Elsa Johnson

Lucia Lately (almost 14 months) and Britta's Bachelorette Party

2013-04-28T21:39:00.001-05:00

Here's a picture of our sweet little Lucia these days.

I decided not to update each month anymore. I figure the lower I keep standards for myself, the less I gyp our future children. You know, lower the bar so you don't have to rise to it, right? Anyway, Lucia is getting close to 14 months now and she's changed so much I figure it's time for an update.

Some of our favorite new things about Lucia...she's been more snugly and likes to sit in our laps, especially when reading books, more 'mamas' and 'dadas' (plus calling me 'Elsa' sometimes), enough hair to make pigtails, loud laughs, waving 'hi' and 'bye', her new appreciation for watching and interacting with other kids, being able to really play at the park, placing her milk on the table instead of throwing it on the ground after each and every sip, babbling to herself when waking up (aka, a slower progression to screaming/crying after waking up), sleeping until 8 many mornings, more creative play, brushing her hair, starting to pay attention to us when we say 'no' and many, many more things. She even maker her own little 'jokes' by doing something over and over that she gets a laugh from us. She loves dogs, pictures of babies, her baby dolls, her cousins, looking out of our apartment windows, walking and reading with us or to herself.

Some of our not so favorite developments...tantrums when she doesn't get her way (you know, like wanting to walk around with a sharpened pencil aimed at her eye), trying to bite something/someone/herself when she doesn't get her way (thank goodness that she hasn't been very successful at biting people, mostly inanimate objects...and mommy), telling us 'no' (although this is still kind of cute) and the nearly impossible diaper changes due to thrashing/standing up/trying to walk away. But then again, all these things are normal to toddlers.

Each new phase I think, "Now this is my favorite phase!". A growing child is always displaying the positive and negative aspects of their new skills, but I find that the positives just always seem to out-way the negatives. Lucia toddles around everywhere, getting into everything and we find ourselves amazed and exhausted with lots of laughing. It is so fun to watch her little brain put the pieces together and I like to test it sometimes, just for fun. Example: "Lucia, put the baby doll in the drawer", and she does it, ha! I've always been amazed at that stage when babies can understand you but not quite talk yet so it's fun to see her begin to get there. She seems to most prefer me, Matt and my sister, Linnea, these days. This makes sense since she spends her time with Linnea when I am at work. At our house, she is the only child but over at Linnea and Cam's, she is just one of the bunch. I figure it must be good for her as she's learning how to hold her own with her older cousins.

She has 6 teeth now and continues to be a great eater, although picky at times. She is a great sleeper at night and is straddling the line between 1 and 2 naps during the day. She is getting better at the words she already knows and is always trying out new ones. Once she gets going, her babbling is so loud and intent that her incoherent sentences are pretty convincing, whatever they are. The funniest is when I say "Lucia?" and she yells back "YEAH?". We can't quite tell if it's on purpose, still funny though. 'Yeah' seems to be her go-to word these days when we ask her something in a questioning way. So funny when you get her on a roll. So many great moments with this girl! We are having so much fun with her amidst the chaos that toddler-hood brings.

Here are some random pics from the last month or so...

Easter morning. She has some eggs with Cheerios inside.

Easter lunch with the fam.

Naomi and Lucia playing with their dolls.

Hanging with baby Zeke.

A fun birthday party a few weeks ago. Look how cute the birthday girl is! I loved how they were holding hands.

Lucia gets a lot of 'look at that belly' comments. You can see why from the above picture.

Goofy girl

Lucia paying me a visit at work.

I had some fun with my cousin celebrating her upcoming wedding at her bachelorette party. It was a great time and we're looking forward to the wedding next weekend!

Some of the wedding party.

It was fun to decorate the hotel room.

Lucia is one!

2013-03-19T15:33:00.000-05:00

It is so exciting and surreal to celebrate Lucia's first birthday! I feel like I spent her whole pregnancy not really believing that I would actually have a real-life, actual baby when it was all said and done. Then you spend the whole first year amazed at that little one, hanging on their every twinge and move, just soaking it all in and getting used to the crazy schedule that you now call 'life'. Then a year goes by and you go to Texas with a baby and come back with a little girl...what happened?!? (We celebrated her birthday in Texas.)

And what a year it has been! Matt and I just love being Lucia's parents. Lucia is such a sweet little girl (says her parents). She is starting to show a funny little personality...she loves to laugh when others do, 'read' to herself and drag around her little baby dolls while saying 'baby' over and over. She says a few more words like 'mama', 'dada', 'dah-ee' for doggie, 'ih-ee!' for kitty, 'uh-uh' for uh-oh but 'baby' is by far her favorite and most clear word. I just love how she is starting to imitate us by brushing her hair or picking up objects that look like phones and bringing them to her ear saying "ay-ya" for 'hello'. She tells us she's hungry by saying "mmm, mmm" and she is working on many more words. She spends her days babbling and chattering and others seem to comment often on how 'loud' she is. It is true, one of her favorite activities is to look out of our window and yell at people/dogs/cars/etc. passing by.

Lucia has officially made the switch from crawling to walking in the last few weeks. At first Matt suspected that she would only walk when she could use the leverage to swing her toys around more fiercely but now she walks all the time. I had a surreal moment this Sunday when I saw her following her cousins around after church. She was trying to keep up with their running and screaming, smiling every second and I just couldn't believe my eyes. She seemed so grown up. She loves to crawl under things and can now climb on a number of objects in our apartment which makes me think she will be early to figure out how to climb out of her crib.

Lucia weighs in at just over 22 pounds and 29 and 3/4 inches. She is in the 55th percentile for height and has bumped up to 75th for weight. I think her a-typical bump up in weight is due to the fact that she loves to eat so much. She has become pickier this month but is still a great eater all in all. If she can identify what it is on the plate that she doesn't like, she will pick it all out, throw it on the ground then go back to eating. She almost always shrieks and screams as we are wiping off her hands after eating or changing her diaper. I guess some things never change.

Here are some pics from her big day. We were in Texas for the week with my family.

Special treat of pancakes and yogurt for breakfast! Also she officially made the switch to cow's milk but she's still getting used to the new taste.

Morning 'happy birthday' serenade from grandpa.

The blurry blue thing is the birthday crown her cousin Gwen made for her.

A yummy cupcake to celebrate.

And she loved it!

Just for fun to compare...here's a picture of Lucia after her first bath at home.

And then one year later!

We had a little birthday celebration for Lucia at our place with my family last Sunday. It was fun to celebrate together especially since Matt wasn't able to be with her on her actual birthday.

I decided to make the cake that my mom used to make me on my birthday, angel food cake with 'no fail' icing. Her mom used to make it for her birthday as well. I put my own twist on on it by making the cake and frosting fun colors.

Birthday girl!

The menu was made up of some of Lucia's faves: ham n cheese sandwiches, homemade mac n cheese and fruit skewers.

Pink lemonade in sprinkle rimmed glasses.

Lucia (and her cousins) loved opening gifts. One of the highlights during present opening was when our 22 month old niece, Naomi, locked herself in the bathroom.

The cake wasn't perfect but it was yummy.

It was a great party, so fun to celebrate our year with Lucia. We are so blessed to be her parents and we can't wait to see what the future holds for her. We love you, Lucia.

Here are some more pics from this month...

Lucia and Naomi

Valentine's Day

We went for a little visit to G G's and great-grandpa Ray

Wrestling

On the way to Texas, yes, we drove. I wasn't quite sure how Lucia would do but she slept 10 hours through the night then took her two naps pretty much on schedule, playing happily in between naps. It went better than I expected, for sure.

On the way we stopped at the Oklahoma City building memorial (I'm pretty sure there was a more official name than that). It was a beautiful space and tribute to those who lost their lives in that tragedy. I didn't realize that so many children died due to the building's day care being one of the areas bombed, very sad.

A chair for each victim.

The museum across the pond marking where the street used to run.

There are still fresh flowers and new memorials but also original ones still left up. Kind of random that we stopped there but it was interesting to see.

It was nice to feel warm again and spend time outside. I realized Lucia has never really had the chance to experience much in the outdoors since the last time it was warm here, all she could do was lay on a blanket.

We had the chance to visit our good friends, Ashley and Austin, in their house near Austin.

Lucia got some good stair practice.

Plus we got to go see Jaime and Ryan in Austin.

They live on an awesome street, great for walking, people watching, grabbing some food, seeing the food trucks...so we went for a few walks in their hood.

Puppy watching

Jaime bought some yummy, mini-cupcakes for Lucia's birthday from the 'Hello Cupcake' truck.

Too bad Lucia was so tired that she didn't eat them...just patted the frosting.

We had fun swimming at the pool.

I know this picture seems random but its one of those funny things that just Lucia does and I wanted to remember it. She often tries to grab two things (like the rings above, remote controls, toys, whatever) and try put them together in her hands in this certain way that she seems to have decided in her head. Her ultimate joy comes when she can get them together in one hand and she just beams with delight and pride in her accomplishment. But if she can't get them how she wants them...

Meltdown!

Ending like this! It makes me wonder if this little thing is an indicator of something about her personality that will make more sense as she gets older. It is definitively a reminder that each person is an individual, loaded with their own unique thoughts.

Speaking of tantrums, they have definitely started! We have entered a whole new parenting world, oh what fun.

We took a walk on a near-by dam.

A little close to the fire...

Oh wait, that's not right. Just kidding, to all those who are freaking out! The fire is fake but it looked so real we thought we would have some fun.

Good thing it's fake, right!

Lucia and her great-grandpa Bert.

We had some amazing barbecue at Salt Lick.

Lucia loved it too!

Lucia did well in the car on the way home too. I think she effectively mastered the art of going into space-out mode in the car, a skill all Wallgren family members possess.

First pig-tails!

She could not sit still during her 12 month doctor's appointment. She walked around the whole time but did a good job.

Hanging out with Zeke at the Wilson's.

Welcome Zeke!

2013-03-19T09:16:00.001-05:00

Our dear friends Janine and Aaron Wilson welcomed their son Ezekiel "Zeke" David Wilson into the world on February 27th!

We are so excited to see them become parents to Zeke and just can't wait to watch him grow. It will be especially fun to watch him and Lucia become friends.

We love you, Zeke!

Lucia Lately (11 months) and Washington Trip

2013-02-07T15:13:00.000-06:00

Lucia is 11 months old. It is quite amazing to watch her conquer her little world one little step at a time...literally, she took her first steps this month!

This morning as I was reading my book, "Growing Spiritually", on the couch, Lucia was sitting next to me, her back leaning against a pillow, reading her book, "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See". I would look over at her and she would smile back at me and I just kept thinking of how much has changed in these 11 months. When she was just a few weeks old, I just could not have imagined this moment being a reality...and so quickly! So this moment lasted for a good sixty seconds and then back to the craziness. Lucia is a little girl on the move. Basically, if she is awake then she is moving, playing and hopping from one toy to the next, babbling, laughing or maybe even yelling. Sorry, neighbors below us!

Lucia has added walking to her list of accomplishments! However, there is some debate over when this began. Her uncle Jeff and grandma Debbie would say she took her first step in Washington a few weeks ago. I had just turned away and Matt was out of the room, so after Jeff's half-way convincing declaration that she took a step towards grandma Debbie, Matt decided that it didn't count. Even if we did miss that first one, it was a thrill for me to see her take three little steps for the first time! She had been driving me a little crazy all day with whining, screaming and crying but she took a break, took some steps then went back to screaming. She took some more steps the next day and even again for her dad! It seems this new skill is here for good now and it will be fun to watch her master it.

Another new thing is her ability to replicate sounds, words and even say a few of her own. Her first real word was 'baby'. She had said 'mama', 'dada' and 'ball' but usually when prompted. So when she said 'baby' on her own when she saw a baby doll, we decided it was her real first word. Lucia loves baby dolls and looking at pictures of babies while saying 'baby' over and over. We can also see that she is starting to understand us more now when we say 'no'. When she approaches 'no' items like remotes, the cable box, power strips, etc., she starts saying to herself 'no, no, no'. Or when she starts touching them, she looks over at us just waiting for that 'no'. Cute now but probably not for long.

Lucia enjoys eating and sleeping and we love her for it! She usually sleeps a solid 12 hours a night (sometimes more) and two naps a day. She's good at falling asleep on her own now, clutching her sock and one of her blankies and maybe her favorite stuffed animal, kitty (thanks Molly, you were right about that one!). She can eat almost everything now and pretty much likes whatever we put in front of her. Her has some old favorites like bananas, oatmeal with yogurt, cottage cheese, peas and fruit but now has some new favorites like ham and cheese tortilla roll-ups, mac and cheese and other pasta dishes. She is pretty good at drinking water out of her sippy cup which is good timing since she can start milk out of it next month. Her food is easier chewed now that she has a top tooth coming in. The fussiness of teething is not so fun for her (or us) but such is life.

One of my favorite parts of the last few weeks has been to watch her become more interactive with people around her. Lots more smiles, laughs and cuddles with us, her cousins and others. Her more complicated babbling has become more like a conversation and she has even figured out some noises that make us laugh and then keeps doing them. It's so fun to watch her brain put things together snd getting goofy!

Here are some pics from the month...

We had some unseasonably warm days here so we took advantage of being outside by going to the park. This is one of my favorite faces Lucia makes.

She chose to swing like this even though we helped her move forward too.

We went to Washington last month to spend some time with the Johnsons. Here we are on the plane. Lucia did alright although it was a lot harder this trip than the last when she basically slept the whole time. On the way back, she had her own seat which made a HUGE difference. Minimal shrieks from Lucia and less darting, evil looks from strangers on the way home.

Apparently happy to be flying!

We made it to grandma Debbie and grandpa Mark's!

Hanging out with uncle Jeff

And Jim and Sundra

and great grandpa Bill

We celebrated late Christmas together so Lucia got to open some gifts.

She doesn't quite get it but she did love ripping up the tissue paper.

And of all the toys she got, she was most mesmerized by the packaging of the ornament she received.

She had lots of new toys to play with at grandma and grandpa's.

Notice the little baby doll is in each picture because she dragged that thing around everywhere! Thanks to her cousin, Naomi, for letting us borrow it.

This is basically what most of our time looked like, all of the adults gathered around and watching Lucia play...the life of a first-born.

Lucia got to meet her second cousin, Beau! She was very curious to look at him. It will be fun to watch these two grow up together.

Justina and Becca showed us around their picturesque little town, Edmonds, WA. So many cute shops and restaurants plus I loved how it was on the water.

If there's one thing we Chicagoans know how to do, it's bundle! What's that phrase, "there's no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothes"? In in my family, that phrase also holds true for inside as well. If I had a nickel for all the times my mom has told me to just put on a sweater (or if that doesn't work, do some jumping jacks).

We were lucky to be driving back during a beautiful sunset over Seattle.

Then we left Lucia with grandma and grandpa for our first night away to head down to Portland to spend some time with our friends, Nate and Emily. As always, it was fun to spend time together and we had a great time.

After a fun night, and an extremely generous stay at a hotel in downtown Portland, we headed outdoors to a nearby waterfall for a little hike.

Isn't that cute?

Thanks to all out west for making it a great trip!

Meanwhile, back in Chicago, Lucia is still obsessed with that little doll.

Getting herself into some interesting places these days.

She was sick last week and spent her whole day either sleeping or like this.

This is one pic where I think she actually looks like my baby/toddler pictures. I am thinking specifically of the one where I am sitting in the little chair in that blue dress under an ironing board, right mom?

Here she is doing one of her favorite activities, looking at pictures of babies.

Her hair is getting long!

On the move!

And her cousins cheering for Lucia after seeing her take a few steps.

(Actually, I recreated this pic by making them keep clapping cause I thought it was so cute!)

Love that toothy smile!

But she's not always smiling and here's some proof. In fact, she is crying right now. Still cute though.

We love you, Lucia!

Lucia Lately (10 months), Christmas, Anderson Wedding and Wilson Baby Shower

2013-01-10T13:00:00.000-06:00

As I post this picture of our building dusted in snow, it already feels like the distant past since the past few days have been balmy enough to melt everything. We have been quite busy this holiday season. It seems like each day of the month was jam packed with great time with family, wonderful visits from friends and fun holiday gatherings. One of my favorite lines from any Christmas song is "there's a happy feeling nothing in the world can buy, when they're passing out the coffee and the pumpkin pie". Random and maybe corny, I know, but I feel like this line captures what I love about this time of year: truly enjoying the season for all that it means, with a sense of contentment and thankfulness. Here's a little glimpse of that...

Lucia is 10 months old now. She likes crawling, exploring, using her walker, using other items as a walker (such as stools, empty boxes, vacuum cleaners, etc.), crawling under things, 'reading' and 'talking' to herself, singing games, hide-and-seek, having 'conversations', playing on her own, playing with others, being with her cousins and talking on Skype. She getting less clingy and more snugly...a good combo.

She has two teeth now and loves to eat. She eats anything I put in front of her but her favorites right now seem to be cottage cheese and various veggies like butternut squash and corn. She does like meat a lot too. You can tell that she loves something when she eats it with both hands, alternating little pieces into her mouth as fast as I can supply them. With spoon-fed favorites, she makes her own little yummy noise "minnah, minnah" to let us know she wants more and she wants it now! Because she can be pretty impatient when it comes to eating, we tend to use a rice krispie tactic of giving her a whole bunch of rice krispies while preparing the other food since it takes her so long to pick up each piece (cooked quinoa is great for this too, even smaller and more time consuming than rice krispies). This tactic buys us a bit more time before her little "minnah, minnah" and "mmm, mmm" noises turns into screams and shrieks. I'm enjoying this new food phase of making new things for her to try and being able to take her to restaurants since she can eat off our plate now.

And speaking of noises, she makes a lot of them and it seems she can now connect some noises with their meanings. She says "dada" and "mama" and it actually seems that she is connecting it to us...half of the time at least. Matt seems to have taught her 'ball' because when she sees one she says "ba" and has done so enough times that I am half-way convinced. Some other new things this month: she can stand on her own, clap and can mimic gestures and sounds. It is so fun to see her do and learn new things.

While it seems that we are lucky parents to have a pretty content baby, she is not always this way. She usually hates having her clothes changed (a trait that was noticed by nurses on the day she was born), hates having her coat put on, having her hands and mouth wiped after eating and being put in her car seat. And sometimes when we are changing her diaper it sounds as though we are torturing her (I have found that the music mode on her noise maker or a toy seems to mesmerize her for long enough to get things done). Luckily, any screaming she does is usually short-lived. Now that she has mastered the pincher grasp, she is putting everything in her mouth. But sometimes it seems that she is starting to get that there are some things that you aren't supposed to eat, like dust bunnies (ahem...I guess that's my little reminder that it's time to vacuum). Matt and I find pure joy in watching Lucia grow although it always seems too fast. We find ourselves having more and more moments of laughing at the little new things she does and we look forward to the many more we will have.

Here are some pictures from this past month of Lucia and of our December activities:

Lucia's first Christmas!

Lucia got to eat by the fireside at my Uncle Scott and Aunt Nancy's on Christmas Eve. And Brandy sat next to her to join her.

Playing on Christmas morning at my mom and dad's house

Addison and Caroline

Lucia loves her new toys

Enjoying her gift from us, a Radio Flyer wooden rocking horse.

Practicing standing on her own!

Some cousin time. Notice how everyone is blurry...a lot of action and chaos when they're all together.

I love this picture of Naomi!

Lucia sits like this a lot now.

Or like this, ha!

My cousin Beth got married to Rob Anderson on December 29th. It was a beautiful wedding and fun to be with family to celebrate another cousin's wedding.

Beth looked gorgeous and I loved her dress!

Gwen and Sonja had fun watching the wedding ceremony. They both said they're favorite part was the kiss. At the end of the night when they ran out to the limo, Sonja asked me "are they going to live in their own castle now?"

Roger's speech was awesome!

Of course golf was involved

First dance

Then the real dancing began...grandma always has a fun time

Gwen and Sonja did too! It was a great night! Congratulations, Beth and Rob! Welcome to the family, Rob!

Another special event this month was celebrating my dear friend Janine and her baby due in February. Emilie, Corrie, Ingrid and I had fun hosting a baby shower for her at our place.

Janine looked beautiful!

Lots of yummy food

We can't wait to meet you, Baby Wilson!

One super fun part of the shower was having great friends in town. Ingrid was in town from Alaska, Carolyn and Ashley (with son, Manu) came from MN and Christine was in town from Africa! Janine's surprised reaction to Christine was priceless. Here we all are together like we were last year.

Not pictured is Lucia with Christine which also makes me realize that I didn't take any pics from hanging out with Jaime and Ryan either (I guess when I took a picture of the food, I should have also taken some other pics). Lucia warmed up to Jaime instantly so she obviously already loves her. We were also lucky to spend lots of time with Dave who was in town and stayed with us for a week plus we got to see Eddie as well for a bit.

What we were trying to do above was recreate this picture from last year.

Then Ashley, Christine, Linnea and I had fun taking the kids downtown to see the tree in Macy's, go to the bean and the christkindlmarket. Skating was nixed once we found out the line was 2 hours long. Hard to wait that long with a 4, 5 and 6 year old. We all had fun nonetheless.

Beef Fried Rice

2012-12-27T10:18:00.000-06:00

My love for beef fried rice is inspired by my love for Ron of Japan. So whenever we go, my sister and I study the ingredients and method since it's one of those cook-in-front-of-you-restaurants. I have tried and failed many times to match the recipe and create a batch that tastes just as good as ROJ's BUT this time, this blessed time, I finally finally think I GOT it! So good and so worth the many trials.

The Recipe:

2 cups white rice
2 eggs
1 lb ground beef
1 large white onion, minced
salt and pepper
vegetable oil (not quite sure how much)
about 6 Tablespoons soy sauce
1 green onion, chopped, for garnish (optional)

The Method

Cook rice and cool in fridge for at least a few hours before using (very important)
Combine onion and ground beef, mashing together with hands. Add rice and fully combine. Season with a teaspoon or so of salt and a little pepper.
Fry eggs in small saute pan, breaking up the yolk a little as it cooks. Set aside.
Add a few tablespoons veggie oil, heat and add 1/3 of rice mix. Season with salt. Cook covered on med-high heat for about 5 minutes, allowing meat to brown. Stir and cook covered again about 5 minutes.
Season with salt, a few tablespoons soy sauce, stir and allow to cook for another 5 minutes or until meat is cooked and rice starts to get a bit crispy.
Repeat steps 4 and 5 with the other 2 parts of the rice mix.
Add egg and garnish with green onion.

Lucia Lately (9 months)

2012-12-15T09:34:00.000-06:00

Whoa, where did the time go? We have known our little Lucia for a while now! According to her stats, she is just above average for weight and about 75th percentile for height. She is a busy and feisty little girl who enjoys "dancing" to music and is getting loud! Her favorite noises to make seem to start with 'B', like 'bah' or 'be' and sometimes something sounding like "Buddha" (more like "buddha, buddha, buddha"). She seems to like talking to herself while she plays or in response to us or others. Sometimes she just looks at you straight in the eye, waits a second til you are really looking back at her, and then pronounces "be!". She also loves to hold her right hand up high for a second then smack it down and yell "Bah!" or "Woulda-woulda". There are lots of other sounds but these seem to be her faves for now. She also has learned to use her voice for whining as well little glimpses of tantrums when she doesn't get something that she wants...just a little foretaste of the next phase I suppose. New to this phase is that she gets really clingy with us when we are around other people until she has a little time to get comfortable.

She is still crawling and standing but not quite letting go yet to free stand. She has gotten better at walking along things. She is exploring new places and finding all of the crevices of our apartment...and has the dirt under her fingernails to prove it! She's starting to get the whole cause and effect thing. If she does something that makes us laugh, she laughs then does it again. When she laughs, she has the cutest little dimple above her left cheek. And she really laughs now, like belly rolling, catch-your-breath kind of laughing. We just can't get enough. It is the best sound.

She still clutches a little sock while she sleeps, a habit that began when she was about 2 months old. Most often when I go to get her in the mornings, she has long ago thrown her pacifier out of her crib but is still holding onto that sock. She now has her mor mor made 'blankie' so we are trying to work that in as well (mor mor is what the grand kids call my mom). She is still a great sleeper (almost 12 hours most nights plus 2 naps during the day). It seems those nights where she wakes up crying are due to her coming teeth. She only has one so far but that is just enough to chomp and chew on food. Now that we have introduced this concept of finger foods, she does not want to go back. When we don't give her something to feed herself, she just goes ahead and tries to get right out of her chair. I'm just glad that she likes eating. I love the bonding that comes from feeding her but I have to say that it is insanely cute to watch her feed herself. She loves all the new foods she has tried and it's fun that she can eat (almost) all the foods that we eat.

Some pics from the past month or so...

Meeting her friend Chloe

Chloe is so cute, look at that face!

Hanging out with my friend Natalia

Attacking her kitty. She does this with all her animals, should we be worried?

Play group at church

Thanksgiving

Lucia always wants to grab the camera now when I try to take pictures so I have a ton of pictures of her like this: blurry and crying.

Getting into trouble

You know, I thought we were done with the warm weather but then we had another 70 degree day...in early December. (Thanks, global warming?)

We went ahead and set up the Christmas tree even though Lucia is the exactly perfect wrong age for a tree. The bottom row of lights are out from her trying to eat them and the ornaments don't start til a few feet up, but it's up! She tends to forget about it if the lights are off.

Naomi slept over last week and the girls had some fun time playing together once they both woke up (they didn't sleep in the same crib, that would have been a little too much fun)

At Caroline and Addison's 3rd birthday party. They still call her "Cia", so cute!

She's just one of the cousins

Trying to get a good pic in the mirror...not so much

Happy Lucia Day! (from our little Lucia)

2012-12-13T10:33:00.000-06:00

One of the reasons why the name 'Lucia' is special to me is because I grew up celebrating Saint Lucia day at church. No, it is not a Catholic church but this is the one saint that is celebrated. It comes from the Swedish heritage that our church still honors. Sweden celebrates Sankta Lucia on December 13th. I'm assuming most of you reading this blog know about Lucia but I'll tell the story anyway.

Lucia was a young Christian girl from Italy who was said to have given all she had to the poor and was known to secretly bring food to the persecuted Christians hiding in the catacombs under the city. It was said that she wore candles on her head to light the way. She was martyred for her faith in 304 AD. Lucia means light in Italian which is a fitting name since she brought light and hope to others in need.

There are many stories of how this tradition came to be celebrated in Sweden. One version is that the monks that converted Sweden to Christianity brought the story of Saint Lucia in an effort to change the pagan 'festival of lights' tradition on December 13th into Saint Lucia day. The celebration continues, still representing bringing light and hope into the darkest time of the year and marks the beginning of the Christmas season.

Here's my attempt at taking a 'Lucia' photo with Lucia...

It was an effort to get her to be by the light without eating the light. That restriction meant there were a lot of photos like the one above.

We celebrate at church with a breakfast and program that tells the story of Lucia. Here are Sonja and Gwen at the breakfast. They also played a part in the program and did a very impressive job singing in Swedish.

It always ends with the high school girls singing the Swedish Lucia song, one of them taking on the role of Lucia herself complete with a real (and lit) crown of candles. The copper tray and pot carried each year is the one that I inherited from my grandma (who started the Lucia celebration at church many years ago). The tray was a gift for my great-grandmother when her family went on a trip to Sweden without her since she was too young to go. One of the reasons it is special to me is because her initials 'EMJ' (for Elvira Martha Johnson) that are carved into the tray are the same as mine (Elsa Martha Johnson)!

Happy Lucia Day! May we all represent light in the darkness today.

Pesto Avacado Melt

2012-12-11T14:58:00.002-06:00

BEFORE

The Recipe

2 slices of bread
Pesto (homemade or store bought)
1/2 of an avocado, in chunks
5 cherry or grape tomatoes, halved
5 small slices cheddar cheese
Salt

AND AFTER

The oozing cheese holds it all together

The Method

Layer up with pesto, avocado, tomato, salt and cheese and throw under the broiler for a few minutes.

This is a great way to use up extra pesto. I sometimes get bored of just using it with pasta. So yummy and so simple. Enjoy!

Spanish Tortilla

2012-12-07T20:12:00.001-06:00

Don't let the name fool you. A Spanish tortilla is like an egg casserole with potatoes and veggies except without the half and half or heavy whipping cream. And a bit different of a method. I used a mash up of a few different recipes this time but I'm going to try my best to remember what I did. This recipe is versatile, use whatever veggies you love.

I used these ones:

The Recipe:

4 Yukon gold or small russet potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced
1 small onion, sliced
1 red pepper, diced
4-5 mushrooms, sliced
8 eggs
6-8 tablespoons olive oil
salt and pepper

The Method

Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Boil potatoes about 5 minutes, remove from water and lay out on a paper towel lined tray in a single layer
Heat 3-4 tablespoons of oil on med-high heat, add veggies and season with salt and pepper. Saute veggies until tender, about 7 minutes, let cool
Whisk eggs with 1 teaspoon of salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper, add cooled potatoes, veggies and let sit about 15 minutes (it releases the starch in the potatoes or something)
Add 3-4 tablespoons of oil to a large saute pan, add egg mixture, pushing potatoes to the bottom
Cook on med-high heat for a few minutes
Transfer pan to oven and cook at 350 for about 20 minutes
Allow to cool a few minutes. Invert onto a plate to serve

Tortellini with Roasted Asparagus and Onion

2012-11-29T14:20:00.000-06:00

More Real Food: simple and fast but really good. It's crazy how such a simple thing like roasting the veggies make them so sweet and tasty.

The Recipe (not the most precise but that's how I do it):

1 Package Tortellini (I used cheese)
1 bundle asparagus, cut into 1 inch pieces
1 large white onion, cut into 1 inch chunks
a few tablespoons olive oil
salt and pepper
a few tablespoons butter
1/4-1/2 cup Parmesan cheese

The Method:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Toss veggies in oil, salt and pepper. Roast for 25 minutes or until veggies starting to brown on top.
Meanwhile, cook tortellini according to directions
Mix butter, salt and pepper with drained tortellini. Toss in veggies.

BLT Pasta

2012-11-20T21:33:00.000-06:00

More real food. And I know it looks simple but this recipe is real good.

The Recipe:

1/2 lb pasta (I used bow tie)
3 cups arugula
6 slices bacon
10-20 grape tomatoes
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup mayo
1/4 cup creamy salad dressing (like Caesar or ranch)
salt and pepper

The Method

Cook pasta according to directions.
Cook bacon. My favorite method is baking bacon (place bacon on foil lined baking sheet, place in oven, turn oven on to 425, check after 20 minutes, bake until crispy)
Mix vinegar, mayo and dressing. Season with salt and pepper.
Layer pasta, about 1 cup to 1 1/2 cups arugula and halved tomatoes. Drizzle dressing on top.

Real Food: Quinoa Crusted Pork

2012-11-17T15:24:00.000-06:00

Since becoming a mom, the time I have each day seems much more precious. I work part-time, watch my sister's daughter while she works part-time and oh yeah, one more thing...taking care of a baby is a time-suck!

Our usual evening routine on my working days is: get home around 6:45, feed Lucia, get Lucia ready for bed, put her to bed, make dinner for us. As you can see, dinner comes last (and late). I grew up eating dinner later so I really don't mind that (and Matt has taken a liking to it) but I am always looking for recipes that don't take much time or effort. I love making dinner and I think it's an important part of our family life but because it comes at the end of my busy day, I have had to sacrifice some of my more time consuming recipes to the all powerful parenting gods. Real food please!

In general, I am a person that needs a plan. Matt likes to tease me for my inability to answer open questions. What's your favorite movie? My mind goes blank. Not only can I not think of my favorite movie, but I cannot think of a single movie or only the dumbest ones. The same thing happens when I go to the grocery store without a plan or list. I just go blank. No ideas, or just bad ones. I need ideas! And what better ideas than my own? The other day I hunkered down and wrote down like one million 'real food' ideas and I want to keep those ideas alive. I am going to attempt to jot down the ones that work (electronically, in the form of this blog) so that I can check back for ideas when I draw a blank.

I am not professing that these recipes are the fanciest but ones that work for our family in this phase we find ourselves in. The criteria for my 'real food': real good, real ingredients, real quick and real-istic.

So I'll start with the quinoa-crusted pork I made the other night...

The Recipe:

3-4 boneless pork loins
1 cup barbecue sauce
a few dashes Worcestershire sauce
a few dashes soy sauce
a few dashes siracha chile sauce
salt and pepper
1/2 cup quinoa
3/4 cup Italian breadcrumbs
Olive oil

The Method:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Season both sides of pork with salt and pepper. Make marinade: mix together barbecue sauce, Worcestershire, soy sauce and chile sauce. Cover pork in mixture and marinade in the fridge for 30 minutes (flipping pork half-way through).
In the meantime, mix quinoa and breadcrumbs together. Season with salt and pepper.
Let pork come to room temp. for about 10 minutes.
Heat some olive oil in a shallow, oven-proof saute pan.
Shake the excess marinade off each piece of pork, cover all sides in quinoa mixture. Sear on med-high until browned, about 4 minutes. Sear other side for a few minutes.
Finish cooking by putting the whole pan in the oven for 15-20 minutes or until meat registers at 150 degrees.

(The marinade could be varied in many ways. I just made this one up from the stuff we had around. You could also add shredded Parmesan to the quinoa mixture. I served this with simple roasted potatoes and salad.)

It's not long now til we are in the next phase when Lucia will be eating dinner with us too and trying all the foods that we love!

Lucia Lately (8 months)

2012-11-10T15:45:00.000-06:00

Lucia is 8 months old now and she just gets more and more fun as she grows. In an effort to record all of her stages of development, I'm going to try to summarize her current stage. She's got the crawling thing down now and she currently loves crawling around, crawling under things, trying to go over things (including a step or two) and standing herself up onto just about anything. She's been flirting with the idea of letting go while standing a time or two but she's not quite up for that yet. She is a busy little girl, always on the move. I can barely get her to sit with me for longer than a few minutes because she always sees something interesting and then once I set her down, she's off! This stage brings some new challenges but I enjoy it. She follows us around our apartment like a little puppy now that she can get herself where she wants to go. And it's fun to see where she chooses to take herself; usually she just wants to be in the action, where the people are. She loves to play with her cousins and it is so fun to watch her get excited to see them and play with them. She seems to love people in general, making eye contact with everyone, smiling and squealing at strangers that walk by her, and even waving a little bit now. But she is also starting to show signs of clingy-ness to mama around strangers.

Lucia is a great sleeper and sleeps almost 12 hours at night and takes two solid naps during the day. Man oh man, do we love getting good sleep again! Thank you, Lucia! We are also enjoying this new stage where she wakes up and talks to herself rather than screaming and crying until we ("we" meaning "I") get her. All of her little "talking" noises are just so cute and she is especially loving it these days when we repeat the "bas" and "das" back to her...she just can't contain her laughter, so cute. She still eats pureed foods and lets us know she's hungry now by making "mmm" "mmm" noises or crawling over to her high chair. On a related note, her first little tooth is starting to pop through...better late than never, right?

Here are a few pics from the last month or so...

She's practicing her standing up on everything these days

Enjoying one of our last 80 degree days of the season with a walk to the lake. I believe the next day was about 40 degrees cooler.

One of her favorite spots to grab some toys. Her favorite non-toy toys are this electronic catch phrase game and the remote control. She also likes being read to, playing with books and playing singing games like "this little piggy".

You can see in the background that her exersaucer has been converted to the final stage now that she can stand up on it.

With great-grandpa Ray

Showing off her skills: standing while holding onto something else with her hands.

We celebrated 8 months with some cheerios

She wasn't quite sure what to think about them

When I watch her sleeping like this, I just think to myself that I can't believe that I am so lucky to have this little girl as my daughter. We are so blessed.

And just for fun...here is a picture of my grandma with all her granddaughters at my cousin Beth's bridal shower.

We've been enjoying our fall and hope you have too.

Happy Halloween!

2012-11-02T16:20:00.002-05:00

Happy Halloween from our little bunny!

My mom made this costume for my oldest sister when she was little and (almost) every baby in the fam has worn it since. Who knew that this little costume would get so much use! Here is my sister's post of her oldest wearing the same costume when she was little plus Linnea when she was little...(click here)

Complete with little tail

Linnea and I took our girls to go visit our grandparents at Covenant Village. Here was the crew.

Plenty of room to crawl around!

Grandpa wore this sweatshirt to celebrate Halloween (his name is Raymond)

An angel and a queen

A very cute little zebra

Lucia and Naomi are really starting to play together now that Lucia can get herself around

Lucia changed into a warmer kitty costume for trick-or-treating

Complete with tail

The trick-or-treating crew

The cousins minus Addison who was sick :(

Well, we tried to get a pic of her by the pumpkin but she just kept trying to grab it. Oh well! It's fun that we have Lucia's cousins to tag along with since she couldn't care less about Halloween yet. She sure looked cute though.

Dedication

2012-10-25T18:13:00.000-05:00

Our little Lucia Gloria was dedicated to God at our church on October 14, 2012

We promised as Lucia's parents to show her God's love, demonstrating what it means to trust and follow Jesus and with the help of our family, friends, church community and God's grace, we will try our best to do so. Our hope is that she will someday understand Jesus' love for her and she will decide to be baptized as a symbol of new life and her decision to follow Him. Hopefully it'll go something like this...

"Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. " Ephesians 3:17-18

And, you know, this part will take awhile to really grasp, like, the whole rest of her life. But we'll be there to help however we can (and maybe she will even help us grasp it as well).

Here she was when we were waiting to go up in front

The Johnson family. And, incidentally, this is also an accidental picture of four generations of women on my side (my grandma to my left, me, Lucia and my mom on the right). Too bad everyone wasn't looking.

She did great up front and entertained the crowd.

Then things went a little downhill when she wanted to grab everything in her sight so Pete asked me to hold the book while he tried to keep her away from his mic.

Presenting Lucia to the congregation. One of my favorite moments (not pictured) was when our family came up to lay hands on us and Lucia, covering her in prayer.

It was a special day. It made me think about my own baptism, done in that very same spot when I was a baby by Pastor Art Nelson, who happened to be preaching the Sunday Lucia was dedicated. And a very good sermon it was. The text and sermon focused on the rich, young ruler who was unable to cast off everything and follow Jesus. I pray that we parent Lucia in a way that she has the least possible to cast off when the time comes for her to decide to follow Jesus; that we will be a help and not a hindrance to her loving Jesus. But we know that we will fail in one way or another since we are human so I also pray that God will help us out on that end too (you know, being able to apologize when we're wrong and admitting to our own faults).

And to make it even more special, grandma Debbie was in town to celebrate with us. Somehow this is the only picture I took from the whole week but it was a great week having her here.

Now she's got to get busy writing some thank you notes!

Thanks for taking the pics, Greta!

Lucia lately (7 months)

2012-10-14T22:55:00.000-05:00

Lucia is a little over 7 months now and changing each day right before our very eyes. She can get herself up and down from sitting, she's crawling and starting to become more and more interested in things up high and out of her reach so it's only a matter of time before she's standing as well.

She loves to move around, kick her legs and make noises. She still loves to find the tags on all her toys and she continues to sleep holding onto a sock every night and every nap. She seems to enjoy sleeping and keeps a pretty regular schedule these days. And lucky for us, her eating habits have gotten a lot less messy. She is starting to get more interactive with others, especially her cousins, squealing and kicking when she sees any of them.

Here are a few pics of things she likes to do these days...

She loves her exersaucer

Showing off her skills

She also got sick for the first time a few weeks ago. She just looked so sad :(

I love this face she does

One of our favorite little things she does is tilt her head to the side. This picture kind of captures it. It's one of those things that seems so little to others but to Matt and I it's easily THE cutest thing we have ever laid eyes upon, like ever.

Oh man, she loves riding in shopping carts. She pretty much looks like this the whole time while making eye contact with every single person we go past and kicking her legs.

And she loves hanging out in the Johnny Jump-up

We've been going to the park down the street from us a lot lately. She loves the swings but I think she likes watching the other kids at the park even more.

It is so fun to watch her grow!

Our New Place

2012-09-18T15:51:00.001-05:00

We moved to a new place almost 3 months ago so I figure it's time to post some pics. Above is our street; I love all the trees!

Moving day went well. All the furniture and boxes were lovingly schlepped down 3 flights of stairs then up 3 more flights in 100 degree plus heat. Phew, we have some great family and friends! We loved our old place for many reasons: it was a fun spot, walking distance to tons of great stuff plus there was a man across the courtyard who played beautiful piano music and it wafted in through the windows all day. It was fitting that as I packed up the last of our things, Lucia took a nap to the music of the 'piano man' one last time.

There are a lot of positives about the new apartment...we have more space, Lucia gets her own room and we have a dishwasher, finally! We love living in Evanston. It's neighborhoody with a city feel. There are lots of parks, it's close to the lake plus on the walk to the grocery store you pass 2 antique shops, perfect! Taking a walk the other day, I realized that this is my most favorite place we have lived so far. And that is saying something since we have lived 6 different places in the 6 years we've been married.

If you know me well, then you know I like to arrange things in a particular way and I keep rearranging until I get them just right. This means that some things in our place have moved around even since I took these pictures. There are more projects planned but I'm getting there :) Here's a peak...

Our street with our building on the left. What's that I see? Ooh, parking spots right in front! Definitely an improvement on the last parking situation.

Our building

Welcome to 3W

It was obviously meant to be...check out our front door key :)

(Unless you read it as "Panic, Johnsons"

And now a little tour...here's the entry way

Into the kitchen (and the backdoor)

Kitchen

Table from my grandma and grandpa's house

Dining room

Looking back into the kitchen from the dining room

Looking from the dining room into the living room. These two rooms are basically the same layout in our new place as in our old....just a little more spacious.

Living room

Our little office area. (Does the desk look familiar, Julie?)

Lucia's room

Our room looking down the hall into Lucia's room. Plus the bathroom is in that hall but it's kind of boring right now. I've got some ideas for it though...

Our room

One of my favorite things about our room are the windows and all the light that floods in. I'm pretty sure I gasped when I first saw it.

Love waking up to this!

Our building

This is the playground/park just one block away

And the lake path is about a 15 minute walk

There are a ton of beautiful, old churches all around Evanston. This one is down the block from us. And in it's backyard of this church is another beautiful church. I noticed that the parish houses for the two churches neighbor each other.

And two blocks away is this lovely rose garden/park.

And here is Lucia waking up in her own room for the first time. Apparently it was tough on her since she seems to have bags under eyes (didn't know that was possible for a baby). And to bring it full circle, Lucia now falls asleep to the sounds of a flautist practicing across the courtyard instead of piano.

So there it is...come visit us! Seeing all these pictures makes me think the walls look bare, time to get to work on some those projects...

Lucia Lately (6 months)

2012-09-08T21:23:00.000-05:00

Lucia is now 6 months old as of this week, crazy! It is so fun to watch her grow and learn new things and I love to see her personality emerge. She has developed so much in the last month. It seems like once she masters one new skill she quickly starts practicing the next one. Some new things include: sitting on her own, eating solid foods, sleeping longer and scooting/early stages of crawling. She loves to smile, laugh and make new noises and those new noises really make us laugh. Here are some pics from the last month or so...

She is still pretty good at taking naps all sorts of places. This surely won't last long though.

With her cousin, Gwen

Naomi and Lucia

And some more cousin time

With me at my grandma and grandpa's 85th birthday party

Before she was sitting on her own, she liked to sit like this

Her first time eating rice cereal...pretty neutral

And her first time eating fruit...the quintessential funny face pictures

Lucia is a great eater. She loves it so much that she usually whines with desperation for each bite til it's gone. She is also the messiest eater, ever. I suppose it's because she eats like in the above picture...both hands involved in each bite. It ends with food smeared across her face, dripping off her fingers and elbows and spilling on the floor. And if you think that you would be the one to be able to feed her without the mess, good luck, because many have tried and all have failed.

Hanging at Lake Michigan

And she's out

Speaking of cute sleeping pictures...

In mor mor and grandpa's backyard

Sitting up on her own!

Sleepover with all of her cousins!

Taking in all the new things at the zoo

And lastly, a few smiley pictures of her in her crib today

Lucia, meet Washington

2012-08-30T21:43:00.000-05:00

At the corner of Olympia and Washington in Olympia, Washington

We had a great time in Washington a few weeks ago. There were a lot of firsts for Lucia...first time on a plane, first time at grandpa Mark's and grandma Debbie's house and first time meeting her Washington family. Oh, and first time on a golf course. It was great to have some time to relax with family and enjoy Washington in the summer. And Lucia did great especially considering that she met and was held by about 50 different people in 5 days.

On the first morning there. We hadn't felt 65 degrees in what seemed like an eternity so we were pretty excited about that.

We spent some quality time with the Anderson side of the family.

The Anderson siblings.

Grandma Debbie holding Lucia by 'Lucia's garden'

And Becca and Justin will be next with the arrival of their son Beau coming up in just a few months!

And here were the two best dressed in the Anderson Open. (Can you tell the theme was plaid?) But Mark took the cake since he actually wore his outfit on the golf course.

Then we enjoyed some time with the Johnson side of the family. I like this picture because great-grandma Marilyn and Lucia's eyes look so similar!

Downtown Olympia

A park not far from downtown Olympia

We took a walk on a path at this park and didn't realize there would be stairs so Matt and Mark ended up working a little harder than they thought.

Lucia loved it and squealed with delight.

It wouldn't be complete without a little time with Nate and Emily. It was great to see them, as always. And we wished we had more time with them, as always.

And Lucia liked them too...

Lastly, Lucia got to meet lots of friends and some future playmates:)

She couldn't leave without showing off her fake little cough noise that she just loves to do. Thanks Mark and Debbie for hosting us! It was a great trip and great to see everyone!

Blue-Rasp-Straw Berry and Rhubarb Muffins

2012-08-05T22:35:00.000-05:00

I don't bake much. I prefer the 'taste-as-you-go' cooking thing rather than the 'exact-measurements-only' baking thing. That being said, these were my most favorite thing that I have ever baked. I will definitely make them again.

The Recipe: adapted from here

2 cups flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 cup sugar
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 1/4 cups sour cream
6 oz. (1 1/2 cups) berries (I used a cup blueberries, 1/4 cup raspberries and a few tablespoons of strawberry/rhubarb jam).

The Method:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray 12-cup muffin tin (or 2 12-cup mini muffin tins) with vegetable oil spray.
Whisk flour, baking powder and salt in medium bowl until combined.
Whisk egg in second medium bowl about 20 seconds.
Add sugar and whisk vigorously until thick, about 30 seconds.
Add melted butter in 2 or 3 steps, whisking to combine after each addition.
Add sour cream in 2 steps, whisking until just combined.
Add berries to dry ingredients and gently toss to combine (don't add jam yet if you are using).
Add dry ingredients to sour cream mixture and carefully fold with rubber spatula until batter comes together and berries are evenly distributed, 25-30 seconds (small spots of flour will remain and batter will be thick). Swirl in jam if using. Do not overmix.
Divide batter evenly between muffin cups. (I made mini muffins and baked for less time.) If you want, sprinkle sugar over muffins as a topping.
Bake until muffins are golden brown and toothpick inserted in center of muffin comes out with few crumbs attached, 25-30 minutes, rotating tin halfway through baking.
Invert muffins onto wire rack, stand muffins upright and let cool for 5 minutes.

Chicken Tacos

2012-08-04T10:59:00.001-05:00

These are really good! It's all about the sauce made from an interesting combo of ingredients that I wouldn't think to put together like OJ, chipotle peppers, cilantro and mustard. I saw this recipe on America's Test Kitchen (I love PBS cooking shows!) but I'm too cheap to subscribe to the website to get the recipe so I googled it and found it from some random blog. And now I just need to write it down myself so I don't forget it. I mean, that's actually the point of me writing out all these recipes...I tend to make something once, love it, then forget about it unless I record it in some way. Anyway...

The Recipe:

3 tablespoons butter
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, minced
1/2 cup orange juice
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
3/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
1 1/2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken breasts or tenders
1 teaspoon yellow mustard
salt and pepper to taste
12, 6-inch flour tortillas

For serving: grated cheese, shredded lettuce (I used spinach), chopped tomato, diced avocado, sour cream

The Method: 

Melt butter in large skillet over medium high heat. Add garlic and chipotle peppers and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Stir in orange juice, Worcestershire sauce and 1/2 cup of the cilantro. Bring to a boil.
Add chicken and simmer, covered, over medium-low heat until chicken is cooked through and registers 160 degrees, about 10-15 minutes, flipping chicken half-way through cooking.
Remove chicken from sauce mixture, transfer to a plate and set side, tenting with foil.
Increase heat to medium-high and cook until sauce is reduced to about 1/4 cup, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and whisk in mustard.
Using 2 forks, shred chicken into bite-sized pieces.
Return chicken to the sauce. Toss with remaining cilantro and toss until well-combined. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve in tortillas with desired toppings.

The Rest of June, Last Year of Afterglow, Plus Lucia Lately (at 4 1/2 Months)

2012-07-26T14:01:00.000-05:00

What a summer so far! We moved a few weeks ago from Lakeview East in Chicago to Evanston (more on that in a different post) and now have internet again so I will attempt to sum up our last few months. We have been busy in a good way and this summer is flying by our very eyes leaving us to wonder how it is almost August already! It has been a very hot here in Chicago with several days reaching 100 degrees (one of those days being our moving day). Needless to say, our little window AC units have been hard at work keeping us cool up on the 3rd floor (big shout out to Jaime and the Baileys for giving us those window units!).

Meanwhile, Lucia is about 4 and 1/2 months old now. She is growing and changing but I don't know by exactly how much since we haven't been to the doctor in a while (next week). She can now sit up with help, roll over both ways and loves to play with toys and in her bumbo seat. She is on a pretty set schedule during the day now and sleeps from about 8 PM til around 6 AM most nights. I remember when she was about 2 weeks old and I was wondering, "Will I ever live a normal life again?!?" Well, I kind of feel like I am living a normal life again now that she sleeps pretty consistently through the night. My 'normal' may be a new normal now that I am a mom but it feels good.

Lucia spends most of her waking time grabbing, rolling, smiling, squealing and giggling. She likes to play by herself in her crib and when I come in the room to observe all the cute and sometimes very loud noises she is making, she gets startled and looks at me like "What are you doing in here? I was just fine in here by myself, thank you very much". We now have to clear the way for whatever is in Lucia's reach since she will grab everything in her path. Oh, and another fun development is that she can get her pacifier back in her mouth...if only she would do it more often though, it seems like she would rather throw it on the floor and cry til she gets it back. She is drooling a lot, spitting up less, making lots of funny noises including a pterodactyl-type-screeching sound and it seems like she is getting closer to eating real food (if you count rice cereal as real food). Fun times and I know it'll just keep getting more fun with this little girl!

Here are a bunch of pics of some of our activities...

Happy first Father's Day to Matt! He has so naturally stepped into his new role and Lucia could not ask for a better dad. We celebrated father's day plus my brother Eric's college graduation with my whole family (and I mean whole, like both sides of the extended family whole) by spending the day picnicking and playing at the beach. And then Matt went golfing too.

Debbie (Matt's mom) was in town again too to spend some more time with Lucia. It was great with lots of grandma time and many trips to Ann Sather, yum!

Both of my grandpas on father's day.

An inchworm riding a bike

Austin and Ashley came for a visit! We got to celebrate Ashley's birthday together and they got to meet Lucia.

Watching daddy's softball game

This park is down the block from the church where I work.

We have gone to Ravinia once so far this summer. For those of you who don't know, Ravinia is one of the greatest Chicago summer activities. Its an outdoor concert venue where everyone lounges around in the grass listening to the music/show and eating food and drinking wine. We went with family and some friends to "A Prairie Home Companion", an NPR radio show hosted by Garrison Keillor. It has been a family tradition the last few years and this was the last as he is retiring this year. There are few better feelings in the world than sitting at Ravinia on a perfect summer night. We'll be going again this weekend to hear James Taylor.

Look up!

To the right of the tree is Garrison himself. He mingled with the crowd to see some songs.

Lucia came too and she did great.

Passed out

Whoa, could her eyes be any more open?

So then she passed out for real and we were able to stay for some music featuring pianist Philip Glass.

Lounging on a Sunday afternoon with great grandpa Ray at Linnea and Cam's.

Lucia loves to sit in a highchair now to play with her toys.

And she still loves to hold a sock when she's going to sleep...apparently sometimes in her mouth!

Well, it was the end of an era in the Wallgren family...the last year of Afterglow. It is a lake resort in northern Wisconsin where we have been going every year since before I was born (plus my dad used to go when he was young with his siblings, parents and other families from church). Put simply, we have outgrown our cabins and the resort is in such high demand that there are no more cabins to rent. It is a good problem really, having a family that is healthy and growing rapidly. My mom figured out that when they started it was 4 couples with 2 children and now in that same space we have four couples, their 10 kids, 8 of their spouses/significant others and 7 of their kids! Whew, we made it stretch for a while and now we will try to create the same magic at Scott's Resort next year. It won't be the same but it'll be fun!

Playing in her bumbo seat.

Oh my, I love this one!

Playing with Gwen

Hanging with G G

Sonja entertaining the breakfast club crowd.

Swing time

Lucia is pretty neutral about water, as seen above. When she takes baths, she doesn't seem to mind it but she doesn't get too excited either. Maybe in the future that'll change.

Bags

Having some serious fun with daddy.

Linnea and her girls

The Baileys

and us

Sonja and her favorite guy, our cousin Chad

Happy 4th of July! We always go to a bigger fireworks show then sometimes do some of our own back at the cabin.

View of the lake from the cabin

One of the best activities on the lake...party island!

Funny Naomi face!

It was really hot this year so it was good to get some relief in the lake. Lucia liked floating too!

Goofy girl!

Sorry, Nolan, for having to endure Lucia's death grip!

Addison and Caroline

Some fun with the cabin-mates

And the big news this week was that my cousin Beth and Rob got engaged! He surprised her in the middle of the night by coming up and asking her to marry him. Here they are on the pier where it all went down the night before. We are so excited for them and Rob to officially join the family!

Scott and John. Brothers and fellow Tye-dye wearers.

Giggles in the morning!

I'm trying to make it look like Lucia is jumping off the high dive.

Our attempt to get a picture of all 6 of my parents grand kids...kind of worked

The happy couple with Lucia and their matching Afterglow shirts

Sonja, Gwen and Lucia

So long Afterglow, for now. I know it's not the last time going up there ever but it's sad none the less. Afterglow is something for me that has bridged the gap between childhood and adult life in a way that makes me feel more whole. It represents good to me..the kind of good that is untouchable and pure. We sat in the cabin this year thinking about the fact that we had been in the same cabin every year since we were in diapers, just like Lucia. In the end, the reason why it was such a good thing was because it was all about spending time with family. And I have a great one. It is because of this family time that I am so comfortable with my cousins that they feel more like siblings. And I am thankful to be genuinely friends with my cousins and siblings. They are in fact, some of my best friends. So if anything, being sad about Afterglow is something to be thankful for.

The picture above is from the last morning. I have this tradition of spending a few quiet moments by myself on the pier as everyone is packing up on the last morning. I just love to take in a few more moments of peace, quiet and beauty before the last bit of chaotic packing and bustling to get going. This year I took Lucia with me and we had one last moment there on the pier...plus a few tears.

We'll miss it but it's not like were not doing anything next year...here's to beginning new traditions at Scott's Resort (where we are taking over all the cabins)!

Lucia Lately (3 months)

2012-06-14T17:46:00.001-05:00

Lucia is 3 months as of last week. It has been fun to see all the little changes and development over this month. The last time we were at the doctor (about a week and a half ago now) she was 13 lbs 9 ounces so she continues to be about 90th percentile for weight and 75th percentile for height (seems like she'll be taller than me since I was below 5th percentile for a long time when I was a baby).

She is smiling and giggling, rolling over, grabbing toys and putting everything in her mouth. She has started more consistently to sleep through the night and has also started to really like her pacifier over the month. She likes to fall asleep holding onto something like a hand, her pjs or a sock but she has also perfected the art of wrapping her little fingers around her pacifier and yanking it out (that's when she gets one of her socks instead). One of our favorite times with her is first thing in the morning when she squeals with delight as we go to get her from her crib.

Here are some more pics from the month...

Having fun with her dad

And her uncle Jeff

She loves to go for walks in the moby wrap and look around at the trees and surroundings. Now that she is bigger she has graduated to this legs-through way.

Now that she can roll over she has started to sleep on her stomach sometimes.

Me and my grandma decided that blue is her color.

This is her other favorite way to sleep these days.

Here is a little series I call "Lucia at Night". It all started when I was putting the stroller away in our storage unit and saw Lucia smiling and giggling away to herself. (Don't worry, she was never actually by herself.) I just thought it was funny to see this happy little baby in this dark, dingy space (I have a weird sense of humor). So obviously I had to take some pics...

We had a great visit this month from Matt's brother, Jeff.

And my brother Eric graduated from college and is living in Chicago now. I guess Naomi really missed him, she wouldn't let go of him!

It was also my birthday last week. We celebrated with some good Indian food.

And took over Moody's pub with the fam. Moody's is such a great summer spot. It was here last year that I announced to my family that I was pregnant (via the game "Telephone" so that Gwen and Sonja wouldn't find out yet).

Naomi was really enjoying her moody burger.

Simple Egg Dish

2012-06-14T17:44:00.000-05:00

I have been tweaking this basic egg casserole recipe so now I need to write it down before I forget it! We always seem to end up with lots of eggs and this is a great way to use them up (breakfast for dinner, anyone?). And very versatile, I just use whatever veggies I happen to have...there is an endless list of good combos. Oh, and that beautiful pink jam is my homemade rhubarb-strawberry jam, yum! (recipe found here).

Recipe:

8 eggs
1/3 cup half and half (plus a splash of milk for good measure)
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups sharp cheddar cheese
veggies/meat (this time I used bacon, red pepper, onion and mushrooms)

Method: 

Whisk eggs, add half and half (and milk). Add salt and most of the cheese, set aside.
Bake bacon (my method: place bacon on foil-lined baking sheet. The baking sheet needs edges to catch the grease. Place in cold oven, turn oven to 400. Check after 20 minutes but keep on baking till desired crispyness.) Allow to cool.
Saute onion, red pepper and mushrooms in olive oil for a few minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Allow to cool.
Add bacon and veggies to the bottom of a buttered casserole dish, spreading evenly. Pour egg mixture over veggies and top with the rest of the cheese.
Bake at 425 for 20-25 minutes or until top is browned.