Tagged - AGAIN!

Tag: Your Favorites

book: It's too hard to choose a favorite, but the first real adult novel I read was called, Follow the River, and I loved it. It is a true story about a frontier woman who gets taken captive by Indians and eventually escapes and finds her way to freedom. I've been thinking I need to read it again because I remember it being very good.
movie: I can honestly say I don't have a favorite movie, but if you had asked me this when I was 14, it would have been Princess Bride. I must have watched that movie a million times!
color: Turquoise, like the color of the caribbean sea in Cozumel - beyond beautiful!
TV Show: The Office. I love the stupid humor and the pure entertainment value of that 1/2 hour!
guilty pleasure: A huge bowl of vanilla ice cream with Hershey's syrup, softened, and then stirred up to the consistency of a thick milkshake. I used to eat ice cream like this every day after school when I was a teenager and I still love it even though I am just a couple months away from being 30!
outfit: A soft T-shirt, flowy skirt, and flip-flops.
body part: Hmmmmm....I guess my calves. They are weak right now, but I love when they get rock hard from running and I catch a glimpse of them all flexed up in high heels or something.
kitchen tip: Always do your dishes immediately after dinner. The evening is so much more enjoyable when your kitchen is clean (at least for me!)
life lesson: Always trust your gut, whatever you believe that instinct to be, your life will be easier if you listen to it and follow.
activity: Rock climbing or skiing with my hubby, it's a toss up.
food: I love all food, so it's hard to narrow it down, but fresh, flavorful fruit like cantaloupe or mangoes are hard to beat.
child raising tip: Remember that they are children of God and are entrusted to you. When my patience runs out, this knowledge helps me get it together.
pet peeve: When people "fish" for compliments, like complaining about how fat they are when they are super skinny, or when they talk about how ugly they are when they are beautiful. SO ANNOYING!!!
game: I have very fond memories playing Sardines (a version of hide and seek) at night with the kids in my neighborhood growing up. I haven't played it for years, but we used to have a lot of fun!
tattoo (imagined or real): I had a brief moment where I thought a star on my hip would be cool, but thankfully that moment passed quickly.
element: Water. I have to live by some form of it, whether it is an ocean, lake, or river (of course I would choose the ocean if it was up to just me!). I love the sound, feel, and color - pure beauty!

Is it time?

Months ago I decided that once we were back from our holiday travels, I was going to potty train Logan. I potty trained Mason when he was exactly 2 1/2 and Logan turned 2 1/2 on January 2nd so I figured it was time. I was going to start last week but after a bout of warm weather, I pushed it back to this week because I didn't want to have to spend a rare warm week in my house with Logan on the potty! So, today was the first day. He did really well as long as I put him on the potty every 20 minutes or so and he didn't have an accident until this evening and I was distracted. After that one accident, he went in his pants several times which made me wonder, "Is this kid ready?" Mason picked it up in one day, so I kind of hoped Logan would catch on by this evening. How many days should I let this trial go? Any suggestions?

By the way, this picture isn't from today. I thought it was a funny shot taken of him last week when Mason tied him to the stair railing. I didn't know he was tied up and thought he was playing upstairs. When Eric came home, he went upstairs to change his clothes and found Logan this way. He was whining a little, but I was making dinner and didn't hear him. I don't know why he couldn't get his feet out of that loop - so funny!

New Kick

Eric gave me this recipe book for Christmas. It's by Jessica Seinfeld and the premise is adding pureed fruits and vegetable to everyday meals to get your family eating healthier. So, Saturday I started the "program" by spending a couple hours steaming and then pureeing various veggies. My house didn't smell too good when I was done, but I felt a sense of accomplishment looking at my bags of purees.
Here is the result - bags of pureed carrots, sweet potatoes, butternut squash, yellow squash, and cauliflower in 1/2 c. portions for adding to recipes. I put most of them in the freezer, but kept some out to try this week. So far I have made scrambled eggs with cauliflower and sloppy joes with sweet potato and butternut squash. My kids really do eat fruits and veggies well, sometimes it's all they want, so it's not necessary that I "hide" veggies in food. But I figure we can all stand to eat more veggies, so why not add purees? The eggs were good, and although I could detect the cauliflower, my kids didn't seem to notice. For the sloppy joes I used my standard recipe (Jessica's seemed a little strange to me) and just added the purees. It was not quite as tangy with the added veggies, so next time I might just add some more vinegar, but otherwise they were very good! I'll post some recipes if I come across something really good so stay tuned!

Merry Christmas!!!

We were able to spend Christmas in Colorado with Eric's family this year. We flew in Christmas Eve night and were disappointed to see that they didn't have much snow left, but that changed very quickly! We woke up Christmas morning to lots of snow and it snowed all day! I dreamed of a white Christmas for the 5 years we lived in Denver and never got one, so I think I was more excited than the boys.

These pictures are way out of order, but after we opened gifts we headed out sledding. The boys had a BLAST making snow angels and going down the hill. Unfortunately we couldn't stay out too long because it was snowing and windy and temperatures were mighty chilly!
The boys favorite way to go down the hill was on their backs, head first. Mason tried it this way on accident once and loved it so of course Logan had to do it that way too! It made me nervous watching them go down like that by themselves, but they thought it was great!

Here are the boys with some of their loot from Santa. They woke up at about 6:30 am and I heard Mason telling Logan (while they were still in their beds) that they better not go downstairs because it looked like it was midnight and they wouldn't want to get caught sneaking a peek at Santa. They were thrilled when I told them it was actually morning and they could go see if Santa came. They each got vintage Star Wars rockets and figures (thanks EBay!) as their main presents.
Here they are modeling their new costumes - Power Ranger Mason and Buzz Lightyear Logan.
Logan and his light saber, that's all he told Santa he wanted each of those 5 times he saw him!
I had to sneak in a picture of my growing belly. Just in case this is the last, I'm making sure to document it this time because I hardly have any pregnant pictures with my other kids.
The bummer of the trip was that Mason got strep throat and Logan got the flu. They were very sick for about 3 days and we had to stay away from the cousins. We had lots of quality family time reading books and watching movies, but it was still sad to have such sick kids over Christmas. Because we didn't get to spend much time with family, I didn't take any pictures with cousins or grandma - which is the whole reason we went to Colorado!

I have to thank our dear friends, Shauna and Doug for the use of their house while we were in Colorado. Logan kept saying "Shauna's house is so beautiful" and Mason did not want to leave. Eric and I loved playing "house" for 6 days and can't wait to have a house of our own! We owe you guys BIG time - thank you!!!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all our family and friends. We love you!