"O" Week Snacks

Owl sandwiches
"O" pretzels and cheese

CheeriO bars

Oreo cake

And not pictured were homemade Oreo cookies. They are divine, delicious, and delectable....I got the recipe from Jillian and, Oh my, were they good. Don't ask me what's in them.

A Saturday Thought

My life changed at 5:49pm on May 23, 2002. It's the exact minute that my first child was born. It's the exact minute that I became responsible for someone other than myself. It's the exact minute that I would never be alone again.

Up until then, my life was about me. Yes, I had a husband now, whom I loved to serve and take care of, but I still could basically do what I wanted, when I wanted to. If I wanted to take a nap, I could lay down and fall asleep. If I wanted to go for a walk, out the door I went. If I wanted to go out to dinner, all I had to say was Grandmothers and we were there in two seconds. If we wanted to go to Colorado, we packed one suitcase and drove away. Simple.

Yet, we must have wanted more than that because we had a great desire to have children right away. We wanted to have a family and all that comes with it...all the selflessness, I should say. We were pregnant with Thomas one month after being married. And it was wonderful.

It's weird for me to think that I have not physically been apart from my children for almost nine years now. Thomas and Annie have spent a random night here and there with our parents before. They all have been away from me for two nights when I am in the hospital having their newest brother or sister. The biggest one was this summer, Thomas and Annie went to Norfolk to stay with Jarod, Laura and Andrew for two nights. We have never left them at home while going on a vacation......more to come on that!

A little sweetness for this cold Saturday...

Big Words, Wrong Context

Annie looks at me, as I'm helping her zip her coat this morning and says:


What smells so...obvious? I mean....diagonal?

umm......I'm not sure, was all I could come up with.

Thoughts on Dinner

A week ago, I just happened to come across a great cookbook. I was at the grocery store and passed by the very small row of books that Super Saver sells. I glanced down to see a bright yellow book with the words family dinner that caught my eye. I didn't have much time to stand there and check it out, so I threw it into the cart with the certainty that it couldn't be that bad. Oh what a treasure I found!! Not so much because of the recipes, although there are great ones in there, but for the great ideas of ways to keep your family at the table.

This has been on my mind for months now, ever since we surrendered to the chaos of small children and let our dinners turn into a quick consumption of food with our conversation consisting of how to keep Evelyn from throwing her food on the floor.

Dinner time has always been a priority for me. I think that it is truly the glue that makes a family stick together. Sitting down, talking with one another, asking questions, all while eating a meal that is so good it has your mouth making all those yummy sounds. I love the process of dinner. At our house it usually starts with pouring a glass of wine, getting out all the ingredients and then cooking away. Our children are great at helping with making breakfasts, Sunday brunches, lunches, bread, and pies, but dinner is usually reserved for TJ and me. Most of the time I make what I can ahead of time at lunch, and then we put it all together......together. Sometimes TJ likes to come home after a long day at work and chop away. But after this long process of dinner, the kids would be hungry and whiny, and so we just figured we'd sit (some of us standing) at our kitchen island and eat. It was quicker, and less of a mess to clean up, we thought. We have two children right now at ages which are not conducive to sitting and lingering at table, or who are able to participate in conversation. So, we abandoned it all and gave into our small children who were perfectly fine to snarf down their meal in four minutes and then be on their way.

I was not pleased with the direction our dinner time was heading.

I knew that I wanted our meals to be better, for us all to sit down and eat for heavens sake!! Then when I started to read this cookbook, she gives all kinds of ideas for keeping your children at the table and starting conversation with them. Even small children. I was hooked. It was exactly what our family was needing....to get back to the table.

The book is called The Family Dinner: great ways to connect with your kids, one meal at a time. By Laurie David.

In it are two chapters that I enjoy the most. One is: Table Talk- creative ideas to expand minds, build vocabularies, and keep family conversation flowing. And the other is: Read Around the Table- from news to poetry- inspiration is your dinner guest.

Table talk games are your solution. No more, "How was your day?"......"Fine", followed by silence. These games will loosen everyone up and get your gang talking, guaranteed. Chances are good that the silent grumps will jump in if they see you having fun. Persevere. It took awhile to make this great food; you want the experience of dinner to last. Good conversation will help extend the time your family's engaged, something long after the last bite. As long as you make it fun, you can pretty much get away with anything-even reviewing SAT test words, or memorizing the presidents of the United States in chronological order.

I was trying to do this before, by having each child at dinner say one interesting fact at the dinner table. It was cute, but got old after you heard that snakes don't ever pee for about the one hundredth time. It also took only about five seconds. These games are great because they usually last us the entire meal with everyone participating. (minus George and Evie, well sometimes George chimes in!) The first night we tried this we played the game, I'm going on a picnic and I'm bringing.... then each person has to repeat what was said before them and then tack on their new item. A great memory game. I've never seen Thomas and Annie have such fun at the table. The other night I came up with Spelling Contest. I had them spelling all kinds of words and they kept begging me to, ask me another one! I would say the word, Annie would try to spell it first and as soon as she said a wrong letter I made a very annoying, loud, buzzer sound with my voice that let them know she was wrong and that it was Thomas' turn. I'm sure you all do many of this at your own tables while eating. TJ and I were trying to, we just got stuck somewhere between the chaos and loudness of children, and the frustration of preparing a meal for an hour and then being done with it in five minutes. This sums it up perfectly, from the book: Hold On To Your Kids by Gordon Neufeld and Gabor Mate.... In general, we focus more on getting our children fed than on the eating rituals meant to keep us connected.

Now I don't really care how fast they eat because they are still at the table. SITTING DOWN. TALKING WITH US. Don't let me fool you, it's not perfect. George usually gets up still and starts wandering and when we finally notice that he's gone, we'll bring him back.....sometimes. Sometimes we're having such fun with the older ones that we'll just let him go.


Some of Laurie David's game ideas/conversation starters are:

-my special talent is....

-something I like about myself....

-what I like about you (to the person on their right)...

-would you rather...(we got this card game from the Vaceks and it works perfectly. I set on card on each persons plate and they get to read the four funny would you rather scenarios to us. That way we don't have to come up with our own!

-I remember when...

-name something you are afraid of...

-name three places you would never go....

-spell it

-spell it, define it, use it...

-once upon a time...(start a story out loud and go around the table adding to it.

-my mom doesn't like peas....(one person starts by saying our mom doesn't like P's, what can you give her instead? They can't say a word that begins with a P, but they will think that they should say a vegetable...

-reading, memorizing poetry

ANYTHING you can think of and make fun!

- I also thought of making a weekly ritual of both Thomas and Annie getting to pick what to make for dinner and then making it themselves (with mom's help of course!) One night a week will be designated for their meal. They can rotate weeks. One of them makes dinner each week. I thought it might be a fun way for them to express come creativity and learn how to prepare a meal.

My desire is for us to turn our dinner time into a special time that no one in our family will want to miss. A time for us to reconnect together after all of us having gone our separate ways during the day. A time to enjoy fabulous meals, even healthy meals together. As our children all get older, my hope is that they will want to sit with us and talk. And hey, if they learn a few manners along the way, if they can carry on conversation with adults, learn all kinds of interesting facts, and maybe even to learn how cook meals for themselves and their families....then mission accomplished.

They're BAAACK.....

Sunday pie, homemade bread, and letter of the week snacks....that is.

The rhythm of my kitchen has been off. Oh, I've still been baking and cooking you can be sure, but my weekly rituals have been put on hold. December does that to me. I make cookies, and goodies all month and I just don't have it in me to make pie, bread or snacks.

I haven't made a pie since Thanksgiving. I found myself really starting to miss my Sunday morning ritual. Getting up early to a dark, quiet house, rolling out pie crust, snapping pictures, cutting fruit, sipping hot coffee, reading cookbooks while the pie was baking, greeting little people as they straggled downstairs, bed head and all.

I love Sunday mornings.

Now that we are in the middle of winter, it's so darn dark in the mornings. If you happen to be out walking around our house at six in the morning on a Sunday, this is what you may see. Baking by candlelight.

I also am baking bread once a week again. I have to. It is a must. If you've never made bread, than you should give it a try. It's very therapeutic. It makes your entire house smell good. I feel like I am providing for my family in a small way. I hope my children will always remember baking bread with me, it's hard to let them help at times, but I always do. I suck it up and let them throw flour all over, in hopes that they will remember baking with me. I find great satisfaction in mixing yeast, flour, water and a few other ingredients together and it becoming something very warm, yummy, satisfying and fulfilling. Bread.

And now a new stage is beginning....two new mess makers, I mean bakers.

We're singing the same songs that I did with Thomas and Annie while we knead. On top of spaghetti, O Christmas Tree, and the ABC's.

When You Don't Have a Sled....

Use a pizza pan

or two.

The Twelve Days of Christmas

This is the first year that we have celebrated the twelve days of Christmas. The celebrating doesn't end on Dec. 26th, oh no...it's just the beginning! The Christmas season doesn't even begin until the 25th and then continues on until the Baptism of the Lord which is January 9th.

I've heard of families who celebrate the twelve days of Christmas by having the family unwrap a gift each evening. Usually something for the whole family to enjoy, a game or movie.... I just couldn't justify buying our children MORE since they had just received so much. So on Christmas day, my sister and I sat on the couch brainstorming how we could celebrate these next twelve days. I started thinking that since we were all given so much and our family had been so generous to us, that we should turn around and share and spread that generosity to others. Instead of focusing on us, for the next twelve days we would focus on others.

I've had for years these twelve numbers and have always wondered what I could do with them. So, I cut them out and glued them to card stock. Then I glued to the back the explanation of the number. The song was a cover up way to spread Christanity. One partridge symbolizes God and his love for us. Two turtle doves is for the two books of the bible, the Old and New Testament. Three french hens stands for faith, hope and love. Four calling birds are the four gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Five golden rings symbolized the five precious wounds of Christ. Six geese a-laying is for creation. God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh. Seven swans a-swimming is the seven sacraments. Eight maids a-milking is for the eight beatitudes. Nine ladies dancing is the nine choirs of angels. Ten lords a-leaping is the ten commandments. Eleven pipers pipping stands for the eleven of the twelve apostles that remained faithful to Jesus. And twelve drummers drumming stands for the twelve fruits of the Holy Spirit.

Then I came up with a list of twelve different things we could do for others to show generosity. We would do one each day.

1. Donate a toy to a needy child
2."Ring and Run" we delivered goodies to a friends house, rang the doorbell and ran back to Sherman.
3. Made two fleece tie blankets and delivered them to the NICU at St. Elizabeth's.
4. Visit a nursing home
5. Invited a family that we never had over before, for dinner.
6. Took a New Year's Day dinner over to a family who had just moved into a new house.
7. Prayed a rosary for someone in need.
8. Took a jar of cookies to the Police dept. thanking them for protecting us (and getting to visit grandpa Tom and sit in his chair!)
9. Watch a friends children for the day
10. Deliver cookies to Matt Talbot Kitchen
11. Wrote a letter to a seminarian
12. Sent a care package to a friends brother who is in the navy.

It turned out to be a beautiful twelve days. I found myself focusing on the needs of others which was the whole point. I think the kids got it too....they really enjoyed taking the baby blankets to the hospital and handing them to the nurses. We tried to say a prayer for whoever we were doing something for that day.


It was an incredible way to end our Advent, and Christmas season.

A New Year Begins....2011

A brand new year, brand new expierences await.....

We rang in the new year with our good friends the Vaceks. We ate and played and had a fabulous time! Thanks Craig and Kim for opening your home to us and being such wonderful friends.
I always get a little sappy on New Years Eve, when I think about all the good, bad, unexpected and enjoyable moments we experienced in one years time.

It was picturesque....we sat and talked in front of their very large, very warm, fireplace. We watched our jammied children running around, blowing horns, snuggling tired ones in our laps, sipping champagne and asking eachother questions from the game Would you Rather.....

Last year we happened to have a pineapple on New Years Day. And so began a tradition for our family. The kids looked forward to slicing and eating the pineapple! We also opened up our box that had been kept all year long. I would throw in anything that was memorable from the year, pictures, drawings, ticket stubs, letters, newspaper articles, anything that pertained to the year. No one sees the box until New Years Day!! It was so fun to spread everyuthig out and say, I remember this...

Cheers to a new year!

DINNERTIME

David asks for his dessert
Peggy wants to press her skirt
She has dance class and she's late
David says he cannot wait
Mike is giving him a ride
He'll just go and wait outside
Father tells him he will not
David mutters thanks a lot
Ann says she expects a call
Benjamin won't eat at all
Mother starts to serve the pie
Benjamin begins to cry
Mother asks him what is wrong
Father says the tea's too strong
Ann gets up to get the phone
Benjamin begins to moan
Peggy says her tights are torn
David says he hears a horn
Father says to finish first
David says that he will burst
Peggy says it isn't fair
Ann has on her other pair
Now she will be late for class
Benjamin upsets his glass
David's taking tiny bites
Ann is taking off the tights
David says the crust is tough
Mother says she's had enough
Father says it's not too bad
Mother says she's going mad
David wiggles like a mouse
That is dinner at our house.
-Mary Ann Hoberman