Cooking and eating

I have a love/hate relationship with cooking.
I know that it is something that I want to do as a wife and mother but it can be draining. Maybe I made it that way by putting eating healthy way up on my list of things that I find important in life.
Its hard if not imposable to eat healthy without cooking. I mean I guess I could stock my freezer full of Kashai and Amy's frozen meals but I dont have the money nor desire to do that. Then there is all the waste from the packaging but I am not going into that right now.
So until unless our family decides to go on a raw food/ vegan diet, I am going to have to cook.
Sometimes I get adventurous and try new recipes but most of the time I will stick to the basics.
Cooking with the littles under toe is both fun and challenging.
The little man can be a big help.

The little lady on the other had is not as helpful yet. She tries but most of the time she ends up helping by getting on my back in the Ergo.

She is still in the action but not right in it.
There has been a few times when I have been cooking dinner and she will some in dragging the Ergo behind her wanting to get up, snuggle and help.
But the best part of cooking is getting to eat.

Five randoms from this week

- Its mid January and our tree is still up. The little man and I took off all the ornaments after we got back from our camping trip. So for almost two weeks our tree has been standing in our living room naked.
- The little lady is climbing and standing ALL the time but she is not walking yet. Sometimes I try and encourage her to walk and than I wake up and say 'what am I doing.' I feel like I am going to miss her first steps unless I give her a little push when I am looking. She is just so darn independent, so she will do it when she wants to even if I am not ready.

- One of my goals for 2011 was to stay up on my dishes. I am doing better, not great, just better at it. There always seem to be a few stragglers hanging out in my sink that just did not seem to find there way into the dish washer. The little man has been helping me unload while the little lady tries her hardest to help me load by standing on the dishwasher top, splashing in the water and throwing thing out and onto the floor.

- We are now a two Kindle family. I used my Christmas money to get a used (four months old) 3rd generation 3G white one. The hubby could not keep his hands off it so he ended up getting a black one last night with his Christmas money. I like it. I am a little bummed that I cant check out books from the library onto it. So I will still be reading many paper books. I guess I know what I will be spending my Swagbucks on, Amazon gift cards. At my rate I should be able to get a book or two a month for free. (If you are interested in doing Swagbucks sign up here. It is a great, easy, fun way to earn free money or gift cards just for searching.) Sorry to sound like a sales women but just wanted to let everyone know (or reading) that Swagbucks is a great way to get free money and who does not like free money!?!
- My house is so quiet right now. Both kids are sleeping, the hubby is gone and I have no idea where my phone is. I think that I might just have to curl up in bed and read.

Playing in the kitchen

Most days I feel like I spend all day in my kitchen. Most of the time it is a good thing. I am not the greatest cook but I do enjoy making my family mostly healthy meals that we get to enjoy together. It it is even more fun now that the little man wants to help me. He climbs up into his learning tower and helps me cut celery or kneed dough or do whatever I need help with.

I have a sign in my kitchen that reads 'A messy kitchen is a happy kitchen.' That is very true about my kitchen. Most of the time my sink is full of dishes, the floor is littered with crumbs and you can hardly see my counters. Dont get me wrong having a clean kitchen makes me happy also but when my kitchen is messy I know that I just got done creating something that I hope my family will love.
We dont always just cook food in the kitchen. Some times we make play dough or paint or just splash in the kitchen sink.

The little lady even had her first taste of play dough this week in the kitchen.

We even have toys in the kitchen. The littles favorite is the leapfrog letter magnets. We have two of the toys that make the letter sounds and one that you use to create three letter words.
*Just a side note* WOW after seeing the prices of these items new I am really glad I did not buy them new. They are great toys dont get me wrong but 65 bucks just for the lower case letters is a little crazy. I got the two readers and the upper and lower case letters at a garage sale for 4 bucks and the word speller with a few letters at the thrift store for $2. If you are interested in these letters check used like Craigslist before buying new.
The little man is enjoying learning how to create different words. He thinks that it is really neat that we can spell mom, dad and cop. We even spelled arm and pit the other day and he thought that was real funny. The little lady just likes to chew on the letters and take them off the fridge.
And no matter how messy or dirty my kitchen floor is it always looks amazing in black and white pictures. Dont ya think?

Playing in the woods

My parent have been spending a little more time over at the lake house lately and today our family decided to come over and join them.

The weather was beautiful.
The little man had fun helping Grandma out in the over grown garden.


There is a very large garden space over at the lake but this space has not been used for the past few years so it is really over grown. They planted squash plants, pulled weeds and examined bugs. He even saw his first gardner snake that he was a little afraid of.


He also helped Grandpa spread the new gravel in the driveway.


And he took his fair share of pictures.





The last picture is of the little lady going potty outside. She has had some great potty days lately.
It brought back so many memories walking around in the woods around the lake. I am glad that the littles will get to make there own memories in the same woods.

Making a green treat

Today the little man and I decided that we needed to make a green treat to share with our friends tonight after our dinner of corned beef.


So we decided to make green rice crispy treats.


The little man was such a big helper.


But I think that his favorite part was licking the spoon.


The little lady helped also by sleeping so soundly and looking so cute.

**Notice my clean counters. A big thank you to my hubby for putting in my drawers in the kitchen and main bathroom. It only took 5 years but they are finally in and that is all that matters.

Two days of outings

Yesterday we had our norm play date at 9am. We had to leave it a little early and headed over to the local book store for another get together. After lunch two other moms and I headed over to the mall for some window shopping and some much needed walking. The little man took his nap in the mei tai for about an hour (much shorter than normal). We got home just after 3pm.
Today we headed over to my sisters house to spend some time with her two little ones while she was at work. We got there just after 9am. The little man had a blast playing with his cousins. He was so tired by the time we left at just after 2pm he put his blanket over his face and was out.


I did not want to wake him up so I hung around my parents house for a while and when he woke up he wanted to play in 'Grampa' and 'Grammas' very cool play closet. They just put up a white board and the little man enjoyed coloring on it.


Yes, I have that child

When we finally got home I decided my neglected house needed some TLC. Where to start? The pile of dishes in the sink sounded good. The little man helped me put the spoons in.


They are never to young to learn to help mama out a little.