Fall Pictures

Here's Miles's first grade picture!  It really looks a lot like his kindergarten picture, just with a different shirt.

I took Molly and Elliott to Target. I was really happy to find out that they just sell the digital pictures now...yay!  I like getting all the different poses.  Molly was a little goofy, and Elliott was not enthusiastic about taking pictures.  I was honestly shocked that any of his pictures turned out, much less that so many were cute!

 This is Molly's "shy" face.

He was not having tummy time at all.

 Look at him standing!!!

 They are both looking at me.

 Elliott wouldn't stop trying to pull the pompoms off of Molly's skirt.  When we moved her legs, he pulled her hair.  This was about it that worked.

Gerrit really likes this one for some reason, but Molly looks kind of silly.

October 21st: Daily Life

I loved doing the hour-by-hour account so much a few months ago that I really wanted to do it again.  I have to admit, I was a little worried that I would curse myself and get another flat tire, but nope, this was a much more typical day for the Larsen household.

5:45 Time to wake up! I throw on some exercise clothes and sneakers, grab a banana and a water bottle, and head to the rec center.

6:00 It's time for Tabatas class.  For the first half, we do a repeating circuit of jump rope, squats, jumping jacks, burpees, jump rope, lunges, and planks. For the second half we do normal tabatas (which means to exercise for 20 seconds and rest for 10 seconds) and work on biceps, chest, glutes, triceps, abs, shuffles, leapfrog, and more planks. I really hate doing planks. I have nooooo ab strength after this last pregnancy.

7:05 Grab a quick bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios and eat breakfast while I read my scriptures

7:25 Take a shower. Put on jeans and a sweater.

7:40 Tidy up the ground floor. I like to do this before Elliott wakes up when I can so I can use both arms.

7:46 Pack a lunch for Miles.  He needs a brown bag lunch today for his field trip. He doesn't like sandwiches so he gets a bean wrap, applesauce, carrots, and a special Lunchables dessert for the trip. Lunch of champions!

7:53 Elliott wakes up.  Miles asks me what time it is, because”I’m trying to hold out until 8.”

7:54 Nurse Elliott, check work e-mail and discussion boards. Nothing is quite as much of a relief as having no new e-mails. Having 35 posts to check because I'm teaching the extra hiring section right now? A little less fun.

7:59  Looks like Miles missed his wake-up goal by a minute ;)

8:04 Miles saw what I wrote and kept yelling “:Why don’t you erase that?” I try valiantly to keep working while he keeps yelling.

8:15 Make Miles some cereal mix.  We talk about his dream about being an astronaut on Mars, what kind of plants grow from watermelon seeds, why the Olympics aren’t every year, and how Aunt Emily is having a new baby.  I try to encourage him to eat between stories!

8:30 Get the boys dressed in long-sleeved shirts and long pants and get shoes on so we don’t miss the bus.  Pass Gerrit on his way down the stairs to eat his own breakfast.

8:40 I walk Miles out to the bus stop and give him a goodbye hug.

8:45 Make Gerrit lunch of sandwich, chips, apple, and yogurt.

8:50 Gerrit runs downstairs “I don’t need a lunch today!” Sigh... I do a quick check of Facebook and my e-mail.

9:00 Molly wakes up.  She’s upset because Daddy put her in matching pajamas last night and she didn’t get to pick them. I get her a sandwich, string cheese, and milk for breakfast because she doesn’t like cereal.  Elliott gets rice cereal and pears.  I basically have to constantly remind Molly to eat.

9:25 Molly and I read a stack of library books together. She's really fond of "It's Only Stanley" by Jon Agee right now.

9:40 We begin the ordeal of getting Molly to the bathroom, dressed, hair done, and shoes on.  She’d rather do headstands on the couch.  Elliott and I play peek-a-boo and blast off.

10:00 Nurse Elliott again and send some critical emails for a meeting later tonight.

10:25 Drop Molly off at her “cooking class” for pumpkin day

10:45 Target time!  Look at my cute Target buddy :)  We need Halloween candy, diapers, baby food, and yogurt.

11:40 Back at home.  I was taking my diapers out of the trunk when I was approached by semi-creepy meat salesman who is driving around my neighborhood with a van full of meat.  I don’t do well with door-to-door sales in the first place, and there’s something a little weird to me about buying meat from someone who is randomly cruising the neighborhood.  I politely decline and go inside to play with Elliott

12:00 Pick Molly up from school. She loves her decorated pumpkin and ate all of her pumpkin chocolate chip cookies.

12:10 While I make quesadillas for lunch,  Molly makes  a city out of the baby food.  We eat quesadillas and apples while Elliott eats bread and vegetables.  Elliott smears vegetables all over my pants with alarming accuracy.

12:45 The three of us play with toys in Molly’s room

1:15 I let Molly watch “My Big Big Friend” while I nurse Elliott and work on my presentation on how to help struggling students for tonight’s meeting.

1:40 Put Elliott down for a nap.  Come down and get dinner (harvest chicken and couscous) into the slow cooker.

2:05 Quick check of e-mail, facebook, etc.

2:10 Grade six student papers

2:40 Elliott wakes up.  Yes, that would not be long enough. He really can't handle a one-hour nap.  I hate teething so so much!  He didn’t sleep well last night either....come on in, teeth #5 and 6!

2:45 If I can’t grade, I might as well clean up the kitchen and put all the Target stuff away.

3:15 Try to see if Elliott will let me grade.  Not working well.  He likes to grab the keyboard, the mouse, anything. I finish two more papers.

3:30 Convince Molly to turn off the show and come get mail with me.  We look at my Family Fun magazine and figure out what activities we want to do together.

3:45 Miles comes home and tells me all about his field trip.  Good things: he got two gourds. Bad things: A bunny attacked him with evil claws and he really did not like the goats.

3:50 Brooke comes to play with the kids. She has been coming twice a week to help with the kids and it is basically the most wonderful thing in the world. Miles and Molly adore Brooke, and I really appreciate the break.  I feed Elliott while I talk to Miles about the field trip.

4:00 I make a tail for Molly's Halloween costume.

5:30 All finished! I try it on Molly, who won’t stop swishing it. I guess you can't wear a tail without pretending to be a pony :)

5:35 Time to make couscous and take out the chicken and shred it. When I finish, I chat with the kids and Brooke.  I attempt to grade while kneeling because kids are using every chair in the house for a fort and somehow manage to finish three more papers

6:10 Gerrit comes home and we eat dinner  

6:40 Brooke heads out and Gerrit and I chat and play with the kids.

7:30 I host a meeting for other teachers in the sociology and teacher ed departments. My presentation goes well, and all of the other instructors have interesting things to share.

8:30 Because I'm doing the extra hiring contract, I have an office hour just for people that BYU-Idaho is currently interviewing. My normal students never come to office hours. About a quarter of these participants come and ask me questions about teaching online. I nurse Elliott for the first part, and then Gerrit puts the kids to bed and heads to play basketball.

9:30 Done with the live meetings and go to discussion boards instead.

10:15 Time for bed!

Cooking Around the World

Goal # 58 of my 101 in 1001 was to make a recipe from every different country from the book "The Best International Recipe."  I have checked out this book at least three separate times and made one or two of the recipes but always wanted to try out a few more.

I went through the whole book and tried to pick things that A) my family would actually eat and B) wouldn't need too many hard-to-find or expensive ingredients.

Here's what I ended up with!

Chapter One: Mexico

These chicken enchiladas were fantastic.  They have you make your own enchilada sauce, and the chicken and cheese filling was delicious.  I also liked their method of warming the tortillas in the oven so you can do a bunch at once.


Chapter Two: Central and South America.

These are black bean and cheese arepas (stuffed corn cakes).  I loooove arepas and the arepa restaurant closed, so this was the obvious choice.  Miles ate three of these and had them for lunch the next day!


Chapter Three: United Kingdom

Colcannon Soup

This is a creamy leek, cabbage, potato, and bacon soup. It's good for fall!

Chapter Four: Central Europe and Scandinavia.

I went for the family-pleasing choice of Swedish meatballs.  These were a good weeknight dinner!

Chapter Five: France

I've wanted to make macarons for a long time.  My first batch was a horrific failure.  Like, a "throw them away and go upstairs to cry" type of failure.  When I could finally brave the concept of cooking, I figured out what I messed up, came downstairs, and made these mint chocolate ones.  Yum!

Chapter Six:  Spain

Awful picture, but this is Spanish tortilla with romesco sauce.  Spanish tortilla is actually an egg and potato dish, and romesco is a roasted red pepper and almond sauce.  It's a typical tapas dish and Gerrit and I both really liked it.

Chapter Seven: Italy

Ricotta Gnocchi with Tomato-Cream Sauce

I've made potato gnocchi before a few times, from a crazy experience on study abroad to a few times when we were first married.  They are really, really time-consuming.  Ricotta gnocchi?  Faster, easier, and are basically ravioli without the pasta on the outside.  Delicious!

Chapter Eight: Greece and Turkey

I picked spanakopita.  The taste was good, but I had a really hard time working with the phyllo dough.



Chapter Nine:  Eastern Europe and Russia

I picked pierogies because I'd made them in college and not had a good time.  This was definitely a much, much better recipe.  I've worked with a lot of different types of dough and I really enjoyed working with the dumpling dough.  Pork and mushroom made for a tasty filling, too.  They don't look all that appetizing so you will just have to trust me on this one :)


Chapter Ten: Africa and the Middle East

Miles is a falafel addict.  I made these for his lunchbox and then saved a few for my own sandwich :)  I did bake them instead of frying them because A) it's healthier and B) I hate frying things.  Having to clean out the deep-fat fryers during my brief stint at the bowling alley snack bar really ruined that one.

Chapter Eleven: India

This was super-tasty and gets the extra benefit of being accurate tasting without a lot of crazy ingredients.

Chapter Twelve: Southeast  Asia

This one was my big, big fail.  I read through the book and picked banh xeo, a shrimp and pork crepe from Vietnam.  Looks good, right?

And now I present you with my version.

I struggled so, so much with these crepes.  I've made crepes before but these ones just would not cook right or flip right.  Miles still liked them because of his love for shrimp but Gerrit and I could hardly eat them.

Chapter Thirteen: China

I made sesame noodles with shredded chicken.  Another delicious weeknight dinner!  I just wish I had easier access to the fresh Chinese noodles.  This would have been a lot easier if I still lived in San Jose...

Chapter Fourteen: Japan and Korea

Bibimbap

I had to pick this one because of the delightful children's book Bee-Bim Bop!  Miles and Molly loved the book so we needed to actually eat the dish :)  This is rice, steak, vegetables, fried egg, and sesame oil and it was one of my favorites.

Leaves and Scarecrows

I am so, so ready for fall.  I'm not a big fan of hot weather.  I love autumn colors.  It has been a really hot early fall, so I'm delighted for anything fall-related.

We headed to the scarecrow festival at Thanksgiving Point recently to celebrate the season.  I couldn't get a great picture, but the fall colors right when you show up are amazing.

This Chewbacca scarecrow was a favorite.

We also enjoyed carving apples.

Unfortunately, this was the one day that the fall weather decided to finally show up.  It started raining and we got soaked!

Molly at 3.5

Molly is such a fun little girl!

*She makes friends everywhere we go.  She has a new best friend every time we go to the playground, the library, school, basically anywhere!

*Molly loves art and drawing.  We go through a lot of paper :)

* She loves playing detailed imagination games with her toys.  Preferably as many toys as possible :)

*Molly is getting really good at writing!  She can write her name without any help and has started asking me to help her write other words, too.

*Molly is also a selfie queen.  Your phone is not safe when she's around.  There are always at least 200+ new pictures every time I am careless about where I leave my phone.



*She loves her ponies, princesses, dancing, coloring, and cooking.  Her favorite shows are Word World, Peg + Cat, and Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood.

*Molly is a sweetheart and a delight.  She gives great hugs and we're so glad that she's part of our family!

Makers Gonna Make

Gerrit is a mechanical engineer.  Gerrit's hobbies are also related to engineering.  He loves everything to do with it!  The SLC Mini Maker Faire is basically his ideal way to spend a Saturday.

 Trying out some neat virtual reality goggles.  These have been making him consider Lasik.

 Miles and Molly really liked this booth...something to do with pressure sensors and a clip that lit up when you put it on a coin.

 I got to hang out with Elliott so Daddy and the older kids could spend as much time at the booths as they wanted to :)

 Miles and Molly also really, really love the droids and robots.  In the top picture, the droid is fighting a ping-pong thrower robot, and then it's fighting a Dalek.

 A fun mechanical frog statue!

 This is Molly's rendition of "two Baymax".  I think it's pretty good!