Cat and Mouse

You know that Tom and Jerry (or insert favorite dueling cartoon characters here) where Tom nails a million boards over the door so Jerry can't get out only to turn around and see Jerry standing behind him. Well...that was Zach and I tonight. I was almost at the point where I was going to nail him into his room tonight but I knew he'd just be standing behind me.

How is it that 3 year olds know how to be so creative to get what they want. I wonder if this skill improves with age.


Putting Zach to bed:

Take 1 - Bath, teethbrushing, 2 stories, 2 songs, prayers & goodnight hugs and kisses (I know our bedtime routine is long but I enjoy it too)
Zach: Mommy I have to go pee pee.
Me: Ok go quick and come back (don't forget to wash your hands)

Take 2 - Back from the potty, I'm about to leave
Zach - Mom, I forgot to flush (likely story)
Me - That's OK, I'll do it.
Zach - No mommy, I have to clean up after myself (oh you little punk, using my words against me)
Me - Fine hurry.

Take 3
Me - Good night Zach
Zach - Mommy I need wa wa (his only baby word, I correct him but it is cute)
Me - Ok Zach here is your water. Good night.

Take 4
Zach comes out to the livingroom.
Zach - Mommy I need to go big poopy
Me - Ok
Zach - After sitting on potty...I don't have to go anymore. (Big freakin' shock!)
Me - Ok go back to bed (another tuck in and other kiss)


Take 5
Zach comes out to the livingroom again.
Zach - Mommy I need chapped lips (chap stick)
Me - (mild frustration in voice)Fine, Zach but this is it.
Tuck in and kiss

Take 6
Zach comes out again
Zach - Mommy I got a boo boo can you please kiss it and make it all better.
Me - How did you get a boo boo laying in bed?
Zach - ummm....I don't know.
Back to bed Zach

Take 7
Zach comes out again
Zach -Mommy, with a huge adorable grin, Mommy I want to sleep in your bed.
Me - Melting and putting on my best mommy face to combat the cutest little boy ever, No Zach you need to go back to your bed.
Zach - Mommy stay 2 minutes.
Me - Ok Zach, 2 minutes.
Zach - Mommy you are pretty (oh he is good, isn't he)
Mommy you are my best friend (and manipulative, but still so darn cute)
Mommy you are a cucumber (umm...ok????)
Mommy someone sneezed on me.
Me -Zach, stop talking. Good night.

It has been a 1/2 an hour now and I think we might finally have a sleeping child. Phewww!!!

Taking a stand...can you be jailed for this?

Well we are still having trouble with the picky eating. Zach has pretty much not ate dinner for the past two nights.

Tuesday night he told me he didn't want fish or pasta(his favorite) he wanted candy. I had bought a bag of Hershey kisses for his teacher for teacher appreciation week and a few wouldn't fit in the container I bought so I left them on the counter. I told him he could have a candy after he ate. No, mommy I'm full. I told him if he was too full for pasta he was too full for candy. He asked several more times and he didn't end up eating that night with the exception of about 2 pieces of pasta.

Fast forward to last night. I made chicken and a salad...once again, I'm full mommy. I did get him to eat a few pieces of chicken....mmmm. Hopefully this will end before he starves to death.

On a happier and much more adorable not. I've read that if you let kids help you in the kitchen they are much more likely to eat the food (Note: this doesn't work), however it makes for a lot of fun. I have a bamboo cutting board that came with a small cutting board. Whenever I cut veggies at night, Zach gets out his cutting board and his "sharp" (what he calls a plastic knife from IKEA) and cuts beside me.

While I was in the middle of making dinner, Kaitlyn had a mess so I went in to change her. While I was changing Kaitlyn, Zach took out all of my pots and set them on the kitchen floor and then took out the pasta and poured it into all of the pots and put all of the lids back on. When I got back into the kitchen he told me that he had made me pasta for dinner. He then wanted me to taste it. In my efforts to teach him that tasting is good, I had to eat several pieces of raw pasta that he "cooked" for me. YUCK!!! Pretty cute though, huh...I love that kid!

Mother's Day

I had a fantastic Mother's Day. Mother's Day actually started on Friday with a tea at Zach's school. They invited all of the mother's for a brunch. The kids sang a few songs and then gave us presents. He made me a vase with flowers, a hat to wear for brunch and a jewelery box with his picture. Zach was a little shy during the songs but he came home and sang them to me. The kids were all so cute and every mommy came. It was such a great day.

He also kept randomly saying Happy Mother's Day to me over the weekend. I melted each time!

I got to sleep in on Sunday. Joe got up with both of the kids and they made me breakfast. Zach absolutley loves to cook. He cracked the eggs and helped to put the ingredients in the pancakes and then he stired them up real good (his words).

After breakfast, we went to my mom's and had a very nice dinner of beef tenderloin and creamed spinach with mashed potatoes (my mom's favorite). Aunt La La (Melissa)bought some more age appropriate toys for Zach to play with including water baloons and a foam rocket shooter. Zach of course, loved them and played with the water balloons for hours. I'll post pics later.

I hope everyone had as nice of a day as I did.

Zachies

In the past few hours I have belly laughed about 10 times. Zach is cracking me up tonight...here are a few examples.

1. To Joe out of the blue: Daddy I listened so good at the store today. Mommy was so proud of me.

2. Again out of the blue: I want to go on a trip and ride horses. That is so cool. (He's never been on a horse before)

3. We were watching TV and a Zyrtec commercial came on and he screams...Look it's a Z for Zachary.

4. I took both of the kids to Sams today and put them both in the front of the shopping cart (a first for Kaitlyn). Zach kept patting Kaitlyn on the back and asking if she was OK. They were getting a lot of attention because they looked adorable but then to top it off Zach was saying, "look what a big girl my sister is" Seriously how cute is that! I tried to get a picture but my camera was all dead not just mostly dead and with all dead there's usually only one thing you can do, go through his clothes and look for loose change. I'm sorry for the weird reference I just watched that movie. I LOVE that movie!

Cooking

I've been cooking a lot lately since tax season is over. I couldn't decide what to make when we went up to Melbourne a couple of weeks ago so I bought a ton of stuff...then I ran out of time and only made brownies. I still had a bunch of ingredients left over though so I've put them to good use.

I made carrot cake last weekend for my parents and they loved it. It was moist and delicious. I've become addicted to a few blogs lately and I've decided The Pioneer Woman is nothing but BAD BAD news! How can recipes that are so bad for you look so good. I need to stay off of her website if I ever want to fit into my clothes!!

I also had a cooking-fest last weekend to make meals for the month. Last year I went to No Fuss Meals a few times to stock up on meals. They were delicious, but I learned a few good techniques for freezing and I started doing it myself.

I made a big pot of spaghetti sauce and turned it into lasagna, baked ziti and freezer bags of sauce. I like jarred sauce just fine but I LOVE my mom's spaghetti sauce recipe and it is so easy to make and freeze. I also figured out the perfect way to cook for our family...loaf pans. Whenever I make casseroles (baked ziti, lasagna, chicken and rice...whatever) I just split the recipe into loaf pans. They are deep too so they are perfect for lasagna. I make one that night and put one or two (depending on how much the recipes makes) in the freezer for later in the month.

It is the perfect amount of food for the three of us plus leftovers. I used to always make these things in 9x13 pans and we would end up either eating it for a week and wanting to gag if we ate it one more time or throwing it away.

I also took the mini-loaf pans and made an individual lasagna and baked ziti for my "microwave-only" cooking sister. I warned her of the dangers of metal in the microwave first though...I never know about her :-)

My only concern with this is the "anti-green" mentality of the disposable aluminum pans. I rinse them, crumple them and recycle them so I'm not a horrible anti-greenite but still. Does anyone have any other suggestions for going from freezer to oven?

Caution: Rant coming
If you are thinking wow...that is a lot of pasta, you are right. I have a houseful of annoyingly picky eaters. Neither Joe nor Zach like anything. Joe is a lost cause but I'm determined to win Zach over. Kaitlyn hasn't started eating anything that doesn't come out of a jar yet so we'll see how that goes. I mean seriously they don't eat vegetables, potatoes (except fries) or rice. What kind of people don't like mashed potatoes? They are like little piles of heaven. What the heck am I supposed to make????

They both do like meat though (except fish). So I make a lot of pasta and chicken and pasta and meat and pasta blah, blah, blah. On a semi-healthy note I use wholewheat pasta 95% of the time. The one good thing about pasta is it is totally easy to sneak veggies into it. I puree and finely chop all kind of veggies into the pasta sauces. My boys defintely get their fair share of lycopene from all of the tomato sauce.

I don't cater to them always. I try making things I know is on the no-no list but it is really hard to spend time cooking food that no one but you eats. Zach and Joe will both go to bed hungry rather than eating something not on their small list of "things I like to eat". I'm not about to start making different meals for everyone. I LOVE vegetables. I was a vegetarian for six years for goodness sakes. How did I go from Tofu Chili to these two!!!

I put veggies on Zach's plate every night though. Does that count? Can this have some sort of osmotic effect?

On a positive note, Joe may be picky but he is very nice about it. He could care a less if I actually cook dinner. He is perfectly content with cereal for dinner. I think dinner has to have a vegetable so that doesn't work for me but it is nice to know he doesn't expect me to limit my cooking to his likes.

Long time no post

I've been enjoying my freedom and playing with my little monkeys.

Kaitlyn is officialy mobile...very mobile!!! She doesn't want to sit down. She began a sorta crawl like thingee a few days before her sixth month birthday. I found her standing in her crib on her 6 and 1/2 month birthday. At seven months she is crawling completely and pulling herself up on everything...stationary or not. This has proven to be very dangerous! A few days ago she began moving around while holding onto the furniture in a very crude crusing maneuver. I'm completely and totally amazed by her strength.

I rememeber with Zach waiting and waiting and waiting for him to get the desire to move. He just wasn't interested. He took his sweet time. If he wanted a toy that he couldn't reach...he'd find something else. Kaitlyn on the other hand, that girl, is determined. She has no fear. If she wants to get something she will stop at nothing until she gets it. She has done a few kamikazee moves where she throws herself at the object forgetting the laws of gravity and the fact that she can't walk yet. She is tough though. She falls down cries and gets right back up. My guess is she will be walking before she is 9 months old. Zachary was 15 months.

I'm so curious to see the differences in all of our children. It seems the opposite is true for Corgan and Annabelle and Leah and Erin so it isn't necessarily a birth order thing or a gender thing but evidently its a kid thing :-)

We had a really great time visiting with all of the gang in April. It is so much fun to get together with everyone. I took a few pics but see the rest of the websites for some great pictures.

On a realted note, our thoughts and prayers are with the Konicki family.