Welcome to my blog!

Thank you for taking the time to stop by and visit! We hope to share with you our journey of raising a child with Achondroplasia, the most common type of dwarfism. If this is your first time here, please start by reading Caitlyn's Story. It will share the beginning of her life with you. Enjoy!

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Recipe of the Week

Mediterranean Chicken Pitas

There is no set amount of ingredients for this recipes - it just depends on how much you like each of them and how many you are serving. I'll put off to the side what we use and you can adjust for your family size

Tzatziki sauce (found in local grocery stores)
Diced Cucumbers (about 1/4 cucumber)
Diced Tomatoes (1 small roma tomato)
Diced Red Bell Peppers (1/2 red bell pepper)
Dices Avocado (1/2 avocado)
Diced Chicken, seasoned with a little salt and pepper (7 chicken tenderloins)
Caesar Salad Dressing (enough to coat chicken) (1/4 c)
Pita Pockets

Cook the diced chicken to about 80% done, add Caesar salad dressing and heat until the chicken is cooked through. When chicken is finished cooking, microwave pita pockets (so they are more pliable). Spread Tzatziki sauce on insides of pita, fill with ingredients. Enjoy.

With each of the chopped veggies, I put them into small bowls, which allows the one eating to use the veggies they want.

Let me know if you try them and what you think.

Saturday, February 21, 2009

Thank You Katie!

Patterned Text Generator at TextSpace.net

Introducing my new layout, done by our one and only Katie Johnson! Thank you so much for making over my blog for me. I LOVE IT!!


Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Calling All Recipes

I commented on one of Catie's Facebook status's about how her Chicken Parmesan she was making for dinner sounded really YUMMY and thought that it would be a great idea to share some recipes. I seem to make the same things over and over again - mainly because we like them, the ingredients fit into our budget (no crazy expensive meals on a teachers salary) and they are pretty simple recipes. I'm asking for all of you that follow my blog to post your own blog with a favorite recipe of yours. I'm going to try and post one recipe a week - we'll see how far I can get with the meals that we make.

So my first post is going to be easy - it's a Rachael Ray recipe called "Yakitori Noodle Bowls" and it was really good. A few changes/additions to the recipe - instead of Sherry, I used Chicken Broth - and we added carrots and red bell peppers in when the chicken was almost finished cooking through - thought that it needed a few more veggies than just scallions. We also omitted the sesame seeds at the end, mainly because we didn't have any on hand.

Here's a link to the recipe on her site - YAKITORI NOODLE BOWLS

Let me know if you make it and what you think!

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Happy Hearts Day


If everyone had friends like you...
What a happy world this would be!

Sending you a Hug for Valentine's day...
and for every other day too...

because you're special to me!

Happy Valentine's Day

Caty singing her Valentine's Day songs she learned at preschool


Caty and Nana at the LPA Valentine's Party
Our Little Valentine

Friday, February 6, 2009

Random things

I know I've been slacking in the blogging department; it's just that we haven't done anything REALLY exciting lately.

Towards the end of January we had some really nice weather, so Caty and I took a walk over to the nearby park and spent some time playing in the sunshine.


Caty and I headed to my parents for Superbowl weekend as Scott was going to have a guys day on Sunday watching the game. On Saturday I invited some good friends from my high school days over for a brunch. I am so thankful that we have stayed in touch over the past 14/almost 15 years. One of my friends, Dan, works for a company called StreetStrider. They make and sell vehicles that are completely powered by the rider. It's similar to an elliptical machine you would find in a gym, however this one isn't stationary. Dan brought a couple bikes with him and a few brave ones, including my mom, tried them out. My excuse for not trying it out was "I'm pregnant." For those of you that have been pregnant, you know how your balance can be off. While riding a StreetStrider, you manuever it, making the turns yourself. Although I would have trusted Dan to catch me, I didn't trust myself and my balance. So Caty took a turn instead of me. Dan swooped her up and down the street they went. When they came back around, she had a HUGE smile on her face, so I know that she had fun. If you've been to my parents, you know how narrow and curvy the street is. Dan even rode the bike down the driveway, which is REALLY STEEP!! After some time on the street, we headed to the backyard, where a few more tried the bikes out, then we took a few pictures.

Also during the weekend, we made a trip to the local mall, as I needed some new maternity clothes - YIPPEE for shopping with mom! Instead of driving over, we took the train and Caty loved it! Before the train picked us up, we made a quick visit by the closest Starbucks, where we met up with a friend of mine, whom I hadn't seen since probably 5th grade! I found her several months back on Facebook and it was great seeing Jenny and her son Brody. I should have gotten a picture with them, but we didn't have a whole lot of time, since we were catching the train. Hopefully we'll be able to get together when we're back down there.


Then Sunday afternoon, Caty helped my dad plant some strawberry plants that we're gonna transplant to our house once they've grown a little, to add some nice ground cover under some trees that we have in the front yard. Unfortunately these strawberry plants are just ornamental (if that's the right term) - they don't actually produce strawberrys - BUMMER!


And onto the pregnancy - things are well. I'm actually starting to look pregnant. If you didn't see my previous post about this pregnancy - we're having a girl. She is quite active; I'm not looking forward to another month or so down the road, when I'll really start feeling her kicking and poking. It will be exciting, but on the other hand, is she going to keep me awake at night? I'm almost 5 1/2 months and I can't believe how quickly it's gone. While home at my parents, I sorted through baby clothes. When Caty has outgrown clothes, we box them in those big plastic tubs and when the tubs are full, my parents are nice enough to house them in their attic. Well, they currently have 6 plastics tubs at their house! Sorry Mike and Cherylle, these tubs are of clothes that we didn't have to alter! With my brother and sister in law having their baby girl (Riley) just 5 weeks before us, I sorted out the clothes between us. Okay, so I kept 75% of the clothes. Erin had told me that they didn't need that much stuff, as she was sure they would get a bunch of clothes at their baby showers, which everyone knows that with your first baby, you get a TON!! So we'll be coming home with 4 boxes and they get 2. Our daughter will be well clothed for the first 2+ years.

Some of your have asked for a pregnancy picture, so here you go. This was taken this morning.

I think that that's enough random things for tonight!