Goodbye 2010

What a crazy year. It seems like a really flew by, but we sure packed a lot in.

John spent a good portion of the year working mandatory overtime and taking classes on top of that. Early 2011 will bring graduation and we are very much looking forward to it. He hasn't had much time to do anything else, but does plan to build bunk beds for the boys.

I quit and went back to my job within two months. The current plan is to stay there until John's graduation and then start school myself. I became the parent representative for Nathan's preschool class. I survived another year of putting together our church's Christmas bazaar, but decided that a team of people is needed for next year.

Aiden is in the middle of his last year of preschool. He is reading and we fully expect him to be quite bored in kindergarten next year. He turned five in October and celebrated his birthday by getting a puppy, Buster. Over the summer, he completed one month of swim classes (every day Monday - Friday) and was a total "submarine" (his description) by the end. He also attended science camp and splash camp at his school. His love of learning about chemical reactions has continued through the end of the year. He had his first trip on an airplane.

Nathan started preschool and while it took him a little while to warm up it, really loves doing cool things in class. He was too young to take part in any of the classes that Aiden was in, so he got lots of one-on-one time with mommy. He was fed a bobby pin by his brother and got to have his first trip to the ER to get a tummy x-ray. It passed on it's own with no trouble.

As a family, we lost a house we wanted, but found a better one soon after and are now living happily in a home twice the size of our last apartment. We had our first adventure as homeowners when our washing machine exploded and water went everywhere. We are enjoying our new washing machine. We had our first family trip to Disneyland to celebrate our 5th wedding anniversary. Aiden loved every minute, while Nathan was apparently traumatized (he has requested that he stay with grandma for any future trips to Disneyland). We had our share, plus some, of illnesses and injuries (but the injuries were just Carrie). We may have actually become dog people, despite John's complaint that our dog is barely a dog.

We look forward to 2011 and the new adventures we'll experience as a family. It's hard to know what it will be like once John is done with school. We are trying to decide on a fun vacation for just mommy and daddy to celebrate graduation and our 6th wedding anniversary. But Aiden has requested that we either return to Disneyland or take a family trip to Hawaii for his birthday. He seems to believe that he wants to try surfing. I guess we'll just have to wait and see! Happy New Year!!

A Whole Decade

Ten years ago today, I started dating my wonderful husband. We'd been friends for two and half years and it took me five months to convince him to date me, but he finally gave in and I'm so happy he did. After many adventures, struggles, and two wonderful boys, I can truly say that I married my best friend. It's hard to believe we've been together for an entire decade, but I look forward to what the next ten years will bring. I love you, John Minthorne.

Phonics

Being a believer that children learn to read when their minds are ready for it, I'm not one to push Hooked On Phonics (because phonics don't do any good if you don't have a basic grasp of reading down first) or the whole My Baby Can Read junk on my boys. I've continued to read to Aiden and gradually work up to longer and longer books. He learned to write a few words over the school year last year and then sometime in late summer, began really reading more and more things. Once that took hold of him, he's progressed faster than I can keep up with.

Now that he's reading quite a bit, I thought it would be fun to get him some phonics flash cards for Christmas. We sat down with them today to see how he took to them. We discussed the different sounds letters make (showing him the long and short symbols over the vowels) and he continued to ask questions. After a few minutes, we went on to having him try to read the words on the back of the cards (there are four words per card, with a variation of long and short vowels). He would take one look at whatever card I was holding up and blurt out whatever four words were on the card. We blew through those flash cards with speed that I never imagined.

I am so proud of Aiden. I love watching him absorb everything he possibly can. I would like to get this on tape and post it on here, but John will have to help me with that one (I've never hooked the video camera up to my current laptop, so we'd have to figure that out first). John says we need to start him on math now. Because we apparently need to send him into kindergarten fully prepared for 2nd grade.

Is It??

We're here at the coast in a beach house for Christmas. The boys share a room with us here. Nathan woke up this morning and ran to the window. John asked him what he was doing and Nathan says, "I'm checking to see if it's Christmas!!". So sweet!

So Nathan is happy and ready for Christmas, while we can barely get Aiden to wake up. A five year old too tired for presents?! I'm sure wrapping paper will be flying all over the place here soon though.

Merry Christmas everyone.

Holiday Overeating

Guess what happens when your kids eat too much junk food? Yep, something that means mommy is up at 4am doing laundry and has been for the past hour and a half.

Aiden ate too much candy at Aunt Laura's Christmas party. Aiden gets carsick on twisty mountain roads. There was barf within 15 minutes of heading home last night. He's been fine since, but it definitely contributed to the barf laundry. It ended up all down John's back (yes, Aiden was sitting in the back seat and still managed to hit John in the front seat), all over Aiden, and all over the carseat.

Fast forward to 2:40am: John is passed out because he took a Tylenol PM (he didn't sleep last night due to having a cold that kept him awake). Aiden comes bursting into my room crying, saying that he can't sleep because of Nathan's screaming. I run into the boys room and find Nathan trapped halfway under his bed. I have no idea how he got there. I get the boys settled into my room. Aiden on the little mattress we keep on the floor and Nathan in my bed. Nathan starts coughing REALLY hard and then...barf. Somehow I managed to move myself out of the way quickly enough to not get hit. But it's all over my bed and all over John (again). I can barely get John to wake up enough to get himself into the shower for clean up. I get Nathan in the tub and change all the bedding on my bed.

Everyone is settled once again. I start some more laundry and Nathan comes out of my room to tell me that his tummy hurts. Two words: Overflowed pull-up. And no it wasn't #1. On to the 2nd change of clothes for him. As I'm getting that cleaned up, he barfs again all over the carpet. On to the 3rd change of clothes for him. I move his mattress into my room so I can keep an eye on him and keep him out of my bed in case he goes off again. I start more laundry and begin cleaning the carpet.

And that's why I'm up at 4:15am. I'm starting to feel queasy just from all the vomit and massive amounts of Febreze I'm having to use. My children are banned from having any more Christmas treats for the remainder of the holiday season. I just hope John feels well rested tomorrow because one of us sure needs to be.

O Tannenbaum

A few weeks back, we set out to find this year's Christmas tree. Since we now have a house, I finally was going to get my big tall tree. No three-footers for us this year! We've always taken the Hyundai and just stuck the tiny tree in the trunk (and had the tree farm guy tell us we could have two for the Any Tree for $20 price if we were going to get one that small), but this year we were going to tie the tree to the top of of the Subaru. We've gone to the same tree farm for many years now and I like the idea of being loyal to a local farmer. There's nothing super special about the tree farm - he's just a really nice guy who always has a warm bonfire going and gives the kids free candy canes. Yes, we do drive for 30 minutes to get there and pass about 15 tree farms on the way, but until he stops selling trees or we move way too far away to make the drive, we'll keep going back.

Setting out to find the perfect tree and I tell Nathan to smile. Yikes.

We found it! This was the 2nd one after my first choice was vetoed by John. Apparently an 11 foot tree wouldn't have worked with our 9 foot ceilings. :^)

"I'll carry it, daddy!"

All decorated, mostly by the boys. We've lost a few ornaments because of the dog and the lower branches aren't looking quite so full, but we love our big tree.

And a fireplace to hang the stockings!

Merry Christmas!!

Muffins!

As I was waiting for the dough for our hamburger buns to finish rising yesterday afternoon, I thought I'd see what I could do with the bag of cranberries I still had leftover from Thanksgiving. I randomly came across a recipe for Cranberry Cream Cheese Muffins from a Bed and Breakfast in Wisconsin. It just so happened that I had some cream cheese I needed to use up, so I went for it! It was quite easy and oh, does cream cheese batter smell gooooooood.

I would give you an after picture, but I forgot to take one before all of the muffins were eaten. All 24 of them. These are an instant favorite in our house. John said I might be able to go a little heavier on the cranberries next time, but I thought they were fine. It just depends on how much you like cranberries, I suppose. They do take between 25-30 minutes to fully bake, but they are so worth it. And the cinnamon/brown sugar topping is a perfect fit (I left out the nuts that were suggested). So we Minthornes highly recommend these muffins and they are actually fairly Christmas-y. Enjoy!

Blacksmith Inn Cranberry Cream Cheese Muffins

Presented by Blacksmith Inn On The Shore

Baileys Harbor, Wisconsin

1 c. soft butter

8 oz. soft cream cheese

1 1/2 c. sugar

1 1/2 t. vanilla

4 eggs

2 c. flour

1 1/2 t. baking powder

1/2 t. salt

2 c. whole cranberries

1/2 c. pecans (I left these out)

Topping:

3/4 c. brown sugar

1 1/2 t. cinnamon

1/3 c. chopped pecans (again, left out)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Cream butter, cream cheese, sugar and vanilla. Beat eggs in one at a time. Combine flour, baking powder and salt; beat into creamed mixture. Fold in cranberries and pecans. Fill lined or greased muffin cups 2/3 full. Top with mixture of brown sugar, pecans and cinnamon. Bake for 20 - 25 minutes. Yield 18 muffins (it gave me 24 and also took 30 minutes to fully bake, but I may have not filled the muffin cups as full and our oven is set a tad cool).

Interviews and Self Assessment

As most of you know, I interviewed for and didn't get a library job a little while back. I was fine with that, as the schedule wouldn't have worked very well with having two little kids.

Last Wednesday, I interviewed for a receptionist position at a local athletic club's day spa. It sounded super fun, something I would be really good at, and the schedule was nice. I found out today that they went with someone else. I won't say I wasn't disappointed, but here's my take on things:

I am currently employed. Many other people are not. I'm just looking for a new opportunity in my life. Others are looking for a way to feed their family. I am at ease with not being hired because I believe that these jobs went to people who really needed them at this time. I am still eager to find something new and different, but it will happen at the right time. I also know that trying to branch out in a new field with the economy the way it is right now is going to be quite challenging. The fact that I have been called to interview for the two things I put applications in for is very encouraging and I see it as good practice for future interviews (I really hate interviewing).

So while I still want to see if I can find a job that's going to challenge me a little more, I'm going to take a step back until January and see where I find myself and figure out which direction I'd like to head. I am still eager to start classes, but after much discussion, John really needs to be done before I can start. Provided everything goes well, that should be in March, but we just aren't positive yet. Fingers crossed for new opportunities next year!

Mr Potato Head

This is what happens when you leave a bag of potatoes out on the counter in our house.

Latkes

Last week, Aiden's class learned about Hannukah. He actually remembered everything from the year before (he still has his dreidel), but this year he developed an interest in latkes. Not being at all Jewish, I had no idea how to go about making them, but promised him that sometime for dinner, I would make him some latkes. I found a recipe that sounded fairly easy and had some alternate suggestions for serving, so I finally bought some fresh potatoes and gave it a try.

It was quite easy and very potato-y. Having been told that they were "potato pancakes", I assumed they'd look like pancakes. Turns out they look a bit more like hash browns, unless you do something different to them to turn them into pancakes.

Anything fried in oil is my friend. And yes, I have had my cholesterol levels checked.

Here's the finished product. They were yummy and very filling. Traditionally, they're served with sour cream and applesauce, but I used a non-Kosher serving suggestion and served them with ham, cheese, and a fried egg.

If anyone is interested in exploring how to make and serve latkes (Aiden and Nathan think figuring out these traditional Jewish foods is pretty fun so maybe other kids would too), here's the website I used for the recipe: http://ridgewood.patch.com/articles/not-your-grandmothers-latkes-8-ways-to-serve-11

I think our next food adventure will be discovering how to make challah bread. I was introduced to it in college (John had a few Jewish roommates) and it was quite delicious. I've actually missed it since we moved back from Philadelphia. Yummy!

Jet Pack

This actually happened the day Aiden wrote out "chocolate milk" for me with no help, but I never got around to sharing it.

We were upstairs and I see Aiden grab the trash can from my room (it had just been emptied, so thankfully there was no trash dumped everywhere) and a roll of masking tape. As he heads into his room with Nathan, he calls to me, "Don't worry mom, we're just making a jet pack!". The door is then shut and the boys reappear a few minutes later.....

He was very proud of himself.

A few minutes after I took this picture, Aiden goes back into his room and I hear, "I think it's going to work....I think it's really going to work.........ow.". The next time I saw Aiden, he was no longer wearing the jet pack. I guess he decided it wasn't going to work after all.