Kid Conversation

We were trying to get into the spirit of St. Patrick's Day and had green pancakes and The Frog left some evidences of leprechauns in the basement.  (some green and gold beans in a lazy pile)  I wish I had videoed Hazel's wide-eyed reaction.  "Let me see!!!"

On the way to school, we had this conversation:

Me: Do you know what reminds me of leprechauns?  Rumpelstiltskin.
Peach: Do you know what reminds me of leprechauns?  Jesus leprechauns.
Me: What?!
Peach: [in an, this is so obvious tone of voice] Yeah, you know... Jesus Leprechauns!
Me:  No, really, I don't.  What "Jesus Leprechauns"?
Peach: You know... Jesus healed the 10 leprechauns...

Easter

Easter was really fun this year!  The kids are finally old enough to enjoy the egg dyeing (as opposed to The Frog's first Easter, when I ended up sitting alone, dyeing all the eggs myself.  fun.)  I tried to show the kids the trick where you color on the egg in white crayon and then when you dye the egg, the crayon part stays white.  They all took it a step further and colored with all kinds of colors before dying them, which turned out to be a great way for Hazel to be able to participate too.

 Since we have 9am church this year, I made everyone get dressed for church before opening their baskets and searching for eggs.  Here they are waiting for daddy to come down (and I'm sad to say, they didn't actually wait for him all the way.  We didn't realize he had hopped into the shower).

 This is just a funny shot.

 Our kids get super spoiled because they get a basket from the Massachusetts easter bunny and the Utah one :)  Because I know this, I always try to go low-key, but I think I got a bit carried away this year.  on accident.

 The bunny ears and tail were in the dollar section at Target.  I couldn't resist!

 I at the last minute, decided to host Easter for whatever local family didn't already have plans and so my little sister's family and parents came down.

 We took many many photos of all the kids together, and believe it or not, this was the best one.  (If I got a nickel for every photo of my kids with thumbs in their mouths...)

 These little dolls are something I started last year intending to be for easter, but as usual, I had too much going on and I had to bag them for later.  I thought about trying to finish them for Christmas, but all my spare time went to the quilt for my mother-in-law, so I finally got them done in time for Easter this year.  They are topsy-turvy dolls!  One side they look like they're ready for a fancy event, and if you pull their skirt over their head...

 they're dressed in their everyday wear.  I think they turned out so cute!

 The hair is probably my least favorite part... it was annoying to sew and I'm worried it's not going to stay in.  Only time will tell...

Peach wanted to be in the photo once she saw what I was doing.  However, the dolls went into quarantine right after I took these photos because we had just discovered that Peach had LICE.

EW.

It was super disturbing to see those little bugs crawling in her hair, and even MORE disturbing to see how many eggs were in there.  We are so lucky that nobody else seems to have gotten it.  (where SHE got it, I have no idea...)  Needless to say, my spring cleaning got a huge jump-start that day, since I had to wash pretty much everything in the house that could be thrown in the washing machine and vacuumed everything else.

We're still on red-alert around here, but so far so good :)

Sorry to end on such a yucky note.

Valentine's 2014

Yeah, so, this is a bit overdue...

Jay and I actually celebrated our Valentine's Day a week early, at Tuscany (fulfilling a childhood fantasy of mine.  and sadly, is not worth the money.  if you were wondering*) seeing opening night of Ballet West's Sleeping Beauty (SO SO SO AWESOME!  Might be my favorite ballet... so many awesome women's solo parts!).  We've had season tickets for years now #imsoluckymymanlovesballet2 and I still have NO photos of us there together!!  

Tonight!  We're going to Ballet West II's "The Little Mermaid", so hopefully I'll remember to do it!

ANYWAY, the week-early thing is important because we watched my little sister's kids overnight so she and her man could have a special night away for Valentine's.  I had meant to get lots of cute cousinly togetherness photos, but it turns out, there wasn't much time for photos with a 5, 4, 3, 2, and 1 year old to take care of.  It wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be, actually.  But I'm happy to only have 3 bums to wipe every day, instead of 5. :)  (and if my mom hadn't watched their baby, it would have been 6!)

They didn't come over until after lunch, so I tried to make a special breakfast for Jay in the morning.  His all time favorite is Eggs Benedict, and though I've made it many times before, this was definitely the best time yet!  I'll tell you why

1) Homemade English Muffins:

2) Hollandaise sauce recipe from Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking". (which I forgot to write down before returning to the library!  doh!)

3) "Poaching" the eggs in a slow-cooker** made everything SO much less hectic, and I was able to put more attention on the Hollandaise- which actually wasn't that hard!  I can never get the blender method (which is what most scaredy cats recommend to novices so they don't scramble the eggs) to thicken up properly!  Give me a whisk and a pan on the stove and I'm good to go. I like being more in the thick of it when I cook :)

I admit, we eat our Eggs Benedict with bacon.  Not the most traditional, but most excellent. :)  And I cook them the uber-gourmet way: in the microwave, between double paper towels.  In fact, you can see them in the background of this next photo...

and here are my flowers from the Jay :)

Now, if I could only make good rice Krispie treats...

footnotes:  Chris!  How do you do that?
*But Valter's Osteria is worth every penny!  Get the pasta tour, or just get the spinach ravioli or the limoncello angelhair.  My mouth is watering right now thinking about them...

**How to "poach" eggs in a slow-cooker, brought to you by "Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Cookbook ".  Heat about 1 inch of water in the slow-cooker for 20 minutes. Crack each egg into a separate, Pammed, ramekin or small bowl (I could only fit 4 eggs in my slow cooker) and place them in the hot water.  Cook with the lid on until the whites are no longer runny.  (me thinks it was 15-20 minutes?  it's very flexible, the slow-cooking...)

McCarthy Visit!

I wish I would get back on the picture bandwagon...  I'm now remembering how if I want to get one good picture, I need to take 50.  (or maybe just get some skills...) and that completely didn't happen while Jay's family was in town.  

When you're holding a baby with grabby-hands, taking pictures is rather difficult.

Jay's little sister K did a report in school about the Anasazi, and she knew there were some in Utah (I didn't...) and wanted us to make a special trip to see where they lived.  My mother-in-law found a couple of places in Utah we could go- the Anasazi State Park Museum and the Fremont Indian State Park.  I called a guy at the latter to ask about each of them and he said the former was a small outdoor exhibit and the latter was a large indoor museum with a kids' area and a nearby short "hike" with a view of petroglyphs.  

We opted for the second, because it sounded better for our young kids and it was only 2 hours away, vs. almost 4 hours.

It ended up being really cool, and a totally doable day-trip for the kids (surprisingly... I'm not usually so brave to travel that far with them) BUT I somehow didn't realize, until I got there, that the Fremont Indians are NOT Anasazi.  (duh) However, a lot of commentary throughout the museum would compare the Fremont to the Anasazi, so I guess we did learn a bit about both afterall.

 In the kids section, they had a hut mimicking the kind of huts they lived in for kids to play in, with some activities much like their daily activities - weaving for one.  They also had microscopes set up with a lot of pottery, arrowhead, and other samples to look at.

 There was a huge window with a beautiful view of some rocks with petroglyphs on them, but you could also just walk outside and look at them fairly close-up.  The desk had a free guide you could take that would give you more information based on some numbers they had on the (.25 mile) trail.

 I didn't check my camera settings on this next one, so it's way over exposed, but you can kind of see people crawling down into a replica of what their underground huts looked like.  There was also a granary.

 All in all, it was very cool, and worth the $6 per car and 2 hour drive each way.  It also helped that the place was completely empty, until we were about to leave, and so I wasn't worried about my kids disturbing other people.

We ate lots of good food - including convincing the McCarthy's to deviate from their usual Chinese-food-on-New-Years' tradition by introducing K to the wonders of sushi.  (turns out, she's not a fan)  It's funny, they were surprised that we didn't have to order our food in the afternoon.  Apparently, Chinese food on New Years' Eve is a "thing" back East, so you have to plan ahead, or get your food closer to midnight.

 We celebrated the "New Year" at about 6:30 so our kids could go to bed on time. :)  K helped me get the supplies and she thought Silly String was an essential part of the holiday, much to my chagrin and the kids' delight.  ;)

K and I got to spend that entire day shopping together.  It was very fun and made me realize how long it's been since I've been shopping, girls only, without the kids.

K also was begging to go try out the ropes course at Provo Beach Resort, and so I said I'd go with her.

 It's hard to get a sense of what it's like, but you're either 2 or 3 stories up, trying to balance across various obstacles- the whole time being harnased.

 It was pretty fun and not really that scary, except when I tried to walk across things without using my hands-  then, all of a sudden my heart would race and I'd realize how high up I was.

 The kids had to, of course, ride the $1 carousel.  This was Hazel's first time on one.  I couldn't really see her face to tell if she enjoyed it, but she wasn't crying so....

 Peach, on the other hand, LOVED IT and begged for more.

We went swimming a couple of times and not pictured here is our second swimming session cut short because Jay was showing me his "dolphin" and swam across the entire pool underwater, with his eyes closed.  (that last part I didn't know until...)  And he swam straight into the cement side of the pool.  Despite urging from myself and his mom, Jay sided with his dad (also a doctor-phobe) and opted to not get stitches because the idea of spending 8 hours in an emergency room on a Saturday didn't sound fun.  I secured it pretty well with 2 butterfly bandages and he didn't touch it for the whole week he was out of town.  Now there is just a mark... we shall see if it scars or not.

Peach jumping in!

mmmm. chlorine...

As I briefly mentioned a couple of posts ago, we got to spend a couple of extra days with his family because their flight was cancelled due to a major snowstorm in Boston.  As annoying as it is to have a change of plans like that, we were all glad, especially the kids, for a bit more time with Nanie and Gampie :)

Will someone please please remind me to get a group shot of everyone next time we're together?!!

thanks :)

Happy Belated St. Patrick's Day

So, I married into Irish blood (McCarthy, yeah?).  For some reason, now, I feel like St. Patrick's Day should be a bigger deal for our family.  SO, I tried really hard this year to pull off the traditional corned beef & cabbage thing, even though I've never had it in my life...  I also had this "brilliant" breakfast idea.  hahaha.  I think I was the only one who appreciated it.  Do you see the four-leaf clover fried egg?  and toast cut out to be a clover?  (thanks Jay for eating all the kids' crusts.  That would normally be my job, but I can no longer eat butter....) And a green fruit just to top it all off!

 And here's the corned beef & cabbage:

 I admit, I was pleasantly surprised.  For some reason, boiled cabbage sounds so lack-luster and deflated to me.  It's the kind of thing you read about in books that poor people are eating.  (isn't that what Charlie Bucket's family eats every night?)  But I was surprised by how vibrant and pretty the whole thing looked!

I also made "clover" rolls, just because that's how I roll. har har.

I told The Frog that when I was a kid, I tried to always wear underwear that had green on it for the special day, and he thought that was a great idea. :)

Hope you didn't get pinched!

Happy Valentine's Day!

The Frog comes up behind me while I'm perusing Valentine lunch ideas (mostly sandwiches cut out to look like hearts.)
The Frog:  "Mom, when it's a special day, we should have heart pancakes."
me: "okay!"
The Frog: "the kind of heart that's in your body.  A big splot."
me: "okay?"
The Frog:  "But only for a special day."

I at the last second, thought of a way to make our french toast look like hearts by cutting the French Bread on a diagonal and then flipping the other half upside-down.

Valentine French Toast

 This is the first year of the Valentine-for-classmates obligation and this is what I convinced The Frog to do.

 I got the free printable here.

 We had our Family Home Evening Lesson on Love at Home.  We wrote things we love about each family member and these our the extent of our Valentine's decor.

I actually made these red velvet cupcakes for a Chinese New Year celebration we went to (because they're the lucky color- red!) but they feel valentine'sy and they've lasted all the way until today...

 I love it when the kids have loving moments like this :D

 Nothing like bonding over a bag of Doritos on my white, kitchen rug (that I had to wash after this adventure.  Orange hand prints?  Adorable, but not cute on my rug.)

 I spent the afternoon on these for my visiting teaching families.

 And our traditional Valentine's dessert is Jay's favorite- Créme Brûlée.  However, I made myself a special non-dairy one using coconut creme (the solid part from a can of coconut milk) instead of heavy whipping cream.

It was actually pretty good!  It looked exactly like the richer version and MUCH fewer calories.  Though, still didn't have the je ne sais quoi.  (créme brûlée makes me Frenchy, apparently)

I'll for sure be making the regular kind for myself next year.

Happy Valentine's Day!

McCarthy's in Town!

Jay's family came to visit us this year for Thanksgiving, (which was a great excuse to see the new babe :D)  We blessed Hazel while they were here.

Hazel and Auntie K

Hazel and Nanie

 It was so nice to have a big Thanksgiving meal at my house (didn't have to go anywhere) but only make half of it.  Peach wanted to help me make the rolls, and thought it would be a good idea to taste the flour, directly off the counter:

 Gampie got to hold Hazel a lot while Nanie and I worked in the kitchen.

 Jay even helped in the kitchen!! (we had a hard time moving the 20 lb turkey around...)

We decided to start eating while the kids were napping, expecting them to wake up during the meal.  It was really nice to get to sit and eat quietly for the first half of the meal- best idea ever, Jay :)

 We went to the Natural History Museum up by Red Butte Gardens.  It was really cool, but I was in charge of following The Frog around, which means we were basically running through the museum from one thing to the next and I barely had time to take any photos.  But I did manage to get TWO.

 It was really cool.  I'd like to go again, and I was impressed with how kid-friendly and adult catered it was.

 Nanie bought gigantic gingerbread men for everyone to decorate.

The kids were all really into it!  I thought for sure Peach would just eat the candy right away, but to my surprise, she waited until her cookie was "done".

 Here's her finished product:

 And Auntie K's:

 The Frog was very thorough.  He wanted to use up ALL the candy.

 We blessed Hazel the Sunday they were here and though I got no pictures of Hazel in her dress alone, I did manage to sneak in a family photo.  She's wearing the dress Peach was blessed in, the booties I was blessed in, and I made her a new headband, just for her :)

 We had so much fun.  Gampie spent a lot of time reading the SAME Christmas book over and over and over (by the kids' request.)  He's an excellent story teller :)

Thanks for coming out, McCarthy's!  I wish we could get together more frequently, but we'll see you next Summer :)