Hands-On House Day-Prepare for Pictures

Yesterday we had a very fun days with our friends Jackie, Kate, Cheryl, and Landon.  We started out by going to a cafe and then to the farmer's market in the city.  After that, we went to the local Hands-On House.  The girls love it there, and since we have one year passes, we could bring two friends for free as part of a special they were doing on Tuesdays in March.  Since Kate and Landon are under two, they were also free!  I only have pictures from the Hands-On House...

The first part is all about animals with different doors to look under and hand puppets and stuff.  This is an "underground" part which currently houses an ant tunnel.

Landon enjoyed eating the ants:)  As the only boy in the whole group, he is a great sport!

Kate and Pnut played in the construction part for a long time!  This is one of the parts that changes.  When we went last summer, it was a car racing area.

One of Pnut's favorite parts is the face-painting.  Pilly won't paint anything on her face.  She was just messing around with the paint and I had to remove her.

It is a little hard to tell but here Pilly is holding a fish she caught in the pond.  There is a place to measure the fish to know whether you can keep them or not:)

This is in the beginning of the farm section.  There is also a tractor to sit in, a cow to milk, eggs to sort, and a corn field where you can pick corn and sell it to grocers and feed a pig!

One of the girls' very favorite parts is the grocery store.  It is so neat!  Pilly mostly stays in one section and empties it.  Pnut goes all over the store and gets everything she wants.

They actually for some of the food take real containers and cover them in tape or plastic to protect them so it really is like a real grocery store!

Here you can check out, or if you have a sister, she can check you out!

Equally as popular as the grocery store is the dress-up area.  I have no idea what they are singing, but I am pretty sure they weren't singing the same song!

Pnut likes the costumes that make you look like an animal.  She changes her costume frequently.

Pilly, on the other hand, likes to stay mostly in one costume once she finds one she likes.  She actually cried when I took this off of her.

There were several areas I didn't get pictures of.  Landon loved the giant Light-Bright.  He liked removing the pieces.  The last room in the building is a factory where you go through all the steps of making a Thingamagiggle.  We easily spent over an hour playing throughout the whole thing.  I imagine if the girls had their way we would have been there even longer.  Regular tickets cost $7 for anyone 2 and over.  A family pass for four costs $75 and lasts for a year.  It pays for itself quickly if you live close.

I know most of the pictures are of my girls and I didn't get many of the other two...they all kept going to different parts and it was hard to get them together for pictures!

From Scratch Brownies

1 c butter
2 c sugar
4 eggs
2 t vanilla
2/3 c cocoa powder
1 c flour
1/2 t salt
1/2 t baking powder

Preheat oven to 350.  Grease 9 x 13 pan.  Melt butter.  Remove from heat and place in bowl.  Add ingredients in order listed, stirring well by hand.  Bake for 25-30 minutes.

These are amazing!  Delicious!  They remind me of the bottom of the Double Chocolate Gooey Butter Cake.  I think that I like it so much because you use butter instead of oil like in brownies from a box.  Joel thought they tasted like cake, but I thought they were too dense for cake.  In any case, they were really good and really easy to make!  These helped Pnut sort of get her mind off of her lip yesterday as we mixed them up.  And they seem to be disappearing quite quickly!

Tomorrow I'll do a post about our super-fun day today!  Have a wonderful night:)

Shirts and Shiners

I made these shirts for the girls out of my new favorite book Sewing Children's Clothes by Emma Hardy!

Someone wouldn't cooperate to have her pictures taken...

Joel said "they are really puffy..."  I thought they were cute though!  The girls liked them.  I think I will be making some things out of this book for my Etsy, which I have sadly neglected.  I have several ideas going right now, I just need to find some time without interruptions and distractions...or make my self not distract-able... I don't know which one is harder!

We also had an adventure today titled "Why a couch, folding table, and pillow don't make a good sliding board."

It really looks pretty nasty and black and blue!  I didn't realize lips could bruise!

She really bit into it.  They were in the basement playing and she decided to make a sliding board.  I'm not sure if she tried to walk across it or what.  It was pretty horrible and I think it is bothering her quite a bit because she is being really cautious when she eats and drinks.  Hopefully tonight with 11 hours of leaving it alone, things will improve!

Rambling Thoughts on Parenting

We had a delicious meal at Cheryl's for cooking club today.  She made Pioneer Woman's Veggie and Cheese Bagel except she put it on a really good roll.  It was so good!  Then she had these really delicious chocolate chip and Macadamia nut cookies.  I've had two so far...I have three left and I'm planning to share them with Joel...yes, planning to share...

So right now I'm thinking about parenting.  We had a good talk about it and we also had an incident of Pnut squishing Kate in the toy box.  I said to Cheryl and Jackie that I think sometimes she is mean, but I've continued to think about it, and I don't think she is trying to be mean.  I think she just doesn't think.  And how often do I do that?  So after we got home, Pnut and I talked about being careful with others and how that is showing them love.  She said she didn't want to hurt Kate so I was glad to hear that!  While it was going on, I think I reacted a little harshly.  And that was just me not thinking...just like Pnut did.  I have such high expectations for her.  She is really very mature for her age (I think), and so then when she does something that is in keeping with her age, I'm just shocked!  And I don't hold Pilly to the same standards.  I know she is spoiled (don't tell Joel I said that because he really thinks she is!) and we are working on it, but she is younger than Pnut and doesn't get it quite get it all the time yet.  *Sigh*  There is just so much that I know I do wrong with them.  But one of the things I said to the girls this morning, and I really believe it, is that they won't really remember this time of their life, praise the Lord!  I can't remember it from when I was that young except different trips and stuff like that...and that is probably mostly from pictures!  I need to remember that none of us are perfect so they are going to make mistakes and so am I.  Thank the Lord that each moment can be a new start...I can't wait for a new day with how many mistakes I make each day.  They are sweet girls and I think we will all be alright.

More rambling....hopefully next week we can have real posts again!

Frustration

This is like the most boring week of blog posts ever.  I did finish Pill's shirt today, but I was going to post it at the same time as Pnut's shirt.  They don't take long so hopefully soon.  We managed to go to the playground today, which was freezing!  It felt warm in the sun in our backyard, but it was super windy in the not-enclosed spaces, which would include everywhere except our backyard.  I hadn't realized it was so windy so my coat was a leetle bit thin. 

I'm having a rough week as far as work goes.  We got a virus on our computer on Saturday that got through our virus protection.  Thankfully, our friend Brad was able to get it off, and the computer seemed okay.  However, I have not been able to work all week because my work program is not okay.  We don't know why it is the only thing affected and don't know if it is really connected to the virus or something else.  I have spent the last two days with IT taking over our computer and deleting and reinstalling things and trying all sorts of stuff.  Now, they say our only option is to erase our entire hard drive and reinstall XP.  Ummm, we'll have to think about that for a minute.  We do not have any of our files backed up (yes I know that is bad), but the worst part would be our pictures.  Do you have any idea how many pictures we have on here???  And how much space they take up on a disk?  So we would have to buy an external hard drive to put them all on.  Joel wants to make sure that all options are exhausted before we do that.  We don't even know if this is connected to the virus at all because nothing else is having a problem and it has been uninstalled and reinstalled.  It seems like if the virus were the problem, it would be taken care of now. 

So I'm a little frustrated.  Sometimes computers are not quite as great as we think they are!

Rocket to the Moon

Pnut drew a picture of a rocket today and showed her daddy when he got home.  It was a pretty good rocket.  "Will it fly to the moon?"  "No, but it is upstairs!"  "You have the moon upstairs?"  "No, the rocket is upstairs!"  They later proceeded upstairs and flew the rocket to the moon and for some reason my bed is now covered with a blue sleeping bag that is water.  I do not question the things that go on up there.  Many adventures are had and much fun is enjoyed! 

Cabin Fever

Today was such a  l o n g  day.  It was raining and we didn't go outside.  I was going to just take a walk with our umbrellas, but then it really started to POUR so we canned that plan.  One day of staying inside has given us all cabin fever...how did we make it through the winter??

So last week I bought this cute fabric to make shirts for the girls.  I washed and dried and ironed it and had it all ready.  I traced and cut out the patterns and then cut out the material to start putting it together.  And then.  And Then!  I realized I was supposed to cut on the fold (duh!!).  It hadn't stated that in the instructions, but it did say it on the pattern I traced.  You say, "But Shawna, you have made this mistake before.  I thought you were supposed to make mistakes and learn from them."  Perhaps these mistakes have to be repeated several times before I can learn from them!  So I ended up going to JoAnn's the other night and buying some fabric for Pnut's shirt.  I was able to salvage Pilly's since her pieces are a bit smaller, and I actually like the new fabric for Pnut more than I did the other so that is good at least.  *Sigh*  Someday, when I'm in heaven, I will no longer make these silly mistakes.

And here we have Pnut with her pet cat Fuzzy who is sitting in a cardboard box.  Aren't they too sweet?

Some Like It Vintage $50 Gift Card GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!!

Some Like It Vintage $50 Gift Card GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!!

Mango Coconut Rice

First of all, the naughtiness started early this morning, before she even had breakfast:

Secondly, we made this rice today.  Pnut is totally on a coconut kick, even though she has never eaten any before.  I think she just likes to say it.  So, I will give you the recipe, and then I will tell you about it because I have lots to tell!

This is from The Deen Bros Cookbook on page 14.

1 T olive oil

1.5 c long grain rice

1 14 oz can unsweetened coconut milk

2/3 c water

1 t salt

1 large, ripe mango, peeled and cubed

Heat a large saucepan over medium heat with oil.  Add rice and stir around to coat.  Add everything but mango and bring to a boil.  Stir often!  Add in mango.  Cover, reduce heat to low, and simmer for about 20 minutes or until all liquid is absorbed.

Remove from heat and fluff with fork.  Place a dry dish towel between lid and pan and allow to steam for five minutes.  Eat.

This was not anything like I expected.  It was salty.  It was weird.  It was not sweet.  I guess I should have assumed that as there was no sugar in it, but it really was not good.  The girls loved the mango before we put it in here, and then they didn't really want to eat it.  I guess I was expecting something more like a rice puddingish dessert.  I made this one with rice and milk and raisins one time a long time ago, and that is what I was thinking of with this.  My recommendation would be to omit the salt and add about a half a cup of sugar in instead.  We put sugar on ours, and it did help.  The salt was just too much.  And there wasn't even that much salt in there!!  

Another thing...I don't know when it happened, but some rice burned to the bottom of my pan.  I was trying to stir often before simmering, but apparently that was not enough.  I am not sure if it happened during the 20 minutes of simmering, but you aren't supposed to remove the lid when rice is cooking so I didn't want to do that.  I am still working on getting it cleaned out.  I just soak and scrape, soak and scrape.  Am I disgusted?  Just a little!

On a happier note, we added about a tablespoon of cinnamon to our pancake recipe this morning, and it was awesome!!  Next we want to try adding cocoa powder to make chocolate ones.  That makes me a little more nervous:)

Well, now that I have that all out, I have a new Food Network magazine to read and Scribblenauts to play.  Have a lovely weekend!

We Love This Weather!

We ventured out to the park today in the beautiful sunshine.  I was afraid it would be soggy, which it was a little, but the mulch was mostly dry, and the tennis court was totally dry.  There were quite a few children who came after we were there for a little while, and Pnut wanted to go over to the tennis court instead of staying on the playground.  We went over than and ran around.  They were birds and I was a dragon who ate them.  Nice, huh?!  Basically we just took turns chasing each other.  Then Pnut and I lined up on the white line and were trains, Pilly didn't want to play.  We probably looked slightly crazy as we ran around flapping our arms, but it was fun, and I love to hear them giggle!

Now, on to the cuteness:

I wish I had an outfit like this.  Pnut is funny because every time we go to the playground, she tells everyone about her shoes.  She loved these pink sparkly ones!

I am going to work on their shirts tonight.  I have to trace the patterns and cut them out first.  That is always fun.  Have a great night.

Flirty Aprons GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!!

Flirty Aprons GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!!

Why Joel Needs to Shave

On the 8th of March, it was six months since Joel last shaved.  Today, as a sign that this is out of control, a Mennonite boy asked him what denomination he was.  It is well past time to shave.  Not that Joel sees it that way, but it is sure clear to me!

Joel brought home the Deen boys' (Paula's sons) cookbook yesterday, and I am really excited to try some of the recipes from it so hopefully soon I can share some with you. 

I got some fabric to make shirts for the girls from one of my new books last night.  I am hoping that will come together quickly, but I haven't really studied the directions yet to see how difficult it is going to be.  Hopefully not too much.  I wash and dried the fabric today and now I have to iron it.  Boo!  It is never as flat and smooth!

Today was a pretty low key day so there is not much to report.  The playground is still drying out so we couldn't go there.  We read five, yes five! Charlie and Lola books today.  I like Charlie and Lola but five is a lot!

Shower Gifts

Surprise!  Carolyn's bridal shower was this weekend, and I had volunteered to make the prizes for the shower gifts.  I wanted to make something fun that people would like instead of a notebook from the dollar store as per the norm that seems to permeate showers:)  So here is what I came up with at the suggestion of two very creative friends I have:

I had to make eight prizes so I made four mini banana breads and decorated a towel to go with each of them.

I don't even know which one was my favorite!  I really liked all of them.  

I also made lavender sachets with the lavender I was finally able to find last Tuesday night!  If I couldn't find lavender, I was going to have to do them with peppermint.  Even though it smells good, it is just not lavender.

So I made four sets of four of those.  I wasn't sure how well they would go over, but they were liked as well:)

Now Pnut wants some for her drawers and I do too so I have to make some more.  

It was a wonderful shower with a lovely (and delicious!) lunch and a fun time to see some friends I haven't seen for a while.  It was also fun to see Lyn's face when she came through the door.  I had just seen her the night before and we were all "see you next week!"  Ha!  Joel and Eric took the kids to McDonald's for at least two hours.  What good husbands they are:)

Oh Thursday

What Joel had for supper tonight.  Nice, right?!

Can you handle this cuteness?  It makes her look so big!

Tomorrow is going to be like the busiest day ever!  I am actually glad that it is supposed to rain so we have to stay here and I can do the things I need to without feeling bad for not taking the girls to the playground.  This has just been a busy week!  I'm also covering the account of the most long-winded doctor ever until Monday so I am praying that he doesn't dictate over the weekend or I will be spending hours doing that!  Seriously, this guy talks for over an hour on each report.  I make good money from them, but probably not as much in the time ratio section!  Maybe if I typed him more often, it wouldn't be so bad, but I'm not familiar enough with him to go faster.

*Just to clarify...I had eggs with my bacon:)

Four Friends

Oops

I totally forgot to post last night!  My sister and BIL and the kids came to my parents and we were there and got back right before Lost started.  We are going back over today and doing some fun things.  Sadly, Joel has to work so he will miss all of the fun.

Happy news:  I found dried lavender at a craft shop near my parents, which I have been looking for for a while!  It smells wonderful:)

Alright, I have to get these kiddos ready!

Our First Sojourn

 

Today we ventured to the playground to see how things are clearing out and drying up.  Still a little squishy there, but worth the trip.

 

We made new friends today that we will probably see again, someone who is actually two weeks older than Pilly!  And a girl!  (Pilly is in a class of all boys at church, poor darling.)

 

 

Pnut was desperate for Auntie Rannah to see her dress because, as we all know, Auntie Rannah has the last word on fashion and obviously picks out the best clothes for her.  I didn't expect her to pick up on this so early in her life.

*By the way, isn't Pilly's hair finally getting longer!  

We had a lovely weekend with walks and visiting and ice cream and London Fog for me to drink.  I'm pretty sure it is my favorite drink now!  Steamed milk, Earl Gray teabag and just a little sugar.  Oh bliss!

I will have pictures of some fun projects next week (as long as I remember to take pictures), and joy of joys, I have found at last the dried lavender that I have been searching for and will be picking it up tomorrow.  We will also be enjoying a visit with some sweet little cousins tomorrow whom we adore and their parents, who we love also.  Also the grandparents of the cutest children in the whole world. 

 

I will try to remember to post every day this week that I am supposed to...I guess our lives haven't been quite as exciting lately (which is quite alright) so I don't always feel like I have anything to show.  I ought to try to take at least one picture every day and post that if nothing else.

Umbrellas

We went for a walk yesterday and today.  It was a little chillier today than yesterday and was very gray and overcast.  The girls carried their umbrellas almost the entire walk...even though it was not raining.  Pnut was in front of me and Pilly was dawdling behind as a consequence of carrying her umbrella straight out in front of her face.  Pnut to Pilly:  Is it raining back there yet? 

This week, I made the decision to only work during nap time.  I was working at least two hours every morning and wasn't getting to spend any time with the girls except eating and school.  I knew spring is coming and something would have to change.  But I was worried because the work has not been there in the afternoon.  However, I felt that this was the right thing to do and made the switch.  I have had work every afternoon this week!  The Lord knows and He will provide!

Alright, I've got stuff to do...see you later:)

Do Your...

...forks talk to each other?

 

Ours do every night at supper.

 

Sometimes they are threatened with banishment to the sink if they don't put some food in the girls' mouth.  Sometimes Mr. Knife comes out from near Daddy's seat and growls at them.  They don't seem to take that very seriously though.

And just in case you didn't know they were so cool...

Finnish Pancakes

 

This was a recipe my mom pulled out of Guideposts, and I was happy to try it!  I tested it on Mom's Group, and it was met with approval:)

4 eggs

1/4 c honey

3/4 t salt

2.5 c milk

1 c flour

4 T honey

fruit

heavy whipping cream

Preheat oven to 425.  Heat either 10 inch skillet or round cake pan in oven for about 10 minutes.  After heated, melt butter in pan.  Meanwhile, in a blender, combine eggs, honey, salt, and milk.  Add flour.  Blend until smooth.  After butter is melted, pour batter into hot pan and bake for 25 minutes or until well browned.  It is done when it doesn't jiggle anymore.  Serve hot with sweetened, whipped heavy cream and fruit on top.  I thawed out some frozen blueberries.  Loved the whipping cream!  Of course, I always love the whipping cream:)

Jackie said that the texture reminded her of an egg custard.  I have never had that before, but I knew it reminded me of something.  Carolyn and I got flan one time, and it was rather like that in texture.  It was filling and would make a great breakfast!