Tied Up

Last week, I outlined how I was planning to make sure we maximized our summer fun.  Over the past few years, I’ve liked to try and work in one outing a week.  Of course, we go to the library and the playground and we meet up with Auntie Awesome to go to the lake for swimming, but I like to try and make sure I’m fitting in at least one “special” outing a week.

This doesn’t have to be expensive!  I know that these little trips and admission fees can add up, but it doesn’t have to be pricey.  Here’s some of our tried, tested and girlie approved summer outings that will make their way into our “places” summer fun jar.

1) Bowling.  I cannot say enough about the Kids Bowl Free program.  NO gimmicks.  Your kids can bowl free.  Two games.  Every single weekday of the summer.  Our local lanes allow free bowling from April 15 to September 3 AND you can buy a shoe rental card that, for a few dollars, will cover the cost of your child’s shoe rental for the entire season.  Kiddos must be 15 and under, but it’s a lot of fun for the prices of shoes and a few snacks at the snack bar

2) The Zoo.  We bought a family membership to the Pittsburgh Zoo and PPG Aquarium last summer.  We’ll be renewing this year.  Thanks to free parking and a pretty strict souvenir policy and the ability to bring in our own drinks and snacks, trips to the zoo are a pretty affordable adventure for our family.  Being zoo members also allows us to visit other zoos for reduced fees as well, so we’re not only limited to our home zoo.  It’s a great way to save money on vacation fun, too.  Use your membership!  We got into the Milwaukee Zoo for free during a recent trip.

3) Chuck E. Cheese.  Okay, Moms, don’t boo me out of the room.  Hear me out.  We usually visit a few times a summer.  I’ve been there for weekend birthday parties too.  It’s insane, right?  But, on a Monday morning before lunch?  Chuck E Cheese is a ghost town.  We order snacks and drinks and the girls play for a couple hours.  It’s a great place to find respite from the summer heat and I like to play the games, too.

Oh, look at Baby Bee’s knobbly knees. I could just kiss them.

4) Indoor playgrounds.  We’re so lucky to have a great local one.  And, I admit, indoor playground time is one of my favorites.  At our local indoor playground, there’s a nice couch that faces the entire playground.  I can settle in with an iced coffee and watch the girls play without worrying about where they’re wandering.  To be honest, during some days and times things can get a bit crowded, but if you can tune out the little voices, this is a great activity.  I’ll give an honorable mention to indoor inflatable businesses as well. We do have one locally to us, but I don’t like them as much as our local indoor playground.  I like to be able to easily see the girls and the indoor playground fits the bill better.  For a less expensive alternative (read; free!) head to your local mall.  Most have small, indoor playsets with comfy seats and easy viewing so Mom and Dad can relax while the kiddos play.

5) Spray Parks.  We have to drive into Pittsburgh to find our closest one, but for me it’s worth the drive.   I get a little nervous trying to watch all three girls (no the Princess doesn’t need it, yes I still watch her like a hawk) at a pool.  We have a great pool in our city park, but without Big Daddy I”m just not comfortable. Spray parks give the girls the ability to play in the water and I can worry a LOT less.  We’ll combine ours with a trip to Trader Joe’s to make the drive more than worth while.

6) The Science Center and Children’s Museums.  Again, we’re members which drives our cost per visit down.  We’ve been members of the Carnegie Science Center (and I may re-up this year) and are currently members of Oh Wow! our local science center.

Got any great suggestions?  We’re always open to something fun!

Baby Bee loves Charlie Brown. Over the past couple of years, I bought “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” and “A Charlie Brown Christmas” from Amazon Video on Demand and Baby Bee watches them each at least once a week. I’m a lot more up close and personal with Charlie Brown than I ever thought I’d be. I’m almost tired of Linus’ Christmas speech.

Almost.

But, the more I watch Charlie Brown the more disturbed I become. People are mean to Charlie Brown, yo. Seriously, heartbreakingly mean.

I know what you’re thinking. I’m over thinking this. It’s not that bad. Charlie Brown doesn’t have it so bad. I disagree, though. Until I was forced to watch watching the cartoons with so much frequency, I’d never noticed it either.

Charlie Brown is never invited to parties. When he is invited, he’s quickly told its a mistake. He was on the “do not invite” list. On Valentine’s Day, he doesn’t receive a single one. At Christmas time, he’s belittled so much over his choice of Christmas trees, he has no choice but to go home, depressed and dejected.

Charlie Brown admits to being afraid of anything. His head is drawn on with marker. He literally gets no candy from adults on Halloween.

Charlie Brown seems like a pretty nice kid, but no one ever sticks up for him in any meaningful way. Of course, I know this begs a question about whether or not it’s a mistake to not let our children experience small injustice like NOT being invited to a birthday party or not to require a Valentine be given to each child in class. I’m sure there are people who believe we are raising a generation of wimps but surely a better alternative isn’t to allow the exclusion of a little boy from the neighborhood Halloween party or Christmas play.

I know that Charlie Brown being unfortunate in a relatable way is the whole joke, but I’m having more and more trouble finding it funny.

Additionally, did you know Peppermint Patty considers herself hopelessly dumb? I mean, I always knew she was athletic, but holy cow, I never realized they embedded the “dumb jock” stereotype in Patty.

Two and a half months ago I disappeared into the ether. It wasn’t because I was on a self imposed blogging break, but due to technology problems, I wasn’t able to spend one more second trying to blog on Big Daddy’s stability ball.

While we love technology, we must have been feeling slow about acquiring it this time because it took us this long to decide to order a new lap top (and it took a LOT of pushing and prodding from me. I’m pushy and proddy).

I’ve spent the last two and a half months growing ideas for this blog and missing it so badly I could feel it. I like to write here. And share here. Regardless of who is or is not reading. Writing here makes me feel good and I was sorry that my ideas were jostling around in my head wishing for an outlet.

This comes, of course, on the heels of having just finished a site redesign that I like a lot and that, I think, finally manages to define what I want to write about. It killed me to have sit around with all my ideas waiting for a place to go.

So, I know there’s this huge debate about whether or not you’re supposed to address a prolonged absence on your blog. Apparently addressing it is really narcissistic, but if you and I were meeting for coffee and suddenly you stopped for 2.5 months, I’d want to know where you’d gone. What you’d done in the meantime. I’d miss you. So, there you go. I couldn’t handle Big Daddy’s dumb stability ball or natural keyboard. Now, I can sit on the couch and have a normal keyboard.

I missed you all!

I’m back!

Clack, clack, clack WHOOPS.

It’s unseasonably warm today.  The sun is shining and despite all the snow and cold the grass doesn’t look totally dead yet.  You can almost imagine it being spring.  But, I’m a Midwestern Girl, born and raised (on the playground was where I spent most of my days) and I know that winter just isn’t over yet.  Soon, the temperature will plummet and the snow will fall.  I’m always happy to have days like this, though, as a reminder of things that are soon to come.

My young lady turned thirteen last week and Big Daddy and I were both struck by the bittersweet passage of time.  Like every birthday. Like always.

We were lucky enough to be able to host a baby party for my brother and his wife this past weekend, and I’m looking forward to sharing with you some of my homemade goodies (including another plug for the best white cake you’ll ever eat).

But, we’re back to the menu plan.

Last week, I talked about how we’re trying to be more conservative with our grocery budget.  Only Big Daddy’s spread sheet at the end of the month will tell that final tale.  I feel as though we are spending less (and eating out less which is good too). It’s hard, sometimes, to not turn to quick, fast food dinners.  OUr evenings are busy and sometimes you feel like you just can’t.  My remedy?  A box of pasta and a jar of sauce in the pantry at all times.  It makes a quick, fifteen minute dinner that everyone likes.

This week, my local grocery store has bottom round roasts on sale and I got a little bit excited.   A lot of my favorite cold weather fare involves slow cooking hunks of beef.  This week, though, starts out with dishes made from Big Daddy’s delicious smoked chicken.  So, here we go.  The menu plan

Monday Puff Pastry stuffed with smoked chicken, avocado, cream cheese and salsa

I’m currently having a love, love, love, love LOVE relationship with puff pastry.  It seems like anyone will eat anything that is stuffed in puff pastry.

Tuesday Baked chicken tacquitos with spanish rice and veggies

Wednesday Knock Off Chipotle Barbacoa bowls with rice, beans and veggies

Thursday Shrimp and Grits

Friday Lo Mein and egg rolls

Saturday Guinness Beef Stew

Enjoy!  I hope you have an unseasonably wonderful week.

A few weeks ago, I was in the shower. I do my best thinking in there. I realized that I was missing the mark here. I’ve always struggled with what to write and what direction I should go in. It becomes even more difficult when I realized I didn’t have a “niche”. I blog about my kids and am a Mom, but I don’t think I’m strictly a mommy blogger. I blog about food, but not enough to be a food blogger. I blog about crafts, but not enough to be a craft blogger. The list of things I blogged about but didn’t blog about enough to be considered in that genre was long. All My Loose Ends really did describe this blog and how I approached. It was a place to hold everything. All my interests and ideas.

When I married Big Daddy, I didn’t know anything about how to be a wife and mom. I didn’t know how to make a home. I had nothing but a vague idea of comfort and light and happiness and I’ve spent the last 13 and a half years trying to figure out how to bring that idea to fruition.

My mother was an impeccable housekeeper. The furniture was vacuumed every week. Her knickknacks were always dusted. The cob webs were always pulled down. She washed her drapes and blinds and linens on a schedule. She vacuumed the baseboard and would strip the wax from and rewax her floors. She would scrub the walls down in the entire house twice a year. But, when I married Big Daddy none of that rang true to me and while I knew I wanted a pretty house, finding my way was difficult and confusing.

In the shower, I realized that I did have a direction for this blog. That, the things I take the most joy in is finding a way to do it all.  How do I have time to read?  Well, it’s by finding simple, delicious recipes that don’t take a million hours, steps or ingredients.  It’s by finding techniques and routines that work to keep my house clean without having to devote my entire life to it.  It’s about finding order in our schedule with the girls to ensure that my time is maximized for all of our benefits. It’s about identifying where your effort makes the most sense.

It’s not hard to make the home you want for yourself and your family.  And, I’m going to help you along with way, by offering the best, simple ideas to get the most bang for your buck and your precious time.  I’m going to be honest about recipes.  If they work or not.  I’m going to be honest about time and money and spent.  You really can do it all, but it has to be simple.  I hope you enjoy.

I did it.

I read 52 books in 2012.  That bests my 2011 total of 48 and more than doubles my 2012 total of 23.  This year, I’m raising the bar a little bit and set a goal of 55 books.    I actually have two books in progress right now which should see me logging two books in by the end of this week putting me ahead schedule.

If you want to be more frequently updated about what I’m reading, you can visit me on Good Reads.

But, without further ado my ten favorite books of 2012 (in no particular order).

1) The Wool Omnibus-I listed these books separately in my Good Reads listing, but the Wool Omnibus is made up of five separate novels of varying length describing life in a post-apocalyptic underground silo.

2) First Shift-by Hugh Howey.  This is the prequel to the Wool series and I may have liked it MORE than the the books in the omnibus.

3) 11/22/63 by Stephen King. I read Under the Dome this year and I was disappointed, but this book absolutely did NOT disappoint and I’d absolutely consider re-reading it which is saying something considering it is 850 pages.

4) The Divergent series by Veronica Roth-A real BAMF female main character, a little romance and a post-apocalyptic Chicago makes for great reading.

5) The Twelve by Justin Cronin. Sequel to THe Passage and seriously fantastic.

6)Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close- by Jonathan Safran Foer.  I fell in love with Oskar and his amazing need to solve the mystery of his Dad.  It was amazing and touching and I can’t bring myself to watch the movie despite loving Tom Hanks because I’m afraid I might not love and I don’t want to do that to myself.

7)What Alice Forgot-Laine Moriarty- A suburban housewife faints during spinning class and loses her memory.  Her last memory was being madly in love with her husband and pregnant with her first baby, but that’s not the world she wakes up into.  It IS Chic Lit (which isn’t everyone’s cup of tea) but I thought it was a good narrative on the importance of investing in your marriage.

8) The Adoration of Jenna Fox-Mary Pearson-another book with a dystopian bend.  Jenna Fox awakes one day in a house she doesn’t know without memories and a body that seems like hers but not.  The book is an interesting commentary on medical ethics and how far is too far.

9) The Light Between Oceans by M. L. Steadman-This book is heartbreaking.  Deeply heartbreaking, but it’s so beautifully written I couldn’t help by love it.  It was really moving and beautiful and worth the read despite how much crying I did during the process

10) Fifty Shades of Gray-E.L. James-Before you disown me, let me explain.  As a teenager, I read tons of romance novels and, um, smut.  Tons.  My mother semi-encouraged this habit by subscribing to a mail order romance book club (she wanted the purple wine glasses they offered as a premium).  I read my weight in romance novels and then stopped.  This is the first smut I’ve read in more than 2 decades and I am not embarrassed to say it was fun to read this.  If you haven’t, yet, read the series, I’d recommend reading no further than book 1 as they get kind of worse as they go on.

In 2012, I finally embraced that cooking is something I love.  I’m not one of those people who are great at creating recipes, but there’s something so soothing about life in the kitchen.  I love how following a list of ingredients and instructions can make magic.  Fluffy rising bread and slowly thickening soups seem like something more mystical than they are.

There are some of my favorite magic makers for the year and I encourage you to give them a try.

Easy Creamy Chicken and Rice soup got a lot of time in our kitchen this year.  I really do try to cook with more whole ingredients, but sometimes you need something quick and hearty and this one is a favorite.  I make a double batch.

This Macaroni and cheese recipe has become my favorite, replacing the recipe in my tattered Betty Crocker cook book.

Slow cooker, three envelope crock pot sliders are a perfect cool weather meal. I’m really picky about crock pot recipes because I find so many of them are kind of sub par, but these are fantastic.

I made batches upon batches of these pumpkin chocolate chip muffins this fall.   Baby Bee couldn’t get enough of them.

We made this caprese salad with avocado to rave reviews on several occasions.  It was simple and delicious and I can’t wait for tomatoes to come into season so I can make it again.

Pancetta and asparagus hash is the perfect spring dish.

We all really liked Paula Deen’s baked spaghetti.  It’s ooey, gooey and delicious.

Okay, so this isn’t good for you, but this Smoked Sausage, Potato and Cheese casserole is quick and easy and everyone in my house likes it.

Big Daddy’s outrageously good smoked chicken is such a big favorite.  We can’t get enough of it.

White wedding cake is really the only white cake worth making yourself.  It’s THAT good.

It’s the girls last day of Christmas vacation and I’m mixed with happiness and melancholy. We’ve had such a great two weeks off together, but I feel like it’s time for them to go back so my routines can return.

We’re taking down a lot of our Christmas things today and heading out to do something special, so enjoy this list of my ten favorite posts from last year.

In January, we had to say goodbye to our friend Jack and I tried to capture his happy essence and place in our family.

In March, I made Mason Jar Wall Vases and I’m still totally in love with them.  Over the Christmas season, I’ve filled them with holly and pine and am considering dropping in some tea lights to warm things up over the winter time.

In April, I wrote a letter to our girls about how to have a happy marriage.

In May, I talked about  being a mother and the girls growing as we had the last day of school

In June, our fabulous Baby Bee turned three and I knocked it out of the park with her birthday cake.

In July, Big Daddy and I celebrated our Thirteenth year of marriage.

In October, I wrote about my annual love affair with autumn.

In November, I wrote about being overcome.