Quick Takes: II

Oh Friday Again.

1. I am tired. We stayed up WAY too late.

2. This has been a crazy week. Monday my brother was here, Tuesday was Husband's birthday, Wednesday was ear infection day, Yesterday we stayed up too late and cleaned, today C and I have a lunch date, Tomorrow we are going to an ashes scattering. My little homebody self is cringing and just wants a normal day!

3. Today C is 11 months old. I can't even stand it. The countdown is on.

4. I wish I had something witty or interesting to say. But I don't. I don't think.

5. I have made a new life goal of going to all the Presidential Library Museums. I went to one last year and besides the fact that there were no books at this supposed Library it was really interesting. (My little naive self was expecting... a library.) The one I really want to go to is Reagan's. But I can tell you right now I will not be going to California anytime soon.

6. I am on a quest to make diabetic or low sugar banana bread. I think C would like it, but I don't want him to have as much sugar as in my favorite recipe.

7. It's going to be beautiful this next week. I can't wait.

Have a good weekend!

11 Months Old!

AH! He's 11 months old. How can this be?!

Not new this month but never really recorded:

• If you load a spoon up he will put it in his mouth then drop it on the tray for you to load up again.
• Climbing stairs like crazy if you let him or he makes a break for it. 

New this month: 

• First ear infection
• Can identify Pig and Cow from his Little People Farm and Noah's Ark animals with surprising accuracy. Elephant and Sheep with slightly less accuracy. And those poor other animals on the farm and ark (Zebras, giraffes, lions, horse, goat, chicken, farmer and Noah) they are just for chewing. 
• Had a growth spurt and is 29 inches! (I think but there was definitely a growth spurt as overnight his jeans didn't work anymore.)
• Weighs 21 pounds. 
• Ranges from 6-12 to 12-18 item clothes depending on what it is and what brand. 
• 9 month or 12 month pajamas. The one pair of 6 month pajamas that was hanging in there got kicked out with the growth spurt. Children's Place 12 month pajamas are still too big. 
• Babbling and responding
• Pointing and reaching at things he wants
• Occasionally signs "more." We are not really baby sign people but have sort of taught "more." 

Theme Thursday: Sky and Other Things That Are Going On

My house is a MESS. I need to clean it this morning. But it's so beautiful out that I am having a hard time convincing myself of the fact. I mean, how can I possibly be expected to handle high school cleaning on a day like this:

I stuck my phone out the door of my screen porch.

Alas, it is overdue. I try to clean a little every day so it never gets out of hand. But I didn't get to yesterday. So now it's out of hand. Yesterday C was not himself. Cranky before his nap. That happens though. Then he proceeded to scream on and off the rest of the afternoon. This has never happened. The only thing making him even remotely happy was being snuggled. So while I was perfectly contented to let the house go ala this:

I was still worried. At 4:10 I called Husband home. Not too early but I needed him to see for himself that this was not normal. At 4:15 I called the doctor. Then we took him to convenient care. Poor baby has an ear infection. One ear full blown, one ear almost there. I suppose I should be thankful that it took him until the last 2 days of 10 months before he got go-to-the-doctor's sick but it still broke my heart. 

So I need to get cleaning while he's cheerful. We also discovered he has a love for country music. I have all of 11 songs on my iPod--not really our genre of choice but something about the beat and the twang makes him bop to the beat with a big smile. So it's cleaning to country music morning over here. After this discovery was made I downloaded a few more songs. Now I am in 1992 and rockin' to Achy Breaky Heart. Oh yes I am. 

Link up your sky to Clan Donaldson and thanks Cari for hosting! I bet you have sky to take a picture of! Also a pretty awesome excuse to put Channing Tatum's picture on your blog since he is in talks with Fox to be in a Guys and Dolls movie opposite Joesph Gordon Levitt. And let's be honest, he'll probably be Sky Masterson. ;)

Those People

We have these friends. You know the type. They're married, and have been for 3 years. No kids yet, but they have a cat they got together. They bought a house. Now it should be noted that they even work together. (Her second job is being his employee.) And they post on Facebook. A lot. To each other.

But every time she posts a picture he says "You are so talented babe." And she'll respond. And they like Every. Single. Thing. the other one says or posts. Not to mention the glorious updates on their relationship and little moments via stati. "Coffee with my love!" "Wine, lentils and asparagus with the deepest blue eyes."

But Madeline, why don't you just block them from your news feed? Done. But they serve a purpose to this story. Husband and I often refer to them and their ridiculous Facebook trends. The common reference statement is "I want to stroke your feet. I want to caress your hair. Let's go to dinner soon." Because you guys, that's what it seems like. Example: "Hey? Wanna buy a house today? Meet me at noon."

And we don't get it. They presumably see each other on a daily basis at home. They also work together. They should be able to say all the things they need to say that's gushy and ridiculous about dinner plans via text or in person. Or gosh, even a Facebook message.

We often comment how it seems they are working HARD (Too hard maybe?) to make sure their marriage looks strong in public. And I was thinking about how maybe it's because in private it's not going so well and this is their attempt to do better. Or to fool us into thinking that they're doing great. Or maybe they are just annoying and know no other way. The point here, is that marriage is hard. While Husband and I take the duck philosophy--you know the strong and steady above water and paddling underneath the water, perhaps these two subscribe to the everything out in the open philosophy. And you know what? Either is better than not trying at all.

But all that being said. Today is Husband's birthday. And on this birthday I would like to tell him in a public setting how much I love him and I am so lucky. He goes to work each day and comes home happy to see us. He does dishes. (I hate doing dishes.) He lets me sleep in on the weekends, but that means he rarely, if ever gets to sleep in.

So Husband, I love you. Happy birthday.

I am going to bake a cake and get ready to go visit Husband at work for lunch!

Things to do, what's new and who knew?

It's Monday. Monday. Sheesh where did the weekend go?

I've got things to do today. Finish the front closet clean out that I started yesterday okay, Friday. I started Friday. I've got laundry to do. Run the dishwasher. I've got a guy coming about the basement situation for an estimate I'm guessing will be in $6000 range. (Hear the laughing from wherever you are?)

So what's new? Husband's birthday is tomorrow and the poor man never had a fun birthday celebration in his life 'til I came around. It's sad. And he has no idea what he wants to do for his birthday. Like even just what do you want for dinner? Or do you want a cake? Questions with no answers. At least we got the present situation all figured out and taken care off. Thank goodness--he is always a struggle for me.

Who knew that boys are practically born with the ability to make car noises. C pushes his cars and trucks (He only has 5 and got 3 for Easter from my parents.) around and makes raspberry car noises. Or when he's in his Cozy Coupe--same thing. I didn't teach him that. Husband didn't either. Who knew?!

Happy Monday!

7 Quick Takes: I

Quick Takes! Thanks Jen err.. Grace for hosting and YAY Jen, you're all home!

1. I am really looking forward to a nice quiet weekend. Last weekend we hosted all the family here and it was busy. Hopefully we can relax and not do a whole lot--that would be ideal. Except thank you notes. I've got to finish those. 

2. If you missed my last Theme Thursday on the flooded basement... well the rain kept coming. But the basement isn't any worse so that's lucky. Still, if anyone would like to take the rain away feel free. We have it in spades. My old stomping grounds is covered in snow. It's a toss up for me really. I have green grass, and daffodils and a ton of excess water but it's April 19 so snow doesn't really seem fun either.

3. Life is messy. Never is this more clear than feeding my 10 month old yogurt. We are learning about spoons. Right now if you scoop the food on the spoon and hand it to him he will put it in his mouth. It is way messier than if I just fed him but that's how he learns right?! It really is a good metaphor. I just need to remind myself from time to time.

4. My broseph is coming on Monday on his way back to live in the deep south. That's fun. Both the he's going to live in the south so maybe this time I'll go visit and spend time in the south. And you know, the he's coming to my house for a night thing.

5. I have decided to make bread pudding tonight. I've never made bread pudding before. But I like to eat it and it seems remarkably like baked french toast so... I am going to give it a whirl. As long as I buy milk.

6. If you look at food on Pinterest, you have almost certainly seen this pin on cooking steak restaurant style. I tried it a week or so ago only I used the Omaha Sirloin Steaks Husband's grandma sent us for Christmas. Alas, my estimated rough cooking time was off and I wound up with shoe leather. Okay... it was medium so still edible though not nearly as enjoyable as moo or slightly less moo would have been. Either way, I really enjoyed it and it made the house smell SO good with the lemony, garlicy, buttery smell. And since I still have 2 steaks and half the butter I made it may be time for a second go around. You know to go with the bread pudding.

7. Our house has lovely dark blue carpet that I would LOVE to rid myself of but alas is not to be for some time. It actually looks better now that we've painted and it stays vacuumed. Alas I say again because walking on it makes it have specks of stuff, never mind the crumbs from the baby. To aid in the lessening of crumbs I am considering one of those "spill proof" snack cups with the soft plastic the baby reaches through. Anyone have any experience with those working or not?

Have a great weekend!

Theme Thursday: Boys

What a perfect first real post for my new blog home. Who doesn't love a good theme Thursday? I sure as heck do!And luckily she didn't pick girls because I don't have any!

C loves swimming... he is just a huge fan. So while the fam was here last weekend we made use of their pool. Here are my favorite boys having a good time!

So have a great week and be sure to link up your boys to Clan Donaldson and get ready because sky is next week! 

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Here Goes Nothing!

So... for a lot of reasons it became necessary to start from scratch. So here it is. My new permanent home as A Dash of Snark!

This is where I'll be from now on. Same me. Different place!

Theme Thursday Archives

4/11

A big shout out to Cari who unknowingly decided on a theme I needed some perspective on today. Grow. 

Go grow and link up with Clan Donaldson! 

So... grow. Is the first part of growth. And boy oh boy did we get that in spades. It started with a call from Husband at 7:47... weird. He was in the basement. 

Apparently when the previous homeowners (remember we're newbies) said they water proofed... they only meant for normal rainfall. Not 4+ inches in 2 days rainfall. 

The day was spent with that yellow shop vac and a squeegy trying to get water down that little tiny drain hole. The. Entire. Day. 

In case you're curious... we lost. There is still water but at least all our stuff is out of the way. We caught it early enough. 

What's all that mud? That would be hydraulic cement trying to patch the big holes. We still lost. And yes we ripped out the bottom step. 

So... we grow. 

We hope our bank account grows. 

We hope mold does not. 

We pray that our spirits grow.

We pray that the weather forecast of MORE RAIN does not.

We grew together as a family, homeowners and a couple today. So all around... growth! 

This is not Job. This could be worse. And even though we really really really can't afford this... we will be fine. (Which is a far better attitude than the one I had even an hour ago so... more growth!)

Link up! 

4/4
And we live on a busy street. So we went to our front porch. We sat on the steps holding him and went to town. It was SO funny for us to watch. And he thought all the cars going by were so funny.

It's a good thing Cari at Clan Donaldson never denys participation based on kid photo overload. Because sometimes that's all I got. Most of the time actually. So link up if you've got some funny. 

And if you're feeling generous and wise and have a few minutes could you go read my post from late last night and let me know what I should do? 

Have a wonderful Thursday!

3/21

So I lied last week when I said I had mud covered. 

Our snow melted but it's so cold the ground is frozen. And the old owners of the house took great care of the lawn (lucky us) so there's not even an example of dried mud available. 

There is an old picture of me, at camp, coming back from a bike trip and I am COVERED in mud. But obviously I can't find that. I even found the photo album it SHOULD be in. Nope. So... WAIT! Never mind. Thanks to the wonders that are the interwebs and lovely searchable archives I found it on the camp website! 

I was 15 almost 16 (like a week from my birthday) This is my camp boyfriend. Since well that's what you do at camp. If you look really closely at the strands of hair you can see the tips match my shirt. Because dying your hair pink was also what you did at camp. My parents were thrilled. Not. Funny story, we're still friends and he actually married a girl who went to camp with us and she was SO mad that we were camp dating this summer.

And then my something like mud picture: 

This is what happens when you leave the brownie pan within reach and trust the baby. 

And brownies are like mud. Tasty delicious mud. (It's amazing, brownies this week, cake 2 weeks ago, no one is going to believe we're on diets.) 

Well anyway I found the mud picture but then thought this was funny still. 

So mud. Link up to Clan Donaldson because all the cool kids are doing it and you should be cool. And linking up is way less dangerous than smoking or any of the other peer pressure activities DARE warned about. I don't think there's any risk at all in linking up if you want to know. So do it! 

3/14
How is it already Thursday again? Oh wait. I get it. But can it be Friday again too? No? Well then.

Green. Green is the theme for this Thursday. Clan Donaldson is the place to be if you have a picture of green. I could have taken a picture of natural green but even though the snow melted around these parts it is really only green if you actually consider the gross brownish/army green color mix green. Apparently I don't.

I could have another go at indoor plants but that didn't really work out last time with the trees and leaves. I have a bag of peas in the fridge but who doesn't? Besides a bag of peas isn't really that interesting.

So... for your consideration this week I submit one of C's 9 month/Easter photo shoot pictures. Because he is on a light green background and wearing a green vest.

And it was taken on Sunday so still in this week! That background I swear is mint green in real life though this picture it doesn't look like it. I spent a good while ironing that sheet and then I remembered why I don't iron. Does anyone outside of the hotel industry legitimately iron their sheets? For non photographic reasons aka just to sleep on? 

Anyway that's all I've got. Meet you back here next week for mud. (I got that one down!) And go link up to Cari and all the other cool people who found green in their yard, world, children and beer. Actually I don't know that anyone has found the green beer yet. Still a few days early. 

3/7
Blahdy Blahdy Whatever. Theme Thursday. Link Up. Clan Donaldson. (And check out her boots because come on, how cool is that?)

Piles. Red. Please. Half my house is red. I can do this. Here I go.

And what is this picture of?

My life changing moment. Wacky Cake. Way back in the day at Edward D. Neill Elementary School on the menu once in a while was Wacky Cake. It always made me smile and it was pretty good. I guess at the time in my 6-11 year old world (since Kindergarten was half day and we didn't have lunch.) they called it Wacky Cake to be fun. The same way we had Italian Dunkers  aka cheese bread.

So my mind was blown, BLOWN, when on Pinterest I saw a pin of Wacky Cake. It's a thing. Not just a trick 6 year olds into eating cake thing. And this shows you how dumb I was because who needs to be tricked into eating cake? So I am looking at this pin and seriously you guys, Wacky Cake is amazing.

No eggs. No butter. No bowl. You mix all the ingredients in the cake pan! Well, my little 6 year old flashback self decided to try it immediately. And because I love you all so much I have decided to spread the joy and love. Without further ado: make Wacky Cake! No really, go right now! I bet you have everything you need!

1. Preheat the Oven to 350. 
2. Grease up an 8 inch square cake pan or if you're doubling the recipe a 9 x 13. 
3. Add the dry ingredients directly into the greased pan.
• 1.5 Cups Flour
• 3 Tbsp Coca
• 1 Cup White Sugar
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
4. Mix the dry ingredients.
5. Make 3 indentations in the dry mix. 2 small one big. 
6. Add first 3 wet ingredients to the indentations
• 1 tsp white vinegar*
• 1 tsp vanilla 
• 5 Tbsp vegetable oil
7. Pour 1 cup of water over the whole shabang.
8. Mix until smooth.
9. Bake for 35 minutes.
10. Either dust with powdered sugar or cool and frost
11. Eat. 

*The only warning on the whole recipe is to NOT use apple cider vinegar. So don't do that.

Easy. Peasy. Lemon Squeezy. 

And tasty. It's got a lovely cake texture. It's not super sweet either. It's Wacky. And it is exactly like it was in elementary school. Just the first bite and I was 6 again. Plus... you guys, no eggs. If your house is anything like mine occasionally you get ready to bake and you're short on eggs. Or you have a family member or friend with an egg allergy. I'd say this is ground breaking but really it's a cake from the Great Depression. (Homeschoolers... I am thinking History lesson/cooking class combo.)

So go link up your piles to Cari, and gather your children and make a cake. 

2/28
Okay. It's Thursday. So it's time for a Theme Thursday hosted over at The Clan. And if you're reading this you should link up if you haven't already. Because the theme this week is joy. And even if you have to snap a picture of your coffee or cookie or glass of wine or child... the point is you can most definitely capture joy.

First a little housekeeping. Since last week I was under a log. Or I don't even know. I apparently had a blogging fast without really planning to and I missed it. So real quick (and just scroll down if you want to get to joy faster.) here is my architecture. It's taken of a theater downtown.

Mmkay we got that out of the way. Joy. Happiness. Well this is more difficult than I expected. I could take a picture of my living room wall of my Chagall La Mariee print that's all framed with a gorgeous frame that makes the colors in the print pop. But since we moved recently ahem on Halloween, I haven't gotten around to hanging it up yet. But since everyone knows that Happiness isn't happiness without a violin playing goat here is an awesome downloaded picture of it. I could get in to all the reasons why this painting brings me joy. But I'll spare you. 

Then there's my favorite picture of joy... like ever. Only I didn't take it. Neither did Husband as clearly he's in it. Lemme just say I LOATHED my wedding photographer. But she did get one perfect picture. And it is everything that represents us that day

While some pictures may rotate in and out through the years I have a feeling that I will keep this on my wall... forever. And yes. This one is actually hung up. What can I say? I was hosting book club a while back and wanted it to look like we actually had moved in. And I just love this picture. 

Now for my actual submission. Because it actually is happiness and joy and I took it. 

It was August and my dear sweet muffin was 10 weeks old! (So little but coming into his own you know?) It was that kind of week in August when the heat breaks and it's really nice. Dewey in the morning. Upper 70s at noon. You know the kind of day I wanted scheduling my wedding in August. But whatever. We were dog sitting and they had a deck with a large umbrella. Consequently C and I spent the week on the deck, in the shade. Napping. And when Husband came home we took some pictures. And look how happy they are? And how happy was I to have a picture of my two favorite guys? The point being, everything about this picture makes me happy. The memory. The image. The people.

Okay. Until next week.


2/14
Oh my gosh, I seriously felt like a mini-celebrity last week! Thank you for all the comments on the Caps for Sale pictures. I am glad my moment of inspiration was as fun for all of you as it was for me!

This week is leaves or trees.

Well now. Leaves or trees. The only leaves are on the house plants. And the fact that they're green is not a reflection of me but of Husband. We do have a fancy shmancy Macro lens that I don't know how to use so I just stuck it on Auto focus. Judge away. I'll learn sometime I'm sure and seriously Husband is the photographer of the two of us. Reason # 601 that I love him and reason # 2 that I am participating in these link ups since we have the stuff and I want to know how to use it.

This would be the big tree in our back yard. 

The trees out my kitchen window.

Well there you have it. Some trees. Hopefully in spring/summer/fall I can revisit said assignment and try for some leaves. Happy Valentine's Day! We have a lobster gram waiting for us as soon as one little boy is in bed.

So head on over to Clan Donaldson and show off your trees and leaves pictures. And start clicking away at some cool architecture for next Thursday. I think this means I will have to leave my house...



2/7
So everyone knows that Cari at Clan Donaldson is hosting Theme Thursday Photography Link Ups.

So this week the assignment was Hats or Scarves. I set out on a quest to be artsy. I put a bunch of hats in a pile. Lame. I tried to get the baby to wear his dad's baseball hat because that cracks me up. Terrible pictures. I then tried to take a picture of the Monopoly hat. Yeah that didn't work either.

So there we were reading books like any normal day and it hit me. We were going to do a themed photo series!! Only changing the words Hats... to Caps! Yeah. We made C act out Caps for Sale in his room. Then we photoshopped the heck out of it!

Without further ado Caps for Sale McGee Family Style. (We're paraphrasing a lot. Please buy the real book by Esphyr Slobodkina.)

Once there was a peddler who sold caps. He carried them on his head.
He walked up and down the street. "Caps! Caps for sale! Fifty cents a cap!" he called.
But nobody wanted any caps. So he took a nap. 

When he woke up from his nap all his caps were gone! 

He looked to the right, the left, behind the lamp tree. No caps.
Then he looked up.  On the tree sat a monkey. And on the monkey sat his cap. 

"You monkey you." he shouted, "you give me back my caps." But the monkey only shook his finger back at him and said "tsz, tsz, tsz."

In the real story the peddler gets his caps back. In the McGee story... it was bedtime.
Head over for some more hat pictures. Believe me. There are some CUTE kids to look at this week.
And you know, some hats. Join in next week for leaves or trees! 

1/31
Well the good camera is with Husband today at work so alas I was left to capture a sun flare/haze with my phone. Not knowing what the day was going to turn out as I was less than hopefully I would be able to link up at all.

But lest you be concerned, weird weather week continued and while the high for today is -5 Mother Nature decided to bless us with sunshine. So I set about to capture a sun flare. Well I suppose we can check photographer off of my potential careers, I should just leave it to Husband. But I did manage to at least take a picture of a sun flare:

Sunshine... on my shoulders... makes me happy...

So this completely un-edited picture is brought to you by my crappy cellphone camera and my inability to not participate.

At least my boy likes sunshine. He has a fascination with shadows as I am sure most children do so he does seek out the sun when it happens--which isn't often.

And as interesting as this post isn't, Jeopardy is ending which means I am out of baby free time. What can I say he loves sunshine and Jeopardy. Go look at Clan Donaldson for actually good pictures of sun flares and haze would you?