Dyeing Easter eggs

This week I bought some cute Easter egg decorating kits at Target, and the kids couldn't wait to use them! This morning we were at home by ourselves, so it was the perfect time to test them out. :-)

(This was the first year that Oliver and Buttercup pretty much took care of the egg-dyeing by themselves, with very little supervision! This was also the first year that I finally got wised up and used a towel to protect our countertop . . .)  

I can't believe how tall they both are now. Neither of them needed a step stool this year. :-(

To my surprise, Theodore didn't ask to be involved with the egg-dyeing process! He was content to watch and smile for the camera. :-)

I did end up giving him an egg to hold, which he thoroughly enjoyed. 

This is when he tapped the egg on my camera lens, ha ha!

And . . . this is right before he threw the egg across the kitchen and then threw a massive tantrum because I wouldn't give him another one. :-)

Imagine these next few pictures with a screaming toddler in the background . . .

This is one of Buttercup's eggs. :-)

These next two are Oliver's eggs. It's interesting how Buttercup was so careful about making her eggs look exactly like the ones in the picture, and Oliver was more abstract with his. :-)

This is one of the eggs that Oliver dyed. I'm not sure how it ended up looking like this, but it was really neat! He wanted to save it as long as he could (before it went bad), but then he dropped it on the floor, so it ended up being the one that he ate first. :-)

Buttercup's finished eggs.

Oliver's finished eggs.

Pork and Sausage Jambalaya

I found this recipe in a cooking magazine a couple of months ago, and it's quickly become one of our staple recipes. I don't remember which magazine it was or who even supplied the recipe -- I took a picture of the recipe with my phone, and printed it when I got home! It's not the best jambalaya I've ever had (that award goes to Big Ed's jambalaya at Milldale Baptist Church), but it is very good and it does taste like an authentic Louisiana recipe. :-)  (And, as an added bonus, it takes about half the time to cook as Big Ed's recipe.) 

Here's my fine-tuned version of the recipe. :-)

Pork & Sausage Jambalaya
olive oil
1 large onion, diced
1 large green or red bell pepper, diced
2 stalks celery, diced
2 lb smoked sausage, sliced (beef, pork, turkey, etc all work fine)
3 cups uncooked white rice (brown rice doesn't work that well, but is okay to use)
1 tbsp smoked paprika
1 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
1 tsp coarse ground black pepper
5 cups low sodium chicken broth
28 oz can petite diced tomatoes
2 cups diced cooked pork or chicken thighs (chicken breasts will be too dry)**

In a large, heavy-bottomed pot, heat olive oil. Add onions, green or red pepper, and celery. Cook until browned, about 10 minutes. 

Add sausage to the pot, and cook for another 5 minutes. 

Add rice, paprika, red and black pepper, broth, tomatoes, and pork. Stir well, cover, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer 18-20 minutes or until rice is cooked.  Enjoy!

This is a really horrible picture, because it doesn't look appealing at all and actually looks kind of slimy, but trust me, it's GOOD. Try it for yourself!! 

**I usually cook the pork or chicken thighs in the crockpot the day before, so I don't have to deal with that extra step on the day that I'm making the recipe. I usually use 4 large boneless pork chops or 4 or 5 boneless chicken thighs, and cook them on high for 4 hours. Shred the meat when it's done, and set it in the fridge until you need to use it. 

A bunch of pictures :-)

Here are a bunch of phone pictures from the past month or so. Enjoy!

Oliver proudly displaying his swim school graduation form :-)

Theodore stacking blocks! (I love his look of concentration!)

Theodore talking to the "psshh" [fish] at the Nature and Science Center. :-)

A person dressed up in a mechanized T-rex suit at the Nature & Science Center. It was pretty realistic, and some of the little kids were terrified! One little girl scrambled up the side of the rock overhang to get away from it, and ended up getting cactus needles all over her legs. :-( 

Rwar!

Trying to buckle his own helmet :-)

Anna and I went bowling one night! Beer and bowling don't mix (well, for me anyway)! She won by a lot!

Biking with me at the trail one Sunday afternoon

I love this picture not so much because of how it looks, but because of the memory of what was going on -- Buttercup was being very silly, Theodore was chasing Oliver with a giant pinwheel, and Oliver was dodging Theodore, laughing at Buttercup and trying to throw the ball to her.
One of those sweet moments when they were all having fun TOGETHER. :-) 

We had one of Buttercup's friends over to play one morning, and everyone decided to play dress up. :-)

This is one of my favorite memories! I wanted to go running one afternoon, but we really didn't have time to drive to the trail and back, so I decided to push Buttercup and Theodore in the stroller to the trail near our house, while Oliver biked next to me. When we got to the trail, Buttercup asked if she could get out and run. So I let her run the length of that trail, then she wanted to run more, so she ran the length of the next trail. We stopped for 30 minutes or so at a playground, then headed back home. Altogether Buttercup ran 2.8 miles! It was really awesome because 1) she got to do something she LOVES to do, 2) everyone got plenty of exercise, and 3) I only had to push 35 pounds of kid instead of 80 pounds of kid for those 2.8 miles. :-)  

Riding the carousel at the mall

The 5 of us went bowling last weekend, and Theodore bowled a spare on the first frame! Ha ha ha!

Storytime :-)

We went to a science show at the library, and Buttercup was chosen to be the first assistant :-)

Riding a hovercraft

Hanging around at the playground

Apparently they wore themselves out!

Oliver (in the middle) waiting for his turn at swim practice

Freestyle

Backstroke

Taking pictures of her big brother. She's so sweet!

Hey, it's an update!

Okay, I started this blog post about 4 weeks ago, and today I'm finally going to publish it. :-)

Here are some updates!

Oliver:
He's having a really good year. Just like when he started preschool and he gained confidence from that, kindergarten has been even more of a confidence-builder for him. He's just grown and matured so much in the previous 6 months! He's not as shy as he used to be, and most of the time he jumps into new and different situations with gusto instead of being too cautious to try.

He's doing really well at school. We've gotten 2 progress reports so far, and the 3rd progress report is due some time this week. The first progress report was very complimentary, and I think he was doing mostly "average" in everything, except for reading and math. The second progress report also had a good report, and he got mostly "high" marks in everything, including math. For reading, he is at almost a 3rd grade reading level! I think he's mostly quiet in class, and he seems to have quite a big group of friends! When I pick him up from his art class on Wednesdays, we pass a group of kindergartners on our way out, and just about all of the kids wave excitedly at him and some even jump up to hug him as he walks by. It's pretty funny! Another big thing about school is that he and another classmate were chosen to be the class representatives to talk to the other kindergarten classes about the Living and Learning Lab. He was bummed that he had to miss reading time that day, but he was pretty excited about talking to the other classes. :-)

Oliver is still swimming and doing very well at it! He finally mastered the breast stroke kick, which he had been working on for about 2 months, and he graduated from swim school a couple of weeks ago! Now he's on the wait list for a swim team. He also loves riding his bike on the trail with me while I run. We've only gone a handful of times, but it's always fun and it's nice to have him riding next to me to talk to while I run. :-)

Buttercup:
She is also having a good year. She loves her preschool class, and all of her friends. She has definitely become more of a girly girl recently, and I think it's all due to her classmates. It's fun buying dresses for her, but she definitely still is a tomboy. She always has a great attitude at school and her teachers speak so highly of her! She's their big helper and she is always ready and willing to do whatever comes next. Apparently she saves all of her feistiness for us, which is the way it should be! :-) One thing though, is that she really does want to be in kindergarten NOW. I finally realized that she thought that kindergarten was next year (as in starting this fall), and she was so disappointed when she finally realized that she has another whole year of preschool before she gets to start kindergarten. Poor kiddo!

Buttercup is doing great in swimming, as well! She's almost finished with her level, then she'll get to move up to station 1 of the level that Oliver just graduated from. She also started dance class a few weeks ago, and she's doing so well in the class. I love to watch her concentrating in the class and it seems to me like she is trying really hard to do exactly what she's supposed to be doing. When she was in gymnastics, she was always jumping all over the place when she was waiting for her turn, but in dance class she has so much more self-control, and it looks like this is a really good fit for her! She asked me one day how long she had to do dance, and I said that she needed to keep going for the next 2 months until after the recital is over, and then she could try another activity instead. She thought about it for a week, and one day she randomly said, "I think I want to do dance forever! Until I'm a grown up!" :-)

One last big thing about Buttercup is that she ran on the trail with me one morning a couple of weeks ago! She doesn't like riding in the stroller too much anymore, so one morning I said she could run next to me until she was tired, then get in the stroller, then get out, then get back in, etc. She ran about 1/4 mile at first without stopping, then she had a short break, then ran a little less than 1/4 mile. Then we stopped at the park to play for a while, and then she ran the rest of the way to the car without stopping, which was a little over a 1/2 mile! She was super proud of herself, and so am I. :-) And no, she didn't take a nap that day, ha ha.

Theodore:
Of course, Mr. T. is still an adorable stinker. :-) He is so funny and cute! He's been having a rough time with teething and some illnesses, so he's been pretty tempermental lately, but he's still really cute. :-) He parrots just about anything he hears, whether it's someone asking him to say something, or if he hears a part of a song, or a dog barking, or the sound of a wind chime, etc. He'll mimic anything!

He loves swimming, and playing outside, like most kids do, but one thing that we have definitely noticed about his personality is that Theodore loves music. He's the only one of our 3 kids who, as a baby, would sit quietly on my lap while I played the piano for 45+ minutes. Now, he doesn't sit that still when I play, but he still loves to listen! He frequently climbs up on the piano bench and plays his own little tunes. One funny thing is that whenever Oliver and Buttercup are playing in their room and want Theodore to come in, all they have to do is turn on their CD player, and he'll run in their room and start dancing. :-)  

We had a big answer to prayer a couple of weeks ago! We went to see Theodore's dermatologist to talk about the lasering process of getting his birthmark lightened. A friend of mine had her son's birthmark lasered when he was a few months old, because her dermatologist told her that the younger the skin was, the more effective the laser treatments would be. And Theodore's ophthalmologist told me that the procedure would be much more invasive if we chose to wait until he was a teenager or older. So, Dennis and I had decided about a year ago to start Theodore's laser treatments when he was 2 years old. (I couldn't imagine (and still can't imagine) choosing to do that to an infant!!) We were both really stressed out about it. Then we talked to the dermatologist, and told him that we didn't really want to have the procedure done, and he told us that basically between now and 10 years from now, the skin effected by the birthmark will only be marginally thicker, so we do not have to get it done now if we don't want to! We can just wait and see what Theodore wants to do about it when he's 5 or 6 (or older) and let him make his own decision! We were (are!) so delighted to hear that. I love Theodore's birthmark and I can't imagine seeing him without it, and I'm so happy that he doesn't have to go through the pain of laser treatments without knowing why it's happening. Yay!!!


Here are some cute pictures of Oliver doing one of his favorite things, and Buttercup twirling in her dance outfit. :-) (Sorry, no new pictures of Theodore!)