Bored With Breakfast?

Try this!

Here's a Cooking Light recipe I've been wanting to try for a while; I finally made the couscous this morning and we all devoured it. I made a double batch and scrambled a dozen eggs and a few of the boys were still hungry...guess I'll have to make even more next time. But it still worked out to be an inexpensive breakfast, and oh so good! We splurged and bought the craisins, and walnuts are a staple in my freezer, but I'm sure you could just use what you have and omit what you don't. This basically tastes like a fancy oatmeal.

***Oh, and here's the coolest part--if you substitute 1/2 cup dry milk for the regular milk, and increase the water to 1 1/4 cups--it's a CAMPING BREAKFAST! Just boil the water alone, then stir in the dry milk before adding everything else. How's that for wonderful? I am definitely making this on our next camping trip...

Breakfast Couscous

1/4 cup water

1 cup milk

1/2 cup uncooked couscous

1/4 cup dried cranberries

1/4 cup raisins

1/4 cup chopped walnuts, toasted

2T brown sugar

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/8 tsp salt

Toss together couscous, cranberries, raisins, walnuts, brown sugar, cinnamon and salt in a mixing bowl; set aside. Bring water and milk to a boil in a saucepan, stirring constantly. Once mixture boils, take it off the heat and stir in the remaining ingredients. Cover and let stand 10 minutes, then stir, and serve!

Four Pizza Night

Yesterday, bored with meal plans, I asked the kids to each come up with a dinner idea to put on the list. Reuben chose "rice". Reese chose "pizza with pineapple on the side". Cole chose "Nothing-Since-I-Wanted-To-Pick-Pizza-But-Reese-Already-Picked-It-And-You-Won't-Let-Us-Have-Pizza-Twice-In-One-Week"! Oh well. Two outta three's not bad.

Since the fridge was pretty empty and pizza toppings can be purchased at the last minute, I got busy making the dough so it could get to rising. My dough recipe makes two pizzas. Realizing I had an excess of flour, yeast, etc I decided to make two batches, so that we could have some dough in the freezer for a quick weekend lunch in the future. A couple of hours later, as I was rolling out the dough, Justin made a quick trip to the store for toppings and beer, and in no time, we were tossing pizzas into the oven....

Okay. Do you know how many pizzas we went through last night? Four. All four. Well, three and a half. Which still leaves no dough for the freezer. And which also means that at the ages of 6, 4 and 2, my boys can already put away close to 3 pizzas between the three of them....

I was laughing as I was putting the fourth pie into the oven and the boys were all still sitting at the table waiting for more--thinking of what life will be like a few years down the road--when they are all FOUR at the table--and bringing home their friends, to boot! Good thing this mama likes to cook!

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In other news: today we six hopped the bus that stops right out in front of our house, rode downtown to wander the Farmer's Market, filled our bags with local veggies, a new long-sleeved tee for Mama, and cookies from Mount Bakery, and then stopped into Pita Pit for a special lunch before riding the bus back home. All in all, a bang-up day!

Quote of the Day:

"This is the first time my Golden Tooth has ever eaten pizza!" --Cole, age 6

Meatballs Revisited

Last week I took the boys to the outdoor market and we LOADED UP on every type of fruit and veggie (see previous post for reference to my recent produce addiction). Out of everything we bought, the one thing that we couldn't WAIT to dive into was a perfect little half-pint of perfectly tart blackberries. (Don't your cheeks hurt just thinking about them?) I could hardly get us all buckled into the Volvo before cracking open that little plastic box. Trying desperately to save some for Daddy, who was at home working on the computer, I carefully rationed out 6 berries per hungry mouth and we were on our way. Soon, I hear Cole:

"I'm saving two."

Reese: "I'm saving three."

Cole, frantic: "I'm saving four..."

I peek in the rearview and see the two boys looking at the little berries in their hands, at each other, and back at their berries. Finally Cole, in an act of desperation, blurts out, "Oh, Reese, we can't play Midnight Meatball anymore, remember? Let's just eat them, okay? I'm going to eat mine, are you going to eat yours? Let's just eat them."

Reese: "Okay."

Wowza. Can you just imagine what those little berries would have looked like hidden under the pillows?

Catching Up

I've been MIA on my own blog lately. Justin has been mainly working from home the last two weeks--which is great, but it means I am behind on all things computer. I've peeked here and there at my favorite blogs, but have yet to really answer any emails....


Here's what's new around our camp.


THE CEO'S
Justin's trying out some of his newfound Project Management knowledge on me and the boys. He and I have started meeting weekly....without the kids....he is in charge of providing the coffee or snacks....ensuring I will actually show up at the meeting, ha! We sit for an hour or two with all of our lists and discuss all of the nooks and crannies of Family Life. Kids stuff, the family calendar, financial goals, weekly menus, home improvements. Etcetera. So far, so good; I'm finding it's helpful to have one assigned weekly appointment to dump out all of the random facts, ideas and problems I have accumulating inside my head. It takes a lot of the emotion out of it when you can come to a meeting and talk about missed expectations and miscommunications instead of letting it build up and eventually explode. Plus, we're both noticing that a lot more is getting done around the house--since it's clear who is responsible for what, and what the timelines are. Hurrah for that!




THE BROOD
The boys are good--loving the (warmer) weather. Reuben's favorite thing is to hop out of bed in the morning, jump into his boots (over his jammies), run out into the backyard and wake up while saying Good Morning to the chickens. Cole knows that he earns a quarter for letting the chickens out in the morning--but he also knows that Justin leaves quite early and will do it on his way out to the truck--so he's in a constant race against the clock to be the first one up and outside. It's a tiny bit insane. Even on the weekend, we often wake up to the backdoor slamming right around 6am! Which is, of course always followed by the standard 6-year-old-at-the-side-of-our-bed routine, stage-whispering, "When are we going to have breakfast?!" and "I'm bored!"

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I'm thinking about making some changes to our school schedule--again. It seems things are always changing--but I keep reminding myself that this is why we chose to homeschool--so that we could continually tailor the program to each child's needs. Reese wakes up slowly but is at his prime at about 8pm (bedtime). Cole starts the day strong and slowly wears down until he falls into bed exhausted at night. I've been having them do their schoolwork together mid-morning, but it's not ideal. Cole is too easily distracted and Reese plays Class Clown. So, for now, it's working better to have one-on-one time with Cole while Reese and Reuben nap, since he can zip right through his work when there are no distractions. And Reese is thriving on the special "Mom and Dad time" after his big brother is in bed for the night, and is so proud when he reads a word or solves a math problem that it seems as though he might burst right out of his skin. They're able to both forge ahead at their own speeds without worry of where their sibling is at--and yet still come together a few times a week for science projects or art lessons.

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Sean is getting bigger and stronger and all the brothers pitch in and help him whenever a toy or binks is out of reach. He's developed rashy little red cheeks and it seems to be a food allergy, which isn't surprising since all the other boys and I are sensitive to dairy. So for now, I'm trying my darndest to avoid dairy and wheat, which means that I'm starving (read: grouchy) ALL THE TIME. The good news is that my scale is finally starting to budge again with this strict diet....if I can just manage to stick to it....

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Wednesday we entered into Kids Dental Work for the first time. Back in March Cole's dentist discovered a cavity in one of his back molars sort of underneath the tooth. Making arrangements to get it filled took a bit of running around. I wanted to do some research on mercury/silver fillings, and we also took Cole to the hospital to have an echo done to check the status of the VSD (hole in his heart) that he was diagnosed with at 11 days old. The cardiologist from Children's Hospital that did our consult (via live video) confirmed that the hole has indeed closed, so we no longer have to have any concern about random infection finding its way into his bloodstream and lodging in his heart. After all of this, we finally had the tooth filled Wednesday...which of course turned into a bigger deal, as the cavity was so low it was in the root and the dentist decided to do a root canal and put a crown on the molar, ensuring it will stay strong enough to last the next 6-odd years he'll need it before a permanent one comes in. Cole, despite all of his apprehension, was a CHAMP, and is so proud of his "silver pirate tooth." Everyone? All together, in your best pirate voice? "ARRRRRR!"

IN OTHER NEWS

Our landlord, Nancy, decided to put in a fence this year and graciously offered to put one in for us, too. Justin's been out the last couple of days working on it. He still has a ways to go, but it's great to think that the boys can have more freedom outside this summer. None of the three ever go near the street, but there are SO MANY people that use our sidewalks because of the close proximity to the elementary school and technical college that we feel better about having them playing in a semi-enclosed space.

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And the final news....we took advantage of the electronics stores' Memorial Day sales this week and bought a new camera! I'm thrilled and overwhelmed all at once. There are things I could do on my 35mm Canon that I haven't figured out how to do on this one....and then, of course, there are SO MANY things that this one does that my other one couldn't. It will be a bit of a learning process, I suppose. I'm trying to take some time each day and play around with it. I got a handful of decent shots the other day, and went to upload them, and the SOFTWARE doesn't work (remember the demon computer virus we had a while back?). Ugh. We do have a friend in IT who might be able to find the glitch and repair it, so we'll see. For now, no new photographs. Stay tuned!

Heard Around The House

"I don't like babies. Reuben is still a baby. Well, Sean is a baby, and I like him.....but I don't like other babies." --Reese, age 4

On The Hunt

I'm officially in the market for a new camera. Help! Reese dropped my point-and-shoot digital a few weeks ago and it's acting up (hence the lack of photos and the far-from-current family portrait on the sidebar). I need some advice about what to buy. Anyone? Anyone? I'm loyal to my first love (the Canon AE-1) and won't waver to another brand. I don't care to have anything overly fancy....but I'm dying to have some manual features again and want quality that's good enough for wall enlargements.....

Do any of you out there have a Canon SLR you LOVE?

Today

Today, when I was putting Reese down for a nap, I found a meatball under his pillow.

A meatball.

Under his pillow.

And if you think that's weird, wait until you hear the conversation that followed.

Me: "Reese, you can't have meatballs down here."

Reese: "But Cole has one."

Me: "He does? Where?"

Reese: "Under his bed."

Me: "Will you get it for me?" (I was, after all, holding the baby. Yeesh.)

Reese climbs around under Cole's bed and rescues a perfect little meatball from the frame of the bed. A place where I would have never, never found it. He hands it to me and I trek upstairs, trying not to laugh my head off.

I walk into the living room.

Me: "Cole, I brought your meatball upstairs and it's on the kitchen counter. No more hiding food in your room, okay?"

Cole: "Well, okay. But we do usually remember it."

What?

Me: "How many other foods have you hidden down there?"

Cole: "Just one. It was a cookie."

Okay, now cookies--that I can understand. But meatballs? Reese said they named them Midnight Meatballs and were saving them until after lights out.

Today might just be my weirdest day as a mother!