Happy Valentine's Day!

Yesterday was M's very first Valentine's exchange at school. She's been loving doing all the fun things, just like her big brother gets to do in school. So, she was really really excited to make her valentine's (She says "Balemtimes Day"). I covered pretzels with white chocolate, M sprinkled the heart-shaped sprinkles. I cut the paper and wrote "To:" and "From:", she wrote all her classmates' names and her names (with help of the class list). I gave her heart-shaped stickers, she decorated the bags and the tag (girls had a lot of stickers, but boys got only one because they were boys).  And, she hand-picked each special pretzel for her friends. She was very proud.

 This is her "pink day" outfit. Pink shirt, light khaki pants with pink ribbon, pink socks, and pink hair. I must say, yes, I am enjoying having a little girl, my own baby doll. :)

 

This is J's. Being a 1st grader and a boy, he wanted to do as little work as he could for his classmate. I cut heart-shaped papers, punched holes. He wrote his names and put Dum Dum suckers through the holes. Above picture shows them kind of shoved in the corner.

But for his teacher, it was another story...(the fancy card above)

He used A LOT of stickers and decorated a card very carefully....

 And it says, 

 Yes, she is a really really good teacher and because of her, his reading and writing skills have improved dramatically this year.

And this was for me. I told my husband that he doesn't have to get anything for me, but of course he did. 

I got chocolate, really really good chocolate! - Ghirardelli dark chocolate series, hazel nuts, camel, and one of my favorites, orange filling. He loves me so much.

Last night, I was instructed to sit and play piano while they had some secret activity going on, so that they'd know where I was for sure. Now, that's just brilliant!

 I love J's "you are the best MoMMy ever!" I hope he will tell me the same when he is 16.

Oh, and this? It's just for fun. K groovin' and dancin' in the kitchen with his big sister's heart-shaped sunglasses. I love this child.

Letter M

 Instead of doing other things that I'm supposed to be doing (we call it housekeeping strike), I decided to make this: Letter M. 
Now it's hung on a dining room along with family photos (one next to M is my grandmother).

 It's 8x8 paper, outlined with letter M, tacky glued with small pearls, mounted on a frame I found at Goodwill for $1.99. Very happy about the result. Maybe I should have used different paper as background, but it's good enough now. 

 

Speaking of family, here is our recent family picture, drawn by my daughter M. Yes, there are 2 of her - one below is real her and the all pink one is her baby doll (18"doll she got for Christmas) named M as well.

Random pictures

 Now my wrists (I have carpel tunnel, but it seems to be doing better since I stopped wearing braces...interesting...) are doing better I can update. 

 

An ornament I made for annual (?) ornament exchange at work. I was too cheap and lazy to go to store to buy an ornament the night before at 10 am, I decided to make one. It took longer than I planned...but the recipient seemed to be very happy, so that made me happy.

 

My daughter having a tea party with her animal friends day after family Christmas celebration. It was her first tea party with her own tea sets she got for Christmas. Somehow you see carrots and corn on the cake stand and the tea is accompanied with a bottle of mustard.

 

 I'm just throwing this - the morning of Christmas, the gifts still intact.

 

Now, this was in October. Gingerbread skeletons for my son's 7th birthday treats for his class.

And speaking of birthdays, these are the kids' birthday cakes...

 

J wanted a army tank cake, of course. Flat Stanley was a special guest to the party.

 

M's request was my little pony. I must have been really tired by the time I finished. I wrote 6, instead of 5. She turned 5, not 6... Oh well.
 

This was K's. The whole just evolved as I started decorating. And it worked. Vroom vroom!

Now it's full blown winter here and I miss this place and her fresh beautiful produce

(Natalie's place, we call)

Lastly, this was a sign I made from a free cabinet door I got at Re-Store. It was originally $1, but the gentleman gave me for free. Maybe I looked horrible on that Saturday morning... Painted, scrap book stickers added, and ribbon to the hardware holes. Not the original quote, but this one suits better for me and my kitchen.

Silence

My oldest J is now in 1st grade. My daughter M is in afternoon preschool 3 days a week. My baby K is taking a nap. I have about 15 more minutes of silence to enjoy. The only noise I can hear is our dog snoring.
I could have been productive, but I decided not to be. I just sat in front of my laptop and did absolutely nothing productive. It was my 2 hour vacation.
I like it.

Eating good

Summer is over, school has started, and I have a little bit of breathing time on Monday afternoon. So I decided to post something....then I realized how many photos of food I have taken this past month or so....Well, I love food. What can I say?

My dear husband found a treasure over this summer. We call it "Natalie's place". She sells beautiful fruits and vegetables from her garden or nearby Amish farm. No pesticides. She is not "certified" organic farmer, but she grows them pretty much organically. And they taste like, well, what fruits and vegetable should taste, that you know they grew up with sunshine, not some fertilizer. You know they are picked by her hands with much care, not by...okay, I won't say anything more than that.

Anyway, we have been eating good, I mean GOOD, local food.

Here is very meaty "Stripe Roma Tomatoes" waiting to be canned.
Yes, they are from Natalie's place. Just gorgeous. And they are yummy!

Here is our dinner one night.
Menu:
- Japanese style hamburger steak (made with grass fed beef from my co-worker's farm) with Teriyaki sauce,
- Sauteed zucchini with bacon
- Steamed corn
- Steamed potatoes (blue, red, and white!) with home grown parsley and chives

Locally famous "Buttermilk Pie" with melons from Natalie's place as dessert.

Okay, this was random. But they are cute, aren't they?
This, nothing local. Just yellow cake cupcake (though I did made it from scratch only because I didn't have boxed cake mix) with baby face on top. They are just vanilla wafers decorated with royal icing. Specially made for my friend.

Army of canned peaches ready for winter,

and they remind me of this poster.
{Photo source here}

I really think I can eat this kid.

Mmmm!

Blueberry picking with cousins

Growing up in rural Japan, I had not heard of such thing as blueberries. Then one day, I saw some "made with blueberry" stuff at a supermarket in a rather big city when I was in high school. They grew only in Hokkaido, the northern island in Japan, and were very much exotic fruit to me.

Then, I moved to Michigan over a decade ago. Here we are living in berry heaven. Blueberry picking became one of our summer ritual. Pick them, eat them, freeze them, and even dream about them.

This year, we went with my sisters-in-law and their kids to a berry patch that was new to me. Kids in boots and with little buckets, off we went. Weather was perfect. I came home with 23 lb. of blueberries. The amount in kids' tummies will be a forever mystery. They really should weigh kids before and after. M, as a picky eater as she can be, did not eat them at all, but she did pick. She enjoyed picking so much that she by herself picked a half pound in very short period time (as she finally decided to start picking when I was ready to leave).

J's wish list with these blueberries - smoothie, jam, pie, blueberry muffins, etc.
We did make smoothie after we came home. The rest, well, I need to get some rest first, then I'll think about it.

Sleepover

I'm a scout-camp widow again. My husband is up in camping with boy scouts for a few nights. Because of that and my kidney stone situation, my sister-in-law felt sorry for me and offered me to take a couple of kids from me. Well, J was the only one took the proposal. M wanted to be with Mommy. And there was almost no hope for K to go.

So, off he went to cousins' last night. It was his first real sleepover all by himself, no Mom and Dad or even his siblings. Just J. He was excited about this special occasion, according to my sister-in-law, which is good and made me feel better.

Now the top bunk being empty, M didn't want to sleep in her bed last night. Oh, great. I sighed.
Then, I came up with an idea!

Why not having our version of sleepover!? Just us girls. (Sorry, K, you need to sleep in your crib.)

I made a bed for M next my bed (to maintain quality of my sleep, I proposed her to have "a special bed just for M"). We stayed up and read books and talked. She told me that now her pink bunny has a name and that is Joey, but this little bear here doesn't have a name yet and she would tell me in the morning. And she did. The little bear's name is Boo-Boo.

After she fell sleep tonight, I quietly snuck out of the room for a little bed-time snack. Now my tummy is happy, I think I can sleep good tonight.