Saturday, October 30, 2010

Sweater Time!

Ella has a bunch of cute sweater for the fall/winter seasons. Most of them were found at Value Village by me or my mom. The other day Ella wore the first one. It's so cute with little snowflakes on it. She looked so precious I just had to take a few pictures of her.



Friday, October 29, 2010

Nicknames

All of our kids have nicknames...some have come and gone, but some had stuck.

The nickname we use most of the time with Owen is "O" or "Owen Bowen" Jack is either "Jack Jack" or I'll use his full name Jackson. For both the boys we use "Bubba" or "Monkey". Ella has her own set of names too. She is most commonly called by her first and middle name Ella Grace and her nicknames are "Ella Bean", "Ella Bella" or "Sissy Girl".

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Funny Faces & Boo Boo's!

The other day I was trying to take pictures of Ella crawling all over me on the floor in the kitchen and I snapped this shot!

You can't look like a princess all the time!

See the little circle on her chin? Ella was playing in the living room and she was trying to go into a crawling position from a sitting position. Well...she ended up face planting right on Alex from Madagascar the movie. It's the toy from MCD's and when she landed on him he said, "I'm Alex THE Alex" since it's a talking toy. As you can imagine she was not very happy!

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

What's For Dinner?

Today Michael I watched Rachael Ray and I got inspired to make the dish she made. I had to make a few adjustments since I didn't have all the ingredients, but it turned out SO good! I'm seriously still in shock since I'm not usually that good at winging it in the kitchen.

2 chicken breasts
6 lasgana noodles broken up into little pieces (I didn't have that much so I added a few bow tie paste noodles too. Next time I think I might just use all bow tie pasta since it cuts down on having to cut noodles for the kids)
1 large yellow onion cut into strips
2 cans of sliced mushrooms (I would have used fresh, but I didn't have any on hand)
4 tbsps butter
4 tbsps flour
1 1/2 cups milk
Garlic Salt
Pepper
White Wine
Parmesan Cheese
Mozzarella Cheese


Cook the chicken breasts in butter and then shred them - Cook noodles al dente - Saute mushrooms and onions in butter and garlic salt - Deglaze the pan with white wine and let reduce - Add chicken to mushrooms and onions - Make white sauce by melting 4 tbsps of butter and adding 4 tbsps flour and then adding milk and a few dashes of pepper...bring to a boil and stir for 1 min and then remove from heat - Combine chicken, mushrooms, onions and noodles with white sauce - Place in a casserole dish and top with Parmesan & Mozzarella Cheese - Broil in oven until cheese is browned

Pulling Up!


Now that Ella's crawling she's decided that she should pull herself up to a standing position! She also loves to walk around if you hold her hands.


Excuse me Time...yeah I'm talking to you...could you just take a break, maybe a vacation...just a little time off! Oh you can't...darn I tried!

Saturday, October 23, 2010

Being Intentional!

This year at MOPS I'm not only a Care Group Leader, but I'm the Care Group Coordinator as well. One of the things we're doing with the leadership in our MOPS group is reading the book, Rescue Your Love Life. I'm sure a lot of married couples with kids have gone through changes in their relationship and Michael and I are no different. It's really easy to get wrapped up in the kids and to not make your marriage a priority. It's not that anything was really wrong...we just weren't taking the time we needed to focus on each other and help our marriage grow. So we made some changes!

This last week we actually made a schedule. Everyday we have free time, when the kids are napping and after they've gone to bed. Our schedule includes what we do during those times. It's been so great! We are reading the Rescue Your Love Life book together 3 times a week and at other times we will play games or watch a movie together. Last night we watched our wedding video that one of our friends put on a DVD for us (Thanks Micah!)! It was so fun to walk down memory lane.

Today my parents came and watched the kids so Michael and I could go to the theater. We had free tickets to see Wedding Belles at The Taproot theater. We also had Teriyaki for lunch and then stopped at 7/11 to get my favorite...Coca Cola Slurpee! YUMMY!!!

Here's to being intentional!

She's A Ham!

She knows the sound of the camera turning on.

She immediately gets excited and starts breathing out her nose really fast.

She loves to talk and stick out her tongue for the camera.



She's been scrunching up her nose lately.



For some reason when I snapped the above picture it reminded me of this picture below when she was a bit smaller!



Friday, October 22, 2010

Guess What Ella Discovered?

Ella can crawl all over the place now. She doesn't necessarily choose to crawl a lot, but she can. The other day she did venture over into the entryway and therefore discovered...the stairs!

I just took the baby gate off the stairs a couple months ago and I'm really enjoying it not being there. It's easy to put back on, but it's just nice to not have to move it out of the way. Our entryway is really small so between the front door and the gate it can get a little busy.

I know it will still be at least a month before I really have to worry about putting it up. She did try to pull up on it, but then she ended up slipping on the hardwood floors right onto her belly.



It has been really fun seeing Ella discover more of her world since she's able to get around on her own now.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Pumpkin Pictures!

When we were at the pumpkin patch I tried to get pictures of the kids. There is just something about blue sky and orange pumpkins that I think make for great pictures.

I still have yet to get a really good picture of all three kids together. I can not get them to all look at the camera at the same time. I think I might have to start trying bribery as a tactic for the boys. I'm sure chocolate would do it! I did get some cute individual pictures though...

My sweet and saucy 3 1/2 year old....Owen Michael Martin!


My cute head strong, big brother follower - Jackson Daniel Martin!

My precious attention getter - Ella Grace Martin!


This is my favorite out of the bunch. I love how Jack is lovin' on Ella!

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Picture Perfect Pumpkin Patch!

Yesterday we headed down to Scholz Farms with my MOPS group. This is our third year in a row visiting this particular farm...to walk down memory lane you can click here to see our first visit and here to see last years visit.

Our first order of business was eating lunch. This never really goes well though. The kids are just too excited to play...who blames them!

Ella was definitely too excited to eat. She wouldn't eat any of her baby food or her puffs. She was interested in eating grass though.

The sawdust hill is always a HUGE hit! This year since it's been really dry the sawdust was all fluffy and soft and not mushed down. It was great...we brought a bunch home on our clothes and in our blanket. :)


They have so many fun ride-on toys to choose from.




Silly cheeser!




My friend Erin (who doesn't go to my MOPS group) met us there so her kids Cameron and Haley got to have some fun too.



Kim was nursing Josiah in her van so all of the ladies that were there helped me watch Andy for her. He is such a cute wanderer and he's so quiet...you look up and he's gone! I was so thankful to have all the other ladies helping me.


This picture of Jack just took my breath away...I can envision him 15 years from now walking down the street with this same look on his face and this same posture. Time I am NOT ready yet...please slow down!


Let's head over to the pumpkins Mom!


I think this might have been the first time Kim had both boys on an outing by herself. She did great! I remember being freaked out about doing it by myself. Who am I kidding...I still get a little freaked out. But when you have friends around it lightens the load a bit!


Josiah was so happy in the Bjorn! I remember Ella being that little...okay now I'm getting sappy!

First stop was the teeny tiny pumpkins.


Then we found the BIG pumpkins! Of course Owen picked the biggest, heaviest pumpkin for us to buy. It's not the one he's holding in the picture. I sure hope we get a lot of seeds from it.


I just love how they line the pumpkins up!

Erin and her kids - Cameron and Haley. Cameron wasn't interested in having his picture taken...seriously he yawned! :) Haley is also a wanderer so she just wanted to get down and explore.


Not quite sure what Cameron is saying to Jack, but Jack is sure listening intently.


Owen kept running from pumpkin to pumpkin cleaning off the dirt. I was trying to get him to smile at me and he said, "Mama I'm not talking just now...I'm doing my job!" So sorry to interrupt!


Fun memories!



Time to head to the tractors....Mama it's too heavy!



Let's all help!


I'm pretty sure Owen seriously thinks this is another one of his jobs!



My boys!



Another priceless photo of Jack. He has the sweetest, softest, most kissable, milky white skin!



My friend Wendy from MOPS was also there with us and she offered to take a picture of Ella for me since I couldn't quite do it myself. Ella is still learning to like the Babyhawk. She doesn't seem to mind being carried on my back, but the front carrier bothers her for some reason. I think her little legs need to get a bit longer so it's more comfortable.

Hey let's go pay for our pumpkins!


We ended up staying for about an hour and a half. We didn't go through the maze or check out the animals this year. I was getting tired and it was getting close to naptime. Still getting used to the whole 3 kid thing too! ;)

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

This boy...

can just


crack us

up...with

all his


silly


expressions!



Side note: These pictures were taken during some meal at the dining room table. We eat almost every meal there...sometimes not breakfast. A while back we separated Owen and Jack so now Jack sits where Owen used to sit next to Daddy and Owen sits next to me on the other side of the table. This has made meal time at the table so much more enjoyable since they can't reach each other and drive each other C-A-RAZY!