February 2012: Week 3

Now we on to the week starting with February 12.

That Sunday, we were scheduled to serve in Julie's class at church, and I took my turn so Heath could do preschool later in the month. The lesson was on the Heart House. (Not sure if this is something only our church does or if it is well known in kids ministry.)



The gist is that we allow Jesus into our hearts to "run the house," but sometimes we allow bad people inside (e.g. Mr. Mean, Mr. Selfish, etc.). Jesus is the only one who can kick them out. Something really clicked for Julie, and later for Everest. I wrote an article about it for the church's online magazine.

We did dates with the kids after church, each of us taking them out to lunch, then to another special place. Everest and I ended up at KFC and the new bookstore, where we did the exchange of kids after awhile.




Julie and I went to World Market to wander a bit. She'd been there before a long time ago, but not recently. We had a fun time looking at all the imported candies and foods. I found some items (Vegemite and Marmite) that reminded me of my friend Linda, who was a world traveler as a missionary and exposed to all kinds of different international foods.




Monday, I have no recollection whatsoever of the day. How bad is that? But the kids must have made a fort or something because I have this picture:



Tuesday was Valentine's Day. Everest had a party at school, which I attended. I didn't have any of the ice cream sundaes because we headed to the gym afterwards. But it's always fun to go to his class and see him interact with his classmates. In that second image, Everest's art is the one with the figures on the far right.





After we picked up Julie from the bus stop, we went to the little Korean market near our house to get wonton wrappers. I have been promising to make the kids some cream cheese wontons at home, but we could never find the wrappers at the regular grocery store. They definitely them at this market though--along with quite a few other interesting items.




After Heath got home from work that night, I went to Chili's to pick up our Valentine's dinner. We watched a few episodes of Breaking Bad and ate our dinner, but otherwise, it was pretty uneventful. Ah well. I guess we have celebrated enough V-days that it has ceased to be a big deal. :oops:

6 Days in January: Much Ado About Food

Monday, January 23, 2012
As is our occasional custom on Mondays, Everest and I stopped by my mom's store for lunch after I picked him up from school. The food was delicious, and we got to see practically a full house there. Good thing she had wait staff that day!



That afternoon, in lieu of taking a nap, Everest decided to play with his Lincoln Logs. Somewhere along the way, he decided that it would be pretty clever to write his name with the blocks. (I only helped him with the R.) Pretty cool!



We had roasted baby potatoes and sugared strawberries with our dinner that night. Can't recall the main dish, but the sides were fantastic.




Tuesday, January 24, 2012
I hung out with Puella that evening. No idea what we did. :oops: Maybe she remembers... It probably involved coffee in some fashion.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Julie and I discussed her science project in the evening. She decided that she wanted to do something related to plant growth. The final project would be entitled, "Are Sandwiches Good for Plants?"



Thursday, January 26, 2012
That day is a total blank, but we must have gone to my mom's store for dinner, as evidenced by the photo I took that day of the hotel behind where her restaurant is located.



Friday, January 27, 2012
The kids had their friends M and A over for a playdate that afternoon after school. Julie and M tried out her new little Nook that we had cleared out for her in the closet.



My high school Inkaholics groups met that evening, which always makes for a night of awesome. I stayed afterward to work on typing up prompts, then later met with my Muse girls.



Saturday, January 28, 2012
Yet another weekend, and we woke up to seeing Julie and Everest playing on the dresser with their "sets." They have really been using that tabletop for playing a lot lately. It's the perfect playplace between their two now-separated rooms.



Julie and I went out in the afternoon to pick up supplies for her science project. It was kind of like a mini-date. Pretty fun! Afterward, we met with Heath and Everest at IHOP for dinner. Turned out that Heath had upgraded his phone and got an iPhone. Oh, ENVY.




Back at home, Julie set up her science project before bed. It was quite exciting for all involved!

Sugared Up + Another Robot

Tuesday was a much better day than Monday, that's for sure. As I inch closer and closer to vacation, my list of to-dos is getting smaller and smaller. Soon, I won't have to think about work at all for the rest of the year. :o)

I got the kids to school on time, then went to the church. My meeting was able to get moved up because I wanted to make it back to the school for Everest's birthday celebration. So my time at the church was much shorter than usual. It was fun to surprise Everest by coming in at snack time and getting to share in that time with his class. And the cheesecakes were a hit!




When we got back, Everest was really tired but not interested in napping at all. He just kept playing, then sitting and staring for lengths of time. I got some stuff done while working at the kitchen table so I could keep an eye on Everest. We brought Julie back from the bus stop, and I made some homemade hot cocoa mix. It turned out really well, but it uses almost half a mug full of mix for each cup!



Dinner was southwestern chicken with beans and rice, plus corn and chips with guacamole. Turned out beautifully! Heath was able to join us for a short time just to eat dinner, but then he was back at the school to teach the night class.

After cleaning up the dishes and the kids being done with showers, I started work on another robot for Etsy. Julie and Everest made some of their own sculptures too, which was really cool! This is Electric Elegance, robot #3 in this series.



Once the kids were finally asleep, I talked with the lady whose website I did last night, talking her through changing web hosts and transferring her domain. We're just about done!

School Happenings

Thursday, Everest's class had a group activity where they made Stone Soup. If you aren't familiar with the old folk story, it's a good one. Families were invited to partake, so Heath and I went to his classroom. He was elated to see us there.




That evening, we met my parents for dinner at my mom's store. The kids took their gingerbread houses to show Nana and Papa and to eat them for dessert. The food was wonderful as usual!



Everest had a little trouble going to bed that night and ended up sitting in bed with Heath when he got home. It was kind of cute. :o)



Friday, Everest and I looked up how to make homemade volcano explosions because Julie just gave him one of her old toys that would be perfect for the experiment. We set it up and did a it a few times. He LOVED it. Who wouldn't?



In the early afternoon, Julie's school choir had a special patriotic performance. The three of us were able to make it and hear her sing and say her lines. She did a great job! And the patriotic presentation got me teary-eyed a few times. I don't know why it does that...




Oh! Something fun came in the mail. I decided to have a few copies of my first novel self-published just for my own benefit and to send to a couple friends. I had created a cover a couple years ago, and since I now had the book template from doing the Inkaholics books, I figured--why not?



If you would happen to be interested in getting on yourself, let me know, and I'll send you the private link to the Lulu page. :o)

Julie had a sleepover that night. After dropping her off, Everest and I made our way to the pet store. They weren't busy, so I asked if we could be allowed to handle a corn snake--just to see if Everest could deal with it. He always says he'll be fine holding a snake, but you just never know, and it's a big investment to get such a set up.

Thankfully they weren't busy at all, and a guy took the time to get us handle a snake. Everest actually did a great job, and I had fun holding it too. It was SO cute. We found out that with the snake and the whole set up, it would come to around $150. So...PetCo gift cards for Everest--for birthdays and all holidays! One day we'll be able to afford it...

Parting Shot
I have another picture somewhere (I'm too tired to find it right now) of Julie in this same composition, returning library books through the sideview mirror. I love it and this one as well.

Best laid plans...averted

Wednesday morning, I was determined to take an actual sick day. After Heath took the kids to school, I had some breakfast and coffee and set my mind on taking a nap before I had pick up Everest. Then I started thinking about how much the bathrooms really need to be disinfected after my being sick. And how the trash needed to be taken out. And the dishes put away. Soon, I had my mind set on doing chores all day even if I had to cough through them all.

Then I got the call. "This is Everest's preschool. He's okay, but we have you down as bringing snack today."

Aaagh. I wrote it on the calendar wrong apparently. Thankfully, we already had the stuff, so I just packed it up, got dressed, and headed to the school. By the time I got there at 9:15, I figured I might as well stay because I would just have to turn around and come back in an hour anyway.

This proved to be a fabulous idea! Everest was thrilled beyond belief that I was there, and I was able to help the teachers with organizing folders for parent-teacher conferences. It was neat to see Everest in his element. And since he brought the snack, he got to be the class helper by cleaning the tables, setting up snack, picking the song to sing, etc. It was fun!





We decided to go visit my mom at her store for lunch after school. On the way, we passed by this power plant or relay station. We've passed by it many times before, but this time Everest asked me to take a picture. He calls it a "wire castle," which I thought was a very good observation.



Everest helped my mom with some of the cooking. She made chicken wings (Everest's fave), cheese wontons, and Thai noodle soup (for me). Everything was so delicious! I'm so lucky to access to such great Thai cuisine.



When we got home, I had high hopes of taking a nap with Everest. Unfortunately, he wasn't in the mood to nap at all, so I ended up just being extremely drowsy while laying down with him to sleep. Eventually, I had him play in his room while I laid in my room to rest for 40 minutes. Then it was time to get Julie.

Once she was home and had finished her homework, I tried to rest again while the kids watched a movie downstairs. I think I may have dozed for 15 minutes before I realized I really needed to get started on dinner.

My original plan was to make grilled chicken salads, but all of our lettuce froze in the fridge. :-P So much for that. Plan B was to make use of the cabbage I'd purchased on the last grocery shopping trip. I ended up making a sort of twist on a traditional Russian/German immigrant dish. It's basically ground beef, cabbage, and some other veggies, cooked up, then encased in a bread exterior. I used crescent rolls that I pinched together for the bread dough. They were absolutely delicious if I may say so myself.



The kids played in the back for a bit while we got the kitchen cleaned up. Then it was time for showers and bedtime. Heath fell asleep with Everest while Julie took her shower. She had written me a poem while Everest was showering, and I was supposed to write one back. I didn't take a picture of my poem, but I did get hers. :o)




We played some iPod games for awhile before she finally went to her own bed. I got a long shower for myself, and have been answering emails, IMing, and trying to get this blog written. Now it's time for bed because this is the last chance I'll have to get some extra sleep today. I'm taking it!