Good News for Carver

Carver is such a crack-up. He put his sippy cup in Ellie's new kitty rainboots and drank out of it in disguise. I am so glad I caught the perfect picture of how crazy it looked! He thought he was SO tricky!

Man, I love this boy. Today I took him to a developmental evaluation and I'm just so full of gratitude. He is slightly delayed in every area, except speech. There he's much more delayed, enough to qualify for the South King county early Intervention Program (SKIP for short). We'll have speech therapy in our home soon and then start working towards transitioning to therapy through the school district (after 3 years old). It might seem like bad news, but it FEELS like such good news to me. We were hoping to do this in October, but he was evaluated just short of his 2nd birthday (which made a difference in the results) and it was not a time we could have financed speech therapy anyway. I just feel the Lord's hand in our lives, as things have fallen into place - even our health insurance (which in many other ways isn't as good as our last plan) covers speech therapy so much better. I have hope that we're heading in the right direction with him, that I might learn how to help him and how to understand all that is my sweet little "crumb-cake." (You really need to read SkippyJon Jones to appreciate that one.)

Carver just learned to kiss and makes the sweetest little smacking sound as he leans in. I love seeing him spontaneously kissing people he loves. Little ones on Grace's head out of the blue, on Daddy's leg during scriptures, bedtime kisses for his big sisters and even one for his little buddy McKay today! :) He's such a sweet boy and today I'm more excited than ever to see what his future holds.

yummy new recipes

Okay, this first one is from The Pioneer Woman's blog, which you really must check out! It's full of really wonderful recipes and I have to warn you that you might lose an hour browsing, especially since each step in a recipe is documented with awesome pictures and clever narratives. I made these "muffins" for breakfast Sunday and they were DELICIOUS! Nevermind they are practically donuts. But that's the beauty of them - every bit as good as a donut with not quite as much fat. :)

French Breakfast Puffs
3 cups flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 cup sugar
2/3 cup shortening (Crisco)
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 teaspoons cinnamon
2 sticks butter

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease 12 muffin cups. Stir together flour, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg. Set aside. Pray. In a different bowl, cream together 1 cup sugar and shortening, then add eggs and mix. Add flour mixture and milk alternately to creamed mixture, beating well after each addition. Fill prepared muffin cups 2/3 full. Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes or until golden. In a bowl, melt 2 sticks butter. In a separate bowl combine remaining sugar and cinnamon. Dip baked muffins in butter, coating thoroughly, then coat with cinnamon-sugar mixture. Eat. Faint.

This Coconut Chicken recipe is from a friend, Sarah C., which she posted on our Issaquah Recipe blog. It is one of my new favorites! This is really, really easy and so wonderful. Okay, the rest of my family didn't swoon like I did, but I think I'll make it sometime for myself for lunch and have happy leftovers for the rest of the week, too. Sure beats quesadillas and PB with the kids! Again, not at all a low-cal food. But where's the fun in cooking if you cut out all the good stuff?!


Coconut Chicken
2 chicken breasts
1 red onion chopped
2 T. butter (more or less)
1 can of coconut milk (not light!!)
Mild curry powder, salt, garlic powder


Cut chicken in bite size pieces, cook chicken and onions in butter. Pour coconut milk over chicken. Add salt, garlic powder and curry to taste, I probably did 1/8 tsp garlic and curry since I'm not a huge fan of curry. Just a little sprinkling for the hint of flavor. Serve over rice. I made Rachael Ray's sesame green beans to go with it and they were a huge hit, even if I didn't have sesame oil.

Happy cooking! Now back to laundry and wondering what to make for dinner tonight....

Digging

The kids and I had a great trip to Portland during Spring Break last week. We got to visit with Grandma and Grandpa Eucker, Great Grandma Schutz and Great Grandma and Grandpa Bowman, aunts, uncles, even a little cousin they adore. We made sugar cookies, played with Grandma's toys and Carver followed Grandpa everywhere. It was so much fun and SUCH a great break for me. I think I really just need a couple attentive adults around all the time to help out! I got home and the routine was just so depressing! So I'm digging deep for energy to make it through these gloomy spring days that just won't warm up. This time of year makes me nuts, but the summer is going to be worth it, right? All this rain better be good for something!

Saturday, however, was beautiful. We're talking 70s! So it felt super hot to all of us, who have become used to 55 being a nice day. I weeded almost two full flowerbeds and the crazy part is that I kind of liked it. Maybe it's the instant gratification of it - weeds don't grow back as quickly as laundry piles or dishes. And they don't argue or complain while you tend to them. It's wonderful!! I felt nurturing thoughts for the plants I found amidst the weeds and it was so satisfying that I caught myself yesterday trying to pull just a few more before Lydia walked up to the house from the bus. It's true - I might be addicted to weeding. I would be out there right now except it's not as much fun in the rain.

The other highlight of our weekend was building this sandbox in our backyard. We've been wanting to use our extra blocks from the retaining wall and finally had the right day for it. This is only 4 bags of sand in the bottom, but it was all we could haul that day. Today Derek is getting more. The kids LOVED it and it was so wonderful to see them play in summer clothes in the sandbox that Derek and I built together. We had a BBQ, went on a walk and it just felt like summer. Happy times ahead! If I can just make it through another 6 weeks of spring. :)

Truth in Advertising

This is what I saw on Heather Bailey's (very fun and crafty) website and was so inspired, I decided to try them myself. They are fabric "yo-yo's" but, as Derek pointed out, they don't go up and down at all. I guess they are round like yo-yo's and that's where the name comes from. That's the only connection I can come up with. They are really simple to make and I have scads of fabric scraps so small I can't even explain why I've saved them except that "you just never know when you might need a 4 inch square piece of fabric again." This was the perfect project for me! I went to bed dreaming of my fabulous creation, even wondering if I could attach a button (as Heather suggests) and make a darling baby headband and make MILLIONS. Yes, I could sell them on entsy or at craft boutiques and Derek could retire from law and own that bike shop he's always wanted. This was probably my chance at fame and glory. Sweet were those dreams. Because I woke up and made these:
Now, first of all, I lack the professional photo shoot for my fabric yo-yo's, but mine don't look much better in real life. What a disappointment - they remind me of a tacky 80s prom dress. I'm still hopeful that with a little tweaking and some truly fabulous fabric, they might turn out okay. Naturally, that fabulous fabric requires a trip of at least 30 minutes in the car with small children complaining and then wondering (loudly) why I'm taking so long to decide on the 1/4 yard cuts of this so-called fabulous fabric that may or may not turn into dazzling yo-yo's. It might not work out at all and then I'll just have new itty-bitty scraps to be stashed away in a tote, waiting for their moment to be "just what I needed" for that project that I'm obviously still waiting for.