my wee friends

A few photos today of the children after school...Abigail had just been blown home by the September

winds (hence her little fluff of hair) and she was cuddled up on the couch with Luke; Juliet and Isaac quickly drifted over to join them.  I snapped a few photos before they were all up and racing again; right now I can hear their little voices laughing with glee in the back yard.  Such a lovely time of year.

ps...if you're wondering why Luke looks a little weird in the last picture, he was just getting ready to start yelling. 

Squirrel Land + a recipe

Underneath Isaac's bed is a place my children all call "Squirrel Land."  Remember how we have a couple hundred bottles of water for emergencies?  The children have moved the waterbottles into different tunnels and caves and dens under the bed, and they love playing under there.  The great thing about the waterbottles is they are so easily rearranged to suit the fancy of whoever is currently playing in Squirrel Land. 

Isaac was playing in Squirrel Land just before naptime and I asked him if I could take some pictures.  He was absolutely thrilled  to pose and kept saying, "Nunner one picture, Mama?"




  The thing about Squirrel Land is that it's kind of a one or two-person thing.  Juliet and Isaac are okay together; Abigail tends to get kind of territorial and blocks the other kids out (and then Juliet starts crying because she doesn't want to break down the "walls" to get out, but Abigail has fenced her in.  Oh, the drama!)

Speaking of drama, Luke is on his first-ever round of antibiotics.  I was so hopeful that we were going to break the pattern of constant doctor visits, since he's gone 4.5 months without getting really sick, but...poor little buddy has an ear infection (which, considering everyone else had strep, he's gotten off lightly).  Hopefully he will not pull a Juliet and have 9 ear infections his first year and surgery on his first birthday, or an Isaac and spend his first two years on daily breathing treatments.  (My lucky children inherited some awesome genetic predispositions:  I used to be on an inhaler & opti-chamber and Neil has had pneumonia 3 times since we've been in grad school.) 

But he is so cute that I can almost (almost!) forgive him the sleep deprivation.  I took some pictures of the two of us today--I took some yesterday but I had such deep shadows under my eyes that I honestly looked like I had two black eyes.  It was pretty bad.  I made sure to put on a lot of concealer today to spare the world a repeat.

On a completely different note, I made a dinner last night that everyone actually liked!!  Abigail even told me the kitchen smelled delicious as she was getting ready to eat (so nice to hear that instead of the gagging and retching that usually accompany us to the table).  It's a modification of a recipe from this month's Real Simple (I changed the herbs and cheese and added kale & more mushrooms).

Tortellini with Kale, Mushrooms, and Butternut Squash

1 package frozen tortellini (16 oz)
1 bunch kale (the bigger the better--this is my kids' favorite part so I use a TON)
1 butternut squash, peeled and diced into 1-inch chunks
10 oz cremini/baby bella mushrooms (best part!  add more if you like), quartered
1 c. crumbled feta cheese
3 T. olive oil
2 T. dried rosemary
kosher salt
pepper

Preheat oven to 425.  Toss the squash, mushrooms, rosemary, salt (3/4 t.), pepper, and oil in a large bowl.  Spread onto rimmed baking sheets.  Roast for 25 minutes, stirring once.

While the vegetables roast, tear the kale into bite-sized pieces and stir-fry it in heated olive oil until it wilts down and turns very vividly green (your pan should be totally overflowing at the beginning, so don't worry if this is the case...just keep stirring as it wilts down).  Salt to taste.  Just before the vegetables are done, cook the tortellini according to the package directions.  Drain the tortellini and toss it with the squash, mushrooms, kale, and feta.  Add another 1/2 t. of salt or so, then serve.

applesauce

We spent most of Saturday (eleven hours, all told) turning 300 pounds of apples into 82 jars of applesauce.  Sounds super fun, right?  Actually, canning applesauce is by far my favorite, because it goes so quickly and is so easy compared to something like pears.  (Plus it's really easy for the kids to help, plus they LOVE eating apples like crazy.  And we had this for dinner [minus the peaches] and nothing else.)

If you've never made applesauce before, here are a few pointers:

• Buy "seconds."  This means the apples are slightly imperfect in terms of aesthetics--you can see how the apples in the photo above have blemishes on the skin or are funny shapes.  In all the apples we processed on Saturday, we found only one that was wormy.  The vast majority of seconds are perfectly good eating apples; the farmer just can't sell them as such because they look a little odd.  Seconds are usually way discounted (I paid $15 a bushel this year, but in the past I've paid as little as $6--it just depends on the supply in your area).  Check pickyourown.org or localharvest.org to find a grower near you--go local!  I can't tell you how nice it is to buy food from someone who knows your name.  :-)  Figure on getting between 12-15 jars of sauce per bushel of apples (this time I got 13.66 and the sauce was really thick). 
• Purchase or borrow a food strainer.  (I have this one.)  This will make your applesauce for you!  Here is the process:  quarter your apples (don't core or peel them), toss them in a stockpot with enough water so they don't burn, and cook them until they start to fall apart when you poke them.  Then drain out the water (reserve it until you see if your applesauce is too thick, then use the apple water to thin it out), put the apples through the strainer, and voila, applesauce!  It is seriously that easy.  Pour the sauce into jars, adjust two-piece caps, and process for 20 minutes in a boiling water canner.  (I would not recommend adding sugar, since most applesauce is really sweet already.)

Have fun!  Seriously, give applesauce a try if you've never done it before--it is the cheapest and easiest thing you can preserve at home.  :-) 

so there

This post is solely to torment my sisters, who are currently hanging out with my mom and my grandparents (poor Dad got left behind).  So hah, what if you're all having fun together?!  You don't have my really cute kids there, and therefore, you are miserable.  That will teach you to get together without me!  (Just forget the part where I was on the phone with Mary Beth this morning and Luke threw up very loudly.)

treasure hunt

Yesterday at what my friend Stacie calls "the witching hour" (e.g., the last hour before Daddy comes home) I realized we needed a little spark of something out of the ordinary to get us through.  So I got out some lemon juice, paper, and paintbrushes, and we started painting invisible ink messages to each other.

While the kids were busy with theirs, I drew an extremely artistic/lifelike/amazing treasure map featuring our backyard, as represented by a tree, the swingset, and the corner of the garden with a big X and the words "dig here."  Then I snuck outside and buried some of our emergency fruit snacks (usually only distributed when someone has a really terrible nightmare or is bleeding profusely). 

When we ironed our drawings, something exciting showed up...

...and outside we went....

...and started digging at the locale specified on the map.

The fruit snacks were received with disproportionate glee (that kind of reaction is normally reserved for oh, a pony or a Corvette or something) and the children decided to play outside until dinner.  Yes!!

Best part of the day today:  cuddling with Isaac after everyone had their baths and they were all sweet-smelling and dressed in snuggly jammies.  Neil had gone back to work, Luke was tucked away and snoozing happily in his crib, and the girls were sort of bouncing around on my bed, but Isaac was just lying on my chest with his little fists propping up his chin, smiling into my face and saying, "Old Madonell, Mama, hah a fahm, sheep," and then I would sing about Old MacDonald's sheep, and then wait for Isaac to grin delightedly and say, "Now tuhkey, Mama, gobbah gobbah."  So nice snuggling with my sweet boy. 


ps...if you decide to do lemon juice as invisible ink we found that ironing the drawings works way better than a hairdryer or light bulb, which were the commonly recommended methods I found with a quick Google search.  And I probably should have made my map more complicated because it was way too simplistic for the kids--next time I would do it in advance and spend more than 10 seconds on it, if I was being a real over-achiever. Maybe for a birthday party or something like that. 

it's that time of year again

Today we have three kids with strep throat, four children with a nasty head cold (plus the strep throat), a 'fridge in Should Have Gone to the Grocery Store Yesterday mode, and a very cranky me (underscore, emphasis, bold that crankiness.  My poor children.  I am doing so much yoga breathing). 

At least we went to the zoo while we waited for our carload of prescriptions to be filled.  I have such a soft spot in my heart for that zoo.  Thank you, zoo, for being small, free, and out in the open air where I'm not worried about passing germs.  Plus we were the only ones there, which is another awesome thing about that zoo.

Anyway, I'm taking a quick break from trying not to claw my eyes out with my fingernails (haha, you think I'm exaggerating!!) to post a few pictures from this past weekend at my parents' house.  On Saturday (while my poor dad spent the whole evening at church meetings) we went with my mom and our kids to one of my very favorite places in my hometown, a beautiful park that has an apple orchard planted near its playground.  I used to go here and study all the time when I was in high school, or run through the woods (Neil and I usually run there when we visit) and it's seriously just beautiful.  And the apples make it even more exciting, especially for the kids.  They ate so many!

After the orchard we walked through the woods for a couple of miles--past the pavement, past the mulched trails through the trees, and over onto the plastic decking that floats on the surface of the bog.  Meaning that the water shoots up through the holes in the decking and totally sprays you all over. It's kind of scary sometimes.  My mom and I were wet up to our knees; Abigail told me she got sprayed in the mouth.  Then we all showered to get rid of the bog nastiness, and went home and ate the most amazing okra (rolled in cornmeal and then lightly fried.  Seriously so good). 

Oh, and just to make sure we did a really awesome job of sharing germs (this was before I knew how sick everyone was), we moved all our beds around and now everyone is sleeping in a new bed!  Isaac isn't quite sure how he feels about his big boy bed yet, but so far (2 nights and 1 nap) it's gone well.  Keeping my fingers crossed on that one. 

10K

I ran a 10K today (the same course that I ran last year) and got the exact same time!  I was kind of bummed about this because I always want to improve, but hey, I'm a year older with another baby.  At least I didn't get slower, right? 

More details here. 

Cheeks of Glory

 Lukey's four-month stats:

18.56 lbs
26.25 inches long

This child has packed on ten pounds in four months.  Impressive.  (See four-month Isaac here and Jules here.)  No blog posts for Abigail, but I remember she weighed about twelve pounds and was super cute.  :-)

Lukester is 4 months old!

 ...although apparently he finds this not at all impressive.  Stoic baby.

So the other day Neil was saying that we really needed to find the camera because Luke is the perfect age for sheepskin pictures.  I spent an hour going through our house looking in every weird place I could think of and finally found the old camera sensibly stashed in the new camera box.  Go figure. 

Here is the thing about Luke--he LOVES to smile, and giggle, and make silly little faces and laugh, until you pull out the camera.  Then he just stares at you.  I did get a little more reaction with the sheepskin, but that was mostly because he was trying to eat it.  His favorite occupation these days is chewing on things.  Preferably his fists, but he will also chew on toys, blankets, and people's shirts (he was snuggling with Neil and I today and just launching these crazy attacks on Neil's shirt--he grabbed it in both fists and would just start growling and biting and banging his head down on Neil until finally Neil said, "Okay, scary carnivorous baby!" and gave him a pacifier.  Funny kid). 

The other exciting thing about Luke these days is that he's learned to roll over.  He rolled over a couple times around 3 weeks, then nothing for a few months, then last week he started rolling over like crazy!  He is all over the place now (which means that I have to move Isaac out of the crib so Luke can sleep in a real bed instead of the bassinet). 

Luke is such a sweet baby--lots of chubby cheeks and squishy legs to kiss.  He's still waking up every couple of hours at night (sometimes to nurse, sometimes just to yell for his pacifier).  Now that we're really into our fall activities & school I'm hoping that I can get him on a really regularized schedule and that will (fingers crossed) help him to sleep longer stretches at night.  But on the other hand, it's kind of fun to cuddle those cheeks at night when everything else is quiet and I can give him my full attention rather than nursing him while simultaneously doing 3 other things (making dinner/reading stories/folding laundry/getting someone a snack...take your pick, I'm developing some mad skills). 

one of the reasons why I love fall

Nine years ago I was at BYU waiting for lecture to start when the boy next to me leaned over and asked if I was doing my New Testament homework.

An hour later, after chatting occasionally during the lecture and finding out that he didn't know many people on campus since he'd only been home from his mission for four months, I had invited him to go with me to the campus devotional. 

Two days later as we were walking to our next class, he asked me out on a date for that Friday.  We went to the BYU Outdoor Cinema and saw The Three Amigos.  I threw popcorn at him and he loaned me his jacket.

A few days after that, he picked me up after I finished teaching a physics TA session.  We drove up the canyon and he introduced me to the beautiful Alpine Loop, which is one of my very favorite places in the world.  We munched on the last of his dried mangoes from the Philippines and talked.  At the very top, we got out of the car and sat on a huge boulder and looked out at the slopes of Mt. Timpanogos.  I thought I had never seen anything more amazing in my life. 

That night we went to a required film for our class and held hands for the first time.  I asked him to go with me to my friend's ranch on Friday.

When Friday night came, we made pizzas at my apartment with a bunch of my friends, then drove to the ranch and chased the swans around the lake on paddleboats.  We wandered away from the bonfire and climbed an enormous tree.

He asked if I'd ever kissed anyone sitting in a tree before.

I said I hadn't.

He scooted down the branch I was sitting on and asked if I'd like to give it a try.

I said perhaps.

And then he kissed me.

Then I told him I wasn't dating for fun anymore, and I liked him, but I only wanted to date people who were interested in relationships, not just having fun.

He asked if I wanted to come over for Sunday dinner and meet his parents.

So then I kissed him again.

Four weeks after we first talked in class, he asked me to marry him.

Four weeks and one day after we first talked in class, I said yes.

Fall is always such a wonderful time for us.  We reminisce about our courtship and the dozens of times we drove the Alpine Loop throughout the early years of our marriage.  At least once a week, we drove up the canyon, taking the Alpine Loop if it was open and driving through to Heber City if it wasn't, leaving behind the pressures of work and school to just talk to each other.  Those drives did so much to solidify our relationship as we learned more about each other and planned out our future together. 

Every time I see those mountains in the backdrop of our wedding photos, I remember the butterflies in my stomach when that tall dark-haired boy asked for my phone number.  And then I look across the room and see him washing the dinner dishes or wrestling a diaper onto a wriggling child and he smiles at me and I don't have the butterflies anymore as I grin back, but I have something even better, because our exchange of smiles carries with it so many years of laughter and inside jokes and shared chores and sorrow and euphoria and daily living and working together to become something greater than the sum of our parts.

loverly

with Abigail six years ago

We had a little jewel of a day today.  Seriously, everything was so lovely.  Juliet had her first day of preschool and she adored it; Isaac and I spent some time together (just the two of us!  this never happens and he loved it) reading stories right after she left and then we had a playdate with his little friends.  Then Jules and Isaac played outside in the bee-yoo-tiful weather...seriously, it's SO gorgeous right now and I enjoyed a very quiet house and cleaned like mad while they were digging around in the sandbox.  Jules and I had quality time together while the boys were napping, I got all my grading done, and then when Abigail got home the five of us went off to the farmer's market.

I gave each of the girls a dollar when we got there and told them they could spend it however they liked.  It was fun to watch them go from stall to stall, soberly inspecting the items for sale.  After we walked through the entire market they ended up pooling their money to buy a bag of kettle corn and two glasses of raspberry lemonade (both of which they shared readily with Isaac and I).  We sat on some chairs and looked through library books (our library has an honor-system checkout at the farmer's market) and enjoyed the sunshine.  Then we went to the playground for an hour and I just reveled in my delightful little children.  I was pushing the boys on the swings and listening to Luke's delighted chuckle and Isaac's chortling "Hiyuh!  Hiyuh, Mama!" ("push me higher, Mama") and thinking what fun little people they are.  And everyone left the playground happily, which is wonderful in itself, and then we had such a nice dinner just talking together about the day, and then we went on a walk after dinner. 

It was still a crazy day of laundry and meals and diapers and trying to fit in lots and lots of things, but it was a day where I enjoyed it all and just really relished it, you know?  I love those kinds of days--the ones that make me think,"This.  This is why I am a mother.  This is why I am home with my children, because I am watching them turn into these delightful, fascinating, wonderful little people."  So many good moments from today, not the least of which was Isaac asking me before his nap for one more hug--he threw his little arms around my neck, laid his head down on my shoulder, and just squeezed me so tight for a good 30 seconds, then kissed me very carefully and said, "Night night."  Just perfect.

Lukesly

I still don't have a working camera, but my mom does!  I actually yelped when I realized she was taking pictures, because this was taken after a day where we canned 200 lbs of peaches.  I had not showered, put on makeup, or even brushed my hair that day (the ice pack is because I ran into a wall.  And I'm wearing running tights because they were the closest things to shorts that I packed and it got really hot canning peaches).

Okay, enough disclaimers.  I guess I am just super self-conscious because I so rarely post photos of myself on my blog...but Luke was so darling that I had to post this.  Plus I feel really guilty because I have taken hardly any photos of him this month and he is so big now!  And cute!  And happy!  He is just the most darling thing ever.  I've been so stressed lately but when I hear his little cries and I go in and pick him up and kiss his fat cheeks all over and he smiles at me...it makes my day.  I love love love my little baby man.  I can't believe he's almost four months old!