My Mommy Vacation

This post is a little old. I forgot it was in my draft folder awaiting the photos. Anyway, enjoy.

I invented this new thing that I think all Mommies should try. It is called a "Mommy Vacation". I invented it to save myself from a break-down. I didn't think it would be so wonderful but it was. If you want to learn how to do it, read on.

1. You need to be really overwhelmed. This was best accomplished for me by having my husband sleep in while I fed the girls, picked out church outfits and showered all the three girls together (killer on my back).
2. You need to have been or be super stressed out. For me, I hate being late to places. And at 8:55 when I should have been out the door for church (we live within walking distance), I was still doing my hair (that's the thing with this short hair, I can't just not do it). At 9:00, I finished my hair and started my make-up and at 9:05, I was out the door while everyone else had left before me.
   
3. You need to have been let down. For me, I helped my daughter Chloe write her talk for Primary and practiced, practiced, practiced it. I hate when she has to be fed every line. I mean I think that is fine when they are little but I know she doesn't need that anymore. I told everybody the plan, Daddy would help with parts but Chloe would have to do her main story part by herself. Everybody agreed but that is not what happened and yeah she's a kid and blah, blah, blah but it really bugged me.
   
4. You need to be sick of your job. When we got home and there were dirty dishes everywhere, crumbs from breakfast on the floor and table and everybody whining about how they were hungry (or screaming) and even though claiming to be hungry not wanting to eat anything you offer.
5. You need to feel like you are going to snap.
6. Or if your baby just figured out how to scream, this alone can get you an automatic pass.
   

If you can fulfill these requirements, this is what you get:

• You go upstairs (or to some corner of your house) and you tell everybody that you are gone, off duty, ca-poot!
• You put Daddy in charge.
• You eat whatever you want all day and prepare no meals for anybody else. *(*The key here is that somebody else has to do the next three otherwise you will neutralize your vacation.)
• You do no dishes. *
  
• You don't have to clean anything up. *
  
• You can take a nap. A glorious, guilt-free nap.
• You can play on your computer, cleaning off the desktop, organizing photos, reading emails, and actually typing an email without anybody else trying to whack the keyboard while you're typing, etc.
• You can eat 2 packs of Little Debbie heart cakes if you want to. In theory.
  
• You make everybody ask permission to talk to you before they talk to you.
• You eat Fruit Loops for dinner (even though you don't really love cereal, it just sounds so good to you, you can't believe it), and you eat it in bed if you want to because you're the mom and you can do whatever you want.
• You can "visit" your family a few times on your vacation, but if your baby starts screaming, you just tell everybody you're going back on vacation again.

And magically if you do a Mommy Vacation, the next day when your baby wakes up at 6:30 or screams at you and throws food, it isn't quite as hard to handle. You seem happier, more patient, more forgiving and even more optimistic. Plus, everybody else seems to have fun having a break from Mommy too--at least for a while.


The Daddy Fort was such a success in fact that Chloe and Daddy had a sleepover in it's replica the following weekend. Thank you Greg. Although it would be nice to have a Mommy Vacation every month, I am grateful that I got at least one for now.

Family Snow Day

(Sorry, am I the only one who back posts? So this was dated in Feb b/c this is Feb. So no, there is no snow currently outside although it was a long, tough winter! Didn't mean to fool you all.)

This was our Family Home Evening activity. I generally don't like to play in the snow or even take the kids outside because it is such a pain in the butt to get all the gear on and then off. Tati had never had the chance to actually BE in the snow (we usually are either holding her or leave her strapped into something) though so I didn't want her to look back at this age without any proof.
She ate some snow with her big sis who still loves eating snow and ice as much as she did when she was little too. Can this be genetic?

Look how Tati looks at her Daddy. There really is nothing quite like it.

Front yard.

In the backyard. She was so excited to be allowed to actually crawl in the snow. (If you've got a quick eye, you may notice the outfit change. That's b/c this activity was actually two outings to the backyard in the same day. The second was was after a friend returned our baby snow suit. Good thing too b/c the first outfit was soaking wet when she finished.

She couldn't wipe that smile off her face the whole time. It was so cute!

Lastly, here is a video of Tati in action crawling. It was almost nightfall by this time. Neither of the girls wanted to go inside. They obviously get that from their dad.

2/23/09

Easy, Yummy Snack

Are mine the only kids who are always hungry? I swear as soon as I finish the dishes from breakfast, I'm already getting requests for snacks. It is enough to drive a Mommy coo-koo. The past few weeks, I've been doing something different for snacks. I'm making muffins. They are the perfect serving size and pretty nutritious--they do have wheat germ! My kids also like these for breakfast with a bowl of applesauce or with a yogurt. I got this new recipe from my friend. Make it the real way first and then make your own adjustments. The tricky part for me is the baking because my oven is so old and unpredictable so just watch em good the first time and then you'll know how long to bake. I've successfully done these a few ways: I've done honey instead of sugar(less than a cup b/c it is sweeter than real sugar), less sugar and then once they're in the liners, sprinkle some sugar/cinnamon mixture on top so they don't miss the sugar inside, done some brown sugar in place of all the white, I've added apples and cinnamon and today I did them with carrots and cinnamon with a hint of nutmeg, orange juice & zest (sort of carrot cakish). Let me know what you think. Also, if you have any great, kid snack ideas, hook me up.

This recipe makes 18 muffins in the normal size muffin liners or 12 of those extra large ones. I just use one of those small cookie ice cream scoops, 2 scoops in each muffin. The plain recipe is super yummy for breakfast with sour plum jam on top but unless you are one of my relatives, you probably don't have sour plum jam just lying around. Well and seriously if you are one of my relatives, you probably already ate it all and have to wait until summer again when my mom makes it. It is the best jam EVER but I suppose any jam would do. :-)

Wheat Germ Muffins

1 ½ c. flour
3 tsp. baking powder
¾ tsp. salt
1 c. + 2 T. wheat germ
1 c. +2 T. sugar
¼ +1 T. oil
2 eggs
¾ c. milk

Mix it all together. Bake at 375 for 15-20 min.

I know, kind of random measurements but they've turned out great every time. I think the key is equal wheat germ and sweetener b/c it is quite bitter alone. My other favorite muffins are from all recipes. I'll put the link. It only has 35 reviews so if you like it leave one there. You can read my review there if you look for it. I usually don't make anything from those recipes unless they have a lot of reviews but this gamble REALLY paid off.

Check it out.

If you have any kids, check out Chloe's blog and then do one for them. There's a link on the right down a little ways. Enjoy.

Greg's B-day

Well, Greg is 30. I can't believe I married him when he was only 22. What were we thinking? I have to say Greg is getting better and better with age. I'm so glad I was able to see all of this in him even then.

Here's his cake. It was Chloe's idea. It is a diamond with rock climbers climbing it. It actually was quite easy to prepare because I have heart-shaped cake pans that I just trimmed the cake down a little bit. It looks a little supermanish too I think. I was so proud of myself seeing as it was all my work and problem solving. Then after all my excitement, Greg thought it was a tooth and was really confused. He had to read the words around the edges to figure it out. Well that and Chloe yelled it out. Talk about a long walk with a small drink of water.


We were excited to all eat breakfast together. Greg went into school late and the girls LOVED being able to all have cereal together. They sure love their daddy. Tati is especially going through a total "Daddy Phase". He comes home from school and she is reaching for him and cries if he tries to put her down. Yeah, he hates it.

Chloe wanted to give him his presents right at breakfast so I didn't have a chance to wrap them. Chloe said, "Mommy, don't worry I'll wrap them." then she came back with the gifts wrapped up in clothes and blankets. Pretty resouceful.

You've never seen anybody so excited to get socks before in your whole life!

Happy Birthday Greg, we love you!

My Little Farmer

Chloe: "Mom, can I have a snack?"
Me: "Sure, what do you want?"
"Um, I want some wheat crackers."
"Ok. But I thought you didn't like those crackers."
"Well, I didn't but then on Saturday when you were gone, Daddy gave me some and after I ate seven of them, I thought they were really good."
"Oh really? (7?!) Well, good. Then go eat some if you like them so much."
(a few minutes elapse)
"Mom, I have the greatest idea!"
"What?" (me in the other room)
"Hold on, I'll show you."
(she walks into the kitchen where I'm doing the dishes)
"Look Mom, I got the little wheat seeds off my cracker. Let's put them in a tupperware and then we can plant them in our garden and grow wheat to make wheat bread or some of these crackers."
I told her I thought it was a fabulous idea. I'll talk to her about what sesame seeds are and how baked seeds can't grow later.

The Tooth Fairy?

So as most of you already know, I'm quite anti-Santa. It all stems from me working as "Santa's Helper" at the Esplanade mall back in the day. Santa was a total perv. He was just so gross and would always be like, "Why don't you come sit on my lap?!" and we'd be like, "Shut up Santa." He convinced me that there were plenty other bad Santas or pervy Santas. I never talk about Santa at Christmas time if I can avoid it and we have no Santa decore. But Chloe is no dope and her friends talked about him all the time. She's growing up and this year asked me if she could go talk to him one day while we were walking by and I didn't have the heart to not let her. I told her I wasn't going to "help" her so if she wanted to talk to him, she'd have to do it by herself. I was certain this would have deterred her since she is quite shy with most adults but she just marched right up to him and told him she wanted either a pegasus pony or a unicorn pony with a magnet foot. "Please no normal ponies because my mom says I have too many of those. " Then she explained the difference between a pegasus and a unicorn, asked if she could have a candy cane and we were on our merry way. Sadly, no pegasus or unicorn appeared. Santa did this whole, "If I can't find those, I'll have to bring underwear and socks..." which I thought was pretty lame but probably a good line if you're "Santa". I'm sure she noticed but hasn't said anything. Anyway, this is a really long intro to the following.

For some reason the idea of the Tooth Fairy doesn't bother me at all. In fact, I think it is quite fun. She is a bit of a trippy idea--I mean what is she supposed to do with all those teeth?! And yeah Santa sneaks into your house but this fairy chick sneaks right into your room, worse, right by your head and reaches under your pillow! Why aren't more people freaked out by this idea? [Side note: my little brother used to think a troll was going to come into his room and suffocate him. We saw this freaky show on t.v. (some "short" movie with Drew Barrymore but as a child) Where were my parents changing the channel? He would sometimes write things on his mirror with crayon and then say the troll did it.] The reason I'm bringing it up is because Chloe has TWO loose teeth. More than that, she has two adult teeth already here (only one at the time of the photo) and the two baby teeth are still here too. She's a snaggletooth. See for yourself.

Now let's see if I can answer a few of your obvious questions:

• Yes, I have only one nail painted. So w.t. I know. It is now immortalized forever. I didn't have time to finish--hardly ever do but I love having my nails painted.
• Yes, that is a tear running down her face. I can't say that I had the best parental reaction to seeing this tooth. I feaked out. Then I showed Greg and he kind of freaked out.
  
• Yes, I have heard of this happening to other kids (since then. Before then, no.).
  
• Yes, it is weird.
• Yes she is young to already be losing her teeth. (But again, not unheard of and she will be 5 in April.)
  
• No, there is nothing to worry about unless the baby teeth don't come out on there own at which point we'd have to have a dentist remove them. (I did a video consultation with my dentist--that's how I know that. My dentist is my brother in law.)
• No, there is no free dental in Canada. Yes, free health insurance, no free dental. No free optical.
  
• Yes, she is excited (and scared) and she's been bragging to all the other kids her age about how she is more grown up than they are.
• Yes, we've been reading a ton of books from the library and I've been amazed at how many times biting into an apple is mentioned. I liked the one when the kid bit into a marshmellow and his tooth stuck.
  

Now my turn for some questions.

How do you do the tooth fairy? How much money does the tooth fairy give these days (does it keep increasing like babysitting and gas)? Do you have any fun ideas of things we can do to make this memorable or fun? Any tips on getting the tooth out any faster? What do you do with the tooth that the "fairy" has taken? Do you save it? (side note: when my sister was little, she had this freaky tooth growing up like towards her nose and she had to get it removed. After the surgery, the doctor gave her her tooth is this plastic tooth shaped necklace with a flip top lid. I was so jealous. I was also so excited to see the tooth. She busted it out and it was all long with this like really long root and it TOTALLY freaked me out. After that, every time I'd see the necklace, I'd like pinch pick it up and move it as far away from my dresser as I could get it. I think my mom still has a jewelry box full of our teeth. Wonder if that freaky tooth is still around inside that cool necklace.)