Christmas Card

'Tis the season!  I'm a bit late in ordering our Christmas cards, but the order has been placed and the cards below will soon start showing up in mailboxes.  And they should even arrive before Christmas.  Woohoo!!

Merry Montage Christmas

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Cooking posts return!

I haven't posted anything about cooking in a long, long, loooooonnnng time.  But, that ends today.  I've decided to share a little Cheeseburger Pasta recipe with you because it's warm, easy, comfort food that I love this time of the year.  And it's approved by all members of the Smoller household (well, except for Brenna, but she doesn't get a food vote yet). 

This first picture really doesn't make it look all that appetizing, but trust me on this one.  It's good.

 A formal view of Brady's dinner.  Adults got the same thing, just on bigger plates! Cheeseburger Pasta, cottage cheese and beer bread.

Cheeseburger Pasta (adapted from Campbell's):
1 pound ground beef
1 can fiesta nacho cheese soup
1 can tomato soup
1 3/4 cup water
2 cups uncooked pasta (elbow or shells)

Cook the beef in a large skillet until well-browned.  Pour off any fat.  Add the soups, water and pasta in the skillet and heat to a boil.  Reduce the heat to low and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring very often.  Cook for 10-12 minutes until the pasta is done to your likeness.

5 ingredients.  And one of them is water.  How easy is that!

K-State baby

I don't have much to say for this post, other than reiterating that we have cute, cute kids. 

The last home football game for K-State was this past Saturday and the weather was awful.  Cold and rainy.  We did not go to the game, but I loaded up the kids and we ate breakfast at Early Edition with our tailgating girls Susan, Kylie & Heather.  The kids did pretty good.  And I even got some smiles out of them once we got home.

Brenna is talking and crawling!

We had a big, big night at our house last night.  Little Miss Brenna started crawling.  She's still not an expert, but she's doing great at moving her legs and the arms are starting to go, too.  She moved and scooched all around the living room last night.

In addition to crawling, she marked another milestone by saying her first word.  And what would you guess that word is? 

Dada!  Of course, but only because it's easier to say than Mama.  We carry them for 9 months, we nurse them and we don't even get to be the first word said.  So unfair for us mommas.  I'm sure we'll survive nonetheless. 

So, we've got a crawler and a talker now.  Let the fun begin!

Party pics - grown-up style

Grown-ups are also big fans of parties at the gymnastic place.  Well, perhaps I should clarify.  Some grown-ups are fans of it.  But most of the adults I know fall into the category of having fun.  I didn't get pictures of all the adults joining in, but rest assured that most of the adults at the party took at least one leap into the foam pit or jumped on the trampoline or balanced on the balance beam or ran around on the floor exercise area. 

These pictures are primarily of my buddy Shelby and I.  We LOVED the trampoline.  We played crack the egg and just bounced around and had a generally good time.  Makes me want a trampoline in the back yard.

 Look how high I can go!  Oh wait, I only get that high with bouncy help.

 Shelby on the uneven bars.  She was practicing a little toes to bar move from CrossFit.

 Crack the Egg.  I was the definite champion of this game. But Shelby was far better at Popcorn.

Party pics

The foam pit.  An endless source of fun for children, just in case you didn't know.

 Natalie, in the pink outfit, has my vote for next Olympic gymnast. 

 Brady really loved the foam pit.

 And no party is complete without a dog pile.  That's me on the bottom, with kiddos piled on top.  We all bounced around on the trampoline and then somebody thought it would be fun for everybody to climb on me.  Whose idea was that? 

Brenna at 7-months

Brenna turned 7-months old while we were gone on vacay, but Grandma was more than willing to take our Pooh picture to keep up with tradition.

 Isn't she adorable!

At 7 months of age Brenna is finally sleeping through the night on a pretty consistent basis (now watch that she'll wake up tonight just to spite me for saying this!).  She goes to bed around 8:00 and wakes up around 7:00.  She typically takes a nap in the mornings and then another one late afternoon to evening-ish time.  She has quite the appetite.  She's eating all kinds of Stage 2 foods, including mixed vegetables.  She even gobbles up the peas.  She usually eats a least one 3.5-4 oz. container of food at each meal and sometimes will eat more.  She follows that with a bottle after each meal and then a bottle for mid-morning, mid-afternoon and before bed snacks.  She's also able to somewhat feed herself small pieces of cereal, though we just give her the Gerber Puffs since that chewing motion isn't mastered yet.
She is so, so close to crawling.  She can roll around all over the place and is very mobile just in doing that.  She loves to play with Brady's toys and that's starting to cause problems already.  Big brother doesn't always like to share. 
She babbles a lot and boy, does she stick out her tongue quite a bit.  She's starting to hit a very, very fun stage where she is more interactive and I love that.  She remains fascinated by Brady and watches him all the time.  She also likes to sing and bounce around and she loves it when I throw her up in the air (just a small distance, of course).