It's Like a Horror Movie Around Here

We're two weeks into summer vacation, which means the collection of toys on top of our kitchen cabinets is growing (every time the boys fight over a toy, I pluck it out of their hands and put it on top of those cabinets, that way they can see it but not actually play with it, my own personal brand of child torture.  It must stay up there for a minimum of one month) and every day Adelaide is critiquing my lunch choices ("Mom, you can't just have chips and salsa for lunch," "Mom, popcorn is not an appropriate meal for an adult."  This makes me feel like I'm in a Friends episode as I rage, "SO I CAN'T DO ANYTHING I LIKE?").

Summer vacation also means at least one member of the family sustains a new injury every day.  I had to buy a new box of band-aids today, and I generally only give those suckers out if there's enough blood to stain the carpet or furniture.

Caedmon has conveniently timed all his incidents to occur right before we head to the library.  I can't help but think this is because they do things like gasp dramatically when he walks in and there's blood running down his face (okay, so that time his eyebrow had connected with the corner of a wooden box shortly before we left for the library, and I had staunched the initial flow of blood before we left the house, but then he put a vikings cap on so I didn't even see his face again until he looked up to smile at all his Lovely Library Ladies, and he was smiling, okay, even with all that blood) or give him an enormous band-aid when he's missing a layer of skin from his knee and then carry him around the library when he insists he can't walk (he tripped on the sidewalk on the way to the library, and I wasn't about to turn the circus that is our family around just to clean up one bloody leg- besides, he got loads more sympathy at the library than he ever would have gotten at home).

As for the rest of us, Atticus acquired an impressively skinned knee trying to skateboard, Adelaide has assorted bruises and scrapes from God only knows what, Derek pulled a muscle in his chest, and I am sporting one bruised and bloody toe because I'd forgotten the horrors to be had in taking all three children to the grocery store at the same time- I had already admonished Caedmon not to stack cans on the quarter-holder-thing that's attached to the handle on the carts at Aldi, I turned around to grab some produce and tell A and A to for heaven's sake stop horsin' around, and that this is not a playground and will you please quit scraping the frost off the inside of the freezer cases and eating it, that's disgusting, when I distractedly began to push the cart forward again, causing three stacked cans of Rotel to come crashing down onto my big toe.  It was one of those moments where all three finally did stop horsing around and stared at me with big eyes that clearly read "The cooling mechanism twirling above our heads is covered in excrement.  Take cover."  I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, opened my eyes, looked down at my bloody, bloody foot, wrapped my fingers ever so tightly around Cade's upper arms and quietly told him:  "Do not move.  Do not speak.  Do not breathe."  He looked scared, stuck his fingers in his mouth for comfort, and we all limped through the check-out and out of the store.


And it's only the middle of June.

Father's Day Questionnaire 2014

Happy Father's Day!  By some not-so-minor miracle, I've remembered to do this Father's Day Questionnaire with our kiddos for three years running (here's 2012 and 2013).  I think I'm able to remember because we have a physical copy of these, as I print them off every year, slip them into those plastic paper-protector-thingies, and store them all in a Father's Day binder.  Except that now I have to remember to print these off tomorrow even though Father's Day will be over and therefore completely and totally wiped from my brain for an entire year- our ink cartridge is empty and our printer is the devil.  Aaaaanyhoo, here's this year's.  Oh, yeah, and as always, Adelaide's answers are in pink, Atticus's in green, Caedmon's in blue.

All About My Daddy

By Adelaide Crisler, Age 8

My Daddy’s name is Derek.

He is 6 feet 5 inches tall.

He weighs 164 pounds.

His hair color is blondish-brown.

His favorite tv show is The Master’s golfing.

He likes to go to golf courses.

His favorite food is He likes everything except bad food.

His favorite drink is iced tea.

For fun my Daddy likes to throw things at you and make you squeal.

I love it when Daddy makes you squeal.

My favorite thing about my Daddy is when he makes me fly.

One funny thing about my Daddy is he’s really sarcastic.

If I could give my Daddy anything in the world, it would be a golf tournament he got to play in.

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All About My Daddy

By Atticus Crisler, Age 5

My Daddy’s name is what I call him is Daddy, but his name is Derek.

He is 40 feet tall.

He weighs 100 pounds.

His hair color is kind of blackish.

His favorite tv show is football.

He likes to go in a place that has boy stuff.

His favorite food is cookies.

His favorite drink is Mountain Dew.

For fun my Daddy kicks up the ball.

I love it when Daddy does good workouts.

My favorite thing about my Daddy is when he be’s a cookie monster and when he hugs me.

My favorite thing to do with Daddy is golf.  Golf golf golf.  Now I want to go golfing.

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All About My Daddy

By Caedmon Crisler, Age 3

My Daddy’s name is Daddy.

He is 52 years old.

He weighs kind of like this *pinches his fingers together* pounds.

His hair color is black.

His favorite tv show is Captain America.

He likes to go to work, and he also likes to go to the gym and church.

His favorite food is pancakes.

His favorite drink is tea.

For fun my Daddy likes to play with me.

I love it when Daddy plays with me and goes to the Ankeny Playground with me.

My favorite thing about my Daddy is him screaming and scaring me.

Maybe Five Things Fridays?

A while back I stumbled across a blog who regularly has posts entitled "5 Things"- if I remember right, five things she currently loves.  I did not bookmark or otherwise write the name of this site down in any way, assuring myself that I would remember, because it would appear that I will never learn.  I loved the idea of this "5 Things," because it's in a list format (lists!) and encourages gratitude, something I can always use to combat my inner cranky old woman.  Because I can't find this blog now, if anyone has any idea what blog originally had this idea, I would like to know so I can give credit where it's due.

So!  Onward!

Five Things For Which I'm Currently Grateful:

• T-shirt Capes!  I found this idea on Pinterest, and I loooove it because it was cheap (Goodwill t-shirts) and took right about a minute per shirt.  Our boys are currently in the grip of an all-consuming passion for superheroes, which means I'm asked to tie their beach towels around their necks as makeshift capes approximately four dozen times a day.  But no more- these slip on and off easily without my help, praise the good Lord.  

Adelaide also got to pick a shirt out at Goodwill, and she chose the red cardigan, which is 1000x sparklier than the above photo lets on.  Once we were home, she instructed me to cut off the sleeves (which you also can't see in the photo), so that the cardigan became a vest with detachable sleeves, which naturally allowed her to become Firegirl, who appears to shoot fire at any and all ne'er-do-wells.  

• Mild summer weather.  We're enjoying 70-degree days, which makes it criminal to spend any time indoors at all- matter of fact, I'm typing this on the front porch.  The Japanese beetles have yet to appear, the humidity has finally gone down, and it is gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous.  This is the type of weather and time of year I try to keep in mind when I spend day after frozen, snowy day trapped in the house and staring forlornly out my kitchen window throughout our long Iowa winters.  

No, Adelaide is not engaged in an impressive-looking yoga pose; she's coloring with chalk while I type on the porch and Viktor watches over us all (see him there, in the background on the left?  Our ever-vigilant viking Viktor).  

Speaking of Adelaide, she just found out her name means "noble, kind," and she is pissed, not to mention royally jealous of Derek and Atticus's shared middle name, simply because it means "dark warrior."  I'm grateful for her, too, so I can include it in this list.

• This book:

One Thousand Gifts:  A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are by Ann Voskamp.  I've spoken to a number of women who couldn't really get into it because of claims like "it's too flowery" and "just not really my style."  While I can certainly see what they're saying, I am loving this book, possibly because I'm treating it like a devotional, so I only read two to three pages per day.  I'm finding more meaning and connection to God in the smallest moments of my day because of this book, and where some have called Voskamp's style of writing "flowery," I think it's poetic and beautiful.  I'm only about halfway through because I've been taking it soooo slooooowly, which is really hard for me- I've had to bank several urges to race ahead- but I think it's definitely the way to read this book, at least one time through- maybe after you speed-read it the first time, if you just can't help yourself.

• Flowers.  (OF COURSE.)  The peonies are just about done, but the blue delphinium and various colors of poppies I just planted are blooming already (every time I see the poppies I have no choice but to croon, "Poppies.  Poppies will put them sleep," a la everyone's favorite wicked witch) and the yarrow is just starting to show its colors.  I also had one of the iris my grandma dug up for me last summer finally bloom:

She described them as "bronze-colored," which pegs their color just about perfectly, although they look a little more peachy in this photo.

• We finally got rid of the ants that have been plaguing our house for weeks now.  They do their level best to invade our living space every spring, but this year they just wouldn't go away.  I finally found this recipe for homemade ant-killer via a google search (ten spoonfuls of jelly plus half a spoonful of borax- which we already had; it's one of our laundry soap ingredients- mix well, spoon into bottle caps and set around your house wherever you've seen ants), and it was one of those things that, while I was doing it, I was just sure that it was a mindless prank that some idiot with too much time on his hands put on the internet just to see who'd fall for it and put blobs of jelly all over their house to drive away sugar-loving insects.  But it worked!  I did it two days ago, and have only seen one ant in that time, as opposed to the entire ant families who were not-so-subtly trying to claim some kind of squatter's rights.  I'm super grateful for this one.

A Midweek List

• You know those garage sales I went to last Friday?

The one billed "Selling a library of beloved books" was a gold mine.  Or an ink and paper mine, I suppose.  It was an older couple relocating across the state, and the sale was in their actual, built-in-bookshelves, at-home library.  Hardcovers for $1.  Paperbacks $0.50.  I have no idea how I made out with only these nine books, especially when, as I went to pay the absolutely delightful lady holding the sale, I only had to pay fifty cents apiece, even for the hardcovers, because I "obviously have such great taste in books."  I've read half of these, so my goal is to read the remainder throughout this year, as they're mostly classics I should be familiar with, anyway.  Although, if we're being honest, I'll probably never read that bottom one all the way through (Leviathan by Hobbes), as philosophy isn't one of my genres of choice.  I really just bought it because 1) it has a pretty cover, and 2) I like the word "leviathan."  What?  Bibliophiles can be shallow.  Obviously.  

• It looks like I've been a little too extreme in my instructions to my children to never, ever, ever, cut any of Mommy's flowers, ever.  After last week's yellow irises that I brought indoors had faded, I brought in some pink and white peonies.  Atticus followed me around as I merrily clipped my way through the backyard, anxiously running his hands through his hair and asking, "But aren't you going to get yourself in trouble?"  I tried to explain that it's my rule and I am thus free to break it at will (although, really, he's seen the hypocrisy that exists behind my "Only one cookie and then you're done" rule as I mow through half a dozen cookies in one sitting, so I don't know why he's having so much trouble with this flower thing) and that he can collect flowers to bring inside, too, as long as he has my permission.  

He looked unsettled every time he passed these the first full day they were there.

An unexpected advantage to bringing my flowers inside is that I'm finally able to smell them.  I've always heard people comment on the fragrance of peonies, but evidently when they're outdoors the scent is too widely dispersed for my sad sniffer to detect anything.  Bring a bunch of them into our front entryway, however, and man!  They've been perfuming our house rather beautifully for days, and I am proud to say I do enjoy the way flowers smell- I've never really been sure, as I can't stand floral-scented candles and such; they give me an instant headache.  The real thing, however, I can handle.  Joy!

• I got two calls last week asking me to participate in a local blood drive, and although I tried to explain that I've tried and tried and tried and my iron count's always too low, they insisted I try yet again, and I caved.  A helpful friend watched the kids, I assured her it would probably only be for about 15 minutes, but lo and behold, my iron levels were two-hundredth's of a percent higher than the lowest admissible amount.  They drained a bag of liquid life-force out of my body (I'm going to start a petition to have the Red Cross change the ever-boring term "Blood Drive" to "Liquid Life-Force Drainage Event"- I'm sure loads more people would sign up.  Or not.), I was immensely pleased not to have failed yet again, but I did wonder at the notable absence of signs saying things like, "It's a bloody good time" or pretty much any pun involving vampires.  A wasted opportunity, I say.

Oh, Teenagers

I almost died three times this weekend at the hands of teenagers.

The first time was Friday evening.  Having secured our favorite sitter, Derek and I went to the movie theater.  We settled into our seats.  We observed the fellow movie-goers around us.  All was well with the world.  Until a long line of teenagers filed into the row behind us.

You wanna talk about obnoxious?  Oh. my. stars.  Cursing and speaking loudly in crushingly obvious bids for attention.  And the things the girls were saying.  Aaaaah.  I like to think that girls don't do that thing where they try to make out that they have an impossibly low intelligence quotient around boys, but it was either that or these girls were actually that stupid.  I really don't know which I would rather.  Either way I was so, so embarrassed for their future selves, who will surely cover their faces in shame when they look upon these memories.

Still, I was willing to have a little patience, extend a little grace, because I'm aware that I was not a model teenager.  I'm still not entirely sure how my mother didn't kill me in the six months following driver's ed, as I had to have been the worst backseat driver in the history of mankind.  ("Mom, you're supposed to put your turn signal on half a block ahead of your actual turn."  "Mom, are there at least two car-lengths in between you and that car in front of you?  Because it looks like one at the most to me."  "Mom, did you even look before crossing that railroad track?  Do you have any idea what humans look like after they've been hit by a train?  Because I do."  I'm surprised she didn't purposely wreck just to put the other passengers out of their misery.)  As long as these hormone-carriers piped down once the actual movie started, we'd all get along just fine.

So they squealed and giggled and OMG'd and Derek gripped his armrests and scowled at the empty screen.

The previews started.  The inane comments behind us didn't so much as wane.

The previews ended.  The movie started.  It became clear that these children were going to treat us to what they clearly viewed as commentary worthy of Mystery Science Theater 3000, which it was, except for being neither funny nor clever.

I began to fear for my life, as my proximity to Derek surely marked me as collateral damage once the violence almost visibly brewing within him finally exploded.  To say that he has no patience for out-of-control teenagers would be like saying Jenny McCarthy should not be heralded as a viable medical expert: both understatements so vast they could contain their own galaxies.  I decided it was time to take matters into my own hands.

I, myself, had some rather choice and scathing remarks ready for this band of merry movie-disturbers, but I showed remarkable restraint, if I do say so myself, and merely turned around, and with a tight smile, pleasantly but pointedly said, "Hi.  I can't hear."  I kept eye contact for several seconds with the worst offender, who shrank back in her seat, mouth open, lower jaw jutting out, obviously offended.  When I turned back around, she started giggling again straight away, but this time was quickly shushed by her compatriots, who seemed properly abashed.

The second and third time I was literally almost killed by another teenage girl who was driving a driver's ed car while I was out running.  She ran me off the road twice.  The first time her driver's ed instructor calmly if clearly pointed to me while gesturing to her that she has to share the road.  The second time he was jabbing his finger in my direction while yelling at her, and the two boys in the backseat stared openly, as if in awe that they almost just saw my guts spilled across the road.  In my defense, I was on the very edge of the road, there was no sidewalk, and I was wearing bright colors.  In her defense, she's a teenager.


Honestly, if it weren't for our wonderful teenaged baby-sitter Hannah, I'd have lost all faith in adolescents completely.  I also hereby give all who read this permission to publicly admonish any of our children if you see them to start to act a fool in 5-10 years.

A Thursday Night List

• It's a summer Thursday night, which means I'm going over online garage sale listings for tomorrow morning.  Depending on what's listed, the kiddos and I will either head north or south; south is where I tend to head for our children's clothing, to a suburb chock-full of relatively fancy, high-end neighborhoods, and bless every one of those overspending mamas' little hearts.  North is my usual destination for vintage stuff and miscellany.  As for tonight's listings, south is full of vague descriptions like "kids items and clothing" and "TONS of kids clothes, all sizes."  Thanks for the maddening vagueness, South.  (For the LOVE, garage sale hosts, please, please, please list sizes of clothes!)  North, however, promises sales like "books, books, and more books!" and "library of beloved books going on sale," and "beautiful, low-care plants for sun or shade, starting at $2."   Well, jeez, twist my arm.  North it is!

• Why can't I figure things out for myself?  You'd think I'd see all those yellow irises (iris irises iris irises.  Which do you say to express the plural of iris?  I say irises.  Except when I say iris.) that had fallen over, you know, the ones that I keep almost mowing over, and would realize that hey!  Those would make beautiful cut flowers to place around our home!  But noooo, I have to read it on Cassi Renee's blog, because apparently, I must be told to do even the simplest things.

And then, because we had enough for two vase-fuls (vase-fuls? vase-fulls? vases-full?  I apologize, it would appear that my brain shuts off at 10 pm.), we took the second vase to the local nursing home.

And by the way- if you have small children, this is a great thing for them to do.  It's almost free (those flowers are growing in your yard anyway, right?  And you can stock up on crazy-cheap vases at garage sales and Goodwill.), your kids will look almost criminally proud marching them into the nursing home, and the residents tend to love visits from little ones (one of our children may or may not have once referred to the nursing home as "the den of loneliness," which may or may not have almost made me cry).  For me, one of the hardest parts of multiple-small-children-in-our-home stage of life is the fact that it feels like you are always the one asking for help.  So any way that we can give back, such as small, do-able volunteering or acts of service that I can accomplish with our children are always welcome, and this is a good, easy one for us.

• It's officially summer vacation, which means that our days are full of scenes like this one:

This appeared to be a trampoline game they were engaged in- I believe it was called "Crazy Chipmunk."  It seemed to consist of shoving each other around in a rough manner and then laughing hysterically.  Shockingly, this ended in tears.

FOOD

Last winter, I went through a phase where every new recipe I tried was crap.  It was incredibly discouraging, because when you go to the effort of gathering all the (often unfamiliar) ingredients and painstakingly following the directions and mixing and sauteeing and dicing and on and on and on, you expect to have something delicious to show for it, not a huge pan of  food-like substance that every single member of your family is trying to force down their collective gullets so as not to hurt your feelings.

Over the past week, however, the food pendulum has swung the other way.  Every new recipe I tried was delicious.  Husband was happy.  Children were happy.  I was happy.  A near riot broke out this morning over who got the last of the rhubarb-mint lemonade.  

So here a few quick linky-poos to these belly-pleasing recipes, with my own additional notes, of course, because it would seem that I am incapable of posting a simple link and then leaving well enough alone.

Rhubarb-Cherry Sauce:  I served this over pork chops Derek was kind enough to grill.  I did make a couple variations to the recipe based on what was and wasn't in my pantry- I omitted the large red onions and instead chopped up about half a large white onion, in part because I didn't want as strong of an onion flavor, and in part because white was all I had, and instead of dried cherries, I put in 1/2 cup of my mother-in-law's homemade cherry pie filling that she was kind enough to stash in my freezer a few months ago, again, because that's what I had; I also omitted the granulated sugar and cut the brown sugar down to 1/8 cup because the cherry pie filling was so sweet.  This stuff was dee-lish, and a nice alternative the barbecue sauce I usually serve with pork.

Rhubarb Mint Lemonade:  For this one, you just take a can of frozen lemonade concentrate (or make fresh if concentrate offends your delicate sensibilities), make it according to the directions on the can, add a sliced fresh lemon, three cups of chopped rhubarb, and a handful of crushed mint leaves.  Stir it up, then let it steep in the fridge for at least three hours.  The best part of this one, aside from sucking it down as fast as I could because it was so refreshing, was pulling half the ingredients from my backyard (rhubarb) and kitchen windowsill (mint plant).  

New York Cheesecake:  I wasn't sure about this one, as the author/baker lists its difficulty level as "Easy," while in my (entirely unprofessional, at-home cook) opinion, any recipe requiring a bain-marie should automatically be upgraded to at least "Moderate."  It really was easy, easy, easy, however, especially if you read the directions ahead of time and set out all the ingredients to soften/come to room-temperature and allot enough time for the baking/cooling on the counter (I have got to start reading recipes IN FULL, ALL THE WAY TO THE END before I get to making them), because while the actual work involved is easy peasy, you're going to need to be at home for awhile/not make it right before bedtime.  My only variation is that she calls for a springform pan, and I'm not fancy enough to have one of those.  I instead used two 9-inch round cake pans, and they turned out great, plus I got to skip all that tinfoil nonsense.  I also whipped up a simple graham cracker crust and pressed it into the bottom of one of the pans, because while her recipe doesn't call for one, I love a crust on my cheesecake.  Our family preferred the one with the crust.  This one was easy to make, easily the best cheesecake I've ever made, and one of the best I've ever had, period.

Anyone else have any tried-and-true rhubarb recipes?  Because I've still got a bunch back there, but don't really feel like making the standard rhubarb crisp or rhubarb pie.