Pumpkin Carving

Since Greg and I have been married I don't think we have ever carved pumpkins for Halloween. This year was a first, and I am sure it doesn't have anything to do with a 5 year old who is beginning to catch on to the different holiday traditions. But we did have a lot of fun and ended up with some simple, but decent pumpkins.

Greg dug in, but Tanner was not sure about how involved he wanted to be in this process.

Decision made... "This stuff stinks"

Bryn was not afraid to dig in and get "big handfuls."

The kids were pretty happy with the final product...maybe we'll have to make it a tradition. Sorry Kade was not featured in this family time, he did his part by sleeping nicely through the entire thing.

Recipe Exchange

I have been tagged in a recipe exchange by my friend Alissa and since she added "if you don't have these new recipe's on your blog in the next 3 days then you'll have 45 million years of bad luck, fungus growing on your face and toes, and MAJOR hair loss! ;)"

So, with that warning/threat I thought I better jump on it before I forgot all about it. This is a recipe my mom introduced to me when she was here visiting. Greg and the kids loved it, so needless to say it has made it into our rotation,

Pasta al Forno

Marinara Sauce

Fresh Basil
Oregano
1 lb. Ground beef browned
Sauted onion
2 cans diced italian tomatoes
1 can tomato sauce
Mozerella Cheese

Cook beef and add other ingredients. Set aside.

Bechamel Sauce

1/4 c. Butter
1/4 c. Flour
2 1/4 c. Milk
Pinch of nutmeg
Salt and Pepper

Wisk until boil. Simmer 20 minutes. Cool 10 minutes.
Cook Penne Pasta. Drain and put in 9x13 pan. Add Marinara Sauce. Pour Bechamel Sauce over. Top with Mozzerela cheese.

Cook 20 mins on 350.

Yummy Yummy Yummy. Good as leftovers too!

2 Weeks

Kade has now survived us for 2 weeks. There has been a lot happening in the past 2 weeks, beginning with a fun surprise, then a shed, a blessing and saying goodbye to 2 sets of incredible grandparents. We miss you all and thank you for all your help while you were here.

Here are a few pictures to celebrate!

Kade

So, Kade hads been a part of our family for a week and a half, it is funny that it seems like he has been around forever. He has such a sweet, content personality. He puts up with his brother and sister like it was nothing and sleeps right through all their chaos. The nights haven't been so bad, the last couple nights he has been getting up only once or twice and he's easily put back to sleep. Tanner and Brynlee are as proud as they could be about their brother. Tanner will come home from school and just sit and hold him while he sings Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Brynlee loves to hold him and comment on "all his dark hair." I think she has been listening in on the conversations going on around her.

We are beginning to make the adjustments to having a new baby in the home... although it is a whole different ball game now that Nana and Bampa flew back to Utah this morning.

I have to put in a bit of a tribute to my mom. Honestly, I do not know how I would have been able to survive the last couple weeks without my mom. She is absolutely amazing. When we had our little surprise and brought home a Kade instead of a Kaylee she was right there on top of things. Helping Greg with the kids while I was in the hospital and getting Kade's things ready for him to come home to. She woke up early in the morning and got Tanner ready for school before I even cracked my eye lids. She ran wash through almost every day, kept my house clean, made dinners, held Kade, played with Bryn and Tan. You name it she did it. She even learned her way around Bentonville and Rogers so she could take the car out by herself and make it back home without getting lost. There is so much that she did for us that I really don't know how to thank her for everything. She was definitley heaven sent. It was so hard to let her go back to Utah. I tried not to think about her leaving, but I was already dreading it at the beginning of the 2nd week. I honestly don't know how I am going to do this without her help. I guess it just comes down to putting one foot in front of the other, and constant prayers. Thank you Mom. We love you so much and had more fun with you here than you can even imagine.

Baby Surprise

Sorry it has taken me a few days to get a post up...things have been a little crazy around here. Tuesday turned out to be a very long day with an exciting twist at the end of it all. We arrived at the hospital about 5:00 in the morning and got situated in our room. Dr. Hannah came in and broke my water about 7:30 and then the waiting began. We waited and waited and waited. My contractions wouldn't stay consistent enough to make much progress and the nurses were having a hard time keeping the baby's heart rate on the monitor so there was a lot of adjusting and laying in different positions to try to keep the heart rate visible. Finally about 2:30, I had just about had enough and we called in for the epidural...thank heavens for the epidural. Just when the world is about to close in there is light and the pain is gone. I would love to say that I was tough enough to try to go al natural, but nope. I go for comfort, really, there is no other way. After hours of fighting the heart monitor the nurses decide to put in the internal monitor so they can have me sit up and have gravity help move the baby down. It seems from there things started to move along a bit faster. Finally the nurses said we were ready to have a baby, they called Dr. Hannah, 5 minutes later he arrived and we were all set up ready to go. After about 4 contractions the nurse said "Ok, on this next contraction, you'll have your baby." One push, two push and the baby is here. Dr. Hannah starts talking about all his hair and the nurses join in, she will look so cute with bows in her hair. Greg begins to catch on... he... it's a BOY! He says, "Amy, it's a boy!" I'm a little slow... what, it's a boy? Then it hits, if I could have felt or moved my legs I would have jumped off the bed, but since I couldn't do either of those I sat up as best I could to get a good look. Yup, we had a boy. There he was peeing all over the Dr. As soon as I saw him I instantly knew his name would be Kade R Bench. Don't ask me how because Greg and I had a hard enough time coming up with and agreeing on a girl name (by the way, her name was going to be Kaylee) to even think about a boy name, but I knew that is what his name should be. Wisely Greg agreed. The R for his middle names represents his two grandpas, Ralph and Roger. He has two incredible role models in his life and hopefully this will be a reminder to him to always look towards them as examples and for guidance.

The rest of the night was spent in shock and strategizing on how we were going to get ready for a baby boy. We were completely prepared for a girl. We had purchased all the pink clothes, taken the tags off all the pink clothes and washed all the pink clothes. We had painted the blue room in our house pink, so we had pink walls. All the pink bedding had been washed and was waiting for a princess to sleep on them. We thought we were completely prepared. Now we knew we didn't have anything ready. But, we knew it was right. Kade is supposed to be in our family and we are so grateful for this fun turn of events that has brought him here. The morning after Kade was born Tanner informed us that he had been praying for a baby brother and that Heavenly Father answers prayers. I just wish T would have shared those prayers when we were listening.

Thanks to everyone who has helped us these past few days. Greg and I count ourselves completely blessed to have friends and family who take care of us and help us when ever they can. I count it a double blessing that my mom could fly in a couple days before Kade was born. I honestly don't know how we would be as far as we are in the pink to blue transition without her. We are anxiously awaiting my dad flying in tomorrow night and Greg's parents flying in next Thursday night. Family is good. It is good to have them around, we just wish we could share all this with our brothers and sisters as well.

I'll post better pictures when I can get them off my mom's camera. Love you all!

Baby Update

October 9th, 5:00 am.

So, I went in for one of those lovely end of pregnancy appointments today and everything checked out nicely. We are progressing and the Doc scheduled an induction date, October 9th. Plans are to go in to the hospotal at 5:00 and get the IV and antibiotics (for Group B Strep, the test actually came back negative this time, but since I was positive with my other two we decided to go ahead and run the antibiotics to be on the safe side) Dr. Hannah will come in around 7:30 and break my water and the rest will be history. Hopefully a short history. Dr. Hannah seems to think we will have a baby by 1:00 that afternoon. I think I will have to hold him to it.

I am just grateful there is a date to plan towards...if something happens between now and then I can work with that, but it was killing me just sitting around waiting. Especially since B came 2 weeks early, my mind has automatically adjusted the due date for this one. Oh well, just one of the joys. We'll keep you posted.