Christmas Eve Pajamas

Our family tradition at Christmas time is that the girls get to open one gift on Christmas Eve, usually it is matching Christmas pajamas. I try to make them every year, but sometimes I end up making a last minute run to Old Navy.

I was determined not to run to Old Navy this year and I found this cute cats with santa hat flannel, so I stayed up til 5 am last night finishing these pajamas. Each girl has her own nightgown along with matching baby doll nightgown.

I don't know when the girls stopped knowing how to smile normally! More pictures here.

Kyla's Christmas List

Exactly as given to me, spelling and all.

1. A giant toy stuffed lepord.

2. a recorder that works really well

3. a pogostick

4. the best christmas ever

5. some really warm pajamas made by my sweet sweet mommy

6. three new Didj games

7. a toy stuffed Dog. (the same size as my other toy dogs)

8. a floor puzzle

9. a webkinz dragon

10. a pack of candy canes

11. any other stuff that my mommy and daddy got me

12. a pokemon ex-pack

Interesting.

Willow gets her singing debut.

Tuesday, on my birthday, Willow had her first Kidshine performance. The theme was happiness. Setlist as follows:

National Anthem

Come on Get Happy

Put on a Happy Face

Happy Working Song

Don't Worry Be Happy.

Happy Trails

Willow had her solo in Don't Worry, Be Happy. Videos clips below! They were all so cute and had so much fun!

National Anthem

Come on Get Happy

Put on a Happy Face

Don't Worry Be Happy

Willow gets a speaking part.

Willow's Birthday Party

We celebrated Willow's 5th birthday on Friday with a cake and presents, but her birthday party wasn't until today. After much nailbiting on my part, 11 kids with their parents showed up today at 2:30pm. Kids played with play dough, floam, wiki sticks and more. They climbed trees and swung from branches.... I hope all had a good time.

I managed to grab a few snap shots and created this nifty slideshow with iPhoto. oh how I adore my macbook and it's super cool software.

Enjoy and thank you to all of our friends for making this day special for Willow.

The baby turns 5....

Today, the day after thanksgiving, Willow turns 5. I still remember giving birth to her - at home sometime between 1 and 3 am on the day after thanksgiving in 2004. I am a horrible example for moms, I can NEVER remember birth times. Hard to believe that 5 years have gone by. She is a pretty cool 5 year old. Jim and I are happy to be celebrating the end of the baby years of our lives and looking forward to the cool kid/preteen/teen years.... we hope!

This morning, Jim had to go to work so Kyla and I took Willow out for breakfast. Good times were had by all, especially since I allowed them to sit at the counter instead of a table.

From Willow's Birthday Breakfast

Pumpkin Spice Waffles

If you start these and realize you are out of pumpkin (like me) you can substitute applesauce and they are just as yummy!

Ingredients:

* 2 cups all-purpose flour
* 2 tablespoons brown sugar
* 2 teaspoons baking powder
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1 teaspoon cinnamon
* 2 eggs
* 1 1/2 cups milk
* 1/2 cup canned pumpkin
* 2 tablespoons melted butter
* 1 teaspoon vanilla

1. Heat waffle maker. In a large bowl, combine flour, brown sugar, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Stir to combine completely with a whisk.

2. Separate eggs. Place egg whites in a medium mixing bowl or in the bowl of a stand mixer, set aside.

3. In a medium mixing bowl, combine egg yolks, milk, canned pumpkin, melted butter and vanilla. Stir with a whisk until mixture is smooth. Pour pumpkin mixture into dry ingredients and stir with a spoon just until ingredients are combined. Mixture will be thick and lumpy; do not overmix.

4. Beat egg whites with a stand mixer or an electric hand mixer until medium peaks form. Fold egg whites gently into batter.

5. Spray the cooking surface of a hot waffle maker with cooking spray. Cook waffles according to manufacturer's directions. Serve immediately with butter and maple syrup or the toppings of your choice.

You must watch this movie....

I made Jim watch this and we are completely overhauling what we eat. I am planning the garden again, we signed back up with Winder Farms. It is going to take some serious planning to make natural/organic fit in the budget, but we are going to try!

A few pics from hiking at Mt Charleston

Sent from Jim's Windows Mobile® phone.

First Day of 3rd Grade

I expected to have to do some poking and prodding to get Kyla up and ready for school this morning, but she surprised all of us. Jim got her out of bed without an issue... she got dressed right away. She even ate breakfast, brushed teeth and hair without a single argument. I have no delusions that this will last, but it was nice for today.

She seems excited to be back in school and it looks like she may have gotten lucky and gotten a super cool teacher (I did see some purple streaks in her hair). We are still waiting on official progress of her 504 plan tho. Willow seems to be missing Kyla today. I think we will make some cupcakes and a welcome home sign for her.

First Day of School 2009

Super cool blogging software

If you have a mac and a blog or even just like to journal, I would highly suggest taking a look at this very cool software I stumbled upon the other day. Mariner Journal allows you to write journals and blogs on your computer and with the push of a butting it will update and upload to your blog. It even downloaded all my previous blog posts. I haven’t fully tested it but so far I like. Maybe I will update the blog more often now? ;)

Sometimes my husband is a genius...

I don't know if it is only my kids who have this problem...but in the off chance that it isn't I am going to share an idea the hubby had the other day. The girls go through liquid soap and shampoo like crazy. It doesn't seem to matter what I buy or how small or large the bottle is, I stick in the shower and it seems its empty after the next bath/shower. They apparently take a more is better attitude when it comes to soap. I am not one to complain about this... they can be sticky and stinky and more soap can't hurt ;) BUT I am so over constantly being out of soap and shampoo! So the other day I am whining (yes, I can admit I was indeed whining) to Jim about this and he simply says... why don't you just buy those little empty travel bottles and fill them up, then keep the large bottles of soap in the closet? Simply genius if you ask me. In fact it is such a good idea I don't know why I had not already thought of it ;) So off to target I went and found these cute little travel squeeze bottles for $0.99 cents. Filled em up and labeled with with a sharpie. Knowing my girls the bottle will still be empty after the shower/bath but at least I can fill it back up without a trip to the store! Congrats Jim, gold star for you this week!

Garden Harvest

We harvested some veggies from the garden today! I want to say this is our first real harvest, but we did pull a tomato and a green pepper from the garden about a month ago. This is the first time we have been successful with carrots tho! Our first attempt at squash as well. I am assuming it was time to pick them because they are pretty bright colored and bumpy.... they looked about right.

We have a ton more squash on the plant waiting to ripen up and a few more carrots that are almost there too. We chose the mini carrots hoping they would work better than full size ones and it seems to be true! The girls can't wait to eat them!

I need to get out there and take some new pics, things are going wild!

"my precious" gets a face lift...

Ever since my kindle screen broke and I got a replacement "my precious" has been naked. Just plain ole boring white because I really was not in love with any of the skins from Decal Girl and the skins from 3acp.com leave a residue. I finally decided to splurge and ordered myself a custom skin from My Tego. The bad news is that they are in canada so I was expecting a bit of a wait for it. The good news is the wait was only about 2 weeks total, not bad for a fully designed custom skin and shipping from that cold country up north.

So, here she is (and no she does not have an official name yet...) with the Oberon "Roof of Heaven" cover and a custom Monet's Water Lillies skin.

From Kindle

Garden Update

Things have been slowly growing in the garden. Most things are doing well, but I need to find some more veggies that we like because I have some unused space. I will have to plan better next time.

For now, the lettuce seems to be doing ok. My onion bulbs have not sprouted at all. The carrots are growing still. I just planted beans and they sprouted up quickly! My green pepper is doing far better than the red and the yellow. It has a full size pepper ready to harvest already. The crookneck squash is thriving. I can't wait to see it vining along the rocks. Vine plants are really turning out to be my favorite things to grow!

My basil and parsley are doing well... I have oregano sprouted. I still need to find some cilantro to plant tho. Something has eaten the marigolds I planted in front of the tomato plants... hopefully whatever it was, they are stuffed and will leave the tomato plants alone.

Kyla has been planting sunflower seeds like crazy so we have quite a few sprouting upward. This year I planted both a cucumber bush and a cumber vine... so far only the bush has sprouted and seems to be doing well. My honeydew is just now starting to grow a bit now that its warmer.

All very exciting, more pics below!

New Moon.. yum.

I have no hope the movie will be anything but cheesy, but all I can say about these posters is YUM. Even Jacob looks hot and I totally feel dirty saying that considering I see him and still think of sharkboy.

Many hours and a destroyed dining room later...

I finished my Kindle pouch I have been wanting to make. I am underwhelmed. To begin with I splurged on the fabric and now that it is finished I am just not in love with it. Second, I screwed up .... it should have a shoulder strap and I just couldn't make it look nice. Third.... me and fusible fleece are not friends and I should stop messing around with it. I can deal with it in diaper bags and messenger bags, but in smaller things I end up with lumpy unflattering almost symmetrical pouches.

All in all, this will work fine for around the house but it is not what I hoped to do and I will probably by myself one from Borsa Bella if I can find a fabric I like.

I am saving the cleanup of the dining room for tomorrow....

Daddy's Day in the Classroom!

Jim and I worked in Willow's classroom at the preschool co-op together yesterday. I was hoping for some really messy stuff like gloop or slime or shaving cream painting, but Mrs. Johnson just gave us car painting and scarf dancing. Still entertaining, just not as much work for him as I was hoping for ;) A good time was had by all tho Willow was not too fond of sharing her dad with the rest of the class and I think he was exhausted afterward. I think that next year he is going to have to commit to working with me once a month....

Gardening - 2009

I have been a serious slacker in the gardening department lately.... but I am working on getting back on the ball! We are going to use it as part of Kyla's schooling so I guess I have no choice ;) Now if only I can convince her not to pick all the baby plants before they are ready! She was most excited to find a couple of mushrooms growing up out of the garden soil when we started planted.

We have our first baby green pepper! I planted 3 peppers, 1 green - 1 red - 1 yellow. We also planted some herbs (parsley, chives, oregano, basil, etc). Some of the herbs this year are from seeds so we will see how well they do.... I haven't had a ton of luck with planting from seed!

We have also planted some onions, carrots, honeydew melon, tomatoes, cucumber, lettuce, squash, and sunflowers. Still on the list to come are beans, strawberries, maybe pumpkin, and some more herbs. I have a ton more room now that Jim made me a second box (with more sunlight exposure) and I find myself unsure what I should put in it! More pics of the garden below!

A gift for me....

Not like I need anymore gifts for myself, especially after splurging on the Oberon Roof of Heaven cover for my Kindle, but I ordered myself something I have wanted for a while and always put it off. A charm necklace with the girls names and birthstones. I even added a cute little heart for Jim's name.... just call me a mushy romantic ;) The seller was great and it arrived quickly.... so if you are in the market make sure to check out Sweet Peas Jewelry over on Etsy.com.

3-3-09 ~ French Toast

Yum! Challah bread made it perfect!

Super Giant Challah!

Every time I attempt to make french toast it is a disaster, but then I read online that Challah bread makes the best french toast. I figured I would give making Challah a shot and then hopefully my french toast would be yummy! Well the results are in and the Challah is awesome. I am considering keeping the plain recipe for just regular sandwich bread its so good. I did let it rise a bit too long so I have SUPER GIANT GHALLAH but its still good. The second loaf I kneaded in raisins and sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar and its delicious.... I don't think it will last long in this house!

The plain loaf is braided and stuck in a loaf pan but I cooked the raisin loaf just on a sheet pan.

3-02-09 ~ Breaded Pork Chops

Even tho I felt like slacking off and making sandwiches and soup, I resisted the urge and made Jim's favorite dinner... pork chops. I usually skip the pork and bake myself a salmon fillet instead but I had an abundance of pork chops. It was a new breading recipe and I really liked it! It had a nice crunchy texture to it and even the kids enjoyed all of their dinner, especially when I taught them how to dip the pork chop in applesauce ;)

Breaded Pork Chops
2 eggs
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon onion powder
1-2 cups panko breadcrumbs
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
6 -8 thin cut pork chops

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
2. In a shallow bowl or pie plate, whisk eggs. Combine garlic powder and onion powder with breadcrumbs in a separate plate. Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Dip pork chops into the egg, then press in the cracker crumbs to coat. Fry in the hot oil for 2 to 3 minutes per side, just until golden brown. Remove to a baking sheet.
3. Bake for 30- 45 minutes in the preheated oven, turning once. Serve immediately.

A kindle dilemna...

For our anniversary in April Jim is going to get me the most awesome purple leather cover for my Kindle from Oberon Designs. To go with this cover I have decided that I need a new skin for the kindle and I am having a hard time deciding which. Too many options.... *sigh*

So here is my "Roof of Heaven" cover in purple and the skin options to go along with it:

My Kitchen Re-organization and Decluttering

Thanks to Almond's influence I have been on a decluttering and organizing spree. I trimmed down my 3 crockpots to just 1 and did away with some other kitchen appliances that I never pulled out (including my food saver!). Getting rid of some stuff left more room in my pantry so I was better able to organize my actual kitchen area. This is what I have gotten done so far.... I still need to hit the actual pantries themselves, but this is a start! Ignore the fact that we didn't paint the inside of the cabinets when we painted the doors.... we will get there but I think I am going to change the color of the cabinets and no sense in painting it twice ;)

You can click on the slideshow to see bigger pics...

Slow Cooker Chili

Previously when we have had chili for dinner getting the girls to eat it has been like pulling teeth...so it hasn't been something we make a lot of. However, tonight I made the best chili ever (unfortunately I can't say the same for my corn muffins) AND got Kyla to eat it by putting it on top of a potato. I don't know why that changes things for her, but it did and she ate all of it - beans included. It was even a bit spicier than I typically like it and she didn't seem to mind. Willow is another thing, but at least she can usually be made happy with a baked potato and some deli meat. See the totally awesome recipe below ;)

My broken blog....

I somehow managed to break the admin section of the blog and in fixing it lost some posts. I may try to add them back in tho.... we will see! For now its a new layout I am playing around with :) I am not sure if its a keeper yet, but maybe!

White Cheesy Ham & Macaroni

I was late getting dinner together tonight and was really tempted to just make pancakes, but I stuck to my plan and made an old favorite. This is one of my favorite things my mom used to make for us as kids. Unfortunately my mom always did it by "feel" and I am just not that capable so I came up with my own method :) Recipe Below...

Obama doing 'Single Ladies'

This video is just too funny to not post

Dinner...Night 3

I meant to post last night about dinner but got sucked into a new book. Shocking, I know. I think I am going to have to find a "Kindle-holic" shirt for the auction this year....

Anyway, dinner last night was Baked Pasta. I would usually make this with chedder cheese because I like being different, but I didn't feel like shredding it. Oh and if you are curious why my salad dressing has a 1 on it, check out Meck Mom for a fabulous fridge organizing idea.

Book Links

I managed to stumble upon an entire forum for Kindle freaks like myself: http://www.kindleboards.com/. Within that forum I found a couple of handy links that can help you decide what you would like to read next. I always figured there had to be a website out there that you could put in a favorite author and/or book and come back with suggestions...well here you go:

http://www.whatshouldireadnext.com/search
http://www.gnooks.com/
http://www.literature-map.com/ "map" your favorite author! See who else is close.
http://www.allreaders.com/ - Search for books by plot.

Additionally, free ebook sites....
http://feedbooks.com/
http://freekindlebooks.org/
http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page
http://manybooks.net/
http://www.baen.com/library/ (Science fiction)
http://www.kindleclassics.org/

Woo! Happy Reading :)

Dinner... Night 2

Last night no one was really in the mood to make dinner so we had "breakfast for dinner". The girls had mini chocolate chip pancakes with fruit and sausage. We had blueberry pancakes. The girls like to say that we have the best pancakes ever and I might agree with them. I don't have any big secret to them tho.... I simply use Fresh & Easy Buttermilk Pancake Mix and make it as prepared EXCEPT I replace the oil it calls for with applesauce and add a touch of cinnamon and sometimes vanilla.

Snow in the Desert (December 2008)

It snowed like crazy here in Northwest Las Vegas yesterday. Our house isn't far enough west to get a ton of snow, but we had a light dusting of it. We picked Kyla up from school 15 minutes early and drove off towards the western part of the city and found snow galore! At one point it was coming down like it was cotton balls.... I haven't seen snow like that since living in Vermont.

Kyla was thrilled, Willow was mostly just cold. But the girls got to make their first Vegas snowman and snow angels and a fun time was had by all.

From 2008 Pictures

More pictures in the Picasa photo album.