Overheard

This is dedicated for all the little things that get said in our family. I look forward to the day when Grant has more to contribute than a "uuuhh, blaaaa, ahhhh!"

"it smalls poopy in here" (as we are shopping at Wal-mart)

"I made you a grape pie! Would you like to try some? It's belicious" (not a typo, she says delicious with a B)

"This is going to be a bad day!" (said at breakfast, what a way to start the day!)

"When is Aunt Amber's baby going to fall out of her shirt? How did it get there?"

"New rule: don't touch each other!" (said by mommy)

"I'm big onto the crafting!!" (Elizabeth begging me to let her help paint her name on a step stool)

"AHHH" (Grant)  "Don't say that, it's DEVASTATING!!" (Elizabeth)

"I'm done!!! I'm never playing with you again!"

"Did Amber's baby fall out yet?"

A trip to Grandma & Grandpa Briggs

Grandma reading "Put Me in the Zoo"

 I loaded up the kids on Friday and we drove about an hour and half to my grandparent's house.  When we were in Eureka, I got the first, "When are we going to be there? This is taking forevvvvveeeerr!" Promises of getting to play in grandma's basement seemed to make the trip go faster! 

 Grandma even had a new play-doh set for them to play with!  A lot of the toys in my grandma's basement are ones that I used to play with. 

My grandpa told me that the wooden kitchen that I remember being in the office of their old house, was actually my mom's when she was little and that he had made it for her one year for Christmas.  Both kids love playing with it!  It has served three generations now!

Grant playing with the kitchen. 

Elizabeth swaddling her baby doll.

Elizabeth playing with the kitchen.

This Fisher Price house was mine when I was little.  Elizabeth got the 2011 version for Christmas this year.  Grant really liked playing with this one.  All of the pieces are big.  The new one has too many small pieces and he can't play with it yet!

Grandma made the perfect kid lunch of chicken nuggets, quesadillas and fruit salad, complete with angel food cake for dessert!  Grandma asked me if Grant could have a piece of cake and if I wanted it to have frosting on it.  I told her if she had a piece without frosting that would be fine.  Elizabeth says, "I would like a piece of cake WITH frosting, please!"  

We had a wonderful visit and even got to take some of grandma's special corn and strawberries home!  Grandma, if you are reading this, we made waffles for breakfast saturday morning and EVERYONE enjoyed the special strawberry topping and there was enough left over that I made strawberry crepes for snacks today.  It is quite possible I will just finish up what is left with a spoon, when no one is looking! 

Kids in the Kitchen Week #3

 This week instead of starting with a coloring page they decorated a bag that would bring home their treats in.  They made donut holes rolled in sugar.  Yes they were fried.  Yes her clothes smelled like a fry daddy!  She wanted to eat one as soon as we got home.  I tried one and I didn't think it was that bad, but Brandon didn't care for them and of course she had saved two just for daddy!! We told her they were wonderful!

This is what Grant and I did during cooking class - a nice car nap!

Our Little Bammer

Grant has earned another nick-name "bam-bam" or our little "bammer."  He will pick up anything and start wailing!  If we are lucky it is on the floor, but sometimes it is on Elizabeth or me! All I can think when he does this is, "he is such a boy!"  I don't remember Elizabeth ever having a need to just bang things.  He is finally reaching the age where is starting to stand-up for himself.  He will push back and he has his full set of teeth! Of course his favorite reaction is still a big cry and run to mommy.

Grant's other favorite things are cleaning tools.  He is particularly fond of the Swiffer and a mop that I keep in the closet downstairs.  Aunt Amber gave him a play shop vac for Xmas that is called Henry.  Everyone names their vacuums right?!  He hauls these items all over the house.  His favorite thing to vacuum are the walls.  His mother is such a detailed cleaner that he knows all the best cleaning techniques - like vacuuming the walls!

Kids in the Kitchen Week #2

I know you have all just been on pins and needles wondering what in the world Elizabeth would make this week at her cooking class!!  I guess I would call them a cake pop without a stick? A bonbon? She had fun and when I went to pick her up she was sitting at the table with all the boys!  I think she enjoyed eating it the best!  She got to bring two home, one she ate as soon as we walked in the door.  The second one she saved for daddy. (awww!)

Valentine's Day

 This Valentine's Day was not exactly as I had pictured in my head.  I learned a good lesson though.  In case mommy gets the stomach flu and is out of commission for three days, it is OK to prepare for holidays in advance!  I typically don't leave things until last minute, but I had couple of other events that I was involved with so I just pushed the shopping for my kids to the weekend, which is when the BUG hit!  When I was talking to my mom Sunday night, Brandon overheard me say that I didn't even have cards for kids and he cuts me off and says, "OH I got that covered!"

 What a sweetheart, not only did he get them a card, but he bought "Lady and the Tramp" too!  Elizabeth had seen a commercial for it earlier and the week and I had told him how excited she was that it was going to be on TV tomorrow and she wanted me to set the DVR.  I had to break it to her, that it wasn't on TV tomorrow, it came out on DVD tomorrow!

 The kids had their envelope chair-backers stuffed (ok not really stuffed, but 4 is a lot to them!) with cards to open on V-Day morning.  Grant really couldn't reach his so big sister helped deliver his cards to him. 

This doesn't even look like Grant, but it captures the moment of him getting a valentine! I think that's a smile!

Daddy got the kids Lady and the Tramp

I love my Pancake Pen!  Pink heart pancakes, the breakfast of Valentine Day champions!

The choice is: sprinkles or syrup? She always chooses sprinkles!

It was a wonderful surprise when we had extra valentines in our mailbox! Thanks Grandmas!

At some point in the day I was trying to explain to the kids what Valentine's Day was.  "...has to do with LOVE and LOVING each other..."  A few moments later Grant did something to Elizabeth and it made her cry and she says "He is NOT LOVING me!"  

So we had a relaxing day.  I got gutsy and decided to do a beer-can type chicken on the new ceramic cooker.  This was a two hour process that involved me pulling out chicken innards - love baby, only for love!  At 6:30 we pulled the chicken off the grill (it looked perfect!), filled our plates and the kids were in their seats.  I had just put my plate down on the table and Grant starts throwing up.  Since he was in his high chair I just wheeled him into the laundry room, closed the door and started cleaning up.  I think daddy and Elizabeth really enjoyed their dinner together!  Elizabeth even asked for more chicken! 

Oh a Valentine's Day to remember!  Love my little sweethearts (and daddy too)!

Sports Confusion

This probably isn't worthy of a separate post, but it's too cute not to jot down.  A few weeks ago when I told Elizabeth we were having a Super Bowl party her response was, "Oh that's perfect! I have a bowling set!"  (David and Sara gave her a bowling set for Christmas).

Yesterday she grabbed Grant's baseball glove off of his shelf and said, "I'm ready to play football!" 

Yet this is the same girl that this past fall I would tell her that if she napped she could stay up late and watch the Cardinals with us...and she would take a nap AND watch baseball with us that night!! 

Clearly, daddy has some work to do in this area.  I taught her how to crack eggs, daddy can bond with her on the sports!  Maybe we should sign her up for spring soccer! 

Kids in the Kitchen

Ice Cream Pie

This winter I signed Elizabeth up for a class at the park district called "Kids in the Kitchen."  It is four classes, one hour each and it is a drop off program.  I thought this would be right up her alley.  She was so excited to go today and did very well with the drop-off process.  Besides Sunday School this is really the first organized activity I have dropped her off for. 

She wanted to eat the cherry!

When I picked her up I asked the teacher if she talked any.  She said she was pretty quiet.  There were two girls from her tumbling that were there in the class, but she is pretty quiet in tumbling too!  But at least she had a few familiar faces!  On the car ride home I asked her a few opened questions to see what kind of response I got.  She told me that made ice cream pie and they used butter, sugar, chocolate and a cherry.  When daddy got home she added crumbs as an ingredient as well.  After sampling it made more sense that they had made a crust and the ice cream was store bought!  Initially, I wasn't sure how butter worked into the ice cream equation!  When she showed Brandon when he got home he said  "Oh you made homemade ice cream."  She said, "No I made cooking class ice cream!"  Can't wait to see what next week's treat is!

Super-Bowl...Pinterest Style

For this year's Super Bowl party, there was only one rule, bring something Pinterest inspired.  Here were the results:

S'mores Cookies

Smoked Sausage

Chicken Wrapped with Bacon and Potato Skins

Jalapeno Popper Dip

Orange Dreamsicle Fruit Dip

Strawberry Mojitos

Everything was delicious!  I guess I didn't take a picture of the Asian Flat Iron steak that we did, but it was good too!  Brandon is doing a good job on his new cooker!

Nobody had a vested interest in the game, so we did a lot of eating, drinking and kid watching!   We had two 19 month-olds, two 3 year-olds and a 4 year old - they had so much fun!  The pictures say it best!

Ready for the game in daddy's chair

Pre-game dancing

Mustin & Dandi...um I mean Mandi & Dustin

"Would you like fries with that?"

Yeah, they were good :)

Half-time show dancing

The "monster" got them!

 

I love that the kids are just staring at the TV!

Time to say good-bye

A kiss between friends

Another kiss between friends!  Man, they are going to be so mad at us someday!

Komado Joe

 We are the new owners of a Komado Joe.  It is like a Green Egg (if you are familiar with that) or a ceramic cooker and it also smokes.  After purchasing the cooker, we purchased the meat...burgers, sausage, flank steak, ribeyes!  I never eaten so much meat in a weekend!  The weather was less than ideal the first day, but Brandon was excited to use it so he braved the elements. The first day was cheese-burgers...delicious and juicy (it was raining).  That evening was the ribeyes, again raining, but again delicious!  Brandon likes to look out and see the glow of the fire. 

 The first smoked item was sausage.  Kind of guy thing in my estimation, but it was pretty good, as far as smoked sausages go!  This face is him saying, "Get the dog inside the house, I don't want him to jump up and eat my smoked sausage!"  He takes his meat seriously!  This was for the Super-Bowl.  He also did a flank steak that was really tender.  Good job on the KJ baby!  Keep up the good work!