It's growing!

I'm such a dork. I get so excited when the garden starts to show signs of life. I've grown plenty of gardens before, but I still think it's some sort of miracle when the things I plant actually start sprouting out of the ground. I check on it every day, and whenever I see something new come up, I run to tell Nate, "We have beans!" He humors me, and pretends to be excited too. (Sort of.)

Ready to go

It was a HOT day and we decided to go out for ice cream after dinner. We told Walter to get ready to go:

If that's not ready, I don't know what is...

Road trip and 90 minute shirt

We just got home from a short road trip to the Twin Cities. We were only gone three days, but we did a lot! Two zoos, an aquarium and the children's museum. Nate took nap duty one afternoon so I could spend a couple of hours alone in the Mall of America. It's such a luxury to shop by myself these days. We also saw the Brewers play the Twins – and lose. It wasn't pretty. But it was fun! And Walter got to wear his new 90 minute Brewer shirt. I'm getting so much use out of the 90 minute shirt tutorial. This time, I used a (free!) XL Brewer t-shirt: 

And turned it into a tiny tee for our little Brewer fan:

Sadly, no matter how many times he yells, "Go Brewers!" they just can't seem to win. But we'll keep cheering...

Field trip

The boys from the bachelor pad have packed up some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and are going on a field trip. I hope they brought sunscreen – the Emperor is awfully fair-skinned...

Busy, busy, busy

Here it is, the middle of May, and our summer is pretty much booked. Baseball games, graduations, road trips and a certain little boy's birthday party – yikes! Our weekends are full. It's all a little overwhelming when I look at the calendar, but I think everything we have planned will be fun and I'm actually looking forward to all that time spent traveling in the car – the few hours here and there when I can knit or read.
Walter has always been very good in the car, but with all these road trips in our future, I wanted him to have something new to keep him entertained (so I can do all that knitting and reading). I made him a busy book, packed full of fun toddler activities.

Things to buckle, tie and button. (He'll need help with these things.) A "wallet" holding cards and keys.

Baseballs to slide from base to base. Number flaps, hiding buttons to count.

A traffic light with velcro lights to rearrange. A street with trucks to slide back and forth. A dump truck full of shapes.

A pocket full of animal pictures to flip through.

This was a really fun project for me. It certainly kept me busy! I worked on it a little bit here and a little bit there, making a page whenever I got a new idea. (I found tons of good ideas here and here.) I sure hope Walter likes it. I'm crossing my fingers for happy, fuss-free car rides all summer long...

At the ballgame

The Lee's invited us to join them in the Gehl Club at Miller Park for today's Brewer game. We had a great time, ate great food and stayed until the 6th inning! (Way better than the two innings we saw few weeks ago. Hardly worth the trip...) Walter was in good spirits, despite not having a nap. Here are some photos from our afternoon:



Click on any photo to see a few more on Flickr!

Smile!

Shannon – my co-worker, friend, master of Photoshop, and queen of the smiley-food-face – suggested to me that this:

could have been this:

More fun with food. I love it! Here's another one of Shannon's creations:

Who wouldn't want to eat that? The smiley-food-face will be making appearances at our table in the future.

Breakfast for dinner

One of our favorite ways to eat breakfast is to have it for dinner. We found an awesome recipe for some really good (and good for you) waffles. 

Yogurt Waffles from Everyday Food magazine:
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole-wheat flour
1/2 cup rolled oats (not quick cooking)
3/4 teaspoon coarse salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 cup packed light-brown sugar
3 tablespoons melted unsalted butter
3 large eggs
1 1/2 cups plain, low-fat yogurt

1. In a large bowl, whisk together flours, oats, salt, baking powder, and baking soda. In another bowl, whisk together brown sugar, butter, eggs, and yogurt until smooth. Stir egg mixture into flour mixture and mix well to combine. Let batter sit 15 minutes.

2. Heat waffle iron. Pour batter and cook until brown and crisp.

We like ours with strawberries and whipped cream. Walter really likes the whipped cream. I once caught him shoveling it into his mouth using a strip of bacon as his spoon. That's my boy!

A waffle tip: Make a big batch and freeze the leftovers. Then pop them in the toaster for a quick breakfast.

Kitchen play

I was getting some video of Walter playing in his kitchen when he decided to play IN his kitchen...

Good eats

I just got around to trying out another recipe that was passed along to me after my recipe request a few weeks ago – Caesar Chicken-Pasta Salad, from Cooking Light. It's a great way to spruce up a Caesar salad. And it was a great way for us to use up a leftover chicken breast from last night and the extra lettuce from taco night. I love the kind of meal that helps clean out the fridge a little. We all enjoyed it – even Walter cleaned his plate. It took him a while to decide he was hungry, but once he did, he gobbled it right down. 

Thanks for the recipe, Linda!

Hot Dog! Hot Doug's!

Gramma and Grampa brought Walter a souvenir t-shirt from a visit to Hot Doug's in Chicago. It makes me giggle. Nate has a matching one – perfect for these hot dog-lovin' boys.

"Aliyah, cake!"

Walter's friend Aliyah turned 3 yesterday. For the past week, her birthday party was all Walter could talk about. "Aliyah, cake!" Oh yeah. He gets it. Birthday party = cake. We spent all week counting down to Aliyah's Cake Day. He even shed a few tears that it wasn't coming soon enough — that we didn't have cake TODAY. Finally, the day arrived. We went to the party, played in the bouncy castle and played games. It was cake time. And, wouldn't you know it? That little stinker had one bite of cake and declared himself, "All done!" 


The adorable birthday girl:

Sharing a birthday cookie (ok, maybe he was just too full for cake):