Just keep running

Before

During...those are giraffes!

After

I always tell people I am a slow runner.  They never believe me.  I'm young, reasonably healthy, why can I not run faster?

Mom and friend Angela passed me by, all the runners passed me, then the strollers, then children, most of the walkers, and the elderly.  I run slower than I walk.  I realize that it is for two reasons...one of them being fear.  I am afraid if I go too fast I will run out of energy and won't be able to finish.  So while I was running I was thinking about life of course...I was thinking about Mom at the end of the race, waiting for me and then I was thinking about my mom at the end of life waiting for me.  I started crying while I was running...which seriously impeded my breathing but I just KEPT running.  The course was awesome...a mix of asphalt, boardwalk, and trail.  It was cool...temperature cool...because it was in the woods.  At mile 2 I developed a big blister on  the insole of my foot (I need new shoes!) and I thought...we are given trials...keep your head up and just KEEP RUNNING.  Just keep running, just keep running.

I also thought about this big delicious bowl of spaghetti I helped devour the night before. Love you, Dad.

Life is good.  Just keep running and eat good spaghetti.

When food photography goes wrong...

You know how they say never to shop hungry?  Tony should never shop thirsty...he will come home with bottles of sports drinks, juices, and pop.  Several times when we've had no beverages in the house other than water, he's asked me if it's possible to make chocolate milk out of cocoa powder.  Ha...hasn't every kid tried that?  You see the chocolate label and take a spoonful only to be sorely disappointed.  Ew.  But...thank you Food Network Magazine...now, there is a way.  I can't find the recipe online...so you'll just have to go to the library, like I did, and get out their chocolate issue.

These are yummy.  Just don't try to photograph and pour at the same time.

Life lately, according to my iPhone

We've been...

Snuggling Teddy

Picking Strawberries

Falling asleep on Daddy

Squishy Baff!

Playing at the park with our friends and cousins

Fun for Us!

Finding Kittens

Going on Walks

Riding Sandy

Swimmin'

Making green smoothies

playing in the fountain

we hope you're enjoying summer as much as we are!

**Idea stolen from the Rockstar Diaries

The "K" Word

We're done with Mom School for the time being. 

I am so grateful to the other moms who participated in this with me over the last two years.  I am blessed to have these friends to help teach our little ones.  We had a really fun year...it started out a little hairy but I think I found my stride before the end of the year, I think. ;)

On to bigger things.  I get pretty emotional if I think about the "K" word for too long.  I have a few more months to prepare but I know I am going to be a sniveling mess come September. 

More adventures in baking

This is the bread that took a million hours to make...actually, just a day and a half, it could have been just a day but I didn't get back to it exactly when I could have.  I don't know the difference between a biga, a poolish, and a sponge but these are terms I'm willing to define.  This bread requires you to make and refrigerate a biga for several hours (8-24) before mixing with your dough to then let rise, rise, rise.  This bread was declared as good as Panera (by my one and only critic) and I have to agree.  This bread could be on a restaurant table with dipping oil and herbs (which is exactly how I ate it.)  Look at all those holes!  Every time I folded the dough to let it rise, again, I said, "I love this beautiful dough!"  It was strong but full of yeasty holes.  This recipe makes a lot, I made it into two big loaves. My next goal is to translate this knowledge into some pizza crust.

Baking

I've been thinking-maybe I should have gone into the Culinary Arts?  Sometimes I get a wild hair of an idea about what to do when my kids are bigger.  They range from the insane (cardiologist) to the probable (secretary).  My newest thing has been culinary arts.  I think I could excel at it and there is a Baking/Pastry certificate achievable through Scraft.  So, I get on their website this morning and see that it's 30 credits, not bad at all, and that the first pre-req is CAP 102, which is basically food sanitation, and that I can take it online, this Summer, starting in July.  It wouldn't be too expensive and maybe I could see if this is for me?

Here are some things I've made recently and I've got a biga in the fridge that's going to take like a million hours to finally be bread fit for eating.  Oh you rustic Italians, how you teach me patience.

A fancy way to make cinnamon rolls, go here for the recipe.

A new favorite of mine, Mel's recipe.

I love pie, I love limeade.  This was a natural progression. Here is the recipe. Note, I used the crust from the banana cream.  I'm not saying you have to use that crust for all cream pies but I recommend it.

Wild hair or good idea?

We can stay all day...

You wanna see my zoo pics?

Of course you do.

Feeding the Giraffes was the best part.  There were three adults and two young ones.

Are we REALLY in Africa?

Boys will be boys.  Boys will eat dirt.

Family Pics

You've probably seen these (and more) on facebook already but I wanted to post them here also.  We took the tripod to the Nichols Arboretum.  It is a beautiful setting for photos.  The only thing I hadn't anticipated was Noah not looking at the camera.  Luckily a nice woman walking by made some silly faces in order to get the ones of the four of us.  I have more to share about Memorial day weekend and our awesome trip to the Binder Park Zoo, but this will have to suffice for now.  

Enjoy staring at our cute selves. :)