Pretty cool!

Yum?  Maybe.

It was fun to try, but I doubt I’ll go through the trouble again.  Maria pulled hers apart and only ate the spaghetti.  Sam ate two small “pieces” and Luke about the same.  Andrew played with his and then shared with the dog.  Jack devoured his (nice to see that skinny boy eat) but, again, it was probably not worth the effort.

I think Sarah had MUCH more success.l

I kept putting it off, (do you know what some Thermoses cost?!?) but they didn’t let it go.  So, when I found some very plain (i.e. no characters) Thermoses for about $4 each, I bought them.

The kids were thrilled.  They went home, grabbed the Sharpies and went to work personalizing their new, super cool Thermoses.

They asked for something in their Thermoses on the first day of school, but that was only an hour.

They asked for something in their Thermoses on the second day of school, but that was only a half-day.

They asked for something in their Thermoses on the third day of school, but I had nothing to give them.

On the evening of the third day of school, we had spaghetti and meatballs for dinner.  The kids held themselves to a single serving so that they could bring the leftovers to school – in their Thermoses – the next day.

And so they did.  I dutifully heated up leftover spaghetti and meatballs (for Jack), spaghetti and sauce only (for Maria) and meatballs only (for Luke.)

On the way home, I asked Jack about the sauce on his shirt.  Of course, it was from the meatball that didn’t quite make it to his mouth, but did make it down his shirt and onto the floor.  I asked Maria about her lunch and she told me she was too full to eat her spaghetti (birthday treats of some sort had been consumed during lunch).  I asked Luke about his lunch and he said it was GREAT!

The next day (Friday) we were back to the basics, but the kids were thrilled when we had tortellini on Sunday night and they could use their Thermoses again on Monday.

Once again, I heated leftovers and filled their Thermoses and sent them off to enjoy their hot lunches.

On the way home, Jack told me that his tortellini was gross and hard.  Luke said his tortellini was cold and wet and DISGUSTING.  Maria said her lunch was too short, and after eating her Oreos she didn’t have time to eat her tortellini (which she thought was a good thing considering the boys’ experience).

“I’m never using that Thermos again!” Luke declared.  And Jack and Maria chimed in with similar sentiments.

Anyone need a Thermos?  I’ve got three.  Custom decorated.  Perfect condition.

I’ve felt guilty about this for a while, but not guilty enough to do anything about it.  My grandmother used to say, “If you can read, you can cook,” but it isn’t that simple.  I mean, you have to THINK about what to have.  Then you have to GO TO THE STORE and buy what you need.  Then you need to PLAN so that your meal is prepared in time for the dinner hour.  Never mind the laundry, the cleaning, the homework, the nursing, the diapers, etc. that has to be done… AT THE SAME TIME.

Still… when I saw a discussion among my friends on Facebook about e-mealz, I was intrigued.  I read through the posts, and found myself thinking that this might be “it” for me.  No planning, no list-making, no figuring out what to make… it’s all done for you.  I figured it was the closest thing to having a personal chef.  So… I signed myself up.  Each week, I get a shopping list and a meal plan for the week.  Seven ingredients or less for each recipe.  (The kids complain no matter what, so how could I go wrong?)

I’ve completed Day Two.

Let’s start with the grocery shopping.  Normally, I don’t do much shopping.  Having kids in tow, I usually run in, grab some cereal, milk and shampoo and run out.  Or, Dan goes to Costco and buys 183 rolls of toilet paper, 38 Diet Dr. Peppers and 6 cases of frozen pizzas.

This week, with my e-mealz printout, things were different.  I had some shopping – for actual food – to do.  Despite the list being organized by grocery section, it was still painful.  I had the baby (who, thankfully, was happy) and Sam.  Who had very. limited. patience.

I thought I’d breeze through, but when you don’t know what a squash looks like, or where the onions are, or WTF cube steak is takes a little longer.  (Btw, I actually bought parsley.  Who’d a thought?)  I was DETERMINED to follow the plan.  To buy everything on the list and fix every meal, like it or not.  Unfortunately Super Target didn’t have everything I needed, but enough to get me through a day or two.

Tuesday night was Moroccan Chicken.  It took longer than I realized, so it was after 6:30 by the time I was finished cooking.  Not good when the kids are used to eating around 5 or 5:30.  In addition, the baby wasn’t feeling well.  Graciously, he passed out on the living room floor and I was able to finish up in the kitchen without him on my hip.

I was doing okay until I had to drain the pasta.  When I went to pour it into the colander to drain it, I lost half the pasta to the sink.  F*ck.  THIS is one of the reasons I don’t cook… I’m a total klutz in the kitchen.  Then, before the kids even saw their dinner, they were complaining that they didn’t like it.  Well, tough shit.  I told them they could pick out what they wanted.  Most of them actually did pretty well.  Sam… well, he went to bed early without dinner.

Last night went a little smoother.  I started earlier.  The baby (still under the weather) took a nap during the preparations.  We had cube steak.  I still got negative comments from the kids during preparation, but whatever.  I managed to get everything together and had no big problems until I dumped half a steak onto the floor while trying to serve it up.  Nice.  At least the dog didn’t complain.

The kids grumbled, but I laid down the law – they could pick out the meat (ewwwww…. it was touching some sauce!), eat the broccoli and drink their milk.  Or go to bed.  They weren’t required to finish, but if they did, they’d get dessert.  It worked pretty well.  Jack gave it a “medium thumbs,” while Maria gave it an actual “thumbs up”.  The little boys ate what they had to and didn’t comment much.

Tonight?  Chicken Cordon Bleu (or a version thereof).  I had to go out and buy a meat tenderizer (Luke:  why can’t we just use a hammer?), but other than that I’m ready to go.

I hope.

First, the dog ran off.

Just kidding… that was yesterday, when I was trying to get the kids off to school for the last time before the break.

After dinner, I shooed the children out of the kitchen so I could clean up the dishes and prepare for The Event.

As if a cooking show hostess, I measured out each ingredient and put them into separate bowls for the children to add when it came time.  I set up the mixer.  I got out the cookie sheets.  I put together the cookie press (yes, I have one).  And then… I called them in.

After pushing each other out of the way and pulling up chairs and stools, Dan sent them all off to go wash their hands.  When they returned, there was more pushing and shoving.  I had them each line up to dump in their ingredients, as the mixer slowly churned.

One child dumped the bowl in with the ingredients.

Two children were put into a timeout for shoving.

One child was given hot sauce on the tongue (Sassy Spray doesn’t work for him anymore) for using inappropriate language.

Sprinkles were dumped.

Dough was devoured.

The cookie press didn’t cooperate.

But… finally, the pans were ready to hit the oven.  (And the parents were ready to hit the bottle!)

Then came the clean up.  And a lesson in sweeping.  And a Flat Maria covered in sprinkles – at first accidentally, then purposefully.

Unfortunately for him, the evening ended with Jack writing sentences.  But, he got the last word in, as you can see:

I have the bowls. (Bought today.)

I have the spoons.  (Bought today.)

I have the rice cereal.  (Bought today.)

I have a baby that is clearly ready for food.  (As demonstrated last night during dinner.)

What I don’t have is the desire.  He might be ready, but I’m not.  It makes me so sad that he’s growing so fast.

The menu:  Flank steak, potatoes, biscuits and milk (This is big, people.  I don’t cook much.)

Thinking ahead, I preheated the oven so the potatoes could go in around 4:30 and we could eat around 5:30.  Around 5:15 or so, I wander into the kitchen to start getting the steak ready for broiling.  And see the potatoes sitting on the counter instead of in the oven where I thought they were.

Shit.

I put the potatoes in and change my plans to eat around 6:30.  Might even work out better, as Dan should be home by then.

I put a conveniently sleeping baby into his bed for a nap.

At 6:30, I pulled the steak and potatoes out and put the biscuits in.  Set the table with Jack.  Baby still sleeping – yes!.  No Dan, but I set a plate for him anyway, thinking he’d be home mid-dinner.

As usual, anticipating whatever, I wolf down my meal.  As I finish my biscuit, the baby starts to cry.  Sam declares he is finished also, and is excused to play in the basement.

I leave Maria, Jack and Luke to finish their meals.  As I walk away to get the baby, I think about how nice tonight’s dinner has gone and how well everyone is behaving.

Thinking Dan should be home any second, I change the baby and settle in to feed him.  While he’s on the boob, Sam comes running up the stairs yelling that he needs to poop.  “So, go!” I tell him.

Jack yells from the kitchen, “Maaaaa—oooom!” (How I hate that sing-song calling of my name from another room.)  “Maria is eating another piece of steak!”  (The only steak left on the table is on Dan’s plate.)  I choose to ignore this, as there’s more steak on the stove.

Then, “Maaaaaa—–oooooommmmm!  Luke’s touching me with his steak!”

I yell back, “Luke, you’re finished.  Clear your plate and get into the shower.”

While Luke is in motion, I hear a cup hit the floor and ten a holler from Jack.  He has spilled his milk.  “I’ll clean it!”  He yells.  “You’re damn right,” I think, knowing, though, that I will have to clean up behind him.

Before I can take a breath, Sam hollers from the bathroom that he’s finished and needs me to wipe him up.  Baby is still on the boob and Dan is still not home.  I holler back that he needs to sit and wait.

Baby finishes.  I clean Sam up.  I supervise Jack’s cleaning of the spill.

And Dan gets home.

Sure enough, I flunked the test.  It isn’t the first time.  I had gestational diabetes when I was carrying Jack, too.  So, it’s been a while, but I pretty much knew what to expect.  There are upsides – like a better diet, less weight to lose after birth, a decrease in heartburn… But, there are also negatives, like — hang on a sec.  I gotta go prick my finger…

…

…

Okay.  I’m back.  Where was I?  Oh, yeah.  The negatives of GD.  Oh, wait…  I just got blood on my keyboard.  Hang on while I wipe it off…

…

Back.  Again.  Negatives… Oh, how about NO CARBS???  NO SUGAR???  NO SWEETS of ANY kind?  That kind of sucks.  Oh, and no milk (or very little) which stinks, ’cause I absolutely crave it while pregnant.  I also need to find a way to get more protein.  I haven’t been big on meat, but I do like peanut butter… of course, without bread, I guess I’ll be eating it off a spoon.  Eggs are recommended, but I cannot even stand the smell, much less the sight of eggs right now.

Oh, well. I’ll work it all out.  Right?  And this little guy will be much better off for it (despite having a crabbier mom).

I do have to admit, though, that despite getting the fateful news on Friday, I didn’t exactly jump right on a carb-free/sugar-free diet.  It could wait a couple of days, right?  So, for Saturday, to go along with Dan’s awesome Valentine’s Day feast, I made a cake.  From scratch.  I’d seen a recipe in the paper for a red velvet cake with white chocolate icing.  Mmmmmm.  Looked easy enough.

After three trips to the store (seriously), I had all the ingredients I needed for the cake and got to it.

Unfortunately, the recipe required one to mix red dye with egg whites before combining them with the other ingredients.  As I mentioned above, I have an aversion to eggs right now.  It’s hard enough for me to handle them, much less handle them with red dye mixed in.  Do you know what this looks like?  Ugh!  I imagine they could use the combination for fake blood during a slasher movie.  Gross. I think it’s the only thing that looks as much like blood as blood itself.  Not cool for a pregnant woman.

Somehow, I managed to choke back the bile in my throat and finish making the cake.  Lacking my original enthusiasm, I skipped the homemade white chocolate icing and covered it with store-bought butter cream frosting.  It turned out pretty good.  The kids certainly didn’t complain.  But, after Dan’s exquisite dinner of steak and crab legs, it wasn’t quite the ending it could have been.  It also wasn’t quite worthy of my last sweet item before starting a new diet.  Of course, what would be?  If you could only have one more sweet thing in your life – candy, cake, etc. – what would it be?

Unfortunately, we ran a little late (go figure) on our trip down to rural Missouri.  Fortunately, though, this meant that the kids missed seeing the pig before it was dissembled.  Still, Jack was the only one to eat any.  The others all chose hotdogs.  Go figure.

But, the pig roast is not just about the pig.  It’s really not about the pig at all, as a matter of fact.  Not for us.  It’s about an excuse to visit great friends.  Despite having moved away five years ago, we’ve managed to go back almost every year.  And, each time we do, it’s as if we’d never left.  All our friends are still there and treat us as if we still one of them.  As a matter of fact, depending on how much beer is consumed, some forget we ever left.

While there, we also got a special tour of the nearby Squirrel and ??? winery.  Dan stocked up and Jack learned a few steps in the wine-making process.  I stayed away from the fermenting barrel, as I didn’t want to hurt the baby.  (Just the smell of that stuff will put hair on your chest for sure.)

Maria and Luke sat in the van, on the verge of sleep.  After the tour, we headed back over to the party for another hour or so.  Despite the late hour, we didn’t want to leave.  Luke finally asked if he could go sit in the van, where we found him a few minutes later fast asleep.  Our cue to head to the hotel.  We lost two more to sleep on the way.  You’d think that would mean a quiet night in store for us all.

Nope.

At the excitement of staying in a hotel, the kids were quickly WIDE AWAKE.  Dan, however, was not.  As I got the kids ready for bed (as fast as humanly possible), Dan crashed on one of the beds and immediately began snoring.  Which, of course, the kids thought hilarious.  Which made for a looooooonnnnngggg night.

After fighting about who was sleeping where (not a lot of choices in a single room), imitating Dad’s snoring, giggling, a snorting contest, and then some crying, the kids finally fell asleep.  And, so did I.

After the long drive south and quick turn around, we’re happy to be back home.  But, already we’re looking forward to next year.

Good friends.  Good beer.  Good food.  Good fun.

Remember our hops plant?

Look at it now!

(Too bad we don’t remember what type of hops plant we planted.  This will make for interesting brewing later on…)

We are also proud to announce the appearance of cherry tomatoes:

And peppers:

Maria’s cantaloupe is coming along, but we still haven’t seen the start of any melons.  I’m afraid it might be too late now…

Pretty impressive, considering we started all these with just seeds!  As successful as we’ve been with our first try, I think next year we’ll make some improvements to our garden (like marking what’s what, fertilizing and weeding) and maybe we’ll be even more successful!

Usually, this would be cause for a celebration – peaceful time for Mom.  But today I sit… depressed.

Our wonderful, wonderful friends just left for their long trek back to Kansas.  Of course, we all probably need to recover, but still.  We hated to see them go.

Courtney has been my dear friend for more than 20 years now.  It makes me makes me feel very old to say that, but having her here made me feel like a teenager again.  It’s been more than 5 years since we’d last seen her and her husband, Roger, which means I had never met her beautiful daughter, Celeste, and she hadn’t yet met my two youngest boys.  What a reunion!  I was nervous for Celeste, as my four can be a little overwhelming – especially to a 19-month-old – but she jumped right into the fray, seemingly unafraid.

While they were here, we rode the train, got some culture at the Art Institute, walked hundreds of miles* around downtown, ate Chicago-style pizza, watched a ton of trains, found a GREAT Mexican restaurant (and ate and drank ourselves silly), forced the men to take the children swimming, grilled steaks, ate and drank some more, watched a movie and laughed our asses off all weekend.

Me 'n Court

Celeste ate her very first Happy Meal while she was here, shared her French with us, and basically got to live la vida loca for a few days.

I’m sure we all need some exercise now to work off the pounds we put on.  And the adults need to dry out.  The kids need to get back into a routine.  But…  we just hated to see them go!  Maria cried and Luke asked if they could come back tomorrow.  Jack wants to follow them to Kansas.  I hope they move here one day.

There’s nothing like getting to spend time with good friends.

*It was really only a couple, but if you asked my kids, they would have told you that we forced them to walk hundreds.  They were so hot.  And tired.  And thiiiirrrssssty.