A Date for the Boys

I checked Corbin out of school for a lunch date on Friday, and on a whim, decided to keep him out the rest of the day and go play at the First Friday sponsored by Walmart Toyland on the square. Sometimes, school is overrated, man. Corbin was ecstatic!  

The boys played with all of the hot new toys available this year, scored a loot of really great free toys, waded through a disgusting crowd that can only compare to Black Friday madness to get a mini Anna and Elsa doll to give to Reese and Quincy (that little Corbin has a heart of gold), met a few characters, and ate a giant lemonade, corn dog, and funnel cake (which later caused me to throw up violently All. Night. Long. I'm never eating funnel cake again, guys.) 

We met up with friends from our ward for playgroup at Dave Peel Park. Soren discovered he can independently climb up on the play structure and go down the  slide without any help. But I did have to "Watch Mom! Watch!" and reply with, "Yes, Soren, I am watching you. I see you." every time before he would slide down. It was really cute. Corbin chased friends and climbed and played until it was time to go pick up Reese and Quincy from school. On the way there, Corbin said, "I won't tell them how much fun we had, Mom, or else they will be sad we didn't take them. Or maybe we can give them the presents first, and then tell them." 

Smart lad. 

The girls graciously accepted the spoils Corbin shared with them and were surprisingly not jealous at all of his adventure, which tells me Corbin really was due for a day out. 

The Best Apple Blackberrry Pie You Will Ever Eat

Unless you burn it to a crisp. Then it's the second best pie you'll ever eat. 

Who's loving apple season? We are! We tore through 20lbs of gigantic honeycrisp apples in no time, and then we were sad because they were gone. What's a girl to do?

"Make a pie" is always a good answer. So here we go. Also, be sure to watch the timer and not burn it like I did, last night. Woopsie. The pics are of Kasey's and Carly's pies (same recipe) because it hurts my self esteem too much to post my own. So remember, even the best recipe will fail you if you don't pay attention and completely burn it ;)

Apple Blackberry Pie

1/2 cup butter

1/3 cup crisco

1 3/4 cup flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 cup flour

1/3 cup water

#1 Combine 1/2 cup butter and 1/3 cup crisco using a pastry blender or two forks.

#2 Chill butter/crisco combo

#3 Combine 1 3/4 cup flour and 1/2 tsp salt in a medium bowl. Set aside.

#4 Combine 1/4 cup flour and 1/3 cup water in a small bowl. This is the flour paste.

#5 Add the dry flour mixture to the butter/crisco mixture and blend with pasty blender to pea size. Avoid over mixing!

#6 Lastly, add flour paste and blend with a pastry blender for 15 more seconds. Form into a ball and divide in half.

#7 Roll out both halves of dough balls.  Place one in the pie pan. 

And here's the apple pie filling recipe:

1 1/2 cups sugar

6 TBS cornstarch (I only use 3 TBS)

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp nutmeg

1 dash salt

large handful blackberries

6-8 granny smith apples (or 5 large)

1 TBS lemon juice

butter pats for the top before the crust goes on

#7 Mix in this order: peeled sliced apples, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt, together in large bowl.

#9 Add lemon juice

#10 Add sugar, quickly toss and pour entire contents into pie crust. 

#11 Place several pats of butter on top of apples. Cover with second piece of pie dough. Cut holes in top to vent.  Sprinkle with sugar.

#12 Bake at 400 degrees for 1 hour. Cover after the first 20 min with tin foil.

Rub a dub dub, two boys in a tub

One might naturally assume that yhe boys' bathroom floor is the grossest one in the house.  At our house it is the cleanest floor because it gets flooded and mopped every time Corbin and Soren bathe together. 

Look how happy they are. They ran around naked and I chased them all over the basement to get dressed after their bath. I love being a mother. There is definitely not much quiet happening around our home this morning. I slept in and the kitchen is a wreck from us being gone all day yesterday, breakfast spoils, and a craft the children helped themselves to at like 6am. Not much quiet, but a lot of peace. My children are healthy, safe, and have genuine love for one another. What more could a mom really ask for?  Ok, aside from more sleep and clean floors. But really, those pleasures are fleeting and family love can last forever, so on this noisy, messy, flooded floors morning, I'll take the latter. 

Baby love

On Thursday night, Kasey and Katie put together an intimate girls night out with about 10 of my favorite girlfriends to celebrate Baby Willy.  Obviously, since this is my fifth baby and not the first for either gender, I felt like a great big baby shower would be a little inappropriate, but I was showered indeed, with love, and it was totally perfect. 

We went to one of my favorite local restaurants, Table Mesa, and I was overwhelmed by how much my baby is already adored by each of these amazing, generous women. I love each of them so much and I'm grateful for their examples to me.  They are strong, independent, talented, kind, intelligent, creative, funny, supportive, insightful, and very generous women with great faith. I have great respect for, learned from and feel blessed to know each of them. My baby and I are so lucky to be surrounded by so much goodness. 

Katie and Kasey went above and beyond just a celebratory dinner with girlfriends. There were decorations, cakes, favors, and gifts. I came home on a complete high from being showered with so much affection. It was a beautiful, special experience to be the center of a total love fest. 

Also, it was a LOT of fun to open up little pink presents! When Reese and Quincy were born, we had decided to wait and have the gender be a surprise. It was really fun to already know that we are expecting a girl this time, and be able to open packages of pink sleepers with ruffle butts and bows and sparkles on them! I can't wait to get this nursery finished and fold and refold everything a million times. 

...cuz let's be honest, that is pretty much the only time I ever actually fold laundry! 

Hooter

I bought this pair of creepy ugly owls from a local online garage sale a few weeks ago. They were disgusting. Full of rust and cobwebs and smelled like cigarettes and cats. Nasty. 

I gave it a few coats of primer and high gloss spray paint weeks ago, and decided today was the day to finish a project. It needed a new $3 switch from the hardware store (old one had a short in it), and during naptime I covered a cheap drum shade with some coral fabric to match the nursery, and Ta-Da! 

Totally awesome creepy owl lamp for baby girl's room.

Hoot hoot! 

Best part was when I had the lamp with me in lowes this morning and was trying to figure out which parts I needed to buy. I met an old buddy at the register and turns out he is a retired electrician. He took the lamp over to the counter and rewired the new parts on for me! He said, "There's a rocking chair by the fake fireplace over there at the front of the store. You go sit down and rest little lady, I'll bring this over to you in a few minutes." And he did! It's nice to know there are stil genuinely kind people in the world, happy to do favors to save a stranger some time. And now, I know how to properly wire a lamp, so I can do the other one with confidence. Yay for friendly retired guys in the checkout line.  

Quilting day 2 and a dizzy day.

Eunice came over this morning and told me the next steps for the baby's quilt. 

Starch quilt top, stretch out layers, pin each triangle, and start quilting in the ditches. She brought a special "walking foot" for the machine to prevent puckering and it helped a lot. I'm not sure I would attempt this again without one. The foot didn't fit on my machine, so I borrowed hers. I wasn't feeling so hot so I told her to take her time, I needed to sit for a bit.  While she went home to get the machine, I got really sick and blacked out on the way to my bedroom. Dang low blood pressure! I managed to stay conscious, but I couldn't see anything. I've only had that happen a few times, and not yet with this pregnancy. Anyway, I crawled the rest of the way to my bed and put my head over the edge and slowly, the blood rushed back into my face. Crazy! 

Anyway, I went from feeling super cold to super hot and sweaty, threw up twice and then felt ok. I went to bed for 15 min or so until Eunice came back and then ate some yogurt and took some iron and just sat the rest of the time she was at my house.  I'm grateful Soren was in bed, and that this happened today and not yesterday when I had a house full of active boys over for a play date! The nurse at my doctor's office agrees it's just related to low blood pressure but to call them of it happens again or if my Braxton hicks are regular after (they aren't). 

Eunice gave me instructions and watched me sew the first row and helped troubleshoot some tension issues with the machine, and then headed home. I went back to bed for awhile and woke up feeling do much better when Soren woke up. Days like this remind me how grateful I am to not feel this sick or tired every day, like with some other pregnancies. I should have known better than to stand over the iron for half an hour this morning when I wasn't feeling well. Needless to say, I will not be getting on a step ladder or painting the nursery anytime soon. I know I push myself but I do know my limits even though I felt completely fine later this afternoon.

Right before kids got home from school I parked myself at the kitchen table and quickly got all the quilting done in just under a couple hours while Soren watched a movie.  It was so fast and I love the way it looks!

I'm actually sort of amazed with myself that there are only two tiny puckers in the back, and they're hardly visible. The imperfections are what make it authentic, right? 

Last step will be to add the coral pink binding. That will wait until another day (or week). Thanks to all of Eunice's wisdom, this went 100x faster than I imagined it would.  No need to watch YouTube tutorials when there's an expert in the house! She is truly amazing and so generous with her talents and teaching skills. 

I still need to find an old bumper to recover (which will be way faster than making my own), and Eunice said that crib sheets are so fast and easy to make that she will show me how when she comes by to teach me how to do the binding and I'll be able to bust out 2 or 3 in under an hour. Excellent! 

I'm really glad I didn't wait any longer to get started on this little (big) project. In 2 weeks it will be time to prepare for Thanksgiving, Quincy's 8th birthday, Reese's 10th birthday, and then it will be Christmas! This last trimester is flying by. 

Whatcha talking 'bout Willies?

During FHE (on gratitude): 

Corbin: I am thankful for....food! Oh and you know what I am not thankful for? That people get Chickenpox.

Me: Aaron, it's official. We win. We win as parents. 

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While driving around running errands:

Me: Kids, I'm going to teach you a silly song that my dad used to sing to me, and his dad used to sing to him. It goes like this, "Mares eat oats and does eat oats and little lambs eat ivy, a kid will eat ivy too, wouldn't you?" And then you sing it fast so it sounds like this, "maresey dotes and dosey dotes and little lambsey divey. A kiddeldey divey doo, wouldn't you?" 

Quincy: hey mom? 

Me: what? 

Quincy: could you maybe just turn on the radio for us instead? 

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During dinner, Soren got upset with his chicken and left the table to have a little meltdown. We ignored him and continued to eat while he burned off some two year old angst on the sofa. Frustrated that his efforts were going unnoticed, we returned to the dining area and lay down on the floor near the table with his head down to cry. 

Finally, mid fake-sob, he paused and glanced up at us with a pathetic pout, to see who was watching him. Aaron and I stifled a laugh, and carried on with dinner. Reese looked down at him and set down her fork. 

"That's it. I can't handle it. Look at that little face, it's irresistble. Awwwwwwe, are you sad, Soren?" 

And just like that, she left the table to go coddle her brother. It was too sweet. 

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When my mom arrived in town:

Quincy: Grandma! Your neck grew! 

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Reese: how was your day, mom? 

Me: oh it was just ok.

Reese: so you're saying you didn't get to take a nap today? 

Nice. 

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Quincy: mom, when are you going to have the baby reduced?

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Meg: Corbin come take a shower. You will feel so much better when you breathe.

Corbin: no I don't want to take a bath or a shower. I can already breathe! (Inhales and exhales loudly). See? Did you hear that? I'm breathing. 

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