Upside Down Fort

Bryn dragged me to the hallway, and proudly showed me the Anemone (too much Nemo) she had constructed from a mattress pad for Calvin and herself. Cabin fever?

付けられる

Well, I'm backlogged on tags, so I'm going to hybridize this post into one from three separate tags by Emma, Diana, and Drewmeister

1. What was the best thing you cooked last week?
-Pulled Pork with Root Beer Sauce

2. If money, time and babysitting were no object, where would you go and with who?Everywhere. Seriously. Even the moon. And I like Emma’s idea of bringing a babysitter along.

3. When was the last time you cried?
In the hospital 3 days after Calvin was born. It was about his middle name and I cried so hard I got the worst bloody nose of my life (the nurse was concerned). I’m going to go ahead and blame that one on hormones.

4. Five things you were doing 10 years ago?
-Sleeping through the night
-Playing indoor soccer most of my free and non-free time
-Starting the indoor track season
-Dealing with a nasty case of senioritis
-Skiing the Beav

5. Five things you were doing 5 years ago?
- Still sleeping through the night
- Playing indoor soccer on the BU math dept. team. (we were awesome.)
-Studying like mad for my quals and feeling quite sick but not knowing what to attribute it to besides stress
-Later finding out I was pregnant with Bryn (sickness mystery solved)
-Riding my most excellent bike to and from Alewife everyday, even on the icy bikepath (it was a mountain bike and I was stupid- but hey, I wore a helmet).

6. Five things you were doing 1 year ago (almost to the day)?
Really, there’s only one: driving home after the house fire in the rental car (our car had been totaled the week before) and realizing that we had pretty much no usable earthly possessions besides the clothes on our backs on Humpty Dumpty (Bryn’s lovey at the time).

7. Seven of your favorite hobbies:
-reading
-soccer
-piano
-learning new things
-running
-mountain biking
-hiking

8. Five favorite foods:
- Rueben sandwiches
- Fresh blueberries with Bryer’s natural vanilla ice cream (thanks Nathan and Miriam!)
- The breadsticks at Factory Pizzeria
-LaBella’s panini prosciutto (prosciutto, fresh mozzarella, tomato, basil, grilled on focaccia bread, Mmm!)
-Fresh raspberries in milk with a sprinkling of sugar


9. Five places you've been: (five of my favorite)
-The top of the highest peak in Yellowstone
-The gelato shop(s) in Florence, Italy
-Watching skiers (long jump) practice in the summer on a mountainside in the Alps in Switzerland
-Shark’s Cove on Oahu
-The floating restaurant in Portland, Maine

10. 5 random things people probably don’t know about me:
-I was a barrel racer for 3 years through the horse 4-H program
-I used to run the stairs at USU’s business building to get rid of stress
-My favorite flower is a weed (chickory) that grows on the side of the road
-I went through a radish phase for a few years and bought them weekly.
-I love the smell of good rich dirt to the point that I wonder what it tastes like (but would never actually eat it)

A Fun New Recipe!

Mommy Surprise (aka Calvin Delight)

From Calvin's Kitchen

Ingredients:

1/2 large can of Crisco

3 cups Italian seasoned bread crumbs

2 cups uncooked Penne pasta

3 T. brown sugar

5 broken lasagna noodles

1 graham cookie

Preparation: Divert Mother. Open Crisco, if necessary, scoop some out to leave room for other ingredients. Add the rest of the ingredients in alternating increments. Do not stir. Discard leftover ingredients in pantry cupboard. Cover with two hand towels and let sit until Mother comes. Then yell, "surprise!" and unveil the masterpiece. Do not clean up, as that will ruin half of Mother's fun.

Dies irae

Okay, not really a day of wrath, but of sublime musical enjoyment (I don't know the latin for that). Mozart's requiem was the first classical piece of music that I listened to as frequently as my other music. It's been a dream of mine to hear it performed live since I was a pre-teen, so when I heard on the radio that it was being done at Symphony Hall the Friday after Valentine's Day, I took it upon myself to plan date night this week. Now I get to tick off one of the items on my "things to do before I die" list.

Valentines Wanted

Seeking Prince Charming. Preferably egg-shaped. Loves singing, dancing, and jumping in the wee hours of the morning. Likes sticks, rocks, spiders, and mud. Hates moths, sunrises, sunsets, and loud noises (like vacuums, flushing toilets, and low-flying airplanes). Looking for love? This 21 month-old will slobber you with kisses all day long. Enjoys long walks, and will even let you take a turn in the stroller. Not very cleanly, hasn't gotten the hang of personal hygiene, and eats just about anything that has sugar listed as the first ingredient.

Hot Bling, anyone?

We got our brakes fixed a few weeks ago at Sears Auto Center. The major advantage to Sears is that I can browse at the mall while my car gets fixed instead of trying to corral my kids in a dingy autoshop waiting room.

A couple of days ago our brake light came back on. As a side note, this is the light that goes on when your emergency brake is on, but our emergency brake wasn't on, in which case it is an indicator that your brakes need to be checked out (I didn't know this at first, so I thought I'd pass along the info). So I went back to Sears Auto Center(the brakes were under warranty from the last repair). I told them I'd be at the mall across the way, so they should call my cell as soon as it was ready.

We waited for 4.5 hours at the mall for them to fix the car. This may not sound like a long time, but believe me, with 2 kids it's an eternity. You can only go to the Disney Store and throw pennies at the crocodile so many times. To help pass the time, we looked at the sweet jewelry in the Sears. Bryn wanted me to get a big gaudy ring, and kept showing me different models. Calvin started getting in on the action, too, and eventually I had to gather all the strewn rings, throw them near the display and whisk the children away before they could pick out more. So we went back to the Disney store

Eventually I called the auto center and asked how the car was doing. The attendant said, "says here it's ready." I didn't even want to know how long it had been ready. We left the mall in a flurry, collected our car, and went home.

Besides a headache, I had also purchased some gym shorts for Peter at Sears. When I took them out of the bag to give them to him, the bag still felt heavy. I looked in the bottom, and found a hot (as in stolen) piece of bling. I'm pretty sure it was Calvin who slipped it in there, so I don't have to teach any moral lessons to Bryn.

But I do have to go back to Sears. *sigh*

My Significant Other Post

Peter, who is normally nominally involved in the blog, keeps reminding me that Amie tagged me. I’m sure it has nothing to do with the fact that it’s all about him.

What is his name? Peter, PBJ, Pete, or You There

How long have you been together? We’re celebrating our 8th anniversary in May. (the photo is of us opening our wedding presents)

How long did you date? Define date… there were a blurry few months in which if you asked either of us, we weren’t dating but if you asked anyone else in the world, we were madly in love. Probably somewhere around a year.

How old is he? 30.

Who eats more? Peter. Would you have guessed that? He has hummingbird metabolism.

Who said I love you first? Peter

Who is taller? Peter

Who can sing better? Me. But he can sing well if someone near him can also sing well.

Who is smarter? We have to fight about this a lot. Judging by board games, he beats me 60% of the time in Trivial Pursuit, I clean his clock every time at Rack-o, he’s pathetic at Apples to Apples, but usually gets more Jeopardy clues. I think my IQ is higher (when we take the same IQ test), but his standardized test scores are higher. The jury is out.

Who does the laundry? Peter, because he runs out of clean clothes first.

Who pays the bills? Me (well, actually, they’re all automated now), via Peter’s paycheck

Who sleeps on the right side? Me

Who mows the lawn? Hmmm….have you seen our yard? But I’m guessing it would be me if we had grass.

Who cooks dinner? It varies: usually me, but we have a policy that if one person cooks, the other is in charge of cleanup.

Who drives? Both

Who is more stubborn? Peter (but not if you ask him)

Who kissed who first? Peter kissed me

Who asked who out first? Peter

Who proposed? Peter, on a snowy cliff in December after waiting up there for 2 hours for me (my mom wouldn’t let me take a car until my room was clean-seriously folks, let the in-laws in on these surprises).

Who is more sensitive? Peter by a mile

Who has more siblings? Me

Who wears the pants? We fight over them daily. Maybe we should just get and extra pair.

Google Images Questionnaire

This is a fun tag by Joanne: you answer the question with an image from a google image search of your answer (i.e. you put your answer into the google image search and post what comes up).

Favorite Food?

Bad Habit? (I leave socks in the bed in the middle of the night)

Middle Name?

Place you would love to visit?

Place you would like to visit?

Where do you live?

(okay, I don't actually live here, it's just the building Peter's office is in and I think it's cool)

Favorite holiday spot?

College Major?

Name of past pet?

Why Sunday is more fun at my Parents' house

This is an activity which occured spontaneously one day at my parents house. Yes, my mom and dad even did it themselves. They said it felt like a terrible hug. Some Sundays I wish I were a little closer than a 7 hour plane ride.