Oh Somebody (else) had a Birthday!

Ben reached the ripe old age of 35 last Friday. He is sad that he will never be able to catch up to Tracy in age.

It wasn't that exciting of a day, since Ben worked and then we drove 3.5 hours to Wausau, but Ben appreciated all the birthday wishes he got. I had to think out of the box to make him a special cake since he prefers pie over cake. I found this recipe for Lemon Meringue Cupcakes quite a while ago and decided I would make them since that is his favorite pie.

They were delicious! I didn't quite get enough of the lemon curd filling inside the cupcakes. It was the perfect combination so Ben could enjoy his 'pie' and I could still make cake. The only thing I will do differently next time is buy lemon curd instead of making it myself. It was too time consuming especially with a sick Russell and trying to get things ready so we could leave as soon as Ben got home from school.

Now I have accomplished one of the goals I set at the beginning of the year making a special cake for everyone's birthday.

What a weekend

Tonight Ben and I were talking about how nice this weekend was. We didn't do a single thing for the apartments. Instead we spent our time doing normal weekend things. And, the weather was beautiful! Sunny and mid 60-70 degrees both days.

This was Eyota's city wide garage sale weekend. 63 of the houses in town had garage sales and several were multi-family ones. I didn't even realize there were that many houses in Eyota! The main goal was to find a new bed for him (with mattress). We wandered around without much luck and then stumbled upon one house where the lady had a bunch of vintage toys. We bought  this little people house because Russell loves playing with the one at Mom and Dad's every time we go over.

It isn't quite the same, but it has a 'doo-dah' (doorbell) and a garage, both of which are the most important parts of the house according to Russell. It had two bags of people/cars/house accessories that came along with it. We did end up finding a bed for Russell, plus one more crib sheet, a baby gate, another bookshelf for the kids room, a pair of pants for Russell to wear to church, a sleeping bag for Russell (free!) and a dumb riding toy that I couldn't pull Russell off of. It'll probably end up at Savers when summer is over.

We also spent time in our garden plot. They had a work day tilling each one, setting up the fencing, mulching the paths, etc. We spent quite a few more hours afterwards pulling weeds out. It would have been more relaxing if I wasn't 8 months pregnant, but it was fun nonetheless. Russell enjoyed spending lots of time outside. He and Ben managed to get some good sun. Russell also discovered worms. He really likes them. His biggest contribution was dumping our buckets of weeds into the wheelbarrow once they got full.

Ben and I both taught lessons at church today, plus Ben spoke in Sacrament meeting and participated in a musical number. Then we had lunch with some friends in our ward. We had taken a meal over to them after they had their baby, and Russell immediately disappeared with their two boys upstairs in their toy room that day. The same thing happened again today when we got to their house.

Later we went to one of Ben's former students Stars and Stripes Ceremony for American Hertage Girls. It is similar to getting an Eagle award in Boy Scouts. It was interesting to hear their perspective on helping young women find a righteous contributing role in society. I was happy because they had cupcakes afterwards :) We also went for a little drive through the country to look at a decent house that is for sale within our budget. There were lots of farmers out getting fields plowed, and crops planted.

It was a nice weekend after lots of weekends with gross weather and far too many things filling up our time here at these apartments. It makes me look forward to three weeks from now when school is over and every day will feel like a weekend day having Ben home.

Oh somebody had a birthday

It's hard to believe that this little screaming chubb is two already.

I had high hopes that this birthday would be a fun day for us to enjoy together. Last year we were watching another family of kiddos on his birthday, so his celebration was a quick little thing as we tried wrangling 5 additional kids. Alas, this years celebration ended up happening 2.5 hours later than it should have been thanks to crazy apartment stuff.

Amid all Russell's late night crankiness, he did enjoy the balloons we hung, the 'happy birthday' banner I made at Super Saturday last fall, looking at his little pile of presents all day, and his farm cake. He was especially eager to blow out the candles and did it a few times before we finished singing.

Can't take his eyes off that cake!

Tractors

We also had some cake and ice cream with his friends over in the old people building on Saturday. I made some cute little cupcakes with dum dum balloons. He couldn't keep his hands off those all afternoon.

He has transformed from a screaming little baby to an affectionate ball of energy. He loves to give hugs and kisses and will randomly insist on giving baby sister (aka my stomach) big hugs and kisses in between running around with all his various vehicles. While it seems he is always on the go, he will still snuggle up to us when he needs a little rest. He has finally learned that nursery is great, but still cries right when Ben drops him off. And, he is way too smart for his little age. He will read his books and randomly walks around reciting them and singing songs. The doctor confirmed that he is still our little chubber (90th percentile).

Though I was sad to not have a baby girl first, I wouldn't trade my boy for any little girl in the whole world. I love him and he will always be my baby!

Mardi Gras meal

Way back when it was Mardi Gras season, we had a fun little Mardi Gras meal for dinner one night. It was kind of an impromptu themed-dinner. I don't think much of it was legitimate Mardi Gras food, but it was all southern/Louisiana inspired food.

First we had Swamp Stuff. One family in Destin served this to us and he first had it in Louisiana. Basically it is a red beans and rice mix cooked up with whatever meat (we use half a kielbasa) added in towards the end of cooking. Then you fry an egg (or two) and serve it on top of the beans and rice with grated cheese on top. You aren't supposed to cook the egg all the way and then cut it open and let the yolk ooze into the rice and beans and let it cook there. We both like our eggs cooked thoroughly, so we just fry until hard and it is still delicious. You can also add hot sauce into the dish to give it added flavor. Ben is a BIG fan of this dish. He is always asking to have it for dinner, and it is pretty easy to make.

Next off was some maque choux. We loosely followed Emeril's recipe. It was a nice veggie addition to the Swamp Stuff. I had never made it, but it too was super easy to make.

I also baked up a King Cake. This was really the only reason why we had a Mardi Gras meal. It didn't turn out how I wanted it, but it was still delicious. We didn't have a little baby to bake into the cake, but we did add a coin and Ben found it. Guess he is making the cake next year.

Ben did a good job making me look hardly pregnant in this picture.

We will probably have an annual Mardi Gras meal every year. It reminds me a lot of my mission because people in Andalusia we very much into it. Next year, we'll have to plan ahead. I'm thinking some moon pies for dessert along with the King Cake Ben has to provide.

Things I have learned

I've learned a few interesting (to me) things over the past couple of days that I would like to share.

1. The altitude here in Rochester, MN is higher than in Phoenix, AZ. I was hoping that altitude may have been why I couldn't get a recipe from Ben's Mom to turn out, but that wasn't the reason.

2. Cities complicate all sorts of things. Take gardening, for example. We got a garden plot in the community garden this year. But, we have to follow all these rules and regulations, plus they want us to go to a gardening class since this is our first year. What ever happened to digging up the dirt, planting seeds, tending to the plants, and then harvesting the bounties?

3. When you get a wart frozen off, the liquid nitrogen isn't used to kill the wart. It is used to kill the healthy cells around the wart to rush white blood cells to the area and then have those same white blood cells attack the wart virus itself. I just hope my wart is gone for good now.

4. Old McDonald apparently only has tractors, garages, trucks, and trains on his farm. At least, that is what Russell thinks. We can never get any animals on that dang farm when we sing the song anymore since he always picks what is on the farm now.

I want YOU to go to BYU.

Easter 2014

This Easter we went to Mom and Dad's and spent Ben's entire spring break there. Because of all the snow days and the fact that this school district thinks they have to make up days, spring break was Friday only so our stay was shorter than we would have liked.

It was also fun to see Joseph and Tracy and kiddos while we were there (Ben and Shannon and girls too, but we almost always see them when we go to Mom and Dad's). Russell loved having cousins to play with but wasn't sure about having to share.

 Russell especially loved Baby Alexa and Holly. He would ask to hold Alexa and would give plenty of kisses, plus he liked to play with them when they were hanging out. Hopefully,this is a good indicator for the future :)

 The grandkids colored Easter eggs. Grandma is getting soft because she said they could color seven eggs each! Due to some unfortunate events by the egg cooker, they only got to do six each and some of the grown ups got to color one.

Macey and Afton had a blast, Joseph and Tanner were in their little world, and Ben and Sadie are unimpressed with the whole thing.

 Ben's Mom would make these bunny rolls for Easter each year. We will also be making them every year because they are delicious. It was unfortunate that we had to share them with everyone else.

 The next day we had a little Easter egg hunt for all grandkids. It was hard to get them to sit long enough for a picture before everyone headed outside.

The little kids waiting to go outside.

The big kids had to wait for the little ones to get a headstart.

 Because we practiced beforehand, Russell was excellent at finding eggs. I'm sure in the future when he can run faster, he will beat his older cousins at getting eggs. Plus, he can just use his weight and push them out of the way if need be.

*-Good picture of the boys. Bad picture of the girls.

Good picture of the girls. Bad picture of the boys. How do you get 5 young kids all looking and smiling at the same time?

 Russell was a super stinker on Sunday. He was quite uncooperative and wouldn't let me put his Easter outfit on, so we'll have to try again next Sunday for a good Easter picture. When we left, Rusrsell was basically asking for me to get him all snuggled up in his chair with his best sleeping buddies by the time we got to the freeway.

 He had a good nap on the drive home, plus an awesome night of sleep thanks to being thoroughly warn out from all the fun with cousins (including being awakened early by Afton to find his Easter basket), not getting normal naps/sleep at night, and getting home after his bed time. Plus, we had thunderstorms last night and it was still dark and rainy this morning so he slept in past 8:30.

We all had a wonderful Easter celebration and are grateful for the reason that we can celebrate Easter.

We are a happy family

Russell received one of those little wood train sets from us for Christmas. He really enjoys it and gets hours of fun out of it--from the very minute he wakes up until he puts them away for the night. He loves his "choo! choo!" We had to help him set it up at first, but he can put the tracks together on his own now. I'll find him playing away quietly in his room.

I got an awesome deal on this train set. I saw it at Aldi around the beginning of December, and it was $20. I couldn't bring myself to spend that much money on it. Then the week before we left for Arizona, they had it in their clearance cart for $10.99! I was happy. So was Russell when I handed it to him as he sat in the cart.

It originally had 80 pieces when we bought it. Every time we clean it up at night, it seems like there are fewer and fewer pieces in the box. I'm pretty sure that when we move we will find a ton of little pieces in every imaginable place in this apartment. Among those 80 pieces are these four  people.

Ben and Russell have affectionately assigned each of us to someone in the family. It is really strange when Russell is calling out "MAMA", and I'm sitting right there with him. He clearly doesn't want me, but is wondering where my little figurine is. There are times when I see him giving them hugs and kisses during the middle of his playing, and once he starts with one of them, he has to hug and kiss them all. And, then I have to hug and kiss them.

Can you tell who is who?

PS. I made Robert Redford for dessert. It was delicious! And, totally satisfied a big craving I had been having. There might not be much left when Ben gets home from school tomorrow.

PPS. We rearranged the furniture in our living room and have given ourselves so much more space! It is wonderful. Russell has been super excited to have more room to run around. Ben and I keep congratulating ourselves over how smart we were at 10:30 last night when we figured out the new arrangement, and it fit!