My Little Pet

Everyone knows that babies start out cute. Okay, there may be some mild debate ("little old men"), but they do--they start cute. The fabulous thing, is that they keep getting even cuter!! They go through delightful stages, each more enchanting than the last. Right in between "Baby" and "Miniature Person" (which is my personal favorite) is the one that Little Buddy is in now--"Little Pet".

My Little Buddy Pet just turned one, if you can believe it. Happy Birthday to him!! Let me tell you about him.

Disposition: Happy, playful, cuddly, and a tiny bit of a temper. Laughs spontaneously, smiles to himself when things like thumbs are funny to him, and throws Cheerios (while yelling) when things don't go his way at dinner time.

Modes of Transportation: Crawling, primarily. He also pushes a walker around, cruises around furniture, loves to be carried, strolled, carted. Most recently, firetruck.

Favorite Things to Do: Making messes at blinding speed. Unloading the bookshelves, the pantry,

and drawers with lightning-quick efficiency.

Hobbies also include following Mommy around (sometimes literally biting her ankles), trying to keep up with the big dogs (I mean, kids...), climbing stairs, smiling so big it fills his whole little face, and hassling the vacuum (and panicking when he accidentally starts it).

If I sit down for a nanosecond, Little Buddy crawls into my lap for a snuggle. He eats stray fruit puffs on the floor by his high chair, and loves to be petted and covered in kisses. Possible future occupation: escape artist. If I turn away for a moment during a diaper change, I turn back to see a bare little bottom high-tailing it out of the room.

Vocally Speaking: Volume: Loud

Words: Mama, Dada....and a whole lot of yellin'.

Hours of Operation: 7-9:30 a.m., 11:00 a.m.-1:30 p.m., 3:30-5:00 p.m., 5:30-8:30 p.m.

He will "lay his sweet head down" upon request, loves his white blankie and sleeps with a little stuffed hedgehog.

We celebrated his joining our family ONE YEAR ago with a little family baseball party. He got his first taste of refined sugar (from me, anyway. ....J...sheesh....) and loved it.

We all absolutely adore our sweet boy and feel so very blessed to have his joyful soul in our lives. Here's to you, Little Buddy! We love you a million, billion, zillion.

Life or Blog???

Apparently I've been choosing "Life" lately, because I've certainly been neglecting "Blog". We've been busy, and while I feel the need to record our mischief, I think it'll have to be in bite-sized installments.

So, we went to Utah for my sister's wedding. I thought that a 13 hour road trip would be plenty of fodder for a good post, so I started out by writing quotes down in a little notebook. I didn't get far.

My record in its entirety:

Utah Trip May 1, 2009
"Turn right and continue for 176 miles"--Rosalita, our GPS.

"Son, where's your sandwich? Oh, you're sitting on it. Sure, go
ahead--take a bite."--J to Sam

"Honey, where's your DVD player? Oh, you're sitting on it too?"--Me,
to Sam.

"Well in my world, I envision it to be a very simple task to have us ready
to go the night before a trip. And in my world, I envision it
being somehow impossible for you to do." J--on very dangerous
ground.

"Well. Then the next time we take a trip, why don't you show me just
how simple it can be."--Me, in response.

{After J's observation of my scribbling}

"What are you doing?? Are you writing that down? [Pause]

Sweetheart, I love you. You are the best wife in the world and I
appreciate you so much.

...Memorialize that, chick."

Charming.

We also took a bunch of really fun pictures at Thanksgiving Point and went to the Petting Zoo, which was actually a non-petting zoo, but was fun anyway. The kids rode the horses. Girlie felt the need to rename her horse something "prettier". Wild Man picked a small pony, despite some daring driveway motorcycle riding with his all-too-accommodating Uncle Jared. Little Buddy just sat in his stroller. We did not buy the baby goat that we saw, nor the pirate hat that they were selling in the farm gift shop (because, obviously, where else would one think to look for a pirate hat?), despite some heart-felt pleas.

.

PS: To my friends in Utah ...I love you and I wish I could have seen you. Truly I do. With time split between two families and wedding festivities, it just wasn't possible. I thought of you, and I would LOVE to see you on another trip.

Something I didn't know...

is that I look really, really, really bad when I run. Here is the picture from our race--standing around feeling great about what we just accomplished. I would have put one in that has me actually running, but I looked at the pictures last night and thought "um, yeah, THAT isn't going to happen." For some reason, I looked TERRIBLE in all the pictures during the race. I mean, bad. So bad, in fact, that it had my darling J SHAKING in laughter. Giggling like a school girl. Unable to make coherent sounds because of the laughter. Actual tears filling the corners of his eyes. That bad. I kind of felt like I was 14 again, where you go through that really u-g-l-y (that's a word we spell out and don't say in our house) stage--awkward and just not... good... I kind of want to burn all the pictures of me during that unfortunate-looking stage of life. In my wedding video, very few pictures are of me during this period. It kind of skips over the stage and goes right to senior pictures where, even though now I cringe at the fashion, at least I was hip for the time.

Anyway, I digress. THAT, friends, is why this is the only picture of my race you'll ever see. And why I'm pretty sure I won't be doing another one any time soon.

Happy Mother's Day to Me

I thought I'd share this little book that Girlie made for Mother's Day. There was a page for each sentence and she had filled them out so carefully.

My mom is 303 years old. (I think she meant 30, bless her heart)

My mom's favorite color is pink.

My mom likes to have fun.

My mom makes the best chickinidl. (chicken noodle)

My mom is the queen of cook.

My mom's favorite restaurant is Demes. (Denny's...where I haven't been in years...)

My mom likes it when it is qwiit. (quiet)

My mom can clen fast. (clean fast--at least someone notices)

My mom's favorite TV show is Nit at the Myoseum. (Night at the Museum)

My mom is special because she is prite. (pretty)

The handwriting made it absolutely adorable. It was my very favorite mother's day gift. And, of course, it made me cry. What is it about your kids loving you that just gets you?

I Did It. And I Have the Shirt to Prove It.

[PICTURE TO COME]

So, in case you didn't notice, I took a little time off. A whirlwind trip to Utah for my little sister's wedding. It was fabulous.

While there, another sister talked me into doing Race for the Cure. Me. Had she not been the kindest person on the planet, and had my grandma not survived breast cancer this may not have happened. This ultimate act of betrayal to my friend, Amy. I'm sorry, Amy, and I hope we can still be friends.

You see, I hate running. It's like torture. If you ask me, forget waterboarding, people--make those terrorists RUN. Amy hates running too, and we had a sort of unofficial Moms Against Running club. I feel I sold out.

"It will be fun," said my sister.
"Yeah, and then next year, I'll sign you up for the Craft-a-thon and see how much fun you have," I retorted. But I did it anyway. Also on board were my brother, his wife, and our youngest brother . I only mention that to make you realize the pressure I was under. I've revealed my relationship with sports before--and I've long suffered the sibling teasing from being completely inept.

I know most of my friends are all a little crazy and throw around "carb loading", "10K", and "marathon" like it's nothing. (Amy and I actually refer to those people as "Them"--as in, 'Oh, you're one of Them, are you?) But, baby steps, people. The choice was "One Mile Fun Run" or "5K".

One Mile Fun Run it is.

We started out strong, and besides my crying, I was totally fine. Step aside for just a moment--a reminder of what kind of a race this is. This is for breast cancer. No one is trying to beat each other. People are running with names and pictures attached to their backs of people they love who have battled breast cancer. Like the young solo guy whose sign read "In Memory of My Wife. I love you." and the couple whose signs read "For My Wife. 17 Years!" and "Me. 17 Years!". If any of you know my crying history it will be obvious that I was hiccuping tears the whole time and hoping the huge lump in my throat didn't close off my precious supply of oh-so-very-thin mountain air. And smiling really, really big. (Read the "Crying" post to understand that). There were also packs of people with matching shirts that read "Save the Ta Tas" or "I Love Breasticles" that just made me laugh, and disguised the hiccuping.

I paced myself just fine, until, according to my body, I had gone longer than a mile. My siblings encouraged me, blaming the thin air, etc. That bone in my foot was starting to hurt. Parts of me were jiggling. The ground was getting harder and harder. Energy was actually starting to leak out of me, I could feel it. I insisted that this was no ordinary mile. Then I saw the sign.

"Mile 3"

"HA!!!! I KNEW IT!!! WE TOOK THE WRONG TRACK!!! THIS IS NO 'ONE MILE FUN RUN'!!!" I spent some of my energy jabbing at the sign. The good news was, we were .1 mile from the thick pink finish line. All the cheering people made me cry some more, so I focused hard on the tables of bottled water, bananas and oranges ahead.

As we walked the 4-ish blocks to the car my sister said, "Wasn't that awesome??? Do you want to train for a 1/2 marathon with me?"

It was great. Exhilarating, really. But...um, I think...not. Because, then, I would be one of "them."

PS: I'll post a picture as soon as my brother emails them to me.

It's All in the Presentation

Maybe it's just my kids. Maybe not. They seem to get hurt a lot. Not "big hurt", but a good number of ouchies, boo boos and the such. We figured out a way to soften the impact without coddling them. Spin it. It plays out like this--when one of our little ones has a run in with a wall, floor, dirt, etc, we look completely flabbergasted and ask them why. "Why are you trying to knock that wall down with your head? That is so crazy!" "Why are you trying to put a Sammy-sized hole in my beautiful wood floor?" "Why are you trying to eat your tongue? I gave you some delicious dinner, you know." "Why are you trying to fly off of that chair? Your wings aren't big enough yet, you know." It will stop my child mid-wail and start them laughing. Sometimes they'll even come to me saying through a few tears, "Mommy, I was trying to put a Girlie-boompa sized dent in the sidewalk!" (Bottoms="boompas" in our house) Don't worry, we've discussed safety. Sam-Sam is well aware that "Giwls an mommies an babies aw delicate, an boys an daddies aw tough, but thew heads aw still delicate." But, until those safety lectures are seriously internalized, we'll just keep spinning it.

What a Weekend!!

We are coming off a fabulous weekend!! We went to Skagit Valley for the Tulip Festival. How totally fun is it that there is a whole festival dedicated to one of my favorite flowers??? We also went to Deception Pass State Park, named by the mariners for the "deceiving" positioning of all the little islands and land forms in the pass. This was one of our very favorite Seattle days yet! We finished off the day with enormous ice cream cones from Snowgoose Produce, followed by naps on the way home. Wahoo!!!



This was an absolutely breathtaking sight!! And the smell was intoxicating.






We had so much fun hiking on the rocky beach there, and the kids and J entertained themselves by squishing barnacles (which would then spit at us). Good fun.

For Those Who Have Stuck Admirably to Their New Year's Resolutions, and the Rest of Us

Thought I'd share my favorite repices from each end of the spectrum.

First, Bran Muffins, courtesy of my dear friend and health food GENIUS, LeArta. This recipe makes a VAT of muffin batter, which you can store in the fridge for FIVE WEEKS and bake up muffins when the spirit moves you.

Apple Cinnamon Bran Muffins



Mix and set aside to cool:
4 c All bran cereal
2 c boiling water

Cream together in large bowl:
1 c vegetable oil (I substitute applesauce)
2 1/2 c honey
4 eggs

Add and mix well:
2 T baking soda
2 t salt
4 c buttermilk
cooled bran mixture
7 c whole wheat flour
4 T cinnamon
4 1/2 c finely chopped, peeled apples
2 1/2 t nutmeg
2 1/2 t cloves

Yield: 13 cups batter

Bake at 350 degrees for about 20-25 min.

And now I give you, my favorite

New York Cheesecake (thanks to Martha for this one)


4 T unsalted butter, melted, plus more for pan (I use cooking spray for that)
8 full graham crackers
2 T light brown sugar
3 8 oz bars cream cheese (I always use neufchatel), room temperature
1 3/4 c sugar--divided
1/8 t salt
2 1/2 t vanilla extract--divided
5 large eggs, room temperature
1 pint sour cream (2 cups)

1. Preheat oven to 350. Butter bottom and sides of 9 inch springform pan. In food processor, place graham crackers and brown sugar until finely ground. Add butter and process until moist crumbs form. Press mixture into bottom and 2 inches up side of pan. Set aside.

2. In large bowl, beat cream cheese, 1 1/2 c sugar, salt, and 1 t vanilla until smooth. Add eggs, beating after each one and scraping sides of bowl. Pour filling into pan, bake until center is almost set, about 50 min. Let cool 15 min.

3. Meanwhile, raise temp to 450. In a bowl, combine sour cream, remaining 1/4 c sugar and 1 1/2 t vanilla. After cake has cooled 15 min, spread topping leaving 1/2 inch border. Bake 10 min.

4. Let cool, then refrigerate at least 12 hours. Run a knife around edge of pan before releasing sides.

If you've ever had my cheesecake, this is the recipe I used.

Both of these are so yummy, but the recipes are worthy of a complete read-through before you begin. The cheesecake one, especially takes some pre-planning (room temp ingredients, etc). Let me know how you like them!

The Point Is--

It's finally a little bit warm here in Seattle, so we opened windows. When I caught Girlie and Sam Sam jumping off the Barbie house roof--again--I just had it. {Flashback to the playroom picture, with the Barbie house positioned right by a window} The danger, children!! I marched determinedly in to make my point clear. Into my mind sprung an effective, albeit gruesome, object lesson involving an egg (representing their heads) and gravity (representing gravity). I made them watch as I popped the screen out at the back of the play room, proving just how easily a misstep on the Barbie roof could result in a tumble through the window. I put a pan on the ground outside the window (to catch the mess and ordered them to watch closely. What if this little egg were your head??? Dramatically, I let it plummet to sure death. Okay, this picture is what is was supposed to look like. Instead, the egg missed the pan by a good foot and simply thudded down onto the soft mulch and rolled lazily down the landscaping to a gentle stop. Completely unharmed. The kids just stared. I tried my very best to swallow the guffaw that exploded out. They looked up at me from the patio as I leaned out the window. I didn't know what to do at this point, so I stuck to my guns and pointed emphatically to the peacefully resting egg. Do you see this? Do you want your little heads to end up like this??? I choked back more laughter, because the kids were staring solemnly at this egg, but I could tell they had no idea what was supposed to be so bad. They looked up at me seriously and I had to pull my head in for a minute for my laughter to die down. I'm serious guys, do you want your head to just... be 'rolling' all over the ground like that? Look at that poor egg! I was just dying at this point. I had to exercise some seriously hard core self control to continue my tirade. Well, the point is, that THIS could happen to YOU, if you keep climbing on the Barbie house. You could fall out the window, all the way to the ground. Do you guys understand me?? Wide eyes gravely assured me that they understood, although clearly they had no idea what on earth their zany mama was trying to prove. I brushed the mulch off the serene little egg and my now-dirty pan and tramped sternly back into the house to drive the point home, snorting in laughter the whole way. The point is, I think I just taught my kids how to pop off the screens and throw eggs out the window.

Something Weird Happened to Me

Strangely enough, when I posted last week, my blog was suddenly flooded with hits from around the world. Like, Bulgaria, Germany, South Africa, Canada, New York, etc. Like, we're talking 36 global hits in less than 15 min.

I'm more than delighted to share our life happenings with people I know, or at least people that people I know know, but this kind of weirded me out. So, for about 1/2 an hour, my blog became private. That seemed to take care of the "problem".

However, if, for whatever wacky reason, my blog becomes broadcast to the general online population again, I will consider making it private. In that unfortunate event, I would love to already have everyone's email who'd like an invitation. So, should you care to remain apprised of the goings on here, just leave your email address in the comments or email me at things.mommy@yahoo.com. Thanks!