Happy Birthday, Michael!

Today is Michael’s something-somethingth birthday! 

We celebrated by sending him to Mass by himself this morning, taking a morning bike ride, going swimming, and playing video games.  Well, Michael played video games – he somehow figured out how to hook up his Nintendo games to our projector, so he could show the kids Super Mario.  He enjoyed it a bunch.  So did they. 

[You may be asking yourself, “How is it that Michael has his Nintendo and games, when Monica is such a freak about getting rid of stuff?”  I’m asking myself the same thing, but it’s Michael’s birthday, so I’m not going to ask him that today.  He’ll probably site the used-in-the-last-6-months clause, though.  And since he used it today, he’s right.]

I made this for his birthday dinner.  It was good.  Michael likes bacon.  And burgers.  When this recipe appeared on the blog last week, I knew that it was what he wanted for his birthday dinner. 

I made this for his birthday cake.  Also good.  But why is some of the recipe in cups and some in grams and some in milliliters?  Mysterious.  I doesn’t make any difference to the taste, though.  I will confess, my creation did NOT look like the picture on the recipe.  

We managed to eat a whole bunch of it despite its looks.

My local sister and brother-in-law stopped in to help later in the evening, too.

I’m so glad that Michael was born!  Happy Birthday, My Love!

Staycation day 4

Today is the last day of staycation, and we’re going to miss Michael when he goes back to work! 

Saturday, day 4 of staycation, was a home day.  Michael took the kids for a bike ride to the park in the morning.  I had taken the opportunity of the kids waking up late to take a morning walk on my own instead of a bike ride – mix things up a bit.  I didn’t go to the park because I was making jam.  Strawberry rhubarb and orange rhubarb.  And canning it.  I recently came upon this book, and have really been having some fun with it.  I made the pickled asparagus earlier in staycation, and then these jams.  Mmmm.  In theory I’d like to save them for when the weather gets dark and cold again, but I’m not sure that’s going to happen.  Everyone likes the jam so much that it might not last us the next few weeks. 

The rest of the family enjoyed the park, though, and the dire predictions of rain for the day didn’t come true.  Just shows you can’t trust the weather.  There was more moving of compost, as well. 

Michael and the kids made strawberry rhubarb pie in the afternoon.  I forgot to take pictures, but they all enjoyed it.  I had gotten some mini pie pans to use with the kids, so they each got to make a mini pie.  They’re really 2-serving pies, though, which we had to explain.  While they made pie, I sewed a new summer purse for myself:

using this tutorial.  It was pretty easy and quick.  We all hung out in the dining room together again, working on our various projects and enjoying our family. 

We had more salmon for dinner, although the friends who were supposed to come over ended up getting sick and not being able to come.  The girls especially are really enjoying salmon this year.  It’s quite cute.  We ate their pie for dessert, and it was a hit with everyone but Naomi, who doesn’t care for cooked fruit.  She had chocolate instead.

Rush hour explained

Naomi has carefully explained to Simeon that “rush hour” means the time when cars can go fast on the freeway, since there aren’t many cars.  When there are lots of cars, it’s called…I can’t remember the whole name, but “traffical hour” is in there. 

Simeon has picked this up quite easily, and will happily tell Naomi, “It’s rush hour, Naomi!” as we’re sailing down the freeway. 

It’s too cute to disabuse either of them of this idea.  Besides, it does make more sense their way.

Staycation Day 3

was yesterday.  Despite the forecast for RAIN, RAIN, RAIN, both Thursday and Friday had a significant amount of sun.  And only a small amount of rain.  So we went to the farmer’s market downtown and had some good fun.  Salmon, rhubarb, strawberries, beef jerky (one of these things is not like the others…).  The salmon is Copper River salmon, which only has a season of about three weeks and is totally delicious – more so even than other salmon.  It always comes around Michael’s birthday, which he doesn’t mind.  In the market is a fishmonger where they throw the fish, and we got to see our salmon thrown.  The kids were most impressed.  

Then we went and picked up the rest of the straw for our garden.  More on that in a different post.  I’m trying out a different technique.  Then we came home and had Quiet Time and proceeded to spend most of the afternoon outside enjoying the beautiful weather.  And spreading more compost, since the pile is depleted, but still there.  We’re nearly done, though, and I got a whole bunch of stuff planted Thursday!  More to go, but this spring has been so cold that it hasn’t seemed like a good idea to try putting things out early. 

Yesterday evening we had friends over to help us eat some of the salmon.  That was a lot of fun, and the kids all heartily enjoyed the salmon.  (I was realizing that, since I grew up in Texas, I hadn’t had salmon until much later in life.  It’s just not a Texas fish.)  It was great to see our friends – they are a lot of fun, and our kids do well together, too.   Prepping dinner on a weeknight with Michael home is really a breeze, particularly if he’s grilling most of the food. 

The kids are definitely enjoying long hours of each day spent outdoors.  Naomi spent quite a while practicing biking uphill – the large hill next to our house – yesterday.  And then she spent some time practicing biking up our driveway, which is even steeper.  The girls also cleaned off the plastic table for Michael, which involved the hose, so was totally fun.  Simeon did a lot of digging, whether in the compost bed or in the hole in the garden that I let them make, he didn’t care much.  Needless to say, he was pretty dirty by the end of the day – the sign of time well spent, as far as he’s concerned.

Staycation continues to be fun and both productive and relaxing. 

Staycation Day 2

Michael here.  I don’t know if we’ll keep this up daily, but here’s a quick note on day 2: The Day of Three Contractors.

First, the Door Works mechanic arrived to install a garage door opener for our garage:

I think I’ve wanted a garage door opener for that garage since we moved in, and we started the project of getting electricity out to the garage almost 2 years ago (July ‘09).  I was very happy to finally see the garage door opening on its own this morning.

While the mechanic was at work, the second contractor arrived: well, a deliveryman, actually, with 3 cubic yards of compost for our garden.  The kids were delighted to see it dumped on our front walk and spent hours playing king of the mountain on a pile of pit-washed dairy manure.  I reminded them what that pile actually was.  They told me that it was a tradition to jump on it anyway.

While we were shoveling, the third contractor arrived from Roto-Rooter.  Nothing was actually wrong: we just wanted to do preventative maintenance.  The cleaning went very well: he said the pipe looked great and will hopefully be good for many years.  He was fast, too: he came and went before the garage door mechanic was finished.

So, three contractors had come and gone by 11:00.  We spent the rest of the morning and afternoon working in the garden, taking compost to various spots, pulling weeds, chatting with the neighbors, and so forth.  The girls had their last choir rehearsal of the school year, and then dinner was provided by our favorite little Italian joint.  It was a golden day – the kids were happy to be playing out of doors, and we were happy to get so much done on our house!

Hannah on our modern age

At dinner tonight, we were discussing a particular pastry that the kids wanted to make.  They were distressed that we didn’t have a recipe for it, and Monica replied that we could certainly look up a recipe for it online.

Hannah remarked, “I’m glad we have a computer and don’t have to use our wits like people in Daddy’s time did.”

I couldn’t stop laughing – that quote works on so many levels.

Staycation Day 1

Michael’s taken some time off, and we’re staying home and doing things around our area.  And, to tell the truth, around the house.  Of course, the forecast is RAIN, RAIN, RAIN.  Oh, well.  Last week we had a whole bunch of nice weather, so I shouldn’t complain.

This morning, Michael took the kids to our local science museum.  They had a great time.  Lots of experiences to relate, funny stories to tell, and a butterfly landed on Simeon!  It sounded like a lot of fun, and they saw just about the whole museum.

I spent the morning creating a big mess.  And also some pickled asparagus. 

It looks a little scary, doesn’t it?  I’ll keep you posted on how it actually tastes.

This afternoon, after naps and quiet time, the kids and Michael did Dada’s legos, which is always a big treat.  It doesn’t happen very often, but when it does, it’s a whole lot of fun.  I think they played legos for two hours straight.  And while they did, I made a dress for Hannah.  We were all creating things together in the dining room, which made for a pleasant afternoon of family togetherness.

I’m optimistic that summer may actually come some day.  And when it does, Hannah will need some clothes.  Naomi gets lots of great hand-me-downs, so even though I’m sure I’ll buy and make things for her, I’m a bit more concerned about having some clothes for Hannah to wear.  She was highly enthusiastic about this dress, which was gratifying.  And it was a really simple pattern, so I put it together today!  I foresee that this will be a popular pattern for some more summer clothes…