Oh hai, blog.

I'm sorry to have been neglecting you.  It's Spring Break and my husband is out of town and I am very busy keeping little children busy so they go to sleep when they need to.  We went Roller Skating on Monday.  Wow.  THAT'S harder than I remember.   Roller Garden, where I had my 18th birthday party, looks exactly the same.  Right down to the carpet.

The kids did pretty well.  Boy mostly played the arcade games and got tickets.  Girl made it around the rink about 5 times.  Her heinie hurts from falling, but I have to give her huge props for her persistence.  She just kept going no matter how many times she fell.  Also, I introduced my 6 and 3 year olds to Pixie Stix.  

High Five

My kids get High Five Magazine in the mail every month, thanks to my in-laws.  I love this magazine, and we read it a lot together.  Yesterday we made a "cookbook" of all the recipes from their back issues.  It's a copy of each recipe page, three hole punched and put in a three ring binder.  They think it's the best thing ever.  The only thing I had all the ingredients for right away was this:

The kids liked it.  (no comment from the peanut gallery - not all recipes are created equal. 

I went shopping for other ingredients today.)

The Peanut Gallery.

Lost and Found -or- Is it Spring Yet?

You know when you want to find something and you can't and it drives you crazy and you know it's out there somewhere and we have the Internet for god sake and you should be able to find it so where is it already?  And then you give up? And then a while later you find it?

In my real life, I recently found and lost the cufflinks I gave to my husband on our wedding day.  I found them the week before he was going to be wearing a tux again on the cruise we went on last week. I was so excited.  I put them someplace I would remember to bring them them.  Or did I not move them, because I knew that I would forget where I put them?  I don't know, because I didn't find them again in time for the cruise.  Perhaps I'll run into them again in the next seven years - hopefully before the next formal event we go to.

In my Internet life, I've been looking for a swing set for the kids.  All I've been able to find are the kind that are $12,000,000 and have a turret and a moat and maybe some crocodiles circling it. And guard dogs with bees in their mouths and when they bark they shoot bees at you.  I just want a regular swing set.  With four poles and a few swings. Maybe a slide.  Maybe, maybe a see-saw.  I gave up looking when the snow started to fly.  But I didn't really give up.  I knew the answer was out there somewhere.  Now, I live in Minnesota, so it just keeps snowing, and it may keep doing so for another few months, but I have faith that Spring is coming.  I'm looking for signs of it - too early, I know.  But I know it will come.  Besides, look what I just found without even looking: A plethora of SWING SETS!  Please click the link and tell me which one is your favorite.  I'm all excited.

PS: CSN stores rule. 

Hello again, hello.

Oh, my poor neglected blog.  I'm so sorry to have been away for so long.  My family has been passing around a stomach flu and I have been unable to think about food for days. Very sad.  We are all in the clear now, and I look forward to eating regularly again and sharing with you all the delights of the rest of the season.

In the meantime:

My children are home from school on Winter Break for two weeks (OMG), and then we will be going on a cruise for a week.  I'm looking for things to entertain them while were all home. Together.  Bound in by snow and ice.  For two weeks.  *ahem*  Sorry. -and will probably do this awesome kitchen science project again. All you need is cornstarch and water (and food coloring if you want to be fancy like me).

When you work it (create friction), it's a solid.

When you let it relax, it's a liquid!

My daughter made hers pink.

My son made his green.

You should totally do this - even if you don't have kids - do it for "cheap date at home with a bottle of wine night".  Seriously.  It's quick to make, entertaining for a really long time, and super easy to clean up (the best part).

Check out the rest of Liz's site, Kitchen Pantry Scientist, for more great experiments!

The things we do...

From the back seat of my Honda Cr-V, my children track where we are by noticing the water towers we're near.  These landmarks are very common here in the Plains of Minnesota, and each one is a little different.  My children have names for each one, and it helps them figure out where we are, and where we're going.  I think it's pretty smart.

The other day when my five year old had school and my three year old didn't,  he and I took a mini- tour of the local water towers for Something To Do.  It was a huge hit.  We walked around the first one (fenced in), we TOUCHED the second one (after ignoring the No Trespassing sign and running up the hill it was on, leaving the car running for a quick getaway), and we played at the park next to the third one.  Then when my Kindergartener came home and got wind of what we did - we went back and touched the second one again.  This is just one of the crazy, creative, semi-ridiculous things I do for my children.

The clock glows blue at night!

We touched this one.  Twice. 

This one's next to a great playground....

...and has a bonus tornado warning siren!

What strange things did you find yourself doing this week? - with kids or not!

Laundry Day

As I spent time sorting what seemed to be Every Piece Of Clothing My Entire Family Owns in the laundry room last night, it occurred to me that I might be doing it wrong.  Or at least different.  As I sorted the adult clothes diligently into whites, lights and darks, I simultaneously sorted the children's clothes into their own basket.  When the kids clothes basket gets too full for one load in my (awesome) washing machine, I don't sort them into lights and darks.  I sort them into His and Hers.  Why is it that I don't feel the need to sort the kids' clothes by color?

Anyone else out there do weird sorting?

Also, let it be known that the kids stuff all gets washed on cold.  I'm not That clueless.