Sweetest Things

Sometimes I think D is such a "wild child", a trouble-maker, or his name should be D for Destruct-o! But all that aside he really is a sweetheart, a snuggler, a hugger, a smoocher, and he says the sweetest things right now.

"Mommy, I like you and I love you"
"I love you every day!"
"No leave, I keep you forever"
"No, I kiss you mouth!" that always makes me laugh, he will hold your face and make you kiss his mouth, the cheek is not acceptable

This is his "I'm Sorry" hug for Cali after hitting her in the head with a large roll of packing tape. Twenty minutes prior he threw a juice cup at her head. Yes, he's all boy, but a loving boy at least.

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My friend Vanessa finally convinced me to try carving something other than a simple jack-o-lantern face this year. Her family makes these amazing themed pumpkins every year, things like Buzz Lightyear, a Cowboys' football helmet, and Thomas the Train. It's very impressive. She's been trying to convince me that it's not really that hard and sent me this link for a Snow White design. I did have those two pumpkins the kids' already painted and nothing important to do this afternoon so I went ahead and gave it a try. Diego picked out a really cute spider design for his and it looked easier so I did that one first.

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Are you the Mom who's always taking pictures and look back only to realize you aren't IN any of them? Do your kids look through photo albums and ask "Where were you Mommy?" Well, Carin over at Forever in Blue Jeans decided to change all that and challenges any one who's interested to do the same. So hand over the camera, or at least figure out the self-timer and get on the other side of the lens more often. Post your photos of you enjoying time with your family every Thursday and share the link with other Mom's by posting it on Carin's blog. You can start any time with week 1 of 52, don't worry about being "behind" just jump on in.

Halloween Past

This photo always makes me laugh. Someone gave me this elephant costume way back before I was even married or had kids! They just knew I loved elephants and thought I might like to have it "some day". Unfortunately neither of my kids were the right size at the right time, but I tried it on D that year anyway. It was size 3-6 months but he was a big 8 month old. Cali thought it was hilarious and couldn't stop laughing hysterically. Her spider costume was borrowed from a friend and it was a perfect choice for that year. D went as a "soccer player" instead of the too-small elephant.

Join the carnival over at Seven Clown Circus this week for your chance to win a Flip camera!

Scrap Night

I can't recall quite when it started but I know its been at least a year, maybe two that I've had a weekly scrap night with friends. Fantastic motivation to scrap at least once a week and of course a great source of some much-needed, grown-up, adult, girl talk!

Sometimes we talk more than scrap, but this week I was really on a roll... maybe it helped I worked on some little bitty 6x6 pages and also that I always find a great sketch at 52 Sketches to work with but I got 4 pages done!


Sketch #12 from 52 Sketches, to go with the 6x6 "Photography 101" layout posted just prior to this.

A 12x12 of sketch #36 from 52 Sketches. Vanessa said I could have this journal tag and I immediately thought of these pictures to go with it.

I still had some time so I flipped through some pictures until I found some that caught my eye and created two more 6x6 pages. I've always loved this picture of D. So much so that it was even on our Christmas cards last year.

Photography 101

Been waiting all day to do this sketch, especially since I got a few new sheets of paper today. This photo was taken by her friend Zander (age 3) when we let them both play with our cameras at the park one day. Used Sketch #43 from 52 Sketches... 52 Weeks. This is a 6"x6" layout.

Pear Sauce (version 2)

A while ago we made Pear Sauce and it turned out really yummy. Today I had two pears and one apple that really needed to be used so I came up with this version.

1 apple peeled and chopped
microwave on high two minutes with a splash of cranberry juice
peel and chop 2 pears, sprinkle generously with cinnamon
mix with apples and microwave on high 1 more minute, smash & mix it up
you can eat it warm or cooled off

I have a microwave steam cooker from Pampered Chef that I use.

Cattle Drive on Main St

As part of the Founders' Day events, this little town had a cattle drive down Main Street. I told the kids we were going to see "Real Cowboys" and we invited our little friend along too.

Halloween Preview

Pumpkin Patch Faves

We always take a little roadtrip in the fall to visit our very favorite pumpkin patch. This year we waited 'til Granny & Papa came to visit and took them right away the first day after they arrived. The weather was just right, it had stopped raining earlier in the week so it wasn't even muddy.

This year D absolutely loved the corn maze, was very impressed with Papa's ability to catch the giant grasshoppers we found in there, thought it was hilarious to share his milk with the goats, and showed his continued love of donkeys by kissing one right on the nose!

Cali insisted on doing the hayride first, then spent a lot of her time feeding branches full of leaves to the goats, and even though the farm had run out of their amazing homemade pumpkin ice cream the berry berry flavor is almost as good and she finally agreed to share a bite with Granny and me.

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Sorry, I really didn't fall off the Earth. I just had my parents visiting for three days so I was on a computer hiatus while enjoying their company. First morning after they arrived we went straight to the pumpkin patch. It was a beautiful day and I took 139 pictures, will post a few more as I get a chance.

*************************************************************************************
Are you the Mom who's always taking pictures and look back only to realize you aren't IN any of them? Do your kids look through photo albums and ask "Where were you Mommy?" Well, Carin over at Forever in Blue Jeans decided to change all that and challenges any one who's interested to do the same. So hand over the camera, or at least figure out the self-timer and get on the other side of the lens more often. Post your photos of you enjoying time with your family every Thursday and share the link with other Mom's by posting it on Carin's blog. You can start any time with week 1 of 52, don't worry about being "behind" just jump on in.

HUEY

All of a sudden Cali decided she wants to write.. letters, numbers, names, words. She doesn't want help either. She'll ask me what letter comes next or ask me to show her a letter she's never tried before. Like "Y" today. She did this and several more pages while riding in the car today, and even at the store. She was walking around with a pencil and notebook in the grocery store, I had to remind her to look where she was going.

The "mini" Mini

I was inspired by this tutorial last night and whipped up this little book about our trip to NC back in July. Little books like this are really fun to make for kids too and let them fill it in as they like.

Painting Pumpkins

We've learned from past years that carving pumpkins holds the kids' interest for all of 2 minutes, especially since they don't get to do the actual carving. So this year we went for painting their pumpkins instead. This is just step one... putting on a nice base coat of "real" (aka not washable) paint, later we added glitter paint and tomorrow they'll be able to add stickers.

Wontons & Pineapple

Tried two new recipes for dinner. Loved them both (and the kids did too!) so I wanted to share. I absolutely love this Robin Miller Quick Fix Meals cookbook my brother sent for my birthday. I've tried so many recipes already and dog-eared about half the pages for others I still want to make.


Wonton Soup

6 cups reduced sodium chicken broth
1 tbsp toasted sesame oil
1 cup shredded coleslaw mix
1 cup shredded leftover pork (or other meat you have handy)
1 tbsp reduced sodium soy sauce
24 wonton wrappers
1/4cup chopped scallions

Heat oil in large skillet over medium heat, add coleslaw mix and stir 1 minute. Add pork and soy sauce, stirring for 2 minutes. Remove from heat. For each wonton wrapper put 1 tsp filling in center, wet edges of wrapper with finger dipped in water and pinch together forming a "beggar's purse". Once wontons are made, bring chicken broth to a simmer, add wontons and cook about 5 minutes until wontons are soft and translucent. Top with scallions.



Brown Sugar-Glazed Pineapple w/ Toasted Coconut
(you can probably make this faster than you can say it)
Measurements depend how much you're making so I'll just give you the basic idea...

place slices of canned pineapple rings on a baking sheet
sprinkle with brown sugar
top with sweetened coconut

bake at 375*F for 10 min

top with cool whip or vanilla ice cream

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Spent 5 hours at the "jumpy place", then went to the Circus right at their usual bedtime. Can you tell we are tired? So much fun though, we were all impressed with a lot of the stunts.

*************************************************************************************
Are you the Mom who's always taking pictures and look back only to realize you aren't IN any of them? Do your kids look through photo albums and ask "Where were you Mommy?" Well, Carin over at Forever in Blue Jeans decided to change all that and challenges any one who's interested to do the same. So hand over the camera, or at least figure out the self-timer and get on the other side of the lens more often. Post your photos of you enjoying time with your family every Thursday and share the link with other Mom's by posting it on Carin's blog. You can start any time with week 1 of 52, don't worry about being "behind" just jump on in.

Quotes of the Day

Cali came out from "nap" to find me mopping the kitchen. She said...
"Wow, mommy you are so good at cleaning... you're a hero!"

At dinner I had a cup of juice with ice in it...
Diego: What's in that?
Me: Ice
Diego: Oh, I eat you ice?
Me: No, you can't eat my ice. Eat your eggs.
Diego: I eat you ice?
Me: No, eat your eggs... pretend its ice.
Diego: Oh, ok. (starts eating eggs with hands)
Me: Diego, use your fork please
Diego: I no eat ice with fork!

Day Out w/ Thomas

Made an impromptu trip to visit Thomas over the weekend. Drove about an hour only for it to start raining 10 min before we got there. I checked the forecast, it just said cloudy. We headed for the craft tent first...


then as D posed for pictures Thomas came pulling into the station! I hadn't told them about Thomas being there so it was fun to see their surprise.


Found another tent with clowns making balloon animals. Cali got a pink unicorn and D a Spiderman "watch", lots of smiles over that.

After listening to a storytime we stopped in the gift shop and were about to buy a whistle and couple books when Cali threw a giant fit over wanting the book D was holding. That is so unlike her and completely unacceptable so we put everything down and walked out. After giving Cali a firm talking to and D asking "my book?" I realized he had done no wrong so we went back for his book then quickly left for home. We'd all had enough of the chilly rain and I'd definitely had enough of the fussy whiny kids. But on the way out Thomas pulled in again so I had them pose, grumpy faces and all.