I can’t believe it! I have been nominated for two blog awards! Tori nominated me for the Thinking Blogger Award last week! I’m soooo happy because I’ve never won any kind of award, much less props for my saggy britches! And be prepared because now I need to nominate 5 bloggers for the award, stay tuned for my list this week! I should have already made my list, but. Can I just whine for a moment?

I have had a stomach bug all. weekend. long. As if the gray roots, a teething infant (Noah’s first tooth finally), and the lack of warm weather weren’t already bumming me out, the stomach bug surely would. Saturday was BEAUTIFUL outside, a whopping 75 degrees too. But this mommy was laid out and couldn’t play. I’m telling you, this is probably the worst stomach icks I have EVER had! I have slept nearly 48 hours and have lost a good 5 pounds. Now the sleep and weight loss are alright by me, but the road to getting it was no fun. No fun, I tell ya.

Anyways, today I found out that Meghan nominated me for the Hottest Mommy Blogger award! What? Me? Hot? I’m soooo totally psyched that she nominated me! Thanks, Meghan! And you can also vote for me here, even though Dooce has 340 votes more than me! I can totally beat that. Right? Ok, I’m a dreamer. But even if I don’t win, I atleast get to post this fun little badge:

Thank you Tori and Meghan!

…the way Noah gets so excited when I pour a bath for him. He makes the awesomest noises and squirms around in my arms until I put him in the water.

…how I have to brush Bella’s alligator’s teeth as bribery before she’ll let me brush hers. She makes me brush his teeth and when I’m done, she makes him watch as I brush hers.

…the way Austin always observes my needs. He notices how I’m feeling and always tries to support me and help me. He’s way ahead of his time. I so love him and his sweet ways. He’s going to be an outstanding man one day.

…when Jeremy compliments me. And he does all the time. He convinces me that I’m pretty, even when I feel frumpy. He knows when I need to get my hair done or when I need some time alone. He works so hard every day and then comes home with open arms to grab a baby, feed them the dinner I prepared, and play with them while I go to the gym. I love the way he compliments my mothering. He knows how important it is to me to be good at it. I wonder if he knows that he’s the beautiful one, inside and out.

…tripping over toys and crunching cheerios between my toes in order to travel from one room to the next.

…dirty fingerprints on the television screen, mirrors, and walls. They make me smile. So much so that I had to do them in paint in a special place that I’ll never have to wipe them off of.

…the way I miss the babies when they go to bed, and the sweetness of Bella cuddling with her books and “babies”.

…the way they smell.

…the sound of Austin and Bella playing together.

…the forts Austin makes Bella all over the house with every blanket he can find. She tears them down as fast as he can put them up. His frustrated patience with her is adorable.

…the way my house smells. And the laundry. The fresh sheets I have time to hang on the clothes line now that I’m not working.

…Bella’s wild hair. Especially when it has jelly in it. I think there’s nothing cuter than a child who looks like she enjoys every bite she eats. By lunchtime she has paint on her clothes, milk on her moustache, food in her hair, and playdough in her pull-ups.

…wearing the look of a mommy. I take my clothes of at the end of the day to take my shower and find cookie crumbs and cheerios in my braziere. I have snot marks on my t-shirt. I usually have something sticky and unknown tangled in my ponytail.

…the way Noah’s eye gets squinchy when he smiles his biggest smile. I have a squinchy eye when I smile too, although it’s the other eye on me!

…and the mooshy, gooshy feeling I get when they smile…

In an effort to meet and welcome some of my silent readers, I’d like to ask (Umm, beg?) you to say “hello”! Commenters certainly boost my little ego too, so we’ll be killing two birds with one stone. (Don’t you hate that saying? I love birds. Let’s not kill any birds.)

I check my statcounter from time to time and see the same visits from regular readers that don’t ever comment. There are visitors from California, New Mexico, Colorado, Florida, Virginia, Texas, and Utah that visit frequently but never comment. I’d say that 1/3 of my visits are from random folks searching Google, 1/3 from folks that comment regularly, and 1/3 from visitors that come consistently but never comment. I even see blogline subscribers that read, but don’t comment. I definitely have blogs that I read and don’t comment on, such as Amalah or Yvonne. But that’s only because those women are famous bloggers and my comments are swallowed in the sea of other commenters. That’s not the case here!

I’m totally copying Tori here, she made a recent post asking folks to “delurk”. I think she’s had some good response too.

So. Ready? Go!

I’m in a bloggy mood today, two post in one day. But I have some things to say…

My son needs braces. Yep. This sweet child of mine has had some teethy problems. He can’t manage to get the baby teeth out before the adult tooth tries squishing in front of, behind, around, and through the little guys. Such bullies, those adult teeth are. So, I guess the $3000 that the braces are going to cost me is a drop in the bucket next to the cost of all the dentist appointments I’ve made to have the baby teeth yanked over the years. Next Wednesday he has ANOTHER appointment to have this bad boy taken out. $200. Cha-ching.

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I got this awesome recipe for Crockpot Italian Mushroom Chicken from the lovely Meghan. Delish, y’all. It fed us for two days too! A mom can use all the leftovers she can get. Here’s the fam enjoying my new fave recipe, and the recipe, of course:

Ingredients:
5-6 large boneless/skinless chicken breasts (fresh or defrosted)
2 cans Condensed Cream of Mushroom Soup
1 cup water
1 cup milk
1 package of powdered chicken gravy
1 package of Italian dressing mix
1 package (6-8 oz.) of fresh mushrooms
8 oz. of Cream Cheese
Rice (prepare separately)

Preparation:
Combine everything except cream cheese (and rice) in Crock-pot. Stir to mix it together. Cook on high for three hours. Cube cream cheese, add to mixture and stir. Cook on low for one hour. Serve over rice.

Even Nooskers loved him some chicken and rice. Yummmm!

With our dinner we had a yummy salad and, because we’re classy like that, we had cheesy garlic sandwich bread.

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And just because it’s fun, we had dinner on the ground tonight. On Bella and Noah’s level. Dinner hadn’t been served just yet in this first photo and dinner looks to be all over Noah’s face in the second photo! Bella was thrilled to share her little Dora patio set with us!

(Yes, Bella is almost always diaper clad. I’ve got trouble on my hands. This girl hates clothes.)

“Oh, yes. Some more Mango Applesauce, please. Mango Applesauce is the bomb diggity.”

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I have a chihuahua named Penny, a.k.a. “Neeners”. Yes, we have some funky nicknames in this fam. I got Neeners in 2002, after I had decided that I was pretty darn infertile and needed something small to cuddle with to help me feel better about that. Poor Neeners. She used to have diamonds around her neck and pretty painted pink toenails. She slept with us at night, went everywhere with me, and was always in my lap. Then came Bella, then Noah. Neeners probably wants to eat herself some baby toes as revenge, but she’s been quite a good sport about settling as being my “other baby.” Some might think her ugly (even the camera didn’t want to focus on her), but she’s just a little doll to me! Jeremy thinks she’s fugly, in a Paris Hilton kind of way, but methinks her beeeeeautiful!