Mining for gold

  Last weekend we went mining for gold up on the mountain a few miles from out house. They have a great playground up at the State Park that we go to and have always wanted to visit their "living museum" of the gold rush days. But its $10/person and for a 1 year old I just couldnt justify it, luckily they had a free weekend so we went! The weather was beautiful and Char loved it!

  Its basically a collection of cabins all staged to look like they would have in the early 1800s complete with a barn of animals (C's favorite part of course). They give each kid a sachet to collect their treasures in and have "gold" hidden all around. She wasnt super into collecting the gold but loved the kitchen, barn of animals and running up and down the ramp :)

xoxo
Ashlea

Photo Dump

ball pit fun at a local fundraising night event

stroller rides with best friends

acorn hunting

climbing into the sand table and thinking its HYSTERICAL

fall decorating!!!

flying to VA for baby showers :)

activities to keep an active 15 month old from losing her mind on the plane

lots of activities

lots and lots of activities

my nephew and glowing Mama

starting to try for baby #2!

bath time preciousness

park walks

sensory buckets

helping Mama "ook" (cook)

having really funny phone convos

working on those spoon skills

xoxo
Ashlea

Family Date Night

  Every Friday we either get take-out or go out to eat, Mama needs a break from cooking and dishes and yea! we made it through another week. Sometimes we make a whole evening out of it and have a family date night. This past week that exactly what we did. The original plan was to take blankets and chairs to the free concert series that happens every Friday down at the local arts center and grab some yummy unique sandwiches from Happy Tummy but unfortunately those plans got rained out :(

Luckily the concert series runs through November so we will try again another day. So we switched to plan B, mall date. As a rule I dont like malls, I dont like most of the stores, its all indoors and superficial feeling and its always crawling with silly tweens. But we had a great evening of visiting the toy store for Charlotte, Pottery Barn for Mama and As Seen On TV for Daddy. We ate at the food court and played at the kids play place after. It was an evening of not really mattering where you are but who you are with :)

please excuse the messy hair, runny nose and open mouth of food :0

play place fun

rocking out so a sweet muszack version of bailamos

washing off the mall germies ;)

xoxo
Ashlea

Funny Faces

Char's sense of humor is developing and as of late her favorite way to get a laugh is to make a funny face - Ive captured some of these beauties on camera, enjoy :)

xoxo
Ashlea

My girl started school

and by school I mean a sweet little church nursery mothers-day-out program once a week from 9-1. But it feels like a giant step toward independence and her not needing me every second. Up until now the only times I have left her is for a few hours with Tony or close friends and family.

 I was super duper prepared, new outfit (that she picked out in Target herself because its covered in tats! thats cats for those of you not fluent in toddler)- check, new sneakers- check, awesome new stainless steel bento box for yummy lunches- check, monogrammed pink seer sucker back pack- check and of course our favorite Stella doll washed and pretty- check. But even with all that the what ifs still were there. The first day was excited and terrifying - what if she was scared? confused? hungry? cold? what if another kid hurt her? what if she hurt another kid? Deeeeeeep breath.

I love her teachers and trust that they will comfort and cuddle my scared confused girl, feed her, put a sweater on her and guide her socially with love and patience. I repeated this to myself through tears as a drove away. Drop off was HARD, she cried and death gripped my neck as much as I wanted to stay, the teacher in me knows its like a band-aid, just rip it off and go Mom. The longer Mom stays the more the child cries and the harder it is on everyone. So with a smile and "I love you sooooo much" I walked out. Then I got to the car and cried like a baby.

this is what I got when I tried to get her to wear the backpack - classic

I pulled myself together and went to yoga, cleaned a bit and worked on my birth class certification stuff. I felt productive and peaceful. I think this will be good for my mental state ;) But you bet I was at those doors 10 minutes early waiting with open arms to grab C and get her home. Her teachers said she had a great day, loved the play ground and danced during music time. Im sure one day the drop offs will be easier and maybe one day she wont even want to hug and kiss me by, and when that day comes Ill come read this post and remember my tiny sweet girl and her first days of school. <3

sweet exhausted pre-nap snuggles <3

xoxo
Ashlea

favorite meals lately

 Although we have our standbys for meals I also love trying out new recipes and ideas. Here are a few of our favorites lately....

* "spaghetti" and meatballs - we eat whole grains but I try to keep it to a minimum as they arent very nutritionally dense and they are one of the harder things to digest. So one of my favorite and easy substitutions it spaghetti noodles for spaghetti squash noodles. Cut the spaghetti squash in half, clean out the "guts" and roast in an oven insides up rubbed with a little EVOO for about an hour at 375. I follow this recipe for meatballs and for a sauce I either make a super simple tomato sauce or use a jarred brand from Costco which is awesome because its organic and has no weird or chemical ingredients.

* zucchini cakes - this is the perfect side for just about any meal. I had a friend give me 5 giant zucchinis from her garden the other day because she has more than she could use so I came up with a way to use them other than the old stand by of sautee with salt and pepper :) I grated the zucchini, added one egg, and about 2 tablespoons of goat cheese (we love our local farms Tuscan flavor which has Italian herbs and sun dried tomatoes) if you want to switch it up you could use a different cheese or skip it all together and use your favorite spice blend. I mixed in whole wheat flour until I could form patties then cooked them on the griddle until done - totally Charlottes new favorite thing!

* yogurt, chia seeds and peaches - peaches are overflowing down here so I came up with a yummy breakfast/snack to use them up. 1 cup plain whole milk yogurt, 1 T chia seeds and 1 diced peach. Mix yogurt and chia seeds, let sit in the fridge for a few hours or overnight until thickened and top with peaches - yum!!!

Hope you try one of these out and enjoy!

xoxo
Ashlea

Summer hiatus

    I unintentionally took a bit of a summer hiatus. We just got so busy with traveling, out-of-town guests and typical summer fun that blogging took a back seat. Even though its still summer, I feel the energy shifting to the structure of back to school (Huntsville went back this week), the readiness for cooler temperatures and all amazing things Autumn, good bye to staying up late, grilling out and long afternoons at the pool with friends, so with that IM BACK :)

   I managed to capture random pictures from our adventures over the last couple of months......

BEACH! We had the most perfect weather, Charlotte loved it and was so well behaved. In true Charlie fashion I set her down on the sand turned to get our our blankets and by the time I had turned back around she was running, arms wide open, giggling right into the waves - cue heart attack and visions of her being swept away by the undercurrent. We had so much fun and  I cant wait to go back next summer :)

LAKE HOUSE - (almost) All the family came down and spent some time in Huntsville and for a long weekend we rented a lake house. The weather gods were not on our side like at the beach but thankfully we rented the best house ever, so cute and clean, a beautiful covered back porch with a bar, plenty of space and it even came with a very friendly neighbor dog! So we made the best of it :)

   LOCAL FUN - we have also been busy doing things around town like library story time on rainy days, cat-sitting, playing dress up, walks, farmers markets, cook outs with dear friends, play dates and lots and lots of playground time!

So thats our summer in a nutshell - oh and Mama got to go to a Bachelorette party out of town for 4 days, leaving my girl was super hard but she had a blast with the best DaDa in the world and all of our sweet friends stepping in to help take care of her :) She starts nursery school on Wednesdays this week, gymnastics and music start again soon and before you know it it the summer will be gone and we will be into Fall and Winter. Which I am super excited about because there are a million fun Fall things I cant wait to do with the girl, I will be an Aunt in October!, C will sort of get the holidays this year and I get to be an honorary Aunt again in January - good stuff :)

xoxo
Ashlea