Indoor Playground - Part Deux

As I post this, I am actually dreading the next 24 hours to come. Both kids have fevers, and both kids are FINALLY sleeping (after a very stressful day of going back and forth comforting one, and then the other). I actually wrote Joe this email today at 1:30pm:

'it's been a miserable day. the kind of miserable that i want to just go out for dinner. alone. and drink a ton of wine. even though i don't like wine. it's been exceptionally challenging, and i'm just going to say they are both FINALLY not crying in unison, and asleep. so i'm going to sleep now. the play date JUST finished. so i'm going to not clean up, and just sleep. so don't freak out if i don't answer your texts or answer your calls. I am not in the mood for any moods. i am still friendly, but if you tick me off i will blow up like a bomb. i'm jsut warning you.'

And Joe.... oh my husband Joseph... he's a darling. He didn't tick me off. In fact he made me smile. I'm still smiling when I see it (behind me).

We gave Colin some medicine, so he perked up a little bit and Joe offered to build his indoor playground once again. And they were talking, and Joe asked Colin what he'd like to build. He wanted a swing. Hmmm... toughie. Apparently, not for my safety hazard family.

Indoor Playground

It's 12:30am on a rainy Saturday evening (well, now Sunday morning), and I write this post as I selectively shut out the disaster zone to my immediate right.



This is what happens when a little boy who loves LEGO, decides to build an indoor playground. This, is what happens, when that little boy's father gets a piece of shelving, to use as a slide, and a big empty box for his castle. This, aside from all the safety hazards, is a diaster of happiness.

And.... because it's 12:30am, I'm just going to continue to have my 'mindless time' (you know, that time right after you put the kids to sleep and you don't want to do anything, not even think... just nothing? yeah... that mindless time has been going on strong for 4 hours) and leave Colin's indoor playground as is because I really just don't want to clean.

Cara!

For those who have been loyal readers and followers of my blog.... we do in fact have another child. I just haven't really posted anything on her, because she's still fairly young, and doesn't do or say silly things yet!

But, that will change today! Cara, did something specatular today. She's only 23 weeks old, and she..... sat. On her bum! Oh, how they grow.... soon she'll be learning to drive.... *sigh*

My own little monkey?

I'm sure some of you have seen this lately, but on the lighter side of the news, a monkey in Indonesia stole a wildlife photographer's camera and started taking pictures of himself.



Well, these past couple days... I've noticed a lot of giggling. And Monkey see.... monkey do.


There are more than just these 4 photos... in fact there are probably about 50 (no joke) since he discovered the photobooth feature on the Air yesterday.

Here's video proof too that he actually does it on his own.

Photographers

We had a busy week and weekend, so I decided to make today a rest a home day. The kids need it, and I need it. It's also nice not to be breastfeeding on some park bench, restaurant, or mall... or do diaper changes in our trunk, ground... anywhere that's flat really. Home is nice.

While we're at home, we just take it easy, I do try to get things done, but I spend quality time with Colin too. (Don't worry, I do have another child, but all Cara does is eat, sleep, poo, looks cute, and jolly jumps).

One of the things he absolutely loves is to play with his 'new blocks' (i.e. LEGO). He builds a lot of stuff now, giraffes, airplanes, camels... mommy seals breastfeeding baby seals... the usual.

He wanted me to show him how to build a camera today. So I obliged, and build him a pretty awesome camera.

I thought I did a reasonable job building a camera that represented a fairly realistic camera. But Colin started to make some.... adjustments. He was happy I built it for him, but he wanted to make it... 'better'.

I was a little confused why he added so much. That wasn't normal... most of the animals or structures he builds are fairly realistic interpretations of the actual things. I totally thought the weird stick coming out the top was awkward, maybe he wanted to add a giraffe on top? Or he wanted a tower? But then I understood. He wasn't out in left field at all.....









He really did build a camera. One of Daddy's cameras.

Spinach Lasagna

I thought I'd start a series of 'Easy Cooking' recipes that I come across. As a mom it's virtually impossible to keep your eyes on your kids, and cook/clean at the same time. And to do it all under the pressure cooker of either whining, or crying, makes me think I could actually win an Iron Chef competition hands down.

Well, my sister actually introduced this recipe to me. It's a delicious Spinach Walnut Pesto Lasagna - and *gasp* it's.... vegetarian?!?!??! IMPOSSIBLE!!! You'd think my carnivore son and husband would protest... but Joe actually requested it yesterday, and Colin scarfed it down.... so it's a winner in my books.

I did make a few adjustments... because
1. I don't like to measure things
2. I buy what's cheap/on sale at the store.
3. I like to use the least amount of dishes/preparation possible to limit my cleaning efforts later.

Ingredients:
2 packages of frozen chopped spinach
1 container of cottage cheese
Parmesan cheese (howveer much you want)
grated cheese (one of those packaged ones... I buy 3-4 of them when they're on sale and freeze them for pastas)
1 prepared jar of pesto
1 big (i don't even know the size, it's just the big can on the shelf) can of pasta sauce
12 strips of lasagna (3 layers)


What you do:

1. get a big bowl.
2. put the spinach, pesto, cottage cheese, parmesan and mix.
3. get a casserole dish, and put some pasta sauce on the bottom
4. 1 layer of pasta
5. spinach mixture, then pasta sauce, then grated cheese. repeat.

Now - you can soak the noodles, or cook them raw. (there's enough moisture in the lasagna to cook it all in the oven), but I like to be just on the safe side and I just dump it in hot tap water while I make the mixture so it softens up just a touch.

Cook in a 375 degree oven for about 30-45 minutes.

Seriously, I was so glad I made it the other day... we got back from and outting at 5pm, I got it prepped in about 15 minutes, then while it cooked in the oven we just played with the kids. This, my friends is a family friendly recipe!!

Guess what the dinosaurs are doing?

I don't think I need to say much about this one. You should know the answer, if you've seen his latest video (How to Feed a Monster).... Lately he's been big on comforting all of his stuffies and toys :)