Kids Aplenty, Kids Galore

This weekend Jenna and Sarah had their first slumber party with Nicholas and Emmerich. Nicholas and Emmerich stayed the night and we had a great time planting the garden, digging in dirt, eating enormous amounts of pancakes and playing in the sandbox. Jenna and Nicholas played the entire time together and amazed me with the imaginative play they made up. They didn't even want to watch TV - they were having so much fun together. Sarah and Emmerich on the other hand didn't pay too much attention to each other. While we were playing outside, Emmerich sneaked back in the house and tracked mud all over the place. Later tonight Sarah learned that trick from Emmerich. Erik turned his back and Sarah had opened the screen door and was outside playing even though we were all inside. After I changed her into her nightgown for bed, I caught her trying to escape again!

Having 4 kids in the house was fun and filled with energy. Erik may have a different view though :).

Math went well for me on Wednesday. Since I hadn't taught math in 5 years I was a little nervous, however the class went well and I enjoyed it! The only issue I had was explaining to a student how to factor. I look at 3x^4 - 9x^2 and know how to factor it to 3x^2(x^2-3) but had difficulty explaining how to do it. For some things it's hard to have a good way to explain the material especially when the math is somewhat like art.

76 points on Quiddler today and I made the word "loser".

Railroad Yummies

I found this picture of a Carcassone cake on cakewrecks.com. This game is a lot of fun and found this cake rendition a good one. It has inspired me! If I ever do beat Erik at Railroad Tycoon - I might just make a Railroad Tycoon cake! Although the board is much bigger and hugely more complicated and I'm NOT drawing little hexagonal lines on the cake. So maybe I won't do this...

Next week starts a new semester and I'm nervous. I'm teaching math which I haven't taught since 2004. I love math but it is easy to get rusty when you don't "complete the square" every day. So I hope the class goes well. I'll be spending all weekend preparing. Except for the time on Saturday when we go pick up the camper! It is 80°F out today and beautiful! So it should be a perfect day for me to risk my life cleaning the top of the camper.

Missy, my "sister", bought the girls singing and dancing toys for Easter. These toys are played constantly. I do have a video but it doesn't quite show Sarah doing the chicken dance. She really tries to do the chicken dance. Jenna is having a ball dancing and Sarah is trying. Check it out.

Only 78 on Quiddler today!

Exercising Dreams

As we played squash the other day, I was thinking of my favorite exercises. So of course, I decided to compile a top ten list of my favorite exercises.

1. Squash - so much awesomeness!
2. Hiking - outdoors + walking = fun
3. Walking - anywhere, anytime!
4. Swimming - I love swimming!! It would be higher if I didn't have to shave my legs :)
5. Aerobics - I've done aerobics since I was 13 and have always loved it!
6. Tennis - racquets + outside = fun
7. Elliptical trainer - workout + listening to books on my mp3 player :)
8. Racquetball - a fun racquet sport - not as much fun as squash or tennis though
9. Sit ups - I'm a glutton for punishment. I love situps for some reason?
10. Stretching/Pilates - I've done pilates at Wright state and loved it. Stretching always makes me feel good afterwards

Golf - as you notice is not on here even though it involves outside and walking. It's not on here because golf is not fun. Bicycling is also not on here as it always hurts my bottom. I loved it as a kid but I don't have a tough bottom anymore.

Also, I was thinking of some dreams I have for myself, family, community and world and thought I would share these as well. Maybe these dreams will never happen, but if I know my dreams, maybe I can work towards them and come one step closer.

A dream for myself - to earn my PhD

A dream for my family - to all become followers of Jesus Christ

A dream for my community - no one would go hungry

A dream for the world - the end of abortion

So now that I know my dreams. I can work to accomplish them. When I asked Erik what his dream for himself was, he said he wanted to live in a castle. Well....we'll see about that one. His dreams for community and world were that our world would be a safe place.

73 on Quiddler today.

Breathing Chocolate

Le Whif has developed a chocolate inhaler. It's a new way of eating chocolate by breathing it. I'm not so sure about this. Would it really replace the yumminess of chocolate? Although if it curbed my sweet tooth it might be worth it.

I don't just have a sweet tooth. I have 32 sweet tooths (or teeth... sweet teeth just didn't sound right). I wonder if this product would satisfy my sweet tooth. In my 20s I weighed about 10-12 lbs less than I do now. On my frame (I'm not short!) that makes a big difference. I no longer have the excuse that I can't give blood because I don't weigh enough. However I have been okay with the additional weight because I don't want to give up sweets :). Who's going to go buy this breathable chocolate?

My psycho crazy baby

Easter was glorious! We all packed up and drove to Cleveland to cram into Missy's condo. It was an amazing time of bonding as sisters and as sisters in Christ. Praise God my two sisters are Christ followers! We had a blast. And hopefully Erik wasn't overwhelmed with estrogen.

We attended Missy's church called Church on the Rise. It was definitely a great service for Easter!

Then we left the girls with my parents for two days. And Erik took a 2 hour nap. I made homemade pasta with my pasta maker and put fresh rosemary in it. Then I stuffed the pasta with fresh mozzarella cheese, ricotta cheese, parmesan cheese, and italian seasoning. Fantastic! We had that paired with pinot noir for lunch. Since I was teaching Monday night I had pb&j for dinner but at least we had a great lunch!

Sarah has become psycho crazy baby. I say this with the utmost affection. Here are my reasons for why my daughter is psycho crazy baby:

• She RUNS! She is 15 months - how can she run already?
• She runs away from me, particularly in public places, and very fast. I'm 33 - I should be able to keep up with a 15 month old.
• She climbs on the table and eats directly out of the salt shaker
• She grabs goldfish out of the box under the secretary and just snacks whenever she feels like it.
• She walks up to anyone, ANYONE, and puts her arms up so they will pick her up (grandparents, aunts, friends, waitresses at Der Dutchmann, random strangers...)
• She mooches food off of anyone who looks at her
• She climbs the backs of chairs
• Her "hugs" for Scruffles look like some form of torture
• She eats crayons, dirt, soap, soap bubbles, pens, and anything else that looks tasty

Even so, I still think she is absolutely adorable and I love her more every day. I haven't queried Erik or Jenna to see if they feel the same.

I just finished "Your Best Life Now" by Joel Osteen. Very motivational book - I hope I can live out the principles he talked about in the book to live my best life :).

54 on Quiddler today!

Iron Chef Erik Green Olives

Thank you to everyone who voted for Iron Chef Erik's secret ingredient. The winner was green olives!!
Erik made 4 dishes:

• Chicken salad with Italian Olive Dressing. Erik cooked chicken in olive oil and put it on a bed of lettuce with chopped tomatoes on top. He made an Italian dressing with chopped green olives. This dish had a very strong olive flavor.
• Fried BLT wtih Olive mayo. Erik received a lot of originality points for this one. He put bacon, olives, lettuce, and tomato in a burrito shell and then fried them in olive oil. Then he made mayonnaise with green and black olives. YUM!
• Creamy olive rice. This dish was composed of rice, bleu cheese, cream cheese, green olives, and chopped peppers. The green olive flavor came out well in this dish and he paired it well with the cheeses.
• Olive spread with crackers. Erik used one of the olive containers to put the olive spread. This was a cream cheese spread with chopped olives, sour cream, juice from the green olives, and chopped orange peppers. We spread this on crackers. Yum!

I gave Erik 15.125 and he rated himself a 15. This was a really fun Iron chef. We will take a break for a few weeks, but I'm saving that poll for his next Iron Chef!

I've had an incredible week. Here's what happened:

1. Wednesday - I beat Erik at Squash!!! We've been playing for a few months and I've never won. But I beat him 9-7 (you have to win by 2). I jumped so high!!

2. Wednesday - I finally reached level 80 with my Paladin. I started the night at 83%. I've never been the highest level in the game before the next release comes out. Yea!

3. Sunday (today) - I received notice that my paper was accepted to BIOCOMP 09. I'm going to Vegas baby! The conference is July 13-16. Yea! And I read on the site that they only accepted 27% of papers.

You'd think that I was on a roll and would get an awesome score in Quiddler - no, just 80 although the minimum score was 75 so that wasn't too bad :).

Erik's Culinary skills

I'd like to pick a secret ingredient for Erik this weekend so he can do iron chef but can't decide. Would you please vote in my poll? I deleted the poll so Erik would not see it and know what his next secret ingredient is!

Iron Chef Peanuts

Today was another iron chef experience at the Cooper Household! Today Erik brought me peanuts as the secret ingredient! He got peanut butter, butter toffee peanuts, honey roasted peanuts, dry roasted peanuts, and even hot and spicy peanuts. So I had lots of peanuts to chose from! I love peanuts and peanut butter so this was a lot of fun for me. I love peanuts much more than Erik but he still enjoyed the food I made.

I made:

• Fruit and nut salad with peanut ginger dressing. This salad consisted of strawberries, nectarines, and butter toffee peanuts on a bed of lettuce. I mixed peanut butter, honey, ground ginger, and oil to create a dressing for it. It was yummy!
• Peanut chocolate oatmeal carmelitas. These were not actually cookies, rather it was oatmeal with peanut butter, chocolate, and caramel mixed together. I used hot and spicy peanuts to make it more interesting. This was Erik's least favorite since he thought it was not chocolatey enough even though it looked chocolatey.
• Lobster pasta with peanuts. YUM YUM YUM. I steamed a lobster tail mixed it with bow tie pasta and a butter herb sauce with fresh parsely and herbs. Then sprinkled peanuts throughout. I had originally planned on making a peanut sauce but decided that it would not pair well with the lobster.
• Peanut selection. This was my favorite!! When I think of peanuts, I think of pb&j, bananas, and buckeyes. So I wanted to feature each of these in a different way. I made a peanut butter, confectioners sugar mixture and put it on a piece of french bread. Then melted chocolate on it. This was my buckeye sandwich. Next I made a pb&J sandwich without the bread. I used a peanut butter mixture, flattened it, then put jam inside. Finally, I made a mini sandwich with banana and peanut butter in the middle and chocolate on top. This three item peanut selection earned me a perfect score on originality!
• peanut butter chocolate chip cookies. I made a standard chocolate chip cookie with peanut butter and layered them on a pretty plate. This was yummy too.

Erik and I scored my dishes exactly the same - 15.1 points as average out of 20 points average. Pretty good :). I loved this secret ingredient. I have one in mind for Erik. I'll keep you posted when we do the next iron chef - probably after Easter.

Sarah likes to hug Scruffles. In fact, she follows him around the house so she can "hug" him (actually tackle). Here is a video of her following him and saying "cat". Sometimes she will walk up to him and say "hi", then tackle him. Maybe she will be a linebacker...

I got 78 on Quiddler today and made the word clingy! Sometimes Sarah is clingy to me :). She's a mamma's girl.

Not Quite the Appalachian Trail

On Saturday, we walked a 3 mile trail through Highbanks with Jon and Michelle and Aaron and Michele. Jon and Michelle will be hiking 75 miles of the Appalachian Trail in June so we thought we'd break them in :). Pulling both girls in the wagon for the 3 miles was a challenge but doable. We are excited for camping this year and hope to take the girls on some hikes (very minor ones!). We scheduled our first camping trip for Mother's Day weekend - this nice weather is so wonderful!

Since I'm a little crazy about making cake, I made a three layer red velvet cake. The cake layers were chocolate with an entire bottle of red food coloring in them and the frosting was cream cheese. This cake was fantastic - I wish I could give you some through the computer.

I also must include some cute pictures of the girls. Jenna was wearing her Snow White dress and decided she didn't like the collar so she put it on Scruff. Poor Scruff. I will need to get a picture of what Sarah does to him. She body hugs him that is almost like a wrestling mood. Poor Scruff. Sarah also decided to sit in the sink - so I just stripped her down to a diaper. She had a good time.

In Photoshop news, I took a picture of my hands to make the shape of an A and made the word PRAY. I'm so excited about my Photoshop progress. someday I'll be good at it.

73 on Quiddler today!

Jenna's Survey About Dad

Ask your kid the questions and write them down exactly how they respond.

1. What is something dad always says to you?
I'm his girl

2. What makes dad happy?
hugs

3. What makes dad sad?
when I'm not around

4. How does your dad make you laugh?
tickle me

5. What was your dad like as a child?
me

6. How old is your dad?
34

7. How tall is your dad?
Daddy is very tall

8. What is his favorite thing to do?
keeping Sarah and Scruffles away from the fire

9. What does your dad do when you’re not around?
sometimes he goes to work and sometimes he works on his computer

10. If your dad becomes famous, what will it be for?
a show

11. What is your dad really good at?
painting with mommy

12. What is your dad not very good at?
trying to look underground to find a groundhog or the velveteen rabbit

13. What does your dad do for his job?
work

14. What is your dad's favorite food?
pizza

15. What makes you proud of your dad?
when my daddy comes home for lunch

16. If your dad were a cartoon character, who would he be?
spongebob

17. What do you and your dad do together?
we play together

18. How are you and your dad the same?
we're not even the same

19. How are you and your dad different?
Daddy's hair is shorter

20. How do you know your dad loves you?
he tells me he loves me

21. Where is your dad's favorite place to go?
a music place

Note: I do not think Erik resembles spongebob, nor do I think Jenna thinks so either. However we just got a book from the library about spongebob so it was fresh in her mind. I'm sure normally she would choose a prince from some Disney movie :)

Learning Photoshop

I've been working more with photoshop and have posted my first attempt to make my teeth whiter along with my second attempt. You might also notice that I changed my eyes, lips, and removed the design from my shirt. So I've gotten somewhat better but Erik thinks my mouth looks a little crazy in this new version but I like it (certainly better than my first attempt).

Sarah is walking all over the place. Check out this adorable video. She is also talking so much! She loves to point at Scruff and say "cat". I say "point" but she actually tackles him.

For years Erik and I have talked about having more land. Now is not a good time to buy, but Jon has inspired us to buy land! Unfortunately, what we want does not exist at the price we want it unless we move far away or live with the Amish. So we are bummed. But we would love to buy land and build on it someday.

86 on Quiddler today!

Jenna's Survey About Mom

Ask your kid the questions and write them down exactly how they respond.

1. What is something mom always says to you?
I don't know

2. What makes mom happy?
hugs

3. What makes mom sad?
I can't think of anything

4. How does your mom make you laugh?
tickle me

5. What was your mom like as a child?
maybe me

6. How old is your mom?
33

7. How tall is your mom?
I can't guess

8. What is her favorite thing to do?
working on her computer

9. What does your mom do when you’re not around?
I don't know, I'm not around

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
I don't know

11. What is your mom really good at?
painting with daddy

12. What is your mom not very good at?
trying to get something from under the ground

13. What does your mom do for her job?
work

14. What is your mom’s favorite food?
that's a hard one

15. What makes you proud of your mom?
when me and my mom go to the library together

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
she would be she

17. What do you and your mom do together?
we go to some grocery stores whenever we need groceries

18. How are you and your mom the same?
we're not even the same

19. How are you and your mom different?
my mom has longer hair than I do

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
mom tells me she loves me

21. Where is your mom’s favorite place to go?
everywhere

I'd like my daughter to meet you

Someone recently said this to me. Several people have said this to me back at my old job and at my current job. Which makes me wonder why. Do they assume that I am a role model? I know me and know that I'm not which is why I think this is odd. Are we lacking female role models?

This brings me to the church. I find it interesting that if a business did not allow women in leadership roles it would be considered sexual discrimination. Yet so many churches do not allow women in leadership roles. How is it that the secular world has it right and the church is so backwards? I've discussed this topic before. But we do need more women as role models in the church and elsewhere (not that there are none since I know there are many great women role models, I just don't know why people count me as one).

Okay so in Quiddler today there were so few vowels that I got -46. That was pretty awful. However the second time I only got 28 points. It was actually pretty hard today.

I posted a 3 layer cake that I made for Erik's birthday again. If you're keeping track this is the third cake I made for Erik's birthday. I made a caramel cake to eat with my family, a chocolate truffle torte to eat with Erik's family, and a 3 layer butter cake with chocolate buttercream frosting to eat with our small group. Now I'm wondering why my pants are tight!! Of course, Erik is losing tons of weight since we've been playing squash. I've just been eating more :).

Enough Parties already!

Erik turned 34 on Sunday and we had two parties with two cakes. One was the caramel cake I mentioned previously (why is it spelled "caramel" when so many people say "carmel"?), and the other was a chocolate truffle torte. The chocolate truffle torte has 3 ingredients - bittersweet chocolate, eggs, and butter. It is loaded with fat and goodness but is doable for a diabetic or someone on the atkins diet. Not that I'm going on the atkins diet or diabetic *fingers crossed*.

Erik got several movies for his birthday. They were mostly old Arnold S. movies since he seems to like them. Hopefully I won't have to watch them.

My new semester starts this week. It is the first semester that I'll be teaching during the day since having the girls. I got a babysitter and am hoping this will work out well. It will be nice to have more nights free. With those free nights Erik and I plan on playing squash!!! Last night I scored 7 points against Erik in two games. As the games go to 9 points, that was pretty good. However, I feel like John Cooper in that I can't quite pull it out at the end. I can never beat Michigan (or Erik for that matter).

Lent started on Wednesday and I've decided to give up coffee and read through the gospels. Erik has decided to read through the gospels with me and it has been going well. We are reading the CEV version which should actually be titled "the 8th grade version" as the wording is very simplistic.

91 points on quiddler today and I was able to make the word "purl". I didn't know that was a word - not that I'm going to look up what it means :)

Justice

On Wednesday me and two of my friends got together for a night of prayer to stop human trafficking. The sex slave industry has been growing exponentially and many women even children are enslaved. Even in Columbus there are children being trafficked. Here are a few websites for more information: http://www.ijm.org/ and http://www.humantrafficking.org/
Many people feel removed from it since it seems so far away in places like Thailand, Haiti, Russia, etc. However it can happen anywhere. I just read The Sacred Bath about a woman in a middle class family who was a victim of sex slavery. Many of these women are forced to have abortions too - and that also angers me!

Yesterday at the abortion clinic though was awesome! One of the nurses (who are generally very hostile to us) came and picked up some tracts. What she will do with them, who knows? But she picked them up and took them inside -yea!

My family is coming to visit for the weekend so I made a lasagna and a caramel cake for Erik's birthday. While making the lasagna, Sarah got ahold of the spoon (and proceeded to make a mess!). See picture. The frosting on the caramel cake is awesome!! 1/2 cup butter, 1/2 cup dark brown sugar, 1/2 cup light brown sugar melted in a saucepan then add 1/4 cup milk until it boils. Remove from heat and add 2 cups powdered sugar and 1tsp vanilla extract. This was fabulous!! For Erik's birthday I got him 2 books and 2 games. I got him The Death Ship of Dartmouth by Michael Jecks, the BBook of Geek from a website we like bbspot.com, the Seinfeld Scene it Game that I'd like to play when Joel comes to visit this summer, and the Railroad tycoon video game. I think he will like all these games but I don't see him read much. Maybe I'll read the books for him.

Just one note about lasik. It is a miracle! I wake up and can see. I am free of contacts and glasses. I really LOVE it! The recovery time was so quick and I feel awesome. I love seeing :). We even played squash last night since the doctor said it was okay to play!

52 points on Quiddler today. There was a Q and I just couldn't use it!

Update on my Goals!

100 days ago I came up with a list of goals I wanted to accomplish in 100 days. To keep track of my progress, I set up a spreadsheet (obviously) and unfortunately I did not do too well. Here are my goals and the percentage complete:
1. Go to bed by 11pm (50 out of 100 days) = 39/50 days, 78%
2. Read 2 fiction books = 13/2, 650%
3. Read 1 nonfiction book = 2/1, 200%
4. Read 1 journal paper = 1/1, 100%
5. Lose 5 lbs = gained 4 lbs, -80%
6. Exercise (30 out of 100 days - 30min) = 22/30, 73%
7. Pray at abortion clinic on Fridays (12 times) = 7/12, 58%
8. Go on 3 dates with husband = 3/3, 100%
9. Go on 2 mommy dates with Jenna = 1/2, 50%
10. Write in journal (80 out of 100 days) = 47/80, 59%
11. Do Iron Chef = 2/1, 200%
12. Try 3 new vegetables = 3/3, 100%
13. Memorize 1 verse per week (15 verses) = 12/15, 80%
14. Read to kids besides bedtime (45 out of 100 days) = 44/45, 98%
15. Clean desk 3 times = 3/3, 100%
16. Take Stats or Graphics design course =1/1, 100%
17. Have girls movie night = 1/1, 100%
18. Learn something new about GIMP = 0/1, 0%
19. Serve dinner at Faith Mission=1/1, 100%
20. Take a Pilates class = 0/1, 0%
21. Try 10 new recipes=9/10, 90%
22. Level my EQ2 character 2 levels =2/2, 100%
23. Do 3 things for my secret sister (mommy group) = 3/3, 100%
24. Paint master bathroom =1/1, 100%
25. Write conference/journal paper =1/1, 100%

Well this list is pretty dismal. 14 out of 25 goals were greater than 80% which is only 56% and thus I scored a "D" on my goals. Of course I could have probably finish some of my other goals if I would not have read so many fiction books. The fiction books count my audiobooks too so this really is a little skewed.

This list shows me that I need to rework my goals and come up with a new list or maybe scrap the whole goal thing as I don't seem to be very good at it.

I'll keep you posted!

68 points on Quiddler today and made the word "ute". Whatever that means!

Was blind but now I see

I had my Lasik done yesterday by TLC, the company who fixed Tiger Wood's eyes. The procedure itself was short, weird, and unpleasant. It did not hurt, however I did feel a lot of pressure. On the way home, my eyes were burning and I wanted to claw them out. That was not entirely pleasant either. We got home and I laid in bed for a few hours while tears streamed down my face. I couldn't sleep but could listen to my MP3 player - yea for audiobooks!

In a few hours though I felt better and today I feel great. And the best news of all is that I can see!! I can see my alarm clock in the morning. I can stand in the kitchen and see the leaves on the plant in the living room, and the panels on the door and the clock across the room. I can see!
My eyes are all puffy, red, and bloody (I look pretty yucky) but I can see!!! This is totally awesome. And I feel 100% even though the surgery was 24 hours ago.
One thing I'm sad about is that I can not play sports for 2 weeks after getting lasik. This is a bummer as Erik and I discovered a new sport that we love. We love SQUASH!! We have had difficulty reserving racquetball courts as they seem to always be reserved. The squash courts right next to the racquetball courts are not reserved that often so we decided to play it. Wow!! It is amazing!! I feel like I am more competitive at squash and that Erik and I have more fun. In racquetball, sometimes the returns would go over my head, and even though I have a huge 1/8 inch vertical leap, sometimes I can't hit the return. Thus I miss the volley unless I turn around and hit it off the back wall with limited success. In squash the ball doesn't bounce as much, so I'm able to volley more often. The court is shorter, which also helps me (not because I'm short), and there is a minimum line that you must hit balls above on the wall. This prevents kill shots. Erik and I seem to be more evenly matched at this game since it is more about endurance than height and reach. I can't wait to play it again!
82 on quiddler today.

Iron Chef Shallots

To spice things up in our iron chef competitions, Erik used his culinary skills as iron chef this weekend with a secret ingredient of shallots. We absolutely LOVE shallots in cooking. They are a cross between garlic and onions and add delicious flavor to any dish (well almost any dish). Erik was the iron chef, and as this was his first time in a solo competition, he was 20 minutes over. However, his dishes were excellent! He made:

• Fresh shallot salad. This salad was almost a salsa. It was a mixture of tomatoes, tomatillos, shallots, green and red peppers, and italian dressing - absolutely yum!
• Rice with shallots and tomatoes. In this dish, Erik finely grated shallots and a ham steak and mixed it with rice and cream cheese. In the middle of this ring of rice (you can see in the picture), he put the shallot salad from dish 1. It was good but the rice needed something more to give it more flavor. Good though.
• Shallot dip. This dip with crackers was fantastic! He roasted shallots on the grill (it wasn't that cold - too cold for me to think about going outside and roasting on the grill though), then he mixed those roasted shallots with fresh shallots and made a cream cheese and spice mixture. He made two versions, one with an infinite amount of cayenne pepper and the other was milder. Both were delicious!!
• Pasta with shallots. In this dish, Erik put shallots and roasted chicken in a red sauce over pasta with shredded mozarella on top. This was also a great dish too.

A very successful iron chef. He rated himself as a 13.05 and I rated him as a 13.75.

In other news:

1. I just got my hair done and now I really look like a skunk. I wanted to touch up my highlights before my lasik on Friday (don't ask about the connection) and the highlights look blonde. So I have blonde hair now??? Well I took a picture and decided that my teeth were too yellow. So I used my mad photoshop skills to whiten them. Ummm.... I think I need to practice more.
2. I scored a miserable 54 on Quiddler today www.setgame.com because there were hardly any vowels!
3. I'm doing some Excel spreadsheet work for a local non-profit organization to help them out. I've made some nifty macros, etc. to speed up their processing. I hope it helps them.
4. Columbus Right To Life is having a 40 days for life initiative and I would like to help out. It will be over lent so I'm trying to decide what to give up for lent. I'm thinking about giving up red meat and using the 40 days to read through the 4 gospels. 40/4 = 10 which means I'll have 10 days to read each gospel (I'm so good at math!).
5. I'm getting Lasik on Friday!!! Yea!!

Quilting Bees and Bugs

Erik's Aunt Shelby is a master quilter. She makes lots of quilts and even teaches quilting classes. I asked her to make matching purple quilts for Jenna and Sarah and got so much more than I had imagined. These quilts are absolutely beautiful and so intricate. Everytime you look at it you see something new. On Jenna's quilt, her name is sewn on it as well as several lady bugs. Sarah's quilt has her name along with bumble bees. Aunt Shelby made wall hangings for both girls, pillow shams, the beautiful quilts, a play quilt for Jenna's dolls, a princess crown wall hanging, a J and an S pillow, and a "Minkie bear" toy for Sarah. I wish I could show the intricacy of these quilts but it is hard to show with these pictures. They are incredible!

So Jenna got to sleep tonight with her new quilt. She was very excited and pointed out all the images on the quilt. We do plan on getting bunk beds for the girls - and now they will have matching quilts!

Four year olds really do see the world differently from adults. We tend to take things for granted but Jenna doesn't. For example, yesterday while eating cereal, Jenna asked what made the K special? (we were eating Special K). I don't really know the answer to that question. I guess it is a more special letter than J?

I'm getting closer to my goal. On Wednesday I played racquetball with Erik and scored 7 points! So I lost 7-15 but I'm getting closer! If I can win at racquetball or railroad tycoon then he will take me out to the cheesecake factory. I'm not sure if I'll win at either but I'll keep trying.

I got 70 on Quiddler today! Quiddler is located at http://www.setgame.com/quiddler/puzzle_frame.htm see if you can beat my lame score!

Extreme Den Makeover

Just after we fixed the pipes in the basement (our basement is still actually all torn up) part of our ceiling caved in. It's not a huge amount of ceiling, but for awhile our ceiling was dripping. Jenna was holding her little bowls under the ceiling to catch the water before it caved in :). I've included a picture of the part of the ceiling (you can't see all the damage in this picture).

While our house is falling apart, Erik decided to do an extreme den makeover. We took this room that used to be a horrific mess, painted it, put Pergo floors in and got new desks. It really looks like a new room. Check out the collage. I have two before pictures (on top -obviously) and two after pictures. We also got a flat panel HDTV on the wall - and it is nice! Looking at these pictures I wonder how we let the computer room get this way.

83 on Quiddler today

Iron Chef Smoked Gouda

Today I competed (against myself!) in iron chef Smoked Gouda. As usual I was given an hour to make several dishes all featuring smoked gouda. I made the following:

• Gouda and pear salad. This salad had a good mix of flavors but I think it needed to be mixed better as the pieces of gouda and pear were too large.
• Stacked gouda sandwiches. These sandwiches were the best of all the dishes I created. On a slice of a roma tomato I put a slice of bacon then a piece of chicken cooked in butter and spices with a thick slice of gouda on top. Finally I garnished it with fresh rosemary. While these sandwiches sound a little odd, the flavors blended very well and they were delicious!
• Chicken goudathon. This is a twist on chicken parmesan. I made some breaded chicken and tortellini then made a white wine garlic sauce with gouda and freshly grated parmesan cheese. This was yummy but a little heavy. I think it would have worked better with bowtie pasta or something lighter.
• Honey caramel gouda thins. This was my gouda dessert. I took a thin piece of pie crust and shaved thin slices of gouda on top. Then I sprinkled some unsweetened cocoa powder on them and baked them in the oven for awhile. Next I drizzled honey and caramel sauce over them and sprinkled them with more shaved gouda. Erik really liked these but I thought they were just okay.

Interestingly enough Erik and I both rated the dishes evenly with an average of 14.875. Overall it was an excellent Iron Chef competition!

I'd like to do an Iron Chef with Erik sometime. I have a secret ingredient for him in mind just waiting for when he wants to do it!

Erik's birthday is coming up and anyone who knows him knows he loves Railroad Tycoon. So I'm getting him the video game version of Railroad Tycoon and I hope he likes it.

70 points on Quiddler today!

Happy Birthday Jenna!

Jenna's fourth birthday was yesterday and we had a great celebration! She got her hair done at a "beauty salon" which she talked about constantly. She loved getting her hair done and thought she looked so beautiful - and she did! Here's a picture of her at the beauty salon :). We even went out to eat at a fancy restaurant - Le Bob de Evans. This birthday we learned something too. We bought her some education toys and crafts thinking they would be better than barbies or my little ponies. Um. No. That's not what she wants - she liked them and had fun with them. But we ended up getting her a my little pony :).

I bought a wilton castle cake set and tried to make a cake with it. You can see what it's supposed to look like and what I actually did. Jenna did not fail to mention numerous times that the cake I made did not look like the box. She did help me make it though and it was a lot of fun to do together.

I only got 68 on Quiddler today because apparently "farmy" isn't a word. Don't you think as you're driving through Ohio that sometimes it looks "farmy".

Which reminds me of an AWESOME joke. This is one you have to say out loud.

"What's in between Dayton, OH and Marion, OH?"

"Engagement, OH".

HAHAHAHA. We were telling jokes while playing EQ2 and this one came up - definitely a keeper!

In other exciting news, the pipes in our basement froze and burst over the weekend. The plumber was here along with people called the flood squad to clean up the basement. There is still a lot of work to do since there's a big hole in the ceiling of the basement, but Erik can do this himself so he's not worried about it. He can fix anything!!

We are starting a new Bible study called the Truth Project. It is run through Focus on the Family and I hope it will be a good study.

One little monkey, sitting on the dishwasher....

Sarah has turned into a monkey. We are wondering if she is part monkey, part cute toddler. We've found her climbing the shelves of the pantry, climbing the shelves of our bathroom closet, climbing on the table in the playroom, etc. She is everywhere. And she likes bananas. It's looking more and more like she's a monkey. Bananas + climbing = monkey. This is really all the evidence I need.

David and Becca are now board certified pediatricians. Congratulations!! Of course, I need to throw in this picture of him holding Sarah upside down very unsafe like :).
We have continued to sit by the fire at night and drink hot chocolate. Usually I make the hot chocolate with my very special mixture of 1 1/2 cups milk, 1/4 cup cocoa powder and 1/4 cup sugar. Tonight Erik made it using 1 1/2 cups milk 1/2 cup cocoa powder and 1/4 cup sugar. It was pretty dark - still yummy though. We often try to be "peaceful" while sitting by the fire. I've included a picture of Erik laying "peacefully" by the fire while the girls climb all over him. This is a regular occurrence. (by the way, I love the word "occurrence")

So I'm sure you're thinking - stop it with the salty caramel already!! I decided to make salty caramel chocolate bread. Prior times that I've used the packaged caramels in baked goods they hardened too much. So this time, I cut the caramels into small pieces, coated them in flour, and made a basic chocolate bread and added sea salt. The bread had a good taste but I used milk as the liquid which made it too crumbly (I thought milk would go well with the chocolate). Next time I'll use oil. We'll see how it goes :).

I got 61 on Quiddler today. Doo was not a word. Sounds like a word to me!

Wildflowers, Kitty Cats, and Drums

Happy New Year! 2009 is only 3 years away from the world ending according to the Mayan Calendar (this is something we watched on the history channel so it must be true) in 2012. We spent New Years at Erik's parents house in Morgantown. Erik's dad has a huge train set (see picture) with three trains and a whole village accompanying it. It's quite a setup that both girls loved!

For Christmas, Jenna got a "Create your Own Storybook" present from Dave and Becca. Jenna had a blast! We spent an entire day working on this story "The Princess and the Wildflowers" and Jenna made up the whole story herself. She thoroughly enjoyed it! My favorite page had the following text (she told me and I wrote it down) "The castle was covered with wild things like wildflowers, kitty cats, and drums". Ummm....yea.


In other news:

1. I got 77 on Quiddler today but it wouldn't let me use the word "grok". That is so obviously a word! Apparently I don't grok the English language.
2. I had to change my Lasik date to Friday Feb. 13. Sounds ominous to have surgery scheduled for Friday the 13th.
3. Erik has become quite the chef lately and made coconut potatoes for dinner one night. Not a combination I would have thought of but it was quite good!
4. Tuesday night was one of the worst first day of classes I've had yet. Of course I found out I was teaching Tuesday on Monday and thus was not prepared, but so much went wrong last night (my syllabus was wrong, the students could not log in to our class on the online system, software was not working, etc, etc, etc!) - I hope the rest of this semester goes well.
5. I read the second Twilight book (New Moon) in 1 day. It has 563 pages. So I've decided to stop reading fiction for awhile lest I neglect my family. Let's see how long that while lasts....