wednesday stuff.

So this has been one of...those...weeks.
I am flat worn out.

I still have one sick kid at home.
He's been sick since Friday,
and I'm pretty sure we are going stir crazy.

Desperate times call for desperate measures,
so I figured tonight called for pizza.
It was the right call.

And since it's looking like I'll have another day home with a sickie tomorrow,
I've decided I'm going to go to the store and buy ice cream
so I can make the poor kid a milkshake.
That's good for sore throats, right?
Plus milkshakes just make you happy, darnit.

Making me happy?
These beauties.



My in-laws' greenhouses have produced their first crop of the year.
I know that most of you probably don't think tomatoes in January can be any good.
These??
They'd rock your world.
{coming to the san rafael and ferry plaza farmers markets very soon, bay area peeps.}
They also brought us two gorgeous basil plants and two huge bags of mandarins.
Heaven.  Having in-laws that are also farmers is a very good thing.

And speaking of good things...
My parents were here all day staying with my sick kid
while I went on a field trip with Colin.
My dad played the wii with Riley
and my mom folded all my laundry...cleaned the kids' rooms...and cleaned their bathrooms.
I can't even tell you how much I appreciated that.
Best parents ever.

And as long as everyone is healthy,
Gary and I are going to a Superbowl party on Sunday.
I'm making this: Jalapeño Popper Dip.



{photo and recipe from here}

A friend made it last weekend and it was unbelievable.
If you're going to a Superbowl party I'd highly recommend it.
Or this buffalo chicken dip.
Also totally delish.
The perfect dishes to snack on while cheering on the niners. :)

Ok.
I'm off to bed.
Praying for a less-germy day tomorrow.

sick...and a kitty.

So, 3/5 of our family is sick.
It happens to be the male 3/5 of the family.
Avery and I are the only two healthy ones in the house,
and I'm really really hoping it stays that way.

I'm doling out Ibuprofen and Albuterol right on cue.
I hate when my family is sick.
Hate.  It.
But I know I shouldn't complain.
This is NOTHING compared to what so many others go through.
{but i'm still feeling a little complainy.  i'll blame exhaustion.}

So...
this little person is obsessed with snowflakes.
I probably folded no less than twenty squares of paper for her this weekend,
and she cut cut cut away.





The broom is getting a lot of action thanks to this snowflake phase.

I realized that I haven't told you much about the kids' Christmas present.
All three of them asked for just ONE thing this Christmas.
One.
And Santa promised.
Oh boy.



Last weekend we headed to the Humane Society.
After looking at every. single. kitty. many times,
we found our new kitty friend.
{spayed, immunized, and microchipped for $29.  bargain!}

This is Allie.



I know...some of you are thinking we're crazy.
I get it.
You're either a cat person or you aren't.
But...she's a good kitty.
The kids are totally in love.
She plays, she purrs, she has a cute gravelly meow, and she makes Lucy totally nervous.



And she gets a lot of attention from Avery.
She lets Avery carry her all over the house.
Such a patient kitty.



So there you have it.
We have a cat.

Now I need to finish watching The Bachelor
and head to bead.
Playing nurse all weekend has worn me out.
Can summer just get here already?
I'm over this winter thing.

hey friday.

hey new slippers and country living.



hey pretty flowers and an open window.



hey cholula at costco.
oh happy day.



hey mr. bachelor.  i like mondays again.



hey afternoon ice cream date.



hey cold winter morning.



hey planning for next week with mumford in my ears.



hey friday.
it was a good week.

weekend breakfast. done.

So.
I hosted a little brunchy thing with a few friends on Tuesday.
I decided to get crazy and make new recipes I'd never tried before.

It was a good idea to get crazy.

First: Pioneer Woman's coffee cake.
My kids are obsessed with it.
Initially they wouldn't try it, because of the name.
ew!  gross!  coffee!
Once they were convinced there was no actual coffee in the cake,
they were sold.
PDub's recipe is here.
You'll like it.
{not a low-fat food.}

And then, there was the crock pot blueberry french toast.
Crock pot.  Blueberry.  French.  Toast.
It's life changing.

And this is the worst picture ever in this history of this blog,
but it's all I've got.
It went too quickly to photograph.
And that white stuff is cream cheese.
Mercy.



The original recipe is from this site.
{look at her picture...it's much better than mine.}

Really...you should make this this weekend.
Surprise your husband...your book club...your Sunday school class.
It's good stuff.
And you make it ahead of time and just cook it in the crock pot in the morning.
How awesome is that?
But...it's also not diet food.  You've been warned.

in the kitchen.

Can we just all give a collective
"woot woooooo"
for three-day weekends??

They rock.

This weekend was a full one.
There was basketball
and a party and a sleepover and blue skies and a new kitty and cooking.
Lots of cooking.
{more on the kitty later.}

I'm having a little brunch tomorrow morning so today
I was cooking up a storm.



Meatballs: not for brunch...just Saturday night dinner.
This recipe.  Delish.

One thing on the brunch menu: PW's sausage kale strata.
I've never made it before but I'm thinking it's going to be gooooooood.



This is before I poured the egg mixture on top.
Oh mama.

I'm also making crock pot blueberry french toast.
I'll let you know how that turns out.

In other news: I'm back together with My Fitness Pal.
Dangit.
But it had to happen.
I have a 20th high school reunion this year, friends.
Yikes.

Also...four day weeks?
Yay.
Upcoming weekends away with my favorite husband?
Double yay.
The 49ers in the Superbowl?
Another yay.
2013 has started out just fine.

life, as seen through the iphone.

I realized I haven't done an instafriday in awhile.
I like looking through the pictures I take on my phone.
It's a nice reminder to me of how we spend our days.
And what I cooked, apparently.  :)

A family day out for my birthday.
These two...I tell you.
I love it when they're smiling together.
It's so much better than when they're arguing.



A sundae.
It was rough...but I managed to finish.
{it was my birthday, i had to!}



Some sweet potato pancake action.
I'm a fan.



Date night with my favorite Aggie.



This girl is a reader.  Big time.



I feel like a grown-up when I buy Brussels sprouts.



And even more like a grown up when I cook them.
{roasted with balsamic vinegar and other veggies.  really good.}



Butternut squash.  Such an - interesting? - vegetable.
Don't you think?



I get one hour a day of alone time with this girl.
I treasure it.



A cold on a Friday.  Bummer.



A girl and her favorites.



I taught my monthly art lesson to Colin's class today.
We worked on mixing colors.
Third graders are awesome.



And that's it.
A few weeks in a few iphone pics.
Happy Friday.

tuesday.

Ah, Tuesday.
It's kind of my favorite day right now.
It's got none of the Monday stigma,
but still a good amount of "this is a fresh, new week" glow.

And like just about every other day,
this Tuesday had a little bit of this.



Thanks to Lucy and her never-ending shedding,
I do this just about every day.

And laundry.
Oh, laundry.
It's weird to think that it will never stop, isn't it?
Even if you get every.single.thing. washed in the house,
that only lasts an hour or so.
Right?  Weird.



I ran out to TJ Maxx this morning on the search for a new lamp.
I didn't find a lamp there...but I did find shoes.



It's hard to tell from this picture but they're silk, and a kind of a burnt orange color
with cork-ish toes.
And they're cuuuuuuute.
I also got mocassin slippers for my icy cold feet.
It was a good day for shoes at the Maxx.

It's been so cold here lately.
Like..."surely this is Alaska and not California", cold.
But at least the skies are blue.
I took the back road home today.  It was so crisp and clear and beautiful.



I then I came home and got a rager migraine.
I spent a good part of the afternoon on the couch with an ice pack.
Darn you, Tuesday.
You were nearly perfect.

{37 things}

I know it's the in thing to do to choose a word for the year.
I like that idea, even though I've never really been able to nail down one single word.

But this year I think I chose two words:
peace and purpose.

I have a nasty little tendency to be fearful.
Some fears are little and silly.
Like riding a ferris wheel.
The thought of being on one almost puts me into full panic-attack mode.
The big one at Disneyland?
I'd rather go bungee jumping while holding a tarantula.
But some fears are bigger and uglier and more joy-swallowing.
This year I want those joy-swallowing fears to be replaced with just peace and joy.
{i like what psalm 34:4 says.  radiant joy sounds so much better than fear.}

And then purpose.
I don't want my head to hit the pillow even one night and think that I wasted a day.

Yesterday I celebrated being another year older with a cake made by my favorite bakers.



Thankfully it only had 10 candles for me to blow out instead of 37.



I made a list of how I'd like to fill my days in this 37th year.
I hope this list is going to help me make every day purposeful.
Even on those days where it's only about mopping the floor.

1. go to the alameda flea market.
2. deliver cookies to a friend.
3. write twelve letters.
4. wash my windows.
5. do 100 jump ropes without messing up or stopping.
6. read through the entire bible.
7. have people over more often.
8. read ten books.
9. plant flowers in my backyard.
10. explore a new city.
11. print out my 2012 photos.
12. go away for the weekend with my husband.
13. run a 5k.  even if it's by myself.
14. have coffee with friends once a month.
15.  take a nap on the beach.  or at least close my eyes for 10 minutes.
16.  watch live music.
17.  read pride and prejudice.
18.  organize my closet.
19.  finally learn to do a kipping pull-up.
20. take a yoga class.
21.  get a massage.
22.  read a magazine in the bathtub.
23.  paint my bedroom.
24.  paint colin's room.
25.  hang curtains in the kitchen.
26.  mop the floor twice a week.
27.  take my vitamins every day.
28.  call my grandpa more often.
29.  finish my crochet blanket.
30.  make pillows.
31.  recover my bench.
32.  go to a giants game.
33.  sit outside by the fire pit in the summer at least once a week.
34.  work on avery's baby book.  {poor 3rd child.}
35.  start a quilt.
36.  go to bed by 11.
37.  put something in the blessing jar.  every day.

Today:
3, 28, 36, 37.

back to life.

Darn it...vacation's over.
Tomorrow is back to school for the kids and back to work for Gary.
I've been so spoiled having everyone home the last couple of weeks.
But tonight I got the coffee ready to go and made lunches..
I tried to make tomorrow morning as easy as possible.
I can feel it...I'm not going to want to get back in the groove.
Ugh.

It's also time to get back in the healthy eating groove.
November and December weren't pretty.
But now I'm back on the wagon.

This weekend I made healthy french toast.
No egg or dairy, for my wanna-be vegan husband.



I also made sweet potato pancakes which were delish.
Tonight was homemade pizza pockets for dinner,
and tomorrow it's roasted balsamic veggie salad with brussels sprouts.

Let's have a moment of silence for Christmas cookies.
Sigh....

well hi there, 2013.

It looks like I took a little break from this space.
I didn't plan to, but it just happened.
The week before Christmas we baked and hung out by the tree
and listened to Christmas music on Pandora 24/7
and got the stomach flu.
{it seemed like everyone got the stomach flu this year, didn't it?}

Mis.er.a.ble.



I made Pioneer Woman's bacon appetizers for Christmas Eve.
Lucy is my bacon bff.



And speaking of bff's...Kim's baked brie is mine.
I made it twice for Christmas celebrations.



And you know there ain't no party like a happy birthday Jesus party.



The stomach flu left the building, finally.
We were healthy for about four days before the kids all caught colds.
Darn you, germs.



Then Christmas.
American girl and Easy Bake Oven.
Ipods and Legos.
Happy kids.



On Christmas Eve morning we made the decision to take an impromptu road trip a few days later.



It's never, ever a bad idea to take a spur-of-the-moment Disneyland trip.



Oh, and it was cold.
I mean COLD.
And rainy.
I'm pretty sure Orange County has never been that cold before.



And did you know that eleven year olds looooooooove wearing matching rain ponchos?



Even with the cold and the rain,
we had a great time.
Two of the kids may need therapy after riding Tower of Terror...I won't lie.



But except for that minor detail,
we ended 2012 with a bang.



2012 wasn't my favorite year.
I didn't mourn its ending, that's for sure.

But 2013 is fresh.
Full of promise.
Actually already full of fun.

Meeting up with girlfriends on our side of the bay...



...to visit with girlfriends on the other side of the bay.


Those are some lovely ladies right there.

And today, a few more family adventures,



topped off with a hot fudge sundae.



Yes.  2013 is going to be a good one,
come what may.