Friday, October 31, 2008

where is the cooking spray?

Seriously? I am a little bit weird as in Monday is the day that I vacuum my floors upstairs, and Wednesday is the day that I Clean my bathrooms,and Fridays, well that is the day that I clean the basement and do laundry.

While I was upstairs preparing for the loads and loads of laundry to travel downstairs Skyler and Nathan decided to find some trouble, where you ask, well why not torment the fish.

They took cooking spray and thoroughly coated the bowl, and sprayed plenty inside, while in the process managed to spray all of my floors and table. Then just for kicks added chocolate chips and pancakes. That poor fish, I am not sure it will live until tomorrow.

Thursday, October 30, 2008

Turkey...

Jordan wants to have an American thanksgiving because he was away (at a school conference) on Canadian thanksgiving, but I have tons of Turkey in my freezer! We had cook up a gigantic bird (26 lbs) and I have been making my family eat it every other day for weeks, and I still have a way to go!

We have made Turkey Cheese pockets, Turkey Jambalya, Turkey Tetrazini, Turkey Encore, and then today I made loads of Turkey pie filling - resulting in 2 pies, enough to make twice that many more to freeze, and some super cute leaf cracker made from left over pie dough!

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Little buddies

I am actually so excited for the boys to share a room, and we will be moving Ethan in there sometime in the next couple of months (I hope!) Anyways, I walked into Skyler's room today, and they were playing in the firetruck like best buddies, and it made me soo happy!

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Non verbal words

Just because my 16 month old is not verbal in the sense of carrying on a conversation, or telling me what he would like, he certainly has a way of getting his point across. He is a horrible eater, and I fight with him to eat anything besides breakfast (and snacks of course) so I was thrilled when he started eating rice at dinner. I always offer him food hoping one day... Well tonight he ate, and made a mess, but then started fussing, he stood up in his seat, leaned toward the pot of rice - I asked if he wanted more, and took a scoop, and just to make sure that I new what he wanted he jams his fist down onto his plate. He cracks me up!
sorry you have to ignore the snotty nose, he hasn't been feeling up to par lately.

Skyler's Party

So to start things off lets do some clarification I am not creative, in fact I am far from it, I am a class A copycat, and will give credit where credit is deserved! Also, I don't often do just for the heck of it parties for my kids, I go all out on their birthdays, but my husband for some reason loves throwing Halloween parties - he says it is the best holiday to throw a party for. Anyways I go along and totally get stuck on all of the details and trying to make his party the best that it can be. Last year Skyler was terrified of Halloween, but this year he is excited and loves all of the Scary things there are to see, so I decided that he could have a party of his own - I think I will probably let him have one in the future as well, tweaking some things of course and learning from the past.

This year he invited all of his cousins (they are only on one side of the family) and then of course Grandma and Grandpa had to come because they were going to be in Europe on Halloween and not get a chance to see the kids in costumes, and because they were there they were a ton of help! The grand kids all love them!

I am horrible at taking pictures at these kinds of events though because I am the one organizing everything.

We started off with dinner - nothing too festive, just something fast that we could all enjoy so that we would have time for the fun before bed (fresh rolls, crock pot tortellini, Jello Salad, and Strawberry poppy seed salad)

then the fun began, we made witch cupcakes found at Martha Stewart although they have popped up on blogs all over the placethe kids loved making them - Skyler really loved the hair for some reason, and made really hairy witches!

We made Caramel apples, and I would say it is the best way to go about it, we used craft caramels (about 2 cups) with 2 Tbsp of milk, melted them in the microwave and went nuts! Jordan especially likes the Smartie, Caramel combination
We then played Spider web bowling which was so fun, the kids loved it and took turns really well, but I forgot to get a picture of it.

Then we carved the pumpkins, again I only have a picture of our 3 after the fact because I was up to my elbows in Pumpkin guts, and then we decorated Sugar cookies! I did up a few extra plates to take to some neighbors, and it was quite obvious that I had a 3 year old helping, but it was his party after all right?

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Halloween Sugar Cookies

Now that Halloween is getting closer I can indulge in all of the fun activities that I have been eagerly waiting to do with my kids for months now. Today we made Halloween sugar cookies so that we can decorate them for school tomorrow, and Skyler loved it!

I do believe that this is the best sugar cookie recipe ever (ok actually they are called sour cream cookies, and the recipe is not mine, it originally came from a friend Allaina)

anyways I love these because they are always soft and chewey, and are impossible to screw up. I also use wax paper to roll the dough which keeps down on the mess, and keeps the cookies lighter because there is no extra flour


Sour Cream Cookies

1 cup margarine
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
5 cups flour

cream margarine sugar, eggs and sour cream. Add dry ingredients. Mix thouroughly and chill for 1 hour. Bake at 375 for 8 min.

oh, and I love pairing it with this icing

1/2 cup margarine, softened
1 1/2 cups icing sugar
1/4 cup cream cheese
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/8 tsp salt

combine all ingredients, and beat until smooth.

Now I have 6 dozen cookies a very happy boy, and an activity/ snack for school tomorrow which is at my house!

Thursday, October 16, 2008

Tagged

so this is new to me, I have never been tagged in anything, but Kalina tagged me with this little blog game, so here goes.
7 random weird facts about me?

01. I am the only girl out of 5 children, and I now have 2 boys of my own - a life of boys, and I am lovin it!

02. I love reading and can polish off a novel in one day, while running a dayhome (maybe a week for The Work and The Glory which I am re-reading right now)

03. Both of my children were emergency c-sections, and I will never be able to birth a child naturally.

04. I dated my husband before his mission, broke up with his on his mission, and then married him 3 months after he got home...

05. when I am alone with my children (much to their dismay) I often sing at the top of my lungs

06. If I try to watch a movie at night - I fall asleep. It doesn't matter which movie, for this reason sometimes my husband relents and lets me pick a chick flick because he knows that I will be asleep in 20 minutes.

07. I am a copy cat - there is very little that I do that has not been fostered by someone else. I have very few original ideas of my own, but love the internet for making me feel able, and talented at times as well.

ok, now to tag 7 other people. Here goes

Liam Craig

Kristy Stanford


Tanis Anderson

Amanda Thompson

Keshia Larsen


Meghann Clements

Kari-lynn Bezooyen

wow, I actually feel bad tagging people, I think I am going to turn out to be one of those horrible people who let these things die. Fun to read interesting things about others but...

Saturday, October 11, 2008

Thankful

so sometimes there are those days where nothing seems to be going right. The day starts off with your son getting grease stains all over the front of his shirt - when there are family photos planned for later that day. Feeling like you are the last to be informed about anything because your husband is a man- isn't it supposed to be that way?? It is not his fault that he is a boy right??? with 3 sisters, we do seem to be the last to find out about everything, and today it was getting to me. My parents are on a cruise on the other side of the world Yay them - except they have asked me to watch their home where 3 of my brothers are living, and help them to follow the rules laid out. A big confrontation occurred where I am called all kinds of nasty names that I chose not to repeat, oh and I was told that I am hated and dead to them. If that isn't a warm fuzzy then I don't know what is. Walking to my home from my parents place I cried, I cried really hard. I love my brothers - all of them. Faults and all. I am not perfect, and my shortcomings are in my face every day. I came home to my family, my sweet husband, and my 2 little boys, and I feel THANKFUL! I don't feel sorry for myself, or frustrated or upset with anyone. I feel grateful. My boys knowing that it was cold outside, and a small portion of the confrontation from when they dropped me off had turned my bathroom into something similar to thisI had candles all around the room, soft music and a hot bath filled just for me. I am so thankful for perspective, for my children and for my wonderful husband. Life is good!

Tuesday, October 7, 2008

You don't know what you got till it's gone...

ok, so I have been babysitting kids part time for several months, and then a couple of weeks ago I started 2 kids full time. Jordan is still in school (finishing up his Masters this year) and we do need the money, or we could live in a cardboard box and save the mortgage payment... tempting sometimes. Anyways I feel like I am locked up! I no longer have the freedom to take my kids to the mall to see Clifford if I hear last minute that he is visiting, or to go to the Zoo on a whim because it is a beautiful day. I can't even go to playgroup with the other ladies in the ward because I have 4 children under 4 that I deal with every day. Really as far as children go, they are some of the easiest children to take care of, but I miss my freedom...