The JMB Family

This past weekend Kaylee and Natalie ran away to grandma Candi's and papa John's house so just Lily and Nate were here at home. We had an exciting Saturday morning with a 6am ER visit again. Lily has pneumonia again! She is on medications and we are hoping to avoid another hospital stay at all costs! Here are some pictures of the two babies! Okay well I guess I have to find the ones I took this weekend and need to update it when I locate them. I thought I saved them to my computer, but apparently they are still on my camera.. Ooops! Its the thought that counts right?! ;o) Joe is in Hibbing tonight for work.. I hate being home 'alone'.. thankfully Eddie is downstairs if anything happens and I know he has a loaded gun behind his bedroom door if need be! Now when this happens the next time, hopefully we will be in our own home by then but also hopefully I will have my safety training done and will have my permit and everything so I can buy a hand gun to keep next to ...

By golly I think it is!!! Just got a GREAT phone call!!!! House related.. :o) Seriously shocked and in tears! If you have ANY clue about our house hunting ordeal, then you know why I am tearing up and what call I would consider a GREAT call! I am DONE house hunting! Yup! You heard me! DONE!!!! :o) A enormous weight has just been lifted off of my shoulders! I have always believed that what is meant to be will happen and now I firmly believe God has been pushing me on this decision because it is what is meant to be and now... it is happening! EeeeekkkK!!! Details to come someday! Just not sure when I will be able to leak all details! Lets just say that we will be buying a home this summer and its looking GREAT!!!!!!!

We have been very busy the past two weeks with house hunting so I havent been able to post much and I am so very sorry!!! Right now we are searching for a home in Apple Valley or Lakeville and will even go as far as Eagan, Rosemount, maybe Farmington. We had searched very seriously in Lonsdale but decided that it is too far for Joe to be driving to and from work each day. We cant have that with the price of gasoline. Tomorrow we are going to go walk through three homes in Lakeville.. Wish us luck.. Nothing seems to be very decent in our price range.. I still have hopes on my grandparents home, but it is fading very quickly.. In all honesty, this whole house hunting crap it for the birds! I HATE IT! Nothing is going to be exactly what we want and knowing that makes it very hard to have high hopes on finding 'the home'. We are beginning to think that we are not meant to buy a home. But as Michael Jordan once said, "I can accept failure, but I can't accept not...

Creative Memories 2011 Fall Retreat Friday, September 23 rd ~ arrive any time after 9:00 am till Sunday, September 25 th ~ stay till 5:00 pm Americ Inn, 510 South Elm Street, Belle Plaine, MN    (on US Hwy 169) Enjoy a full weekend of “crafting” (traditional or digital scrapbooking, or cardmaking) with your friends or just time for yourself.   The Parlor combines indoor intimacy and convenience with an outdoor experience.   Stay in the beautifully appointed guest rooms with unique accents and spectacular views of Emma Krumbee’s Apple Orchard.   The perfect getaway for relaxing, creating and inspiration!       The fee for the weekend includes: 2-night lodging in the hotel room, complimentary breakfasts, Friday night meal and Creative Memories gifts. Cost ($6.00 discount cash/check): 2/Room $129.00 4/Room $ 93.00 Check with me for other options! Register with a $25.00 deposit $50.00 Due on July 1 st Remainder due on August 1 st I...

Say Hello to the 2011 Scott County Junior Pork Queen!! Yup Kaylee got a crown and sash tonight. She is most excited about the parades and I cant say I blame her! :o) I must say though, I better be the one to be told about the parade details and whatnot and not Lynn as Lynn is not her mother. Otherwise I will never know anything about when and where and what Kaylee is supposed to be doing to uphold her role. Anyways here are some pictures of my girls! They look amazing!!! as usual! hehe!

I have tweaked the recipe a bit. For one thing, the original icing recipe made twice as much. Having a 3/4 inch-thick layer of candy on top of this yummy cake seemed like overkill to me. So I cut the recipe in half and thinned it down some so that it is more of a glaze. I prefer this more subtle addition of sweetness, and I still have icing left over after frosting the cake. I am kind of a cake snob... I like my cake made from scratch. And only real butter will do. I love any kind of pound cake. I won't even tell you how many calories this cake has in it. But it is worth every bite! Enjoy... Brown Sugar Pound Cake with Caramel Glaze 3 cups all-purpose flour ½ teaspoon baking powder ¼ teaspoon salt 1 cup milk 1 teaspoon vanilla 1.5 cups (3 sticks) butter, softened 2.5 cups brown sugar 5 eggs Caramel Glaze (recipe below) 1. Heat oven to 325 degrees. Generously grease 10-inch tube or bundt pan with butter, and flour liberally. 2. Sift together flour, salt, and baking po...

Check out Carrie's Sweet Life blog! She is giving away a cookbook!! :o) I love reading her blog! She has great recipes! You can read about the cookbook giveaway here

Tonight I signed my new consultant agreement with Creative Memories!! I am SO excited to get this new business up and running!! I invite you to take a look at my new website !! Here you can contact me, shop our products, place an order, check in on my calendar, and many more things!! Please let me know if you have any questions! I look forward to helping you preserve your memories one photo at a time!

Here is a photo of my sweet little man that got entered into the 'Lil' Cuties Fall/Winter Contest 2010'! We greatly appreciate your votes!! In order to vote you have to 'Like' Graddy Photography on Facebook and then you have to go to their Lil' Cuties FALL/WINTER 2010 Contest album and then click on Nathans photo and select 'Like' which is right below the photo! :o) Thank you SO much for you votes!!!

So Saturday morning was a not so good morning! I was woken up to Lily throwing up.. YUP! Groosum details, but I shared them anyways! I felt so bad for her! When kids are this small they dont understand what is going on and why they dont feel good.. And they most certainly dont understand why stuff is coming out of their mouths when all they have ever learned was how to put things into their mouths.. Needless to say it also ended up being laundry day! Joe, Kaylee and his brother, Richie, took ALL of our laundry to a laundry mat and washed everything!! Lily went through quite a few receiving blankets herself with being sick.  :( Joe and Lily fell back to sleep after our 4:30am wake up call and 5am bath.. 

So Nathan has two teeth now! He is getting too big, too fast!!!! It seems like just yesterday he was born and then other days it feels like he has been around for forever! Like he was never NOT here! Its amazing how that works!! Nate HATES showing people his teeth!!! Its just that simple, but I had to get a few pictures for his baby book! Not but two days after his first tooth came through, his second was on its way through too! Here he is trying to bite me.. Now he is getting cranky...  Look that those little compers!!  Perfectly content now with his toys!

Annie was right, this is one recipe you should make tonight!! It does require some prep ahead as you refrigerate the dough for at least 24 hours, but that makes it the perfect pizza for entertaining, because you can make the dough and sauce ahead of time! This is now my go-to pizza recipe and it will be hard to ever stray from it! Source: Annie’s Eats , originally Cook’s Illustrated , Jan. & Feb., 2011 Makes 2 12-inch pizzas Ingredients: For the crust: 3 cups (16½ oz.) bread flour 2 tsp. sugar ½ tsp. instant yeast 1 1/3 cups ice water 1 tbsp. vegetable oil 1½ tsp. salt For the sauce: 1 (28 oz.) can whole peeled tomatoes, drained 1 tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil 1 tsp. red wine vinegar 2 cloves garlic, minced or pressed 1 tsp. salt 1 tsp. oregano ¼ tsp. ground black pepper Directions: For the Dough: In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the flour, sugar, and yeast. Mix just to combine. On low speed, add the ice water and mix ju...

Ok so this looks absolutely DELICIOUS!!! And I personally LOVE Campbells 'Cream of' soups!! And pork chops! I am not an onion fan but maybe I will try it anyways. I will just let the flavor soak in and not eat the actual onions haha! I just had to share this and stash it away for my records! ;o) So glad to have found Carrie's blog! She posts some really yummy recipes!!!!!! (From: Madelyn & Carrie's Sweet Life ) 6 slices pork tenderloin (1 1/2-2 inches thick) 1 can cream of mushroom soup 1/2 cup milk 1/2 cup sour cream 1 24oz package frozen hashbrowns, thawed 1 cup shredded cheddar 1 large can dried onion pieces Brown and cook pork in skillet. Combine soup, milk, sour cream. Stir in hashbrowns, half of the cheese and half of the onion pieces. Spoon mixture into prepared 9×13 baking dish. Arrange pork over potato mixture. Bake, covered, at 350 for 40 minutes. Top with remaining onion pieces and cheese. Bake, uncovered, 5 minutes.

*A MOPS friend shared this on facebook! She found this blog and I found it very interesting so I am re-posting it here. SIDE NOTE: I dont go out in sweats and rags!* Click Here to go to the direct page where this post is located **The Professional Family Manager: Motherhood is a career. Treat it like one.** "It’s time for Mothers everywhere to change the image of Mothering. Mothering is a career. Mothering is a job. It’s time we start treating Mothering as a career, and treating ourselves as professional career women. Thanks to the internet and, specifically, blogging mothers, I think it is finally beginning to happen. Here is my harsh analysis of what I believe to be the current situation for the state of Motherhood: I see too many (not all) “stay-at-home moms” running errands, taking their kids to school or activities, and attending meetings in sweats or ratty clothes. They look beaten down by life–heck, they feel beaten down by life. They nag and complain about the...

Recipe found at southernplate.com This is a recipe I modified for the slow cooker and some of you will be happy to know I also removed the entire stick of margarine it called for. Others, like myself, will shrug and go on with things. Because, in the grand scheme of the world, there are more important things to concern myself with than whether or not I’m ingesting a tablespoon of margarine with my chicken and rice ~winks~. Alright, lets get cooking! Hello easy! You’ll need: Yellow Rice*, Cream of Chicken, Whole kernel corn, onion, chicken breasts, and shredded cheddar cheese. I love Zatarain’s rice, one of my favorite meal helpers. If you want to use the lower fat cream soup that’s fine in this. A lot of folks have been making my Slow Cooker Chicken and Wild Rice with cream of chicken because they don’t care for cream of mushroom and that is great, too! Make it your own and tweak these recipes however they work best for your family. Place your chicken breasts in the bottom of...