a dairy free christmas

So I have had a fairly eventful week. After a million soaked burp cloths much stress, I finally figured out that Eli is sensitive to dairy. So, since i'm nursing, that means i will no longer be workin' on my night cheese (ok if you don't watch 30 Rock then you will have no clue what I meant by that and you might be slightly freaked out.) Let's just say I can't eat dairy for a while. It might not seem like a big deal BUT I LOVE CHEESE. And butter. The butter is not as big of a deal because I also like Earth Balance, but butter substitutes don't work the same way in baking (not to mention buttercream frosting...sniff sniff tear...pull it together Mary...) Of course, the best time of the year to give up dairy is Christmas, duh. It's not like there will be dairy-laden treasures of culinary goodness surrounding me wherever I go... Alas, who could say no to this face:
Rest assured, though, I will be doing lots of experimenting in the kitchen and I might have just a few tricks up my sleeve for the holiday season. We'll see how they turn out. I have yet to make a full trip to the grocery store since my dairy-free revelation, so meal times have been rather sad for this dairy lover. I had to finish up making the meals I had already planned so that my current groceries didn't go to waste. Yesterday I made a giant pan of stuffed shells that Kian and Jonah and Chad enjoyed while I drowned in a pool of my own tears while I went out to get a long-needed eye exam. I should mention that we did have some really good dairy-free pancakes yesterday morning courtesy of some substitute rice milk and earth balance. I plan to make a Whole Foods run tonight to stock up on some dairy free essentials, but in the meantime I made myself a lunch of roasted fennel and red potatoes. It was delightful.
There will most certainly be updates to come on my dairy-free adventure. I am forced choosing to look at this as an opportunity to be more creative, so we'll see where that creativity lands me!

bread and potties

Well I *think* i have turned the corner and I am now baking our bread instead of buying it. I'm sure we will still buy some every once in a while, but I think I have finally gotten into a groove with making it on a regular basis. It just really seemed to make sense because I can control what goes into it, and we all love having fresh baked bread. I am trying to experiment with making homemade hamburger/hot dog buns, and I am planning on making some bagels too. I am also making homemade pizza dough on a regular basis. It's actually super easy if you can take a few minutes to combine the ingredients and knead the dough (this is where my love affair with my heavy duty kitchenaid freestanding mixer comes into play). Then it just takes time for the dough to rise and to bake...but very minimal effort in my opinion. If anyone has any loved bread/bun/bagel recipes, I would love to hear about them!

On another note, Jonah is totally ready to potty train but I don't have time to do it right now! He asks to sit on the potty all the time and he actually pees and poops sometimes (normally he just says that he wants to get some toots out on the potty and other things come out as a result). I'm hoping that we can take some time when Chad is off over Christmas/New Years to get the first few days over with. I think I can handle the upkeep of the training, it is the first few days that I don't think I can pull off while also taking care of both Eli and Kian. Poor guy, he's practically begging to be potty trained and it's me that's holding the whole process up! On a positive note, he might be the most affectionate child I have ever been around. Last night he woke up crying in the middle of the night and all he wanted was a kiss and a hug. He hugged me and said, "I love you. I love you so much." When I told him he needed to go back to sleep, he just said "okay mommy" and closed his eyes. I can't handle how cute he is sometimes!

surprise date

Two weeks ago, Jamie Bumgarner told me about this place in Powell called SkyZone. It's basically just a huge indoor trampoline park. From the moment I heard about it, I knew I had to take Chad on a surprise date there. What could be more fun than jumping on massive trampolines (with trampoline ramp walls no less...)? Plus, if you were friends with me in high school, then you probably remember the trampoline we had in our backyard. It was a post-homecoming/banquet (prom for those of you that went to normal school) hotspot.

I told Chad to wear some athletic clothes (he didn't know where we were going until we got there) and we dropped the kids off at my parents' house. We got to SkyZone at 10:45 and it was a little crowded so we had to wait a bit. We were probably 2 of maybe 4 people over the age of 15 in the entire place (aside from parents sitting on the sidelines waiting for their sweaty kids to finish jumping.) The age thing didn't bother me at all because...come on...it's a room made of trampolines. I hope I don't ever reach the age of not wanting to jump on trampolines. We started jumping and after 10 minutes we were already flushed and breathing pretty heavily. Chad, of course, was flipping and doing 180s off the walls while I just tried to figure out flailing myself against the wall without totally losing my balance and landing on a poor defenseless child. It was awesome. They made us wear these high-top shoes, and I was thankful because Chad has glass ankles and I didn't fancy carrying him out of there on my back. We had a super fun time and then went to Sushiko afterward (one of our faves).

here is a pic of Chad and me on vacation last year:


I was supposed to go see Chad play 2 shows tonight with his bro, Mike Wojniak (if you haven't heard his music, you should...) but Eli is still sick and not sleeping super well. So, I had to make the tough decision to stay home with him. I'm super bummed because there is pretty much nothing I love more than watching my husband play music (and it doesn't get any better than when he plays with his brother). On the bright side, it's Saturday night and I am looking forward to a fun Sunday complete with going to the Westerville Christmas parade and celebrating my brother's 21st birthday! I still remember when Eric was born and I didn't want to continue going to school because I was convinced he needed me to stay home and take care of him. Twenty-one years later and I still talk to him on the phone pretty much every single day. I hope that never changes :)

this is me with eric

bumps in the road

Yesterday was one of those days that left me gasping, flailing, clawing for the sanity that lay just beyond the reach of my outstretched fingers. Why is it that sometimes I wake up in the morning and the boys are smiling and the house stays (relatively) clean and I am effortlessly creative in the kitchen and life is full of sunshine and rainbows? And other days it seems like I can't make toast without setting the kitchen on fire, or leave Kian and Jonah alone without 15 markers getting flushed down the toilet (ok so maybe it was like 3 or 4 markers...and the kitchen was never actually on fire...you get the point.) I woke up yesterday morning knowing that Chad had a late meeting and wouldn't be home until after bedtime. This is never good news because, aside from his supernatural ability to clean up the house and get a load of laundry done within moments of coming in the door, he is a rock of emotional stability.

So, to start off the circus of a day, I was talking to my friend, Amber, on the phone when I walked around the corner and found that my dog, Sophie, had left a HUGE pile of puke on the floor (most likely due to the entire sleeve of Ritz crackers that Jonah had so generously shared with her 30 minutes prior). Amber asked if I needed to get off the phone, to which I responded, "No way. I am staying on the phone so that I can focus on something else and pretend like I am not cleaning up a giant pile of dog vomit with paper towels." Thank God for Melaleuca Sol-u-Mel.

Later I had to have a very unpleasant conversation with a young man from our prescription benefits center. I had been informed that, due to an "oversight" (does playing solitaire on your computer instead of doing your job count as an oversight?), Eli had never been added to our prescription policy and I would not be able to pick up his waiting prescription for a few days. As most can imagine, this was not welcome news to someone with a 3.5-month-old who has a deep congested cough that is exacerbating his reflux so that he is now waking up 5-6 times a night instead of 2. Not welcome news at all. I proceeded to inform him that I didn't care if he had to get in his car and drive to CVS, he would make sure the job that should have been done 3 months ago would be taken care of, and that my prescription would be covered TODAY. Thankfully, the young man on the line recognized the crazy that lay not-so-very-well-hidden beneath the surface on this end of the line. He took care of it and I kept the hounds at bay.

I hastily attempted to make myself look presentable and drove up the street to CVS, a little concerned that if they told me there were anymore problems I might punch a hole in the wall. By the grace of God, everything was as it should have been and I was able to go home and give Eli the medication for which he was waiting.

It was at this point that I began making dinner (translate: a box of Trader Joe's mushroom risotto and a banana...inspired, i know.) I also decided to start making a loaf of bread because I had failed to do so earlier in the day. Of course, Jonah tripped and busted his lip and cried/yelled for 20 minutes while Kian repeatedly dove off our small dining room steps into some strategically placed cushions. I nursed Eli and simultaneously attempted to shovel a few lava-hot bites of risotto into my mouth while begging the boys to sit down and eat. I finally got all 3 boys down to bed after dinner (I resorted to bribing them with ice cream for an uncomplicated and complaint-free bedtime) and just in time to put the loaf of bread in the oven. I took a shower and washed the traces of spit-up, snot, and blood from my hair and collapsed on the couch in front of the tv. I smelled the bread baking and felt a sigh of relief. Chad finally got home and I shared his beer while I rewarded myself with a warm slice (3? but one was a really small piece...) of bread slathered in butter (well...earth balance actually). I shook remnants of the day from my psyche and finally relaxed. And, if I had posted on facebook, you probably would have only heard about the fresh-baked bread.