Snack Please?

I've been trying out lots of new recipes this summer and wanted to share a few of our new favorite snacks. The first is homemade granola (gluten-free of course :-) found here. This was super fun to make because I had my little sous chef join in on the action. Great pre-math lesson too, as little man is becoming quite the counter!

I prepared the ingredients during Judah's nap

Chop chop! 

When I told Judah it was time to stir the pan, he said "No mommy, sweep!" You're right, little buddy, "sweeping" the oats around worked out much better :-)

in the oven! 

Finished product...oh so yummy. 

Another summer favorite has been Almond Energy Bites found here or "Energy Balls" as they are affectionately called at our house~recommended by my dear friend Andrea, aka "Isaac's mommy." Judah first tasted one of these at Isaac's house and even though I've made them several times this summer, he still says "Isaac's Mommy" when I give him one. Oh well. I don't have a picture of these because they are gobbled up by the the two men in my house soon after they are made! Gluten-free and great for kiddos with a peanut allergy because they are made with almond butter. (Hint: I use a little less agave nectar than listed or you can substitute honey...both make them not as sweet, which seems to be better. I also substitute dark chocolate chunks for the raw cocoa nibs.)


And lastly, we've been making kale chips to substitute for all of those tortilla chips that are usually consumed by the Nixes. So easy and very delicious! This is the recipe I use....the olive oil in plastic bag trick is the way to go!

Quite possibly my favorite meal of the summer...
gluten-free basil-pesto BLTs and kale chips.

Happy Snacking! 

Fun in Bama!

The first week in August gave us the much anticipated summer trip to Alabama...back to my hometown to visit family and friends. Although these trips are now much more expensive (thanks to a little someone turning 2 and needing his own seat on the plane) I must say that this self-proclaimed "big kid" is quite the airplane passenger~making flights a little easier. Can you tell he was excited to board?!

waiting to board the plane while flying his own

One of my favorite things about visiting is getting to see Judah with his cousins, Marlee and Maggie...or as Judah sometimes affectionally calls them "Margie," as one unit of course :-) Not sure if the highlight of this trip was visiting the zoo....

Or celebrating Marlee's 8th birthday...

I think the birthday party wins out because of this...

It's safe to say he enjoyed himself.

We also visited with lots of old friends. So special for me~and pretty cool for Judah, too, as they all brought along their kiddos. Here is a shot of most of us (a few didn't make the picture) after a fun day at my parents' pool. And yes, after one too many cookies and a few too many hours past his nap time I just couldn't get Judah to hold it together for the pic. Next time, buddy.

And one of my college besties, Brooke, visited another day. Judah had so much fun swimming with Sawyer.

And we finally got to meet Sawyer's precious baby brother, Ben Fischer! My niece was quite the babysitter, too ;-)

I'm pretty sure every other second of the trip was spent in the pool with this cool kid, my very own Olympic swimmer.

It was a great, action-packed trip and I think we're finally caught up on sleep. Yay! In the words of J-man anytime we leave a place, "See you next time!"

Lil Fish

So much to catch you up on...I'll get to it I promise. Tonight I just want to share some evidence that our lil' man went from being quite apprehensive of the pool early this summer to this by the first of August...

He now jumps off "all by self" without me there to catch him. Too bad I don't have video of this yet. It really was priceless. After jumping off the diving board a few times, he boldly declares as he stands on the edge and points to his chest, "Big Kid!" I know what this means. He does not want mommy to catch him. I give in and off he goes...huge jump, goes way under, comes up smiling and swimming to ladder..."all by self." It's true I tell ya.

Celebrating Judah, Ethiopian style

This weekend was full of culture for the Nix fam~Ethiopian culture that is.....something we should be doing more of here in our "little Ethiopian city" known to others as DC :-)

Friday evening we headed across town to Dukem~one of DC's most highly recommended Ethiopian restaurants. We had so much fun celebrating Judah there, and walking into the restaurant took me back to Ethiopia immediately~mostly because of the aroma. They sat us right by the bar with no high chair, which we thought was a little weird with a 2 year-old, but we just went with it. Judah didn't seem to mind :-)

My dear friend Amy was in town visiting us this weekend. You may have heard me mention her before ;-)  It was so special that she got to celebrate "Judah Day" with us, as she was among the first to meet him two years ago. This pic of Amy and Jeff was taken by Judah with no editing done by me...not too bad, buddy!

While stuffing ourselves with way too much wot and injera (see below), Judah opened his gift.

As you can see, he was super excited about his new books.

And later, he became even more excited. This is the look on his face when he heard us say, "cupcake time!"

Dig in! (literally :-)

It's safe to say that he liked it!

Coincidentally, when cleaning out some shelves this week I stumbled upon some loose printed pictures from our time in Ethiopia exactly two years ago. So I made a little picture book for Judah. He loved looking through it but got a little upset when he saw just Mommy and Daddy on the plane getting ready to take-off for Ethiopia. He asked, "Where's Judah?" and "Judah go?"

You're right, buddy...hard to imagine life without you in it. Here are some sweet pics of all THREE of us :-)

Two days later, a nearby suburb of DC hosted its Second Annual Ethiopian Festival. We went with our dear friends the Schicks and their sweet Gabriel....more Ethiopian food, friends, and of course music and dancing. I could not believe how many Ethiopians were there. It's as if we were back in Addis...especially when the emcee was speaking only in Amharic, cracking jokes that we could not understand!  Here is a snapshot from my iPhone...you can sort of grasp the magnitude.

As usual, Judah and Gabriel had a ball together. Here they are being silly in front of the Ethiopian food truck .

And topping the night off with a little dancing of course. I know you are jealous of J's mad dancing skills and his air guitar :-)

What a great weekend to be blessed by celebrations with dear friends and sweet reminders of our time in Ethiopia. Two years later, we still can't believe the amazing gift we received there.

Grateful.

Ethiopia is not yet done with us. Whether it is another child or just visiting and serving, we can't wait to see what it has in store for us next. 

Judah Day #2!

If you hadn't figured it out just yet, today is a very special day for our family. There are many important dates documented throughout our adoption journey: the day we received our "referral;" the day we "passed court;" the day we completed paperwork through the US Embassy (which is actually our agency's date for our official "placement day)." However, the day that means the most to us is the day we saw Judah's face for the first time and held our precious little 15 pound miracle. You can read more about it here if you missed it. :-) The day was July 20th, 2010, and we will forever commemorate this day.

Since Judah understands much more language than he did at this time last year, we are revealing more about that special day. We're showing him pictures and talking about what a special time it was for us in Ethiopia to hold him for the first time, and how God orchestrated a miracle that day when he made the three of us a family. I think he's starting to get it. And I just love that he wants to look at this picture all the time, while smiling and pointing~"Mommy." "Daddy." "Judah."

Last July 20th, we filled Judah's day with two of his favorite things....swimming and cookies. Well, it was actually his first taste of a real cookie so they quickly became one of his favorite things :-) So far today this year, we've been to music class with his buddies (a favorite of his) and had a lunch date~just the two of us....at Qdoba....a very happy place for Judah...even happier today because I let him have lemonade as his drink. I know, crazy, right?!

Tonight, we will all celebrate at DC's best Ethiopian restaurant and top it off with his new favorite treat...

Stay tuned for pics of the weekend, as we're also attending a nearby Ethiopian festival on Sunday. Happy Friday everyone, and Happy Judah Day!

All Done Lazy

"All done nap!" (often heard through the monitor when a little someone awakes)
"All done hurt!" (when Judah realized I was feeling better and could pick him up again after my surgery)
"All done work!" (when Jeff walks through the door in the evening)

Judah is applying "all done" to many things now, so when I thought of the title of this post "All Done Lazy" immediately came to mind. Since my lazy summer days post, it seems that we've been anything but. Hopefully, that will explain my lack of posts :-) This post is a sad attempt to catch you up with pics from my iPhone~since I hardly ever remember to take my "real" camera to places anymore.

First of all, DC has been HOT. All of my friends in the South who think I'm always "cooler" way up here~think again.

When I first started the car on this day, it said 109! 

It was during this time that DC experienced a terrible storm and we were without power for three days. We stayed at our place for the first two nights but it quickly became unbearable with no AC and 100 degree temps. We thankfully were invited to stay with dear friends who had power for the final night...such as huge blessing! Oh, and did I mention we haven't had AC in our Jeep (our only car) since May 29th....not that I'm counting the days or anything ;-)  It's currently at the shop getting repaired, but for the past month or so we've been strolling a lot of places because our car has been too hot. Most trips begin like this....

But end like this....

Judah is still loving all things sports. He began a summer soccer series~another with Coach John , but his favorites these days seem to be golf, which he sometimes calls "hockey." Don't worry, this will be corrected :-)

....and baseball (still).

We began a summer music class with Miss Patti again, too. Although he hadn't been to this particular class since December, he totally remembered and is loving it.

We've also been spending lots of time with our "besties."

At the Zoo with Gabriel

Having Marilyn over for dinner

And of course, there was July 4th~when Judah experienced his first ever parade.

...as well as his first fireworks...DC is a great first place for this :-)

And finally, our little man got a haircut. I absolutely love it! He looks adorable and it's so much easier~and definitely better for him in this heat! However, I do miss his curls and he looks soooo much older (sniff, sniff).  These are the only pictures I have post-haircut, but I promise there are much more to come!

Where is my "lazy" summer going?! And better yet, where have the past 2 years gone?! It was this very night exactly two years ago when I couldn't sleep~due to excitement and anticipation~because we were to board a plane to Ethiopia the very next day. Can't wait til Friday when we celebrate the anniversary of the day we became a family. For now, it's night-night time for me. "All done blog!"

DC-versary

Yesterday marked one calendar year since our move from Carolina to our nation's Capital. Just look at our sweet baby during the move-in this time last year...

I don't really know where this post is going, but I'm feeling reminiscent and sentimental because it has been a very eventful year to say the least. Anniversaries like this certainly shed light on the ups and downs of life. It would be easy to focus on the "downs" because there have been many... the loss of three family members, a very scary hospitalization, LOTS of illness in our family of three, and a recent surgery....just to name a few. However, the lessons learned and outpouring of love of grace by others and our God overpower all of that to me.

Truth be told, Jeff and I were both quite shocked when we found out we were moving here. Jeff participated in the national urologic oncology fellowship match in 2010~so a computer algorithm basically let us know we would be moving to DC a year later in order for Jeff to complete his training at the National Cancer Institute. DC was high on our list simply because of the prestige and career opportunity for Jeff. However, it was far(ther) away from both of our families and the cost of living here is astronomical. So it wasn't our perfect plan....but it was God's. It's neat to look back over the past year and think of all of the experiences and people He has brought into our life simply because we moved to DC. We are so grateful for the meaningful friendships, amazing church, and endless opportunities here~as well as the tough lessons God is teaching us, specifically regarding finances and waiting.

The crazy thing is that we only have 2 years left here. Time is ticking and it's ticking quickly. There is still SO much we've yet to experience here in this great city (did you know that DC has 200,000 Ethiopian residents~the largest population in the US...so much of Judah's culture here!)....so it's time to get "crack-a-lackin'" as my niece would say. Jeff and I have a date night this weekend, so I think it's the perfect time to make our "DC Bucket List." Here's to residents masked as tourists until 2014!

Judah this week at one of our favorite summer DC spots..Georgetown waterfront park....love this view of him running full speed with the Kennedy Center in the background