Tuesday, February 19, 2008

I'm a Copycat

Okay. I know I'm a copycat...taking ideas from my friends, Denise and Ashby. But I'm the kind of person who needs ideas...
and motivation. So I'm going to try to post some of my scrapbook pages on here at least once a week...hoping that it will get me moving in the right direction on keeping up with my kajillions of photos. Getting caught up is not even something I can dream about at this point (12 years of photos before digital camera is a little intimidating), but progress has to start somewhere.

Please feel free to bug me if I start to slacken and forget to post one weekly.

Denise and Ashby...thanks for the inspiration . :)

Friday, February 15, 2008

Actual conversation with Ellie this morning.

Me: Hey Ellie, what do you do with your eyes?

Ellie: See fings. (things)

Me: What do you do with your nose?

Ellie: Mell (smell) things like stinky diapers and cookies.

Me: What is your tongue for?

Ellie: For eating food.

Me: What are your ears for?

Ellie: For getting wax out of.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

California Dreaming...

This is what it looks like outside our window today...a good old-fashioned ice/freezing rain storm.


But this is life inside our house. The girls got out the beach towels and water toys, put on their swimsuits, and "played beach".


They even took turns being the life guard to save people who were in "trouble"...you know drowning in the mess in the playroom!

Monday, February 11, 2008

One of our favorite winter meals...

This is one of the few meals that passes muster with every single person in our family...

Potato Soup


6 cups water
6 chicken bouillon cubes
4 large potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 large onion, diced
2 carrots (or one sweet potato), cubed
1 Tbs. parsley
3 cloves garlic, pressed

Saute onion and garlic in 1 Tbs. oil for 2 minutes. Then combine with the remainder of above ingredients and simmer until the vegetables are soft.

Keeping the heat at low, add:
2 cups half & half (I usually use milk, since I rarely have half and half around)

Make a roux with:
1/3 cup butter
2/3 cup flour (I often use whole wheat flour)

Spoon some of the hot liquid from the vegetable/cream mixture and mix slowly with the roux until it thickens and is smooth. Add roux to soup while stirring quickly. Heat for another 2 minutes. Serve hot inside of bread bowls. Garnish with shredded cheddar cheese and bacon bits.

Bread Bowls

1 Tbs. yeast
1-1/2 cup lukewarm water
1 tsp. sugar
2 tsp. salt
4-5 cups flour

Dissolve yeast in 1/2 cup lukewarm water. Combine in one large bowl the remainder of the water, sugar, salt, and yeast mixture. Add just enough flour until dough is stiff enough to handle. Knead well (in Kitchen-Aid of course). Cover and let rise for 1 hour (I'm usually in too big of a hurry, so I skip this step).

Then divide dough into 6-8 sections and form into round shape. Place on greased baking sheet sprinkled with cornmeal and allow to rise about 1/2 hour. Before baking, generously brush each bread bowl with an egg white mixed with 1 Tbs. warm water. Bake at 425° for about 20 minutes or until golden.

When they are finished baking, cut a shape off the top of each one (making a lid). Then scoop out the soft part with a spoon reserving it for dipping in the soup if desired.

Enjoy!

Saturday, February 9, 2008

Preteen Craziness!

Glen and I have always been a little behind the times as far as modern conveniences go. Over the last couple of years we've slowly made some progress in this regard, with some of the advances more welcomed than others. The arrival of a DirecTV satellite dish to our house was widely loved by all (except for me, who thinks we've all put on a few pounds since its debut).

With this new technology, our kids were introduced to previously unknown shows like Suite Life of Zach & Cody, Cory in the House, That's So Raven, Drake & Josh, .. and their favorite (and mine, I must admit)...

...Hannah Montana.



So when we heard about the new 3D Hannah Montana movie they were only showing for a couple of weekends, the girls could talk about little else...so we did what any softy parents of three girls would do...

left Spencer at a friend's house, loaded three more friends into the car (you don't want to count kids vs. seatbelts), and headed to the local theater.

Emptied our wallets and put on our super expensive 3D glasses (the only logical explanation for the $6.50 higher price per ticket!)

I guess I should've done my research better, as I'd expected the movie to be an extension of some of the cute plots and characters from the Disney show, which I must admit I enjoy watching. But after an ear-splitting hour and a half of a plotless movie that was supposed to imitate a Hannah Montana concert with hordes of screaming pre-teen girls -- my ears and mind completely numb, and I was less than impressed...and apparently so were Adam and Glen.

At least the girls had a good time.

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

My Old Man Husband!

Glen may try to tell you that he's only a year and ten months older than me, but since when do they start offering memberships to the AARP to 36-year-olds?

And in keeping with acting his age...

"Help! I've fallen and I can't get up!"

Tuesday, February 5, 2008

Out of ideas...

My life is busy and boring and I can't think of a single thing to blog about.

So here's a picture of me, my Mom, and brother Nate in front of the Eiffel Tower in 1975 ( a time in my life when it wasn't quite so busy or boring...too bad I can't remember it).

Saturday, February 2, 2008

Six more weeks of winter!

Well, it's official...Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow this morning thus indicating with 30% accuracy--six more weeks of winter!
A few hundred miles of south of Punxsutawney, PA, several dozen edible groundhogs popped their heads up out of the snow and were quickly devoured by happy children.

Happy Groundhog's Day!

Friday, February 1, 2008

Crossing off our list!

Including the time we lived in Baltimore, we have lived in this area for 10 1/2 years now. (Wow--a decade seems like such long time)!

This area is just so rich with history and amazing places to visit, that you could spend every day for years visiting and never get bored! But we live here, and life goes on. So we find that with all these amazing things to do that we tend to do the same ones over and over again.

...the National Zoo, National Air and Space Museum, Baltimore Aquarium, Gettysburg, Maryland Science Center, Mount Vernon, American History museum (when it's open)....

And the Natural History Museum (Ellie loves holding these giant grasshoppers in the Insect Zoo of the Museum)...

We finally decided that after all these years that it was time to branch out and go visit some places that we've never been before.

Like Harper's Ferry.


The National Cathedral.

The National Museum of the American Indian


The US Botanic Gardens



And most interesting of all...the Mathematical Association of America. hehehe! Seriously, what do they DO here?


Still on our list: National Building Museum, Bull Run, Postal Museum and revisiting National Archives and Bureau of Engraving and Printing.

Any other ideas for us?

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

We will miss you President Hinckley...



I love this sweet tribute to the life of our beloved prophet, President Hinckley. What an amazing life he led...we will miss him.

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Moderation in all things...

What happens when a five year old has a friend over at lunchtime and Mom is distracted?


...Well they asked me to open a brand new jar of dill pickles


...then ate the entire 20 oz. jar.

...and then 7 clementines each.


ummm...what else can I say? At least it wasn't an entire 1/2 gallon of ice cream and 7 cookies each.

Sunday, January 27, 2008

My Mom's Secret


My Mom has a crush on ******* *******






(serves you right Mom)




This is Spencer for those of you that couldn't tell( can you believe her, telling personal stuff like that)

Friday, January 25, 2008

Our Own Little Dancing Queen



Ellie has a little dramatic streak in her that keeps her laughing, clapping, singing, and chatting through life. I guess I shouldn't have been too surprised when attending our school's night at Chuck E Cheese, that she shunned all of the rides and games and hung out here at the little dancing floor having a wonderful time dancing and making new friends!

And in a related conversation with Spencer:

Spencer: "Mom! We're starting a break dancing unit in PE class!"

Me: "That sounds....mmmmm....interesting."

Spencer: "And we get to dance with girls."

Me: "Wow! How does that work? Break dancing with partners?", as I sit envisioning two twelve year olds trying to synchronize their "Worms" and back spins.

Spencer: "Did I mention we get to dance with girls and the girl I like is in my class?"

Me: "Gym class sure is interesting in middle school. When I was in school we got to square dance to fiddle music."

Spencer: "Square dance?! Oh yeah! That's what it's called. We're square dancing, not break dancing."

Me: suppressing laughter..."Slight difference there."

Spencer (unfazed): "And the boys and girls get to take turns picking their partners each time. I'm going to pick *******"

Me: "hmmmm...Maybe break dancing doesn't sound so bad after all."


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