Friday, July 30, 2010

Pork: It's What's for Dinner!

All day my house has had the aroma of roasting pork. Not just any pork, mind you, but this recipe for spicy pork. This is one of my favorite dishes; I just eat and eat come dinner time! The tortillas, limes, cilantro, and sour cream are just waiting in the 'fridge to be welcome additions for dinner.

I have to say that our local meat market provided the perfect pork shoulder roast; previously I have bought the roast from the grocery store. I am particularly excited about the nice layer of fat (healthy much?) on one side that will crisp up in the last 20 minutes of roasting when I turn up the heat.

Go forth and make this for yourself!

In other news, the week has flown by. The kids and I explored a local used book store. I needed a Dicken's novel in cheap, paperback form for an upcoming book discussion. We came away with a bag full of treasures. I've always thought that I'd like to read the Harry Potter series but have never taken the time to do so. I came away with the first book from the store!

The kids enjoyed blowing bubbles on the front porch step today. Small Fry is still mastering the art of blowing into his bubble wand. He had some pretty hilarious attempts today; one he actually spit through the hole!

I hope you all have a sweet weekend in your parts of the world!

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Normal, Busy Day

A random list:

1. One of the items on my spring cleaning list was to clean my oven. Well, today it is officially scrubbed. I feel like my target heart rate was reached in doing that job.

2. Pandora radio is awesome. Today the kids and I are working to the tunes from my Johnny Cash station.

3. We used the first cucumbers from our garden (and my parents' garden) to make a huge jar of refrigerator pickles. They are yummy! Big Fish actually sliced all the cucumbers for me. The pickles taste even better because of that.

4. Why do my kids' fingernails and toenails grow so fast?

5. Every time Small Fry gets hurt he runs to the freezer and waits for me to put an ice cube in a baggie for him to carry around.

6. Baby vegetables are fascinating! The kids LOVE to do a daily garden check to look at the green tomatoes and tiny watermelons.

7. Brookie told me that the new little baby growing in by belly is a little sister named Molly.

8. I just can't believe how blessed we are; Big Fish's mother is moving in right next door. She'll be around when the new baby comes and everything. Actually she's moving up from FL in a few weeks. Wow!

9. So far we've had zucchini casserole, zucchini cake, and grilled zucchini. We love it.

10. Leftover chicken from last night is about to be made into cheesy biscuits and veggies for dinner!

Have a productive day!

Monday, July 12, 2010

Home Again, Home Again

Hello, Monday morning! Wow do we have a lot to do to catch up! Hopefully, the laundry piles will diminish today as well as the weeds growing in the garden.

The kids and I must make the grocery run to pick up the week's supplies and then come home and continue with the catching up. I need to bake something; we seem to have apples and bananas that need to be used.

We were excited to see lots of baby cucumbers and yellow squash in the garden and baby green tomatoes too! We're a little disappointed in the state of our zucchini; we found two babies. That seems to be a little low for zucchini!

Our last few days of vacation were a whirlwind: we toured the zoo and the aquarium, visited the monuments, returned to Chinatown for more yumminess, watched a movie, swam in the pool, etc. Some great food included: sushi, coconut milk soup, soft shelled crab, Lebanese sandwiches, strawberry/dark chocolate crepe, apple/cinnamon crepe, our weight in fresh berries from the hotel's breakfast buffet as well as a mushroom strata, etc. Hmmm....now I have to figure out something to make for dinner!

Well, here's to starting the week with a bang!

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Day One of Vacation is Through!

Interesting night in the hotel with two kids in my bed - check
Museum of Natural History - check
Air and Space Museum - check
Near death experience on the metro rail - check
Chinatown - check
Evening swim at the hotel - check

What a fun and busy day! I'm sure glad that I'm only 15 or 16 weeks pregnant and not much more, for we've walked so much today.

The near death experience was due to the fact that we took our strollers on the escalator (the elevator was broken). I somehow got stuck at the bottom with Small Fry in his stroller. I had visions in those seconds of us being crushed - or at least my feet being amputated. Fortunately, I used my adrenaline rush to get us over that final step. We started going down the escalator facing forward; I excited with the stroller going backward!

We had an amazing dinner in Chinatown consisting of steamed dumpling, homemade noodles (the guy was making them in a window off the street), and Peking duck. Big Fish bemoaned the fact that our hotel fridge is miniscule; we would have done some damage to takeout food!

Tomorrow is living creature day - hoping to hit the zoo and the National Aquarium!

Here's to rests in the shade!

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Vacation State of Mind

Last week the kids and I traveled to VA. We wanted to visit our friends/church family, as it has been almost a year since we moved away. How wonderful it was to meet new babies, see new houses, and catch up with our buddies!

My children were wonderful on the trip! The only thing I'm changing in preparation for this week's journey is buying a sun visor for the back seat windows. Small Fry in particular cries when the sun is in his eyes. I also bought them some travel size etch-a-sketch boards, so those hopefully will be entertaining.

This week we are headed to DC for a tiny family vacation. I looked over last night at an email Big Fish was writing to himself. I assumed it was a little itinerary, so I immediately exclaimed at the amount of time he had us spending at the Air and Space Museum. He patiently explained that he was only writing the daily hours of a few points of interest. Silly me!

I have never, ever been to DC; so I am excited to do a little exploring. One of the most exciting things for Big Fish and I will be the different foods we will consume! We are making a list of top-rated ethnic restaurants to try, for out here in the country we only have the occasional pizza night! I have to admit that my mouth is watering already (I'm also very late in eating lunch today!).

Here's to family vacations!