A Refreshing Weekend

It's always such a treat to buzz up a mere 2.5 hours to my parent's house for a weekend. They live on 15 acres of hills, prairie, and woods. What a perfect mix, eh? We were hoping to go up this weekend and enjoy the warm spring air, sit on the various porches/decks while sipping coffee, and play outside without getting bundled. Alas, the weather turned and it was cold, windy and it even snowed a little. Oh well.

We still had a great time. Ben spent a good chunk outside throwing the ball for Maggie (a non-stop border collie) and playing tractor with my dad. Marc and I were able to get a few walks in by ourselves and take a little time to breathe easy. My dad topped off the weekend with a cozy meal and kept a fire crackling.

Ahhh...

Muesli

This is a recipe I wanted to share that I made recently. While I was in VS in Washington, DC, my housemate enlightened us about this wonderful cereal that she learned to make while spending a year in Germany. It makes a TON and it's SO GOOD (and good for you! HOLY FIBER!!!)! I'm trying to get more creative with this recipe and I think next time I'm going to substitute the mini chocolate chips (GASP!) for dried blueberries or something of that nature. One thing that I enjoy about the process of making this cereal is when I go to the co-op and spend some serious time in the bulk section collecting a cup of this and a cup of that. I find it fun!

Here's the extensive list of ingredients:

12c quick oats (toast for about 10 minutes)
2 c steel cut oats (again, toast 10 minutes)
2 c mini chocolate chips (I used dark chocolate regular-sized chips and ground the chips to make them smaller)
1 c sunflower seeds
1 c peanuts
1/2 c almonds, chopped
1 c sesame seeds
1 c flax seeds
1 c toasted soy beans
1 c wheat germ
1 c wheat bran
4-6 c grape nuts cereal

Mix it all together.

Seriously, this will last for-EVER!

Bike Season

This spring and summer are going to be MUCH different than last year in terms of Ben's ability to play and move around. Recently, Ben has taken a real liking to his bike that we got for him last August for his first birthday. Over the year, he would sit on it and ring the bell, but didn't REALLY get into it like we thought he would. His cousin actually took much more interest in it and she's much too big for it, but Ben had fun chasing her around the house, nonetheless. Hey, whatever! Just a different kind of fun with the bike, right?

Now that it's (dare I say) summer-like out, Ben has discovered the joy of having a bike. Not only does he pretty much obsess being outdoors with it, he has mastered his footwork, turning corners, and ringing his bell to tell the cat to get out of the way! Needless to say, this is all quite entertaining! All we need to master next is the concept of breaking.

(By the way, Ben insisted on wearing his winter hat during the shorts-wearing day! Needless to say, he played so hard that he soon took it off. We were just amused that he wanted it on to begin with... of course.)

Thank goodness for spring, eh?

Winter up here in these northern states get to be a bit intense. However, this past winter seriously has to have been the worst. Winter. Ever. Oh my. It brought everything and stayed for a long, long time. Here's just a little taste of what we experienced: 25+ inches of snow OVER our snowfall record last made in 1978 (!!!), every kind of flu/cold/what-have-you entered this house, passed around to friends and family and back again to us, CABIN FEVER, really cold temperatures, everlasting icy roads and sidewalks (you know it's been a long winter when slipping on the road while driving feels a bit too natural), and overwhelming amounts of sad events in people's lives in all of my various communities, to top it off. This was a hard winter to process on so many different levels. I should mention, though, that there were good bits of news of a few babies that were born and they helped bring in some hopeful light to this long winter.

But, we survived! We supported each other with phone calls, sending flowers, having baby showers, hosting dinners, coffee dates, and much, much more. There's still a bit of darkness lingering, but with this warm(er) weather and new life sprouting around us brings me a feeling of hope and fresh starts to a brighter season. There are weddings to look forward to, babies to welcome, a new house to move into, Saturday morning farmers market, getting more involved with our community, ... the list goes on! It is finally warm enough that the windows are open, the heat turned off (during the day), the grass is working on turning green, the trees are budding, the crocuses are out (that Ben so happily stomped on when I was just out of arms-reach ... oops!), and we are spending every moment that we can outdoors playing.

Spring has never felt so good!

"Do you want to help Dada with the doo-doos?"

Sometimes when I'm talking to Ben and speaking his language, I often stop and giggle to myself at the words that come out of my mouth. Like, "Do you want to help Dada with the doo-doos?" (Translation: "Do you want to help Daddy with the dishes?")

Ben's language has been a treat to watch develop, especially over the last couple of months. It really amazes me at how young children pick up so many new sounds and learn the meaning of words in such a short amount of time. It's a real bummer that your peak learning time for languages is from birth through age 7 (or something like that). There are those people who learn languages really easily (like Marc), and those that don't (like me).

When I was teaching in DC, over half of my students parents spoke Spanish and very little English. Where they were with their English, was where I was with Spanish. HA! Oh, the "conversations" we'd have! When we were getting to know each other and I would speak a little Spanish, they would think that I was fluent and they'd start telling me stories and Lordy-knows-what since I really couldn't understand. I concentrated so hard, trying to understand, nodding as if I was really understanding and only able to identify a few words in their whole story. Oh. My. Gosh. I felt foolish telling them after their long story, "Lo siento, pero hablo un POCO Espanol!" ("I'm sorry, but I speak a little Spanish!"). We would always laugh and then ask their child to help translate for us both.

This system worked most of the time. Every now and then, with the more challenging students, I never knew if they were REALLY telling their parents (or grandparents) what I was really saying. I totally relied on their reactions. I had a student from Albania, who lived with his grandmother, aunt and uncle. To his credit, he came to the school in kindergarten and didn't know any English. He was pretty much fluent and thriving in all subjects by the time I had him in third grade. However, he was a nix-noox, always getting under other kids' skin, bragging about his good grades, needing to always be first in whatever we were doing, and always making up stories (and being the gullible teacher I was, had a hard time with this). He was a real piece of work! His grandmother came to pick him up every day and we had to have a "conversation" about how his behavior was during the day. She spoke NO English and only understood the daily color behavior chart that the school implemented. I just hoped every day that this boy would get all greens so that his grandmother would be happy and I didn't have to exhaust myself trying to explain, with this boy's "translating" to boot. It totally didn't help matters that Albanian was a pretty rare language spoken in DC. Oh, he was a piece of work!

Well anyway... back to the original story... Here is Ben doing the doo-doos with his Dada.

Getting Nosey

Lately, Ben has been getting a kick out of touching his nose to someone else's. Yesterday morning, he woke up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at 6 am and wanted to play "nose-to-nose" with us. Obviously at that hour, we were not in the mood to play this cute game, but of course we did anyway. He went in between Marc and I a few times, giggling in between, touching his nose to ours ever so gently. It's actually quite a hoot since he giggles up until he puts his nose to yours. Then, he gets very still, serious and a little cross-eyed. Sometimes we put him on the table and he makes the rounds with whoever is there.

We love this game... just not at 6 am.

Just a Little of Each

A few sips of this, plus...

a bite of that; equals a happy mama and wife!

(Not to mention the boys are out entertaining themselves elsewhere for a few hours... and I can just walk down the road to get my Swiss chocolate! Who needs to go to Europe anymore to get the good stuff?)

This boy...

eats his spaghetti ...

one noodle ...

at a time.

Crustless Tex-Mex Meatloaf Cheddar Pie

It's not a secret that my family loves food. We obsess about it, really. When we're enjoying one meal, we're talking about what's going to be prepared for the next. When we go on trips, the most important decision to make is where we're going to eat. When we go to a favorite restaurant, we order the same thing. Every. Time. It's bad! Real bad!

Not only do we get into the food itself, but we have heirloom serving dishes and real silverware bought from somewhere across seas way back when that we inherited from extended family who have passed on. This family has loved eating for many generations! (Okay, so we don't eat this fancy all the time, just for special occasions)

Needless to say, cooking is definitely a hobby of mine that I inherited from my dad. My grandmother can't quite figure it out since she spent a good portion of her life keeping busy with feeding 8 mouths, including herself. I'm thinking it's a generational thing since I have the luxury of being home, with one young child, and have time on my hands to prepare fresh, healthy meals. There are many more factors that would play into this, I know, but I grew up in a family where meals were fun to make and we have a great appreciation for all the creativity out there for it.

So, without further ado, here is a recipe I'd like to share. It's from "Everyday With Rachael Ray." Some folks have a love/hate relationship with her, I know. I'm not crazy about all her lingo, but I am crazy about her creativity, level of fresh ingredients, and overall really flavorful meals! I made this the other night and thought it was worthy of passing on.

16 oz jar of fired-roasted red peppers, drained split, and seeded
12 oz (3 cups) shredded Mexican cheese blend (I used the 4 cheese blend, without the seasoning)
1.5 lb ground lean beef
16 oz jar chunky salsa
1 cup bread crumbs
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1/3 cup chopped flat-leaf parsley
3/4 tsp salt
3/4 tsp pepper

1. Preheat oven to 375. Grease a 10" pie pan with a light coat of olive oil and line with red peppers.
2. Scatter 1 cup of cheese on top.
3. In a bowl, mix 1 cup of cheese, beef, 3/4 cup salsa, bread crumbs, eggs, parsley, salt, and pepper until just combined.
4. Press into the pepper/cheese-lined pie plate. Spread the remaining salsa on top. Bake for 35 minutes.
5. Spread the rest of the cheese on top and bake another 10-15 minutes.
6. Let cool for 15 minutes before serving.

IT'S SO GOOD!!!

Side note: If you actually look this up online (www.everydaywithrachaelraymag.com), it tells you to bake it in less time. I think they made a mistake, because there is no way this would be fully cooked with the amount of time they tell you.

Little Bread Helper

Today is a cold, dreary April day and Ben and I made oatmeal cranberry bread this afternoon, breaking out his new apron his PA Grandma made for him. He loves to help me in my cooking projects, especially when it consists of soft, gooey, play-doh-like material that he can dig his little paws into. He also likes to play with the leftover flour on the counter and snack on little bits of dough left behind. There was a good chunk left that he snarfed down before I could clean it up. I'm hoping there aren't any tummy aches later this evening!

Baby Lamb

Out of all the stuffed animals and dolls that Ben has to choose from, his current favorite "baby" is a lamb wearing a cardigan. He rocks the lamb and talks quietly to it as if it's about to go to sleep. It's really dear to watch!

Today, Ben comes up to me with his diaper wipes box and says in a softer voice in some baby mumble I wish I could actually spell out and I suggest that we go change his diaper. Well, when we got to the bathroom, not only had Ben gotten out his diaper pad and had the wipes in hand ready to go, but who else was ready for the diaper change on the pad but Baby Lamb? I just about fell over, it was so darn cute! (Okay, you know it's your kid when you think anything he does is that cute!) I opened up the wipes box, Ben took out a wipe and wiped Baby Lamb's bottom. I helped put a diaper on and off he went to sooth his baby and rock.

(And just a few moments after rocking his baby, he was busy banging on the wall with his hammer... these sweet moments don't last forever!)

Here goes nothin'!

Hey there folks! Due to a push or two from bloggers I know, I'm starting my own blog. I'm hoping this will be a fun outlet during my days at home with Ben where I can record the many things we do together. This may include a variety of things: going to the library, co-op, friends' houses, bike rides, reading "Babybug," changing baby lamb's diaper (seriously), etc. Those of you who have (or had) a toddler know how this stage in their lives provide constant entertainment on so many different levels. There are so many things that he's doing these days that I want to remember, this might be the best way for me to do just that.

So, here I go! Happy reading!