What would you do for good BBQ?

For Thanksgiving Brad's sister, Erika, and her husband, Derek flew out to spend the holiday weekend with us. After all the dishes were done and the pumpkin pie was devoured we determined that a trip to Pappy's was in order. Pappy's just happens to be by far the best BBQ in St. Louis. The line goes through the restaurant, out the door and through the entire building. People routinely wait in line for an hour or more just for their delicious food. We were lucky and only had to wait for 55 minutes.

Erika and Derek

Mike eating lemons...again.

Brad eating Mike ;)

Monday Picture

Gobble Gobble

I'm pretty sure that Mike thoroughly enjoyed enjoyed his first Thanksgiving.

Before all the action - when he was still clean:

During dinner:

Round 2 - Dessert:

Hope yours was as good as ours!

Boys will be boys?

Does this fall into the category of boys will be boys?

Monday Picture

Pure Joy

Squishy Face

I dare you to try to find a cuter sleeping, squished face.

Rocking

My little drummer boys have emerged just in time for Christmas.

Fall

Rainbow trees.

Buddies...well, sort of

Meet Mike...

and Will...
They were born almost exactly 6 months apart, and are buddies. Well, unless Will touches Mike, or looks at Mike...

Usually after Mike gets used to Will they do alright together...

They may even snuggle a little bit...

or try to give each other piggy back rides...

It's good to have buddies.

Monday Picture

Holiday Cards

It is getting to be that time of year again. The time when your mailbox is filled with lovely colored envelopes and something besides bills! My goal is to have our Christmas cards out the door the week after Thanksgiving. Usually I'm pretty good, last year I sucked. Mike was quickly on his way so no cards were mailed out at all. This year I'm going to be better and the wonderful folks over at shutterfly are helping me out! I'd like to first share my love of shutterfly. For my and Brad's 10 year anniversary (dating) I created a cookbook on shutterfly with all of our favorite recipes. For Christmas last year, my mom got a lovely photo book and while I was pregnant I created a book that detailed my pregnancy week by week. I also recently found out that they do all sorts of things like calenders, puzzles, and even ornaments. And now they are giving away 50 free holiday cards to bloggers! I know. I kind of love them too right now.

Outtakes

Apple Pie Oh My!

I'm not a huge pie person. I prefer cake, however, Brad loves pie and despises cake. At our wedding we had a wedding pie to go along with the cake. On Christmas we make Jesus a birthday pie (the Jesus Pie) instead of a cake. It's kind of funny really. I've always been kind of intimidated by baking pies (aside from pumpkin...I love me some pumpkin pie from scratch), but when I found this recipe for apple pie I knew I had to try it.

Apple Pie:
12ish apples - peeled, cored and sliced
1 C. Sugar
1-3TBS cinnamon
1/4 C. Flour
Lemon Juice
Refrigerated pie crust

Spray your pie pan with pam and lay the pie crust in the dish.

Wash your apples:
Peel your apples:

Core and slice your apples:

Take a quick break to watch your baby laugh:

In a large bowl combine the sugar, cinnamon and flour. Toss the apples in and mix until they are well coated. Add a few dashes of lemon juice and toss again:

Pile the apple mixture into the pie pan:

Cover with the other half of the pie crust and press the edges together. Then cut four slits in the top of the pie:

Brush the top with milk or egg whites:

Bake at 425 for 40 minutes. Check on the pie after 20 and if the top is starting to get really brown, cover with a foil tent. Remove from oven and bask in your baking prowess:

Slice and enjoy:

Friday Night Date Night!

Mike here. Can I just tell you about the horrible, mean thing my parents did to me last Friday? So everything we looking great. Mom picked me up from daycare a little early, we took Sam on a nice walk, we played for a bit then they started saying something about a "date night." What in the world is a date night you ask...well basically it is when they leave me home with some random person and disappear for a HOURS. I know...I could hardly believe it myself. Mom kept saying something about free box seats to the Zac Brown band. I didn't think too much about it until Brooke and Mike showed up and started spouting the same nonsense. At that point I decided I was not happy about this "date night" decision and I started to tell them about it. Mom then tricked me with some snuggles and play time so I thought we were safe and that they decided not to go. Boy was I wrong, a few minutes later Rachel showed up all smiles and happy. By this point I was starting to realize that something was definitely going on. Mom put me in my high chair and gave me my dinner and then WALKED OUT THE DOOR. Yes...she left me all alone with Rachel. Well I was not going to stand for that so I screamed and I screamed and well I screamed some more (I'm not really proud of it, but hey, I've got to do what I've got to do). Rachel tried to distract me with some toys but I was not having it so I screamed some more. Finally I gave in and let her put me to bed. But can I just say that next time mom and dad decide to have a date night I better be invited.

Monday Picture

Things that make up for all the crap of daily life:

Impromptu dance parties in the kitchen when daddy finally gets home from the hospital at 8:15 on a Thursday night.