Life Randomness

 

Twitter & Time Flying

I knew I would be terrible at Twitter….I was so right. The irony is when I glance over at my last “tweet” and it says how many days ago I think; “Wow, time really flies”. And it does. Apparently the older you get the faster time goes by. I am really feeling that these days. I do not know how I could have “just had a baby” who is pushing three. Three years old. And that teenager…sheesh, he’s 16 and in just two short years he’ll be graduating high school. I might add this is also the exact same time his little brother will be entering school. Now if that’s not ridiculous……..

Weight Loss & Pants

So, this weight loss thing really sucks. As does the clear fact that the older you get the more your body wants to retain extra weight. I recently went through a huge dilemma as to whether or not to buy a cheap pair of Capri pants (on sale at Old Navy for $15!) if it means buying them in the next size up while I am still attempting to lose. So far, I have not convinced myself to buy them. I keep thinking; “Just a few more pounds and I could at least fit into many of the pants I already own!” Ugh. It’s very frustrating. But I could gripe about this topic for days so I’ll leave it at that for now.

Smart Phone

Yesterday I was saved by my smart phone—I’m so glad I have this thing. After years of going the paper planner route I finally decided that I needed a PDA and phone in one. I determined this after missing an appointment entirely in which I had to pay a “no show” fee. So, yesterday afternoon while the little guy was playing with Daddy outside and Teenager was working on his homework my phone went off with a reminder; Teenager had an orthodontist appointment! Crap! I had completely forgotten about this! I had it set with the default reminder which is 15 minutes…this was just enough time to yell out the back door that I was leaving, grab the teenager and head out the door. Sadly, this was not enough time to change out of my yoga pants. I need to set the reminder just a tad earlier to avoid such calamities in the future but at least I made the appointment! Thank you Smart Phone. My apologies to all the folks in the orthodontist’s lobby who had to see me in my at-home-only “mom attire”.

Check the Linen Closet

Around here there is a not-just-occasional-occurrence in which Teenager forgets to get a towel before heading into the shower. Last night was one of those occurrences and since I'd just done a huge load of towels and didn't replace his towel in the bathroom he was caught unaware. Poor kid just assumed his towel was there. So when he hopped out of the shower dripping wet and discovered its absence we heard him calling pathetically from the other room. Dad went and rescued him by handing him a towel through the door but not without a few words about making sure he had a towel first. Later, we were all treated to one of Hubby's stories from back in the day. It seems he once worked with a guy (we'll call him Ted) who also forgot to get a towel before his shower. Ted remembered his roommate Bob had done laundry earlier and all the towels were likely in the dryer. Ted, wet and naked, headed out to the garage where the washer and dryer were. As he approached the dryer, the door to the house closed and locked. It was at this moment Ted discovered an empty dryer because apparently Bob had taken the clean towels in the house but they hadn't yet made it to the bathroom. So, Ted was locked out the house, wet, naked and with no towel. And it was winter. At this point in the story the hubby described Ted's efforts to keep warm by rigging the dryer to run with the door open while he stood in front of it waiting for Bob to come home. I can only imagine the horror Bob must have felt upon his arrival and watching as that garage door opened up.

I am also very grateful we do not have our laundry room in the garage.

Fractured Fairytales

Awhile back I wrote about the hubby reading bedtime stories to the little guy. Lately I've been paying closer attention to the stories over the baby monitor and have been cracking up listening to him. Apparently, he's been doing some serious paraphrasing and ad-libbing with the classics.

From Cinderella:

"Cinderella had two ugly stepsisters...and boy were they ugly."

"Cinderella had a great time dancing with the Prince at the Ball, but she heard the clock strike midnight and had to hurry home because her dress was a rental."

 

From Winnie the Pooh:

"Pooh got himself stuck in Rabbit's hole so Rabbit painted a face on Pooh's bum, but it didn't seem to help any."

I can't wait 'till the little guy learns to read. Daddy's going to have a lot of explaining to do!

No one ever had this much fun recycling

So it's just another Friday night in our household. Before we whipped out the camera I had built my own creation similar to this, yet not quite as spectacular. Then Hubby comes by and bets me he can yank out the pizza box without knocking the whole thing down. Hilarity ensued. A mess followed. Then he builds this and naturally I have to have it photographed because, well, it's a blog post just waiting to happen. And there you have it folks.

Also, we really need to bring back date night.

Something to get excited about

It just doesn’t take much to make me happy sometimes. Getting through a day without a tantrum for example; that’s a good day! And on days when the little guy doesn’t have one either it’s even better. But yesterday something special happened. After over a year of bemoaning the loss and months of begging various people to please bring it back, it finally happened. I’ve been reunited with my special salad dressing! Readers may recall a previous post: Discontinued Favorites, in which I mentioned this little gem; Litehouse Tangy Citrus Orange Salad dressing.

The store that was able to accomplish this fabulous feat is the special grocery store I wrote about in: Wherein I liken a Grocery store to Disneyland. For those still with me (I probably lost a few of you when I started discussing condiments) here’s why it’s so awesome; it’s got a lot of flavor and tangy zip, but it's fat free and only 45 calories! It’s great on any salad but I particularly love to make a special spinach or baby greens salad with it. I haven’t been able to make this for so long now because there was just nothing to replace this dressing. I’ve searched every market and brand, both shelf and refrigerated, and no one else makes a citrus-based tangy flavored dressing anything like this one. I've seen raspberry, pomegranate, cranberry, pear, and other “fruity type” dressings, but they are nothing like this and many have a lot of added fat. This dressing can also be used as a marinade and the hubby and I are already planning trying it on some skewered shrimp on the BBQ this summer. And once again, alas, I am not being compensated for blogging about this. I actually even went so far a while back as to plead with the folks at Litehouse to please send me some of this stuff or make it possible to purchase through them but never had any luck. So my point is they are fortunate I love this stuff so much to be giving them the free plug.

So, to celebrate this event (because you know I’ll use any excuse to celebrate) I’ve made my special salad and included the recipe for my readers. I think this is only the second recipe I’ve ever offered here. (Last summer I shared my guacamole and accompanying margaritas.) This salad is great as a lunch all by itself, or a side dish for summer BBQ’s. For example: served alongside some grilled salmon, jasmine rice and a nice glass of Chenin Blanc. I’m ready for summer!

SAHM Salad

(The amounts below are calculated for a single serving of this salad and amount to 6 WW points for the serving. To make this as a big family size salad you can multiply the portions or simply throw in whatever amounts you like of each item.)

· Baby spinach or baby spring mix (pictured)

· Candied pecans ½ ounce

· Mandarin Oranges 2 ounces

· Dried cranberries 1/8 c

· Purple Onion (to taste)

· Blue Cheese crumbles 1.5 ounces or 1/8 c

· Litehouse Tangy Citrus Orange Dressing 2 T (hopefully you’ll have good luck finding this in your area! FYI: it’s in the refrigerated section as it has no preservatives.)

Toss and Enjoy!

Easter Weekend

The weekend started out with the big Easter Egg hunt at our local park. This was only the little guy’s second year of official egg hunting but his big brother recalls numerous Easters at this Egg Hunt as we went every year when he was younger. Of course it’s been a few years since he’s been young enough to participate, but he really enjoys now getting to help his little brother. Daddy was armed with the camcorder and I snapped pictures wildly as hoards of parents and little ones rushed onto the field to gather eggs.

 

I guess you can’t really call it “hunting” when they are all out in the open. The little guy had a blast and did great at getting eggs into his basket!

 

According to the males in this family (i.e. the majority of our family!) this was like a true sport to them as evidenced by the cheering on of the little guy to get the eggs and the "practice session" at home with Daddy when he hid eggs around the living room and explained to our toddler what he’d be doing at the Egg hunt the next day. (No, I’m not kidding. )

This morning the boys got their Easter baskets and were quite pleased with what they got.

We headed out to church this morning and dropped the little guy off at nursery. He did his usual “super sad crying face” which is always so hard to leave. Fortunately he calms down a few minutes later. (I always sneak back and check through the little window.) And while we’re talking about church, here’s an interesting little side story: You know how you meet someone and just know you’ve seen them somewhere before but cannot place them? Well, this week when we had our gas leak issue, the guy who came out to re-light the pilot lights looked so familiar to me. I chatted with him a little while he was doing his job and learned he lived right here in town and had been here for many years. I started to think that I knew him from the "other church" I attended back in the day, many years ago. I didn’t say anything because if that is where I knew him from I figured it was advisable to not bring it up. When you leave a more extreme type of religious organization you are pretty much looked at as a defector of sorts and I really didn’t want to open that particular can o’ worms. Well, imagine my surprise when this morning before the Easter service started we headed out to the coffee cart and there he was doing the brewing! Here I was thinking I knew him from a completely different church years ago then realizing he actually goes to my church today. One of life's little ironies.

After church we enjoyed a lovely Easter Brunch at one of our favorite breakfast places in the area. This is a special treat and family tradition for us to enjoy a holiday brunch and we had a great time. We were seated right next to the dessert table of all places. This meant little guy spotted the cake and proceeded to asked for it by saying “Happy!” since to him all cake is “Happy Birthday” cake. So, we had to let him have a piece.

Happy Easter!

Observations on the Weekend Breakfast Out

One of our family’s favorite treats is enjoying a breakfast out on the weekend. Over the years when going out for breakfast on a Saturday or Sunday morning I’ve observed many interesting characters and they seem to break down into the following basic categories:

Just trying to feed the crowd: Extended family is in town and they all go out to breakfast. Usually followed by fights over the bill at the completion of the meal (except in our family, in which case this doesn’t seem to occur for some reason.)

Just hooked up the night before: These are the folks who have that awkward “just met” aura about them who look like they… well, just hooked up the night before.

Just roared in: Those dressed in leather who came on their motorcycles.

Just rolled in: The sporty folks who came by bicycle. I have to admit, this is something I don’t get. If you’re wearing full-on biking attire and have been out working up a sweat on a miles long bike ride is showing up a restaurant really something you want to do? I acknowledge that a weekend breakfast is a casual meal, but I think we’ve taken casual a tad too far when we think it’s ok to “workout” and go dine with other folks, who..well, showered and aren’t wearing tight bike shorts. But maybe that's just me.

Just give us some peace and quiet: The empty nesters who are trying to enjoy a quiet, leisurely breakfast out and are hoping they don’t sit next to families with kids.

Just a weekend family breakfast aka Families with Kids: That’s us. The whole family troops in complete with an inordinate amount of gear for baby. Highchair cover, cold carrier with food/milk/juice, diaper bag, toys, etc. Teenager acts as helpful pack mule despite damage to his cool factor with a Petunia Picklebottom diaper bag slung over his shoulder. The table immediately gets completely rearranged to keep everything out of baby’s reach. We each get about a four inch square within which we must contain our plates, cups, utensils, etc. We attempt to keep the little guy occupied and quiet and enjoy breakfast. Generally speaking we have pretty good luck, though I will admit to the occasional sippy cup being hurled. He usually manages to miss the other diners.

It’s also interesting how when it comes to the choice of restaurant it breaks down into genders. The men seem to go for the food alone, no atmosphere, basic selection of food and big portions-- basically no nonsense. The women like the “foofy” places: cute atmosphere and more gourmet type selections. There’s a running joke in our family about my all time favorite breakfast place; it was in an old Victorian house, of course very nicely furnished and decorated and they offered quite innovative breakfast selections [my favorite was a poached egg in puff pastry with melted gruyere.] They served the best homemade scones, including a white chocolate rose petal scone (trust me, it was delicious). The joke is that the hubby didn’t like this place because they “didn’t serve toast”. I should clarify that; they served the previously aforementioned delicious scones (a choice between whatever two they had that day) instead of boring toast. Apparently, if you wanted an order of toast you could certainly have it, but it was $1.50 extra. Yeah, the hubby was not happy with that. Sadly, my all time favorite breakfast place closed down. Now every time we drive past the building the hubby says they wouldn’t have gone out of business if they’d just included toast.

Quote for the Day

This just in from the Teenager who was inspired by his little brother:

"Say; Wheeeeeeee! It makes everything more fun."

Gas Leak

So the Gas Company showed up today to fix a gas leak we didn't even know we had. Apparently it wasn't serious and they were able to repair it right away. The gas had to be turned off though and they told me it would be a awhile before they could send the guy out to turn it back on and re-light all the pilot lights. While some might have been put off by the inconvenience I'm thinking to myself; This is great; an excuse to not have to make dinner just landed in my lap! What a terrific Monday!" So naturally, the gas re-starting guy shows up right away foiling my plan. Crap.