KidPics

A while ago I gave Squirt my point-and-shoot camera. She had so much fun playing with it and I seldom used it so giving it to her seemed the logical thing to do. She uses it quite a bit but I never think to check her memory card. The battery needs attention far more frequently than the memory card does. She's loaning the camera to His Hotness for the weekend which meant it was time to clear the card and see what was up. There were pictures of trees and toys, shoes, potatoes, friends, her room, drawings, closed doors, herself, and a bunch with nothing but total blackness.

A few things are evident:

• she still has no idea to wait and let the camera focus before pressing the button all the way (I've tried to help her, but all I get is an "I know, mom."
• she loves to change the setting to "pets" because of the little dog image that shows in the screen corner even if the pictures turn out crummy
• she is not camera shy, as evidenced by the 300 blurry self-portraits I found
• I can approximate the date pictures were taken by the way she captures her obsessions-of-the-moment
• she loves that it can take video and makes/narrates her own movies
• giving her the camera was the right thing to do, even if the images are less than stellar, simply because of the fun she has with it. 

Birthday Surprises

Last weekend His Hotness had a birthday. It was a significant one (as they all will be) because we are now the same age. Sometime back in October (19th, to be exact) I got an email from my MIL containing an itinerary. Not just any itinerary, but one containing a huge birthday surprise for my handsome husband.  After all, what could he possibly want more than to spend the day with Jellie-bellie?

The answer is nothing. There is nothing on Earth he would ever want more than that. Ever.

So the plans were made and the mild deceptions began so that we could pull off the surprise. I'd say it worked...

The only thing he'd actually asked for (or rather planned on his own) was to go to the BYU/Portland Pilots basketball game the night of his birthday. It isn't often he gets to watch his favorite college team in person any more. We went with his brother, niece, and mom along with our complete family. BYU won and it wasn't the blow-out that he was expecting, but honestly I don't remember any of the game because I was too focused on the little people.

I'd say Squirt liked Jellie-bellie coming almost as much as her dad did.

Jellie-bellie had a 100 days of school homework assignment to do during her stay with us. It was decided that she'd do a poster with 100 pictures of she and her dad. So the challenge then was to make sure we had 100 pictures. We did a few silly photo moments and were able to round up enough to get it done. We spent all Wednesday morning working on making a collage of the images while Squirt was at school. It was laminated to stay intact on the plane, and with that we were off to the airport again to send her home.

The weekend went quickly. We are sure counting down the moments until she is out here with us again. In the meantime, I had better practice my underdogs.

Goodness Gracious

We are still alive! Which is good news to us all after last week.
So here's our family life update in 60 seconds. Ready? GO:

• Squirt was more sick than she has ever been and it was a little challenging on us all. Amazingly it hasn't spread to any others in our home. 
• Last night we went to dinner with an Aunt of mine whom His Hotness had never met. It was a grand time with good food and good conversation. 
• His Hotness is getting into some busy times at school and has had some early mornings participating in studies and being made radioactive. It's a good thing he seems to really like all this experimenting-on-living-people stuff. 
• We are missing our Jellie-Bellie and counting the moments til we see her again. Squirt is enamored with the dragon Happy Napper Jellie-Bellie gave her for her Birthday and likes to take it everywhere. 
• After months of searching for pastry rings to use with some recipes I adore (like this one) a cousin blogged about English muffins and I found that if I searched for "muffin rings" instead of "pastry rings" there was a plethora of options available. All is right in the world, even if I do feel a tad silly over how long it took to figure that one out. 
• His Hotness is humoring me by watching The Bachelor and letting me drone on about the ridiculousness of it all and dealing with my analysis of everyone's personality. Our my guilty pleasure. 
• Oregon continues to surprise us with sunshine rather than torrential downpours this winter. It's a pleasant surprise, though I do hope it will not mean adverse results for the farmer's market when they reopen this Spring. 

I think that's about it. Happy Thursday!

Chewy goodness

Last summer at our favorite store ever there was a baking mix for sale that piqued my interest. Not one to use a mix unless I have to, the idea was filed to the back of my mind where I hoped I'd remember it for some future purpose. His Hotness had an appointment to go home teaching today and one of the family members had a birthday - so treats were definitely in order. Add to it that Squirt is sick in a needs-no-attention-whatsoever kind of way and I was happy to fill my time baking.

The idea is simple, but the results are amazing.

Mix up your favorite brownie batter (I used this one) then mix up some chocolate chip cookie batter (I used this one). Place one scoop of brownie batter in the bottom of well greased standard muffin cups and top with one scoop of chocolate chip cookie dough. Bake at 375 for 15 minutes. Of course the time is approximate for the recipes you use and the way your oven bakes. As always when brownies or cookies are involved, aim to err on the side of a bit underdone rather than overdone. 

When they are done, place the muffin pan on a cooling rack until cool. Using a plastic spoon gently remove the Crownies (Browkies?) and try very hard to not eat them all immediately.

I would love to tell you how many this yields, but I have no clue. I mixed up one batch of the brownie batter and 1/2 batch of the cookie batter. I made 12 standard muffin cup Crownies, 20 mini-muffin brownie bites, and ate the rest of the cookie dough straight from the bowl. A yield I am completely content with.

Poor Squirt is sick enough that when I offered her one she said she was too sick for chocolate... I can't say that I have ever experienced that! His Hotness and I definitely approve. 

Birthday

So it really did happen, of course. She's getting big!!! But enough about that... Saturday started like most any other day, except for the fact that Squirt woke up at 6:00 and started knocking on our bedroom door every five minutes for about the next 45 minutes until I had a minor nervous breakdown and relocated to the couch so she'd quit trying to come get me. I was a brilliant parent, and we set all her gifts out on the living room chair to tempt her mercilessly. At least that was the end result.

She played her first basketball games on Saturday. They were ref training games and truthfully I felt quite sorry for one of the kids. He didn't "demand it!" quite the way his trainer expected... but I digress... She had a blast. I don't think she really has any clue what is going on still, but she did have one lengthy dribble down the court.

After three games, a shower, and a tiny bit of down time we went for a birthday dinner of her choice: Carls' Jr. As we got there she asked if we could go through the drive through... which was both hilarious and not indulged. Birthday dinners are not to-go (at least in the grown up mind). We made faces and played with the shutter remote while waiting for our food.

And then the moment(s) arrived: cake and presents!

The cake was a simple coconut cake served with double chocolate ice cream. While I was playing with the camera and timer, His Hotness was being goofy and smearing icing all over the birthday girls' face. She loved it.

Despite the fact that Christmas was here about fourteen minutes ago, she got some serious stuff. In addition to the pile pictured there was a huge stack of clothes and a new winter coat. After conversations with many different family members, it was time to play Skylander, have a dramatic sugar crash, and collapse in bed. She had a great day.

Halfway

Squirt had a birthday this weekend. It's a birthday that is hard for me to face. I'm a sentimental mother and for the past six years (prior to my marriage) it has just been the two of us. She's been my other half for so long, it's hard to realize that we're halfway to the point that she leaves the "nest."

She doesn't view it that way of course. To her it's another year older which means another year closer to the freedoms older kids get. And presents. It was definitely about presents. I realized after the festivities were done that once again I was in a precious few photos with her. Several years ago I had made a goal to be in at least one photo with her each month, even if it was a cheesy self-portrait snapped in the bathroom mirror before bedtime on the last day of the month. Since meeting His Hotness, I've gotten out of that habit and I realize now how much I miss it. 

Before bedtime, I made Squirt take some pictures with me. 

I can't believe how big she is now. I can't believe that we're halfway to the move-out point. I can't believe how different our life has become from when she was little. It's beautiful and completely amazing but I confess that a small part of me is not loving this whole growing-up business.

Happy Birthday baby girl. With every passing year you weasel your way deeper into my heart.

Normalcy

Sometimes it really is the little things. The last couple days have been filled with relaxation, playing at the park with neighbors, and just being. It's nice to let kids be kids and not worry about the hype and chaos of Holidays, travel, or other such things. Squirt had her first day back at school today and in the afternoon the weather cooperated again so we spent a good chunk of time outside.

Jellie-Bellie wanted me to capture her "being a tree." Rest assured she was merely 3 feet off the ground, if that.

She also loved riding a bike - a LOT. In fact she tried at one point to get Squirt off her bike and teaching her how to ride with no training wheels. If not for the fact that the other bike was way too big and she had no helmet, I might have just sat and watched that scene unfold.

After every lap of the common area, she would pose for the camera (often making goofy faces) and I would wait until she circled again to show her the image.

We took Squirt's new basketball to the park and had a blast trying to make baskets. She starts up basketball practice again tomorrow and is super-excited for it.

Then they rode bikes some more.

It was just a normal day of kids being kids.