Christmas Time at the Cabin

Ben at 6 Weeks Old

Merry Christmas

Charlie is very excited about Christmas, Christmas trees, and Santa this year. On the night we decorated our tree he told us it made him so happy. "Now I know Christmas is near." Charlie is really excited about Santa now that Christmas is just around the corner. He has drawn pictures for Santa, reserved candy canes on our tree for him, and made gingerbread cookies with LOTS of sprinkles. (Sam ATE lots of sprinkles.)

Charlie was so excited to meet Santa this year. We went to see the downtown Macy's display, which was great, and visited Santa afterwards. Charlie went right up onto Santa's lap and Sam just stared. He did get on his lap for a quick photo. Charlie gave Santa a hug goodbye. I wanted to give him a hug when we left for being so sweet and gentle with all of my boys!

P.S. Doesn't Charlie look old in this photo...where has my toddler gone?

Merry Christmas to all of our friends out in blogosphere....we hope you have a wonderful holiday.

Halloween at Christmas....?

Sam loves his sheep costume. Everyone said he stole the show. He was very cute!

We had our Christmas program today at church. This year the shepherds had a flock of animals. There was a bat, sheep, giraffe, zebra, and mouse. It was a cute show!

Charlie showing off his costume. He loves dressing in animal costumes lately!

A trip to the zoo

When Chris asked about the zoo all Sam could talk about was fish. Both boys love the coral reef tank.

Sleepy Heads

Ben and Papa time...

Our Favorite Sugar Cookies

PERFECT VEGAN SUGAR COOKIE RECIPE This makes about 36 cookies.

1 cup Earth's Best "butter"
3 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup white sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 whole egg replacements (Ener-G)
1/4 cup tofu cream cheese (Tofutti)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Directions:
1.
In a large bowl, cream together the margarine and sugar. Stir in the egg replacements and vanilla. Gradually add the flour, baking powder and tofu cream cheese. You may have to use your hands at this point to finish the mixing. Form the dough into a long loaf and wrap in cellophane. Refrigerate for a couple hours.
2.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease the cookie sheets or use a non-stick foil.
3.
On a lightly floured surface (we taped down a sheet of non-stick foil to our counter top instead), roll out the dough to 1/4 inch thickness. Cut into desired shapes with cookie cutters. Place about 1 inch apart cookie on sheets.
4.
Bake for 12 to 14 minutes in the preheated oven, until bottoms and edges just start to get light brown. Remove from baking sheet and cool on wire racks. Store in an airtight container.

PERFECT VEGAN ICING RECIPE Each batch is enough to easily coat 24 cookies.
2 cups confectioners' sugar
1/2 teaspoon of almond extract
6-8 teaspoons of soy milk (Silk Vanilla)
Assorted food coloring
4 teaspoons of light corn syrup
Directions:
1.
In medium bowl, stir together confectioners' sugar and soy milk until smooth. Beat in corn syrup and almond extract until icing is smooth and glossy. If icing is too thick, add more corn syrup.
2.
Add food coloring to desired intensity. Dip cookies and allow to dry overnight.

We made these cookies last year at Christmas and Charlie loved making them....you can see pictures on the 2007 blog posts.

Our Favorite Pumpkin Cookies

Vegan Pumpkin Cookies

2 C flour
1 1/3 C Oats
1 t Soda
3/4 t Salt
1 t Cinnamon
1/2 t Nutmeg
1 2/3 C Sugar
2/3 C Canola Oil
2 T Molasses
1 C Pumpkin puree
1 t Vanilla
1 T Flax

Preheat 350 degrees. Cook about 16 minutes. I mix in order of ingredients. I'm not very careful and they always turn out. These freeze great. The dough is slightly sticky but they still turn out.

Enjoy....the dough and cookies since there isn't any egg to worry about.

Getting Chunky

Charlie and Sam were convinced Benjamin would enjoy playing with toys. They spent Friday playing with baby toys and waiting for Ben to wake up from his nap. Ben spent 5 minutes "playing" with the toys Charlie and Sam set on top of him. Charlie was overjoyed when his hand randomly hit a toy.

Love the toothless grin...even if it was a happy to have a full belly smile.

Ben enjoys staring out the window at the trees. Everyday I put him in the moses basket so he can just relax and look outside.

Chicken Enchilada Recipe

Our Favorite Enchilada Recipe

2 pounds of boneless chicken breasts
4 Tablespoons of butter
1 large onion finely chopped
3 cups sour cream
1 bag of loose leaf frozen spinach
2 - 4 oz cans of green chilies, drained and chopped
1/4 cup milk
1 teaspoon of cumin
Course Kosher salt to taste
12 tortillas (wheat, white, or corn)
6 oz of Monterey Jack cheese grated


Cook chicken in oven, cool slightly then shred. Set aside. You can use left over chicken.

Melt butter, add onion and cook slowly until translucent. Add cumin and salt. Then add sour cream, chilies, and spinach, and milk.

Add half of the sauce to the shredded chicken and mix well. I usually add some cheese to the chicken as well.

Extras I assemble to add as fillings for tortilla: black beans, brown rice or yellow rice (basmati seasoned with saffron) corn, grilled vegis (summer), squash roasted in the oven with olive oil and cumin, salt, and pepper seasoning.

I take tortillas add chicken, fillings, some cheese and then place in lightly greased casserole dish. Top with extra sour cream sauce and enchilada sauce and cheese. Cook at 350 until bubbly and browned on top. (About 35 minutes)

Easily made vegetarian by omitting chicken and making it with rice, beans, and squash or vegis.
Dairy free by using Tofutti Sour Cream and soy milk and vegan butter alternative. I skip the cheese for dairy free.

When you add lots of extras this can make a few pans and it freezes well.

Enjoy...hope you give them a try! I'll add pictures some day when I make them again. I'm on a dairy free diet so I haven't been up for making them lately.

Week 3 and still in love....

Sam is still enjoying Benjamin but he is getting rougher with him. The pat pat on the head can turn into a bang bang if not watched carefully.

Charlie is completely in love with his baby bro. He is sure Ben's favorite colors are the same as his. Tonight he was lying next to Ben near the Christmas tree telling Ben all about the ornaments in his sweet, big brother voice. Charlie is also sure Ben loves his cars and trucks hat that is too big for him but had to wear all day when Charlie was around.

Ben after a bath this week. He was staring out the window...and loving this pacifier that he never will take. He has another type that he will use a couple times a day.

Ben is getting chunky cheeks already! He is also waking up more. He has fussed a little a few times in the last few days. I keep waiting for the fussiness that is bound to come in the next few weeks as he gets less sleepy. I am glad it is slow in coming.

First Bath

"Look Mom!" Charlie loves it when Ben holds his fingers. Charlie also loves to read Benjamin books and still loves to give kisses when he runs by. Sam is more inclined to want to hold and kiss still.
It looks like Ben's eyes are already turning brown.

Ben had his first bath on Friday. He was unsure if he liked it a couple of times, but never cried. Today Ben met his Great Grandma and spent time with his cousins. He slept through the whole encounter. He is still sleeping most of the day. He is awake 3 times a day now and still does well most nights. He eats at 10:30 most nights and then 2 more times before the boys get up for the day around 6:30. We feel like we are getting more sleep than we expected at this point which is nice. It's been so fun getting to hold Ben in our arms and cuddle. There's nothing like cuddling a newborn!

One Week Old

Ben is one week old today. He has slept through most of his first week of life. He is usually up a couple times a day for about 45 minutes. He has been a very mellow baby which has been nice for this first week. He had an appointment this morning and he is almost back to his birth weight which is great news. He was born at 7lbs 12.8 oz and he is now 7lbs 12 oz. He got down to 7lbs 3 oz at 2 days old which is too low so it's nice to see him gain.

Charlie is so in love with his new baby brother. Today at dinner we (Charlie) were having a conversation about things firemen might step on (who knows how we got to this conversation???) . They could step on the table, chairs, cups...then Charlie said what if they stepped on our baby? I said oh that would be really bad. We never put a baby on the floor because they could get hurt if somebody stepped on them. All of a sudden Charlie's lip quivered a little and he got tears in his eyes thinking about Ben getting hurt. I ,of course, cried because I thought it was so sweet that Charlie was so concerned about his baby brother.

All Sam has wanted to do all week is hold Ben. "I carry him." He has also been the kiss king. He wants to give Benjamin kisses whenever possible.

Chris is off to work tomorrow for the first time since Ben was born. Wish us all luck....

Coming Home

A little brotherly love time. Sam and Charlie couldn't get enough of holding and kissing Benjamin on our first days home.

2 days old and going home with an

official name:

Benjamin Francis Tripp

Benjamin has always been a favorite name of ours and Francis

is Chris' grandpa's name.

Meeting the other "babies" in the house.

We've had a couple busy but fun days with everyone home. We've been out for a couple of walks around the neighborhood. The boys are both "nursing" their stuffed animals and love to watch me nurse. Benjamin has slept a lot and has started to gain weight again after border line losing too much the last couple. He was also borderline jaundice so we've had a home health nurse check in on him the last two days. It's nice that he has turned the corner towards chubbiness that will overtake his little body in a few weeks. Sam and Charlie were both 20 pounds by 6 months so I'm guessing Ben will be the same way. His bilirubin is also with in normal numbers now as well.

Benjamin was actually awake a couple times today. It was fun for the boys to see him watching them and I think they felt like he was listening and understanding their conversations.

Thank you everyone for all or your well wishes.

Our New Arrival

We were all excited and surprised (relieved) when our newest arrived this past morning at 3:07a.m. He was due in 9 days. Thank you Benjamin! What a thrill to meet a new baby! Contractions started a little after 1 a.m. and Benjamin was here 2 hours later...luckily we live 5 minutes from the hospital. (There has been 7 nights of false labor in the last 2 1/2 weeks that moved the process along quite quickly in the end.) We have had a wonderful day cuddling and watching his every move. Charlie and Sam came up this morning and enjoyed meeting their new brother. They were so excited he was a boy. Charlie told us we could even call him "Ben" sometimes. The boys were thrilled by the Lego cars Ben gave the them. He kept asking how Benjamin knew he liked Legos. What a wonderful blessing to have 3 healthy boys! We are overjoyed.

Benjamin Tripp

11/11/08

7 lbs 13 oz

20 inches

middle name coming soon....stay tuned

Charlie really enjoyed holding Benjamin. He wanted me to feed him. "I really think he's hungry mom. You need to feed him." He was such a loving big brother to both of his brothers today. He kept telling Sam little tidbits about Benjamin. It was fun to see the boys all interact for the first time.

Sam was very excited to see his baby. "He's so tiny!" We asked Sam what the baby's name was and he still insists it's "Baby". It will work for now.

OBAMA!

Just read this on a friend's blog and had to share:

someone on the forum posted this (author unknown):

Rosa sat so that Martin could walk.
Martin walked so that Barack could run.
Barack ran so that my children might fly.

After 8 years, at last some hope ahead for our children!

Happy Halloween

A little fun in the leaves before trick or treating. We enjoyed being outside all weekend. Tomorrow is suppose to be 70! I love this bonus nice weather in November.

Charlie and Sam had fun trick or treating with their friends Johan and Gus.

The "workers" checking out their tools.

The boys had to carve our littlest pumpkin after reading the book "The Littlest Pumpkin". They enjoyed trying to get the seeds out.

A little trick or treating fun.