Rain, rain...

I'm not a fan of the thunderstorms, but it is nice to have a soggy rainy day. Especially one that ends with a big batch of spaghetti sauce and a boule of fresh bread.

Sorry posting is so light. I'm trying to catch up with things here, and I've actually been very busy knitting and sewing lately, so soon I'll get around to posting pictures of all my projects. (Fingers crossed.)

Mother's Day and a Birthday

It's always nice that Todd's birthday and Mother's Day either coincide or fall right near each other. We have the excuse to party all weekend. Friday night we grilled out; Saturday was the farmer's market, some coffee shop time, working in the basement, dinner out with a friend, and a little walk to the park, and Sunday was a relaxing day of German pancake with strawberries and vanilla ice cream for breakfast (H), sewing!, delicious veggie stir-fry wraps for lunch (T), napping, Empire Builder board game playing, split pea soup and fresh bread for dinner (H), and calls home to both moms. Plus lots of hugs and kisses from a sweet little girl.

Spoiled Rotten

Oh man. You know sometimes when you cook something up and it's just sooooo good? You sit back as you take your first bite, and you realize you couldn't get it any better in a fancy restaurant, and you just glow through the whole meal.

Tonight we grilleda pair of lovely, thick Iowa pork chops, and a huge bowl of veggies, and it was pretty spectacular. Sorry again, Tyce and Dave, for those inferior pork chops we served you a few summers ago. Try again soon?

But seriously, it was a really great start to the Mother's Day/Todd's birthday weekend.

Productive... but still so much to do...

It was one of those days where I had a pretty good rhythm and got a lot done, and yet I'm still totally behind on everything and still feel like I'm never going to catch up.

But on the bright side we had a tasty new soup for dinner, rhubarb muffins for dessert, and I got big batches of chicken stock and bread dough made.

I need to start posting some pictures again, huh? Maybe pronto, before the tulips fade?

Sweet Peas

My dad used to grow sweet peas in planters along our entryway walk - one of the few seeds that he and I as hobby gardeners ever had much success with. Last year I tried (and failed) at growing some sweet peas of my own, but I'm giving them another go, and this year Roo helped me poke the seeds into the holes and pat the soil down around them. Surely they can't refuse to come up for such a enthusiastic gardener?

Fingers crossed!

Why we love the weekend here:

1) Coffee shop time downtown - an espresso, a steamer, and a scone
2) The first farmers' market of the season - we bought eggs
3) 6 books from the library for Roo
4) Starting to frame in around the duct work
5) Home-made Pad Thai for dinner
6) Going to bed at 7:30pm
7) Mowing the grass, harvesting rhubarb, and putting in the vegetable garden
8) Pad Thai leftovers for lunch
9) Open windows and a warm breeze
10) More progress downstairs
11) Beecher's ice cream!!!!!

Cucumber Before Bed

I just ate a little bowl of sliced cucumber dipped in homemade 2% yogurt. I read in some L. M. Montgomery novel* that cucumber and milk was supposed to give you terrible indigestion (and therefore vivid dreams if consumed before bed), but this combination has only brought my tummy much bliss.

And homemade yogurt is seriously where its at, yo.

*It was either The Story Girl or The Golden Road.

Mended!

I spent all nap time mending two pairs of work jeans for Todd, and now I am in bed, tired, at 7:30pm. But there are nice chocolaty brown corduroy patches peeping through his ripped out knees, and we even mowed half the lawn after dinner, and took Roo for a walk to the park, and she went down the slide all on her own for the first time. So it's been a good day.

But man, I'm tired. So instead of a photo I'll leave you with this:
http://kalman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/may-it-please-the-court/

Something New

We tried out a new recipe for dinner tonight - a sort of Mediterranean/Middle Eastern salad dish of lentils and couscous, garlic, bell pepper, onion, olives, tomatoes, and fresh cilantro. Topped with a home-mixed balsamic vinaigrette and crumbled feta cheese.

I think it's going to be a prominent feature in our warm-weather menu rotation.

Ty and Roo are back to playing on the deck while I make dinner. Spring! Spring! Spring!

I think he was hunting something in the grass below.

Oh, Hi

Let's see if I can end this month-and-a-half long blog hiatus I fell into... Hello again!

My day:
lazy breakfast with a cute tot
putting away some 12 and 18 month clothes
taking out some 24 month and 2T clothes
storing the highchair
Indian leftovers for lunch
nap!
making hummus
baking granola
loads of laundry
hummus and egg sandwiches for dinner, strawberries for dessert
early to bed!
watching a beautiful sunset
and maybe some knitting?

Citrus

We have the most uneven produce at the grocery stores here. You buy some oranges and they're pretty good, bordering on the downright tasty, and you go back for more and get dry, crunchy, under-ripe, orange look-alikes.

These were some of those. Is it even worth it to speculate on marmalading them?

Messy #5

Lastly, here for messy week, is a room that is supposed to be a bit messy. A bit of a catch-all for cleaning supplies and the watering can and the extra fish food and the bag of things for the Goodwill. I love my laundry room; it is sunny and full of green things.

I want to paint it bright yellow. Someday.

Tonight: sweet potato fries, peas, and breaded cod fillets. And blueberry yogurt coffee cake.
Tomorrow: Pi day!

Messy #4

So, I was mentioning the kitchen:

Thankfully, I got it all cleaned up this morning. And I even folded two bins of laundry this afternoon. Too bad I did the wash yesterday and so still have two loads of laundry yet to fold. Endless!

We went out on a date this evening, to dinner at Red Robin. Roo ate spoonfuls of my chocolate milkshake and helped herself liberally to my french fries. This is why we never go out for burgers anymore.

Messy #3

The great room is a fantastic idea and a terrible idea at the same time. Great for keeping an eye on Roo while I work, fantastic for socializing while cooking, and terrible at hiding any kind of kitchen mess or the fact that I sometime struggle to stay on top of the dishes.

Tonight we had pizza. Fresh, homemade pizza, the best kind. I'm posting my pizza dough recipe for a couple of reasons. It's not anything fancy at all, but it is good, it's healthy, and it's fast. It's just a squinch modified from the Newlywed Cookbook, which we got as a wedding gift from a good Whitman friend.

Pizza dough:
Place 1 C warm (110* F) water in a medium mixing bowl. Sprinkle in 1 packet or 2 1/4 tsp. active dry yeast. Let stand 5 min, stir.
Add 1 tsp. olive oil and 1/2 tsp. salt, stir. Add 1 3/4 C white flour and 3/4 C whole wheat flour (2 1/2 C flour, total), mix, then knead for about 5 min.
Cover with a damp tea towel and let rise in a warm, draft free location until doubled, about an hour.
Preheat oven to 350* F.
Dust top with cornmeal, punch down, divide into two balls, stretch by hand to desired diameter and place on a baking sheet dusted heavily with cornmeal.
Let rise before topping approx. 20 min. for thick crust; top immediately for thin.

Super easy pizza sauce? We use homemade (vegetarian) red sauce, which we make in big batches for use on pasta, baked dishes, pizza, baked potatoes, spaghetti squash, dal, etc...

Also super tasty? Fresh mozzarella cheese.