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Saturday, April 23, 2011

it's on like donkey kong


We are heading to an egg hunt with the fam today.  I have prepped the little guy.  I put him through my own personal egg collecting boot camp.  


We'll see how he does.  I'm expecting him to get at least 54 eggs, that's how many I'm taking up there.


Good luck little man, bring home the golden egg!

Thursday, April 21, 2011

one step closer

Week by week I'm getting closer to my goal of having all those unfinished projects completed.  It's slow going but it's going none the less.  

I worked on some more blankies last week.  How many blankies does one kid need?  Right now the answer is four, with some lovies thrown in.

These are his blankies, minus one that is tucked safely under a sleeping baby right now.  You aren't missing anything though it's just a duplicate of the owl blanket  The two on the left I made and the one on the right is an Ally Zabba.  It is what started this whole blanket chaos that I am stuck in.  It's a nice blanket, I just figured I could make them cheaper myself, and make them I have.


These are the ones that I finished last week.  Two lovies and a blankie.  I'm thinking I'm going to put one of the lovies in the car, since it's a bit smaller and put the other up for a future baby gift.  I'm going to have more baby gifts by the time this is all over.


And because we all know I can't finish something without starting something new...
I saw a pillow very similar to this one online a while back.  It was for sale, I'm too cheap to buy something I think I can make.  So I bought some cheap fabric and went to town.  I must say it looks great in the picture, in reality it was a so so.  I'll give it a 6.72 out of 10.  I was going to make two to toss on the guest bed but I cut the front panel of fabric too short.  So now I have one of these pleated lovelies and one plain white boring pillow that I'm going to sew some fabric rosettes that I will attempt to make tonight to.  I gave them a half ass shot the other day and it didn't go so well so wish me luck.

Monday, April 18, 2011

milestones and memories

Today's memory is in recipe form.  Cupcakes from Cobra's first b-day bash.  I made them again this weekend and thought I'd share.  

Take all this.

Do this.

Then bake.

Then take all this


Do what I did up there.  Hey there were tornadoes that broke up my little cooking session, so frankly I think it's ok that I didn't get pics of every stinkin step.

Frost.  Then get these.

Eat.

Look at that technique.  Look at that hair.

And here's the recipe in case anyone would like to try them out and I strongly recommend you do.  More importantly it will be recorded.  Therefore it will be easier to find next time I decide to make them.  I won't waste 30 minutes trying to find it in my email box then get sidetracked and finally delete the over 10,000 emails I've been saving to...apparently read sometime I don't know.

White Almond Sour Cream Cake
1 box white cake mix
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup granulate sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
4 egg whites
1 1/3 cups water
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 cup (8 oz) sour cream
1 teaspoon clear vanilla flavoring
1 teaspoon almond extract


Mix all dry ingredients by hand using a whisk in a very large mixing bow.  Add the rest of the ingredients and beat on low speed for 2 mintues.  Bake at 325 degrees for 25 minutes.


** I used a spring box cake mix in the cupcakes above.  I also used pure vanilla extract, not clear vanilla flavoring.

Buttercream Frosting
1/2 cup shortening
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 tablespoon meringue powder
1 teaspoon almond extract
4 cups (1 lb) siftened confectioners sugar
2 tablespoons milk (more or less for spreading consistency)

In a large bowl, cream shortening and butter.  Add almond extract and milk.  Gradually add sugar one cup at a time, beating on low speed.  Add meringue powder.  Scrape sides often while mising.  Don't overwhip.  makes three cups.  Will keep in fridge up to  weeks when stored in air-tight container.

** I don't sift anything.  Martha one time told me this was unnecessary, that whisking it in a bowl a bit was just fine.  Martha who you ask?  Stewart of course.  Ok maybe she didn't tell me per say.  She told her whole viewing audience and I was one of them.  And maybe I just think I heard this and really didn't but I swear my brain is telling me that I did indeed hear it.  So I live by it now and so far everything has turned out fine.  For his party I didn't use almond extract.  In the cupcakes I just left it out and in the frosting I replaced it with vanilla.  I wasn't sure if the kids at the party would like the almond.  But both ways are yummy.  Also my frosted cupcakes have been sitting out on the counters since Saturday.  I understand that there is milk in the icing and that made me go "hmmm" for a minute but then I remembered when my mother was down for Cohen's birthday she kept the cupcakes out and surely she wasn't trying to kill us.  I mean we have no money so there would be no point.


I hope you guys enjoy them as much as we did.  They were a hit at the little man's birthday back then, and I'm certainly enjoying the batch I whipped up this weekend too.  So thanks sis for finding the perfect cupcake for our littles' bdays and thanks Brenda for sharing it with us.  This is one thing that I will always associate with not only Cohen's first birthday but also Morgan's.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

to switch or not to switch


I'm struggling with trying to find out what's right in terms of sleep for the little man.  He's getting older and there are days where it's tough to get him to go down for two naps.  The last thing I want is for him to get too much sleep during the day and it start to affect his bedtime routine.  So every now and again I think "today I will switch him to just one nap a day", today was one of those days.  

OMG.  In case you didn't hear that OMG!!!  By the time I gave in and put him down, an hour earlier than I was planning, I had decided a wild animal had taken over my child's body.  

Given he did fall out of a chair.  However this is an everyday thing for him.  I often wonder just how many falls it takes before we will see a difference later on when it comes to grades and school.

I only wish I were kidding.
So while he slept I made a huge mess.  I decided I'd try to get another one of my projects finished up, the rest of Cohen's blankets, or at least get a start on it, pictures to come I'm not quite finished yet.  I forget how much of a pain it is to cut the fuzzy material.  Fuzz was everywhere.  In my hair.  In my eyes.  Under the couch.  Up my nose.  Everywhere.
But just one look at Cohen sleeping so peacefully with his blankie, one I made at that, clutched between those chubby little fingers made all the fuzziness and the vacuuming worth it.
See how fuzzy that is, well it's a bit ratty looking now but when washed it's super fluffy and the potential for a huge fuzzy mess when cutting is extremely high.

Do you ever wonder just how people get those shots?  I was browsing through a blog and noticed this picture she had.  I was floored and instantly wondered how she did it.  And I don't mean how she got a great looking picture, it was great and all, but it was the angle that floored me.  It was a picture of a round table full of cookies.  The amazing part was that it was taken looking directly downward and 99% of the table was in the shot.  All I pictured was this chick hanging from the ceiling Mission Impossible style.  I don't know how she did it but I can say that I did a bit of fancy footwork to get these pictures today.  At one point I had one foot inside the crib and the other on the edge.  Several times I was standing on my head.  So heck maybe she was hanging from the ceiling like Tom Cruise.  

Monday, April 11, 2011

milestone monday

How bad is it that my kid is asleep out in the car as I type this?  Does it make it any better than I intercomed two phones to create a makeshift baby monitor so that I can hear him when he wakes up?  Does it make it any better than I made up the word intercomed?  No, no, and no...oh well I was just kidding about him being asleep in the car then.

The little man gives kisses now, only to his father.  He gives hugs too, only to me.  I would always grab him and ask for a hug all the while giving him a big bear hug of a squeeze.  I was super stoked when he came up to me the first time wrapped him arms around me and laid his head on my shoulder.  The Mr's thing was to try to get him to give him a kiss.  Finally about a week or so ago Cohen started doing it, a big open mouth to the cheek.  He will give Dada a hug here and there and me a kiss every once in a while but for the most part the kisses are reserved for ole Dad and hugs for Mom, I have no idea why other than I always asked for the hugs and the hubs was after the kisses.

On a side note, doesn't every little boy need a pair of leather sandals.
Now I'm not a huge fan of classic dressy boys' clothes, especially the shoes, but I couldn't help myself.  It may have been the fact that they were only 15 bucks, and when I see a pair of stride rites (new) for 15 bucks I'm getting them, it doesn't matter what they look like, or the fact that really leather sandals just scream summer.  Either way the kid tried them out for the first time yesterday, and yes we already have scuff marks on the toe.  

On another side note, or a small confession rather, I had to sweep the floor where I took that picture and I only swept that part of the floor.  Lazy, I think so.

Friday, April 8, 2011

i'm slowly getting my closet back

I know you guys thought that I forgot about the challenge I made for myself, oh no not me.  I would never drop out of something in the middle of it, or before it even started.  This was my first accomplishment.
Wool dryer balls.  They go in the dryer with your clothes, while drying of course, and they are supposed to help your clothes dry faster.  Don't ask why they are all over the floor.  I can't say I've noticed a difference as of yet.  I will say though that looking around the interwebs I've found that for optimum results you need a lot, as in like 10-12, and I just finished the rest today.  I've been using only 4 for a few weeks now.  I have 10 total presently, all accounted for, I think I have at least one or two more floating around the house that the little guy swiped.  I will say this was kind of a cop out in terms of finishing an unfinished project for the week.  It was super easy.  The only reason I'm counting it, besides I'm a cheat, is that over half of these yarn balls had been sitting on my kitchen table for weeks now.  I'm glad they are off.

Since the above was a bit of a cop out I forced myself to do something else today.  So while I got my sewing machine a whirling...
...the kid, he ate some nanners.  See I'm not too bad of a mother, I do feed him occasionally.  The proof is on his face.
He's such a dork.  Back to the machine.  I mentioned in a previous post, the one about my big challenge as a matter of fact, that I had bought fabric to make the little guy some more blankies.  I made one as soon as the fabric got here.  Then my ADD kicked in I realized I needed a needle for lightweight material, the one I was using kept snagging the silky material.  After finding a pack in the depths of my closet I knocked this bad boy out.
It turned out much better than the first one I made, which coincidentally is exactly the same.  Each set of fabric makes two blankets and two small blankets, or as I would call them lovies.  So 2 down only 4 to go, 10 if you count the lovies.  No I'm not one of those people that completely over do something, why do you ask?

And just because I'm one of those obnoxious mothers that smother you with pictures of her kid...
a twofor!

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

wait it's not monday anymore

You know I should probably switch my milestone monday to tuesday.  I would too, if it weren't for the fact that once I did that I would start putting it off until wednesday.  So what's the kid been up to this week eh?  This past weekend he has started making animal noises, a limited few mind you but still animal noises none the less.  He has a book called What (you have to say it as if someone just told you the most ridiculous thing your pretty little ears ever did hear).  So anyway the story goes something like this...What  sound does a dog make...woof.  What sound does a cow make...moo.  and on and on.  The kid loves this book and it's mate Who (Who lives in a hole...gophers.  Who lives in a tree...birds. etc).  This weekend as we were reading it for the 25,443rd time he started making the horse sound.  Since then he has also made the cow and bee sounds.  The horse is by far his strong suit.  It almost sounds like he is laughing "hee hee he hee", I actually thought he was when he first started.  He so so with the cow, or "mmmm" as he does.  And the bee, "zzzzz", he's only done a couple of times, but gosh darnnit I'm his mother and I'm counting it.

I also figured something out this weekend myself.  The novelty of things wears off rather quickly with my child.  He has said various words during the short time he's been here...mama, dada, reagan (our dog), tractor, yipee.  The hubs may disagree with some of these.  He at one point would point to his ears when asked where they were or stick out his tongue when asked where it was.  He would clap during if you're happy and you know it.  Now he doesn't.  The best I can figure is that the novelty has worn off.  The words last a few days then about two weeks later another one will pop up only to stick around for a couple days.  He did the bit with his ears and tongue a bit longer but still, rarely will he do it now.  So since he started the animal sounds on Saturday he may be done with them too by now.  Oh well they were fun while they lasted.