Living in Munchkinland

We had an awesome time this weekend at the Austin Food and Wine Festival. They really addressed a lot of the problems we had last year and this year was fantastic. The weather was cloudy and humid, but not too warm on Saturday and the rain held off till the evening. Sunday was a warm, sunny day, but not nearly as hot as last year. I enjoyed it. We drove up Friday evening with mom and dad and checked into the Hyatt on Lady Bird Lake. We had happy hour in the room and then we drove to Uchiko for dinner. We all did the omakase ten course tasting menu and it was mind blowingly good. It was the best food we ate all weekend. I loved the raw diver scallop on apple, the vinegar soaked, charred peppers in sriracha dipping sauce, the shredded, fried brussel sprouts, the sashimi with roasted tomato and basil and the roasted eggplant sushi. All of it, totally and completely delicious. That may have been the best meal of my life. Saturday we had a light breakfast and then met mom and...

My mom showed me this page in a book she had today. I had read it before, but I was so glad to read it again. On Children Kahlil Gibran Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday. You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far. Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness; For even as He loves the...

A recipe! It's been a while since I've put a recipe on the blog, but this one keeps coming up in our weekly dinners and it is so good and cheap and easy, I had to share it. It doesn't really call for 40 cloves of garlic, just ten smashed ones. The recipe is from my favorite cookbook, Appetite for Reduction . This is a great cookbook. I use it every single week. The pages are well worn and food splattered. Every recipe I have made out of the book has been a winner. The salads are the best and the dressings make them. I never buy salad dressings anymore because these are so delicious and healthy. But you do not get a salad recipe today. Nope, instead you get a quick, dish meal that makes my whole family go back for seconds. They were extremely disappointed that I didn't triple recipe last night when I made it. I love this recipe because I can put it together in five minutes and the clean up is minimal. Here is the recipe. It says it serves four, but these mu...

The boys are really growing up. The last week has been full of changes as we shift our family dynamic around our growing boys. There has been a silver lining to my injuries. (two actually, but one shouldn't count lots of hydrocodone as a blessing in public). The silver lining has been finding out how much the boys have grown and how much more responsibility they are happy to handle. It turns out I've been babying them quite a bit. I have learned that they can easily go in the bathroom, brush their teeth, turn on the shower, get in and clean themselves, get out, dry themselves, and put on jammies. I used to go in and help and supervise and do and they didn't need me to. They take pride in doing it themselves. ( I should know this. This is the montessori way.) They have also started to wash their own dishes after a meal and put them in the dishwasher, water the plants, take out the garbage, put away their clothes from the top of the dryer after I fold them and k...

Michael ran his second Tough Mudder race yesterday. What is a tough mudder you ask? Here is what the website had to say, "Tough Mudder events are hardcore 10-12 mile obstacle courses designed by British Special Forces to test your all around strength, stamina, mental grit, and camaraderie. With the most innovative courses, 700,000 inspiring participants worldwide to date, and more than $5 million raised for the Wounded Warrior Project, Tough Mudder is the premier adventure challenge series in the world." Basically, Michael ran a 12.5 mile obstacle course up and down a huge hill including, electricity obstacles, ice water, fire, mud moguls, floating platforms, carrying your partner, inclined monkey bars and half pipes. He rocked it. He ran the whole thing in 2.5 hours and that includes waiting in line at the obstacles. Michael ran the race with his friend Phillip and Michael says he was a great person to run with. We started the morning with a hearty breakfast of toas...

Things are much better around here. We had a quiet weekend. We were supposed to go camping at Enchanted Rock with the cub scouts, and I had been looking forward to it all year, but with my back and wrist pain, I couldn't go. Michael had spent the whole week in a stressful situation in Lubbock and we all decided, as he frantically packed on Friday night, that we would benefit as a family if we all stayed home and took care of each other. I did a lot of lying around. Michael's parents drove up from their new home in New Braunfels and had lunch with us at the food trailers. I took my cushion and it was a gorgeous day. It was my big outing of the weekend. We are thrilled that they are here and are already enjoying their proximity. While at lunch, they told us they would like to take us on a Disney Cruise to Alaska next summer. You can bet we said yes! Don't I have the most wonderful, generous in-laws ever? We are going with my sister and brother in law and their boy...

It still hurts. I keep thinking I'm going to wake up and feel so much better and it doesn't happen and I am so frustrated. My pain pills really help, but I can't take them during the day because I'm single parenting and driving the kids. I can't use my right hand for anything and every thing is such an obstacle with only on hand and takes forever to do. I don't want to ask for help for fear I might be judged as, "milking it for all it's worth," and also because deep down I just plain feel like I should be able to rise above it and quit whimpering and just get it done by myself. It's just really frustrating! To be honest, I am improved. I can walk without shooting pain and I can press lightly with my fingertips now without pain when I couldn't before. But there is not a single comfortable way to sit down and my fingers are huge sausages sticking out of the top of my wrist brace. I'm exhausted. Driving hurts. Michael is out of t...

Davis requested a space unicorn themed roller rink party this year. I found a space unicorn graphic and put it on stickers and thank you cards and the evite. We bought rainbow snacks and marshmallow shooters which Davis assembled and mini bags of rainbow marshmallows. (On a side note: Davis assembled these over a week ago and each time he passed the box he gave a satisfied sigh. Then a few days ago he told me that he loved getting hard things done right away so that then he could just relax and have fun and not have to worry about doing them later. It was a huge proud parenting moment for me.) We bought rainbow napkins and plates and glow sticks. Davis wanted neither cupcakes nor cake. He wanted kolaches from Dos Gatos here in town. They made him a rainbow assortment of fruit flavors. Michael made an MP3 of the song space unicorn and had the roller rink play during the party. (Stop right here and go watch this video , then come back.) Davis wore his roller blades and loved ...

Yesterday we had Davis' 8th birthday party at a roller rink. I'll do a separate post for him with all his pictures. I had a marvelous time skating and zooming around, but at the end of the party I stepped onto the carpet and my feel slipped up and away from me and I fell down hard, directly on my tail bone. It hurt at a level ten, ya'll. My legs went numb and I could feel the reverberations through my whole body. And then pain. But I rallied enough to get Davis' presents open. The car ride home was intense, and I took two left over vicodens from my surgery last year as soon as I got home. They didn't help and I couldn't find a comfortable position. Michael dropped me off at the hospital and I waited and waited. They took tons of xrays on both my back and right wrist which had swollen and was very painful. It turns out that I fractured my coccyx bone and sprained my wrist. They gave me a norco prescription and sent me home. It hurts lots. The most ...

On Saturday we went to a vegetarian/vegan food festival in Austin with my parents and Kade. The weather was perfect and the food was awesome! It was so fun to be able to eat anything I wanted. The kids had cupcakes and ice cream for lunch and Michael and I shared vegan nachos. We sampled and sampled and I picked up some great swag and a few hard to find items like coconut bacon. The kids enjoyed the kids area too. We'll definitely try to go next year too.

We had a lovely easter weekend. On Friday the boys and I drove up to Whole Foods. We ate lunch at the vegan counter and then after our shopping, we ended in the bakery where Davis picked out a carrot cake for his birthday. That evening we had family movie night and watched Rise of the Guardians. It was a perfect movie for Easter and the kids loved it. Davis didn't run from the room once. Saturday was a day with no agenda. Davis woke up with a swollen eyelid so I rushed him off the to the doctor. They think he has cellulitis of the eye and prescribed both oral antibiotics and eye drops. We got all that sorted and then came home and cleaned the house and practiced piano. With all our chores done for the day we were free! We went out to lunch at Tres Hermanas where I had the most delicious vegan enchiladas. The red diablo sauce was amazing and the whole lunch fantastic. New favorite mexican place in town! After lunch we stopped to get Michael's hair cut and then went...