Rudolph

Picture says it all... This little dude cracks us up!!

Virtual Visit

Today, I would like to give you a little sneak peak into our apartment! Here are some overview pictures. There are so many things I would like to zoom-in on, but this will give you an idea of the layout for now.  Please excuse all of the toys :)

The front door would actually be to the left of this photo.
This photo is taken with me standing in the entrance to the bathroom.

This photo was taken with me standing in the living room,
looking back into the kitchen.

This is Christopher's reading nook.  The far right of this picture leads into our bedroom.
The wall opposite has our couch.

Here is opposite the tv. To the left of the clock is the entrance to our bedroom.
The far right of this photo (near the lamp) is the door to the nursery.

Open doorway into the den, which we use as our bedroom.
We usually keep a baby gate here to keep little man out of mischief!

Our apartment is a 1BR+den.  The den is a small room off of the living room with two closets, just big enough for a queen bed and two small nightstands.  While this would have made an ideal nursery, it does not have a door.  Since we always try to keep it as quiet as possible while little man sleeps, we decided to put the nursery in the large bed room (because it has a door).  This has worked out great as he doesn't wake up until 7:30 each morning (he sleeps through my Mr. getting in the shower, making coffee, etc).

Looking into the den/bedroom from the living room.
From this angle, there is a window to the right of the bed and the closets are on the left side. 

We keep our clothes in the large walk-in closet in the nursery.  The two closets in the den, we have turned into his and her offices.  We put two tables from Ikea, chairs, lamps. It is a bit cluttered in there now. I hope to be able to better organize this space.

His & Her "closet offices." Our tv is mounted up above them.

I will try to take some more photos to include the nursery and bathroom (which I'm sure you're dying to see!) ... but that is another post for another day!  I hope you enjoyed 'visiting' our home today! 

Spoiler Alert!

One of little man's Christmas presents arrived in the mail today and I just HAVE to share it with you guys!! It is a Beatrix little kid backpack. I think it is just adorable!! I have no doubt little man will love dragging this around the kitchen island and putting things in, taking things out! Only 19 more days! I better wrap it and put it under the tree before he wakes up!

The Tree is Up!

Over the weekend we put up our Christmas tree!! Little man liked to help by dragging parts of the tree around the kitchen. Doesn't it look like he chopped down the pine himself?!

Setting up the tree

Decorating with Dad

Merry Christmas! 

Skyping

Last night we skyped with Gram Min and Gramp Kenny. Little man insisted on holding the iPad himself. He has been very independent lately!

Tony's Chex Mix

I've finally cracked the code! And like most things, it was under my nose the whole time. What am I talking about?? Ok, let me back up a little.

It all started last year at a Christmas party in Louisiana. Like any polite party-goer, I grabbed a handful of the host's Chex mix as we were chatting in her kitchen. Then... "Ohmygosh! What's in this?! It's amazing!" She looked at me like I was crazy. "It's the recipe from the back of the box," she calmly replies. But I know better. I've made the recipe from the back of the box hundreds, if not thousands, of times, and this mix has a kick. I'm thinking she must have added a few splashes of hot sauce, or wing sauce...or maybe it's a secret Cajun recipe that can't be shared. Whatever the case, I decide I MUST recreate this party mix.

After much googling and several failed batches later, I still can't crack the code. But then, in the middle of the night it occurs to me and it's obvious how she made it. She used the recipe from the back of the box! I just had to think like an LSU fan instead of a buckeye. In LA "seasoned salt" isn't Lawrys. It's Tonys! Duh.

I'm not even sure if you can buy Tony Chachere's in Ohio, so for those of you who don't know, it's slightly spicy seasoned salt (maybe seasoned salt with paprika or chili powder??) I'm not exactly sure what you're supposed to put it on, but in LA you put it on anything and everything (a lot of restaurants have it out on the table, at work it was on top of the community microwave, you get the idea). It's basically hot sauce in a salt shaker. Well, I made a batch of Chex Mix using Tony's instead of Lawrys and Voila! It was the missing piece of the puzzle!! It's not melt-your-face-off hot, just perfectly delicious!!

Yum!

Tony's Chex Mix

1 stick of melted butter

2 T. Worcestershire 

1/2 tsp onion powder

3/4 tsp garlic powder

1 1/2 tsp Tony's Chachere's

Mix the above and pour over 12 c. Cereal, pretzels, nuts, goldfish, etc. 

Pour into two 9 x 13 pans. 

Bake at 250 for 1 hr stirring every 15 minutes. Let cool on paper towels. 

Rear View Mirror

I was looking through the photos on our iPad and noticed a bunch of them were taken by little man on our Thanksgiving drive. Apparently, while he was playing on the iPad in the back seat, he snapped a few photos! Most of them were of the car ceiling and were blurry, but this one actually turned out pretty good!