One Year Ago: Leaving the Party Early

One year ago, we were trying to celebrate a normal Halloween. Lily was almost four months and we were settling into our new reality. We tried to do all of our traditions and act as though nothing was different, but a lot was different, and it was hard not to feel it.

We went to a Halloween party and tried to have a good time. Hunter was running around screaming and having meltdowns. He could not calm down or play with the other kids and Lily was still so small it was like bringing a newborn out and about town.

We left that party early. We were exhausted from trying. From trying to have a good time, from trying to act normal. It was just exhausting.

I remember leaving the party thinking that we were the only family that couldn't go to a party and be like all of the other families there. We only had three kids with us, but it felt like we had six kids to manage. As we drove away, (we were the first ones to leave) I remember thinking that we would never be like the other "normal" families out there. This party was symbolic of all of my fears. This party was the proof to me that we would never be able to do the things that we want to do and we would always be that family leaving the party early.

This year was a totally different experience. We did all of our traditions and went to our parties and things felt normal, we all had fun, and this year we were not the first to leave!

Recipe 34: Yummy Mummy Pizza Faces

Ingredients

• English muffins
• Pizza sauce
• Black olives

• Scallions
• Red or green pepper
• Cheese sticks or slices

Instructions

1. Heat the oven to 350º F. For each mummy, spread a tablespoon of pizza sauce onto half of an English muffin (toast it first, if you like).

2. Set olive slices in place for eyes and add round slices of green onion or bits of red or green pepper for pupils.

3. Lay strips of cheese (we used a pulled-apart cheese stick) across the muffin for the mummy?s wrappings.

4. Bake for about 10 minutes or until the cheese is melted and the muffin is toasty.

I found this recipe in the magazine "Family Fun". It looked so cute I had it to try it out for the kids. They loved it and loved that it looked like real mummy faces. This recipe is so easy and as far as pizza goes, I think it is pretty healthy too. I didn't have a lot of these ingredients so we used refrigerator biscuits and spaghetti sauce. Also I left out the peppers and onions. You can definitely substitute a lot of these ingredients for whatever you have around, which I think makes this recipe inexpensive as well.

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Recipe 33: Open Faced Chicken Sandwiches

Ingredients:

1 loaf of french bread

Pesto

Cooked chicken breasts

Tomatoes

Mozzarella

Basil leaves cut into medium pieces

Directions:

Slice bread and spread pesto on each slice. Next, add slices of cooked chicken breast, slices of tomato, and basil in that order. Broil under high heat until cheese is melted and bread it completely toasted.

This recipe comes from my mom and so I had to write it from memory. But it is a very easy recipe and can be changed and tweaked to your preference. We have added avocado, bacon, different kinds of pesto and lots of other different ingredients. This open faced sandwich is delicious and always a crowd pleaser, plus it is healthy and fresh. Although I have eaten this sandwich many times, I have not actually attempted making it myself. So I decided to make it on my own and see how it would turn out. I love this recipe because it is pretty hard to mess up and you can add or omit whatever you please.

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Weekend Getaway

Last weekend we all decided to take a little road trip to visit some family and celebrate my nephew's first birthday. The kids loved playing with cousins, staying at a hotel, going to a corn maze, and dressing up for a halloween-birthday-extravaganza! It was a wonderful little getaway and I love whisking the kids off for a special weekend.

Redneck Shindig

Our friends had a really fun redneck themed bash, so the kids and I dressed up (more like farmers and less like rednecks) and had ourselves a hoedown. There were tractor rides, log throwing games, chicken chasing, and lots more. It was a really fun night and its always fun to hang out with great friends.

Apple Picking

We celebrated the wonderful fall season by going to the apple orchard. This apple orchard has over 150 different varieties to choose from, and the kids loved running from tree to tree seeing all of the different names and descriptions for each one.

After we picked and weighed our apples, we brought them home and made some very delicious treats.

Cupcake Party

The kids have been earning cupcakes over the last few weeks for "sweet" behaviors. Whenever they did something that showed good manners, or kindness, they got to put a cupcake magnet on the cupcake stand. After they got all of the cupcakes on the cake stand we got to have an actual cupcake party. They were very excited that their hard work paid off and we had a wonderful afternoon of baking... and eating!

Our own "naked chef".

My cute little chefs!

Recipe 32: Caramel Apples

Ingredients:

1 Recipe for Caramel

Melted White Chocolate

Crushed Candy and Nuts

(Butterfinger, walnuts, M&M's)

Make the recipe for caramel below, heating it to a soft ball stage. Dip apples into caramel and let cool. Dip or drizzle apples into white chocolate and decorate with assorted candy and nuts.

This recipe tastes so much better with homemade carmel and I will never use store bought caramels again. This recipe is also easy to make and a kid pleaser! Unless you can count this as a fruit, the recipe is not all that healthy, but it is a great way to celebrate the season.

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Recipe 31: Homemade Caramel

Caramels:

1 1/2 cups (360 ml) heavy whipping cream (has a 36-40% butterfat content)

1 cup (200 grams) granulated white sugar

1 cup (210 grams) packed light brown sugar

2 teaspoons kosher salt

2 teaspoons purevanillaextract

Caramels:Butter an 8 x 8 inch (20 x 20 cm)bakingpan.

In a heavy medium sized saucepan, stir together the cream, sugars, and salt. Place the saucepan over medium high heat and bring to a boil, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon. Once the mixture boils, with a heatproof pastry brush that has been dipped in warm water, wash down the sides of the saucepan to remove any sugar crystals that may have formed. Clamp a candy thermometer to the side of the saucepan. Boil the mixture over medium high heat (do not stir) until the temperature reaches 245degreesF (118 degrees C). (If sugar crystals form on the sides of the pan, wash them down with a heatproof pastry brush that has been dipped in warm water.)

Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla extract. Pour the caramel into your prepared pan and let cool, undisturbed, for at least eight hours, or overnight.

With a sharp knife, (oiled with a tastelessvegetableoil, like safflower), and with a sawing motion, cut into squares or rectangles. These caramels can be stored at room temperature, between layers of wax paper, for several days. Caramels make a nice gift, especially when wrapped in wax paper or cellophane.

Makes about 48 pieces. Preparation time40 minutes.

This is a great caramel recipe and I used it to make a lot of other yummy recipes too (coming soon). It tastes so much better than store bought caramels and it makes any other recipes taste that much better too. It is not healthy but it is not too expensive and it really is easy to make.

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Recipe 30: Pumpkin Soup

Ingredients

• SOUP
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 1/2 tablespoons chopped fresh ginger
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 4 large garlic cloves, chopped
• 2 teaspoons ground coriander
• 4 1/2 cups peeled, 1-in. chunks pumpkin or other orange-fleshed squash (from a 2 1/2-lb. squash)
• 4 1/2 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth
• 3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• PESTO
• 1 small garlic clove
• 1/3 cup fresh mint leaves, plus slivered leaves
• 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 1/4 cup salted roasted pumpkin seeds

Preparation

• 1. Make soup: Sauté onion and ginger in oil in a medium pot over medium-high heat until golden, 5 minutes. Add garlic and coriander and cook until softened, 1 minute, then add pumpkin, broth, salt, and pepper. Simmer, covered, until pumpkin is very tender, 8 to 10 minutes. Purée in batches in a blender until very smooth.
• 2. Make pesto: Pound garlic, whole mint leaves, salt, and 1 tbsp. oil in a mortar into a coarse paste (or use a food processor). Add remaining oil and pumpkin seeds and pound until coarsely crushed.
• 3. Drop small spoonfuls of pesto over bowls of soup, garnish with slivered mint, and serve remaining pesto on the side.

This soup is very yummy and healthy, although it does taste like a "health food" so be warned now! I think it was also easy to make, but you do have to have fresh pumpkin on hand and you have to be willing to scrape out the pumpkin (I did this a couple of days before I made the soup). It also calls for ingredients that I don't keep on hand, so it was more expensive then other recipes that I am used to making.

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Goodbye Tooth

Ella is growing up. She lost her first tooth and she was ecstatic. Her two bottom teeth have been loose for a while, but then one morning as she was brushing her teeth, it just fell right out. We must have made at least ten phone calls that morning, because she just had to tell everyone her big news.

It was fun to see her so excited over this milestone, but I have to admit, I was a little sad. It was a reminder that she is growing up so fast and that she won't be my little girl forever.

Although my sweet little daughter did mention that she was going to be very sad to give her tooth to the Tooth Fairy, because she was going to miss it, and she was worried that her tooth might miss her as well. Only Ella could be concerned about the welfare of her lost tooth!

She may be growing up, but she has not lost her sweetness.

Piggy Tails

Lily finally has hair that is long enough to put into tiny little pig-tails. I love doing her hair all girly and cute and it totally changes the way she looks.

Enjoy some cuteness:

One Year Ago: More Bad News and Some Good News

One year ago we were headed back to the hospital for the last time. This visit was to see what was going on with Lily's heart and organs. Kids with CdC can have problems as part of their disorder and so the doctor recommended a full work up. We spent most of the day in different hospital rooms watching Lily hooked up to lots of different machines waiting for a doctor to explain what the results to all of these different tests meant.

We found out that Lily did have a heart defect and that there was not much we could do but wait and watch. It was frustrating, not fully understanding what was going on with her health, but we did feel a sense of calm and peace about it. Some how this news did not cause me worry and so we moved on to the next set of tests.

We finally got some good news towards the end of the very long day, and we found out that Lily did not have any organ defects, it was nice to finally hear some good news. This hospital visit had not been nearly as emotional as the last visits had been, and it felt like a relief to know everything, to be out of the in between.

It had been a long few months and this was the end. The end of doctors, the end of tests, and the end of waiting.

Of course with every ending there is a beginning, and we were about to begin a new journey...