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More Culinary Adventures with Cole

You know, a few weeks ago, The Next Food Network Star filmed their show and subsequent challenges in Las Vegas. This weekend included a little pre-audition "grooming" for my rising star. Our toddler-equivalent to Las Vegas was celebrating two friend birthdays in one weekend.

Saturday night, we went to Ichibon Japanese Steakhouse in Kemah for Sharon's birthday. Like his daddy, Caleb is more of a "behind the scenes" guy and doesn't really care to have his picture taken much.


Here's a picture Cole took of our table-side chef.

Cole was a ham (food pun totally intended) the entire time but finally decided to sit down once the ice cream arrived. Here he is foregoing the spoon and digging in "Vegas-style".

Overall, the boys enjoyed the show. Caleb said he liked the flaming onion volcano the best. Cole pretty much just liked the attention.

Sunday brought us another food-related adventure, as we went to Chuck E. Cheese to celebrate Reagan's 7th birthday. (She and her sister, Alyssa, looked soooo cute all dolled up straight from Libby Lu!) Cole didn't sit still long enough to pose for any pictures, but I'm sure he has plenty of stories to tell about it...given you can understand him.

Cooking (and eating) with Cole

I've decided I'm auditioning Cole for the next season of Next Food Network Star. Really - the kid's a sure bet. How can the judges resist the cuteness...plus, it's never been done before - a cooking show for toddler, hosted by a TODDLER! Genius. In preparation, we have been working on some basic skills this week.

First - the All-American favorite - peanut butter and jelly. Notice how carefully he holds the knife (a safe butter knife, of course).


Taking a cue from tv chefs before him (and boosting the "cute" factor), he takes a quick taste of his culinary efforts. (He loses points in my corner for this one, though. If the video camera had been rolling, you would be witnessing my "mom-freak-out" over him licking the knife.)

Also, to expand his international food knowledge, here he is eating a bowl of salsa. He had his own idea to make it a Mexican-Americana "fusion" snack by eating it with Frito's. (Yes, he really eats my salsa.)


You better watch out, Bobby Flay!!!

And just because I can't help it...

I REALLY want one of these:

Yes. I want an old library card catalog. No doubt it will be painted and made fabulous, too.

Friday Favorites 7/25

As tempting as it is to make my Friday Favorites list of things I *want*, I'm trying to focus some positive energy on the things I already have.

For example...my newly updated scrapbooking supplies. Okay, for the investment of about $5 for paint (and I still have more left over!)...

a bowl that Chris gave me for Valentine's Day in 1999 (it had B&BW stuff in it) - now repurposed as my loose stamp bowl:


a boring, black pencil/tool holder - now cute:

a pressed tin hanging bucket thingy - was once green and just hanging around, now cute and holds my ribbon scraps:

and, lastly, my ATG (remember this from an earlier Friday Favorites list?) What used to be red and ugly is now brown, turquoise and FABULOUS. Oh, and just for kicks, I painted an old wooden spool I found, too.:

I'm sorry ma'am, but your feet smell like fish.

So, I'm surfing the internet today and found this article. I LOVE LOVE LOVE to get pedicures done...but I'm not too sure about this one!

Friday Favorites 7/18

I have a complete stranger on my list of Friday Favorites today...his name is Jason and all I know is that he works for the fire department here. He just returned my Cassie-girl back to me. See, *someone* (coughcough*meter-reader-person*coughcough) left our back gate open and she got out. Thankfully, the old girl is kinda lazy and super friendly. She was laying up under some shade and walked right up to Jason when he came home. I had put some signs up earlier today and he called to say that he had found her and even drove her right up to our house. What a nice guy. Nice people do still exist.

Second on my list is Caleb's new smile. Last Saturday, he actually held still for Chris and the second top tooth came out! He has the cute little snaggle-tooth lisp going on and I can't help but giggle every time.

Lastly, this pair of shoes I got this week. Love them. Love them even more since they were only $15. And, yes, those are my black yoga pants I'm wearing them with today. :)

Practicing Practicality

So, my mom gave me a gift card to go buy some new clothes for work (I go back on August 11th - YIKES!!!). As luck would have it, Nancy also had some gift cards from her birthday burning a whole in her pocket, so we went shopping on Monday afternoon. I found several nice things and then we went to look at shoes. If you know me, you know that I have a slight addiction to shoes. (well, my stay-at-home-mom status slightly changed that, but whatever...) Really - shoe shopping is fabulous. No matter how much your size changes *up top*, you almost always wear the same shoe size. Plus, I just really like my feet...they are about the only things I still like about my body after children... Anyway, after *almost* giving up finding shoes in my size, I came across these...



I loved them. I bought them. I went home and had guilt. I started shopping in my head...what could I have purchased with that amount of money instead? Within hours, guilt turned into buyers remorse. The boys were asleep and I just couldn't stop thinking about the shoes. I tried scrapbooking to divert my thoughts. No luck. So, I walked to my closet, opened the box and stared at my oh-so-cute shoes. I put them on (yes, with my t-shirt and yoga pants) and returned to my scrapbook desk to craft in style. Chris laughed at me.

Yesterday, my cute shoes were returned to the store...no doubt, to join some "other" family. BUT - with the money I had spent on the shoes, plus the remaining $20 I had on my gift card, I came home with two necklaces, two pair of earrings and two new pair of SHOES! I feel much better now. But watch out when I get my first paycheck in September...I'm sure I can justify the 3 1/2" heels THEN!

Caleb's Impossible Questions (part 1 of many, I'm sure)

Those of you that know Caleb personally know that he can talk your friggin' ear off. It will come as no surprise then that I have a terrible time getting the child to be quiet in order to go to sleep at night. He always has "just one more thing" to tell me or something "super important". You know, like red is is favorite color or that the Autobots beat the Decepticons today. Well, a few nights ago, he had a "very serious question". Uh oh. He wanted to know how Pop built the stairs in his house when there wasn't a second floor to attach them to. Hmmm...the best I could come up with (as I was unsuccessfully trying to get Cole to be still) was that he would have to ask Pop next time he called us from New Mexico. That satisfied him, but he had to clarify that he needed to talk to him first. (In case you are wondering, Pop's response was that Nana had to hold the stairs up for two days so he could start the second floor.)

Tonight brought Round Two of Impossible Questions...he wanted to know just how I got the bones inside his body when he was a baby. I'm telling you, when I'm tired and wrestling a two-year-old monster, I'm just out of creative answers. I just told him that I didn't really know, they were just there when he was born. After a brief pause, he concluded that "mommies must just have bones laying in their tummies and then, before a baby is born, the skin and stuff just grows around them."

I'm praying for his Kindergarten teacher now...she's gonna have a long year...

Crafty? Why, yes. Yes, I am!

Here's a look at some of the favorite things I made while away from blogging...

A clipboard for school (school colors are blue/black/silver):



Mini-book for Savannah pictures (the last of those!):




Mini-book about our Easter Hat-stravaganza:


Caleb's pre-school pictures from 2005 (the letters look like notebook paper; size 12x12):


Cole learning to feed himself (size 8.5x11):


Caleb and Nana (8.5x11):


Caleb's first bath at home (double page 8.5x11):




Cole "Happy." (8.5x11 - picture taken by Caleb!):


For those of you wondering about the different sizes, I do each of the boys' first year albums in 8.5x11 and then subsequent yearly albums in 12x12 (standard size). Obviously, I don't scrap chronologically, either. I do what inspires me at the moment. I recently printed off what I think are the last pictures from Caleb's first year, so that album should be finished sometime in the near future, hopefully. Meanwhile, I have seven other "in progress" albums on my bookshelf...

Friday Favorites 7/11

This smile...

Really. How cute is he? I mentioned last night that this is Caleb's FIFTH tooth to lose. Can you believe it? He's only FIVE! The other top tooth is also loose, but it will probably still be a while...he's not a fan of wiggling them or letting us even get close very often. For about a week, all we heard was, "I think I'm just going to wait for it to fall out." Eating and toothbrushing had become quite the chore!

My next two favorites are my latest addictions - The Next Food Network Star and Design Star. Ugh. How do I get sucked into these shows? I started watching NFNS at Mom's several weeks ago and then we happened to catch the Design Star marathon on the 4th and now both have their designated spots on our DVR. Chris even watches. Okay, so he sits at the computer during NFNS (which has full view of the TV) and pretends to not watch...but I've seen him. I know his secrets... He DOES actively watch Design Star, though.
Anyway, for what it's worth, here are my predictions...
NFNS - I'm thinking Aaron might be the winner. I like him...now. He really has come around in the last few weeks. Adam is fun to watch on camera, but he acted like a goof for far too long and hasn't really shown that he can cook well. I guess that can be learned, though. Kelsy is sooo young and it shows. Lisa, well, I *wanted* to like her, but I just can't. She lost points with me a few weeks ago when she commented on messing up her $300 blouse while cooking. Seriously. Why are you cooking with that on? Then, last week she really pushed the envelope with the steak and horseradish sauce with couscous for her Brownie Girl Scout. Really? I won't even mention the disaster of a "guest shot" she had on the Rachael Ray show.
Design Star - Ummm...well...I'm watching it even though I've been underwhelmed with the "talent" so far. I think Mikey V. has the best shot at winning, though. All I know is, barring some disaster, Tracee will go next. She has been lucky that someone was worse than her in previous weeks. Sliding by...

I'm back!

...but without pictures. Our computer decided to poop out on us, so I'm blogging on our new one. I don't have my picture program loaded yet, so this will be a picture-free area for the time being. Chris' time off went great. We got several things accomplished and even had a little fun. A few highlights...
~we found a really nice guy to be "our" mechanic. Much cheaper than going to a big-name shop and he's super nice and local.
~visited the rainforest. Okay, it was the Rainforest Pyramid at Moody Gardens down in Galveston. Cheap, close and pretty to look at. I would also comment on humid and hot, but - let's get real - is that any different than Houston summers anyway?
~got family haircuts. (are you excited?)
~Chris and Caleb went to see "Hancock" together. Report is Caleb is much too talkative and frequents the bathroom too many times for the movie theater.
~finally celebrated Nancy's birthday (albeit late...and on the 4th of July).
~got to cuddle a sweet newborn baby girl. Miss Kayla was born on July 1st!!!
~got some craftiness done.
~signed my job acceptance letter.
~Caleb lost a top tooth (that's FIVE for those of you counting at home)
~got a new lawn-mower (out of necessity, since our old one died in the middle of our front yard - poo...less money for fun stuff)
~Cole got stung by a wasp (on the hiney, no less) and survived!

and, finally, today we got to spend a day with my well-travelled mom. We spent the day doing a little shopping/looking around. The best part was the bag full of fresh tomatoes she brought me from Uncle John and Aunt Margaret's house (thank you UJ/AM)! Even tried out the gelatto place in town (sorry, Sarah) - yum.

On Vacation

As you may have noticed, I am taking a semi-break from blogging for a while. I promise to be back updating you with my impressive lifestyle late next week. Saturday started Chris' vacation. We aren't really equipped to be the "jet-setting" type, so we aren't doing anything FABULOUS. Instead, we celebrated a late (child-free!) anniversary Saturday night by going to the movies and then meeting Stefan & Nancy for a late dinner and drinks (their flight had been delayed in North Carolina). Before I went to pick up the boys on Sunday, we did our part stimulating the economy by having the brakes on our Jeep fixed. We have to take it back next weekend to have some other whatsits and whozdoodles fixed. Really. Don't ask me...I have no idea. So much for having a little "no strings attached" money to spend friviously. Why do we spend our entire childhood desiring to grow up? It's not that fun being responsible...

Oh...fun vacation news - we are currently on "Kayla Watch 2008" - my friend, Sharon, was induced this morning!