Catching You Up

It's been a crazy couple of weeks, and I haven't had as much time as I'd like to post on my blog or to visit everyone else's blogs. Here is a glimpse at what I've been doing instead of blogging.

The kids and I spent a day researching plants, compost, etc, and mapped out a garden. We have about half of it planted now--tomatoes, bell peppers, yellow squash, zucchini, leeks, and various herbs. We hope to get the rest of our plants and seeds this next week and get it finished. They have really enjoyed the daily ritual of taking out the bowl of peelings to the compost pile and watering the little plants.

I've been learning (or trying to learn) how to do little girl hair. To be honest, Jared is the better hairdresser around here, but he's not usually around during the week when it's time to do hair. These piggy tails are her first--the boys said she looks just like a bug with antennae!


I also gave Bronwen her first pedicure. Ok, so really it was just her first polish, since I didn't do anything else. She was fascinated and kept wanting to grab the nail polish. And I picked such a pale pink that you can't even tell in the picture. I'm not ready to put lipstick red on her toes yet, even if it is on mine!

We saw Henry receive a Good Citizen Award in kindergarten for the middle trimester. He was very proud, and so were we. In kindergarten this year Henry has been developing his social and leadership skills, and is coming out of his shell. Here he is with his principal.



Henry also recently completed 19 laps at his school Jog-a-thon. The activity has been so popular with our family in the years that my kids have attended public school that I'm thinking about hosting our own next year at Tiger Academy.

I created this cake for Jared's birthday, which turned out to be too rich. I didn't think that was possible--I've never had anything chocolaty before that was too rich. I did four layers of chocolate-chocolate chip pound cake with two layers of whipped ganache filling and one layer of chocolate mousse filling, chocolate ganache frosting, and toffee pieces all around. So either I've finally proved my theory wrong about there being no such thing as too much chocolate, or I've turned a big corner when it comes to food. I was actually sick to my stomach for 36 hours after I at a piece of this--and I didn't even eat the whole piece. After we celebrated with our family, I took the rest of the cake and gave it away.

I've been reading (and enjoying) this book. Sadly, it has taken me a few weeks to finish, since I have had so many other things going on. A good read.

While folding laundry the other night, I caught a bit of "I Can Make You Thin" on TLC. It plays a lot like an infomercial, but I tried out a couple of the techniques and they seem to work. So if you can tolerate the feeling that you are being sold something, you might want to check it out. I'm sure he's doing the show to sell his books, but it's not actually an infomercial. I watched the episode on cravings and found it to be very effective in giving me control over chocolate. Perhaps it has something to do with why Jared's birthday cake made me sick?

Today was Patient Appreciation Day in Jared's office. We do this event twice yearly; existing patients are treated to a free adjustment and 10 minute massage, new patients get an exam and x-ray for free. I do a food spread to keep everyone happy while they are waiting their turn. This time I decided to not go overboard--I generally have ridiculous amounts of leftovers. We ordered sandwiches from Costco, had a veggie platter, lots of fresh fruit, and some homemade desserts. I was so proud of myself for not overdoing it. Then we had our best turnout ever and I had to send someone to Costco at noon for more sandwiches! Still, that is good.

I made Lemon Raspberry Bars,

Mint Brownies,
Chocolate Chip Pecan Cookies (which you must try if you haven't yet),

and a new twist on my CCP Cookies, with some added 1 c. coconut, 2 c. oatmeal (I reduced the flour by 1 1/2 cups), and 1 c. semi-sweet chips (I reduced the milk chips to 2 cups). Amazingly, although I made all that food this week, I did very little picking at it as I baked. And I was down 2.4 lbs at my Wednesday weigh-in! Yeah! Here's hoping that will be true next week, too.

I do not have a picture of the mountains of laundry that I have done in the past couple of weeks with the stomach flu running rampant through our house yet again (this has not been a good year for that,) and my decision to stop buying pull-ups for some bedwetters in the house. Enough said on that subject. If you are a mother, you feel my pain!