Tommy's 6th Birthday

I wish I was a kid in my family when I was a kid. 

Wait. That doesn't quite make sense. But you know what I mean.

I don't remember having any birthday traditions growing up. So when we started to have children and celebrate birthdays, I really wanted to establish traditions that our kids could look forward to and find comfort in year after year.

I think it's safe to say that we've made up some pretty fun traditions. 

Tommy had a great birthday. 

His birthday fell on a Tuesday this year. On the Sunday evening before his birthday, he had a family dinner with the menu of his choice: pizza, greek salad, and apples. In lieu of cake, he requested strawberry ice cream. He was very clear on the fact that he wanted ice cream for his party, but cake on his actual birthday. Okay buddy. You got it. 

So he got to celebrate his birthday a few days early surrounded by some of his favorite people: his cousins. 

One tradition for the last four years has been for us to make his birthday cake together. I have pictures of almost-2 year old Tommy licking frosting and helping me to mix the batter. By next year he could probably make the whole thing himself.

This year he wrote out the exact specifications of what he wanted in a cake: Lemon cake with vanilla frosting. Strawberries on top. Sprinkles. Round. Two layers. Big.

I tweaked his specs a bit to fit my idea of what our family would need in a birthday cake. (ie: not too big). Since the cake was eaten on his actual birthday, and it was just the four of us, I just made a half cake. And if you only have half a cake, how else would you decorate it but as a lemon slice?

Another tradition: Birthday cereal! Our family doesn't normally eat cereal: not out of any strict code of good nutrition, but because it's messy and it doesn't fill the kids up for more than one hour. So it's a very special event to get to pick out birthday cereal. Tommy strayed from his usual choice of Lucky Charms and chose Trix. I have to admit that I've never actually had Trix before. They tasted like a cross between Kix and Jolly Ranchers.

He also got a lot of thoughtful birthday presents: 

The Iron Giant because it's a tradition to get the boys a classic hardcover book for birthdays and Christmas; and because we read an excerpt of the story once and he loved it so much we had to keep reading the same excerpt every night for a week.

A book about origami, because he loves paper crafting so much. It's the perfect level for a kid to follow the directions by themselves.

The movie Aristocats because it's his favorite. I think he likes it for its swingin' music. We rented it from the library a while ago and kept it for a long time because he liked it so much. Ever since then he's been asking to get it from the library again and again. Since I knew we were getting it for his birthday, I kept making excuses like, "Oops, it looks someone already checked it out! Oh well." Hee hee. 

A microscope, because he's one science-lovin' kid. He's always talking about germs and wanting to know what things look like "teeny-tiny". It's by far his favorite birthday gift. He learned how to use it himself and for the past two days has been sticking everything he can find under the lens. 

In the evening we had a family dinner of Tommy's choice (cheese pinwheels) followed by birthday cake. Then we tucked one seriously tired and happy six year old into bed. 

Changing Seasons

When I first moved to California from Connecticut six years ago, I felt like this place had no seasons. I take that back, I felt like it had only two seasons: warm and sunny (April through September) and cool and rainy (October through March). Since I lived for twenty-two years in a place that had four clearly defined seasons (COLD, warm, HOT/HUMID, cool), it was really difficult for me to adjust to two less-defined seasons. Over the last few years I've finally come to appreciate the small differences between the seasons here in California. I've noticed nuances that mark the beginning of fall, like cold mornings and the honking of geese in the early evening, and the sound of football games in my backyard at the high school behind us. 


One way that I've learned to mark the seasons is with the food I cook. Before I taught myself how to cook properly, I just made whatever sounded good at the moment. It usually wasn't very healthy, and usually had nothing to do with the season in which it was being made. In the few years, I've tried to prepare recipes that remind me of the season in which they are made. 


What this looks like is that our summer blueberry pancakes turn into autumn gingerbread pancakes. Summer quick-grilled veggies and grilled meat gives way to winter all-day stew and fresh bread. In the beginning of each of our (two) seasons, I'll go through my recipe binder and take out the old seasonal recipes and replace them with the new seasonal ones. I've been doing this for a few seasons now and each time it's so much fun to rediscover old favorite dishes that haven't been enjoyed in half a year.


While it's technically fall now, we're still having 90 degree days. I'm just waiting for 'real fall' to start. As soon as it's cool enough to leave the windows open and feel a cool breeze blow through the kitchen, I'm going to plug in our slow-cooker for the first time in months and make something hearty.

Irish Beef Stew

Some of my favorite seasonal recipes:

Irish Beef Stew

Roasted Winter Squash with Rosemary

Chicken and Vegetable Pot Pie

Indian Spiced Chicken

Slow Cooker Spaghetti Sauce

Pumpkin Bread 

The pumpkin bread is my all-time favorite fall/winter thing to bake. I've baked this bread so much, I could probably do it from memory!

Christmas gingerbread pancakes: gingerbread pancakes with sprinkles and crushed candy cane. Truth be told, they don't look too good once they're flipped over, but the kids absolutely love that there's candy in their breakfast.

Monterey Solo

This week I did something I've never done before: I took the boys on a day trip by myself. It's amazing to me that in almost five years of having children, I've never actually taken them anywhere far away on my own ('far away' by my definition is a drive one hour or longer). 


This has mainly been because Mark's job: it used to be that he had flexiblity during the week to occasionally do house projects or other chores, so we would often have our weekends completely free to do fun things together as a family. But in the past year or so, his job has changed so that he doesn't have time to do those things during the week, and we end up doing them on the weekend. Therefore, we have less free weekend time as a family to do fun day trips. 


Mark has been encouraging me for quite sometime to get out of the house with the kids to do day trips, but I've always disliked the thought of going somewhere fun without him. Not to mention that an extra pair of hands is always a good thing with a pair of energetic boys. 


Finally this week I summed up the courage to do a day trip by myself, so we went to Monterey. We visited the aquarium first and explored eels, penguins, puffins, and kelp. Then we got some lunch and hit the beach. We had a good time for the most part, but the day was not without its challenges: Tommy's attitude was very disagreeable and he was just all-around difficult most of the day. But he mellowed out once he was released onto the open sand. Then Ben cut his foot open at the beach and, being without a first aid kit, we had to scour downtown Monterey for a pharmacy to buy some Band-Aids and neosporin. An hour and $20 later, we were all patched up and had our hot cocoas* in hand and were headed in the general direction of Home, so the day ended on a pleasant note. On the way home Tommy remarked, "Mommy, this day has been really big." I couldn't agree more.

*Getting hot cocoa after visiting the beach is another tradition. Northern California beaches are so cold and overcast that we're usually chilled to the core after spending a few hours there. A hot cocoa really hits the spot.

 Breakfast at our favorite pre-adventure bagel shop. We usually come here right before we set off on a road trip, even if it's just an hour long.

Zebra eel 

Huge Sunfish. I think it was about the size of my car.

The kids love this water tank. It's a tunnel about ten feet tall. Every few seconds there's a huge wave that crashes down and startles the kids. Every single time.

Drawing at the beach with some burnt wood.

Jumping!

Obligatory beach kids-on-log photo

Blue Friday

This weekend we repeated our new tradition of spending our Black Friday Blue Friday at the beach on the day after Thanksgiving. We were expecting freezing cold and dreary weather like we had last year, particularly because it was so cold at our house. But instead we were greeted with clear blue skies and temperate weather. 

We had a relaxing, enjoyable day just spending time with each other and exploring the beaches through a four-year old's and two-year old's eyes. It made our hearts thankful and joyful to spend the day in such a beautiful place. We hope this tradition carries on through the years and helps our boys appreciate God's awesome creation, particularly on the day after our Thanksgiving feast - the holiday which invites us to take stock of all the ways we are blessed and to be thankful to our Creator.

Tommy did a lot of this - he was content to stand and watch the ocean.

Rock climbing is always a favorite part of visiting the beach.

I love these little guys!

Me and my little buddy

Picnic lunch of our Thanksgiving leftovers 

Sleeping in the car after a long day of exploring.

Tommy's 4th Birthday

We celebrated Tommy's 4th birthday on Saturday. The festivities started Friday afternoon when Mark took Tommy to the store to pick out his Happy Birthday Cereal, which was Lucky Charms. I hear that he originally picked up a box of generic brand shredded wheat squares, and Mark had to steer him over to the sugary section of cereals. We realized that it's so true that cereal box design is aimed 100% at children, because Tommy chose the brightest, most colorful box available, without even knowing what kind of cereal he was getting. So, he got to partake of his Sugar Bombs Lucky Charms on Saturday morning. (Not surprisingly, he was starving about an hour after breakfast, despite eating two bowls of cereal). 

He got to open his present after breakfast...a refurbished Power Wheels Jeep!

Taking brother out for a test drive. The Jeep goes a little slower than I imagined. We're currently figuring out how to modify it a bit. He drove it around for about an hour and went all over our property. We were very impressed with how well he drives. He actually figured out how to make a 3-point turn all by himself!

After he drove the Jeep around, Tommy and I went to the bookstore to pick out his birthday book (a Richard Scarry book) and to the coffee shop to get a hot chocolate. Then we all went to a birthday party for one of Tommy's friends who, amazingly, has the exact same birthday. After a sugar high, succeeding crash, and a nap, we celebrated our birthday boy with his grandparents, aunt & uncle and cousins with pizza and some seriously blue cupcakes.

Blue! Cupcakes

All festivities, talk of being a "big boy", and presents for Tommy left Benji wondering when his birthday was going to be. Just three more months, little man!

Stay & Play

It's been a few weeks since my last post. Last week was crazy busy. Our weeks are normally pretty lively (at least compared to what we're used to), but last week was busy times two. It left me little time to contemplate life long enough to write about it or take pictures of it, only enough time to recover from one activity in time to prepare for the next. And so, I was forced, thankfully, to revisit the idea of Stay & Play Days. I got the idea over a year ago from my friend Jodi, who started this tradition with her family.

The basic idea of Stay & Play is pretty simple: we stay home and play. For me, it is a day that is completely unscheduled, laid back, and mostly child-led. I may have some chores to do, but it's usually something like laundry or dishes that is hands-on for just a few minutes, and then I can walk away.

YouTube crash test videos...who needs PBS Kids when you've got YouTube?

For example, last week on Thursday morning, Tommy woke up at 6:30am (way earlier than usual for him). No problem. I got him up, and we watched crash test videos on YouTube for the better part of an hour. Then we made breakfast together. By the time Ben wandered into the kitchen around 8:30am, Tommy and I had spent some great quality time together. And then we ate pancakes for breakfast. After breakfast we flew paper airplanes back and forth to each other for about thirty minutes. Why? Because I didn't have anything else to do! 

Thursday morning has become an oasis where I know that I don't have to prepare for anything, get dressed for anything, cook for anything, or clean for anything. I just hang out with my kids do things that they like to do. I look forward to Thursday all through the week. So when my little guy looks at me with his big blue eyes and says, "Mommy, can you fly airplanes with me?" I can say "Sure, buddy!" with a clear conscience and not have to put a time limit on our fun. 

Enjoying a puddle on our morning walk

Flying the Lego car we built together this morning

Quietly contemplating his new Lego car

Building a Duplo fortress

First S'mores!

This weekend the boys had their first s'mores experience. It was a lot of fun for them to help Mark build a fire and watch it grow bigger and brighter as the sky grew darker. They got to roast their own marshmallows, though they only had the patience to hold their poles for about 30 seconds before deciding they were too tired for such a job and handed them over to us. We let them stay up late so they could get the full effect of the fire, and also so they could watch the stars. Just one more thing we can cross off our summer bucket list.

Watching Mark start the fire.

As Mark stoked the fire, sparks flew up, which the boys thought were really cool.

Concentrating hard on eating their s'mores and watching the fire.

How We Spent Our 4th

Eating popcorn and waiting for the parade to begin. Ben was a social butterfly and kept visiting all the people who sat around us on the curb.

The boys loved seeing the old car show that preceded the parade.

Fire trucks parade! 

Some dancing at home after naps.

And some wrestling on the floor. These boys so often remind me of puppies.

Sitting in the back of our truck waiting for the fireworks to begin. For some reason, popcorn was a very big part of the day.

We had a fun fourth enjoying some of the traditions we started last year with the boys. They loved seeing the fireworks, and Tommy kept calling them "rockets that go to space". Amazingly, they actually stayed awake for the whole show and didn't fall into bed until 10:30pm! 

Benji's Day Out

You may remember from Tommy's birthday a few months ago that we started a new birthday tradition with the boys that includes choosing meals for the day and going out on a mommy date to get a treat and a new book.  Normally this would be done on the child's actual birthday, but with Ben this year we had to do it a day after his birthday because of Mark's work schedule.  

So, on Monday night, we all went out to Target together to pick out that special Happy Birthday Cereal, which turned out to be Cocoa Puffs (one of my favorites!)  We ate it for breakfast Tuesday morning and after breakfast we gave Benji his birthday present, a set of tools that look just like Daddy's.  Both boys were completely enamored with the toolset and it kept them busy for quite awhile.  


After toolset playtime, it was time to go to Barnes & Noble to choose a birthday book.  After consideration, I decided to narrow the selection down for Ben so that he had four good books to choose from, because if it were up to him, he would have chosen a cacophonous Thomas the Train Engine "book".  He selected a mommy-approved classic Curious George book.  After the book was chosen and I picked up some books for big brother, we headed to the Starbucks inside the bookstore and got our treats: a mocha for me, chocolate milk for Ben, and a peanut butter cookie to split between us.  

The rest of the day was pretty normal.  We went home for a lunch of hot dogs, french fries and on the more healthful side, blueberries and carrots. Luckily, I didn't set the oven on fire this time!  After naps it was time for dinner, which was spaghetti, meatballs, and homemade bread.  Benji seemed to enjoy all his yummy food and I think he enjoyed his few hours of having mommy to himself.

More Wrestling

Weekend Review

In an effort to slow down as we near the Christmas Day, we decided to stay home all weekend and do as close to nothing as we possibly could.  I think we were pretty successful.  





On Saturday we woke up late (and when I say we, I mean Mark and the boys, since as a mom I am biologically unable to sleep past 6:15am) and had a big breakfast complete with pancakes, eggs, hash browns, and fruit.  Then we went on a family walk to the high school down the street so the boys could ride their bikes over the speed bumps in the parking lot, which is one of the great joys in their lives.  Then we returned home, put a fire in the fireplace, and read books on the couch for awhile.  Actually, we just read Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel three times. After this, we built and decorated a gingerbread train.  It was sticky, sugary good fun.  Afterwards, I put the finished train on top of the stove and told the boys not to touch it (yes, our children still need to be told not to touch things on top of the stove).  As I walked away I heard Tommy telling Ben in a very serious tone "We can't touch.  I'm letting it dry.  It needs pribacy."  

After the boys went down for a nap, I made sugar cookies from scratch broke apart pre-made, pre-cut "Christmas Shape" sugar cookies and baked them, so the boys and I could decorate them later in the day.  Sugar cookies are Mark's favorite and I had planned to make them from scratch, like I do every year at this time, but Christmas week snuck up out of nowhere and I decided my time would be more wisely spent outside of the kitchen, rather than spending half a day rolling, cutting, freezing, and re-rolling cookies.  After the cookies were done baking, I did something unprecedented and watched a movie during naptime by myself.  

After nap time we went to the playground, then came home and watched a tractor plow the field across the street for about fifteen minutes.  It was in that moment of watching my boys so intently watch the tractor do its work that I glad we had no plans and nowhere to rush off to.  When it was too dark to watch the tractor anymore, we went inside and decorated cookies while Mark made us a yummy dinner of Trader Joe's orange chicken and rice.  


On Sunday we went to church and had lunch with friends afterwards.  Then we returned home and put the boys down for a late (and long) nap, and I made myself a nest of blankets on the couch and dug into a new book I was given at church as an unexpected  Christmas present called The Thought of God.  After naps and dinner, we drove around town to look at Christmas lights.  Tommy told us "I love a lot, a lot, a lot of Christmas lights!" In all, it was a very relaxing, enjoyable and mellow weekend.

There are two drainage vents in the field at Nordstrom Park.  The boys realized that they could yell to each other through the vents, like the "phone" funnels at the playground.