all the time!

sweetest things though:
charlie is feeding her teddy bears and dolls bottles- SO sweet. This was totally unprompted (she first used a shampoo bottle for a bottle- then we pulled out some old ones.)
and she is kissing every animal or baby in any of her books. SO sweet.

oh the fun of being one!

almost a month later........

charlie's first birthday was a fantastic day- she had no idea what was going on and was asleep for the first half of her party. which was jungle themed- very fun! I had my best friend Alicia up from north carolina to get everything together.

what an awesome day- and amazing friends & family to help celebrate this milestone. we are truly blessed.

on another note i figured it was time to change up some of the decorations in charlie's room. here are the old pics- cards from baby shower (i've since replaced w/ cards from 1st birthday, but haven't taken pics yet.) this girl is growing up! :)

i've yet to put them up- but i found some old school letter cards that i am going to hang up on the wall. i've been searching for the perfect set and just never ordered any. while going through things from my parents house i found these- full of tape & pin marks. I'm sure they lined the walls of all of our rooms when we were little. having this to put up for charlie is so very special. will have to take pics soon!

sweet moments

i keep saying "i need to write down the sweet things that charlie is doing..." so here we go:

- flirtatious "hi"- is SO cute- batting her L-O-N-G eyelashes & softly saying hi. it melts our hearts!
- sharing- the halloween candy bucket kept her busy for a long time- pull the candy in, take it out, put it in..... one day she was handing me pieces and for whatever reason i wasn't paying attention. charlie grabs my hand, opens it, and places a piece of candy in it. so sweet.
- jason taught her "just kidding" where she cracks up- he'll pass balls, toys, candy, whatever back and forth but every now and then instead of giving it to her he grabs it back and says, "tricked you..." she laughs and laughs. i think she is learning to trick us now too.
-"daddy's home"- when jason gets home if we're in the family room she rushes to the window where she can see him get out of the car- she laughs and squeals when he comes up to the window to see her.
- noticing other babies- we've had several itty bitty babies over recently and she is interested in them for sure. maybe she needs a sibiling? :)
-crusing all around- it is just fascinating to watch her figure things out- learning to sit back down on her own, leanring that certain drawers will pinch fingers- down to little things like helping herself get dressed.
-weaned herself from nursing- right at 11 months. i am glad she stopped when she was ready.

we're coming up on her first birthday- where did the time go? and it took about a year- but i am having my first night away from home this weekend- and i have to say that i CANNOT wait! i have really needed a break and am going to the beach with a girlfriend to volunteer at a friends 5K race. saturday afternoon- come on! :)

clean floor, no more.....

should have known that after scrubbing, and i mean scrubbing the floor under the high chair (and washing the seat cover, all that fun stuff) ALL of tonights dinner would end up on the floor! in my attempt to find low sodium waffles/pancakes (because charlie scarfs up eggos) the healthier ones didn't fly too well...... so i ended up mixing them in with some pureed fruit :)

ok, and pictures aren't cooperating...... don't have the energy to try to figure out how to correct....

where oh where......

i know that is a kiddie song- haven't learned it yet- although now i think the tune will be in my head (and yours!) for a while. ooops!

Been too long, huh? We've been all over the place! Mid July Charlie and I went to North Carolina- we never have enough time there- ever. But we squeezed in time here and there- the main reason was going to a meeting/mediation with our lawyers about the lawsuit from my family's accident. What a nightmare- it was draining mentally & emotionally- and nothing really happened. We knew it wouldn't- but it was a hard day. Hopefully this will all be wrapped up in 6-8 months (candidly speaking.... hehehe).

Flora rode home with me to maryland and we had days full of spongebob & swimming! Julia came up a few days later and us girls headed north to Grandma's. What a special trip that was- a slow paced time on beautiful property and good food. After a few days we headed east to Nana's where life is a little bit faster paced. Charlie had her first trip to NYC- she loved it of course. As hard as it was traveling and sleeping (she actually slept very very well)- it was SO worth it to see family- especially grandmothers. I'm thankful we can take off and my husband will stay home and work very hard!

Early August just the three of us headed to the beach- a beautiful home of a co-worker of jasons that we were able to stay at. It was a great time- but now i see why people travel with nannies or their whole family! Charlie rules the schedule- but I am totally ok with that. She def. takes priority and when she is happy- we are all happy!

So we've been home for a couple of weeks now- Charlie is growing and growing. She's such a doll. She is very happy *most* of the time- when she's not it is very frustrating! (today she screamed on our whole walk- but when we got home and picked her up- she let out a BIG burp- we'll remember that next time!).

I've got exciting things going on here and there- i wish there were more than 24 hours in a day!