InstaFriday

Saturday night.  My (early) birthday dinner out with our friends.  I had been CRAVING some wasabi (LOVE the blissful burn paired with the tang of the ginger) so everyone joined us at Osaka.  Deeeelicious!

Following dinner, only the real warriors that ALWAYS have room for dessert (pretty much just me & Jill - haha!), drove down the street for some Cold Stone.  My usual is the Coffee Lovers:  coffee ice cream, Heath chunks, chopped almonds and caramel drizzle.  Uh huh.

Craig spent a bit of Sunday prepping four pair of skis for upcoming use.  Why do we each need two pair you might ask?  Um... because that's how my husband works.  He's a chronic overpacker and always prepares for the worst case scenario when taking a trip - big or small.  "What if something breaks?"  "What if we lose one?"  The reality is: it didn't and we didn't.  Two of the pairs just came along for the ride without every being used.

Part of the prepping involved waxing the bottoms.  He does this every time before he skis.  The wax coat is just a lubricant for the bottoms - he melts it on with an iron (he has an iron just for this job) and then spreads it all around with the hot iron.  He also bought some special protective tape for the tops of the skis to avoid scratches and whatnot.  Craig is SUUUPER meticulous about caring for his things.  Sometimes it borders on the annoying, but mostly I love it about him.  :)

Meanwhile, Little Miss and I spent some time fancying up her fingers and toes.  Sophie's been begging and begging me to "put polish on her nails".  She always calls it "polish" and often takes note of mine and compliments it:  "I like your polish, mommy!"  But this is only the second time I've ever done it for her.  (Although the grandmothers have done it a few times.)  I used a soft, subtle pink-nude called Dear Diary (OPI) and it looked really cute.

Bring it, Leandro!  Sunday's late morning workout. 

Arms full of children, reading The Gruffalo's Child (one of our new library books).  Happiness.

Will has mastered the second grade sight words list.  Ready to move on!

Sophie wanted to return the favor later that afternoon.  ;-)  I now have a glittery pink on my toenails... err... skin.  Ha!

Craig's in the planning stages of building me something for my birthday.  Can't wait!  I saw the idea on Pinterest and he insisted he could design it better than that.  He's got a lot of extra work on his schedule (like, the paid kind of work - haha!) coming up, so it may be awhile before he finishes.  But it's going to be awesome.  Love him!

Love at first coat!  Zoya Tru.  Kind of a goldish shimmer to this deep grapey-plum.

School lunch packing at a glance.  We heart our Planet Boxes!  An invaluable investment.

Chicken tortilla soup with chipotle and fire-roasted tomatoes.  Toppings for this soup include:  raw, red onion, cilantro, crisped bacon pieces and a wedge of lime.  DIVINE!!

What's For Dinner? Week 4

{Week of January 19-25}

I knew this week was going to fly by.  We'd made the preparations for the kids and the dog to stay with my parents while we were in New York and everything about their days would go on as usual, save for the dinner, bath and bedtime at Nana & Papa's.  Sophie still went to the babysitter's during the day and anything school-related (homework, lunch packing, school library books, clothes picked out and packed) was taken care of for both.  I also packed up some raw fruits and veggies, several pb&j's and some cookies & snack foods for Craig and I too.  I knew it would be handy to have those things for breakfast and lunch instead of the ridiculously-priced lodge food or the Burger King that was right by the slopes.  We planned to eat dinner out of course, but I hate eating every meal out.  It was very helpful.

So for dinner this week, I only planned two meals for the beginning of the week:
1) creamy grilled chicken piccata (found on Pinterest)
2) Rachael Ray's chicken tortilla soup with chipotle and fire roasted tomato (see picture in my InstaFriday post coming shortly)

I've made both several times before.  Especially the tortilla soup - that's one of my faves and I've made it for years.

InstaFriday

Warning:  this post is sort of dominated with talk of nail polish.  Haha!

Sophie will often float into the kitchen and ask to help with whatever I'm doing.  Saturday mornings pretty much always include a pancake breakfast for us.  On this particular Saturday, whole wheat oatmeal pancakes were in the works, so she took over the whisking.

Jammin' to Party Rock on the way to the library.  I think we've been watching a little too much Chipmunk movies.  The kids know soooo many more songs!

Don't think I instagrammed this one, but I love their contrasting expressions.  Such a beautiful weather morning!  Soph has on her new rain/spring jacket.

A solid game of Dora Memory while I get dinner going in the crock pot.  I heart lazy Sundays!  And having Craig around to play with the kids while I get work done is WONDERFUL!  Side note:  you'll notice that Will and Craig ALWAYS have on a red shirt for their lay around clothes... and usually the same ones every time.  Will's Under Armor t-shirt and Craig's either North Face or OSU sweatshirt.  Seriously, guys.  Branch out a little bit.  Try, say, blue for a change!

This game is tricky but Sophie's determination is unwavering.  Mad skillz.  :)  I think she's gonna' excel in math.  Craig and I sometimes get into an intense Winomino match when this is out.  So fun!

It's been a few months now and my basil plant is... thriving, if not hearty.  I'm shocked and proud at once. This is the longest I've kept something alive besides my kids.  Maybe the vegetable gardens have turned around my terrible luck with house plants too?

I've been on the hunt for an emerald green nail polish.  Not sure this is exactly what I had in mind (this is more forest), but I still dig it.  OPI - Jade is the New Black. 

I think I've mentioned before that I have a co-worker who's obsession and collection of nail polish FAR exceeds mine.  She claims to have created a monster after seeing my sudden interest. Haha!  And although my boss doesn't paint hers regularly, she admires and discusses our new daily colors with us.  :)  So, although in the hospital bold colors might be frowned upon, our little office is openly accepting.  And slowly everyone is converting into polish-aholics.

Bahahahahaha!!!  Amen!! 

Sophie was the special helper again this week. Craig went with her for the second time and they had a great day.  I made some carrot apple coconut mini muffins and sliced up some apples for them to take for snack.

Preschool Special Helpers! 

Oh, vomit!  After seeing a really cool acid-y gold on Whitney Cummings on her Wednesday night sitcom (she always has great nails on that show, btw), I'd been on the lookout for a similar color.  So I tried this OPI shade and HATE IT!!  But in an effort not to have completely wasted my time, I left it just for one day and walked around with what looks like bile at the ends of my fingers.  An emergency polish change was scheduled for that very night.  I passed on the whole bottle to another co-worker who actually looked much better in it and determined that my skin tone is just not meant to compliment acid yellow gold.

But never fear!  All sorts of happiness arrived in a box that day!!  Have you heard of Zoya?  They're a Cleveland-based brand that uses cleaner ingredients and removes a lot of the bad chemicals in polish.  They're also designed specifically for natural nails (not artificial like some other brands).  Zoya polish was awarded for their long wearing formula, but that doesn't really matter much to me because I voluntarily change it about every 2-3 days.  Plus, I LOVE all their colors!!!!  Madly in love.  

With this particular order, they had been offering a New Years special where you could get three "free" bottles of polish for the price of $10 shipping (shipping is not normally that much though).  But if you spent $25, you'd get free shipping.  Their colors are usually $8/bottle, so I chose four more, spent $32 + tax, and got 7 bottles of polish and a free 2oz bottle of their remover to try.  OMG - best remover ever.  Even with glitter polish, it's all like difficulty-who?  It has a more pleasant scent and removes all layers with ease.  Will be buying more!

First trial and a HUGE improvement to the previous bile color:  Zoya Bevin.  Ahhh... so much better. 

Sophie:  "I look just a little bit fabulous." 

Shades.  A necessity for bath, no? 

Love is in the air.  Literally.  We heart Valentine's Day! 

What's For Dinner? Week 3

{Week of January 12-18}

I'm finding it easiest to make up a pot of soup on the weekend (usually something I like that my family doesn't prefer) and just pack it for lunch most of the week.  I am never opposed to leftovers and soup is so easy and comforting in the winter.  So this week, I made black bean soup with cilantro lime cream.  It's easy to make and soooo good.  Then I just throw in some apple slices, maybe some sliced cheese or some crackers or something, and a cookie.  The soup is surprisingly filling.

On the dinner menu this week:
1) Crock pot Hungarian beef goulash from Many Makings.
2) Tacos with some homemade, chunky salsa.  I know it's winter, but I was craving some of the fresh stuff.  The tomatoes on the vine at Meijer are my favorite through the winter time.
3) Hot ham and cheese sandwiches usually with some raw veggies and some chips or pretzels.  I smear a mixture of the following onto both sides of the bun:  mayo and mustard with some super-finely-diced onion and a little garlic powder.  Then layer some sliced ham and cheese and wrap in foil.  Pop in the toaster oven just long enough to warm throughout and melt the cheese.  Yum.

Homestead Randoms

A bunch of random photos from our meanderings around the house.  Nothing terribly exciting.  But the reality of our down time... minus the cooking and laundry and cleaning and, and, and...

 

New Years morning pancakes.  Don't laugh... I don't think oatmeal pancake batter was meant to be piped through a sandwich bag.  Hindsight...

A little game playin'. 

Brain Quest is super fun for the Kindergarten and up set!  Soph's a little young yet.

This pose Will's got going on cracks me up.  He looks like a little man!  And just like his daddy.

While we played Brain Quest at the table, Sophie was busy with her kitchen and serving us multiple cups of tea with cookies.

Concentrating on one of Will's encyclopedias with the magic pen that reads her the facts.

Independent pottier.  Never thought we'd see the day.  And I know this is TMI, but she's so quick with her poos now!  It used to take her FOREVER to relax and just go. 

Done???  Yep!

 

A typical evening...

Homework first.

 Dinner then bath.

Last minute play time.

Teeth brushing. 

And, um, checking to make sure you can't see any sugar on them???

Followed by books, prayers & kisses goodnight.

 

Another frequent evening occurence: 

Step 1) walk in door.

Step 2) beeline for dress up drawer and put on tutu.

All her dress up stuff gets shoved into one big drawer for her easy access and this poor tutu has been so well worn and loved that it's all scrunched and tangled.  Note the discarded sparkly ballet slipper and tiara.

Reading Charlie and Lola to little sister.

Pop-up books rock.

And that's about it!  It's been pretty quiet around here.  No complaints from us!