Easter Morning

Early Easter morning, Kiran awoke to find her Easter basket in the den.

"Hey Kiran! Show us what you got in your Easter basket!"

That's the picture we got. Are you ready for it?

Will she hurt me for that one later in life?

So that paint with water book (which I'm realizing we haven't used since Easter morning) was the only thing in her Easter basket other than eggs. I'm a fan of Santa. I enjoy doing it for my kids and I have fond memories of that tradition as a child. But I'm kinda ambivalent about the Easter Bunny. Our compromise this year was we just said she had gotten an Easter basket and we didn't reference who it was from. That was enough for her 2.5 year old brain. What are you feelings on the Easter Bunny, et al? What Easter traditions do you have- including or excluding the Easter Bunny? I feel like we really need to make up our minds by the time next Easter rolls around.
At my house growing up, the Easter Bunny would hide our baskets and we would have to find them. In the oven, the dryer, or way way up high on the bookshelf were some of the best places.

Easter Egg Hunt

I've been working on We've Been Outsourced Blog Book #2 and I realized that I enjoy how it documents both the daily and the special events of our lives. I'm going to try to blog more about what's been going on so I can look back and remember.

The day before Easter we went on an Easter Egg hunt. You've already seen the family picture from there so I'll leave you with these.

Kiran eating the cookie she decorated

Sienna learned how to wave

My big girl listening to the gospel presentation

This year Kiran knew exactly what to do!

She collected quite a few eggs

"I'm supposed to do what? With what egg?"

Sharing the bounty (lots of ink stamps which may or may not have ended up in her sister's mouth before the day was over)

Take a Guess

Anyone want to take a guess at why we retook this family photo from the Easter egg hunt?

*update
My friend Anna was taking the photo and she happens to be a real live photographer. She took the photo and burst out laughing at the lady's behind coming out of my head. So we scooted over and took another one. No booty over me, no bush afro for J but I think the snot is still pouring out of Sienna's nose.

Awesome Soup Recipe

I'm sharing with you an awesome soup recipe that my friend from Furman, Megan, sent me after she learned I was looking for recipes with no dairy or tomatoes! This has become our favorite soup and we will continue to make it long after we can reintroduce dairy and tomatoes. Thanks Megan!

Chicken, Corn, and Black Bean Soup

2 Tbsp. vegetable oil

2 pounds chicken tenders, cut into bite-size pieces

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 Tbsp. ground cumin

1 ½ Tbsp. ground coriander

1 chipotle chili pepper in adobo sauce (chopped)

1 large onion, chopped

4 ears fresh corn, kernels cut from the cob (a bag of thawed frozen corn would probably be fine, but I wouldn’t use canned corn)

1 red bell pepper, cored, seeded, and chopped

3 Tbsp. all-purpose flour

1 quart chicken stock or broth

1 15-ounce can black beans, drained and rinsed

Juice of 1 lime

¼ cup fresh cilantro leaves, chopped

Heat a large soup pot over medium-high heat with the vegetable oil. Add the chicken and season with salt, pepper, cumin, coriander, and chipotle chili pepper. Cook the chicken until lightly browned, about 3 to 4 minutes. Add the onions, corn kernels, and red bell peppers. Cook, stirring frequently, for about 3 minutes. Dust the chicken and veggies with the flour, stir, and continue to cook for 2 minutes. Turn the heat up to high and add the chicken stock. Bring the stew up to a simmer and then add the black beans. Simmer the stew for 15 minutes. Add the lime juice and cilantro, and stir to combine.

4 Servings

Singing

Kiran loves to sing. Right now, her favorite song is "Oh Be Careful Little Eyes." I guess she got bored singing the regular verses because I overheard her singing some new ones.
"Be careful little clothes what you wear..."
"Be careful little puffs what you eat..."

Kiran watches Sesame Street and one of the segments is Elmo's World. The theme song goes a little like this
"Lalalala Lalalala Elmo's World. Lalalala Lalalala Elmo's World. Elmo loves his goldfish. His crayon too! That's Elmo's World!"

Kiran likes to put in other people's names and what they love. I love hearing what she comes up with for each person. For Sienna she'll say "Sienna loves her mommy and her Kiran too" or "Sienna loves her legos and her car too." For herself she crams in "Kiran loves her mommy and her daddy and her Sienna too! That's Kiran's world" I just realized this post probably would have been better with some video. Ah. I'll work on that.

When Little Girls Play By Themselves...

(you might notice that Sienna is not wearing her fun cloth diapers in this picture...its b/c I accidentally washed them in bleach with fragrance and they haven't been as absorbent since! Oh no! So I ordered some new inserts and while I was ordering those I decided to order three new diapers in three new colors! I can't wait to get them!!!)

9 Months Old!

Yeah Sienna turned 9 months old yesterday. The day Jonathan returned from his trip to Myanmar (he has promised to guest post about that!) and the day I forgot to go to the Persalls to hang out with Brian & SB (So sorry! Public apology! So glad we got to see you today!).

So let's see...this has been a big month! Sienna started crawling at 8 1/2 months. At first she would just go one or two crawls (is that what you call them?) but now she is everywhere. Which means we've had to start disciplining her because she's grabbing cords or pulling her sister's hair or eating any number of things that she shouldn't be. Just yesterday I turned the corner out of the kitchen and she was standing up holding on to the chair. Now she thinks she can stand without holding on. So she'll pull herself up, look around and let go. We've had a lot of tumbles and tears since this all began yesterday. And she keeps wanting to stand up in the bath. No, no Sienna.

See, Mom, I got it! No problem!

She babbles a lot- bababa and mamama (but only when she's upset). She still has no teeth and none that we can feel but I'm ok with that because I love toothless babies!!! I hope its still a while before she gets teeth! We've been slow in introducing new foods because of reactions and reflux flare ups and waiting extra because of the current allergies. She only eats bananas, rice cereal, baby oatmeal, avocados, carrots, green beans, peas, sweet potatoes, and now puffs. Twice we've tried pears and twice she's had very fussy times after. Those are supposed to be the least allergenic fruit. I must have had dairy last week at the beach because she had a very classic reaction. Unfortunately the reaction lasted just as long as they have previously so my hopes that she was outgrowing it were dashed.

Sienna likes to wave at herself and has definately had bouts of separation anxiety this month. I think the best part of this past month has been the development of Kiran and Sienna's relationship. Now that Sienna can move, those two have been playing non-stop. Their favorite game is the one where Kiran will go hide in Sienna's closet and Sienna will crawl over there and open the door. They both just fall over laughing and Kiran will yell, "She found me Mommy! See-nee-na found me!" Repeat 14 times. Kiran has been calling Sienna "See-nee-na" for a while now and I love it. In fact, I've found myself accidentally calling Sienna that a few times. But over the past week Kiran has slowly started to pronounce her name the proper way and I kinda miss See-nee-na.

So even though I have yet to write Sienna's name in her baby book, I think this counts as marking the milestones.