Last week Aaron went on a backpacking trip with his scout troop. Each scout had to bring all of the food they would be eating for the few days they were camping. I bought him multiple things that didn't need to be refrigerated including a box of Pop Tarts, which is a treat that I don't usually buy.
A few days ago, Brielle was complaining that I had bought Pop Tarts for Aaron, but I wouldn't buy them for anyone else.
Brielle: "Why won't you buy Pop Tarts for the rest of us?"
Me: "Because they aren't good for you, they're mostly just sugar."
Brielle: "But you bought them for Aaron!"
Me "That was because it was one of the few things that didn't need to be refrigerated that he could take with on his camping trip. Besides, they were on sale."
Brielle: "Will you buy some for me?"
Me: "I already said NO!"
Brielle: "OK, let's say that you HAVE to buy Pop Tarts for one of us, which one would you choose, me or Aaron?'
Me: "Max. I would buy them for Max, he can stand to gain some weight."
Brielle: "But what if there was a situation where you were dying and you had to buy Pop Tarts for either me or Aaron to be able to live, which one of us would you buy the Pop Tarts for?"
Me: "Seriously? In what type of a situation would I need to buy Pop Tarts for you to save my own life?"
Brielle: "???????????"
Me: "I guess if I was in that situation I would buy them for myself, because if I'm dying anyway, it won't really matter if I'm eating something unhealthy, right?"
Showing posts with label chuck full o calories. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chuck full o calories. Show all posts
Monday, August 20, 2012
Monday, December 19, 2011
It's a Christmas chocolate candy miracle!!!!
Last night I opened the kitchen closet and sitting there right in plain sight, and at my eye level, was an unopened package of Cadbury Christmas candy! (solid milk chocolate in a candy shell, to be exact)
Here's the deal, I don't remember buying it (seriously, as if I would forget buying chocolate) and no one else will admit to putting it there.
I do believe in Santa Claus!!
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Truth in advertising? Bait and switch? Just plain not paying attention? First day on the job?
This is what I ordered.......
(the one on the bottom left, the hot fudge sundae shake)
And this is what I got.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Cub Scout cookies and other random stuff
This week was Talent night for the Cub Scouts. We tried to think of a talent that Aaron could display at pack meeting.
Our ideas were:
1. A window washing demonstration.
This wasn't really an option, because the meeting was being held in the gym, where there aren't any windows.
2. Taping a pen to the end of his trombone, and having him draw a picture while playing a musical selection.
Aaron has only been playing the trombone for a month. We decided that this might be a bit above his current skill level. (however, he is doing very well with the trombone! Maybe next time)
We finally concluded that his best talent was cooking. The plan was for him to make dinner then take a picture of it and put it on a poster.
The night before Pack meeting Aaron made spaghetti with homemade sauce. (he's only 9, yes, he is amazing) Unfortunately, by the time we remembered to take pictures, dinner was over, all of the spaghetti was gone and all that was left was the dirty dishes.
Instead of pictures of dinner, Aaron decided to make a batch of chocolate chip cookies and bring enough for everyone to have one.
I'm pretty sure that Aaron's talent was everyone's favorite.
*******************************
In other news, Max has started speaking with a southern accent, and we have no idea why. It's just weird. Cute, but weird.
******************************
Monday, after the freak snowstorm that dumped an inch of snow in our yard, Max dumped a bag of cotton balls on his bedroom floor, so the inside would match the outside.
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Friday, Brielle made the observation that me and Max are the only ones in the family without a bicycle. (Max does have a tricycle, however, he is 5 and is getting too big for it)
The next day, Max climbed into my lap and said "Mom, I love you SO SO SO SO SO SO MUCH!"
I gave him a squeeze and said "I love you too!" Then holds my face in his little hands, looks into my eyes and says "And I really think we should get bikes."
******************************
Tonight took Brielle for a girl's night out. When Max found out that we were leaving, he wanted to come with. As we were leaving I explained that he couldn't come because it was just for girls. Then he wrapped his arms around my leg and says "I DON'T WANT FOR YOU TO MISS ME! TAKE ME WITH! I DON'T WANT FOR YOU TO MISS ME!"
*******************************
I'm really beginning to think that someone should invent self cleaning kitchen floors.
*******************************
When we were at my mom's house last weekend, I pulled out some of her photo albums from when I was a teenager. I showed them pictures of me and said "Look! See how skinny I was, here's photographic evidence that I used to be thin."
Then Aaron says "Who said you were fat?"
Aaron is currently my favorite child.
********************************
It's quite late right now. I'm beginning to think that the Diet Coke that I drank at 10:00 tonight was probably a bad idea...................
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Max and the big, sweaty guy
Tonight we went to a wedding reception for the son of a neighbor.
As we waited in the incredibly long line to greet the happy couple, we heard rumors of ice cream as refreshments.
The children were elated..........except for Max. He doesn't like ice cream, because apparently, it's too cold.
After we made our way through the reception line, the kids made a mad dash to the ice cream table.
I will say that we were not disappointed :0)
Chocolate dipped waffle bowls, brownies, caramel, chocolate and marshmallow topping (which I need to say was like creamy clouds made of sugar, sent down from heaven to rest upon my ice cream) various fresh fruits, crushed candy bars, chopped nuts, sprinkles and pink m&ms adorned the table.
Max still insisted that he didn't want ice cream, however, once he saw the brownies, he got very excited.
"I want a brownie! I want a brownie!" He jumped up and down until he got his hands on the plate with the brownie.
Then he saw the ice cream.
The lady serving the ice cream asked him if she could put some on his plate. He hesitated until Brielle said "You know, Max, the ice cream has been sitting out for a while and it's melted a little bit, so it won't be super cold."
This was all it took to convince him and he eagerly handed his plate to the lady who put a Max sized scoop..............
right on top of his brownie.
I knew that this would be trouble, especially with the whole "my food can't be touching, even a little bit" phase that he's been going through lately.
Surprisingly, Max didn't even flinch, and we walked outside to a table in the garden area of the reception center.
We sat down and slid Max's chair up to the table. He picked up his spoon and then it started.
"Hey. I didn't want the ice cream on top of the brownie."
He was uncharacteristically calm about the whole situation. I suggested that we just scoop the ice cream off of the brownie, and he happily agreed.
Then he looked at the brownie.
"Hey, there's still some ice cream on top. I don't want it there."
The already soft ice cream had melted a bit and left a puddle on top of the brownie. I scraped it off the best I could, but there was still some ice cream residue remaining.
My husband said "It's just the same as when you dunk your cookies in milk before you eat them. Go ahead and eat it, it'll taste good."
Max eyed the brownie suspiciously. "I dunk cookies in milk not brownies." Then he picked up his spoon and looked over the entire brownie, trying to find a place to dig in.
Again, I was a bit confused by his calm demeanor.
He finally looked up at me and said "Can I just pick it up with my hand and eat it?"
I told him that would be fine, so he picked up the brownie and "HEY THERE'S ICE CREAM ON THE BOTTOM OF MY BROWNIE!"
Yes, I knew we were headed for a meltdown, and it happened. I took the brownie, looked at the bottom of it, and sure enough, the bottom corner had some ice cream soaked into it. I turned the brownie around and handed it back to him. "Here buddy, just eat the other side, OK?"
He must have been really hungry because he did just that, and finished off the entire brownie, ice cream sludge and all.
I returned to my ice cream (remember, little clouds of marshmallow heaven mixed with chocolate sauce and crushed candy bars........) when Max looked at the melting scoop of ice cream on his plate.
"I don't want to eat this. Do I have to eat this?" he asked.
Almost as if they had rehearsed it, Brielle and Aaron said in unison "I'LL EAT HIS ICE CREAM"
He slid the plate over to them and they proceeded to attack the scoop seeing who could get the most of it first.
I leaned over to my husband and said "Apparently, I haven't actually fed them for like a week." (sidenote, I have fed them for the last week, I just haven't fed them ice cream)
As soon as Aaron finished of the bigger portion of the scoop, he started to shiver. It seems that the combination of eating his ice cream and Max's ice cream, plus being outside in the shade made him shiver uncontrollably.
Teeth were chattering.
This was really strange, because Aaron isn't usually a kid that gets cold easily. He's always the first one to declare that "Sure it's snowing outside, but it's really not that cold, I'm pretty sure I don't need a coat."
Brielle made some comment about how strange it was that he was cold because he's usually kind of sweaty, and then it happened. Max started singing.......
"He's big, he's sweaty, he's a guy, he's big sweaty guy!!"
We all looked at him, because this was kind of random. He must have enjoyed the attention because he sang it again.
"He's big, he's sweaty, he's a guy, he's big sweaty guy!!
This time we laughed, so you guessed it, he continued with his song, only louder.
"HE'S BIG, HE'S SWEATY, HE'S A GUY!
HE'S BIG, SWEATY GUY!!
Then again.
"HE'S BIG, HE'S SWEATY, HE'S A GUY!
HE'S BIG, SWEATY GUY!!!!"
So by now, people are staring. (You know, you'd think I'd be used to this by now.......)
At this point, we just picked him up and hauled him out to the car and we went home.
The problem is that now, I can't get the stupid song out of my head, so here it is, for your listening pleasure (or torture, you decide) Bill Nye and the Sweaty Guy song.
Is it just me, or does big, sweaty guy look a lot like an old version of Mario Lopez?
As we waited in the incredibly long line to greet the happy couple, we heard rumors of ice cream as refreshments.
The children were elated..........except for Max. He doesn't like ice cream, because apparently, it's too cold.
After we made our way through the reception line, the kids made a mad dash to the ice cream table.
I will say that we were not disappointed :0)
Chocolate dipped waffle bowls, brownies, caramel, chocolate and marshmallow topping (which I need to say was like creamy clouds made of sugar, sent down from heaven to rest upon my ice cream) various fresh fruits, crushed candy bars, chopped nuts, sprinkles and pink m&ms adorned the table.
Max still insisted that he didn't want ice cream, however, once he saw the brownies, he got very excited.
"I want a brownie! I want a brownie!" He jumped up and down until he got his hands on the plate with the brownie.
Then he saw the ice cream.
The lady serving the ice cream asked him if she could put some on his plate. He hesitated until Brielle said "You know, Max, the ice cream has been sitting out for a while and it's melted a little bit, so it won't be super cold."
This was all it took to convince him and he eagerly handed his plate to the lady who put a Max sized scoop..............
right on top of his brownie.
I knew that this would be trouble, especially with the whole "my food can't be touching, even a little bit" phase that he's been going through lately.
Surprisingly, Max didn't even flinch, and we walked outside to a table in the garden area of the reception center.
We sat down and slid Max's chair up to the table. He picked up his spoon and then it started.
"Hey. I didn't want the ice cream on top of the brownie."
He was uncharacteristically calm about the whole situation. I suggested that we just scoop the ice cream off of the brownie, and he happily agreed.
Then he looked at the brownie.
"Hey, there's still some ice cream on top. I don't want it there."
The already soft ice cream had melted a bit and left a puddle on top of the brownie. I scraped it off the best I could, but there was still some ice cream residue remaining.
My husband said "It's just the same as when you dunk your cookies in milk before you eat them. Go ahead and eat it, it'll taste good."
Max eyed the brownie suspiciously. "I dunk cookies in milk not brownies." Then he picked up his spoon and looked over the entire brownie, trying to find a place to dig in.
Again, I was a bit confused by his calm demeanor.
He finally looked up at me and said "Can I just pick it up with my hand and eat it?"
I told him that would be fine, so he picked up the brownie and "HEY THERE'S ICE CREAM ON THE BOTTOM OF MY BROWNIE!"
Yes, I knew we were headed for a meltdown, and it happened. I took the brownie, looked at the bottom of it, and sure enough, the bottom corner had some ice cream soaked into it. I turned the brownie around and handed it back to him. "Here buddy, just eat the other side, OK?"
He must have been really hungry because he did just that, and finished off the entire brownie, ice cream sludge and all.
I returned to my ice cream (remember, little clouds of marshmallow heaven mixed with chocolate sauce and crushed candy bars........) when Max looked at the melting scoop of ice cream on his plate.
"I don't want to eat this. Do I have to eat this?" he asked.
Almost as if they had rehearsed it, Brielle and Aaron said in unison "I'LL EAT HIS ICE CREAM"
He slid the plate over to them and they proceeded to attack the scoop seeing who could get the most of it first.
I leaned over to my husband and said "Apparently, I haven't actually fed them for like a week." (sidenote, I have fed them for the last week, I just haven't fed them ice cream)
As soon as Aaron finished of the bigger portion of the scoop, he started to shiver. It seems that the combination of eating his ice cream and Max's ice cream, plus being outside in the shade made him shiver uncontrollably.
Teeth were chattering.
This was really strange, because Aaron isn't usually a kid that gets cold easily. He's always the first one to declare that "Sure it's snowing outside, but it's really not that cold, I'm pretty sure I don't need a coat."
Brielle made some comment about how strange it was that he was cold because he's usually kind of sweaty, and then it happened. Max started singing.......
"He's big, he's sweaty, he's a guy, he's big sweaty guy!!"
We all looked at him, because this was kind of random. He must have enjoyed the attention because he sang it again.
"He's big, he's sweaty, he's a guy, he's big sweaty guy!!
This time we laughed, so you guessed it, he continued with his song, only louder.
"HE'S BIG, HE'S SWEATY, HE'S A GUY!
HE'S BIG, SWEATY GUY!!
Then again.
"HE'S BIG, HE'S SWEATY, HE'S A GUY!
HE'S BIG, SWEATY GUY!!!!"
So by now, people are staring. (You know, you'd think I'd be used to this by now.......)
At this point, we just picked him up and hauled him out to the car and we went home.
The problem is that now, I can't get the stupid song out of my head, so here it is, for your listening pleasure (or torture, you decide) Bill Nye and the Sweaty Guy song.
Is it just me, or does big, sweaty guy look a lot like an old version of Mario Lopez?
Sunday, November 15, 2009
How I lied to Max about the cookies
And now, the rest of the story..............
When Max asked what happened to the cookies, I knew that if I told him the truth that he would be really mad at me.
I thought fast. CJ wasn't home to defend himself so I told Max that CJ was the one that ate all the cookies.
Max's cute little face turned red, he lifted his arms in the air, threw his head back and yelled to the ceiling,
CJ
IS
A
REALLY
REALLY
BAD
GUY!!!!
Sure I felt kind of bad about it for a while, but I was mostly just glad that he wasn't mad at me. I would have made him some more cookies right then, but we were out of oats and the mixer bowl was dirty, and quite frankly, I wasn't really hungry for cookies anymore anyway.
CJ is in the kitchen right now, making another batch of no bake cookies. This time, I will be sure to save some for Max.
So anyway, those of you who guessed #4 on yesterday's post should be very proud of yourselves. Yes, I blamed the whole thing on CJ.
Unfortunately, I didn't think of blaming Naughty Bird, Naughty Frog and Naughty Rabbit until I was writing the post last night. I wish I had thought of telling him that his imaginary naughty pets had eaten the cookies just to see his reaction.
I will remember the naughty trio the next time I need to shift the blame elsewhere. I mean, if Max can use them as an excuse for everything, why couldn't I?"
I was asked to give our recipe for no bake cookies, here it is.
2 Cups sugar
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup cocoa
Beat these ingredients together for a few minutes then pour over
3 cups oats
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup coconut
1/2 cup chopped nuts
Mix together then drop with a spoon onto wax paper and let them sit for a while. (Ours never last long enough to see how long it takes to set up) They will be gooey.
CJ said that he's going to put this next batch in the fridge to see if they set faster.
This is the official recipe, however, my kids don't like coconut and nuts (weird, I know) so we make them without, and just use more oats.
Also, I don't always use the vanilla, and it's OK without.
Monday, August 3, 2009
Maybe my son isn't really a vampire
A while ago, my husband told CJ that when he achieved the rank of Life Scout in the Boy Scouts that he would get him a pizza from this place.
This wouldn't be just any pizza, this would be his very own pizza to share...............or not.
Now, if you've ever had pizza from this particular establishment, you will know how incredibly filling it is. Their pizza is delicious and has more cheese on it than a pizza should be allowed to have.
Seriously, DO NOT order extra cheese.
A few weeks ago, CJ fulfilled all the requirements to become a Life Scout and so late on a Saturday night, his dad took him to get his pizza.
The cool thing about this pizza place is that it has live streaming video to the internet, so you can see the people eating in the restaurant. Knowing this, we pulled up their website and watched them buy the pizza. We even called them on the cell phone and told CJ to dance around in front of the camera and pull faces.
And he did just that.
I also need to mention that it was late enough that nobody else was really there. (Nobody except the hundreds of strange people that who probably like to stay up late on a Saturday night to watch a live video from a pizza place)
They brought the pizza home, and contrary to what CJ had originally planned, he shared some of it.
1/2 slice for Dad.
1/2 slice for Aaron
and
1/2 slice for Max.
Then CJ started to eat the rest of the pizza. This was a large pizza and he enjoyed each piece.
Now, I do need to mention that I can only eat 1 to 1-1/2 slices of this pizza before becoming uncomfortably full. This pizza is very rich, and very filling.
When he had eaten all but 3 slices of the pizza, I asked him if he was going to save the rest for breakfast the next morning, and he said,
"No, I'm eating the WHOLE THING!"
And he did.
I couldn't believe he at the whole thing.
Well, maybe I could, he eats a lot, and he eats fast. What I really couldn't believe was that he wasn't at all sick. If I manage to eat two slices, I get an upset stomach.
The next morning when CJ woke up he came into the kitchen, said hi and stood next to me. The garlic smell nearly knocked me over.
Then he spoke and I got a whif of his breath.
The garlic wasn't just his breath, it was coming out of his skin. Even his eyelashes smelled like garlic.
The kid really smelled bad. You could almost see the garlic fog following him everywhere he went.
And so what did he do? Probably what any normal 13 year old garlic infested kid would do. He followed us around and BREATHED ON US!
The really bad thing was that now we needed to take this kid to church with us.
We wouldn't let him sit with us, we made him sit on the row in front of us. I felt kind of bad for the people sitting in front of him, but hey, we didn't have to smell him.
While at church, he breathed on a few of his friends.
One of them said "EEWWWW! SICK!"
You have to know it was bad at that point, because it takes something really bad to gross out a 13 year old boy.
Does anyone care to guess how long he smelled like this?
Three days. It took three days for the smell of that pizza to wear off. His room even smelled of garlic, until I made him open the window and air it out.
And he thought all this was funny.
Now he can't wait until he does something else worthy of earning another pizza all to himself.
This wouldn't be just any pizza, this would be his very own pizza to share...............or not.
Now, if you've ever had pizza from this particular establishment, you will know how incredibly filling it is. Their pizza is delicious and has more cheese on it than a pizza should be allowed to have.
Seriously, DO NOT order extra cheese.
A few weeks ago, CJ fulfilled all the requirements to become a Life Scout and so late on a Saturday night, his dad took him to get his pizza.
The cool thing about this pizza place is that it has live streaming video to the internet, so you can see the people eating in the restaurant. Knowing this, we pulled up their website and watched them buy the pizza. We even called them on the cell phone and told CJ to dance around in front of the camera and pull faces.
And he did just that.
I also need to mention that it was late enough that nobody else was really there. (Nobody except the hundreds of strange people that who probably like to stay up late on a Saturday night to watch a live video from a pizza place)
They brought the pizza home, and contrary to what CJ had originally planned, he shared some of it.
1/2 slice for Dad.
1/2 slice for Aaron
and
1/2 slice for Max.
Then CJ started to eat the rest of the pizza. This was a large pizza and he enjoyed each piece.
Now, I do need to mention that I can only eat 1 to 1-1/2 slices of this pizza before becoming uncomfortably full. This pizza is very rich, and very filling.
When he had eaten all but 3 slices of the pizza, I asked him if he was going to save the rest for breakfast the next morning, and he said,
"No, I'm eating the WHOLE THING!"
And he did.
I couldn't believe he at the whole thing.
Well, maybe I could, he eats a lot, and he eats fast. What I really couldn't believe was that he wasn't at all sick. If I manage to eat two slices, I get an upset stomach.
The next morning when CJ woke up he came into the kitchen, said hi and stood next to me. The garlic smell nearly knocked me over.
Then he spoke and I got a whif of his breath.
The garlic wasn't just his breath, it was coming out of his skin. Even his eyelashes smelled like garlic.
The kid really smelled bad. You could almost see the garlic fog following him everywhere he went.
And so what did he do? Probably what any normal 13 year old garlic infested kid would do. He followed us around and BREATHED ON US!
The really bad thing was that now we needed to take this kid to church with us.
We wouldn't let him sit with us, we made him sit on the row in front of us. I felt kind of bad for the people sitting in front of him, but hey, we didn't have to smell him.
While at church, he breathed on a few of his friends.
One of them said "EEWWWW! SICK!"
You have to know it was bad at that point, because it takes something really bad to gross out a 13 year old boy.
Does anyone care to guess how long he smelled like this?
Three days. It took three days for the smell of that pizza to wear off. His room even smelled of garlic, until I made him open the window and air it out.
And he thought all this was funny.
Now he can't wait until he does something else worthy of earning another pizza all to himself.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
The birthday party weekend part 1
I had planned on posting about the birthday parties sooner, but someone (CJ) was taking a really long time to put the photos into the computer, and I thought that the post would be better with pictures.
Thank you to those who left suggestions on things to do for Brielle's party! There were so many fun ideas.
I prepared 5 activities before the girls arrived. As it turned out, I neglected to remember that girls that age will spend a whole lot of time talking.
And gigging.
And talking.
And giggling, and squealing and giggling and talking and giggling and giggling and...................
As it turned out, we only had time for 2 of the games I had planned.
When everyone got there, I put a sticker on their back with the name of a famous person. They were to ask yes or no questions to be able to guess what the name was. This was a great ice breaker because many of the girls didn't know each other.
I made sure to put "Hannah Montana" on Brielle's back. I knew this would just make her day!
(the last sentence is to be read with great sarcasm. Brielle is NOT a fan)
Next We played a game called "I never"
The girls sat in a big circle and I handed them each 15 beans. One girl would think of something that she had never done and say "I've never........been to Disneyland" then every girl who had been to Disneyland (Or had done whatever the girl said she hadn't done) would put one bean in the big bowl in the middle of the floor.
The object of the game is to try and have the most beans at the end of the game, so you try and think of something that you've never done that you know that many of the others have)
Aaron joined in the game and when it was his turn he said "I've never worn a dress!" And all the girls put a bean in the bowl. They did get even with him when one girl said "I've never had the name Aaron!"
Sidenote- This is a really fun game to play with adults. You can learn so much about your friends, like the time we were playing this game at a church party and I said "I've never been arrested" It was so much fun to see who had been arrested! Of course after that, they HAD to explain why they were arrested.
Good times.
By the time we were done with the games, it was time to eat. The girls ate hot dogs and more chips and salsa than I thought was humanly possible. (They finished off an entire bag of Costco tortilla chips and nearly two big jars of salsa!)
Then we had cake and ice cream. I thought the tie dye cake would look really cool if I made it in a bundt pan. (and it would have if the whole cake had come out of the pan at the same time)
After I carefully dug the top half of the cake out of the supposedly non stick bundt pan and molded it back onto the bottom part of the cake, I drizzled three different colors of frosting on it and gave it a generous coating of sprinkles.
It did look quite fabulous.
Both inside and out.
And it tasted good too!
Next, Brielle opened her presents, and was given more pig related items for her pig collection.
The best part of the party was when we started the movie. Only one of her friends had seen Pee Wee's big adventure, and the rest of them had never even heard of Pee Wee.
As the movie started, the girls watched as Pee Wee got out of bed, put on his bunny slippers and played with his toy fire engine and train set.
The conversation went like this...........
"He's acting like a little kid"
"He's a grown up, why does he have all those toys?"
"Is he mentally disabled or something?"
"How sad!"
"Yeah, this is really sad!"
Then one girl FINALLY got it.
"Oh, I get it! The movie is so dumb that it's funny. Kind of like Napoleon Dynamite!"
YES!
They all SCREAMED when Large Marge's face morphed. When the movie was over, Aaron showed them that part again,
and again,
and again.........
And they screamed every time. We had to close the windows.
Precisely at 10:00p.m. the girl's parents came and collected them. We sent them each home with a great big muffin and a bottle of orange juice for breakfast the next morning.
T.hen it was over.
And we did the "happy dance."
The thing that surprised me the most about this party?
It was fun. I actually had a good time! I had been dreading this for weeks, and it really turned out great.
I was ready for some super drama to emerge so that I could blog about it, but all the girls were very polite and well behaved, so all you get is a post about a fun party.
Brielle has some really great friends!
Come back later for part 2 of this post. Max's "garbage truck" party.
(as soon as we find which memory stick has the pictures on it so we can get the photos into the computer)
Thank you to those who left suggestions on things to do for Brielle's party! There were so many fun ideas.
I prepared 5 activities before the girls arrived. As it turned out, I neglected to remember that girls that age will spend a whole lot of time talking.
And gigging.
And talking.
And giggling, and squealing and giggling and talking and giggling and giggling and...................
As it turned out, we only had time for 2 of the games I had planned.
When everyone got there, I put a sticker on their back with the name of a famous person. They were to ask yes or no questions to be able to guess what the name was. This was a great ice breaker because many of the girls didn't know each other.
I made sure to put "Hannah Montana" on Brielle's back. I knew this would just make her day!
(the last sentence is to be read with great sarcasm. Brielle is NOT a fan)
Next We played a game called "I never"
The girls sat in a big circle and I handed them each 15 beans. One girl would think of something that she had never done and say "I've never........been to Disneyland" then every girl who had been to Disneyland (Or had done whatever the girl said she hadn't done) would put one bean in the big bowl in the middle of the floor.
The object of the game is to try and have the most beans at the end of the game, so you try and think of something that you've never done that you know that many of the others have)
Aaron joined in the game and when it was his turn he said "I've never worn a dress!" And all the girls put a bean in the bowl. They did get even with him when one girl said "I've never had the name Aaron!"
Sidenote- This is a really fun game to play with adults. You can learn so much about your friends, like the time we were playing this game at a church party and I said "I've never been arrested" It was so much fun to see who had been arrested! Of course after that, they HAD to explain why they were arrested.
Good times.
By the time we were done with the games, it was time to eat. The girls ate hot dogs and more chips and salsa than I thought was humanly possible. (They finished off an entire bag of Costco tortilla chips and nearly two big jars of salsa!)
Then we had cake and ice cream. I thought the tie dye cake would look really cool if I made it in a bundt pan. (and it would have if the whole cake had come out of the pan at the same time)
After I carefully dug the top half of the cake out of the supposedly non stick bundt pan and molded it back onto the bottom part of the cake, I drizzled three different colors of frosting on it and gave it a generous coating of sprinkles.
It did look quite fabulous.
Both inside and out.
And it tasted good too!
Next, Brielle opened her presents, and was given more pig related items for her pig collection.
The best part of the party was when we started the movie. Only one of her friends had seen Pee Wee's big adventure, and the rest of them had never even heard of Pee Wee.
As the movie started, the girls watched as Pee Wee got out of bed, put on his bunny slippers and played with his toy fire engine and train set.
The conversation went like this...........
"He's acting like a little kid"
"He's a grown up, why does he have all those toys?"
"Is he mentally disabled or something?"
"How sad!"
"Yeah, this is really sad!"
Then one girl FINALLY got it.
"Oh, I get it! The movie is so dumb that it's funny. Kind of like Napoleon Dynamite!"
YES!
They all SCREAMED when Large Marge's face morphed. When the movie was over, Aaron showed them that part again,
and again,
and again.........
And they screamed every time. We had to close the windows.
Precisely at 10:00p.m. the girl's parents came and collected them. We sent them each home with a great big muffin and a bottle of orange juice for breakfast the next morning.
T.hen it was over.
And we did the "happy dance."
The thing that surprised me the most about this party?
It was fun. I actually had a good time! I had been dreading this for weeks, and it really turned out great.
I was ready for some super drama to emerge so that I could blog about it, but all the girls were very polite and well behaved, so all you get is a post about a fun party.
Brielle has some really great friends!
Come back later for part 2 of this post. Max's "garbage truck" party.
(as soon as we find which memory stick has the pictures on it so we can get the photos into the computer)
Sunday, February 15, 2009
She blinded me with science
Last week was Brielle's Science fair.
Thank you all so much for your project suggestions!
She almost decided to do her project on which cleans better, regular store bought cleaners, or home made "green" cleaners. (suggested by Jo)
However, Tiburon suggested that she do a project where she makes several batches of cookies and leaves on ingredient out of each batch to see what would happen.
Hmmmmmmm. Let's decide................
Cookies or cleaning.
Cleaning or cookies.
Cookies or cleaning..............
She decided on the cookies! (with no influence from me, I promise;0)
One evening, she made a batch of regular cookies, to use as an example of a perfect cookie.
The next afternoon, I heard my hand mixer being used, which was strange, because I have a perfectly good Kitchen aid which is great for making cookies.
When I went into the kitchen to see why she was using the hand mixer, I discovered that the bowl and beaters to the Kitchen Aid hadn't been washed, so she was forced to use the hand mixer, because there wasn't enough time to run the dirty bowl through the dishwasher.
Brielle had a quick lesson on how to hand wash a bowl (and no, this was not the first time that she has been taught this skill) and we continued with the making of the cookies.
We made 1/4 batches of cookies and we worked out a system where I would mix the ingredients for the cookies, and Brielle would put them on the pan and in the oven and out of the oven and onto the cooling rack then onto the plate to be photographed.
This way, I was the keeper of the dough.
I love cookie dough.
I have to admit that I actually learned a few things with this project. I really thought that by leaving the butter out of the cookies that they would stick to the pan when they baked. Instead, they were just really gross.
Seriously, if you're going to leave something out of a batch of cookies, DO NOT LEAVE OUT THE BUTTER!!!
The butterless cookies looked awful, almost like they were growing hair on them or something, and they tasted terrible! The dough even tasted bad.
I thought that by leaving out the baking soda that the cookies would be flat, but strangely enough, they turned out to be one of the less bad batches of cookies.
Oh, and did you ever wonder what would happen if you leave the flour out of cookies?
The kids said it looked kind of like fruit leather with chocolate chips. Strangely enough, this was one of the better tasting batches. We referred to it as "cookie leather."
The overall winner for tasting the best were the cookies made with Splenda. Max wouldn't even try any of the others.
I can truly say that when this was over, I was SICK of cookies!
And I never thought I would say that. Ever.
Brielle made a big poster with photos of each plate of cookies along with her prediction of what would happen if a particular ingredient was left out, what actually happened, and then she taped a sandwich bag with the actual cookie in it next to the photo.
The morning of the science fair, when Brielle picked up her poster to take it to school, most of the photos fell off.
YIKES!
The double sided tape she was using was actually removable double sided tape.
We scrambled to find some real tape, and she taped everything back on, and we managed to get her to school only moderately late.
The teacher was very impressed with "The great cookie experiment" as she chose to call it.
For three days, we had plates of leftover cookies sitting in our kitchen. They sat there and nobody ate them.
NOBODY!
And we have three boys living in our house, one of them being a teenager who is chronically hungry.
So, I threw the cookies away.
Did you hear that?
I THREW AWAY COOKIES!!
But they weren't fit for human consumption. And I'm pretty sure that if we had a dog, it wouldn't have eaten them either.
The conclusion to this experiment?
Don't leave anything out of your cookies, or you'll be sorry.
or
Be sure to do a two part experiment. What happens when you leave ingredients out of cookies AND What kind of cleaning products work the best to clean up cookie dough which has been ground into the grout between the tiles on your kitchen floor.
Thank you all so much for your project suggestions!
She almost decided to do her project on which cleans better, regular store bought cleaners, or home made "green" cleaners. (suggested by Jo)
However, Tiburon suggested that she do a project where she makes several batches of cookies and leaves on ingredient out of each batch to see what would happen.
Hmmmmmmm. Let's decide................
Cookies or cleaning.
Cleaning or cookies.
Cookies or cleaning..............
She decided on the cookies! (with no influence from me, I promise;0)
One evening, she made a batch of regular cookies, to use as an example of a perfect cookie.
The next afternoon, I heard my hand mixer being used, which was strange, because I have a perfectly good Kitchen aid which is great for making cookies.
When I went into the kitchen to see why she was using the hand mixer, I discovered that the bowl and beaters to the Kitchen Aid hadn't been washed, so she was forced to use the hand mixer, because there wasn't enough time to run the dirty bowl through the dishwasher.
???????
Brielle had a quick lesson on how to hand wash a bowl (and no, this was not the first time that she has been taught this skill) and we continued with the making of the cookies.
We made 1/4 batches of cookies and we worked out a system where I would mix the ingredients for the cookies, and Brielle would put them on the pan and in the oven and out of the oven and onto the cooling rack then onto the plate to be photographed.
This way, I was the keeper of the dough.
I love cookie dough.
I have to admit that I actually learned a few things with this project. I really thought that by leaving the butter out of the cookies that they would stick to the pan when they baked. Instead, they were just really gross.
Seriously, if you're going to leave something out of a batch of cookies, DO NOT LEAVE OUT THE BUTTER!!!
The butterless cookies looked awful, almost like they were growing hair on them or something, and they tasted terrible! The dough even tasted bad.
I thought that by leaving out the baking soda that the cookies would be flat, but strangely enough, they turned out to be one of the less bad batches of cookies.
Oh, and did you ever wonder what would happen if you leave the flour out of cookies?
The kids said it looked kind of like fruit leather with chocolate chips. Strangely enough, this was one of the better tasting batches. We referred to it as "cookie leather."
The overall winner for tasting the best were the cookies made with Splenda. Max wouldn't even try any of the others.
I can truly say that when this was over, I was SICK of cookies!
And I never thought I would say that. Ever.
Brielle made a big poster with photos of each plate of cookies along with her prediction of what would happen if a particular ingredient was left out, what actually happened, and then she taped a sandwich bag with the actual cookie in it next to the photo.
The morning of the science fair, when Brielle picked up her poster to take it to school, most of the photos fell off.
YIKES!
The double sided tape she was using was actually removable double sided tape.
We scrambled to find some real tape, and she taped everything back on, and we managed to get her to school only moderately late.
The teacher was very impressed with "The great cookie experiment" as she chose to call it.
For three days, we had plates of leftover cookies sitting in our kitchen. They sat there and nobody ate them.
NOBODY!
And we have three boys living in our house, one of them being a teenager who is chronically hungry.
So, I threw the cookies away.
Did you hear that?
I THREW AWAY COOKIES!!
But they weren't fit for human consumption. And I'm pretty sure that if we had a dog, it wouldn't have eaten them either.
The conclusion to this experiment?
Don't leave anything out of your cookies, or you'll be sorry.
or
Be sure to do a two part experiment. What happens when you leave ingredients out of cookies AND What kind of cleaning products work the best to clean up cookie dough which has been ground into the grout between the tiles on your kitchen floor.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Does anyone have a toothpick?
I just got back from the Meet-n-greet. It was fun to visit with some old friends and meet some new ones.
I even got to try some chacon.
Mmmmmm! Chocolate covered bacon! With almonds on top!
The verdict? Not bad. However, if you ever get the chance to eat any chacon, I would recommend having some dental floss nearby.
I brought my camera so I could take pictures that I could post tonight. Unfortunately, I forgot that I brought it so I didn't take any pictures, and I refuse to post the picture that I accidentally took of my chin yesterday. I was turning the camera around trying to figure out how to get the memory stick out and somehow pushed the button and took a picture (I can't seem to get it deleted from my camera. It's still there, mocking me with it's hideousness)
Since I'm running out of ideas of things to write for NaBloPoMo, I've decided to do something completely unoriginal by copying some other, more original bloggers and have you ask me questions.
What do you want to know about me?
Leave a comment and ask me a question. I'll answer in tomorrow's post. (unless I can think of something better to write about)
I even got to try some chacon.
Mmmmmm! Chocolate covered bacon! With almonds on top!
The verdict? Not bad. However, if you ever get the chance to eat any chacon, I would recommend having some dental floss nearby.
I brought my camera so I could take pictures that I could post tonight. Unfortunately, I forgot that I brought it so I didn't take any pictures, and I refuse to post the picture that I accidentally took of my chin yesterday. I was turning the camera around trying to figure out how to get the memory stick out and somehow pushed the button and took a picture (I can't seem to get it deleted from my camera. It's still there, mocking me with it's hideousness)
Since I'm running out of ideas of things to write for NaBloPoMo, I've decided to do something completely unoriginal by copying some other, more original bloggers and have you ask me questions.
What do you want to know about me?
Leave a comment and ask me a question. I'll answer in tomorrow's post. (unless I can think of something better to write about)
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Vegetable cake
In yet another attempt to get Max to ingest a vegetable, I came up with a new plan.
Today I would make zucchini bread.
I had a few zucchinis in the fridge and decided that they weren't really going anywhere so I searched online for a recipe.
I found one that sounded really good and printed it off.
It said that the prep time was 15 minutes and baking time 60-70 minutes.
Now I realize that the prep times on the recipe are highly optimistic and probably determined by someone in a very tidy test kitchen who not only has all of the ingredients right in front of them and doesn't need to search through the closet to find the other bottle of vanilla because the first one ran out and someone put it back instead of throwing the empty bottle away, and they most likely had all of their bowls, dishes, spoons and utensils sitting right in front of them all clean and shiny so they didn't have to hand wash them due to the fact that even though someone did their job and put the dishes in the dishwasher last night, they didn't bother to turn it on and the test kitchen people probably didn't have a toddler in the room with them..........
So I figured that to be more realistic, I would allow closer to 30-40 minutes to mix up the batter.
I look at the clock. It is 9:30 a.m. I figure that by 11:30, I would be enjoying a nice warm slice of zucchini bread.
The recipe said it made 2 loaves, and I decided that I should double it because I have this theory on cooking.
"It should take longer to eat it than it takes to make it."
This is the reason why I double recipes. Six dozen cookies will last much longer than three dozen cookies.
Am I right?
I watched an episode of Martha Stewart once where she spent like 3 hours making 6 cookies.
She carefully mixed up and rolled out the dough.
She took a leaf which she had carefully hand picked from her yard and then thoroughly cleaned
and laid it gently on top of the dough which had been rolled out to a thickness of exactly 1/4 of an inch. She then took a sharp knife and very precisely cut out the dough using the leaf as a pattern. Next, she took the back of the knife and very artistically drew in the veins of the leaf in the top of the dough.
She placed two cookies on each cookie sheet (they were large) and baked them.
After she took them out of the oven, while they were still warm, she gently lifted them off of her silpat lined cookie sheet and draped them over a large tube so that when the cookie cooled, it would be curved.
Just like a real leaf.
Then she took a pastry bag and with perfectly tinted icing, outlined the veins in the leaf cookies.
In comparison, at our house, we make drop cookies, and we don't give the cookies the luxury of cooling off before we eat them.
Besides, chocolate chips smear all over your face much easier if they're still warm.
When I got out the mixer, Max became rather interested.
He LOVES the mixer.
"Whatcha doing mom?"
"I'm making a special treat for you."
"Oh, are you also making me cookies?"
"No, I'm making some special bread."
I discovered that I needed to wash the bowl to my mixer, the measuring cups and spoons and the grater. I hand washed everything then I got out the ingredients and peeled and grated the zucchini as it said to in the recipe.
Max watched me measure a few ingredients, and then he became rather inquisitive.
"Mom, why you putting the eggs in it?'
"Mom, why did you also drop the egg on the floor?"
"Mom, why did it make a mess?"
"Mom, are you also cleaning up the mess?"
"Mom, why you are throwing away that egg from the floor? Is it also gross?"
"Mom, what's that white stuff?"
"Why you also putting that brown stuff in it?"
"Mom, why you also have to mix it?"..............
"Mom, what's that stuff?"
I was dumping in the zucchini.
"Max" I said "This stuff is SO delicious! It's called zucchini, and it tastes like candy!"
I have to admit that this was not the first time that I fibbed to one of my kids about the taste of zucchini.
I once told CJ that Zucchini tasted like chocolate.
He believed me.
He ate some.
He has never forgiven me.
Seriously CJ, it happened TEN YEARS AGO!
GET. OVER. IT!
I finish mixing everything together and realize that there's way too much batter to fit into my four small loaf pans.
I re read the recipe to discover that it will fill two large loaf pans not two small ones.
Shoot.
I fill the four small loaf pans.
And two round cake pans.
And a pie tin.
I manage to get them all stuffed into the oven and I set the timer.
Then I look at the clock. It's 11:30. So much for the 30 minute prep time. I get a pen and write on the recipe "15 minutes? Don't count on it. Allow two hours!"
50 minutes later, I take the bread out of the oven. (since the pans were smaller I felt the cooking time should be shorter. Plus, it was smelling really good and I couldn't wait to get a taste!)
It was great! The texture was really light, it was more like cake than bread. I ate a slice, then Max came over and asked for some.
HE LOVED IT!
He ate 4 big slices!
I finally got him to eat a vegetable!
OK, I realize that it was hidden within a cake like substance, but still, he ate a vegetable.
And a GREEN one at that!
When the kids got home from school, they were met with the lovely aroma of the zucchini bread. The boys snarfed down as much as they could, as fast as they could, but Brielle wouldn't touch any because "I won't eat cake with a vegetable in it!"
I might re name the recipe "Vegetable cake."
Today I would make zucchini bread.
I had a few zucchinis in the fridge and decided that they weren't really going anywhere so I searched online for a recipe.
I found one that sounded really good and printed it off.
It said that the prep time was 15 minutes and baking time 60-70 minutes.
Now I realize that the prep times on the recipe are highly optimistic and probably determined by someone in a very tidy test kitchen who not only has all of the ingredients right in front of them and doesn't need to search through the closet to find the other bottle of vanilla because the first one ran out and someone put it back instead of throwing the empty bottle away, and they most likely had all of their bowls, dishes, spoons and utensils sitting right in front of them all clean and shiny so they didn't have to hand wash them due to the fact that even though someone did their job and put the dishes in the dishwasher last night, they didn't bother to turn it on and the test kitchen people probably didn't have a toddler in the room with them..........
So I figured that to be more realistic, I would allow closer to 30-40 minutes to mix up the batter.
I look at the clock. It is 9:30 a.m. I figure that by 11:30, I would be enjoying a nice warm slice of zucchini bread.
The recipe said it made 2 loaves, and I decided that I should double it because I have this theory on cooking.
"It should take longer to eat it than it takes to make it."
This is the reason why I double recipes. Six dozen cookies will last much longer than three dozen cookies.
Am I right?
I watched an episode of Martha Stewart once where she spent like 3 hours making 6 cookies.
She carefully mixed up and rolled out the dough.
She took a leaf which she had carefully hand picked from her yard and then thoroughly cleaned
and laid it gently on top of the dough which had been rolled out to a thickness of exactly 1/4 of an inch. She then took a sharp knife and very precisely cut out the dough using the leaf as a pattern. Next, she took the back of the knife and very artistically drew in the veins of the leaf in the top of the dough.
She placed two cookies on each cookie sheet (they were large) and baked them.
After she took them out of the oven, while they were still warm, she gently lifted them off of her silpat lined cookie sheet and draped them over a large tube so that when the cookie cooled, it would be curved.
Just like a real leaf.
Then she took a pastry bag and with perfectly tinted icing, outlined the veins in the leaf cookies.
In comparison, at our house, we make drop cookies, and we don't give the cookies the luxury of cooling off before we eat them.
Besides, chocolate chips smear all over your face much easier if they're still warm.
When I got out the mixer, Max became rather interested.
He LOVES the mixer.
"Whatcha doing mom?"
"I'm making a special treat for you."
"Oh, are you also making me cookies?"
"No, I'm making some special bread."
I discovered that I needed to wash the bowl to my mixer, the measuring cups and spoons and the grater. I hand washed everything then I got out the ingredients and peeled and grated the zucchini as it said to in the recipe.
Max watched me measure a few ingredients, and then he became rather inquisitive.
"Mom, why you putting the eggs in it?'
"Mom, why did you also drop the egg on the floor?"
"Mom, why did it make a mess?"
"Mom, are you also cleaning up the mess?"
"Mom, why you are throwing away that egg from the floor? Is it also gross?"
"Mom, what's that white stuff?"
"Why you also putting that brown stuff in it?"
"Mom, why you also have to mix it?"..............
"Mom, what's that stuff?"
I was dumping in the zucchini.
"Max" I said "This stuff is SO delicious! It's called zucchini, and it tastes like candy!"
I have to admit that this was not the first time that I fibbed to one of my kids about the taste of zucchini.
I once told CJ that Zucchini tasted like chocolate.
He believed me.
He ate some.
He has never forgiven me.
Seriously CJ, it happened TEN YEARS AGO!
GET. OVER. IT!
I finish mixing everything together and realize that there's way too much batter to fit into my four small loaf pans.
I re read the recipe to discover that it will fill two large loaf pans not two small ones.
Shoot.
I fill the four small loaf pans.
And two round cake pans.
And a pie tin.
I manage to get them all stuffed into the oven and I set the timer.
Then I look at the clock. It's 11:30. So much for the 30 minute prep time. I get a pen and write on the recipe "15 minutes? Don't count on it. Allow two hours!"
50 minutes later, I take the bread out of the oven. (since the pans were smaller I felt the cooking time should be shorter. Plus, it was smelling really good and I couldn't wait to get a taste!)
It was great! The texture was really light, it was more like cake than bread. I ate a slice, then Max came over and asked for some.
HE LOVED IT!
He ate 4 big slices!
I finally got him to eat a vegetable!
OK, I realize that it was hidden within a cake like substance, but still, he ate a vegetable.
And a GREEN one at that!
When the kids got home from school, they were met with the lovely aroma of the zucchini bread. The boys snarfed down as much as they could, as fast as they could, but Brielle wouldn't touch any because "I won't eat cake with a vegetable in it!"
I might re name the recipe "Vegetable cake."
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Day after Halloween - sugar withdrawls
Halloween is now officially over, and I actually got some sleep last night so I can now type coherently.
First, I will describe the steps of my Halloween costume making process.
#1. Spend the entire year before Halloween trying to come up with really great ideas for a costume.
#2. Spend about three months before Halloween designing the costume and trying to figure out the best way to put the costume together.
#3. Spend the day before Halloween running around to different fabric stores to get the necessary materials to make the Halloween costume. Be sure to go to the grocery store and buy an entire case of Diet Dr. Pepper.
#4. Stay up all night making the costume.
#5. Move your kitchen table next to the wall so you can have more room on the floor to make the costume.
#6. Leave tons of fabric scraps all over the floor of the family room, bringing the total numbers of rooms covered in costume makingcrap stuff to three.
#7. About 4:00 in the morning begin wondering why you're doing this in the first place.
#8. Notice that the burns on your fingers from the hot glue are really starting to hurt.
#9. Decide that you are indeed crazy and should probably be committed. Preferably someplace quiet where you can relax and get some sleep.
#10. Finish the costume just in time to wake up the kids for school. When one complains that they think it's too early to get up and that they are very tired, say to them very sweetly...........
"DON'T EVEN TALK TO ME ABOUT BEING TIRED!!! YOU HAVE NO CLUE WHAT IT MEANS TO BE REALLY TIRED!! NOW GET YOUR BUTT OUT OF BED AND GET READY FOR SCHOOL!!!!"
#11. Notice that you might be getting a tad bit crabby and decide that it's probably a good time to drink another can of Diet Dr. Pepper.
#12. Notice the huge pile of empty cans of DDP on your counter and wonder if it's bad that you drank that much.
#13. Notice for the first time just what an incredibly huge mess you made all over the house while making the costume.
#14. Ignore the mess and take a nap.
#15 go to the school costume parade and get there just in time to see your kids run past you before you get your camera out of the bag.
I managed to get a picture of the costumes before the kids went trick or treating.
These are not my children in the costumes. They are paid actors.
The costume on the left is a tornado. It is not dryer lint. It's hard to see, but I glued little cars all over it. I wanted to put some little plastic cows on it too but all I could find were some little plastic lizards. I decided they could look like alligators. Brielle has a flying monkey doll (from the wizard of OZ) that I was going to use, but she couldn't find it. Next year I'm adding some small telephone poles and fences to it.
CJ wouldn't let me get a picture of him in his costume. He decided at the last minute that he would go trick or treating and threw a costume together himself. He combined his iPod costume from last year with his alien costume from the year before and went as an iAlien.
These are my darling little nieces.
Random things about this Halloween.
I noticed a big drop in the amount of Three Musketeer bars being handed out this year. What's up with that???
My kids know that the Three Musketeers are the ones that they arerequired allowed to give me.
We have a rule in our home that the kids aren't to eat candy out of their siblings buckets. However, if they leave the candy laying around it's pretty much understood that I'm allowed to eat as much as I want.
It really bugs me when my kids eat the candy and don't throw away the wrappers. Especially when I'm looking through their bag start to grab a peanut butter cup only to discover that it's an empty wrapper.
Last year, Max really surprised me when I took him trick or treating. I thought he would get tired and want to go home early, but after every house he would look at me and say "MORE CANDY! I GET MORE CANDY!" and on to the next house we would go.
This year after three houses he wanted to go home. He said "Why we are also going so long way from our house?" (we were one street away) I forced him to finish the street. When we got home he sat down to eat his candy and fell asleep. I guess it was really tiring to walk around in a crab suit.
In the last post, I wrote about how fascinated Max was with the moldy pumpkin. What I didn't mention was how he was making this annoying siren sound every time he lifted the lid.
WEEEEEOOOOOO WEEEEEEEOOOOOOOO WEEEEEEEEOOOOOO
And then he would run around the kitchen making the siren sound and then would stop for a moment to tell me that "THE PUMPKIN DID ALSO POOP IN IT'S PANTS AND IT NEEDS IT'S CARS TAKED AWAY BECAUSE IT DID ALSO POOP IN IT'S PANTS!!!! WWWEEEEEEEOOOOOO WEEEEEEEOOOO WEEEEEOOOOOO..........
In retrospect, I probably should have put him to bed earlier.
Here are the kid's Jack-o-lanterns. Left to right CJ, Aaron, Max and Brielle. Max drew the design and I cut it out. He says it's a mad pumpkin.
This morning, DH told the kids that he would take them swimming today if they cleaned up the costume making mess I made all over the house.
And the regular mess they made in the family room.
They are at the pool right now.
And every one of them have left their Halloween candy on the kitchen table;0)
First, I will describe the steps of my Halloween costume making process.
#1. Spend the entire year before Halloween trying to come up with really great ideas for a costume.
#2. Spend about three months before Halloween designing the costume and trying to figure out the best way to put the costume together.
#3. Spend the day before Halloween running around to different fabric stores to get the necessary materials to make the Halloween costume. Be sure to go to the grocery store and buy an entire case of Diet Dr. Pepper.
#4. Stay up all night making the costume.
#5. Move your kitchen table next to the wall so you can have more room on the floor to make the costume.
#6. Leave tons of fabric scraps all over the floor of the family room, bringing the total numbers of rooms covered in costume making
#7. About 4:00 in the morning begin wondering why you're doing this in the first place.
#8. Notice that the burns on your fingers from the hot glue are really starting to hurt.
#9. Decide that you are indeed crazy and should probably be committed. Preferably someplace quiet where you can relax and get some sleep.
#10. Finish the costume just in time to wake up the kids for school. When one complains that they think it's too early to get up and that they are very tired, say to them very sweetly...........
"DON'T EVEN TALK TO ME ABOUT BEING TIRED!!! YOU HAVE NO CLUE WHAT IT MEANS TO BE REALLY TIRED!! NOW GET YOUR BUTT OUT OF BED AND GET READY FOR SCHOOL!!!!"
#11. Notice that you might be getting a tad bit crabby and decide that it's probably a good time to drink another can of Diet Dr. Pepper.
#12. Notice the huge pile of empty cans of DDP on your counter and wonder if it's bad that you drank that much.
#13. Notice for the first time just what an incredibly huge mess you made all over the house while making the costume.
#14. Ignore the mess and take a nap.
#15 go to the school costume parade and get there just in time to see your kids run past you before you get your camera out of the bag.
I managed to get a picture of the costumes before the kids went trick or treating.
These are not my children in the costumes. They are paid actors.
The costume on the left is a tornado. It is not dryer lint. It's hard to see, but I glued little cars all over it. I wanted to put some little plastic cows on it too but all I could find were some little plastic lizards. I decided they could look like alligators. Brielle has a flying monkey doll (from the wizard of OZ) that I was going to use, but she couldn't find it. Next year I'm adding some small telephone poles and fences to it.
CJ wouldn't let me get a picture of him in his costume. He decided at the last minute that he would go trick or treating and threw a costume together himself. He combined his iPod costume from last year with his alien costume from the year before and went as an iAlien.
These are my darling little nieces.
Random things about this Halloween.
I noticed a big drop in the amount of Three Musketeer bars being handed out this year. What's up with that???
My kids know that the Three Musketeers are the ones that they are
We have a rule in our home that the kids aren't to eat candy out of their siblings buckets. However, if they leave the candy laying around it's pretty much understood that I'm allowed to eat as much as I want.
It really bugs me when my kids eat the candy and don't throw away the wrappers. Especially when I'm looking through their bag start to grab a peanut butter cup only to discover that it's an empty wrapper.
Last year, Max really surprised me when I took him trick or treating. I thought he would get tired and want to go home early, but after every house he would look at me and say "MORE CANDY! I GET MORE CANDY!" and on to the next house we would go.
This year after three houses he wanted to go home. He said "Why we are also going so long way from our house?" (we were one street away) I forced him to finish the street. When we got home he sat down to eat his candy and fell asleep. I guess it was really tiring to walk around in a crab suit.
In the last post, I wrote about how fascinated Max was with the moldy pumpkin. What I didn't mention was how he was making this annoying siren sound every time he lifted the lid.
WEEEEEOOOOOO WEEEEEEEOOOOOOOO WEEEEEEEEOOOOOO
And then he would run around the kitchen making the siren sound and then would stop for a moment to tell me that "THE PUMPKIN DID ALSO POOP IN IT'S PANTS AND IT NEEDS IT'S CARS TAKED AWAY BECAUSE IT DID ALSO POOP IN IT'S PANTS!!!! WWWEEEEEEEOOOOOO WEEEEEEEOOOO WEEEEEOOOOOO..........
In retrospect, I probably should have put him to bed earlier.
Here are the kid's Jack-o-lanterns. Left to right CJ, Aaron, Max and Brielle. Max drew the design and I cut it out. He says it's a mad pumpkin.
This morning, DH told the kids that he would take them swimming today if they cleaned up the costume making mess I made all over the house.
And the regular mess they made in the family room.
They are at the pool right now.
And every one of them have left their Halloween candy on the kitchen table;0)
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Here comes the fudge! Here comes the fudge!
Due to the overwhelming, nearly unanimous vote in the comments for my last post, I made the fudge.
Some of you asked me to take pictures and give the recipe. Being nice like I am, I will do just that!
First of all you take 4 and 1/2 cups of sugar and mix in 4 Tablespoons cocoa.
The recipe doesn't say to mix the sugar and the cocoa first, so I suppose that you could just throw all of the ingredients in together and mix them up if that's really the way you like to do things, however, I find that if you do it my way, it's easier to get the clumps out of the cocoa.
(Please take note of how ambidextrous I am being. I am stirring with my right hand while taking a picture with my left. Please be impressed, I am right handed, and this was not as easy as it looks) (and yeah, I realize that I probably spelled that word wrong. It's 11:52 p.m. right now, and I'm just too darn tired to look it up to see how to spell it correctly, so please just deal with it. )
Next, mix in one large can of evaporated milk and one cube of margerine. Please note, I prefer butter, because it just tastes better. I guess that you could use margerine, but then your fudge won't taste as good as mine and you might have self esteem issues.
Due to the fact that I have one child that thinks that she doesn't like nuts, I've decided to be ultra cool mom, and make some fudge with nuts, and some without. See the cute little divider that I cleverly made out of the left over tin foil from my foil hats that I will be selling in my Esty shop. You know, the ones that will prevent the mind controlling electromagnetic waves from getting to your brain.
Pre order them now. They will make great Christmas gifts! I can monogram them too, but that will add an extra week to the production time.
Back to the fudge. Heat and boil it 7-8 minutes, stirring constantly. I boiled this for 8 minutes, and I probably should have stopped at 7.
Now this part is very important. Listen carefully.
When stirring your fudge DO NOT SCRAPE THE SIDE OF THE PAN!!!!!
Don't ask me why, I think it's supposed to keep it from going grainy, and help it to have a nice smooth texture. I learned this from a friend of mine whose husband is a Chef at the Lion House, so she should know what she's talking about.
(If you'll notice in this picture I've completely given up on trying to stir with my right hand while taking pictures with my left. After I nearly dropped the camera into the boiling hot fudge, I decided that I should probably hold the camera in my right hand, Besides, the camera strap kept getting in the picture and it was really stressing me out.)
After boiling for 7-8 minutes (again, I think I boiled it too long) Remove from the heat and stir in 1 cup of chocolate chips.
This is where everything went HORRIBLY WRONG, because in the recipe, I had written 1-2 bag of chocolate chips which I took to mean between one and two bags of chocolate chips which really seemed like a lot to me so I just dumped in one bag. Apparently, I should have trusted my instincts because after talking to my mom today, it was supposed to be 1/2 of a bag, or approximately 1 cup.
NOT THE ENTIRE BAG OF CHOCOLATE CHIPS!!!
Anyway, at this point, instead of the chips melting nicely and the fudge turning creamy and smooth, the chocolate chips stuck together and the fudge got REALLY stiff and hard to stir.
I finally got all the chips melted into the mixture, but I still had a 16 ounce bag of mini marshmallows to stir in to the fudge!!!
(also, I took some time out to snap a quick picture of the chocolate chips to show you what they look like before they are all melted. Those few seconds might have cost me dearly)
At this point, I enlisted the help of my very strong hubby who put on the oven mitts and held on to the hot pan while I dumped the marshmallows in the fudge and started stirring.
And stirring.......
and stirring.......
and stirring.
Eventually, I got the darn marshmallows all mixed in but it was still kind of lumpy. (Sorry I didn't have any pictures of this part, but I was stirring with both hands while DH was holding the pan still, and quite frankly, I was getting a little onery about the whole thing)
I dumped some of the fudge in the pan, then added 1 cup of chopped pecans to the rest and stirred some more...........
(Now if I were Kristina, I might have thrown in a jar of bacon bits too)
Then I dumped the rest into the other side of the pan.
The pan was very heavy. Aaron was taking the pictures at this point. I had to use both hands. Notice the blue oven mitts? They are the ones featured here.
So, I'm not sure if it was because I cooked the fudge too long, or if it was because I used too many chocolate chips, but the fudge just didn't turn out as good as usual.
OK *Mary* you might have been right about what you said about fudge in your comment on my last post.
In a last act of desperation, I tried to smooth it out, thinking that it might actually look better.
Left side no nuts, right side nuts.
Let's just pretend that it looks like that because the lighting is bad, OK?
Now it should be common knowledge that anything left sticking to the inside of the pan belongs to the person who made it.
And I'm pretty sure that this part doesn't have any calories in it either.
Now here's a nice tasty chunk-o-fudge!! No comments *Mary* I promise it tasted really good.
While it was still warm, it was nice and creamy, but by morning, I was chipping it apart with a knife. But as I said before, it smelled good and it tasted good, and quite frankly, it was my reason for getting out of bed this morning.
And the kids liked it. In fact, they may or may not have had it for breakfast.
And I may or may not have used it asbribery incentive for Max to get dressed today.
And to clean up his toys.
And to stop whining.
And to sing my favorite songs.
Actually, I was feeling a bit like I was raising a trained seal.
"Here Max" as I'm holding the fudge over his head "sing a song for mommy! Come on Max, sing. Sing! SING!"
And then about 100 times today I got to hear him say "I ALSO DO NEED SOME MORE OF DAT STUFF!!"
My conclusion on the fudge. I should have only used one half of a bag of chocolate chips, and only boiled it for 7 minutes.
Still, it did satisfy my chocolate craving............
(and no, I didn't weigh myself to see how much weight I might have gained.)
I will now give you the recipe as long as you don't tell my mom that I gave it to you.
Fudge recipe
4 1/2 cups sugar
4 Tablespoons cocoa
1 cube margerine or butter (USE BUTTER!)
1 large can of evaporated milk
Heat and boil 7-8 minutes (7!) stirring constantly!
Remove from heat and stir in 1/2 bag of chocolate chips
Stir in 1 pint of marshmallow creme OR one 16 ounce bag of mini marshmallows.
Stir until dissolved
(or until your husband gets tired of holding the pan so you can stir with both hands)
Add one cup of chopped nuts then stir until creamy.
Variation on this recipe- leave out cocoa, use white chocolate chips, and add almond flavoring after it has boiled.
Some of you asked me to take pictures and give the recipe. Being nice like I am, I will do just that!
First of all you take 4 and 1/2 cups of sugar and mix in 4 Tablespoons cocoa.
The recipe doesn't say to mix the sugar and the cocoa first, so I suppose that you could just throw all of the ingredients in together and mix them up if that's really the way you like to do things, however, I find that if you do it my way, it's easier to get the clumps out of the cocoa.
(Please take note of how ambidextrous I am being. I am stirring with my right hand while taking a picture with my left. Please be impressed, I am right handed, and this was not as easy as it looks) (and yeah, I realize that I probably spelled that word wrong. It's 11:52 p.m. right now, and I'm just too darn tired to look it up to see how to spell it correctly, so please just deal with it. )
Next, mix in one large can of evaporated milk and one cube of margerine. Please note, I prefer butter, because it just tastes better. I guess that you could use margerine, but then your fudge won't taste as good as mine and you might have self esteem issues.
Due to the fact that I have one child that thinks that she doesn't like nuts, I've decided to be ultra cool mom, and make some fudge with nuts, and some without. See the cute little divider that I cleverly made out of the left over tin foil from my foil hats that I will be selling in my Esty shop. You know, the ones that will prevent the mind controlling electromagnetic waves from getting to your brain.
Pre order them now. They will make great Christmas gifts! I can monogram them too, but that will add an extra week to the production time.
Back to the fudge. Heat and boil it 7-8 minutes, stirring constantly. I boiled this for 8 minutes, and I probably should have stopped at 7.
Now this part is very important. Listen carefully.
When stirring your fudge DO NOT SCRAPE THE SIDE OF THE PAN!!!!!
Don't ask me why, I think it's supposed to keep it from going grainy, and help it to have a nice smooth texture. I learned this from a friend of mine whose husband is a Chef at the Lion House, so she should know what she's talking about.
(If you'll notice in this picture I've completely given up on trying to stir with my right hand while taking pictures with my left. After I nearly dropped the camera into the boiling hot fudge, I decided that I should probably hold the camera in my right hand, Besides, the camera strap kept getting in the picture and it was really stressing me out.)
After boiling for 7-8 minutes (again, I think I boiled it too long) Remove from the heat and stir in 1 cup of chocolate chips.
This is where everything went HORRIBLY WRONG, because in the recipe, I had written 1-2 bag of chocolate chips which I took to mean between one and two bags of chocolate chips which really seemed like a lot to me so I just dumped in one bag. Apparently, I should have trusted my instincts because after talking to my mom today, it was supposed to be 1/2 of a bag, or approximately 1 cup.
NOT THE ENTIRE BAG OF CHOCOLATE CHIPS!!!
Anyway, at this point, instead of the chips melting nicely and the fudge turning creamy and smooth, the chocolate chips stuck together and the fudge got REALLY stiff and hard to stir.
I finally got all the chips melted into the mixture, but I still had a 16 ounce bag of mini marshmallows to stir in to the fudge!!!
(also, I took some time out to snap a quick picture of the chocolate chips to show you what they look like before they are all melted. Those few seconds might have cost me dearly)
At this point, I enlisted the help of my very strong hubby who put on the oven mitts and held on to the hot pan while I dumped the marshmallows in the fudge and started stirring.
And stirring.......
and stirring.......
and stirring.
Eventually, I got the darn marshmallows all mixed in but it was still kind of lumpy. (Sorry I didn't have any pictures of this part, but I was stirring with both hands while DH was holding the pan still, and quite frankly, I was getting a little onery about the whole thing)
I dumped some of the fudge in the pan, then added 1 cup of chopped pecans to the rest and stirred some more...........
(Now if I were Kristina, I might have thrown in a jar of bacon bits too)Then I dumped the rest into the other side of the pan.
The pan was very heavy. Aaron was taking the pictures at this point. I had to use both hands. Notice the blue oven mitts? They are the ones featured here.
So, I'm not sure if it was because I cooked the fudge too long, or if it was because I used too many chocolate chips, but the fudge just didn't turn out as good as usual.
OK *Mary* you might have been right about what you said about fudge in your comment on my last post.
In a last act of desperation, I tried to smooth it out, thinking that it might actually look better.
Left side no nuts, right side nuts.
Let's just pretend that it looks like that because the lighting is bad, OK?Now it should be common knowledge that anything left sticking to the inside of the pan belongs to the person who made it.
And I'm pretty sure that this part doesn't have any calories in it either.
Now here's a nice tasty chunk-o-fudge!! No comments *Mary* I promise it tasted really good.
Here is the finished product on a plate. Delicious!!!
While it was still warm, it was nice and creamy, but by morning, I was chipping it apart with a knife. But as I said before, it smelled good and it tasted good, and quite frankly, it was my reason for getting out of bed this morning.
And the kids liked it. In fact, they may or may not have had it for breakfast.
And I may or may not have used it as
And to clean up his toys.
And to stop whining.
And to sing my favorite songs.
Actually, I was feeling a bit like I was raising a trained seal.
"Here Max" as I'm holding the fudge over his head "sing a song for mommy! Come on Max, sing. Sing! SING!"
And then about 100 times today I got to hear him say "I ALSO DO NEED SOME MORE OF DAT STUFF!!"
My conclusion on the fudge. I should have only used one half of a bag of chocolate chips, and only boiled it for 7 minutes.
Still, it did satisfy my chocolate craving............
(and no, I didn't weigh myself to see how much weight I might have gained.)
I will now give you the recipe as long as you don't tell my mom that I gave it to you.
Fudge recipe
4 1/2 cups sugar
4 Tablespoons cocoa
1 cube margerine or butter (USE BUTTER!)
1 large can of evaporated milk
Heat and boil 7-8 minutes (7!) stirring constantly!
Remove from heat and stir in 1/2 bag of chocolate chips
Stir in 1 pint of marshmallow creme OR one 16 ounce bag of mini marshmallows.
Stir until dissolved
(or until your husband gets tired of holding the pan so you can stir with both hands)
Add one cup of chopped nuts then stir until creamy.
Variation on this recipe- leave out cocoa, use white chocolate chips, and add almond flavoring after it has boiled.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
The trouble with fudge
So,
I'm sitting here, valiantly fighting the urge to go and make myself a great big batch of fudge.
Homemade fudge with pecans.
My mom's recipe. So good!
"So what's the dilema?" you ask? "What's wrong with fudge especially if it's your mom's super-de-duper delicious recipe?"
Well, I'll tell you what's wrong with it. It's magical fudge. It's addictive.
It's impossible to just eat one piece!
And did I mention how wonderfully delicious it is?
Did I also mention that I've been craving chocolate all weekend? And not just my ordinary chocolate cravings that can be satisfied by chocolate chips.
NO!
It's a "I need to have chocolate in the form of fudge!!" sort of craving.
The recipe makes five pounds of fudge.
FIVE POUNDS!!
This is the fudge that I make and give to the neighbors for Christmas. Only, the neighbors don't get all of it.
Here's a question. I always make a five pound batch of fudge, and I never eat the whole five pounds. (shut up, I seriously couldn't eat ALL of the fudge) Why do I gain TEN pounds every time I make a batch of fudge?
I think that's proof that the fudge has some magical properties to it.
What I don't understand is why something that tastes so absolutely good can be so bad for me.
Somehow, it just seems so wrong.
Maybe I could market it as "Magical fudge, feed it to your skinny enemies!"
I really like that idea, because if I manage to make everyone around me fatter, it would totally make ME look thinner wouldn't it?
Seriously, you would think that the Diet Dr. Pepper I drink with the fudge would somehow cancel out the calories and carbs and everything else.
I'm rambling, I know.
I'll put it up to a vote. Leave me a comment telling me whether or not I should make the fudge and why. Somehow, leaving it up to mycyber BFFs will make me feel less irresponsible.
p.s. In a chocolate craving moment of weakness, I bought a bag of Hershey's kisses. We discovered that Max will do pretty much anything to get a chocolate kiss.
ANYTHING!!
This information will come in handy at a future time, I'm sure.
Mwhahahahahah!
I'm sitting here, valiantly fighting the urge to go and make myself a great big batch of fudge.
Homemade fudge with pecans.
My mom's recipe. So good!
"So what's the dilema?" you ask? "What's wrong with fudge especially if it's your mom's super-de-duper delicious recipe?"
Well, I'll tell you what's wrong with it. It's magical fudge. It's addictive.
It's impossible to just eat one piece!
And did I mention how wonderfully delicious it is?
Did I also mention that I've been craving chocolate all weekend? And not just my ordinary chocolate cravings that can be satisfied by chocolate chips.
NO!
It's a "I need to have chocolate in the form of fudge!!" sort of craving.
The recipe makes five pounds of fudge.
FIVE POUNDS!!
This is the fudge that I make and give to the neighbors for Christmas. Only, the neighbors don't get all of it.
Here's a question. I always make a five pound batch of fudge, and I never eat the whole five pounds. (shut up, I seriously couldn't eat ALL of the fudge) Why do I gain TEN pounds every time I make a batch of fudge?
I think that's proof that the fudge has some magical properties to it.
What I don't understand is why something that tastes so absolutely good can be so bad for me.
Somehow, it just seems so wrong.
Maybe I could market it as "Magical fudge, feed it to your skinny enemies!"
I really like that idea, because if I manage to make everyone around me fatter, it would totally make ME look thinner wouldn't it?
Seriously, you would think that the Diet Dr. Pepper I drink with the fudge would somehow cancel out the calories and carbs and everything else.
I'm rambling, I know.
I'll put it up to a vote. Leave me a comment telling me whether or not I should make the fudge and why. Somehow, leaving it up to mycyber BFFs will make me feel less irresponsible.
p.s. In a chocolate craving moment of weakness, I bought a bag of Hershey's kisses. We discovered that Max will do pretty much anything to get a chocolate kiss.
ANYTHING!!
This information will come in handy at a future time, I'm sure.
Mwhahahahahah!
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
If you chance to meet a frown............
Max: "Mom, I want a frownie."
Me: "Why Max, are you sad?"
Max "No, I want a frownie. Please I can have a frownie?"
I frown at Max.
Max: "Mom, please! Pretty please with sugar on top! I can have a frownie?"
Me: "A what?"
Max : "A frownie! A frownie! (jumping up and down) "Please-a-please-a-please-a-please, I also do need a frownie!"
Me: "OK Max, let's see you frown."
Max: "No! I also not frown! I also want a frownie!!"
Me: (singing) "If you chance to meet a frown, do not let it stay, quickly turn it upside down" (I pick up Max and turn him upside down) "and smile that frown away"
Max: "NO! I NOT BE UPSIDE DOWN! I BE UPSIDE UP! MAKE ME UPSIDE UP!!"
I turn him over and stand him on his feet.
Max: "I also do need a frownie."
Me: "Max, honey, I don't know what you're talking about."
Max takes my hand and leads me to the kitchen and points to these........................
Me: "Why Max, are you sad?"
Max "No, I want a frownie. Please I can have a frownie?"
I frown at Max.
Max: "Mom, please! Pretty please with sugar on top! I can have a frownie?"
Me: "A what?"
Max : "A frownie! A frownie! (jumping up and down) "Please-a-please-a-please-a-please, I also do need a frownie!"
Me: "OK Max, let's see you frown."
Max: "No! I also not frown! I also want a frownie!!"
Me: (singing) "If you chance to meet a frown, do not let it stay, quickly turn it upside down" (I pick up Max and turn him upside down) "and smile that frown away"
Max: "NO! I NOT BE UPSIDE DOWN! I BE UPSIDE UP! MAKE ME UPSIDE UP!!"
I turn him over and stand him on his feet.
Max: "I also do need a frownie."
Me: "Max, honey, I don't know what you're talking about."
Max takes my hand and leads me to the kitchen and points to these........................
"frownies?"
Which is kind of strange, because brownies always make me smile:0)
Which is kind of strange, because brownies always make me smile:0)
Friday, March 7, 2008
Favorite places :0)
I have several favorite places.
Like.........
here
And here.
Now, as of today, I have a new favorite place :0)
and it is..............
:
:
:
:
:
:
V
HERE!
And why, do you ask, would this be a favorite place of mine?
Like.........
here
And here.
Now, as of today, I have a new favorite place :0)
and it is..............
:
:
:
:
:
:
V
HERE!
And why, do you ask, would this be a favorite place of mine?
I think it might have something to do with
these!
these!
Oh, yes, I also have a new friend!
It's name is;
White Chocolate Carmel Macadamia Nut CHEESECAKE!
I've been thinking all day for the appropriate word to use to describe this fine treasure of a dessert.
The word I came up with is;
"Rapture"
nuff said.
It's name is;
White Chocolate Carmel Macadamia Nut CHEESECAKE!
I've been thinking all day for the appropriate word to use to describe this fine treasure of a dessert.
The word I came up with is;
"Rapture"
nuff said.
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