winter cheer

Do you need a good dose of cheer?  How about some colorful pompoms? 

I made this myself.  Sometimes you just have to forget the kids and do something just for you.  Or maybe that's just me.

Anyway, the kids have been busy sledding and playing hide and seek around the house.

We have been making pompoms wrong for years.  We were trying to thread the piece of tying yarn through the tunnel of yarn wrapped around your hand.  Don't do that.   If you need a good tutorial, watch this video at MADE.  It's so easy!

Rainbow colors are so beautiful!

Tootsie pops are good for a winter pick-me-up, too!

one scary night

Valentine's Day over the years has been quite uneventful.  Maybe some heart shaped pancakes and handmade valentines.  With Juan Pablo in Bolivia this year, I thought I'd splurge and get the older children a small gift card to Target, and Diego received a square box of classic legos.  I thought this would be the highlight of the weekend.

But we got an unexpected call from Uncle Shep and Aunt Beth that they would like to come down from DC and take us out to dinner.

I'm not sure we've ever taken Carmen out to dinner!  She's pretty unpredictable at that hour and often has ants in her pants like most toddlers.

(Can you tell she has a wild streak?)

We decided to try and eat out early to beat the crowds since it was Valentine's Day, not to mention it was a Saturday night.  The closest we could get to early was 6pm.

(Here's the little wiggle worm.)

 (Fighting over desert.)

The appetizer of chips took forever to come.  Dinner was even longer.  We didn't get out of there until just before 8pm.  Aunt Beth had been checking the weather and mentioned there might be wind gusts,   but who's ever scared of a little wind?  The children busted out of the restaurant doors laughing as the wind whipped their hair in all directions.


(Getting ready to hit the road.)

We headed home in a packed minivan with me at the wheel, less than a ten minute drive to the house.

Or so we thought.

The first hint of a problem was a traffic light that was completely out.  As we crossed the reservoir, the usual glow of lights from neighborhoods across the water were gone.  Pitch black.  We  knew what that meant...no power.

But as we reached our street corner, notorious for dangerous crashes and downed power lines, a barely visible woman was walking down the middle of the street with a tiny flashlight.  She was alerting the few cars that a tree had fallen across the street and it was impassable.

No problem, we'd just turn around and come from the other direction.  It's a fairly skinny road, but thanks to the car's back-up camera, I managed to turn around without running off the road.

As we recrossed the bridge over the water and turned at the broken light, the wind was picking up.  Every now and then, I'd drive straight through a mini tornado of leaves swirling upward in front of me.

Across the bridge, I immediately spotted flares and a fire engine.  But I must have been blind because everyone else could see the ACTUAL FIRE on the side of the road.  Another tree had fallen on power lines and sparked a large semi-circle of fire along the edge of the road....and I was being directed to drive right by it!  I think by now, I had a death grip on the steering wheel, and my heart was definitely beating faster.

We continued on, maybe five minutes from the house.  Did I mention it was windy?  At one point, I gently stated, "I think I see snowflakes."  Everyone disagreed, thinking it was just stuff blowing from the trees.  Then Aunt Beth began to see them.

And the next SECOND, we were in the worst blizzard of snow I've. ever. driven. in.

Pinpoints of snow were speeding horizontally toward the windshield, and my eyes were tricking me, focusing on the tiny shoots of white, then seeing the darkened road ahead.  All of a sudden, a giant branch came crashing out of the sky onto our windshield and roof of the car.  Isabela and I screamed as loud as we could and Joaquin blurted out a few bad words.  There was no time to correct him as I tried to steady my breathing and stop my legs from shaking.  Aunt Beth was calming, reassuring everybody that we were fine and Uncle Shep was the meteorologist, advising us that the temperature had dropped 10 degrees since we left the restaurant minutes ago.  Visibility was near zero, the wind was getting worse and the snow was getting heavier.  We were seconds from the house, but I started to doubt whether we should keep driving or just pull over.  We all agreed to push on, not wanting to be trapped on the side of the road for any amount of time.

We roared up the driveway.  I told everyone to run inside as fast as they could.  (Our yard is famous for throwing down branches in any storm.)

Inside we were safe, but yes, the power was out.

Aunt Beth and Uncle Shep were doing their best to calm my freaking out children.  We looked for candles and then remembered the headlamp!  What were the chances?  They had given one to Joaquin that afternoon for Valentine's Day, and we had finally figured out the secret door for the batteries just before dinner.  Isabela strapped it on for most of the night.

(Can you tell those kids are scared?)

We played charades, convinced Shep and Beth not to venture out, and set up beds for everyone.  As we were getting the kids settled in for the night, I saw the faint glow of my bedroom light.  The electricity was back!

(Reading by flashlight.  It's blurry, but I'm no good at night photography.)

Oh, what a night it was.  We went through hurricane winds, mini tornados, fire, and blinding blizzard snow in a simple ten minute drive.

But then, Valentine's Day has always been about making memories with the ones you love.  Mission accomplished.

handmade valentines

The boys and I have been hard at work over the last several weeks.  Handmade valentines are not something you do the night before.

It all started with those {somewhat scary} dragon valentines.  Diego's been a little into dragons lately, so I thought it would be fun to make some out of hearts.  He added all those cool details, carefully and thoughtfully.

But he was done after two.  And there are twenty-two kids in his class.

So we decided to do lots of different animals as the 14th of February slowly approached....angler fish, crabs, snails, jellyfish...

...just a couple each day...giant squid, even a robot...

....mice and killer whales, too.

We strategically hot-glued a single tootsie roll onto each card...laughing when the mouse had to decide whether to eat the cheese or the tootsie roll and the crab was pinching his.

Joaquin's valentines were ninjas.  I made a little template for him to trace, but as he went along, he got more creative.  He decided to make some jumping, kicking, and even doing the splits!

They crack me up with the sugar stick as a weapon.

The important part of making your own valentines is using supplies you have on hand.  I don't think I've bought scrapbooking paper in years.  I'm just glad these were finally put to good use.

And by request, this year we decided to make special boxes for their valentines.  Joaquin wanted one that looked like a real mailbox so we based it off of this one from CampClem.

Isabela's in sixth grade now, so they don't do valentines.  But when she saw the boxes, she said, "Mom! I wish you would have made me one of those when I was in elementary school!"  (They had always decorated brown paper bags before.)

  This one is for Diego.... Toothless from How to Train Your Dragon.  Of course, he said, "Mom, we decorated brown paper bags in class today for our valentines."  He took it in anyway.

I hope they come home stuffed full with cards and candy. 

Happy Valentine's Day!

quinua con tocino y huevos

I have a very cool cookbook.  It was given to me by my mother-in-law early into my marriage.  I always planned on using it, but you know what happens to the best laid plans...many years of spaghetti, chicken tetrazzini, and tacos.

Our grocery store recently remodeled...it's now huge and wonderful-- and even has a bulk foods section, where you scoop out foods yourself...from chocolate covered peanuts to quinoa...and it costs a lot less.  I bought two cups of quinoa for about one dollar.

I had never eaten (or heard of) quinoa until I moved to Bolivia.  Now everyone has heard of it and probably tried it.  But it's just not the same as it is in Bolivia, where quinoa originates.  So I thought I'd go back to the source and try a quinoa recipe from my Bolivian cookbook.

This cookbook is the Betty Crocker cookbook of Bolivia.  I believe every family owns one and has memorized most of the recipes in it.  

The best part is that it's in Spanish, so just following a recipe is a language lesson in itself.  Notice the spelling of quinua...somewhere along the way, people started using an O instead of a U.  I pointed out to Joaquin that if you just add a J, quinoa can spell Joaquin.  He wasn't impressed.

I love the way the recipes are written.  There are no lists of ingredients or numbered steps, just descriptive paragraphs that are more than enough to get you cooking like you know what you are doing.

I decided to go with quinoa with bacon and eggs, since that's what I had on hand.  The recipe stated:

"Prepare la quinua como para la receta anterior."

I had to laugh.  But I went back to the previous recipe and read through it to figure out how to cook the quinoa.

The previous recipe started with:

"Dos tazas de quinua lavada como se indica."

What?? So I needed to read the introductory paragraphs to make sure I had washed the quinoa like it should be washed.

The irony of all that is that my quinoa really didn't need to be washed because it's already pretty clean somehow...no gritty sand.

But here's my quinoa, washed and ready to cook.

The best part of this cookbook is that it is full of little tidbits, like an abuela passing down her cherished recipe secrets. 

For example, she writes:

"La quinua tiene la particularidad de que se la cocina sin sal.  Si se pone sal, no revienta."

So don't put salt in your quinoa while it's cooking...wait until it has popped open.

But what made the quinoa taste so good was toasting it in butter before boiling it.  Juan Pablo likes to do this with rice, too.  I love the description in the recipe:

"Refría la quinua igual que el arroz para granear, que quede ligeramente toastada (suena como si estuviera reventando)."

And sure enough, I began to hear little pops, and I knew it was almost ready.

The next part was easy...cut up some bacon and fry until it's golden.

The author suggested:

"...en la manteca del tocino fría un huevo por persona."

Nothing is wasted...so I used the bacon grease to fry the eggs.

And here's the finished plate.  Now, I'm no food photographer, so it might not look that great, but Juan Pablo declared it even better than the quinoa that the cholita up the street brings him when he visits Bolivia.  Quite possibly the highest compliment he's ever paid me.

Here's Joaquin's plate mid-way through the meal.  The kids couldn't stop raving about it either.  This is one of those meals that would be good for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Let me know if you try it and how it turns out!

happy birthday to me

Did I forget to mention?

I had a birthday a few weeks ago and turned (ahem!) 40.  

My hairdresser (who's 22, by the way...is that even old enough to cut hair?) said I look no more than 32.  I thought that was a funny number to choose.

Joaquin wanted to make something special for me (well, really he wanted to spend our money to buy me something) but I suggested he make me something out of legos.

He carefully taped it up so little fingers wouldn't undo it.

So sweet....I was very impressed!

Isabela baked me some cupcakes.  She knows the way to her mom's heart.

Diego drew me an awesome picture with 40 presents on it....well, really there were 38, but who's counting here?

We had big plans to go out to eat at a Japanese Steakhouse.  But Carmen had another surprise waiting for my birthday. 

She threw up all over herself on the way to the restaurant!  Not a peep was heard.  No one knew until I said, "What's that smell?"

So we turned the car around and cleaned her up, cleaned the car seat, and I had to cook a last minute dinner.

That turned out to be egg rolls and fried rice.

And would you believe Juan Pablo threw up that night, too?  He blamed it on the egg rolls, but come on.

At least no one ended up in the hospital as in years past.  So... I say.... it was a great day spent with the ones I love.  What more could a girl ask for?

why my kids love school

Joaquin has been looking forward to Thursday all week.  At the end of the day, he gets to open his store of unwanted toys and make fake money to hopefully buy real cool toys at the auction held at the end of the year.

This was the conversation overheard in the car tonight:

JOAQUIN (in an excited, quickly talking, sing-songy voice):  Tomorrow's going to be SO fun! First, we'll have 30 minutes of science, then our spelling test, and then we have an assembly, and then....

ISABELA (interrupting):  Assembly?!! I hate assemblies...they are so boring!

JOAQUIN:  Well....at least we're not learning anything!!

welcome, new year!

I love the start of the new year!  I don't care if I don't complete any of my resolutions...I'm a dreamer and an idealist, so just making them makes me happy.



1.  This year, we will recycle.

So we're a little late to the party.  I always felt a pang of guilt when I saw everyone's curbside recyclables waiting to be picked up.  We care about the earth, we really do, so now we're going to participate.  We have our green arrow sticker on our extra trashcan, and we have a house full of cardboard ready to go.

Ugh! But why is it so hard?  Now I'm adding plastic applesauce and Nutella jars to my dishwashing load, that darn cream of mushroom soup can will not rinse clean, and now there's a paper bag of glass, paper tubes, and junk mail tripping us by the front door.

I've caught myself being lazy and throwing a pasta box into the trash, only to reach down minutes later and get it back, not willing to give up so soon on this do-able resolution.



2. This year, we will exercise {outside} more as a family.

I added the outside part because everyone knows Americans in general don't get outside enough.  Our favorite memories as a family are the ones of us doing:  Seeing the snake on our breakfast picnic; climbing Crabtree Falls and complaining the whole. way. up.; the great Bolivian trek.  More doing.  More family.



3.  This year, we will talk nicer.

In public, we're pretty nice to each other.  But in our house, it's a whole nother story.  (Wait, nother is not a word?)  Brothers call each other names, sisters whine and complain, Dad is sarcastic, and Mom is easily frustrated.  Talking nicer means no yelling.  Yelling is no fun...it hurts your throat, it hurts your ears, it hurts your spirit.  Even if you're yelling to someone in another room just so they can hear you, how hard is it to get up and talk to them face to face.  I say no more yelling.  (Of course, it's nap time, Dad's at work,  and the other kids are at school, so wow! this one is so easy!)  The Orange Rhino is a great place for inspiration on talking nicer.



4.  This year, we will earn more money.

The kids came up with this one, but it's a good one.  We saved and cut back till there's no more to cut.  Now it's time to up the ante.  My new job as a preschool fitness coach is only four hours a week, but it's been the jolt I needed to believe in myself again.  I tend to gravitate towards volunteer work.  It's always appreciated and I can stop when I want...but that doesn't put food on the table.  And we want more than food.  We want dessert, too!  The kids are brainstorming their first summer job ideas.  It's very exciting for them.  And I've got lots of ideas on the back burner...maybe I could write, maybe I could open an Etsy store?

5.  This year, we will learn to count to 200.

OK.  This was Diego's goal.  But I've been reading One Thousand Gifts, by Ann Voskamp, about the power of gratitude and living fully present.  Could our family be truly thankful 200 times a year?  That's about sixteen times a month.  Four times a week.  I think we should give it a go.

So these are our hopes for the new year.  If we can do all this, I think 2015 will be the best year yet.  Let's get started!



TAG...you're it!  What are your new year's resolutions?