More Snow

I don't know why I always wait until the last minute, but I realized this morning that I was running out of time to get some new calendars for next year. I still needed a wall calendar for the kitchen and one for Tyler's room and maybe a small one for my scrapbooking room.

The worst part about it was that we were expecting it to snow pretty heavily today. So I decided to get out to the stores first thing before the snow started accumulating too much on the roads. I brought Tyler with me and he kept me from browsing too much, so we finished our shopping in no time.

I was really interested in getting a Gooseberry Patch wall calendar for the kitchen, but it was sold out everywhere online and it's the kind of thing that's hard to find in town. Luckily I saw some at Fiddlesticks last month and they still had a few on hand. We also stopped at Borders and picked up a Cars calendar at 50% off for Tyler and a small bird one for me.

We spent the rest of the day indoors, watching the snowfall.

I usually look out the kitchen window at the fence to gauge how deep the snow is getting. By 3:00 in the afternoon we had a good 4 inches of new snow, so Tyler and I went out to clear the driveway up a little bit.

I had the snow blower and Tyler had the snow shovel, but it didn't take him long to ditch the shovel and start playing in the yard. It's actually getting pretty deep on the edge of the lawn with all the displaced snow from the sidewalk and driveway.

Maybe if it stops snowing tomorrow, the boys can get outside and build a snowman or go sledding. We'll have to see what the day brings.

The Week So Far

It snowed last night. That's the second snowfall we've had this week and we're supposed to get more tomorrow. It's not much, just a few inches.

It's just enough to throw a wrench into the process of getting Tyler ready for school. Whenever there is fresh snow on the ground it takes us longer, as I have to shovel the driveway, drive to school at a reduced speed and then allow enough time to walk to school from the nearest parking lot that's not uphill.

Thankfully it's his last day of school this week. He gets Thursday and Friday off for New Year's. Technically his school has been on Winter Break for the last two weeks just like the public schools, but the Montessori school stays open as an option for working parents. Not all of the teachers or students are there and they haven't been doing their normal work. Instead, it's more like open free time and play days.

Earlier this week, urged by those desperate bloodhounds at the Red Cross, I went in to donate blood. Whatever it takes to get them off my back and quit calling every night at dinner time.

You have to have a minimum iron level of 12.5 to donate and I had a 12.9. Phew! I would have been upset if I'd driven all the way across town in the snow for no reason. Plus those bloodhounds would have been right back at it. At least now I'm safe for a few months.

I'm still not impressed by my iron count though, considering that I've been on a liquid iron supplement for several months and it's been 5 months since my last donation. I read in Women's Health magazine that women that do high impact exercises and more likely to have low iron counts. Maybe all the running on the treadmill, and STS workouts are taking a higher toll on my body than I realized...iron-wise, at least.

Speaking of STS...

I'm so excited! I got my new STS Cardio workout videos in the mail yesterday. Normally I'd start them right away, but I still have to finish the 3rd mesocycle of STS Strength first. The videos are actually meant to work together, but I'm not crazy like that. I'll just stick to the treadmill on cardio days for now.

Pizza 1,2,3

Tyler received two new cookbooks for Christmas and it sure didn't take him long to start breaking them in. I was working on my menu plan for the week when Tyler declared that he would be making dinner..."all by himself". He decided on Pizza 1,2,3 out of his Gooseberry Patch book.

The first step was opening the canned items and combining the sauce ingredients.

The second step was to make the dough. It was really easy.... just a mix of Bisquick, yeast, and water.

Next he kneaded the dough.

After the kneading process, you have to let the dough rest for 5 minutes. Watching the timer the entire time doesn't exactly make the time pass any faster.

Then it was time to divide the dough, flatten each piece into a cute little pizza round, and cover them with toppings.

After one bite, Tyler said that it was the best pizza in the world. Everyone agreed, but secretly the sauce could use an adjustment. It was a little heavy on the dehydrated onion and garlic powder, plus it could have used a pinch of salt. If I could get Tyler to veer slightly from the recipe, it really could be the best pizza in the world...especially if he is the one making it.

Until Next Time

We dropped Anni off at the airport this afternoon, which means the holiday is officially over. She's headed back to school, Tyler has school tomorrow, Rick's going back to work, and so on. It sure was nice while it lasted though.

I was worried that we might make for boring company, but Anni insists that she enjoyed her time here, so I'll take her word on that.

I can't even count the number of games she played with Tyler and she probably can't either. Everything from Scrabble, to Monopoly, and Yahtzee...you name it.

We went out to eat a few times. On Christmas eve we went and picked up a dozen tamales from a little shop in Union Gap. It might not have been much compared to the tamales in the Los Angeles area, but it's the best place around here and it's pretty popular with the locals. We also went to a new burger joint called Bob's Burgers. There was a bit of a wait, but it wasn't bad. Anni ended up getting a mushroom burger with fries. I got the sourdough bacon burger with onion rings and Rick had a funky chipotle kielbasa salad.

We watched a few movies....She's Just Not That Into You, and Julie and Julia. Both were pretty good.

On Saturday we went bowling. Tyler played the entire game using the between the legs maneuver and ended up with a pretty decent score. I had some crazy stroke of luck and got something like 3 strikes and several spares, which is above average for me. Rick also played a fairly good game. Anni started off kind of slow, but really came back at the end and bowled two strikes in the tenth frame.

And that was that. Our time went by a little too fast. Anni's on her way home and we already miss having her around. Sigh. There's always next year, right?

Christmas Day

Guess what Santa brought this year?

Legos! Well actually Santa brought a Lego table to use with the Legos that Tyler got from Grandpa. It's really cute...it's a 2 ft square table with drawers that have hanging mesh bags for storage. My favorite part is that the table top is double sided. One side has the green Lego base, but you can flip that piece over to have a smooth wooden top for doing school work or other activities.

Besides Lego's, Tyler also received several game boards, some erector sets, some books (cookbooks and chapter books), and some new crayons and markers.

Anni was with us this year, which made everything a little more special. It's always nice when family members are able to make the trek up here.

After opening all the presents, Rick and I headed into the kitchen to get started on the dinner.

We made a turkey breast and a spiral cut ham with all the trimmings....mashed potatoes, stuffing, deviled eggs, sweet potatoes, Anni's spinach artichoke dip, cranberry sauce and so on. For dessert I made a pumpkin cheesecake with a gingersnap crust.

The food was delicious and super filling!

After that, it was back to playing with our loot. Well, more like Tyler's loot....board games and Legos ruled the night.

Snowman Cookies

Last month when I got my Best of Country Cooking Annual 2008, I immediately marked several recipes to try. One of them was the poppy seed coffee cake that I tried a few weeks ago and another was snowman cookies.

First you start by making sandwiches out of Ritz crackers and peanut butter.

Then you dip them into melted white chocolate candy coating and decorate the faces. I was completely inept when it came to dipping the crackers into the chocolate. It certainly sounds easier than it really is. I ended up giving the job to Anni who did much better using a pair of tongs and a silicone spoon. So with Anni dipping the crackers and Tyler decorating the faces, I had nothing left to do but snack on the leftover candy. What a hard life.

The hardest part was leaving them alone long enough for the chocolate to set up. Tyler wanted to eat one right away. We waited until after dinner to sample our delights and everyone agreed that they were quite tasty!

Weekend News

Yesterday we took Tyler over to Lowe's to build the final project for the year...a pet treat keeper. He's been really independent lately and wants to do practically everything by himself. His building project was no exception....he was determined to do it all by himself. He wouldn't even let me hold it while he hammered!

Well I guess he knows what he's doing because it came out great. It must be meant to hold large dog biscuits, though, because the drop slot on the inside is huge! Hmmm, I'm pretty sure it won't work to hold our cat treats. That's too bad.

Afterwards we stopped at Borders to use my 30% off coupon on a new Christmas book. It turns out we were just in time for storytime. Actually, it may have just been a craft event. At any rate, Tyler made a reindeer hat and had free cookies and chocolate milk.

Back to the books, Tyler ended up picking out a Thomas the Train Christmas book. We were also looking at the chapter books, but it's a little hard finding something that's geared towards boys and that has age appropriate material. It seems like they're all mystery books. I should probably check the library and see what they have first.

In the kitchen this weekend, I made Apple Gingerbread Muffins.

They turned out really good and were a nice change from the usual bran and banana breads I always make. The only downfall is that I used practically all of my molasses, which I was planning on using for cookies. Oh, well. Once I get a new jar I'll be able to make the cookies and a second batch of muffins, yum!

What a Week!

Wow! I'm so glad this week is finally over! Getting around in the snow has been something else! In years past, I've had the option to stay home when it snowed, but now that Tyler's in school, I have no choice but to get out there with the rest of them.

Tuesday was the worst, the day that the snow was fresh. When I went to pick up Tyler from school, I ended up getting stuck more than once. We had already established that morning that the driveway to his school was too slick to drive up, so I had to find a place to park and walk to get him. I decided to go with the Senior Center across the street, which was fine until we got stuck trying to leave the parking lot. I can't even describe my embarrassment. One guy drove up next to me and proceeded to tell me that I needed to straighten out the wheels. Then someone came out from the Senior Center to try and give me a push (an employee, not a senior...that would have been too much). I even had a guy stop his truck in the street to come see if I needed any help.

The next few days got progressively better. There was no more snow so I just had to deal with the leftover ice on the roads. I even found a much better place to park...a nearby dental office. My next biggest obstacle was just getting Tyler to school on time. It's not the quickest process in the world getting him into his snowsuit, boots, and gloves every morning.

The week wasn't all bad though, we still had a few highlights. Rick and I had our first parent/teacher conference. We were pleased to find out that Tyler is one of the stronger students in the class as he routinely works at a kindergarten level or beyond. He has even started reading chapter books.

And the artwork he brings home...sometimes I just can't stand it. I am in love with the stocking he made this week.

Couldn't you just eat it up?

Well, how about some cookies instead.

Rick actually told me that my snowball cookies "were not his ideal Christmas cookie". Hmph! I thought they were good! To him, a cookie is not a cookie unless it includes chocolate chips. So to please the chocolate loving boys of the house, I made a batch of chocolate chip cookies from my King Arthur Cookie Companion. They were pretty good...just not my ideal Christmas cookie!

Right On Cue

I was just saying to Rick the other day, "I wonder when's it going to snow already". It was starting to feel a little funny doing all the Christmas shopping with no snow around. The two seem to go hand in hand around here, so I've been expecting the white stuff to appear any time now. It snowed a little bit the week before Thanksgiving, but it melted quickly and that was the last we saw until last night.

We awoke this morning to a fresh coating of snow. Rick was actually scheduled to fly out of town early this morning, but due to the weather, the flight was cancelled and rescheduled for later in the morning. That worked for me. I was able to get Rick's help shoveling the driveway while I got Tyler ready for school.

Sounds like work shoveling 5" of snow off the driveway, but it was a breeze with Rick's new electric snow blower. Apparently he was the envy of the neighborhood this morning. I think a few of our neighbors might be running out to get their own.

In no time at all Rick had the driveway cleared out and since he was home and awake, he drove Tyler to school this morning, which is usually my job. Turns out our car is slightly inadequate when it comes to snow. Although the road to Tyler's school was plowed, it was too steep of a hill for the car. Tyler and I had to get out at the base of the driveway and walk up the hill to the school. Nice. I think we need to trade our car in for something with 4-wheel drive.

Weekend Rewind

This past Saturday, we took Tyler to Lowe's for their Build and Grow Clinic. They actually have three projects this month instead of the usual two, which is nice because Tyler can't seem to get enough of them. This time the kids were making a set of Christmas tree ornaments.

I'm not sure which part Tyler likes best...the hammering, or the application of the stickers at the end.

The ornaments he made were a picture frame and a Christmas tree. Our tree at home is really starting to fill up with all the handmade ornaments that Tyler has made at school and at these weekend clinics. I like it.

Then we spent the better part of the day browsing the mall and other stores looking for Christmas presents or otherwise good deals. I stopped by Toys R Us looking for a mini skateboard that was in the ad for $10, but of course they were all sold out, except for the girlie patterns, that is. Somehow I don't think Tyler would be excited to ride a Barbie or iCarly skateboard. We also stopped by Fred Meyer because they had a coupon for Buy 1 Get 1 Free on athletic shoes. After trying on countless pairs of running shoes, I decided on a couple pairs of Avias. Turns out they were on clearance, unmarked of course, so my coupon was no good, as it excluded clearance items. So I ended up buying one pair at the clearance price. Ugh, what a bunch of stupid luck.

For dinner I made Paprika Chicken with Egg Noodles, a recipe I saw on the Rachael Ray show.

I omitted the pickle topping and just used fresh parsley instead of all the other herbs. I thought it tasted great, but Tyler wasn't much of a fan. I hate it when that happens. And here I thought I'd found something good enough to enter our regular roation.

Holiday Spirit

The advent calendar I got Tyler this year counts down instead of up, which is a good thing, because now I can easily see how many days are left until Christmas. When I saw that there were only 15 days left, I realized that I'd better get things in gear if I planned on baking any holiday cookies this year. So in between loads of laundry and assembling Christmas cards, I managed to churn out a small, yet delicious batch of snowball cookies.

I tried to make them more festive as seen here, by adding colored sprinkles to the powdered sugar, but somehow they didn't turn out as nice. Hmmm, I'm sure that has nothing to do with me.

Then after dinner, Tyler had his much anticipated Winter Concert. All the kids from the two Montessori schools, toddlers thru 8th graders, put on a show that included singing, playing of instruments, and a short play.

The preschool and kindergarten classes stood together and sang around 5 different songs. Here they are singing the Alphabet Rap.

That really must have wiped them out because they had to sit down to sing the second song.

Overall, it was an enjoyable night although we had to leave early since Tyler was having a hard time sitting through the rest of the performances. That was fine by me, because I had a nice hot mug of hot cocoa calling my name back at the house.

Recipe Review

I tried three new recipes this week, all of which were positively received. First I made a Spinach Puff Pastry Quiche, a recipe I came across on Epicurious.

This was the first time I've ever worked with puff pastry and I thought it made the quiche look a bit more fancy than usual, but secretly I think I prefer a regular pie crust. After reading the online reviews, I decided to prebake the crust a little bit, but since it was puff pastry, I had to cover it with foil and weigh it down with dried beans to prevent it from "puffing" too much. I also added crumbled bacon to the custard mix, which I usually do with spinach quiches anyway, but after tasting the finished product, I wish I had added some garlic as well.

Next, I made Chicken Over Curly Noodles, a recipe out of a Quick Cooking Annual.

My thought on this one, was that it was a unique way of using Top Ramen. When I told Rick that we were having chicken with peanut butter noodles, he got all excited until he realized that Top Ramen was involved. I guess he prefers my regular peanut butter noodles that I make with spaghetti. Next time I'll just use my own seasonings on the chicken instead of the seasoning packet from the ramen and substitute my own peanut butter noodles. It was a good idea though.

Lastly, I made Poppy Seed Coffee Cake. I found this recipe in my newest cookbook, The Best of Country Cooking 2008 Annual.

I cut the recipe in half to fit an 8x8 pan, as well as to accommodate our family size. The cake itself is kind of a cross between a poppy seed muffin and a coffee cake. The brown sugar filling has espresso powder in it, which makes the whole thing even more delectable. Yum, I can't wait to have another piece!

The Outtakes

Over the weekend I had everyone dress up in festive colors so we could attempt to get a nice family photo to use for my scrapbook calendar or Christmas cards. I suggested that we go to the nursery down the street and use their trees as our background or that we could just do something at home. We decided to take pictures at home, partly because it was super cold outside and because it would have been awkward taking our tripod to the nursery.

Once we had the location, our next problem was the lighting, which is horrible in our house! We opened up the blinds all the way and did the best we could. Everything was going fine for the first few shots, until Tyler's attention span had run out. Here are some of the outtakes.

We ended up with a photo that I was pretty pleased with, but I'll have to wait until later today to find out how it looks printed. I've been having the worst luck with the Walgreen's by our house. I went with Costco this time, so we'll see.

Light Parade

I've been looking forward to this year's light parade ever since Tyler and I went last year. In my opinion, it's the best parade in town, well at least the prettiest. The only drawback is that it's so cold outside. It's always cold this time of year, but 28 degrees....come on!

We knew we had to bundle up, but it took us so long to put on all the layers that we arrived kind of late and ended up catching just the tail end. I guess that was better than missing the whole thing completely, but I was still disappointed that we missed most of the floats.

It took me a while to figure out which camera mode worked best for taking pictures of moving lights at night. The first several pictures came out blurry until I switched the camera to candlelight in the scene selection mode. That seemed to work a little better.

The Coca-Cola truck was the most well lit of all, using over 14,000 lights.

I had to catch these two trucks at the end of the parade route because we had missed them on their way through.

If Tyler looks a little dazed, it's because he fell asleep in the car on the way to the parade and then continued to sleep through most of the parade.

After the parade we walked over to the Millenium Plaza to watch the lighting of the Christmas tree. Then we boogied home as fast as we could before our fingers and toes started to fall off.