Chicken Pox.

Seth started school on Thursday, September 16th. The VERY NEXT DAY I heard Seth calling me, “MOM!!! Come look at all these mosquito bites!!”. My first thought was OH. NO. I looked Seth over and repeated my thoughts over and over. “Oh no. OH NO! Oh. Noooooo”. Seth was like, “What Mom? Mom! Mom! WHAT?!”. “I think you have chicken pox Seth. Oh. No.” Apparently I was over-dramatic in my assessment of the situation because Seth immediately decided he did not, no WOULD NOT, have chicken pox. He would only have mosquito bites and that would be that. Neil and I dared not mention the CP over the next couple days. Whenever we did we were very quickly reminded that Seth did NOT have chicken pox, only a lot of mosquito bites.
Anyway all my worrying was for nothing because Seth ended up with a very mild case of the chicken pox. He WAS vaccinated when he was one and the vaccination is 70-85% effective. When a vaccinated child does contract chicken pox it is much milder. And so was the case for us. Besides having a multitude of spots from his neck to his hips, that was about it for him. Not really any itching or anything. We can handle that. So far (knock on wood) Ben and Oliver have both remained spot free but apparently when siblings do catch it (which is almost always), the spots turn up a week or two later. We’re coming up on two weeks this Friday.
Seth still looks like this:
but he doesn’t seem to care.
And now we have done the chicken pox. How fun!

Pocket sling.

I sewed my first sling the other day. It was pretty simple to sew and it turned out great. It’s really easy to use and Oliver seems to enjoy it a lot. He is happy to peer out and watch what’s going on around him.
When he got tired I just laid him down in it and he drifted off to sleep. Love!
Here’s a picture of all of us at the park:
And here’s a picture of Oliver sleeping in the sling:
I’m going to sew one for Lucy too. Then hopefully the babies will stay happy in their slings while the mommies shop in a couple weeks!

Girly sewing.

I made a dress and diaper cover for a friend’s baby. I needed to take pictures because it was just so cute. I needed a model. Oliver kindly volunteered.

He didn’t seem to mind.

I really probably should get a girl.

Make ‘em yourself.

Here’s the recipe for the cinnamon buns. Thanks Canadian Living cookbook that I borrowed from the library- you will cause me to gain untold amount of pounds from all the baking that I have done in the last couple weeks. Argh.

cinnamon buns

½ c. milk
¼ c. white sugar
¼ c. butter
1 tsp salt
½ c. warm water
2 eggs
1 tbsp active dry yeast
4 c. flour (approx).

In small saucepan, heat together milk, all but 1 tsp of the sugar, the butter, and salt until butter is melted; let cool to lukewarm.

Meanwhile, in large bowl, dissolve remaining sugar in warm water. Sprinkle in yeast, let stand until frothy (about 10 min). Whisk in milk mixture and eggs.

With electric mixer, gradually beat in 1 ½ c flour into egg mixture. Beat for 2 minutes. Stir in enough of the remaining flour to make soft, slightly sticky dough that comes away from the side of the bowl.

Lightly sprinkle some of the remaining flour onto work surface; turn out dough. Knead, sprinkling as much of remaining flour as necessary to prevent sticking, until smooth and elastic, about 10 minutes. Place in large greased bowl, turning once to grease all over. Cover with plastic wrap, let rise in warm place until doubled in bulk, about 1 – 1 ½ hours.

Filling:
Melt ¾ c. butter with ¾ c. brown sugar; whisk until sugar is dissolved. Pour into 9×13 baking dish. Sprinkle with ½ c. chopped pecans or walnuts if you want. (You do want, believe me).

Melt additional ¼ c. butter. Set aside.

Combine additional ¾ c. packed brown sugar, ½ c. chopped pecans (if you want), and 1 tbsp of cinnamon. Set aside.

Punch down dough. Turn onto lightly floured surface. Roll out inot 18×14 inch rectangle. Brush with all but 2 tbsp of the melted butter, leaving ½” border; sprinkle with sugar mixture. Starting at long side, tightly roll up, pinching seam to seal. With serrated knife, cut into 15 pieces. Place in baking dish. Brush with remaining butter. Cover with clean tea towel and let rise until doubled, about 1 hour.

Bake in center of 375F oven until tops sound hollow when tapped, about 25 minutes.

Let stand for 3 min. place flat serving tray over dish. Grasp dish and tray; turn over. Lift off pan, scraping out remaining filling to drizzle over buns.

Try to just eat one. Heck, try to just eat two. If you’re like me, you’ll stop when you feel slightly sick.

Cinnamon buns.

I’ve tried to make cinnamon buns several times over the last few years. I’ve always failed. Until now. Now I have not only successfully made cinnamon buns, but it’s possible I actually made the best cinnamon buns in.the.world. I’m not kidding you on this one. I mean, hello…
I will be making these puppies again. And again. And again.

Daddy’s guy.

Neil is just the best dad ever.
I’m not the only one who thinks so.

First day of preschool.

Seth started preschool today. He’s been really excited about it for awhile now, counting down sleeps and everything. Until last night, when he decided he did NOT want to go to school. At all. Tears were happening. Same situation this morning. All manner of bribes were offered in exchange for one day at preschool. No dice. Well, too bad Seth, you’re going anyway, otherwise I’m giving your lunch to Benji. That did the trick (hey, there were Dunkaroos in that lunch!). Seth put on his shoes and we all loaded into the van. We all walked Seth into the school. I guess Seth realized that hey, school is actually a pretty fun place, and he ran off to play with some toys as soon as we got there and barely gave me a glance after that. I managed to coax a hug out of him and then we left. No tears, no fighting, nothing. I was SO happy. Because heck, I had been looking forward to Seth starting preschool for weeks now. Well, maybe months now. I’ll admit it. I am not one of the moms who cried when their firstborn headed off to school. I was so excited! Not just for me and the quietness that would be my house for ONE FULL DAY a week, but for Seth too- I just knew he was going to love it. That kid loves learning and I knew he was going to just eat it up at school. Anyway we went to go get him at 3:30 and he was all smiles. He had a great day. What was the best part? He went to the “park” THREE times! He told everyone he talked to tonight about that. Hey, who really cares about the letter “A” and the color red when you have recess three times a day! All in all, the 1st day of preschool was a roaring success, and Seth is already looking forward to next week. Me too!

Sunday night.

I wanted to write this down so that one day when I get to sleep through the night again (however many years from now that may be) that I really appreciate it!
7:30 – Oliver, Seth, and Ben all went to bed without a peep.
10:15 – I am getting ready to go to bed.
10:16 – Oliver starts crying.
11:30 – Oliver is still fussing and crying. He keeps flipping himself over onto his tummy and then he’s mad about being on his tummy. I give up on trying to settle him and I feed him and then put him back to bed.
11:45 – I finally get into bed. Oliver is sort of quiet.
11:50 – Benji wakes up yelling “CUDDLE ME!!!”. I go cuddle him for a minute and then tell him I’ll send Neil in in a few minutes.
12:00 – Benji is yelling again. Neil settles him and then goes to sleep in the basement so he can actually get a couple hours before work.
2:30 – Oliver wakes up crying. By the time I drag my exhausted self out of bed to check on him, he has stopped crying. I go back to bed.
3:30 – Oliver wakes up crying. I feed him and put him back to bed.
5:00 – Oliver wakes up crying. I feed him and put him back to bed.
6:00 – Oliver has been crying for I have no idea how long. Possibly an hour? I was so tired I couldn’t wake up enough to get out of bed and then an hour had passed. I get up and wrap him up and chuck him in the swing. I climb back in bed.
6:10 – Benji is yelling, “I want to get up!!!”. I run in to get him before he wakes Seth up. Too late.
6:12 – Seth and Ben are in bed with me, semi-quiet. I am hoping they fall back asleep.
6:15 – Neil’s alarm goes off.
6:16 – Seth wants a drink of water. I send the kids downstairs to get Neil.
8:50 – Oliver wakes me up. Neil put the kids in front of the tv at 6:30 where they stayed quietly until I woke up. LOVE them for that.
9:00 – On with our day. Is it naptime yet?!

T-Shirt.

I sewed this long sleeved t-shirt for Seth the other day using fabric from one of Neil’s old shirts and some scraps from some of mine.
The pattern was pretty simple and I’m really happy with how it turned out. Next time I’ll make the neck hole bigger though- I forgot about my kids’ notoriously large heads when I made this shirt for Seth.
I love this kid.

One-third.

How could it have been four months already?
Oh my gosh Oliver, I love you so much.