Three Months Old.

Ryan is 

months old!

I fail. I neglected to take these pictures sooner... so he is really about 3 1/2 months... but oh well! 

THREE MONTH STATS:

11lbs, 8oz
25 1/2" long 

(that's 4" since birth and 1 1/2" in a month!)

english muffins.

English muffins are one of my favorite breakfast foods. And lunch foods. And dinner foods. You can do so many different things with them! You can make...

...an egg sandwich with ham

...a mini pizza 

...toasted PB and J

...or just eat it with butter and jam

...plus a million other things, I'm sure. But those are my favorite. :]

Between Jake and I, we go through quite a few English muffins. We usually just get the cheap-o ones at Aldi, but if we feel like "splurging," we buy the Thomas' ones. 

Source

They are SO GOOD. But... we don't have have the money to splurge on things like English muffins every time, and the cheap-o ones aren't AS good. So I decided to try making our own. It was super easy, and the ingredients are fairly common in most kitchens... so I encourage you to give it a try!

I used the recipe from the Pioneer Woman's recipe blog.

ENGLISH MUFFINS.

• 1 cup Milk
• 3 Tablespoons Butter
• 2 Tablespoons Honey
• 1 cup Warm Water
• ¼ ounces, weight Yeast
• ¼ cups Cornmeal
• 5-½ cups Flour
• 1 teaspoon Salt

Combine milk, butter, and honey in a saucepan over medium heat. Warm until butter starts to melt, then whisk briefly. Remove pan from heat and allow liquid to cool to lukewarm.

Pour water into a mixing bowl and sprinkle with yeast. Stir gently with a fork. Set bowl aside for 10 minutes, or until yeast has dissolved.

Line baking sheets with waxed paper and sprinkle with a generous amount of cornmeal. (Note from me: when she says a "generous" amount, she means it. I didn't put enough cornmeal down and my muffins stuck, hence the fingerprint indentations on most of my muffins. And, bonus! You can re-use the leftover cornmeal that DOESN'T stick to the muffins, so go ahead and put a bunch down.)

Pour cooled milk mixture into yeast mixture and gently stir until well blended. Add 3 cups flour and beat vigorously with a wooden spoon until smooth. Beat in remaining flour and salt until the dough is no longer sticky. Scrape the dough onto a floured surface and dust with flour. Flour hands and knead dough for 3-4 minutes. Let rest 5 minutes.

Roll out dough with rolling pin to about 1/2 inch thick. Cut the dough into circles (a tumbler or mason jar does well). Transfer muffins to prepared baking sheets and sprinkle with cornmeal. Cover with a dry, lightweight towel and let rise until doubled in height, 35-45 minutes.

When muffins have risen, heat a skillet over medium heat. Carefully lift muffins from the pan and place on the ungreased skillet. Cook about 10 minutes on each side, using a spatula to flip them. Transfer to a wire rack to cool before splitting (with a fork) and toasting them.

Here is how mine turned out! I will definitely be making them again. 

SMILES.

Ryan decided last week that he doesn't like laying on the floor when I am "doing" things. He'd much rather be sitting up, around our level, and watching everything that is going on. So, I brought out the highchair... and he loves it! He can sit up pretty welll; with help, obviously... but the Bumbo seat doesn't hold him up too well because his butt is on the smaller side so he just slides around in it. The highchair works great! I had to laugh at myself because of all the straps that come with the highchair... I kept thinking that with my (hypothetical) next child(ren), I probably won't even think to strap them in... but it's just the over-cautious first-child syndrome. Ha. 

[ryan loves his lion from grandma.]

Ryan also "discovered" himself in the mirror recently. I had him sitting in the bathroom with me and, at first glance, he seemed to not really know what to think about the little person in the mirror... but he quickly warmed up to his new "friend."

In other news... we are still house hunting. It's a tiring process! But the Lord will lead us to the right house in His time... we are just trusting in that fact right now.

We've also been attending Grace Community Bible Church, a church plant that meets in Lakeville. Wow... what a Body. Such encouragement, such accountability... it's really awesome. The ladies recently held a shower for me and Ryan; it was such a blessing and I felt so loved and welcomed. We are going through the membership class and will have an interview before we are officially members.

I definitely don't miss the snow, but I'm not a fan of hot weather, either... I'd rather it be fall all year long! Our car does not have air conditioning, and from the beginning I've noticed that Ryan is definitely a sweat-er... those two things definitely do not mix, so we're hoping to be able to find a car. We need one that has A/C and is a little bigger, so the car seat can fit behind the passenger seat without it being moved up all the way and I can sit up in the front with Jake.

Hopefully I will be able to take some 3 month pictures soon... I can't believe he is 3 months old (and then some) already... time flies. *sniffle*

granola.

I had been wanting to make granola for a long time... so this week, I finally did it. And oh my goodness, is it DELICIOUS! It's sweet and crunchy and full of all sorts of yummy things. I kinda-sorta followed a recipe, but like I do with most recipes, I substitute things I don't have (or don't like!) with things I do have (and like!). I don't typically measure these added/substituted ingredients, so you'll have to guess at how much a 'handful' and stuff means. Ha.

Here's the recipe!!

Preheat oven to 250 degrees.

Combine in a large mixing bowl:

2 cups whole wheat flour
6 cups rolled oats
1 cup coconut
1 cup wheat germ

Then blend together in a separate bowl:

1/2 cup water
1 cup oil
1 cup honey
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 tablespoon salt

Add blended liquids to dry ingredients and mix well. Spread out on two ungreased baking sheets and bake for an hour or until dry and golden.


My substitutions?

I only made half of the recipe, because I didn't have enough oatmeal at the time. It's probably a good thing, too, because this makes a LOT of granola!! I don't like coconut, which is probably why I don't have any, so I omitted it. I also didn't have any wheat germ at the time (but I do now!) so I left that out as well. I didn't use as much oil, and used half of the honey and added maple syrup to make the difference. I also added a handful of chopped walnuts, a lot of sunflower seeds, and bunch of flax seeds... I don't remember what else; I just threw in whatever sounded good!

My favorite thing to eat the granola with right now is greek yogurt (which I'm going to attempt to make sometime soon) and strawberries. MMMM...