MOMmy & DADdy

Just this week Jacob has gone from calling us Mommy & Daddy to just Mom & Dad.  I’m not sure why the change happened and I’m also not sure I like it!  I guess our little guy is growing up…

The long way

My manager and I were recently in the Boston area to do some research and finish out a trial from which we recorded over 2,000 numbers.  We finished early and made it to the airport with 3 hours to kill before our flight, so I decided to start averaging the numbers to see how the results turned out. 

I always keep my TI-30x calculator handy while traveling so I started crunching the numbers.  I was able to get a third of them calculated before the flight and even made a hand-drawn graph to show my manager the results.  I did have my laptop with me, but it would have taken me longer to try and input all the numbers without a number pad. 

We then boarded the plane and while everyone was finding their seats and the flight attendants were showing everyone what to do in case of an emergency I pulled out my calculator to keep going.  But then came the announcement of turning off all electronic devices.  I was not sure if my calculator was included, but it is an electronic device and I didn’t want to be THAT person on the plane.

I still really wanted to keep averaging, so I decided to start doing it with my pencil and paper.  The adding was easy enough, but then came the long division.  I tried to think how many years it had been since I had to do long division and then I realized it had been decades!  Oh boy, this might take a while. 

But actually it was quite easy and I remembered what I was doing fairly quickly.  It was just like riding a bicycle.  Once the electronic devices were allowed to be turned back on I did pull out my calculator and check my math.  I would say that I was about 75% correct.  I erased my math after each set, so I wasn’t sure if the wrong ones were off because of the adding or division.

I guess I’m all set for when Jake brings home his math homework in a few years.  Jamie and I were both able to pick up math very easily, so I really hope Jake will too. 

Bridal Shower Cookbook

For my co-worker's bridal shower we asked for a recipe from each of the guests.  My plan was to make a scrapbook out of them and give it to her as a gift.  In the end though I decided that would be too much work, so I made a cookbook using a photobook on shutterfly.com.

It took me a while to understand the layouts and how to make my own, but after a few hours it was complete.  I think it turned out great! 

Click here to view this photo book larger

You'll love award-winning Shutterfly photo books. Start your own today.

Easy Baked Cod & Homemade Tartar Sauce

I came across an easy recipe for baked cod and decided to give it a try.  It was quite tasty, but I made a few simple additions and it was even better.

Ingredients:

4 cod filets, thawed
1/2 cup flour
2 eggs
1/4 cup milk
15 Ritz crackers
1 tsp Penzy's Northwoods seasoning

Directions:

• Sprinkle flour onto a small plate.
• Mix eggs and milk and pour into a shallow bowl.
• Crush Ritz crackers and combine with Northwoods seasoning.  Spread onto a small plate.
• Pat dry each cod fillet.  One fillet at a time, press into flour to coat well, then drench into egg/milk mixture and then press into crushed crackers to coat well.  Continue with other fillets.
• Bake at 400 F for 20 minutes or until they flake easily with a fork.

I also recently made homemade tartar sauce which was way better than store bought.  The only downside is that it only keeps for 3 days, so modify as needed to make less.

1 cup Mayonnaise
1 tbsp pickle relish (or finely chopped pickles)
1 tbsp minced onion
1-2 tbsp lemon juice
salt & pepper

Mix mayo, pickles and minced onion together in a small bowl. Add lemon juice and salt & pepper to taste. Refrigerate for 1 hour before serving.

Enjoy!

Grandparent and Family Printable

This past fall I came across a printable for Grandparents and thought it was really cute.  The link was for a shop on Etsy and I am just not one to pay money for something I know I can do myself.  I’ve used PowerPoint for many presentations for work and only in the past couple years have started to use it for printables and invitations too.

Here’s the Grandparent printable I made for my Mother-in-law and Father-in-law.  I uploaded it to Walgreens and printed out a 8x10 and put it in a frame. 

 

I also used the same format to make one for my brother-in-law’s family.  He has three boys from his first marriage and just proposed to his girlfriend so I gave this to them as an engagement present.  I really think the quote sums up their life as a family.

Ultimate Superhero Cake

For the little guy’s birthday party we decided on a superhero theme.  And while perusing the Everything board on Pinterest I came across the most awesome superhero cake.  I pinned it to my Kid Stuff board thinking it would be a great birthday cake.  Here’s the one I found:

Picture from www.lilaloa.com

Pretty awesome hey?!?  Well, I made another rookie Mom mistake (I’ve made many) which was to show the little guy this picture. Oops, now he’s expecting this awesome cake and I’m not sure my decorating skills are up for the challenge, but how hard could it really be?!?!

About a week before the party I decided the above cake, while awesome, would be way too much cake for our party of 20.  So I decided on a square cake and because I’m a perfectionist I made a model of what I was thinking.

I added Superman for the 4th side and I had no idea what to do for the actual side and originally thought of putting his undies on there(but as you will soon see I changed my mind).

The most difficult part I was foreseeing was that I wanted 4 different colors on the top (and sides) and wasn’t sure how to make them come together seamlessly.  But I’m creative, so I decided to use thick wooden skewers to make an X on the top and at each corner along the sides.  After adding a crumb coat I pushed the skewers into the frosting just enough so they didn’t slide around.

I used a ruler to smooth out the top and then followed up with the Viva paper towel method.  “The What?” you ask.  Another recent pin I found was that you can use a white Viva paper towel (only Viva brand works I guess) and lay it on the surface of the buttercream and very lightly smooth it with your hand.  There are a few You Tube videos about it like this one if you want to check it out.

After I finished all 4 sides I removed the skewers and set it outside (it was only 18 degrees out, but if you have the space then set it in the freezer for about 5-10 min).  The skewers left a fairly large space between all the colors so using the same Viva paper towel method I was able to smooth the colors towards each other and got a perfect seam.

Next up was the actual design on the cake.  I use a toothpick to first mark the design on the cake and then fill in with the frosting.  I started with Spiderman since I knew it would probably be the easiest of them all.

Then I worked on the top of Superman.  I first outlined with black then tried to fill in the red and yellow.  I would not recommend this.  Instead, start with the red, then leave a space and add the yellow, and finally fill in with the black. I spread it with the spatula as well as I could and then smoothed with the paper towel. I pressed a little too hard though, so be careful if you do that.

At this point I had already been working on the cake for 5 hours (yes, 5 hours) and decided it was time for bed. 

The next night I still wasn’t sure about the rest of Superman, so I got started on the Hulk.  For this I started by tracing out the hand with a toothpick and then added large mounds of frosting for each of the fingers and added green blobs all around the rest.  Then using a brownish color I added a thin line around all the blogs and to define the fingers.  Using a toothpick I spread it around picking up some of the green and trying to blend it.  Then I filled in the cracks.

For Batman I traced out buildings and windows and then piped the outline and filled in with black.  I smoothed it out as much as I could and then added the yellow windows. 

For the logo on top I first added the yellow and then the black (see I’m learning from my Superman mistakes).  I also added white dots for stars.

Last up was that pesky Superman side.  The buildings on the batman side was fairly easy so I decided to make light grey ones.  I also added in a bird and a plane (get it?!?).

Whew! This took another 3 hours, so in all to decorate it took me 8 hours! But the look on the little guy’s face when he saw it was all worth it.

Look who’s 4

Happy Birthday to my 4 year old!

This past year has brought many challenges.  But with all the challenges we have had a blast!  Here’s a snapshot of the past year:

He loves to dance!  He may look like daddy, but he has my personality all the way!

He loves to put out fires in the neighborhood.

And when he’s done he’ll mow your grass!

He loves to cook and bake with us!

He got his first set of stitches :(

He is fully potty trained (except at night) and had his first experience peeing in the woods camping.  Unfortunately this backfired in the summer when he dropped and went on the beach… oops!

He finally figured out how to ride his tricycle…

And then a big boy bike all in the same year!

He still laughs uncontrollably on the swings :)

He loves his swimming lessons and this was the first time without me in the water with him.

He went to a couple Brewer games and Admiral’s hockey games.

He loves to help daddy fix things.

He got his very own fishing pole this year!

He loves dragons!

Happy 4th Birthday to my little boy who is growing up so fast!  Let’s hope that this year brings just as much fun without so much drama though, okay?!?!  Love you little guy!