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pikchrs uv miy famuly

2012-01-25T14:44:00.000-08:00

Today we are privileged to welcome a guest blogger, an aspiring writer and photographer who just happens to be my daughter. Kyle's parents gifted her a fully functional kid camera for Christmas and ever since she has enthusiastically documented her life's major events which, judging by the photos below, are centered around her baby sister about 97% of the time. Okay Ellie, take it away!

i luv my grandparins

ameas frst smile

wut a nis day

amelea frst time goyne to chrech

misis strong muslse

to hot aw

i want a koocye

in hevin

hold me

i git to et kake

i got pets

Minguh smiles, and other stuff that's happened

2012-01-24T00:36:00.002-08:00

Dah! This new blogger formatting junk 'n trash is not working for me yet. However, this is all going to be neatly slurped (or is it blurped?) into a blog book someday and all will be well (and within the margins) then, right?

Still can't get my pics in chronological order, but we haven't changed too much in the past month so here we go anyway.

Minguh's a binky baby, through and through. Not as thoroughly through and through as Charlie was/is, thankfully, but just enough.

Kyle started his last semester of school today (probably ever) and is considerably nervous and excited about it. These will likely be four of the most important months of his life thus far. Before today, though, he squeezed in a few rounds of golf over the break, for r&r, and also for practice at being a business executive.

Ming was gifted this darling holiday dress at my baby sprinkle and it's the newborn size, that size that technically terminates at seven pounds. You know, her birth weight. Still, it was a lot too cute to NOT wear at least once. Her first opportunity for semi-formal wear was Christmas day, but she donned a blessing dress for that occasion. So, we relented and started bringing her to church last Sunday and just barely got this dress buttoned. Worth it! She loved the experience way more than is depicted here.

Matching red shoes! Dah!

You would seriously not believe how sweet these two are together. For the record, Kyle has loved all of our children the same. For the other more honest record, he has never loved a baby like he loves this one.

For that same honest record, I have never loved bottomless sweet potato fries and mud pie like Red Robins'. This indulgence was a top-off to an Old Navy clearance sale run, so yeah. Life is pretty sweet.

Speaking of pretty sweet... Considering the intensity of Ellie's post-tonsillectomy halitosis, Erik's sub-conscious willingness to snuggle up to her is as sweet as it gets. Very brave, as well.

I wasn't here for this one. I'm pretty sure Ellie stole my camera AND my baby. And Charlie's crab pillow.

Here are two Pretty Pretty Princesses in their element. Kyle will not be happy when he sees our son bedazzled with jewelry, but I always sympathize with the kid and paint his toenails a nice neutral color when he wants in on the fun. Boys like to be pampered, too!


Ellie was one seriously pitiful creature for that first week after her tonsillectomy. It was downright dreadful, and I'm referring to her recovery, not just her dragon breath. (For the record, the doctor did warn us that "bad breath" was a common post-surgery symptom. The smell of a decomposing animal carcass constitutes more than "bad breath" in my book, but perhaps there is no medical term for this type of stench.) Okay but really, mostly we just felt so awful for this poor, sweet girl who was so completely out of sorts and in a tremendous amount of pain. I don't know that she consumed more than a scoop of ice cream and a few sips of juice a day with her pain meds for the first week. She was so lethargic, too, and clearly just miserable. Ellie's whining is not my favorite, and she does tend to milk her injuries for sympathy, but we let her have whatever she wanted for those first few days. Thankfully, after a week of misery, she started to improve gradually and was actually completely recovered after two weeks. I have to say it was so wonderful to have our old Ellie back-- we missed her helpfulness and cheerfulness! (Kyle and Mish also had surgeries at this time, and family all left town, so it was kind of a rotten week, but Kyle and Mish thankfully recovered quickly.)

I lost another round of Iron Chef/Chopped, a tasty and stressful family tradition of a few years. Joe was my partner this time because I tend to stress Kyle out when I'm partnered with him and I was definitely the weakest link. Joe was amazing and came up with perfect ideas for our appetizer and dessert. We just couldn't compete with Mish and Kyle's rich chocolate cake dome in the end, though. Their dessert dwarfed ours quite literally. Next year I either call dibbs on a judge's seat or a rematch! I am actually a decent cook (though nothing like a chef) so I really ought to win one of these years.

We also played another scavenger hunt across town. All of our team's pics were on a different camera except for this one that I tried to take of myself with an illegal immigrant there in the background. I didn't ask for id, though. Come to think of it, most of the good pics taken during family reunion times were taken by someone other than me, and I didn't even bother to copy them before those cameras left. Oops.

Mish and Bob got birthday cupcakes this year, as did Charlie the Unicorn.

He was more than happy to help Uncle Bob start and finish his cupcake.

And left nothing but candles for his cousin/best frenemy Alex, or Loralex, as Charlie lovingly dubbed him after his first exposure to Dr. Seuss' Lorax character.

This is also how we celebrate birthdays.

And this is how we celebrate anniversaries. That's seven for us, if you're keeping track!

That's my girl! I'm sure he'd earned that punch, one way or another.

All of the kids have actually done surprisingly well with baby Ming. They all genuinely enjoy holding her for pockets of time proportional to their ages, only Charlie's are in seconds and the other kids' in minutes.

She tolerates her brothers reasonably well. Ellie is relieved to finally have someone around who understand what she puts up with.

Amelia very much prefers to be held, but for short intervals she will consent to being left to her own devices in her swing, which is a great convenience to me when at times I bother attending to the needs of my other children. It's also completely to her own advantage because there's a mirror hanging directly above her face. Do you envy her yet?

What if I told you that she not only gets to stare at her own pudgalicious reflection, but that it's also a jovial reflection quite often these days?

Cameras do her absolutely no justice, I tell ya. I took about a brazillion shots today because what I experienced live was just not coming up accurately on my digital screen. Oh well, that's probably got nothing to do with how she objectively looks anyway. Mamas see nothing but unrivaled beauty and charm.

But you see a glimpse of it too, n'est-ce pas? Yep, after seven weeks of waiting for these smiles to surface, I can now officially declare that the pain-in-the-rear they call labor and delivery were most definitely and certainly WORTH IT. Swoon.

larsens visit, thanksgiving

2012-01-22T20:44:00.001-08:00

Some strange bloggish occurrence has rendered it impossible for me to caption the following photos without erasing them. I am just a bit too lazy to fetch my more technologically savvy hubby to investigate, so I'll just let the pictures do the talking for the next few posts. That's probably for the best. After all, I am approximately 12 posts behind, as well as two months behind on life in general. Tomorrow commences my first day as a single mother of four, aka Kyle's first day of school. I'm afraid. Veeeery afraid... But until tomorrow 6:00am hits me, let's enjoy a trip down memory lane of happier, more restful days when Kyle's parents were rescuing me from dreadful a.m. responsibilities, and much more.

Seven tips to shorten your labor and delivery room stay

2012-01-17T19:37:00.003-08:00

Recent mail excerpts (with changed names):

--------------

Kyle,

Denise wants to know how you spent only 11 minutes in the delivery room with Tiffany. She may try the same thing...

Chau,

Martin

--------------

Hi Martin,

Great question! Here are seven tips to help minimize your time in the delivery room:

1) Wait as long as humanly possible before leaving for the hospital--once you're admitted, they won't let you eat. Then wait 15 more minutes.

2) Don't pre-pack a hospital bag--do this after the said 15 minutes. Next, pause to take a relaxing hot shower.

3) Make sure you live 30 mins away from the hospital.

4) Enter the hospital through ER at night. This is because the person at the front desk will know nothing about delivering babies and will make you stand in the lobby for 25 mins or until a baby falls out, which ever comes first.

5) Wait patiently in Triage as they monitor you to see if you really are in labor. After they hook you up to all the equipment, threaten to push out a baby on the floor "if you don't get into a delivery room, pronto". At this point, they should start calling around for a room.

6) Coordinate with other expecting mothers in the area and come on a very busy night, so all the delivery rooms are either occupied or dirty.

7) Proceed to hold in the baby until the staff is ready to assist you. Then, one push should do it!

Hope this helps!

Cheers,
Kyle

Seuss-tacular

2011-12-19T11:04:00.000-08:00

Way back in the time before Amelia (which already feels light years behind me), my peeps threw me the darlingest baby shower in all the land. Truly, it was. The attention to detail was spectacular, the spread delectable, and most importantly, me and Amelia were feeling the love. See for yourself.

some postpartum thoughts

2011-12-11T11:08:00.009-08:00

-Wow, food tastes so good. all. the. time.

-Baby hiccups are less annoying with baby on the outside. Now they're quite endearing.

-I am so grateful Amelia is calm. She eats and sleeps well and is not much of a spitter. I have several adorable burp cloths that won't get extensive use, but it's worth not having to do 30 loads of laundry a week.

-I missed you, skinny jeans. Someday I will even be able to button you again.

-How am I going to survive after Kyle's parents leave? My kids are up before 6am these days.

-But not Amelia! Is she supposed to be sleeping this much? Babies are so easy. Well, easy babies are easy.

-New fave article of clothing: spanx!

-Why do Mom Larsen's molasses cookies taste so good? No really. Zero self-restraint when it comes to these. They make a great breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snack. Not OR snack. And.

-Look what I made last night! Kjerstin and Mom made the snowflakes. I'm so pleased we got this done before Christmas so Santa can leave lots of goodies for Amelia to share with me. Thanks, Santa! The rest of our stockings can be seen at the end of this post.

-I love church time. I'm not there, of course, but everyone else is and I'm enjoying my three hours of quiet alone time.

-It's so nice to have my body back to myself. I can walk, sleep on my back, put a child on my lap, hug Kyle, hold pee all day, get up unassisted, etc.

-It's Christmastime around here! Usually that means I'm overextending myself through crafts, service projects, treat baking, gift shopping, etc. This year I'm just focusing on loving this baby and the rest of my family. That's been real nice.

-Perhaps I'm still just running on adrenaline and when the sleep deprivation catches up to me I'll feel differently, but at least for now, I really don't mind waking up even at odd hours to the sound of little grunts and puffs and the sight of her little arms stretching all the way to her earlobes, mouth wide open and turning toward the sound of my voice. We love each other, little Minguh and me.

P.S. Here are my favorite photos taken from the hospital. Well, only if by favorite I mean worst pictures of me since the Great Chemical Burn of 2010.

Here I am looking really vexed that I've been relegated to laboring in the ER waiting room.

Here I am looking really vexed that I just had a baby. Or maybe just not fancying the idea of having my picture taken thirty seconds after giving birth.

Here is one of the many reasons that I wanted out of that hospital asap! Supposedly this entree was baked fish, but I took one bite of that white stuff down by the warm, soggy lemon slices and honestly couldn't tell if it was overcooked cauliflower, chewy mashed potatoes, or indeed fish. The only part I ended up eating was the plain piece of kale. Yes, I was that desperate.

Hospital food is a funny thing. Every single meal was kind of gross and disappointing, but I was still so excited every time room service knocked and brought in a tray. Recovering from childbirth plus those nausea-inducing hormones finally gone makes for one hungry Tiff!

Baby Model

2011-12-10T12:10:00.002-08:00

Kjerstin and I were about to nakify and play dress-up with Amelia for an afternoon with my ghetto point-and-shoot when our talented friend Polly serendipitously showed up with banana bread, overheard our plans, and offered her services instead.

Amelia's our first child to get a newborn photo shoot and goodness it was a little too much fun to manipulate those moldable limbs and decorate her with all manner of silliness. Polly did an incredible job, and Amelia only pooped on Polly's comforter twice. Success! Sweet, snuggly, scrumptious success. Oh boy do I love this little girl.

I think I look like a creepy brontosaurus in this one.

Kyle's mom crocheted this darling little hat. Yum!

See, we got a little ridiculous at times. This is my bow and it looks way too big even on my head. Good thing Amelia has a sense of humor.

This photo shoot was so much fun! More good news: just recently a friend who is starting a photography business offered to do a sibling photo shoot for us and I am ecstatic for the opportunity to capture on film some of the sweetness that's been going on around here.

Ellie is ever attentive to and enamored with her sister (no really, she's rather obsessed). Erik talks to her in a sugary, high-pitched voice and gets upset if anyone puts their germy lips on her face or touches her without sanitizing first. Charlie asks to hold her for brief intervals and even if she's perfectly content he coos, "It's okay, Ming-uh. Chawie's here."

"Ming-uh" is Charlie's best attempt at pronouncing her name and it's a nick name that has officially stuck! Erik dubbed Charlie "Chuz" and "Chuggy" as a baby and those stuck, too. Yes, we are feeling the love. More pictorial evidence coming soon!

Nice to meet you

2011-12-02T21:49:00.009-08:00

Welcome Amelia: the extended version

2011-11-30T12:37:00.003-08:00

Kyle's summary of Amelia's birth in that last post may suffice for many of you, but for the minority of you who care about things like placentas and pitocin, here's the extended version. Very extended. Feel free to skim.

So, my back was killing me, right? I actually really looked and functioned like a cripple. Try as I might, I literally was unable to straighten my spine so waddling about was very strenuous and painful. I planned to hit up the chiropractor first thing Monday morning (it really was too bad all this hit at the start of a long holiday weekend), but then there was still the weekend to get through. I could go into labor at any time and even if not, I was having a hard time emotionally being such a useless human being. I know that's silly because people were around and happy to help, but I'm a mom, so I feel bad about things like that.

Kyle convinced me to try the emergency room Saturday night for an osteopathic doctor on the off chance that he could pop a bone back in place and we'd be out of there in a wink. Well, they took one good look into my eyes and sent me straight up to labor and delivery. I knew I wasn't in labor, but it was hospital procedure to check anyway. Two and a half hours later (thankfully Storage Wars, one of Kyle's faves, was on in the triage room), the nurse confirmed that I was not in labor, offered pain meds, and sent me on my way. Why, thank you.

I tried to compensate for that royal waste of an evening by crafting with Mom Larsen, Mish, and Kjerst late into the night. I finally finished some hair bows, Kjerstin applied newspaper print to her finger nails, and Mish whipped up bacon-chocolate-chip cookies and a knit ruffle scarf. After midnight as we were finally wrapping up, I looked at my pathetically crooked posture in the mirror and tried one more time to shift my torso into an upright position... and it worked! Walking worked, too! I paced around the living room couch with glee, rolled on the floor, twisted, squatted, and even bent down to the floor. A Christmas miracle! I hadn't the slightest clue what had suddenly healed my back, nor did I care!

To celebrate, I took a power nap and promptly went into labor. The contractions were strong enough to wake me at 4:00 am. I timed them for a little while, just to be sure, but I'd had enough contractions over the past weeks to know these were different. These were real. Kyle woke up around 4:45 as I was topping off my hospital bag with toiletries and about to hop in the shower. Go, go, go! Kyle's not one to condone my dilly-dally attitude and he pushed me out that door (after giving me a blessing with his dad, and miraculously I made it through the prayer without a contraction) around 5:15. By this time, I was having to really move, breathe and focus to get through a contraction.

We arrived at the hospital around 5:45 and only the ER was open. They still made me sign paper work, answer silly questions about my family history and what not, asked me about four times if my water had broken yet, forced me into a chair to take my temp and blood pressure, and other extremely annoying and unnecessary details that a woman deep into labor should not be subjected to.

This was the ER, right? I thought they knew an emergency when they saw one, but absolutely no one seemed to feel any urgency about getting me up to labor and delivery. A nurse had supposedly been called to come fetch and escort me back to that wing, but perhaps she forgot or decided to take a coffee break first? Meanwhile, I labored behind the registration desk in the ER, pacing and huffing and puffing through hard contractions and resenting all of the employees around me, chewing their gum and doing absolutely nothing to help me realize my dream of laboring in the jacuzzi.

FINALLY the nurse arrived, and soon I saw how it had taken so long for her to arrive. She "led" us down the hall to the elevator at about the pace of a dead raccoon. This was not a moonlit stroll along the Seine-- this was a matter of life or death! Well, life at least. When we got out of the elevator I knew where to go and had no inclination to wait for the sluggish nurse to catch up with me. Only I needed her code to get through the locked door at the end of the hall.

And then there was another waiting room, in which they made Kyle wait while I went to triage. The nurse tried to get me to pee in a cup first, but just getting into my gown unassisted was a fierce struggle. There was no way at this point that I could relax enough to produce a pee sample, and for what? They could take my baby's urine sample in about five minutes if they'd just admit me to a delivery room.

Well, next I got strapped with fetal monitors and blood pressure cuffs and again interrogated about my pregnancy and family history. Good grief! What does a woman need to do around here to get into a delivery room? Should I start screaming and flailing or do you actually need to see a head before you'll take me seriously? Eventually the nurse checked my cervix and, surprise surprise, I was already completely dilated and ready to push. Yeah.

So, they let Kyle come in and together we waited AGAIN for some doctor's permission to do something. I don't know. At this point I'd been waiting 45 minutes and all hopes of laboring in the tub were lost. The midwife appeared and I asked her not to leave me because I really didn't want to deliver on that triage table, but nobody else seemed to care if I got to a room or not so it just might happen.

Finally someone decided I deserved a delivery room and a nurse wheeled me to it. As I looked around the room, I realized that I had never developed my plan B for a spontaneous water birth. Water births are technically illegal in most hospitals, but that's only because they want to be able to swiftly wheel you away on the bed if necessary. I hadn't planned on birthing on the bed anyhow, though, and pushing could be a fast process, so it was tub or bust in my mind. Except that that was no longer an option and nothing else in the room looked quite comfortable enough to birth on. Hmmmm, rocking chair? Cot? Toilet?

The midwife asked if I felt that ominous "urge to push." I've never really known what that's supposed to mean. With Ellie and Erik, the doc told me I was fully dilated and told me when to push. With Charlie, all I knew was that pushing wouldn't get him there slower, so I pushed (gently) through most of the hard labor. If that "urge" was simply the feeling that there was a head lodged in my crotch and I wanted it out, yes I felt the urge. However, I've never felt like I couldn't not push. It's only the knowledge that pushing will get that baby out faster that prompts me to push.

Well, the midwife stepped out for a minute (it better have been for something good!) and the nurse had the nerve to ask me to sign a stack of paperwork (have none of these people felt a contraction before?!?! Could I stab her in the uterus and ask her to neatly print her name twelve times on some forms?) and tried to put an iv in one arm and then the other, but I ran away from her each time to work through another contraction.

The midwife stepped back in and defended me, politely asking the nurse to just deal with that later. We were having a baby now. So, I settled for the bed. I sat up and writhed through just another contraction or two, pushing but not with all my might. Then we decided to break my water and just get this over with. I always dread that part because without the cushioning of that fluid, the contractions are considerably more intense. Still, all I really needed was a boost in effectiveness to push this baby out, and breaking my water did it.

The very next contraction I pushed like I meant it, felt the burn, ignored the nurse's advice to slow down/stop pushing, and a baby was placed on my tummy. I did it! I conquered! It was over. Well, almost.

After Charlie's birth (placenta acreta, hemorrhaging half my blood supply, almost losing my uterus, etc.), we were all pretty nervous about the placenta this time, and it seemed like it took forever to decide to come out. I was enjoying my baby and basking in love and relief and pride that I had survived it once again, but I was also very distracted by my placenta's tardiness. Well, a shot of pitocin and some long minutes later, all was well and beautiful and over, and entirely free of stitches--woo hoo!

Amelia was such a beauty-- I could tell immediately. She didn't even cry at first. She just opened her pretty little eyes at me and we fell in love. She is our first baby with hair! Like, more hair than Charlie has even now. She's also our first thumb sucker, and our first possibility of a child that looks like BOTH of us. Her hair is decidedly brown, her eyes are decidedly undecided (that bluish-brown that could go either way), and she's just a sweet and content little angel that none of us can get enough of! Well, not Charlie. He hasn't even pretended to care one whit about her, but he's also been a little under the weather... we hope that's all that accounts for his monstrous behavior as of late.

The rest of us are completely enraptured. I knew brand new babies are precious and cute, but still I take one look or snuggle and can't believe just how much I love her already.

Some of you know that I'd had quite a few strong intuitive feelings about Amelia, beginning in my first trimester. I felt strongly that she would be a daughter, have dark hair and eyes, and have some serious health problems and developmental delays. I had these feelings confirmed multiple times, though I always checked out fine at ultrasounds and on blood tests.

Still, I didn't need a doctor to diagnose for me when I'd already had confirmation from a divine source. It was a trial of my faith and patience to know but not "know" throughout my pregnancy, but I was able to do so without much doubt or concern.

And then she was born without any of the problems or even the color hair I'd known she'd have. So, I'm still working through these surprises and the self-doubt that accompanies them. She is certainly not the baby my heart has been preparing for all these months. I'm sure I sound crazy for being disappointed that my baby is healthy and normal. I feel crazy.

However, though my faith in my own ability to receive and interpret revelation is somewhat shaken from this experience, my faith in general has not wavered. I've just got some more soul searching to do.

And plenty to keep me busy in the meantime. This newborn phase is a doozy! There's no way in the realm of sanity that I'd have survived the past few days without my team of helpers, and with Charlie's screaming fits and sleepless nights, we have needed every drop of help we can get. Kyle's parents, Kjerstin, Mish while in-town, and Kyle have been wonderful.

My backbone is still awry, which is frustrating because nothing, including chiropractic work, has seemed to make a difference and I refuse to live the rest of my life out like this. It corrected itself enough for me to walk, which was very useful through labor and delivery, but it still feels very much wrong. If not for my back pain, I would be feeling quite fine, actually, and I hope soon we'll figure it out so I can return to a state of somewhat usefulness around the house and with the kids. Still, it was a tremendous blessing to have it corrected just in time for the most arduous physical feat of my life. (One of the four, I guess.)

So, everything worked out beautifully. In terms of what my body did, this was my best and easiest birth, simply because it was so fast (2.5 hours start to finish) that I didn't have as much time to freak out about how much pain I was in. The hospital setting and protocol were very frustrating, though. If I could have had this baby outside of a hospital, it would have been the perfect birth. Still, I don't regret my choice because we had to play it safe. We feel oh so blessed that everything went well and we have a beautiful, delectable little baby to show for it.

Done waiting for Amelia!

2011-11-27T12:35:00.001-08:00

Here are the highly anticipated baby pictures of the day!

Amelia Larsen

Born: Nov. 27, 2011

Time: 6:47am

Weight: 7lbs 1ounce

Length: 18.5 inches

Minutes in the delivery room: 11

Pushes by mom: 1

Description: Cute

Tiff and baby are both well and happy.

Cheers,

The Larsens

Still waiting for Amelia

2011-11-24T12:21:00.002-08:00

Well I'm still here, spending Thanksgiving at home rather than the hospital. That's a good thing, I know.

At the same time, I'm getting the inkling that the only way I'm going to get a smidget of relief from the intense back pain that seized me on Monday is to expel this fetus.

First I suspected a pinched nerve, and then posterior orientation (baby's skull against my spine instead of her nice, squishy face). But with the severity of my soreness and a steady decrease in mobility (today walking/shuffling around is a serious struggle and standing up straight as-of-yet impossible), I am more and more at a loss as to the cause.

I would very much like to go into labor spontaneously. I no longer feel a need to accomplish a thing before Amelia's grand entrance, which is good because there's only so much that can be achieved from a solid existence on the couch.

The idea of back labor terrifies me, though. My lumbars are already so messed up right now that contractions on top of this pain might drive me out of the water and straight into the anesthesiologist's arms.

I recognize that worse things could happen to a person than an epidural, or even a c-section. Emotionally, I am not-at-all prepared for those alternatives, but I believe I must try to be.

I guess all I can really say is that this Thanksgiving I am grateful to have Kyle's parents, Mish, Kjerstin, and Kyle around to help. I am completely useless as a matriarch right now and they have all stepped up in ways I deeply appreciate. And the fun has only begun! This is shaping up to be quite a memorable holiday season.

waiting for amelia

2011-11-20T12:04:00.002-08:00

Well, I'm still large and in-charge and infant-less. With two and a half weeks until my official due date, I understand that this is normal. Still, given my birthing track record (Ellie-5 wks early, Erik-3 wks early, Charlie- 2 wks or 4 days early, depending on which due date you trust), I don't feel my anxiousness is entirely premature.

Unlike my last go at self-inducing labor, in which I tried absolutely every reliable and unreliable trick in the book, this time I am not-so-very desperate. This time I am more torn between wanting this pregnancy to end immediately and needing more time to check boxes off of my nesting list. Daily tasks drain my energy reserve enough that I am hacking away at that nesting list at a rather sluggish pace.

My former self, who lived off of veggie smoothies and never needed to sit down and rest once during the day (remember that? I was really like that!) could have swept away the entire list in a weekend. Oh well. That former self no longer exists. And while I look forward to reclaiming much of my body's proper functioning that's been lost over the past nine months, I also recognize that the newborn phase can be the most exhausting of all.

A friend recently asked me about how long it takes after having a baby for things to return to their former state of normalcy. I could only honestly answer that they never do. Yes, eventually you create a new state of normalcy, but that former dynamic with its ease and simplicity (in retrospect, of course) is permanently lost.

I hope I am ready for this.

Actually, to say that I am "ready" to mother four little ones is a presumption laden with denial. I have no expectation of being capable of caring for four on my own for quite some time. How do I anticipate our survival then, you ask?

Enter support network. Kyle's parents come in on Tuesday, as well as Mish for the weekend, and the Larsens will stay right up until my mom arrives. Then almost the entire Goodwin clan trickles in for Christmas and New Years. Kyle has most of January off of school and Mish will be living with us until the spring. Especially with that snuggly newborn around, Kjerstin will also often be around.

I feel very fortunate that we will be well taken care of. Our schedules and living arrangements will be rather skewed for a while, but that's a small price to pay for extra hands and attention spans to dedicate to my older three.

Yes, I suppose everything is going to be alright. I'll still welcome you without restraint any old moment you come, Amelia. In the mean time, though, I've got a closet to organize and some hair bows to whip up for your pretty little head. I look forward to kissing it very soon.

Home stretch...

2011-10-28T22:57:00.003-07:00

Yes, I had every intention of catching up on blog posts once and for all. Then my third trimester hit. Hard. Yep, "hard" has kind of been the theme of this pregnancy. I honestly amaze myself by surviving stressful/exhausting/exasperating episodes most days, both on my body and nerves. Certainly I could not be surviving without help of both seen and unseen sources.

To complicate matters, with six weeks to go, I am now officially nesting! This is good. This means the end is near....er than it has been. However, in my B.C. years (before Charlie), I actually had the physical and emotional energy to accomplish the tasks on my nesting list.

This time around, it's a longer list than ever, not to mention my daily responsibilities are greater and more hectic than ever. And yet, it remains rather draining to tackle a single item on my list. No, it should not be asking too much for me to organize a closet and wash the dishes all in one day. And it is. My anemia, that was for several weeks quite debilitating, is more or less under control, for which I am quite thankful, because "bed rest" is not in the least restful if children are carving paths of destruction all around me. I just feel like I have so little left to give after simply keeping my children alive and delivered to school and activities sort-of on time.

This all contributes to a surmounting anticipation for this little one (who we call Amelia) to arrive. True, I would love to have my bedroom finally decorated and stacks of important paperwork organized and filed away before her arrival usurps these and many other projects in priority. Still, I can't say I wouldn't welcome her any old day she might choose to come.

This blog post has inadvertently become an exception, but I do try in general not to complain excessively about pregnancy. It is a tremendous blessing. I also realize that the discomforts and burdens I feel will only translate into a greater fondness for and commitment to this little babe for whom I have already sacrificed much.

We are all so very excited for her grand debut. Ellie is baby-crazy as ever, Erik always hugs her goodbye before preschool and even asked for Amelia for Christmas, and Kyle confesses he feels greater happy anticipation for a baby than he's ever felt before. Of course, no one can hold stronger feelings for her than me. She is never absent from my consciousness and sentiments for an instant. A life that is literally shared with mine cannot be separated from my deepest emotions.

We all love you, sweet baby girl. Come soon, Amelia dear. Not too very soon, but just soon enough.

Disneyland Dec. 2009

2011-10-09T14:27:00.001-07:00

Guess what? We went to Disneyland two years ago (Christmas 2009)! "We" meaning Joestie, Bob, Bryce, Mish, and we Larsens. The 'rents couldn't come, but they funded the trip--thanks Ma and Pa!

Those lines were long, let me tell you. We managed to squeeze out some smiles early in the a.m.

What did I tell you about the crowds? Brutal, yes. I can't remember if it was worth it, but I do recall that at the end of the day of holding kids, fighting crowds, and waiting in lines, my body ached in ways that I never knew possible and my feet throbbed the way feet were never meant to throb.

But it was still pretty magical.

And then we did it again the next day, this time with Bob and Bryce.

This is how Christie felt when they made her take three-month-old Alex out of the baby wrap and place him next to her on the seat for the ride (as if he sits), in the name of safety.

We've all done Disneyland before, but it was something else to be there with almost all of my beloved sibs.

Okay, this was definitely the scariest ride in the land. Yes, it's a ferris wheel, but the it's a little off its rocker. The babies were okay, but Joe, Mish, and I were a little bit freaking out and a lot concerned that we might all die, but we tried to hold it together for the older kids' sake.

Yay! We conquered that nightmare without dying!

On Charlie at age two

2011-10-02T22:32:00.004-07:00

***A couple months ago I wrote this draft in honor of Char's birthday, though even then it was quite belated. I would edit it before publishing if only that kiddo didn't wear me out so solid that I have nothing left in my brain at this hour. ***

A little while back, Charlie was promoted to age two. On June 3rd, for the record. You may presume that I was frightened for this child to embark on the "terrible twos" and to claim all this year entails. Truly, though, I've known for a while that it's looking nothing but up with this child.

If ever I find myself exasperated with the terribleness of his twos (and indeed I do, almost daily), I need only recall where he once was-- how far we have come.

And while every parent hopes for a child that is naturally well-mannered, obedient, and calm, I know it's the child who tries the patience and stretches the bounds of sanity that best promotes growth. Truly, I see that I have needed this boy for my own character development every bit as much as he's needed me.

(For instance, I don't judge other parents for not being able to control their children anymore.)

Yes, while he naps, the rest of us experience quiet relief and relaxation that is never possible in Charlie's presence. But we are still excited to hear his sounds of waking-- to watch him speed-waddle to the kitchen, clutching multiple nuks and emphatically demanding, "eat! eggs!" or something of the sort.

And though cleaning up after his potty time is truly more work than simply changing diapers, how proud we are of how immediately he took to using his own little potty-- the effort and maturity that his chart of scattered reward stickers signifies.

You wouldn't guess now that he was previously the quintessentially clingy mama's boy. This kid has developed a degree of independence that has left precious little time in his busy schedule for snuggling and the sort. (That's where the new baby will come in, right?)

Still, he's generous with hugs and kisses. And twice a day he counts on being cradled into my arms-- nuk, blanky, book, sippy, and stuffy in tow-- and gently hums along with my bedtime serenade, nuzzling his very warm (and often damp) little head on my heart, there to stay.

July

2011-09-16T20:26:00.002-07:00

Stuff happened in July. Some of it was pretty cool and/or cute. For instance, ...

-We celebrated the 4th at Marks' parents place with a delish barbecue and fireworks in the pool. Well, we were in the pool. Charlie exclaimed "happy!" with every explosion of light, as in happy birthday. Also, I remembered to make Ellie wear her patriotic skirt, for the first and last time.

-Makakoa's first birthday party was celebrated luau style with another fabulous pool party. That's the only kind that exists during Arizona summer. Look at that adorable family of sea turtles! Okay, cake decorating is admittedly not my forte. Actually, I'm not sure if I have a forte. Spread a little too thin...

Why so cute!? I know. I love this kid.

-This picture is what I have to represent the swimming lessons Ellie and Erik conquered for two weeks, and how I kept Charlie mostly-out-of-trouble on the sidelines.

Man, those lifeguards were fierce on us parents. Forget the flailing preschoolers-- they were all eagle eyes on us sweaty adults fanning ourselves in the bleachers, lusting after that cool body of chlorinated water.

Oh goody, I do actually have a few of swimsuit-clad children.

Both the kids made excellent progress in the pool. Ellie still appears to be drowning, but engages in some swimming-like movement sans assistance. In terms of floatation devices, Erik has graduated from enclosed pool ring to simple arm floaties. Also, his reaction to the back of his head becoming moist is slightly less dramatic. His face? Still an ordeal. But yay for progress! He wouldn't have come around even this far simply at my persuasion.

Next year I want to start all three of the kids in lessons early in the summer and keep 'em going as long as I can tolerate the sweltering heat of the sidelines. This is Arizona, after all. Most kids can swim before they're potty-trained.

-You can tell I don't make cake very often by these boys' reaction to their very own mostly-scraped-out bowl of chocolate batter.

-Do pandas really have dagger claws? I've tried to convince Erik they're for climbing and catching fish and berries... that pandas don't eat, but then his y chromosome kicks in and they are inevitably weapons.

birthday and beyond

2011-09-08T16:17:00.003-07:00

I bothered to sort through all of my unfinished blog posts today and felt a renewed commitment to help those drafts achieve their full potential. So, after I get this current stuff out of the way, it will be a return to memory lane.

You may not have noticed that you missed Ellie's cute Fourth of July outfit or a Goodwin family reunion fifteen months ago, but someday when these blog entries have magically formatted themselves into a solid piece of literature called a blog book, I will know. Yes, it may not be until my retirement (from what? motherhood? ha!) that any of this bloggishness assumes bookishness, but it WILL happen.

And now, I bring you the end of August.

-Kyle was just a wee bit sick one night and Ellie went beserk with maternal instincts, determined to pamper and make him well. She even scribbled onto the calendar "fed Dad in bed" and the next morning, you better believe she delivered, presenting first a menu of healing foods, aka all the edibleness we had left in the kitchen.

"BReKFist

-GRNoL.AND.OTS.AND.MiLK
-GRNoU.AND.MiLK
-GRNoU.AND.SHREDiD.WeT

SNAXS
PAR PeCH
MAeGO
PLUM"

We were actually all out of those snaxs (and it looks like we were out of normal-sized spoons, too), but thankfully Kyle only ordered ots and grnou. So I heard. Clearly I wasn't conscious during any of this.

-Slappy birthday to me! A surpise birthday party, too! Kjerstin and Noe did a fabulous job pulling together beautiful details and successfully deceiving me. I recall unsuccessfully attempting to throw myself a surprise party or two in my earlier days, and also I tend to get stuck purchasing and wrapping my own Christmas presents and stuff like that, so being 100% genuinely surprised was pretty amazing! At first, I thought the surprise was just that my living room was clean, and that would've sufficed. Then I noticed the balloons and streamers and Noe wearing a sideways ponytail. It was 90s themed, you know.

The only bummer was that I know all y'all love me, but you just didn't show up to my party. (I think Kyle was maybe a little conservative on the guest list, though.) Kjerstin had to keep delaying us because no one had arrived, and then finally one friend did, so poor Kjerst (it's stressful throwing this type of shindig) called us home. Another did come later. (Thank goodness those were two awesome friends.) I spent a little bit of time over the next couple of days feeling sorry for myself for not having friends, but I'm over it now.

Really, truly, my girls did such an amazing job on the party (see for yourself below), and did you know that I am actually an expert on 90's sitcom trivia? I didn't either, but I got all but one of the questions right! I honestly don't remember watching that much tv...

not sure what was with my camera that gave everyone an extra-terrestrial blurriness

Yes they did pull this bad boy out as it is only available in VHS form. I really remember my child self being a much better dancer and actor...

I wish you could see in this frame that there were actually about six children helping me blow out my birthday candles. Cuz I let them. Cuz they're so cute.

Yes, she polished off a bowl of chips for dinner.

My friends' kids are a little too cute for this universe, eh?

-Next point of business, a baby bump update. I complained to my midwife today that I'm astronomically larger than in previous pregnancies, and she kindly reassured me that I'm measuring right-on-time and not a centimeter bigger.

Yes, that I still FEEL ginormous matters, but it will be nice to sock that solid piece of datum to the next so-called-nice-person who throws down a comment like, "December? Whoa, you must be having twins!" or "Any day now, huh?" Yes, both of those insensitive comments happened to me. It's always mothers who make them, too. Selective memory, I tell you. Even those who've been through this not long ago forget how freaking huge you actually have to get before you can deliver a baby. I intend to get much, much larger over the next three months, so keep the patronizing remarks rolling my way.

Truthfully, I am just enamored enough with motherhood that I still find preggie bellies to be beautiful. I am not miserable in my body just yet.

Plus, Erik always greets his baby sis in a sugary, high-pitched voice and gives baby her very own hug and kiss. It's heart-melting material.

-I made these little ditties for a friend, but it was good practice for a baby girl crafting frenzy that will ensue in the near future.

-I also made some cute tag blankies I didn't photograph and some good old fashioned bibs, that I just realized say "ew."

-Thanks to the library summer reading reward program, our whole family enjoyed prime seating at a Diamondbacks game last week. It was actually the best family outing we've had in recent memory. The boys are a little obsessed with a jibjab clip Kyle's dad sent them months ago of our family playing baseball so they were genuinely enthused about witnessing the action in a professional (air conditioned!) arena. And during that seventh inning stretch you should've seen Erik's eyes light up when his theme song blasted through the loudspeakers.

Ellie may not appear to have been awake, and I believe she was actually flossing her teeth with a piece of hair at this moment, but she really did enjoy herself, as well.

Aside from Charlie tripping and rolling down four to five sharp, metal stairs, the entire evening was a huge success, in large part to a bag of goldfish crackers I packed. We even witnessed what I thought was a home run (turns out it was just an old fashioned run)! We would definitely repeat the occasion for another $5.

-As a final note, there was some real cuteness to behold and deliciousness to be scarfed at a baby shower I co-threw last week. Putting forth so much less effort plus splitting all the responsibilities made for probably the most pleasant party planning in my life history. Plus, I love this girl and her adoption story is so touching. Also, mmmmm, I miss those cookies already.

the reveal

2011-08-26T22:00:00.003-07:00

One extremely long hour in the waiting room, one stressful and struggly hour in the dimly lit room with restless kids (remember the one hour wait?) and a passive-aggressive ultrasound tech who doesn't love kids, one passive-aggressive ultrasound tech calling me back in as we packed kids into car because she'd forgotten to take a photo and actually dared to politely blame it on my kids for distracting her... and we have a verdict:

I will NOT be returning the following mass of cuteness I have accumulated since my inconclusive ultrasound two months ago! And I WILL be headed to Goodwill's 50% off sale tomorrow morning for more.

Yeah, you're right. I wasn't planning on returning a jot of it, anyway. I'll admit it feels good to finally have a scientifically-founded confirmation, but the kids and I were already quite certain that a baby sister is on her way. I've had a great deal of intuitive revelations about this little nugget. We are anxious to see the rest of our predictions realized.

P.S. I left kitchen chairs in the living room overnight while my freshly-mopped floor dried. The next morning a rare and unprompted scene of harmony greeted me.

Cool enough for school?

2011-08-22T21:30:00.007-07:00

The way it's worked out best for our schedule and finances, Erik is attending a five-day preschool in a neighboring school district, but only ten minutes away. He's actually in class longer than his big sis! I wouldn't consider preschool necessary for every child, but for Erik I believe this is going to be a critical stepping stone toward a positive kindergarten experience.

Erik's preschool teacher and aide visited us at our house the week before school started, which was thoughtful of them! They also held an open house in the classroom, appropriately adorned with toys. This in combination with the excitement of Ellie starting school and getting to pick out his own backpack led to a completely smooth transition for Erik into an entirely new environment.

For a kid generally very resistant to change, I cannot express how grateful and excited I am that he has so openly embraced preschool! His papa was one of those clingy, crying kids who didn't want to leave his mama's side. Not this boy! It's not easy to get an energetic reaction out of Erik, meaning even ice cream and Christmas morning fall short, but we could tell he felt good about entering school.

As Erik selected his outfit for the first day of school, he kept verifying with me that his selections were sufficiently cool. Even down to the socks, "Mom, are these socks cool enough for school?"

Kyle: Wow Erik, you look so handsome!
Erik: Don't you mean cool?
(Tiff: Yes, a t-shirt with a "pork chop" pig doing karate? Quite cool enough.)

Erik and his teacher, Mrs. B, are going to get along swimmingly.

Even Charlie won out on Erik's first day of school. With the parent-child ratio now in our favor, we decided to make a spontaneous stop at McD's for soft serve and germy playland, and then Char was out in a wink for his afternoon nap. I think we've got a good system down for afternoon bliss all around.

The Weekend of Stress

2011-08-18T21:49:00.007-07:00

Usually I like change. Change is good. In four days, however, Kyle's beloved internship ended, he started another job, his scooter died, my phone died, Ellie started school, Erik's preschool registration hit some hiccups, we thought we lost our family's medical insurance, Kjerstin started school and an internship (she's been living with us), and while Kjerst was borrowing our car, someone ran a red light causing a massive collision with her that totaled both cars involved.

Thankfully, Kjerstin and the other lady are okay. Also thankfully, Kjerstin was not at fault. These are the most important factors. Then came some practical details.

But it could have been worse. We could have been this car...

At first our insurance would only give us $15/day to rent a car which is maybe enough to rent a bicycle. They've gone back-and-forth (even today) but finally we did finagle out of them a school bus-esque s.u.v. (no really, it doesn't even fit in our garage) we've dubbed Canyonero (a la Simpsons episode) until Tuesday. That's our deadline for locating and purchasing our dream car with a settlement that is not much more than we dished out in May to replace the transmission.

Feeling patriotic, anyone? No but really, though we'll always be partial to minivans, we sure have appreciated having this vehicle around.

So stress. Yes, it was a stressful four days. I honestly am not sure how I worked in a shower (forget bathing the kids) and I think ultimately figuring out how to get a healthy dinner to materialize each night was what was throwing me over the edge.

I was actually posting all of this nonsense not to whine, but because Kyle and I just started busting up laughing last night at the ridiculosity of the number of burdens we'd faced in a few short days. This post was supposed to be light-hearted because things are already looking up.

True, the first two days of sending Ellie to kindergarten were overwhelming, not that tears of separation-anxiety were anywhere near shed. It was just a lot of information packets with checklists of forms and donation and volunteer obligations thrown at this first-timer, confusion about the bus schedule and the classroom environment, having no means of transportation to drop off and pick up my child, and just barely throwing her on the bus before she'd even had a chance to eat lunch.

But we're quick learners and now she's got her kindergarten groove down solid.

Note Ellie's size relative to the school bus tire.

And then they whisk my young, vulnerable child away.

Erik is also all set for preschool to start next week. I'm not looking forward to parking, unstrapping, and dragging 3-4 children to the school door twice a day in order to sign Erik in and out, but I am looking forward to the extensive and much-needed social and emotional opportunities Erik will have in this classroom. He's going to eat it all up.

Also, my phone self-resurrected.

So things are not so bad as they were not long ago.

P.S. On top of all those changes, Ellie is officially going by Elisabeth now. Well, at least at school. We're a little harder to convince at home.

P.S.S. Also, Ellie lost her first tooth by natural causes a while back (woooeeee was that a dramatic evening!) and Charlie deemed himself ready to potty train.

The beloved tongs. He goes nowhere, even to bed, without a kitchen tool of some sort. Most recently it's been a collection of butter knives. We're thinking about weaning him off of his binky and onto the knife. It's about our only hope.

An end and beginning

2011-08-15T22:27:00.004-07:00

Today my big little girl changed our lives forever (by limiting the flexibility of my schedule) and entered the public school system.

Last week we briefly met her teacher and discovered the classroom.

Today she cruised down the monkey bars and owned that kindergarten class. She will be a super star. If her teacher wants one, she'll be her pet. This girl is ready to shine.

Baby bump

2011-08-01T21:04:00.002-07:00

Just over half-way through this shpeel and finally me and my big-bellied self made it into a photo! My intention was to look all content and maternally glowy, by the way, not sweaty and sleepy. Alas, I am all of the above. Honestly, this middle trimester has been lovely. I'm a wee bit frightened about the coming months, however, as this belly's only gettin bigger...

The Big 2

2011-07-29T20:25:00.002-07:00

We did it again! As of June 3rd, we survived another year of Charlie! To commemorate, I dusted off last year's decor and threw him a celebratory little shindig. I didn't even switch out the photos from his first year of life, but hey! There were cake bites (a la Mish) so he didn't seem to mind.

Yup, this kid sure can drive me crazy. Crazy crazy crazy in love.

San Luis Obispo Nine-year Roommate Reunion!

2011-07-24T20:48:00.000-07:00

It's time to resurrect three-word-captions.

Seven of us.

Together four days.

Party without kids.

Historic gum wall.

Everyone else cooked.

Riveting breakfast conversation.

Creme brulee french. (toast) (sorry for cheating)

Freedom to nap.

Braved Pacific Ocean.

Kayaked against wind.

Narrowly escaped killerseals.

That water's cold.

Naomi's water adventure.

Nerds at heart. (but lovable ones)

Terrible, cheesy movie.

Beautiful beach day.

Crazy body surfers.

Family picture time.

There we go.

All look same...

...nine years ago.

Fifteen kids now.

Must reunionize again!

P.S. Montana de Oro.

Love those girls. Really, I do.

Peur

2011-07-13T20:23:00.001-07:00

Now that I've gotten my truest, foremost feelings out about being pregnant (in this post), I might as well confess that I'm also pretty scared. No, not constantly plagued with worries, but the nagging feelings are there.

See, I'm already weird. I'm a Mormon. A water-birther. A raw-plant-food-eater. A home-schooler. Just kidding. But still, four kids before our seventh wedding anniversary? Might be the weirdest of all, even for mainstream Mormon culture. (No really, check your stats next sacrament meeting.) That's cool and all-- many who want to have four kids by their seventh wedding anniversary are unable to, for a multitude of reasons. This all still feeds into my growing awareness that there is nothing "normal" about my lifestyle, and a fourth baby will certainly turn whatever is familiar and comfortable about my current life upside down and inside out.

I said earlier in this post that I just don't love babies. I was a little severe, but truly I am not eager to reenter the world of chaos, sleep deprivation, and social isolation that is raising an infant. The schedule cramped by nap times and frequent feedings, the juggling of household tasks and disciplining older children with one hand, the sheer madness that is running errands.

Yes, mothering small children is not for the faint of heart. I made the choice to have this child, as I've done three other times, almost purely on faith in a force much greater than myself. As I consider the practical details, though, I am already baffled and overwhelmed.

I know everything will work out fine. It always does. But... how? I have no answer and feel so very unprepared to have four smallies always with me at home. Five months' time... that's all I've got to resolve these sentiments...

Erik's birthday festivities

2011-07-06T22:24:00.001-07:00

I really thought I'd taken pictures of all the fun we had with visitors in April and May. Hmmm, I'll have to hunt for those. In the meantime, Erik did get around to having his fourth birthday and we let him alone dictate the day's activities, free of interference from a certain older sister who lovingly meddles. He requested the train park and Yumberi frozen yogurt. Easy enough.

I figured I might as well throw him a birthday party, too, while I was at it. It's hard to tell if Erik or his mom loves Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs more (we do like the book, but I'm referring to the film), but our shared fanaticism made for an easy party theme choice.

Vicious winds prevented my vision of dangling food and rat-birds from coming to fruition, but the beauty of it all was that... no one cared. Not a one. Why didn't someone tell me seven parties ago that no one cares how a party looks, sounds, smells, and acts like a Martha-Stewart wanna-be-party? I know, I know, you all tried.

Not that there's anything wrong with extravagant birthday parties, if you're not making sacrifices in every other aspect of life in order to pull them off. Okay, lesson learned.

So ERIK. He loved his party just as much as every previous one. Maybe more. I will do (almost) absolutely anything to procure that toothy magic, but it's very comforting to know it's not nearly as hard to do so as I'd made it.

Yes, I free-handed Flint Lockwood for our pin-the-spray-on-shoes-on-Flint piece of entertainment. Unfortunately, I forgot all of the shoe cut-outs at home, but again, no one cared. We improvised and used it as a target for a rat-bird toss.

Erik even invented his own rendition of freeze tag: the tagger had a toy piece of peanut brittle for tagging/freezing and someone else had a toy syringe for unfreezing/administering the peanut allergy medicine for all the "Sam Sparks'" experiencing anaphylactic shock. If you're not well acquainted with the film, you might be a bit confused. Also, you really should see it. Really.

Don't forget Steve's gummi bears!

Party was a confirmed success when Erik fell asleep while Kyle was offering him bedtime story choices. Do I love anything more than that slumbering face? It was a happy birthday indeed.

Boy or girl? Wouldn't you like to know?

2011-06-30T14:11:00.004-07:00

So, today was the big day! I woke up enormously excited and anxious for my ultra sound. I even got to leave all the kids behind at a friend's house and made it to the ultra sound office in forty minutes (including the time it took to figure out I had the wrong address and had gone in the completely wrong direction, and the time to pull over at a gas station to buy a liter of water I suddenly recalled I was supposed to already have drank that morning to prep for the ultrasound).

Upon my arrival at the office, the receptionist informed me that I did not indeed have an appointment because my insurance refused to cover this visit. She said she had tried to call me on my cell but had some sort of phone error (which must have been on her end because I've successfully received many incoming calls today). Then she told me to just reschedule for another four weeks out and hope that the insurance issues worked themselves out by then.

I'm generally a nice-ish person, but I was not feeling very nice at this moment. What I had gone through physically this morning to get there was only a part of it. When you are (under the influence of pregnancy hormones and) anticipating something so whole-heartedly, you feel as though even when that moment of revelation arrives, you could not possibly wait another moment for it. Let alone another MONTH.

I excused myself into the hallway to cry. I was thankfully able to get a hold of Kyle who, being the kind and wise husband that he is, encouraged me to just pay for it out-of-pocket and be seen today. (He just didn't want to deal with the emotional monster I would be for the next month if I didn't get to see my baby TODAY. Wise man.)

Well, they still discouraged me from being seen today, but I'm a fighter so finally, at approximately the time that my bladder of 32 oz of water was about to burst, Jessica called me in.

Jessica is a nice person (she did let me pee after she captured the necessary images), although not nearly as interested in celebrating my baby as I wanted her to be (read: not very talkative. I had to pry every piece of information out of her.) The first obstacle, though, was the layout of the room. Tell me if this makes sense: the screen is completely oriented away from the patient so there I lay in silence, belly covered in goo, while Jessica examines this and that and I (not so) patiently wonder if I'll EVER get a look at my child.

At least fifteen minutes later, she consents to give me a glimpse. Even after she's angled the screen as far as it will turn toward me, I still have to contort my body and use both my hands to pry my head into a position that affords a mediocre, sideways view of the screen.

Well, we had a good long go at it, long enough that both my arms had fallen asleep and the crick in my neck was making me cranky. Ultimately the one I have to blame for my greatest disappointment is my own unborn fetus! There it lay, all comfortably snuggled up with legs pressed together and ankles crossed.

So, clearly a girl, right!?

I knew this could happen, of course, but I was still in a daze of disbelief when I walked out of that office after an hour-long ordeal and knew nothing new of my child. I even remembered to ask if everything looked healthy and normal, and she couldn't even answer that! "Oh, your doctor will look at the pictures and let you know." When I see her in a month! Oh well, if the baby had an extra arm or something, I probably would've noticed myself.

Well, I had planned to dedicate this afternoon to shopping for baby girl accessories, so I'm just gonna go ahead and do that now anyway. Erik had a dream last night that he's having a baby sister, so I'm going to stick with that. Should've just stuck with his intuition in the first place-- cheaper than an ultrasound, at least.

Thoughts on baby

2011-06-28T22:19:00.003-07:00

In a few short weeks I will be halfway through with this pregnancy! I am extremely grateful to be over the worst of it. That third trimester is nothing cool and comfortable, but I'll take it over the vomit-trocity of the first trimester any day.

I have so many thoughts and feelings about expecting a baby (and will have more on Thursday after my gender-revealing ultrasound!). My feelings have already evolved so much since the beginning, but thankfully I recorded some of those earliest thoughts in a journal entry, parts of which I will paste below. This entry was drafted before the onset of my World War Food so I was all sunshine and lollipops about being preggie. Now that I'm feeling mostly better, many of those happy sentiments are returning, so posting about them feels genuine again.

You'd think this ordeal would be nothing special on my fourth go at it, but not so. I was more anxious and excited to take a pregnancy test this time than ever before, more devastated when the results were initially negative, and more elated when I fished the pee stick out of the trash minutes later and discovered the very faint-colored and happy truth.

This pregnancy has felt quite different from my others (I mean more than just the increase of severity in my physical symptoms). I do believe I appreciate and enjoy motherhood now more than ever. There is no question that divine intervention was in on the timing of this one. Ellie and Erik are both truly supportive and excited to welcome a new baby. Kyle is also on board (which is kind of a first for us--yay!). Yes, we are STILL poor students, but at least we have prospects of a career in our foreseeable future. I have finally forsaken all other hobbies and distractions-- I am Mom through and through, with nothing there to resent or regret. Plus, Charlie very much needs to be dethroned.

Our life circumstances leading up to the pregnancy were just ideal. They had to be in order to soften our hearts toward the idea. Actually, I'd been quite soft for several months. But anyway, for a few weeks there, it seemed like every single day went just swimmingly. Nothing too notable, just happy and lacking stress. Charlie seemed to be behaving better, sleeping longer, talking more, acting cuter. (Not long after we got pregnant, Charlie started acting crazy again, but at least he was a peach when it mattered most.) The other kids also behaved well and ridiculously cutely. I made yummy meals and everyone ate them. We went out and enjoyed beautiful weather and did a lot as a family. Something cute or funny would happen and Kyle and I would meet each others’ eyes and exchange a knowing smile, basking in the mutual feeling of near-surreal happiness that our current situation frequently provided.

Now I mean it that our happiness was not determined by what was happening to us. We were just happy. However, some events certainly boosted our gratitude and comfort. For instance, Kyle’s interviews with Cox and eventually being hired for a summer internship, and Kyle waking up one morning being willing to have another baby.

Yes, in the middle of March, Kyle woke up one morning before any of the kids had stirred and woke me up gently by asking me if I really wanted to have a baby. Well, you know how coherent and friendly I am when I’m being woken up, but I managed to grunt in the affirmative. He simply replied, “well, maybe having another baby wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world,” after which the kids stormed into the room, Charlie started crying, and our day commenced, taking us in separate, busy directions until nightfall. I may not have looked awake, but I heard what he said loud and clear and could not stop thinking about it all day with a goofy grin plastered to my face.

Well, some people may call this t.m.i., but this is my story and I tell it like it is. So, I just happened to be approaching ovulation that very next day. Quel coincidence? I think not. See, this is how we knew deity was in on our plan. We both feel strongly that the child who is coming to us in December is supposed to be born to us at this time. Kyle was nowhere near considering having another baby, and then the day before I ovulate he just wakes up a changed man on this ever-weighty of decisions? No no, this baby is part of our God-given plan.

Julie Beck said (during some conference some time) that we don't have children with money, but with faith. I've always loved that statement and made it my motto when it comes to this particular decision. We also don't have children with spare time or lack of stress. We just have them with faith. Nothing else could adequately persuade us to have four children in our short marriage. We have absolute faith that our lives are being guided by a supreme creator and that we have a mission to complete on this earth, parenting these children being a great part of it.

(I have neglected to photograph my quickly-expanding waistline (no really, someone today commented that I look ready to pop! Aren't those comments supposed to be reserved for the final hours of pregnancy?), but I look more or less like this girl. Only much bigger. And not owning such a cute sweater dress (not that I'd wear it in Phoenix). And also no cute, mustardy couch in sight. But yeah, pretty close.)

Erik turned four on May 16

2011-06-25T21:56:00.004-07:00

I don't even know how to talk about Erik with words. (speechlessness is a rarity with me, as you all well know.)

All I know is every time he says anything, my heart skips a beat. He waddles by me and I swoon. I must scoop him up into my arms and cradle him like a baby, or perish. Is this why he still sometimes acts like a baby?

Just kidding, just kidding! He acts like a four-year-old now. Sometimes, even a child of the mature age of five.

After dressing himself in an outfit of which he's particularly proud, "Do I look like a five-year-old, Mom?" And after finishing his bowl of cereal in record-breaking speed (meaning before the cereal becomes one with the milk), "Did I eat as fast as a five (or even six)-year-old?"

I always answer emphatically in the affirmative because, let's face it, the child is fishing for praise, but come on now! Don't get all five-ish on me yet-- you are still too irresistible to be four!

No one can quite say just why I am so enamored with this son of mine. He does have this endearing vulnerability to him-- mechanical speech, built-in love handles and all. I sure hope I outgrow this uncontrollable feeling for him before he's old enough to be embarrassed of it.

Until that day, let me just bask in the sweet and snuggly splendor that is my Ery-muffin. (What a terrible nickname for a boy, I know, but have you seen this kid's muffin-top, prominent even in the nude?)

He is such a reprieve from the rapscallionish nature of a certain other boy in our household. I always thought I was such an effective mother. I'd successfully trained a polite, calm, well-behaved, imaginative little boy. No, not a polite, calm girl--that is less impressive. A calm and well-behaved BOY.

Ah well, Charlie had to go and shatter that illusion for me. Turns out I had nothing to do with it. Erik was just born the sweetest muffin in the tin. He is not everything perfect and well-behaved (and emotionally stable), but then he walks up to me and tells me, "you look so pwetty, Mom" or when I ask him what he liked about his day he throws his arms around my neck and grins, "evewyfing." Or he spontaneously informs me that "I love you all the way to... (this next part in a robotic voice)... outer space and heaven." So he's not perfect but, well actually, yeah actually, he is.

News

2011-06-22T22:07:00.005-07:00

I have no less than ten drafts awaiting elaboration in my "edit posts" file. They each require elaboration, though! So since my entire family is peacefully slumbering at the moment and I wish to be doing the same, I will quickly share an update of my four favorite people.

1. Kyle gets up every morning before I've even begun my final rem cycle, changes Charlie's poo, and fetches the cereal boxes from atop the fridge so Ellie can prepare breakfast for the crew. Then he works hard at a job he LOVES for only eight hours a day and is home for dinner. Don't get used to it, Tiff! Too late!

2. Ellie gave our Family Home Evening lesson on Monday because she was quite enthused about this object lesson she had developed. It went like this: she gave a plate of apple slices to Charlie and Erik for their immediate consumption and promptly left the room. Moments later she returned, shaking her head, then solemnly breaking the news to us that, "You weren't ready when I came. I'm Jesus, and you're not ready." Then she had Kyle read the parable of the ten virgins and bore her testimony about preparing for the second coming. (by eating your apple slices faster?) It was such a good effort, though, and made perfect sense in her spongy little cranium.

3. I really wonder about Erik in the public school system. Yes, they teach you to read, write, do arithmetic, and interact socially, but are they equipped to support the inner workings of Erik's imagination? The simple task of writing his name often becomes a very involved process. Each letter assumes the appearance of a stranger life form than the last, each with an increasing number of unusual characteristics. I don't know how he'll do in the legibility department, but at least his letters have multiple personalities... Extra credit???

4. One of Charlie's numerous "adorable" habits as of late is the spontaneous stripping of his pants and diaper, a hurried exit from my presence, and soon a confession that he did indeed intentionally pee on the carpet. Clearly, he is aware of my disapproval and yet the frequency of "purposes" (it's not an accident!) increases. Today I checked on him in his time-out corner (yes, he spends a lot of time there for various infractions) and he immediately admitted that he was standing in a puddle of his own urine. What was puzzling was that his diaper was completely intact and DRY. Upon closer inspection, of course, I gained a greater appreciation for his dexterity-- the kid thought to pull his little hose out the side of his diaper and let it run down his leg. Ingenious. So, is it time to commence potty training? Or just to up the severity of his punishments?

So, that's a snapshot of my four faves. They have their cute and not-so-cute moments, but every one of them has lovely, snuffaluffagus eyelashes. That makes up for a lot, especially when they're asleep.

Thunderbird deluxe

2011-06-18T21:36:00.001-07:00

Well, you know how great I am not at bringing a camera to outings, and even not better at pulling it out when it's stowed along, but stealing photos from another's blog? Yes, I can do that. A tad outdated, but the following photos document some of the fun that was had with my T-bird girls in past months. Can I just say how much I love this club!? There are two-three events every week, including kids' activities (which I was in charge of last semester-- fun, but taxing), girls night outs, date nights, family field trips, potluck dinners, etc. I love to be over-scheduled, so thank you, T-bird ladies, for making that possible. Plus, everyone I've met at Thunderbird is among the coolest of humankind. Down-to-earth, friendly, wonderful people.

Ladies' bowling night out

Cerreta Chocolate Factory tour

Ladies' dont-have-to-cook-dinner night out

Ladies' game-night out

D-land

2011-06-14T20:33:00.001-07:00

When Noelani told me she'd be able to get us all into Disneyland for free on the day of my choice, my head about imploded with excitement. The magic was ever alive in my young heart. I talked it up to the kids and just believed that, even sans Kyle, D-land would deliver as the "happiest place on earth."

Turns out it was the crappiest place on earth.

Okay, in truth, no crappier than any overcrowded, overpriced venue with no outlet for energetic toddlers. Still, expectations were high, remember? That was my first mistake. Within the first hour, those expectations were shattered and all of the kids had shared at least one emotional breakdown.

Basically, my high school bff Baha was the reason we got through that day, physically and emotionally. Rather than pout and whine about how awful it was to get my family into Disneyland for free, though, I will simply enumerate the circumstances under which I would consider ever getting in for free again in the future.

1. No children ill/screaming through the night/screaming through the day
2. No lines. Really, no lines. Not a one of us felt it worth spending the majority of the day waiting in lines for a few minutes of hyper-stimulation.
3. Help. More help. At least one additional helper.
4. OR leave Charlie behind.
5. OR wait until Charlie can be restrained for two minutes together without gracing the crowds with his signature banshee screams and violent attempts to be freed from the straight jacket that was the stroller, the ride seat belt, or my arms.

So, it will be a few years.

All in all, Noe and I aged quite a bit from the stress and exertion, but emerged triumphant in the end. (Only in the very end, though. We were about to leave when Ellie and I had an impromptu sob session, with different causes of distress. I refused to leave the so-called happiest place on earth in tears, so we squeezed in one extra ride so we could exit the park emotionally stable.)

You know, it's been over three months since the trip, and I remember feeling that it was horrific, and yet time has already abstracted those negative emotions. I even found myself trying to convince Kyle the other day that I'm ready to go back, so long as he comes with. He just shook his head in amazement. Is my memory truly that blurry? Must be like childbirth-- it wasn't THAT bad, right?

Well, we all look mostly happy in the pictures, at least. Even Charlie looks happy in the ones where he's escaping from me and running away.

Yes, Charlie is wearing pajama pants over his fleece-lined jeans. Can't win every battle.

Not surprisingly, Erik was the most content of all of us throughout the trip.

See, we did too meet Mickey Mouse!

Ha ha, the kids slept in their clothes and wore them again the next day.

The rumors are true...

2011-06-05T22:26:00.008-07:00

Just in case there's still a feeble audience out there, I am finally feeling stable enough to declare an official apology for my lack of posts concerning

and
and

Don't get me wrong-- there has been plenty of kid, food, and fun to be had. Rather than do anything about absolutely any of that, though, I have dedicated my days to the pursuit of

and

and growing one of these.

Whew! I sure miss any semblance of energy and enjoyment of food, but it's all good because by

this bad boy (or girl) of a fetal humanoid will be out of me! And in even better news, I'm 14 weeks along and darn well better start feeling better soon. But if not, that's all good too because I figure I'm still pretty ridiculously fortunate to be doing what I'm doing here.

Thankfully, BEFORE the onset of first trimester symptoms, I recorded a few of my feelings of elation concerning my pregnant state. That account will be coming in another post, along with an incomplete record of whatever I've photographed over the past three months.

And just in case I didn't come through in a very positive tone there, YES we are ecstatic to be having yet another one of our kind.

phoenix zoo-- hot but cool

2011-05-01T20:34:00.001-07:00

(that's me stopping Charlie from riding the poor goat, not encouraging it)

Just the four of us

2011-04-15T20:19:00.000-07:00

Well, we showed up late to playgroup and there was no one in sight (except for ducks in the pond). I thought about turning right around and heading home since Monday mornings are not ideal for outings, but we stopped anyway. Turns out it's pretty fun to play with just your kids sometimes.

Erik's day out

2011-04-05T19:26:00.000-07:00

The Mariners migrate south for their spring training to none other than our current stomping grounds. Kyle and some friends got tickets to enjoy a little show time and Erik was more than happy to accompany them.

I think he'll go just about anywhere for a hot dog.

However, baseball turned out to be less-than-fascinating to Erik. Rather, he passed the time with his hand at the camera.

(Wow, those are some third-trimester-looking feet, Erik.)

Erik is the best kid to take absolutely anywhere. He'll just sit and entertain himself for hours without a word of complaint. Awesome on road trips. Perfect at the store. Snuggly and true to the end.

Bookworms

2011-04-03T20:52:00.000-07:00

So, I'd been feeling the absence of a shopping spree in my life quite keenly. I don't shop often, really, but when I do, it tends to be in the face of an astronomical clearance event so... it becomes a spree.

Even when things are cheap, though, I'm finally starting to cut down on some uneccessary purchases, like clothes, toys, rockin decor items, etc. I have a weak spot for literature, though. I seem to always always always be able to justify purchasing books. They're always dirt cheap books, mind you, but still, our shelves are full and yet... I could not resist our library's recent book sale.

The kids and I whittled our enormous round one stack of books down to the following. At a buck a piece, we had to be judicial.

(Oh, funny store about "The Boo Boo Book." I was so excited to see it there because Kyle's parents gifted it to us for Christmas and the kids absolutely love it. I bought it anyway, thinking I wouldn't have a problem finding someone who'd take it.

Well, at home, I searched and searched and could NOT find our Boo Boo copy. Then I realized that this was the only book we bought at the sale that didn't have a library bar code on it. Also, pretty much all of the board books for sale were hashed to pieces at the brutal hands of toddler legions. This copy was in quite good condition, as if only three kids had been handling it for only three months...

Yup, finally we concluded that this was indeed OUR copy of The Boo Boo Book that we must have inadvertently left at the library. How serendipitously wonderful that we were the ones who managed to swipe it at the sale, and before we even noticed it was lost!)

Well, that was a good time and all, but the next day, in the sale's final hour...

Ellie and I stuffed eight plastic bags full of books (for a buck a bag this time!)-- that's right, EIGHT. A staff member had to give us our own book cart and help us roll it to our car.

While we shopped, I felt a tad sheepish continuously returning to that employee for yet another bag to fill, while families around me exited contently with a single bag. Each time I approached her, I had this nagging fear that she would turn me down for exceeding the greed limit, but no. For the record, I DID leave a few of the (particularly mangled and unattractive) books there for others patrons.

Yeah, talk about judging a book by its cover... I'd only ever heard of a handful of the titles that I brought home. These are the library rejects, after all. No matter. If they're terrible literature, we won't feel bad about throwing them out. Otherwise, we've still managed to bulk up the Larsen family library for a negligible fee.

Ever since second grade, I've dreamed of having a library room like in Beauty and the Beast. I think we're finally on our way...

This is glee, sheer glee. Even without the love of books, this bargain gave me chills the rest of the day. Yipeeeee!

Kyle has forbidden me to purchase any more books for a year. It's been seven days, and excluding Goodwill's half-off sale and my community garage sale finds, I have kept good on his wish...

Erin go brach! (what does that mean anyway? I hope that wasn't obscene.)

2011-03-30T20:54:00.002-07:00

I utterly and completely dropped the ball on Valentine's Day, so I tried to compensate a little with St. Patrick's Day, even forcing Kyle to join us at the smallish, more-funny-than-cool (if you know what I mean) St. Patty's Day parade in some ghetto neighborhood of downtown Phoenix.

Mariachi bands originated in Ireland, right? Well you know what, it was a welcome reprieve from kilts and bagpipes.

Not the first place in the world you'd expect to find a delorean, but it at least solidified in Kyle's mind that the parade was well worth attending.

Some leprechaun tossed his hat to Ellie during the parade and this became a much fought-over prop throughout the following days. That leprechaun must have transferred some of his mischievous nature with it, as well...

Because we woke up St. Patrick's Day top o' the mornin' to chairs and furniture overturned, a green slinky hanging from the ceiling fan, general messes made (hard to make those look unusual, though), gold glitter glimmering from the toilet bowl (hmmm, we all found that a bit icky and no one used the potty until the sparkles were flushed), and of course our milk was dyed green. Oh yes, and the lousy, lazy trap we'd set for the fiendish little elf was successfully evaded, but some gold-wrapped candies remained in the trap, as well as some hidden around the room.

I have it on good authority that that leprechaun was mighty exhausted the previous evening and highly considered cancelling all scheduled shenanigans at the Larsen abode, but we're all grateful he bucked up in the wee hours of the night and got the job done. The kids were absolutely giddy about all of the damage, so we do hope he'll visit again next year, and hope we'll be a bit more prepared with a proper trap next time!

One of our traditions is to look ridiculous on St. Patrick's Day, donning every last item of green available in the recesses of our wardrobes. Every year, I feel a little more ridiculous than the last (I'm supposed to be getting more mature and all) and this year was no exception. However, I'm determined to make the most of these precious few years in which my kids deem my nerdiness hilarious rather than humiliating.

We met up with the Brammers in the morning and had a lovely time doing what stay-at-home-moms and happy, rambunctious kidoodles do.

We spent the afternoon cooling down at the Jacobsen's pool where we enjoyed a most satisfying potluck lunch (which for me was mostly peanut butter cookies-- dah! my nemesis!) and I must say that this was the most fun I've had in the pool in recent memory. Ellie and Erik, with some floatie-assistance, fended for themselves, and Charlie is actually beginning to enjoy water adventures. Rather than cling insecurely to my swimsuit straps, he repeatedly climbed out of the pool to "jump" into my arms. Yay! Charlie is becoming fun!

You can see that the leprechauns even managed to cast a eerie, greenish glow to the atmosphere of our home. Either that or someone needs to give me some photography lessons.

Either way, we had so much fun having the Thomas' over for dinner. I didn't feel like corned beef and cabbage, so I certainly would have slacked in the festivity department for dinner, but with Becca bringing green beans, spinach salad, and green focacia bread, all I had to do was throw in some green mashed potatoes and a rainbow fruit platter (with whipped cream "cloud" dip), and I think we enjoyed it much more than the authentic Irish dinners of our St. Patty's Days past.

Preparing such a healthy feast was unintentional, I assure you, but still so satisfying and delicious! Hands down the Larsens' best St. Patrick's Day to date! (Wait, I just remembered that last 3/17 was the first time Charlie slept through the night AND he took an almost two-hour nap. That was an isolated incidence, but still... okay it's a tie!)

Why are these food posts so looooong?

2011-03-23T21:04:00.000-07:00

This is solid day four of working on this food post, which is boring even to me, but will hopefully prove useful for the recipe collection that will someday compile itself, right? Yeesh, I need to cook less often or blog more often. Maybe both.

Pesto Gnocchi

Yep, store-bought, dried gnocchi. Even Costco's pesto could not save it. I'm afraid gnocchi must be from scratch, which is bad news because it's rather a time-suck of a meal. Fresh, store-bought gnocchi might be good, though, for those whose pocket books can manage it.

Borscht

Beets, despite supposedly having a high-sugar content, are kind of gross. And even the chunks of cooked beets in this stew were kinda gross. However, once I wised up and pureed the whole silly batch, herbivores and omnivores alike lapped it up.

1. Place in a crockpot on high for four hours or low for eight:
-2 lbs chopped, peeled beets
-1 lb potatoes
-1 onion
-5 c broth
-3 T tomato paste (I used more like half a can)

2. add 3 c of finely shredded cabbage for another 45 minutes

3. puree it all, or just half if you don't mind beet chunks

4. turn off the heat and mix in the following:
-2 T dill
-1 T red wine vinegar (I used more)
-2 T fresh lemon juice
-salt and pepper, other seasonings to taste

5. garnish with dollop of plain yogurt, fresh parsley, chopped hard-boiled eggs, or if you're us, all three!

T3, El3, Er2, Ch2, Mark/Noe/Kjerstin/Kyle/Mish 3

Broccomole in Lavash Bread

I made this again for a picnic dinner/family hike and rolled it in lavash bread (basically a rectangle tortilla), but this time I steamed the broccoli before mashing it with avocado and seasonings and, not surprisingly, it made a great difference.

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3

Muhammara Dip

Yum! This is our new favorite sandwich spread, and it's also great on toast plain, or mixed into pasta or veggies or eggs, need I go on? I really don't like the taste of plain walnuts, but soaked and pureed in this form, we get our cranial development (thanks, walnuts!) sans gagging.

Blend the following in a food processor:
-12 oz roasted red bell peppers, drained
-1 c walnuts
-1/3 c panko bread crumbs
-2 T olive oil
-2 t fresh lemon juice
-1 t cumin
-1/4 t cayenne
-salt

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3

Spinach Falafel with Yogurt Tahini Sauce (from enlightenedcooking.blogspot.com)

I didn't feel like forming balls (perhaps because the mixture was frustratingly wet even after waiting the allotted time), so I made patties with this and served them with the yogurt sauce on muhammara-slathered toast. Exotic dishes intimidate me, but this one was certainly worth the risk and will be frequently repeated.

Mix the following:
-2 c falafel mix (from a box, although I hear it's not hard to make from scratch)
-1.5 c water
-1 T oil
-3 c minced spinach
-1/4 c minced cilantro

Let it sit for 5 min until water absorbed, form patties, and bake 12-15 min, flip, and bake another 5-10 minutes.

The yogurt tahini sauce is made by whisking 1/2 c plain yogurt, 2 T tahini, 2 t lemon juice, 1/2 t cumin, and salt & pepper.

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3

10 min. Thai Curry (from steamykitchen.com)

Coconut curry is the only entree about which Kyle and I are in complete agreement. So, we eat it lots. Kyle throws in meat when he makes it (though last time even he admitted it didn't add anything to the flavor or texture), and I douse mine with veggies, but it's the curry paste and rich coconut milk that make it pure magic for the mouth. Our recipe fluctuates a great deal, so here's someone else's. (If you want it to taste more like Kyle's curry, and if you're not taking crazy pills surely you do, saute garlic and onion in the beginning and add a generous squeeze of fish sauce, then lime juice and a cilantro garnish in the end.)

The amount of curry paste you use is totally up to you. I've used 2 tablespoons, which is about medium spice level. You can always add more curry paste after tasting, so it's best to start with a little bit and work your way up. If you're cooking rice, make extra and freeze for next time.

1 teaspoon cooking oil
2 tablespoons red curry paste (or more)
12 ounces coconut milk
1 red bell pepper, seeded and cut into strips
8 ounces fresh mushrooms (I used King Trumpet mushrooms)
1 pound shrimp, peeled and deveined
16 basil leaves (optional)
Cooked rice

Heat a skillet over medium high heat, once hot add in the cooking oil and red curry paste. Whisk for about 30 seconds. Pour in the coconut milk and whisk to combine. When it comes to a simmer, add in the mushrooms and the red peppers and continue cooking for 3 minutes. Taste and whisk in additional curry paste if you want. Add the shrimp to the curry and cook for another 2-3 minutes, until the shrimp is cooked through. Stir in the basil and serve over rice.

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3

Middle Eastern Zucchini Boats from steamykitchen.com

Recipe adapted from Family Circle, August 2010 Issue

4 medium zucchini (about 6 ounces each)
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 red or yellow bell pepper, seeded and chopped
1/2 medium-size onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
1 pound ground chicken
1/4 cup golden raisins
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
2 tablespoons pine nuts

1. Cut zucchini in half lengthwise. Using a small spoon, carefully scoop out flesh and seeds, leaving a 1/4-inch-thick shell around edges. Discard flesh and seeds.

2. Place half of the zucchini, cut-side down, in an 11 x 7 x 2-inch glass baking dish. Add 1/2 cup water and cover with plastic wrap, venting one corner. Microwave 4 minutes. Place cooked zucchini in a large baking dish. Repeat with remaining zucchini.

3. Meanwhile, heat oven to 400 degrees F. In a large nonstick skillet, heat oil over medium heat. Add bell pepper, onion and garlic; cook 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Crumble in chicken. Stir in raisins, salt, pepper and cinnamon. Cook 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Turn off heat and stir in cheese.

4. Fill each zucchini half with about 1/3 cup stuffing, then sprinkle the pine nuts over tops. Bake at 400 degrees F for 10 minutes or until the zucchini is cooked through.

Dandelion Salad with Warm Bacon Dressing from asweetpeachef.com

I decided to give dandelion greens another shot. However, I waited too long to use them AGAIN. Anything but perfectly fresh greens makes a mighty bitter aftertaste. Warm bacon dressing, anyone? Alas, still bitter. With fresh greens, though, perhaps plucked directly from your backyard, I have a feeling this might turn out a winner.

serves 4, recipe adapted from Alton Brown

8 ounces baby spinach (or dandelion greens, in my case)
2-4 large eggs (opt.)
8 pieces thick-sliced bacon
3 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
4-6 large white mushrooms, sliced
1 small red onion, very thinly sliced

Wash, drain and pat the spinach until thoroughly dry. Place into a large mixing bowl and set aside.

If choosing to hard boil your eggs, check out How to Make Perfect Hard Boiled Eggs and then slice each hard boiled egg into 4 quarters, lengthwise, and set aside. If choosing to poach your eggs, check out Easy Poached Eggs Recipe on Simply Recipes. What a useful site!

While the eggs are cooking, fry the bacon and remove to a paper towel to drain, reserving 3 tablespoons of the rendered fat. Crumble the bacon and set aside.

Transfer the fat to a small saucepan set over low heat and whisk in the red wine vinegar, sugar and Dijon mustard. Season with a small pinch each of kosher salt and black pepper.

Add the mushrooms and the sliced onion to the spinach and toss. Add the dressing and bacon and toss to combine. Divide the spinach between 4 plates or bowls and evenly divide the egg among them. Season with pepper, as desired. Serve immediately.

I won't rate this because I'm sure it would've been 3s across the board had I used fresher greens. Eight slices of bacon? Yeah, it better be 3s.

Indian Dal Nirvana Lentils (from steamykitchen.com) with mashed cauliflower and naan bread

Recipe from Nirvana Restaurant, Beverly Hills

Serve with basmati or naan flatbread.

1 cup dry lentils

6 ounces canned crushed tomato

1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger

1 tablespoon minced garlic

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper (or less depending on your spice preference)

1 cup water

4 tablespoons butter

1/8 teaspoon salt, more to taste

freshly ground black pepper

1/3 cup heavy cream

2 tablespoons minced fresh cilantro

In a large sauce pan, add the lentils and fill with water to cover by 2 inches. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes until the lentils open and are tender. Drain the water from the lentils and return the lentils to the pot. Stir the lentils around in the pot mashing some of them against the pot to break open. Add the tomato puree, ginger, garlic, cayenne pepper, water, butter, salt and pepper. Cook for 1 hour until the dal is thick. Make sure to check the pot periodically to make sure the water does not cook out.

Stir in cream, garnish with minced cilantro.

T2 (but only because it looks AMAZING in the picture but still just tastes like lentils, but I will make it again with different expectations and it will very likely deliver), El2, Er2, Ch2

Mashed cauliflower is how I get my kids to EACH eat two bowlfuls of vegetables in one sitting. I treat it just like potatoes, and Charlie still thinks it is. I'll break the news to him someday.

Sweet Potato Gnocchi

Ultra delish-sounding, no? Sweet potatoes are my very favoritest veggie, after all. Okay, here goes...

1. Bake 1 lb sweet potatoes for 30-50 minutes until soft, or nuke 'em for 15 minutes if you're in a hurry.

2. Remove peels, mash, and add:
-garlic cloves
-salt, nutmeg, or whatever seasonings make you happy
-1 egg

3. Gradually knead in 2 cups of whole wheat flour until it sticks to itself more than to you, kind of like a bread dough.

4. Boil a big pot of salted water and drop grape-sized pieces into the water, fishing them out once they float. (We tried to press the dough out of a pastry bag like frosting, but the bag broke. I ended up rolling the dough into little snakes and cutting small pieces off. Yes, it took a while (though I about tripled the batch). Enlist small people's help.)

5. Brown lots of butter in a hot pan, add a can of coconut cream, frozen peas, and the gnocchi.

T3 (You might have guessed that butter and coconut cream make anything yummy. You're very smart. I was a little disappointed, though, that the gnocchi still tasted like normal potato gnocchi with only a faint glimmer of sweet potato flavor. Perhaps I'll use less flour next time?), El3, Er3, Ch3+

Lemon Poppyseed Dressing

I made this salad for company, thus the sugar.

Blend:
-1/2 c sugar
-1/2 c fresh lemon juice
-2 t onion
-1 t dijon mustard
-1/2 t salt
-2/3 c extra virgin olive oil (this is the best time to use the purest olive oil because it loses much of its healthfulness when heated, so kind of a waste of money-- cold-pressed in salad dressings is the way to go)
-1 T poppy seeds

I tossed this with baby spinach, kiwi, avocado, grapes, walnuts, feta, and beans. I know it's still a salad, but YUM!

Cashew Milk from elanaspantry.com

I love me some almond or coconut milk in a carton, truly, however, it was time to make cashew milk. There is some settling, so shake it real good each time before you pour. I love this flavor so much more than every other (dairy or non-dairy) milk I've tried, plus I feel so much better about it being completely fresh, even raw, and free of factory interventions.

1 cup (raw) cashews, soaked overnight
4 cups water
1 tablespoon agave nectar
pinch celtic sea salt

Discard soaking water and rinse cashews thoroughly until water runs clear
Place cashews, (4 cups fresh) water, agave and salt in a Vitamix
Process on high speed 20-30 seconds
Store in glass mason jar in refrigerator

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3

Veggie Masala Burgers from dailygarnish.com

My patties took forever to brown, but maybe I put in too many extra veggies (a common offense) and that made it too moist. I ended up just stir frying the rest of the mixture. I love the crispiness of patties fried in coconut oil, but next time I might just bake them to cut down on my stove-side time.

Hands down my favorite frozen veggie burger is the Trader Joe's Vegetable Masala Burger. But more and more I’m trying to eliminate our house of boxed and processed food. This recipe does just that, while also adding a fabulous new addition to our weekly meals!

2 large carrots, cubed
2 medium potatoes (I used red potatoes), cubed
1/2 cup bell peppers, diced
1/2 cup corn kernels
1/2 cup edamame (shelled)
1/2 cup rolled oats
1 tbsp olive oil
1/2 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp mustard seed
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/4 tsp garam masala
1/2 tsp salt

Instructions

Start by cubing the potatoes and carrots into small diced pieces. Try to make the cubes as consistent as possible, so that they will cook evenly in the pan. Over medium high heat, sauté the carrots and potatoes in a little bit of olive oil for about ten minutes, or until starting to brown.
For the rest of the ingredients, I stuck with my Trader Joe’s theme. For the peppers, edamame, and corn – frozen is fine!
Once the potatoes and carrots are starting to get soft…
Go ahead and add the rest of the vegetables and cook until they are warmed. These burgers take a little more time than a bean burger, since you need to cook the vegetables – but I promise the end result is totally worth it!
While the vegetables are cooking, go ahead and pull out your food processor. The first item into the food processor is 1/2 cup of rolled oats…
Pour them in and pulse them to the consistency of a coarse flour.
Add the vegetables once they are ready, along with the olive oil, salt, and the blend of spices. Spices are what make these burgers so delicious!
Alternate pulsing the food processor and scraping down the sides, in order to ensure that everything is mixed well. Combine until the veggies are chopped into teeny tiny pieces!
Wet your hands and form into patties. Using the same pan that you used to cook your vegetables, add a little more olive oil and cook the burgers over medium high heat.
When you make veggie burgers, you’re never quite sure until you FLIP whether or not they are going to hold together or crumble to bits. I am happy to report that these held together really well – probably my best to date! After a few minutes of cooking on one side, use a spatula to flip the patties over.
Once they are cooked on both sides, they are ready to eat!
While yes – it was a bit more work than simply heating up a frozen burger – this recipe makes six patties! So you can easily make it once and freeze the rest to eat later in the week. Problem solved!

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3

Raw Treat Balls

I really ought to come up with a different title for this little tasty. I tried to market them to Kyle as cookies, but he nixed that after one bite. Then again, I actually chose to nibble on them INSTEAD of the cookies on the adjacent counter, and not just out of guilt! So, don't expect these to taste like cookies. They're not even cooked. They are worth making, though. In fact, I am craving some this very moment.

1. Throw 1 c oats into the food processor until the consistency of flour.

2. Add
-1 t salt
-1/3 c cocoa nibs (I used 60% cacao dark chocolate chips)
-1 T cinnamon
-1/3 c coconut oil
-1 c nut butter (I used half almond, half peanut)
-1/3 c maple syrup
-10 dates

3. Transfer to a bowl and add
-1/2 c oats
-1/2 c coconut flakes
-1/2 c raisins
-1/4 c dried cranberries
-1/4 dried apples

4. Roll into balls and binge without guilt; refrigerate leftovers

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3

Meatless Cabbage Rolls

I can't find the recipe I (extremely loosely) used for this, but just know that there are recipes out there in case you're heavy on leftovers and a head of cabbage calls your name. You can stuff pretty much anything in these pretties, and a solid tomato sauce will do it all good.

Broccoli and Bulgar in Peanut Sauce from my friends' Weight Watchers cookbook

1. cook 1 c bulgar in 3 c water; simmer 10 min or until liquid absorbed
2. Steam 3 c broccoli florets until tender-crisp (I just put my steamer over the pot of bulgar wheat)
3. Blend the following
-1/2 loose-packed cilantro leaves
-3 T chunky peanut butter
-2 T reduced-sodium soy sauce
-1 T white-white vinegar
-1 t sugar
-1/8 t cayenne pepper
4. Add the sauce and broccoli to the bulgar

T3, El2, Er2, Ch2
Here's the thing, though. Something funny happens to my grains when I cook them. Instead of doubling in mass, they quintuple, I think. Perhaps I overcooked? Anyway, the peanut sauce didn't get anywhere near flavoring that humongous pot of carbs. I added a little more of this and that, but it was still borderline bland. The good news is that the next day I made another batch or two (or five) of the sauce and then the dish was considerably tasty, even to Kyle.

Green Papaya Salad

Kyle brought home a bag of shredded green papaya from the Asian store. Honestly, I wasn't much excited about it. However, it made a pretty salad, and had I not used spoiled, bitter lime juice, I likely wouldn't have had to toss the leftovers today.

Combine 1 julienned green papaya with shredded carrot, bean sprouts, julienned green beans, tomatoes, and what have you. Garnish with crushed peanuts.

Make a sauce with the following and pour it over the salad:
-3 cloves garlic
-1 scallion or green onion
-1/4 c fish sauce
-1/4 c sugar
-1/3 c lime juice
-1/4 t lime zest
-2 Thai bird chiles (or to taste)
-fresh herbs like mint, cilanto, etc

Okay, I won't rate this because I messed it up using old limes for the lime juice and it came out seriously bitter. Kyle and his friend didn't seem to mind, but I couldn't down more than a few bites. I will try the sauce again later and report.

Vietnamese Shrimp Salad Rolls

These are basically a mix of fresh veggies and herbs rolled up in a rice wrap, decorated with shrimp. They're pretty, fun to eat and, dipped in sweet chili sauce, delectable (though a good ole fish sauce for dipping might be a healthier choice). I made the mistake of leaving the cucumber peel on before I chopped, so another unfortunate run-in with Bitter. However, they were still good. Note: leftovers do NOT keep well-- eat 'em fresh!

1 cucumber, peeled and julienned
2 carrots, peeled and julienned
1 avocado, cut in thin strips
bean sprout, alfalfa sprouts, whatev
cilantro, Thai basil, green onion, whatev

1. Roll all of the above up in a leaf of lettuce (anything but iceberg) and place on top of a wetted rice wrap sheet (available at Asian stores-- they are tortilla-sized, uber-thin sheets of rice, and when dipped in water become stretchy and pliable). Carefully roll it up burrito-style. I placed a few shrimp on the rice wrap before putting the lettuce and veggies down. This was mostly decorative.

T3, El3, Er2, Ch2

Stuffed Portobellos

Okay, I cheated on this one. I saw them stuffed portos on manager's special in the pre-packaged produce section and snagged them. Yes, I do regret it, not because they weren't homemade, but because they didn't taste at all as good as something I would've made. There are so many ways I've wanted to cook with portobellos but could never justify the cost. I'd especially like to try it as a burger patty-substitute. Even stuffed with cheese, this was just way too much mushroom in the mouth. Then again, I served it as the entree. Giant mushrooms. Sorry about that. I'll do better next time.

Yes, but what ELSE do you do?

2011-03-14T21:54:00.000-07:00

Mommy monotony, anyone? Actually, I'm feeling pretty awesome about being a mom these days. However, the dishes, the laundry, the picking up toys, the crazed errand-running with tots-in-tow, the rejected healthy dinners, the--did I mention dishes? Yes, these tasks seem anything but holy.

Guess what, though-- they ARE holy! I am doing the Lord's errand by taking swell care of his small ones. My service is unselfish and significant. Everything involved in the work of a mother-- yes even the dishes-- is holy because it is what HE wants me to do. A cool person called Kristine Manwaring said it better: (excerpt taken from good post here)

“The work of feeding, clothing, and nurturing one another is every bit as spiritual as it is physical. [Some wise mother] feels strongly that when ordinary, life-sustaining tasks are done together as a family, they bind family members to one another in small but critical ways. I was startled to realize that she saw as “sacred” the tasks that I always thought were obstacles to sacredness.

And for evidence, she turned to the scriptures. The parable of the sheep and the goats found in Matthew 25 clearly shows that Christ will judge us according to our willingness to feed and clothe “the least of these my brethren” (verse 40). Does this include members of our own families?

In fact, Christ used imagery of feeding and washing and cleaning throughout His parables and object lessons. “He shall feed his flock like a shepherd” (Isa. 40:11). He will wash “away the filth of the daughters of Zion” (2 Ne. 14:4) and “sweep away the bad out of [His] vineyard” (Jacob 5:66). He even likens Himself to a hen who “gathereth her chickens under her wings” (Matt. 23:37).

Even more striking to me, Christ not only spoke of these things, He personally did them. He fed multitudes with limited tangible resources in a miraculous example of His attention to our physical as well as spiritual hunger. He washed the feet of His disciples to illustrate the humble service required of a Master and to reveal what He was willing to do that we might be entirely clean. In the book of Moses, He states that He, Himself, made the coats of skins to clothe Adam and Eve.

When seen in this new light, my perception of tasks like peeling potatoes and scrubbing floors began to turn upside down and inside out. It was becoming obvious to me that when we care for the physical as well as the spiritual needs of our families, we are patterning our lives after the Savior.”

I mean, I'm gonna do and re-do (to the infiniti-eth power) all those household tasks anyway, but isn't it something else to know that it actually MATTERS!? God values that my children are well-fed and half-dressed, and that my home is occasionally-clean and always-being-cleaned. So I'm going to wager a guess that He values yours, as well. (sigh of relief.)

Being a mom is the coolest, I say!

2011-03-06T21:47:00.005-08:00

Two of my faves came down for Prez. Day weekend and there was a great deal of awesomeness on our agenda, including shrimp tempura sushi with mango sauce. Yes, it's that good.

Almost as good as Mom looking terrible determined, eating an orange (a la Christmas 2010).

One thing you should try NOT to do when you have an enormous zit between your eyes that you've popped three nights in a row which turned it into two enormous zits between your eyes is to SLATHER IT IN TOOTHPASTE OVER NIGHT. Ohhhh yes, it burned real good. You better believe that zit was gone the next morning. But then I had this beaut of a chemical burn to humiliate me for several days.

I'd heard rumors that these burns never fully heal, which would've served me right. However, God was merciful and, doused in neosporin and aloe vera at all times, the burn started to peel within a few days. Still a moderately traumatizing experience. Also, it looked much more distinctly burgandy than these pictures depict.

And just so the last image of me in your mind is not the horrific three seen above, how bout some leggings! Ooo pick me, pick me! Ever since my fateful first encounter with Emily's leggings seen here, I cannot seem to take these blessed stretchy pants off.

And just so the last image in your mind is not of me,

Okay, yeah, that's kinda weird. I was only trying to find a cute, recent candid of my kids and this is the best I've got. I'll do better with the camera.

Charlie

2011-03-01T20:39:00.000-08:00

You know what, that Charlie is not really all that bad. Perhaps I enjoy a little drama, sympathy, and whatever else comes of complaining about that kid. Most of it is justified. Still, if you don't know Charlie all that well for yourself, you might inaccurately conclude from my tirades that his screaming fits and fiendish pranks are not compensated with some pretty irresistible toddlerisms.

He's actually a pretty nice kid.

Now on my third child, I finally get that my kids are, simultaneously, the cutest and best kids in the whole wide world AND incredibly average in everything.

I mean, with Ellie, I think I literally understood that she was the cutest baby ever. I recall being devastated when she and I were ill and had to miss a local baby beauty pageant because I was absolutely positively certain that she would win.

And then when Erik was born, I found myself a bit baffled that HE was the cutest baby ever. Was I so fortunate as to procure from the heavens their two sweetest and loveliest babies of all time?

So I came to discover, as second-time mothers tend to do, that my kids are not really as cute and perfect as I think they are, and that's okay. My mind is all the wiser, but in my heart, they remain unbearably scrumptious.

It is miraculous to feel such a powerful array of euphoric emotions toward another human being (upon the birth of a first child), and then to have that feeling multiplied, never diminished, with each family addition.

Thus, Erik and Charlie may not enjoy all of the attention and novelty of the eldest child, but certainly that ridiculous amount of love I felt for Ellie as a newborn babe is precisely the same ridiculous love I have always and will always feel for my kiddos.

It is with this understanding that I justify my occasional venting about Charlie's special little behaviors. He drives people bonkers everywhere we go, sometimes including me, but many times, not so much. I love him the very most, after all.

If only you felt the way about him that I do when he puts me in a choke hold, scraping the flesh of my neck, yet believing whole-heartedly that he's tickling me.

Or the way he grabs his diaper and notifies me ("bee boo" = pee poo) when he's relieving himself or otherwise filling his diaper.

Or how he obediently chucks his nuk back into the crib after a nap, and then experiences immediate remorse, calling longingly for "nuh nuh" through the netting.

Or how you better watch yourself if you lay down because Charlie's got a diaper sandwich coming for your neck and/or face. Faces make the very best of chairs in his book.

Or the way he lets out violent squeals of protest and jealousy if I dare hold anything but him, including a camera, a book, a piece of fruit.

Or how he confuses "night-night" with "knock-knock" (which are both "nuh nuh," of course) and knocks on his head to bid us good night.

Or how he suddenly decided he doesn't really hate books and actually very much likes them (in 20-second intervals) and can often be found perched on the edge of a chair, legs dangling and kicking, flipping wildly through pages.

Or how he sticks his head between his legs waiting for a little push to finish off his somersault.

Or how he has a 50 world vocabulary, but pretty much all of those words start with b, d, or n.

Or the way he signifies thirst or recognizes a waterfall, a picture of a water buffalo, or the lobster tank at the grocery store with a loud gulp.

Or how he starts waving and emphatically bidding the cashier "bah bye" the moment I swipe my credit card.

Or how his onomatopoeia for pigs sounds like he's gagging and for horses and sheep it's a courtesy laugh.

Or how he slept in until 7 am today.

Yep, if only you felt the way about Charlie that I do, well... I daresay nothing else really matters.

A few more recipes from Dec-Jan

2011-02-15T21:10:00.000-08:00

Crispy Kale "Chips" taken from steamykitchen.com

The biggest secret to getting the kale super-crisp is to dry them in a salad spinner. If there is moisture on the leaves, the kale will steam, not crisp. Also, do not salt the kale until after they have come out of the oven. If you salt beforehand, the salt will just cause the kale to release moisture…thus steaming instead of crisping. I’ve also found that the convection setting on my oven works really well too – I set the convection on 325F and bake for about 10-15 minutes. Have fun with this recipe, I sometimes mix the salt with Cajun or Creole seasoning.

4 giant handfuls of kale, torn into bite-sized pieces and tough stems removed (about 1/3 pound)
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
sea salt or kosher salt

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

2. Place the kale leaves into a salad spinner and spin all of the water out of the kale. Dump the water and repeat one or two times more just to make sure that the kale is extra dizzy and dry. Use a towel to blot any extra water on the leaves. Place the kale on the baking sheet.

3. Drizzle olive oil over the kale leaves and use your hands to toss and coat the leaves. Bake in the oven for 12-20 minutes until leaves are crisp. Take a peek at the 12 minute mark – the timing all depends on how much olive oil you use. Just use a spatula or tongs to touch the leaves, if they are paper-thin crackly, the kale is done. If the leaves are still a bit soft, leave them in for another 2 minutes. Do not let the leaves turn brown (they’ll be burnt and bitter) Remove from oven, sprinkle with salt and serve.

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3

Actually, Ellie's direct quote was, "Mom, these are SO yummy that I want you to make them 100 times a day!" Later she suggested that we should make a new house out of kale chips so she could always, always eat them. So yeah. You better try them.

Corn pudding in acorn squash taken from 101cookbooks.com

I used an acorn squash here, but you can experiment with other types of squash if you like. And if aniseed and scallions aren't your thing, you might try do a version swapping in coconut milk and a bit of curry paste - and perhaps a cilantro drizzle?

Also, (important!) depending on the size of your squash you might have quite a bit of filling leftover - I ended up with double the amount I needed. That being said, I kept Karen's original milk/egg ratio intact here. I poured my leftovers into a buttered ramekin and baked that alongside the squash for a nice, light corn-flecked pudding. Or alternately, you might use a second squash.

1 small (2 lb.) acorn squash, cut in half lengthwise and seeded
1 tablespoon clarified butter or olive oil
1 cup milk
1 egg plus 2 egg whites
1/2 cup fresh corn kernels (or more if you like)
1/4 teaspoon anise seed, chopped
1/2 cup chopped scallions
a tiny pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon fine grain sea salt
1/3 cup grated white cheddar cheese

Preheat the oven to 375F degrees with a rack in the middle.

Rub the orange flesh of the squash with the butter/oil. Place cut side up on a baking sheet. You will want it to sit flat (and not tip), if you are having trouble just level out the bottom using a knife. If the squash is tilting on the pan, the filling will run out - bad news. Cover the squash with foil and bake for 40 minutes or until the squash starts to get tender.

In a bowl combine the milk, eggs, corn, anise seed, half of the scallions, nutmeg, and salt. Fill each of the squash bowls 3/4 full (see head notes about using leftovers). Carefully transfer the squash back to the oven without spilling (tricky!). Continue baking uncovered for another 30 - 50 minutes, or until the squash is fully cooked through, and the pudding has set. The amount of time it takes can vary wildly depending on the squash and oven. At the last minute sprinkle with cheese and finish with a flash under the broiler to brown the cheese. Keep and eye on things, you can go from melted cheese to burnt and inedible in a flash. Serve hot sprinkled with the remaining scallions.

Serves 4 - 6.

T2, El2, Er1, Ch2

The pudding took longer than expected to cook through, and then was insufficiently flavorful to diffuse yumminess into the squash. I love the idea of roasting soup inside acorn squash, but next time I will try a flavor-packed chili or curry.

Fennel Cucumber Salsa from allrecipes.com

Ingredients

1 English cucumber, diced
1 large fennel bulb, diced
1 avocado - peeled, pitted, and diced
1/2 red onion, chopped
1/2 cup pickled banana peppers, diced
1 bunch cilantro, chopped
2 tablespoons honey
3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
salt and pepper to taste

Directions

Combine the cucumber, fennel, avocado, red onion, banana peppers, cilantro, honey, lemon juice, salt, and pepper in a bowl. Allow mixture to sit 20 minutes before serving.

Brussel Sprout Pie from Inspired Vegetarian

Ehh, I'm not even going to bother transcribing this recipe because it was no good. The pic in my cookbook looked absolutely delectable, but it just wasn't. I'm on the lookout for a good comfort food veggie pot pie. I'll let you know when I find one.

Roasted turkey hoisin wraps from enlightenedcooking.blogspot.com

Hoisin sauce is the Chinese equivalent of bbq sauce—it adds tremendous flavor to these wraps, giving them a taste similar to Peking duck. You’ll find it where soy sauce is shelved in the grocery store.

2 cups roasted turkey cut into strips (I bought a 1/2 pound piece from the deli—unsliced—then cut into strips at home)
5 tablespoons bottled hoisin sauce, divided use
2 medium-size flour tortillas (regular or whole wheat)
1/2 of a seedless cucumber, roughly cut into thin strips
4 green onions (scallions), trimmed and roughly chopped
2 packed cups prewashed baby spinach

Combine the turkey and 2 tablespoons of the hoisin sauce in a medium microwave-safe bowl. Heat 30 seconds until warmed through. Place the tortillas on a dinner plate and heat in microwave 15-20 seconds until warm.

Spread the tortillas with the rest of the hoisin sauce, then use to wrap up turkeywith the cucumber, onions and watercress. Cut in half and enjoy while still warm. Makes 2 servings.

T2, El2, Er1, Ch1

Okay, these looked so good I impulsively went to the store just to buy some turkey, and getting off my lazy rear with all the kids for extra groceries is a big deal for me. However, after checking my hoisin sauce's ingredients, I disapproved, but it was too late. Also, I couldn't find roast turkey, so I bought one of those whole roasted chickens. I didn't use enough hoisin sauce. Chicken itself doesn't taste great to me anymore. And I used sprouted whole wheat tortillas, which weren't quite pliable enough to hold together. So... the recipe itself it probably great, but my tweaking rendered our experience less so.

Pineapple quinoa pilaf

I based my pineapple salsa off of the following from allrecipes.com, and then mixed it into quinoa and seasoned to taste.

Ingredients

1/4 cup fresh lime juice
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons soy sauce
3 tablespoons shallots, chopped
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 cup diced pineapple
2 large plum tomatoes, diced
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
salt and pepper to taste
4 (6 ounce) fillets salmon
1/2 cup chicken broth
lemon pepper to taste

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
Whisk together lime juice, olive oil, soy sauce, shallots, and sugar. Stir in the pineapple, tomatoes, and basil. Season with salt and pepper. Cover, and refrigerate. Remove from refrigerator 10 to 15 minutes before serving.
Place salmon in a 9x13-inch pan. Pour chicken broth over the top, and sprinkle with lemon pepper.
Bake in a preheated oven until fish flakes easily with a fork, about 30 to 40 minutes. Serve with salsa on the side.

T3, El3, Er3, Ch2

Eggplant marinara in whole wheat pitas

I had an eggplant to use up, so all I did was slice it and dip the slices first in an all-natural marinara sauce and then in a bread crumb mix (panko, bread crumbs, garlic powder, Italian seasoning) and baked them maybe 15 minutes (?) until browned. I spread pesto inside the pitas and stuffed the eggplant in there with fresh spinach. Only problem with pitas is that they don't hold much. Next time I will layer the eggplant in a sandwich, or just eat plain, which is what the kids and I did for lunch the next day. I find that if I attach the label "chips" to pretty much any food, they come running. This is my new favorite way to eat eggplant.

T3, El3, Er3, Ch2

Asparagus cream crepes

The first time I made this, I roasted the asparagus with butter, salt, and garlic powder until yummy-looking. I mixed about 4 oz cream cheese with 4 oz mozzarella cheese and some parmesan and seasonings and spread that inside whole-wheat crepes, and filled with the asparagus. Too hard to eat-- the asparagus is especially tricky to bite through for kids.

So, my second time (when I didn't have cheese-loving guests to satisfy), I used only the second half of the cream cheese bar with some non-dairy milk, garlic, and seasonings. I chopped the asparagus and stir fried with mushrooms. Obviously, not as cheesy, but still very yummy, although still hard to eat as the veggies didn't stay in at all. Overall, I love the concept of savory-filled crepes. I will keep experimenting, next time sans cheese completely.

Oh, and I used the whole-wheat crepe recipe from enlightenedcooking.blogspot.com

T3, El3, Er3, Ch1 (E&E LOVE asparagus plain, so adding cheese makes 'em go crazy!)

Cheesy Spinach Filo Roll taken loosely from Inspired Vegetarian

1. cook 1 lb spinach until wilted; drain excess liquid
2. saute 1 chopped onion until soft, remove from heat and add spinach
3. add 6 oz ricotta cheese, plus feta or parmesan or whatever cheese you have, plus some seasonings of choice
4. layer five filo sheets down, brushing with oil or butter between each layer
5. spread the filling, leaving a 1 inch border, then roll it up and brush top with more oil
6. bake, seam side down, at 375 for 30 min until golden brown

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3 (I made this when Bob and Mom were in town, and it certainly had enough cheese in it to please all. It's not something I would make for just my family, but was a special treat.)

Coconut panna cotta

Total time: 15 minutes, plus 4 hours chilling time

Servings: 6

Note: From "Hawaii Cooks," by Roy Yamaguchi (Ten Speed Press, $32.50)

-2 envelopes granular gelatin

-6 tablespoons water

-2 cups coconut milk

-1 1/4 cups heavy cream (I used coconut cream, which is so wonderfully thick)

-3/4 cup sugar ("stevia in the raw" is my new fave sweetener-- somehow it's all-natural, not sure how...)

-1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

-Fresh fruit, diced, for garnish (I used fresh pineapple and raspberries with a little canned peaches and fresh mint leaves, but of course any tropical-ish fruit will do)

1. In a small bowl, combine the gelatin with the water until softened.

2. In a small saucepan, combine the coconut milk, cream, sugar and vanilla. Place over medium heat and warm until hot to the touch (about 110 degrees). Add the gelatin and stir until dissolved.

3. Pour into 6 (6-ounce) ramekins or custard cups. Cover and refrigerate for 4 hours, or until set.

4. Serve garnished with fresh fruit.

T3, El1, Er3, Ch3 (Turns out Ellie doesn't like coconut. Weird. Anyway, it's basically jello, but a very healthful version. Yes, I realize coconuts are loaded with saturated fat, and I happen to still believe they are fabulously healthful! I try to consume coconut in at least one form every day.)

Lemon Cream sauce from Inspired Vegetarian (which is a remote cookbook I own but generally do not recommend-- too fancy aka exorbitant for my tastes)

1. combine 1 c broth (even water from cooking veggies will do) and 1 T cornstarch or flour and bring to a boil, stirring until sauce thickens slightly; add 2 t sugar and remove from heat and cool slightly
2. beat 2 egg yolks with juice of 1.5 lemons and stir gradually into sauce
3. cook over very low heat, stirring all the time, until sauce is fairly thick --don't overheat or it will curdle
4. remove from heat, still stirring a minute, and add salt and sugar to taste

T3, El3, Er3, Ch3 (My kids will eat anything over pasta. I love the idea of a creamy lemon sauce, but I think I'll try a more straightforward one next time.)

Gluten Free BBQ Sauce from Elanaspantry.com

2 tablespoons grapeseed oil
3 cloves garlic, crushed
¼ cup shallots, minced
1 (7 ounce) bottle Bionaturæ Organic Tomato Paste
1 cup orange juice, fresh squeezed
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
½ teaspoon dry mustard powder
½ teaspoon smoked paprika
1 teaspoon celtic sea salt
¼ teaspoon black pepper

Warm oil in a saucepan over medium low heat
Add garlic and shallot; cook until soft
Add tomato paste, orange juice, vinegar, mustard, paprika, salt and pepper
Simmer over low heat 15 to 20 minutes, stirring often
Baste over fish or chicken
Refrigerate and allow to marinate for 1-3 hours
Grill and serve

Serves 6 -makes enough sauce for one whole chicken or 4 breasts

T3, El3, Er2, Ch2

I added sundried tomatoes and used this sauce with beans and fresh raw veggies rolled in tortillas. It was plenty sweet, although lacks any of the smoky flavor of traditional barbecue sauces. But with no expectations of barbecue flavor, it makes a great naturally-sweetened tomato sauce.

babies

2011-02-13T21:00:00.000-08:00

Recently Charlie's adopted an obsession with babies. This is normal for toddlers, I know, but still shocking that he was excited to see me hold my friend's baby. He squeals "beh-beh beh-beh beh-beh!" pointing emphatically at every carseat, stroller, and even the occassional two or three-year-old. So, maybe he doesn't actually know what babies are.

Still, it's pretty encouraging to see him do things like this:

No wait. I was supposed to insert an irresistible picture of Charlie cradling a baby doll in his arms. Can't find it, but I promise it did happen!

We're pretty sure Charlie wanted to be some couple's only child. Despite being quite the attention-monger, he just never gets enough lovin. Thus, the addition of a smaller, even snugglier life form might provoke some mighty unpleasant scenes in our world. But, maybe I'm wrong. I hope I'm wrong.

Erik, on the same hand, approached Kyle the other day and suggested that he sure would like to have a baby sister! I swear I did nothing to compel him to have such feelings or utter such utterings!

Ellie has naturally been begging for a sister for some time.

All the while, I am absolutely anything but baby-hungry. I don't even really like babies. I don't swoon when I pass a cute one in a buggy. I have no desire to hold babies (perhaps because I still hold mine all day?). Nothing personal, really. I realize they're very cute and that I can respect. I'll just take a toddler over a baby any day.

It's not that I haven't loved my babies like other mamas do, of course. I just haven't enjoyed that first year of their lives as much as every. other. year. Hmmmm, perhaps circumstances explain some of this? During Ellie's first year of life I was finishing my college degree full-time. Erik's first year of life was blanketed by the hazy gray skies of Tianjin living plus post-partum depression. Charlie's first year would make any woman consider a hysterectomy. So, I'm not such a bad mom after all, right?

It doesn't matter. None of this matters because in the end, or rather, in the beginning, each child must be a baby. I will deal. Babies can't be all that bad because they do turn into children, and them I love very, very much.

Actually, even less than none of this matters. I am no Madonna or Angelina Jolie as baby hoarding is concerned, and Kyle.... let's just say that about the only way I'll be getting a baby any day soon is if that diaper I planted in the backyard really starts sprouting babies. Yeah, you better watch this sketch.

new year resolutions and other stuff

2011-02-11T19:50:00.000-08:00

-Remember that time when it was New Year's Day? Well, I made myself a resolution here and there. Let's get it down in type form to solidify my commitment to a better 2011.

1. be more punctual
2. go to bed earlier
3. get me and kids into a daily household chore routine

A short and practical list, right? Number one is pretty heavy, though. It's going to take allllll year to make some headway on that one.

-Ellie's sporting a new smile for the next couple of years.

Don't feel too sorry for her. She was ecstatic to get a visit from the tooth fairy, complete with eight quarters and a hand-written note. Turns out the tooth fairy's fancy handwriting strikes a resemblance to my own chicken scratch... (how does a five-year-old notice that?)

The other front tooth is loose, but was salvageable. For now. That girl is quite the little putz so it's only a matter of time before the next collision finishes it off.

-Busy week over here, but good and productive. On Wednesday I threw a little Valentine's Day shindig for Thunderkids and fams. As of late, I'm in charge of weekly activities for Thunderbird students' kids and the moms. It's been a challenge to forego indulgence in all those party planning details that make me giddy, but I'm determined to make this a manageable responsibility. Actually, for the first time in a very long time, I don't think I have an unhealthy obsession with some corner of domesticity right now.

-I mean, I'm still going strong on the plant food business, but that's around to stay, and it's not taking any extra time. Except for this past week, that is. Last night I hosted a mini-class on healthy eating for ladies in my ward. I spent a few too many [hundred] hours perusing recipes in preparation for this class. I was actually quite nervous about the whole ordeal. It's not easy to make meat-less, dairy-less food look and sound appetizing to omnivores!

Of course, the only type of person who would show up to such an event is a bit more primed to the idea of vegetarianism than your average Kyle, for instance. So, I think it went well. I still likely came off extreme in my dietary philosophy, but there was some good discussion and taste-testing and the regular hullabaloo that makes a social event worthwhile.

And I remain just as convinced as I was six months ago that this will be a permanent lifestyle for me. I just can't imagine going back to my previous diet ever again. Not now that I feel as good as I do.