Baby party!

What a fun day Sunday was. We had a little party for precious little girl that's going to be coming our way in about 1 1/2 months.... give or take. I'm still hoping for April 4th, for obvious numerical reasons. *smile*

This is the bedding the she settled on. I've got it ordered and it should be perfect!
Where I got it...

So to go along with the super cute bedroom set I had to grab some accessories. Well, I did!

These 2 absolutely crack me up. They just love each other so much, always looking out for the other.

Danee's friend Katie made these adorable little footprints. She is turning into quite the little cake decorator.

Poor Maggie. Almost everything that was opened she said "That's so cute! Is that for your baby Nee Nee?" I made the mistake of giving her a present BEFORE the shower, when I should have saved it for during.

So many cute gifts.

I have been talking for quite a while about the "5 babies" that are coming into my life. Kasey is due in May and her little man is #5.

Rachel & her little man Andy.

Gracie & Courtney

Gabi & Annabel. These 2 haven't seen each other since they were 1, but acted like they have been the best of friends forever.

This was, hands down, the favorite gift. "Rucas" is Dan's friend Lucas and he has been around almost as long as I can remember!

This is a bitter sweet picture. I have this pose in many many venues at all different ages. Katie, Rachel & Danee the 3 amigos.... + 2 babies.

xoxo

Lissa

Bar-b-que pizza

We broke the smoker out this weekend. Knowing it was going to be long week with lots of hours, it seemed like a great idea for several meals. (Adam is one smart cookie, I'm telling you) One of them was some really yummy bar-b-que pizza.

Here's where we started.

Just a basic pizza dough on the stone. I bake it for about 5 minutes before toppings go on.

We have many different sauces in the fridge.... this one is KC Masterpiece Sweet & Tangy.

Next for me comes a light layer of cheese (pepper jack & parmesan this time) the pork and more cheese.

I meant to put caramelized onions on it, but completely spaced it out. But it turned out soooo good. I'll be doing it again with chicken very soon.

xoxo

Lissa

Bourbon Sugar Cookies

This recipe, ironic as it is, came from one of the trainers at our gym. They would have been perfect if we would have had some vanilla bean ice cream to go with them!

• 3 sticks unsalted butter
• 3 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 2 cups sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 vanilla bean
• 2 eggs
• 3 tablespoons bourbon

Preheat oven to 350*.

Mix dry ingredients in bowl & set aside.

Cream butter, sugars, vanilla, bourbon & eggs. Cut open vanilla bean & scrape inside into batter. Slowly incorporate dry ingredients.

Chill for about 15 minutes & in between batches. Roll dough & cut out. Bake 11 minutes.

Seriously delicious!

xoxo

Lissa

Table

A couple of weeks ago we delivered the latest of Adam's furniture projects to St Charles. He made a table for Cameron to hold a 3 ton TV. I may have exaggerated, but not by much! What I really thought would be a basic "butcher block" type table turned out really beautiful.

Every good project begins in one of the home improvement stores. I have to be very careful, I can spend hours in the black hole of Lowes. I may need a 12 step program.

The top is very quickly together.

Next, the base comes together really nicely.

Ready for stain. This is where I'm actually helpful. Messy, but helpful. It's really a good thing right now that the bonus room is not finished yet. It really came in handy with the weather being so bad.

Looking good, right?

Love dowels. And although it doesn't fit my house I really love the big industrial looking bolts.

Needless to say, Cam was thrilled with how it turned out.

Voila!

A new adventure

So I have really enjoyed the whole blogging "thing". I go back and read things and love that I can remember them... sometimes with pictures even. What never occurred to me, and has turned into a great big bonus, is that I would get so much more out of writing. I've connected with a group of women that are smart, very diverse and just plain fun to be around.

And this leads me to a fun new adventure I'm going to take. I've decided to attend BlogHer '11.

Kate from The Guavalicious Life had so many great stories and such a good time last year, how could I resist?

My first thought was that I really needed to write this blog for a while longer before I would "belong" there, but I'm assured that all bloggers will take a way a wealth of new information and friends, soooo..... it's off to San Diego in August with some great CoMo Blogger friends.

Best V-Day gift ever

This has been a really good weekend

Saturday I met with a group of women that I hope to spend a lot more time with. They are all bloggers here in Columbia, some of whom I know and a couple of new friends also.

Saturday night was spent in Fayette at Emmet's Kitchen and Tap for a Valentines dinner with friends, a bottle of wind, fun conversation and a wonderful meal

Sunday morning we slept until 10:30! It's crazy we just never do that. And Annie let us. :o)

I'm really not sure how the next great thing happened.... I have wanted a camera for a long time, I even blogged about this Fond Wish of Mine. We've made a couple of trips to Columbia Photo, and every time we hit Best Buy I visit the camera's no matter what we came in for. I pick everyone's brain on what they shoot and why and make a regular pest out of myself. But this morning Adam announced that Best Buy had the camera that I wanted as a bundle with an extra lens, bag and memory card. Did I want it? Um, did I want it?! YES!

So once again Adam wins.... best gift ever.

xoxo

Lissa

Emerson Kate... at last!

I want to introduce you to Miss Emerson Kate Crenshaw. She is 7 lbs 8 oz & was born at 7:30 am on 2.11.11. I'm in love with her cool number pattern of a birthday, of course.

Emmy is #3 of our family's babies, but that doesn't really fit. She is the most anticipated baby I think I have ever seen. Babies are loved and waited for with excitement all the time. This little girl has been waited for longer than any baby to ever come into my life.

My amazing, beautiful & oh so strong friend Kelly announced on a girls night in Kansas City that she would be having this little girl. Oh right, this was in 2008! It's not my story to tell, so if you want to see some of the journey head on over to her blog & read about the 2+ years of doctors, tears & success.
Laughing Out Loud

I will never, as long as I live forget the day she found out Em was on her way. Adam & I were visiting for a work weekend. What a great celebration we had.

So she is finally here. And I don't have words to say how happy I am for my Kelly. This little girl will give her so much joy, frustration & love. I can't wait to watch & be in this journey with her.

xoxo

Lissa

2 down!

I'm very late with this post, and my only excuse is that the "blizzard" reeked havoc on my internet connection & it has been spotty. So better late than never, let me introduce you to John Robert Reece.

Baby Johnny is #2 of the 5 babies that will be joining my family & extended family by May. This little troublemaker is my daughter Courtney's nephew. The son of her Hubby Ray's brother Chris & his wife CJ. Chris is, at this very moment still away at basic training, he's in the Air Force so are you beginning to see why I call this angelic looking baby a troublemaker?

CJ was due February 10th (still 3 days from the date of this post). We had known for days that we would be getting a large snowstorm. Hmmm... little did we know what it would become. We started joking with CJ days before the snow started that Johnny needed to stay put, not to get any ideas, you get the gist.

Let me remind you that between 7:30am on Tuesday morning & sometime in the middle of the night, the sky dumped nearly 2 feet of snow. They closed I-70 (the main artery across Missouri) at one point. Yep, that's a lot of snow, FAST! So imagine my freaked out surprise when I got a phone call Wednesday morning from Courtney saying that she was at the hospital & that CJ was in labor. Oh that's not even the crazy part of the story.... CJ got up around 1:30am to get a drink & her water broke and contractions started about 2am. Super duper, except her car is under 3 foot + snow drifts. She called 911. The ambulance could not make it either sooooo they call in the Missouri National Guard. Yes, you heard me. They reached her fine, but the few miles to the hospital took an hour, conditions were so bad- very blizzard like. Meanwhile word has passed through the family but nobody could get their car out. The girl's mother in law, Karin, lives in Lawrence & she and Courtney were supposed to be co-labor coaches. Now my girl has inherited a couple of interesting attributes. One of these is a stubborn gene, and can be a blessing or a curse. Yes, I will admit that this is maternally passed. The other is loyalty. This girl of mine will go to the end of the earth for her friends. If she loves you, she will do without to give you what you need. I only hope she got a little of that one from me too. And on that night, those 2 qualities came together and created the perfect friend & sister-in-law. At 4 in the morning she suited up in cold weather gear, and WALKED her happy ass to the hospital so that CJ would not be alone when her son came into this world.

My heart swells with pride & love for this crazy daughter of mine when I think about what she did for her friend. But, as is my nature, I also go to "What If" land. They are all fine, of course so I can let that go pretty easily.

As you can imagine this created quite a stir. Everyone that know's them was blowing up their Facebook status & Tweeting like mad. The 4 TV stations in Kansas City made the trip out to interview them, as did the KC Star. Here is how Channel 9, KMBC reported

Baby John's memorable entrance to planet Earth.

Even Aunt Courtney made it into the slide show of still photos. Love that girl.

Meet the sweet little man. 6 lbs 9oz

His super proud Auntie Courtney. She's just a little bit tired.

So I hope that #'s 3, 4 & 5 make much calmer entrances! Emerson Kate should be next..... here's hoping with-in a week or so! :o)

xoxo

Lissa

Blizzard of 2011

We had been hearing the ominous weather reports for several days. My first thoughts when they mentioned 13 to 15 inches was that, once again, we would probably dodge the worst of it and we were worrying about it for nothing. Granted, it has been 5 years since the last really big snow, but come on, it's been snowing all winter! People started hitting the stores and clearing off the shelves. I'll admit it, I watched and thought they were all crazy. But we did get a few things "just in case".

The "names" for this storm were everywhere. Snownami, snowmageddon, noMOsnow, but my fave is the name they used on Foursquare- comosnowpocalypse.

Then the governor had to get in on the act & declare a state of emergency for Missouri-

"Most of Missouri is expected to be affected by this severe winter storm, which is predicted to cause treacherous road conditions and possibly widespread power outages," Gov. Nixon said. "My chief concern is the safety of Missourians, and these orders make state agency resources and the Citizen-Soldiers of the Missouri National Guard available to help communities respond. As state emergency officials continued to track the storm over the weekend, we worked closely with local agencies and faith and community groups to ensure that Missouri is as prepared as possible."

OK, maybe there's something to this blizzard thing.

So we all made plans regarding work and how we would just stay home Tuesday & Wednesday. Adam brought his whole computer from work to be able to get stuff done. It froze rain off & on all of Monday. At 4 we gave up and headed home. When I went to bed Monday night I expected there to be a good start to all this snow we were supposed to get. First thing in the morning we peeked out the bedroom window..... nothing. The only way I can tell you how I felt was, well disappointed. Weird huh? I know, I HATE snow. But I wanted to be in a blizzard, sue me. But there wasn't much time for disappointment....about 7:45 here it came.

9am

By 11am it was COMING DOWN

Noon- BIG difference

1:30 pm

2:45- Coming down really hard again

4pm

8am Wednesday February 2nd. Best news of the morning? The groundhog didn't see his shadow, so spring is coming.... someday.

Annie has had a really hard time going outside. She is fine to run around and play in the snow, but all this was freaking her out!

Time to start digging out! The driveway is under there somewhere.

First pass

Gives new meaning to "home office"

Overall I loved being snowed in. If my Twitter feed was any indication, I'm pretty much alone in that, and I NEVER would have believed it myself.

There was quite a bit of excitement for some of my family during all this.... story to come.

xoxo

Lissa

Miss Maggie Beth is 3!

Seeing as babies are a very important theme in my life right now... A very special "baby" turns 3 today! We will always remember that for this birthday she had a blizzard & the governor declared a state of emergency. (more on that later today)

As you can see she announced her arrival very loudly.

Gabi was so excited to meet her baby sister. She is still the best big sister I think I have ever seen.

Our Maggie has always been such a smiley little thing. Always happy.

And now she's a big girl. And still I just want to eat her up!

There's that smile! Happy Birthday sweet Maggie. Nana loves you bunches!

xoxo

Lissa