Sanity Saver

 We were in charge of feeding the missionaries for their Zone Conference a few weeks ago.  30+ Elders, 2 Sisters, a couple of Senior Missionaries.  Pork roasts went on sale, so we decided to do my personal favorite: Cafe Rio meat with Jalapeno Cilantro Ranch dressings, rice, beans, and colorful marshmallow salad.  Was great fun!  We prepared and were set up and waited until their training meetings were over.  Sister Sorenson (the Mission President's wife) came to get us.  The missionaries all stood to sing their Cleveland, Ohio special song: Army of Helaman with special verses at the end as a thank you.  It was just incredible!!!  I held Emily (Mitchell was sleeping by the kitchen) and she pointed out to me all the missionaries that we know.  It was so great to serve!!!

 Fast forward to nighttime!!!!
 There was a special deal on a cooking class, so with a few hours notice, some friends and I signed up for an evening out!  We had to pick a class time that would work with three busy wives nad three busy husbands, but we finally found one!

 Heather, Marianne and I spent an evening in Jennifer's Kitchen sampling *and helping prep* the following recipes: Spinach Salad with Sautéed Mushrooms, Aged Gouda, and Walnut Balsamic Vinaigrette (my favorite part of the night - I learned how to better saute mushrooms *in duck fat!*)  The salad was completely delightful!!!

 Marianne playing with Mitchell while we chatted amongst ourselves during a tedious part of the evening.  He was the first baby our chef had ever had at a class (really?!?) in all her years of cheffing, and he was absolutely (mostly) perfect - including quietly falling asleep towards the end of the night!

 I helped knead the dough for Homemade Buttered Noodles.  Heather learned to cut them and use a nice sharp Hinkel...lucky!

 Braised Beef Short Ribs with Red Wine and Rosemary - this was good, but not worth the time, although it did have chocolate in it!  Was very tender and tasty and I learned about making the celery/onion/carrot mixture that goes in most French dishes, although I don't have my recipes and notes right next to me to remind me of what it is called...

 And the crown of the evening: Julia Child’s Clafouti Aux Pommes   Yes, I made *watched someone make* a Julia Child recipe.  And, I'm pretty sure I could do it again - although I don't know that I would make this one.  It was good, but not quite in line with my taste buds.  Fabulous evening - we enjoyed Jennifer's Kitchen and would love to go back again!!!!  (Come on Living Social - do another deal!)



A Name! A Name! He finally has a name!

 Aunt Jamie came for the long President's Day weekend and for Mitchell's baby blessing.  We had lots of fun and Jamie loved Ohio sooooo much that she extended her trip for another day!

Baby Blessing - In the LDS church, a baby blessing is similar in importance to a christening.  It's a special day for the baby/family and performed in front of the congregation by someone holding the proper Priesthood authority (Andy in this case).  The child is given a name and a blessing.

Above, Ben was keeping Mitchell happy for me.  Here, he's had a shower and is waiting patiently for Mom to get him dressed.  Mitchell found his fingers this week and alternates which fingers he likes to suck on.  My favorite is his hand gripping his hair - yes, he fell asleep just a few short minutes later!

Here is our cute little family - with Aunt Jamie and Miss Linda (our fabulous next door neighbor).  Mitchell slept for most of our Sacrament service and was not all that thrilled to be woken up for pictures!

 This is the most typical family picture -- Emily touching Mitchell's head, Mitchell pulling Annie's hair, Ben squeezing Mitchell's leg and Andy and I trying to keep everyone together!  I've learned that two or three is the most pictures I can hope for with kids being cheerful - it gets extremely painful after that if we aren't with a professional!

 Loving on our baby!  This boy gets so many kisses each day!

 Aunt Jamie and Mitchell - he's the most awake here!

 And proof that he really does smile!  This was our happy boy after a real nap in his bed.  This little hat is almost too small as Mitchell's head is a little on the large side - you just can't tell because he has so much hair covering it!  (On a side note - last weekend we took the kids to the local high school's production of Beauty and the Beast.  A few kids from church were in it and one was in the orchestra pit.  As we walked from the front of the auditorium to our seats near the back, there were constant twitters of, "look at that hair!"  It was really funny - most of the time I just pretend not to hear, unless I'm ready to engage in conversation.  I only had 3 people that night ask his age and if I had heartburn during my pregnancy.)

 Fake-Baked Alaska Cake!  I have been looking at this recipe in on of my Pampered Chef cookbooks for 4 years now, but it just looked so hard to make.  I reasoned that since Mitchell didn't have a big family and friend dinner to celebrate his blessing, I would take extra care with dessert.  It wasn't hard at all!  I loved it, Andy adored it, Kids really enjoyed it, and Jamie thought it was okay but didn't want another piece.  You must like Cool Whip to enjoy this recipe...and cream cheese...and butter...and cake...and chocolate...and powdered sugar.  Again, I loved it!

 Monday we went to Pump it Up with a fabulous Groupon that I bought (3for1) so the kids could run out some energy!  It started barely snowing when we got there.  Two hours later, it was almost blizzard conditions.  We stopped at the grocery store because we were out of milk and Jamie got the call that her flight was delayed and she would miss her connection and to please call to reschedule her flight.  She got to stay a whole other day and enjoy this beautiful snow!!!

Our family believes in sharing, so I let Jamie share the joys of snow-shoveling with me!  There was a LOT of snow.  We shoveled together twice (Miss Linda from next door helped us the second time - we gave her some cake as a thanks!) and I went out one more time while she put the kids to bed.  I'm pretty sure the Camry wouldn't have made it through!  Thanks for a fun visit and all the snow help!  We're so glad we have our little guy!

Snuggly Bug

This sweet baby.  We just all love him so much.  This is my favorite time - just as he wakes up and gives his first hugs.  He isn't a cuddly guy, unless he is completely wiped out or it's first thing in the morning.  Snuggles lasts all of 5 minutes, so it is such a precious time - which I don't like to share!  I just got back some pictures a friend took when he was 2 1/2 weeks.  Prepare to drool over this little guy - what a charmer!  Coming soon when I have more time...

Fun on an Icy Driveway

It wasn't super cold, but they wanted to play outside.  Yippee!!!!

 We bundled Mitchell up and set him happily in his duck.  Then the fun began!

 Ben had a little friend over.  Miranda is in the bright green.  The kids all loved her!

On your mark...

 I LOVE the huge smile on Emily's face here!

 Such ghetto fun - sliding on an icy driveway...for a LONG time!  It was great. We quite entertained our neighbor as well!

 I think I need to blow this picture up!

 Oh, the joys of falling on your backside...over and over and over again!

 We tried the snow activities the next day - this time with sleds!  Although some people didn't want to put on snow clothes...

 The consequences of playing on the ice without snow gear...such a sad little face.  Ice HURTS!

 Ben getting cocky!

 Okay - this is the cutest little boy (until Mitchell gets to be 2 years old) and he just melts my heart.  He loves the snow.  Of the pictures I took this day, more than half are of my little Miles!

Book, Anyone?

This is how we read books these days - this is during a calm moment where Annie and Emily have decided to coexist happily. It always works better if I catch them before they are too tired... Sadly most nights have gone out the window for books recently - unless Andy is home to help with bedtime. That is when Mitchell needs just Mom; I think we need to move books to mornings while the youngest sleeps in!

A Quiet Sunday Afternoon

The kids love Sunday afternoon, where we don't have to go anywhere. They get into a groove playing and just enjoy our time. Ben is playing happily and quietly (with humming) with all those lovely little Legos! This kiddo is so amazingly creative! I think he was making a dentist office that day - a nice change from the battle scenes that he typically creates! This can last hours if we don't interrupt him.

I went shopping with a friend to a store called The Flower Factory. She wanted to get some things to make her daughter a mobile. That is one of the things that hasn't survived from our other kids, so I bought some butterflies to make Mitchell one. I just used white sewing thread to tie it to an embroidery hoop. He loves it and gets great big eyes when I put him in the crib (as opposed to his bassinet). Annie told me I needed to make him a 'boy' one because butterflies are for girls. Tough Luck - this boy will like butterflies! Besides, they start as caterpillars and those are VERY boyish!

Andy went out to shovel - Emily wanted to go with him.

Valentine's was the next day, and I wanted to make a special treat for my Valentine: Strawberry Shortcake, his favorite! I found a (supposedly) fabulous recipe that needs to be made 2 days prior to serving it. Friday night I made the shortcake (with 3 sticks of butter!!!) and wrapped it for storage in the fridge. Sunday afternoon Annie helped me cut up 2 pounds of strawberries to sprinkle with sugar. Then we started to make the whipping cream. It wasn't working. Did I add too much sugar or not enough??? I added a dash of vanilla because I like that. Andy thought maybe that was why it wasn't whipping. I checked Google and vanilla is completely allowed and shouldn't make a difference. I gave up. Andy took over and tried whipping it in the blender. After almost an hour - we realized I bought light cream - NOT light whipping cream. Oops! After 5 calls to friends, no one had whipping cream, so we delayed our strawberry shortcake until the Monday (when Andy gets home after 10pm).

Emily thinks Mitchell is her personal buddy and he needed to be rocked. Not much seems to phase him anymore. :)

Lesson learned: do not play on treadmill (after Mom has said 'NO" at least 6 million times), especially not when Annie is already on it. The treadmill will throw you off and rip off the top layer of your skin...

Monday - our friends came over. This is little Gwen, whom we all love to squeeze - almost as much as our little Mitchell. They have become buddies too - just like their mommies!

My Sweet Valentines

Really are many pictures cuter that this?  Love.  Love.  LOVE kids in towels after a bath!!!

 Growing up, we always made Valentine's Chocolates.  When my parents redid their kitchen a few years back, I inherited the molds.  This is the first year we have pulled them out, and the kids did fantastic!!!  This is definitely one baking project we will continue; it doesn't take forever and it makes a ton so they are easy to share!

What a bunch of sweethearts!!!

Baby, It's Cold Inside!

We had a big ice storm one night (after having a snow day). By 2:30am, all four children were in our room...joy! Ben was freezing - the clock wasn't working, so I figured the power was out. (I'm just brilliant in the middle of the night!) After feeding Mitchell, I couldn't go back to sleep and made all kinds of plans for how we would survive without power for a few days. (Last time this happened, people were out 3-5 days). I had it all worked out and could finally get back to sleep around 4:30.

We were doing puzzles upstairs (covered in blankets) around 10am, when we got a call from the Relief Society President in our ward at church - asking if we had power. Andy checked our thermostat - 56 degrees! It was so cold! We thought about packing up some stuff and going to the church. No power there! Andy and I had a little conversation about staying home versus going elsewhere. I was all for staying home and had to be convinced that our children cannot regulate body temperatures, it would just keep getting colder in our house, we don't want anyone to get so cold they can't warm up, and did I remember that we have a tiny baby that we need to keep warm?

So, we finally knelt to have a family prayer to decide. After the prayer we all agreed that we needed to go somewhere with power (temp dropped to 55 during those ten minutes). We called Sis. Dayton back and said we would love to come and crash at their place for a bit! And how do I know that prayers and concerns are answered? While we were downstairs (in the dark basement) packing clothes (that didn't end up matching, oh well!), we got phone calls from three other church members offering their homes to us, as well as one from a neighbor suggesting we find somewhere to stay.

Wow! The people here sure make the winters bearable! Here are a few reasons why my children (Andy included) were thrilled with the situation:

1. They love Sister Dayton.
2. They love Sister Dayton's toys.
3. They love the Daytons' pool table.
4. They love the Daytons' Wii.
5. The Daytons have wireless for Andy to connect to work/school (poor guy couldn't even call the school to check for classes because the internet was down because it comes through the phone which is portable and needs to be plugged in; he was so stressed not having internet access for such a LONG time!!!!).
6. Sis. Dayton loves to spoil everyone - me included (she let me make my favorite Ranch dip!!!).

I could keep going on and on; suffice it to say, the blow up mattresses were a hit, the games were exceptional and we felt very at home. Andy loved hanging out with President Dayton - and we even got some good actual "lawyering" talk in.

We spent some time the next day doing Relief Society visits while kids were in school and then swung by our house to get clothes for the next day. Want to know how well our house is insulated? It was 36 degrees!!! I guess I didn't need to worry about the food spoiling! I came back from picking up the kids after school to hot homemade (by Emily and Sis. Dayton) bread and honey-butter as an after school snack. Thanks so much Pres. and Sis. Dayton!!!! We love you both!

It was a great big silver lining to what could have been a very drastic situation. We are so glad that Heavenly Father often answers our prayers through other people!!!

Making Valentine's Boxes

February has been brutal with weather here this year. We had a snow day and spent most of it making Valentine's Boxes (after a morning of cleaning!). I got out a bunch of supplies and let the kids get creative. We had paper, stickers, a sticker maker, glue, and the beloved markers! Emily was thrilled with the availability!

Annie's box turned out really cute! However, we found out AFTER we'd created the boxes that her class was making bags for them to share their Valentine's. Oh well - it is now a storage box for her 'special' things!

Ben decided he needed a pirate theme! It was so fun to see all the different ideas the kids had! Then we went into Ben's class for his party and I realized how simple our little boxes were. :0

An overview - and proof that Mitchell got to participate!!! Dad was studying/working on this snow day!

Say CHEESE

Just some cute smiley kiddos wanting to say HI today!!!!

Secondary Source

My cute niece is doing a project for school - a biography about my mom (someone still alive and sane enough to recall memories). I was her secondary source.

Q1: What is your favorite memory of your mom?

Oh, what to choose! I’m tearing up just thinking back through them! I think my favorite memory is Mom making grilled cheese sandwiches late at night when Roy would get home from football practice or a game. We would all hang out in the kitchen and chat – at a time much later than I should have been up. She would make me one too, if I asked. I just loved hanging out together – no competition, just enjoying being together.

Q2: Did your mom play with you and come to activities that you were in?

Mom didn’t really play with me – that’s why I had a sister! (However, she plays AWESOME with my kids now!) BUT – she was at everything that I was involved in: choir concerts, sports games, balsa wood competitions, pictures before dances, banquets – everything! It wasn’t even a question to me; how she sat through some of those l.o.n.g. boring games, I will never know!

Q3: Did your mom ever take you on trips? where?

We did trips to visit family throughout my childhood: one summer to Utah to visit mom’s family – the next to Florida to visit Mike’s family. We just knew that alternating years was the plan. We took a few trips in high school to San Antonio to watch Roy play football and eat at the most amazing Mexican Restaurant.

Q4: Did she ever forget about something that you were in that was important to you? What was it?

She didn’t really forget, per se, but she wasn’t able to fulfill the entire day: my 16th birthday. I realllllllllly wanted to get my driver’s license that exact day (I was one of the very youngest in my grade and one of the LAST to be able to drive) and had to wait until the next day – it felt like an eternity.

Q5: Is there any memories that you can think of that were embarrassing about your mom or something that she did?

I’m sure she was embarrassing at some point growing up, but she did a great job being around but not too involved. All my friends knew her and talked to her, but I can’t remember her ever outright embarrassing me. I was always pretty proud to be her daughter! One of my favorite things was to introduce her to my friends – “this is my mom, Mrs. Doerk.” They would always do a double take. I had a friend in elementary school named Julie. She introduced my mom (Mrs. Doerk) to her mom. Her mom got so mad at her for calling mom names! It took about 10 minutes of us all convincing her that really was mom’s last name. It made it fun!

Oh, I did just think of something. If I had been on the phone for a long time (typically with a boy), she would pick up the phone and say, “Lindsey, I need to use the phone.” That was as embarrassing as it got!

Q6: When you needed help on something did she think that she knew it but turns out that was not right? What was that?

Hahaha! That would be math and English – thankfully I had Nancy around to help explain! Mom would say they didn’t teach math that far when she was in school (more was discovered and solved after she graduated); I think she just took too many days off school to ski!

Q7: Did she like to embarrasses her kids for fun? About what?

Nope – I think she was proud of us. However, if it was just family around, she, Nancy, and Jamie liked to tease me about blossoming into a woman. Punks!

Q8: Did your mom make you do a instrument that you did not want to do? What instrument?

No, she didn’t. I really wanted to take piano lessons. However, the older kids (Rusty, Nancy and Roy) took them and rebelled. She decided it was too much work to get kids to practice and it wasn’t worth the battle anymore, so she said no. However, I am taking them now and love them! My teacher loves me because I am taking them because I want to and not because I have to.

Q9: How did your mom solve sticky situations?

I don’t know. I was never in any sticky situations…I was a perfect child (at least in my mind)! However, watching her from a more grown-up position, these are the things I have seen her do:
1. Pray
2. Discuss with Mike
3. Pray
4. Get educated about the situation
5. Pray – go to the temple
6. Make decision and act on it!
She doesn’t really discuss anything ‘sticky’ with anyone, except Mike, until she’s made a decision. Then we are informed.

Q10: Whats the thing that you love most about your mom?

Her complete love for me and my children. Her dedication to do what’s right, even if she doesn’t want to. Giving her opinion about what I should do, but then supporting whatever decision that I make. (Andy likes that she trusts him with stuff.)

It's the Little Things...

*Sigh* Most days are the same around here. Hurry through breakfast. Hurry through scriptures. Hurry to get coats and backpacks on. Hurry to the bus stop. Hurry to clean up breakfast before day's activities. Hurry to shower and get ready before Mitchell needs to eat or Emily brings him to me. Hurry to change diapers before showers start. Hurry to the car because we're late. Hurry, hurry, hurry. Some would tell me to get up earlier. Most days I am up between 4:30 and 5 to feed Mitchell. Sometimes I wake up Andy and we exercise (but we have to hurry so we can be done on time for him to get to school and so the kids don't get bored waiting for us after they wake up.). Sometimes I go back to sleep. Most times I go back to bed and think about all the things I need to do for that day. I think I just need to plan more - and then actually FOLLOW THROUGH with that plan!

A few months ago, we had a bad Sunday morning. Andy was at an early morning meeting. Annie's tights didn't feel good. Emily didn't want to wear a dress (which is never a battle with her, don't know why it was that morning). Ben's boots were too tight, which we only seem to remember on Sunday mornings and no other time during the week! My clothes didn't fit, so I had to change a few times. I was very pregnant and just wanted to stay home in bed and rest. I was in tears, *gently* encouraging the kids to get into the car because I HATE TO BE LATE. (In all honesty, I was in tears during most of my pregnancy - not sad ones, mostly really happy.) This day, I was just feeling overwhelmed. As we got on the on-ramp to get on the highway, there was a cop car on the side of the road with several men in bright orange jumpsuits picking up trash...convicts. Then the real tears started!!! This is why we are still going to our church meetings, even if we might be a few minutes late. This is why my children think I'm a 'mean mom' when they have negative consequences for their actions. This is why I hurry through most of my daily routine - so my kids can learn to choose the right, and what is important, and how to listen for the Holy Ghost to guide their actions, and so they won't be picking up trash on the side of the road on a Sunday morning. I sure hope they learn these things!!!

What else...? I just love my little guys. This past week I've worked really hard to have all dinner prep done (except for today - whoops!) before Ben and Annie get home from school. Then, we've been doing fun things in the afternoon - puzzles, games, coloring, watching a show together, homework (without mom HURRYING to get dinner together or on the computer looking up a quick recipe), talking, or reading books. It has sure been delightful! It's helped make Andy's absence each night a little bit less painful - this whole night-class act is for the birds!!! Okay, I have 10 minutes to find my talapia recipe for tonight and I'm ready for spelling homework from Ben and painting with Annie! Hope you don't have to HURRY through life..