wanna snuggle?

we found our girls snuggling one morning and couldn't resist sneaking this picture.

some kids....

 will believe in Santa Claus.... my girls will believe in Herky.

Go Hawkeyes!!

"Hey Mama, when's the game?!"

celebrate

Aslan keeping watch over Maribelle and Annalie (l-r)

New Season..

Thanks everyone for your sweet notes and messages around email, facebook, phone calls and texts.  I really wanted you to know how much I love hearing from you and having my Mom or Hubs read the messages to me.  I feel so loved by everyone.

Please don't feel hurt or ignored if it takes me a little while to respond to all the love I've been receiving.  I am just having a little hiatus from internet so that I can rest when I find the time.  (I'd rather be reading facebook and updating my blog but I better listen to my Mother and "take care of myself".)

I am humbled by your kind words and praises for our daughters.

Here are some fun facts to "tide you over" until I can give a full report and the birth story....

**Annalie's name is from the last half of my name "joANNA" and the last half of my mother's name "lesLIE"... Eleanor is my maternal Grandmother's name.  Maribelle originally came from my Grandpa Icenogle.  His Grandma's name was Isabella and he suggested we use that for our daughters.  Hubs liked the "belle" portion of her name but wanted something different.  Through him just thinking through different names he discovered Maribelle and we fell insta-in-love with her name.  Eunice is my paternal Grandmother's name.
**if we do nicknames we're going to call Maribelle "belle" and Annalie "lie lie" (pronounced lee lee)
**we're feeding on a 3 hour schedule and it takes us about an hour and a half to an hour and 45 minutes to complete one feeding.  We feed them at the same time or "tandem nursing".
**when the girls are sleeping they almost always turn their heads and face each other.  This is consistent with when they were in the womb because they almost always had their heads together.

Love you all.
Now! I am off to take a nap! :)

June 2011

June has come and gone, I still can't believe it.

While the days went by quickly, it's still hard to remember how I passed the time.  You'd think sitting with my feet propped up on the couch would cause a day to go by slowly but somehow, it didn't and still does not.  Somehow the days slip through my finger tips and are gone before I know it.

June was a good month for reading, cooking and visiting.friends.  It was a month filled with laughter, crazy dreams and yet also a bittersweet ending to the month.

Reading this month included:

"The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society" by Anne Barrows and Mary Ann Shafer

If you are confused about the title and what the book could possibly be about then I can freely share that I was too.  I don't know if I would have picked up the book by the title, but awhile back I asked you all, my beloved blog friends, to share your favorite books and I believe this book was recommended 3 times by 3 different friends.  Anyway, you three lovelies were right.  The book was incredible.  I was so drawn into the story, I laughed, I cheered for the underdog and I was completely surprised by one storyline.  It was so touching that I made my friend Alissa borrow it for her plane ride.  We both fell in love with the characters.

GOOD BOOK!!

I also read "Tender Victory" by Taylor Caldwell which was phenomenal.  I really can't say enough good about this book.  It was triumphant and redemptive.  It had romance and action.  It was surprising, witty, and above all else just reminded me that there are good people out there in life and how important it is to be one of those "good people" in my own life.  It's a good book. Thanks KF for sending it.

And finally, I finished the month off by reading "Silence" by Shusaku Endo.  Hubs recommended that I read it and I was glad that I did.  Wow, three out of three for good books this month. :)  Silence actually took me by surprise and was more of a "thinker" than I was expecting.  It's a book about Christian influence in the Japanese culture in the 1600's.  It's fiction though the stories, I believe, are based on some truth that actually happened to people at this time.  Really good book that will have you thinking long after you turn the last page, in my opinion.

Cooking this month has been interesting, to say the least.  Since my feet now remind me of stuffed Chipotle burritos, I am forced to spend most of my day on the couch.  Even sitting in a chair with my legs downward will lead to swollen feet.  Swollen.  I have the energy and desire to bake to my heart's content but alas, my feet prevent me from doing just about anything.

So when I finally get around to making something, it's gotta be quick, it's gotta be good and it's gotta be made with ingredients I have on hand and don't include a quick "oops I forgot this" trip to the store.

So here goes....

first, if you don't know about this blog

http://lizziecancook.blogspot.com/ 

can you please pause for one moment, click over and peruse the yumminess that is Liz's cooking.  I haven't found a recipe that hasn't agreed with Hubs and I.  In fact, I made the

*shredded bbq chicken sandwiches*

quite apologetically because Hubs doesn't really like bbq... actually not at all but I had all the ingredients and threw in some of my own (and selfishly it sounded good to me) while making it and when Hubs took his first bite he was hooked. Literally, we sat there wide-eyed, mouths chewing, sauce around our lips and were shocked at how GOOD these sandwiches were.  Try them. You won't regret them.  The one thing I would do differently is poaching the chicken a bit longer.  I'm not sure if that would dry the chicken out (does anyone know) but my chicken was hard to shred and so I would have softened/cooked it a little bit longer.

We've enjoyed Liz's chicken devan, her blueberry coffee cake and Hubs' personal favorite of Liz's~ her blueberry muffins.  We've tried more, enjoyed more but those are my "yagottatrythis" recommendations. Seriously!!

This month I also revisited an old friend, the Pioneer Woman and was reminded why I love her so.  She tickled our taste buds with her pesto pasta and cobbler recipe.  I made peach cobbler which came out of the pan looking like junk but tasted like heaven.  

 Put a little ice cream right on top and no one can even tell that you scraped those little cobblers out of their pan and had to piece them together.  Actually serve anything with this much butter and sugar and pretty much no one cares what they look like. :)

In June, I also made two of the hardest recipes I've ever attempted.  I made homemade strawberry shortcake and doubled the recipe. (why oh why did I do that?!)  It also made me realize that I am not a perfectionist (duh) and will try to scimp where I can.  Point in case~ I made my own whipped cream and of course the recipe called for "whipping cream"... but I figured whole milk is the next best thing and since I already had whole milk I just used that.  Needless to say, after staring at my kitchenaid on high speed for ten minutes and nothing literally nothing happening, I figured there was a difference to whipping cream.

Ten seconds of using whipping cream and voila! I had whipped cream.

Anyway, the recipe was just incredibly hard. Not sure why but I made a huge mess that Hubs came home too but the shortcake was amazing and even better... I have some frozen to bake later when the babies arrive and I need something totally unhealthy in a pinch.

The second dish Hubs and I made together was chilis rellanos.  Cry me a river.  It was a recipe that my brother and sister-in-law "passed down" to us when Hubs and I got married.  They said it would be hard work. I believe the recipe is three-pages single-spaced but I thought, "Hey, if I don't do this now, when will I ever do this recipe?" and so we gave it a shot.

It was right around the part where the recipe says, "Freeze for an hour" that I looked at the clock which said, "7:00PM" and I told Hubs, "let's pause here, make it tomorrow, and eat leftovers".... luckily the recipe told you what to do if you wanted to stop mid-way through.

I finished the chilis the next day while Hubs was out and we thoroughly enjoyed the hard work it took to make them.  They were incredibly tasty. I did not get a picture, sadly, because I was too hungry by the time they came along, that I forgot.  And truth be told, they were, also, ugly as sin.  And if you can believe it, uglier than the cobbler pieced together.

Needless to say, June was a fun and busy month with friends coming through our door.  Welcoming baby Esperanza into the world and my college roomies surprising me with a weekend visit.  It was a great month.

Sadly, my family and I said goodbye to my Grandpa Icenogle.  Honestly, it feels a bit surreal to me because I was not able to be with my family and "say my goodbye" with everyone else.  So although I can acknowledge the fact that my Grandpa is gone with my head, my heart just doesn't accept it yet.  I know when I walk into my Grandparents home and his chair is empty that it will feel more real and I will be faced with the reality that I will no longer enjoy his company this side of heaven.  If you didn't see the link I put up on facebook here's my dad's tribute to my Grandpa which I thought was perfectly written.

Grandpa Icenogle

July 1st was a huge sigh of relief for me.  I feel like I can see the finish line with pregnancy.  And although I am forever grateful for these nine months and having my little ones play inside of me, I am eagerly anticipating their arrival.  They're about five pounds a piece, I measured (2 weeks ago) at 44 cm and I now am the proud owner of a back brace.  I wear my brace like a badge of honor...

Twins arrive (on average) between 34-36 weeks and I am at 35 weeks.

Our next doctor's appointment is in two days and I am sure we'll do our best to keep everyone informed of their arrival.

With love....