Life Lately

 I spend SO MUCH TIME complaining about how busy we are, but really? This year’s schedule has been SO EASY to slide into. I complain A LOT about our middle school start and end times (9am-4:25 pm— what the hell), but! Dorothy and Coop leave for the bus the same time I need to take Minnie to school (which is the VERY MOST PERFECT TIME for me to leave for campus), and we don’t even have to RUSH in the morning. A month-ish in, and we are VERY HAPPY and can even open the windows to enjoy the perfect warm fall weather without fearing that our neighbors will hear civil war sounds.

No, those ARE happy faces (they are a tween and teen respectively).

Morning bustling:

Minnie LOVES to putter around with crafts or even leftover papers from school in the morning

She has also been wearing some ideal fits, including her flower girl dress

The evening pick ups are… hectic. That’s maybe one time of day that I am just not loving it. But! I did not expect to love it. Right now, since the weather is so good, we are doing lots of dance studio picnics. And! Since the dishwasher is broken (THIRD TIME IN FOUR YEARS), we have actually been just eating wherever we can that’s not home.

I had to take the girls with me to drive diving friends home on Thursday, which is usually Ben’s job, but he had to be on his campus for a meeting and didn’t come home until Friday. So! We paired the outing with ice cream— so fun!

Speaking of Ben— his campus is gorgeous!

A few more random tidbits:

Car pool faces

Oriental Trading Company— WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE??

These darling mugs are WORTH an early wake time

Toy catalogs are commmmmming!!! Minnie wants a Barbie Dream House- first kid since Jack to ask for it (Jack actually wanted—- and got— the MALIBU dream house, but it did not survive for his little sister to enjoy)

Oh, fall! I love it with an Anne Shirley kind of exaggeration.

YES TO ALL THE COOKIES YOU GUYS.

Look at these cute little LUNCH PACKERS— doing it the night before even

HOCO kid— he went with the same smart funny group of friends he has been hanging out with since middle school, including a girl down the street who was in every single one of his elementary school classes. It’s too cute, really. He’s too cute, really.

Dance mom deets, new cookie bar recipe, midweek hum-drum stuff

 

When you are shopping with a 3-year-old who is pushing her own tiny cart, you buy a particular kind of impulse item.

Also we had to take a break on a bench after we checked out yesterday because she was REALLY HUNGRY FOR MY COOKIE. MY TUMMY IS SO HUNGRY.

She dressed herself, by the way, and I am loving her style POV. (I mean, she picked out her clothes— still needed help with the shirt and tights).

We mainly just go to the store for Valentine sugar cookies these days because Minnie is super into them, and then the other kids eat them, too, and then Minnie asks for one, and we start all over again.

I was really feeling my new $3 jeans— until Minnie asked if I had a baby in my tummy. Honestly,I should have bought a size down, but they are final sale, so **shrug**’

The waist is like under the boobs high, and they get SUPER STRETCHED OUT— I forgot how stretched out non-stretch jeans get by the end of the day. But. Guys. $3.

A fellow dance mom showed me how to use a topsy tail to wrap hair around a ponytail holder without using bobby pins or hairspray (Dorothy had 2 dances that call for high ponies with the hair tie covered by hair, and last year, I would make the ponytail and leave a piece of hair out to wrap around and be pinned in place, but this was always kind of fraught and would sometimes be loose by the end of a dance and then required so much hairspray that it would be hard to change her hair to a different style for a different dance. This year, she has 3 high pony numbers and 2 bubble braid low pigtail dances, plus one double Dutch braid routine— depending on scheduling at competitions, she could need a new ‘do for each dance, so a lower hairspray option is awesome).

(You just make a pony like normal and then choose a small section to wrap around the tie. When you are done wrapping, thread that section through the big loop of a topsy tail and use the device to pull the hair under the wrap and band, back into the pony.)

Now I just need to work on gettin the ponytail IN THE CNETER OF HER HEAD, which is hard when she is constantly moving. (Also the style sheet says it needs to be SLICKED BACK, which this one is obviously not).

Minnie is Very Into making Valentines now and has developed an interest in greeting cards more generally. She was OVER THE MOON to get a Valentine in the mail from her Florida grandparents and is so excited to send the one in return—- it’s pretty adorable.

I made the most awesome cookie bars the other day! I didn’t feel like making actual cookies, but I was dying for something ridiculously sweet, so I made up this little gem of a recipe:

1 stick butter, softened to room temp (I throw it in the microwave for 20 seconds on defrost)

1 cup peanut butter (I use a particular store brand that is super cheap for baking, and when I bought a jar of it years ago, Be asked WHY DID YOU BUY THE PORN PEANUT BUTTER, and I honestly have not looked at him the same way since)

1 1/4 c brown sugar 

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla

(Mix these together)

 (In another bowl)

1 tsp baking soda

1tsp baking powder

2 tsp corn starch 

2 1/2 c flour

(Whisk these together. Add to mixture and mix until combined)

1 cup butterscotch chips

1 cup M&Ms

(Mix in gently)

(Bake in parchment-lined glass baking dish (mine was 9X11) at 350 for 15-17 mins)

So chewy! So perfect! Not super pretty, but SUPER DELISH

Cheers!

Adulting, whining about adulting, DIY preschool Valentines

 Well, after publishing an ambitious February list, I am here to tell you that I have done NOTHING on that list despite devoting some serious time to admin tasks.

(It always takes me SO LONG to do the simplest tasks because I can never find things like stamps or my checkbook).

 I did pay some super annoying medical bills from last year that Ben’s FSA card didn’t cover because he switched jobs and mine also didn’t cover because it started 1-1. **shakes fist at badly time December illness** Also! When I first started working at the university, health care was TOTALLY FREE for employees. We still have good insurance (5 childbirths with ZERO out of pocket costs, for example), but things started to creep up— first monthly premiums, then co-pays, now max out of pocket expenses and co-insurance, and it is all the sudden $45 to go to urgent care and be swabbed for all of the things. 

I also paid for the boys’ AP tests (every year when I make that payment I get pre-emptively pissed at them for not getting college credit, but then they do— but I probably just jinxed this year’s tests LOL), sent in my check for Harry’s super embarrassing yearbook tribute (**rubs hands together like a cartoon villain**), and sent a message to my doc asking her to order all labs before my check up so we can discuss the results.

Very adult-y things.

I also looked at my list and thought about dong stuff, so that counts.

I kind of don’t want to schedule a massage until after my mammogram next week because what if I need a follow up and it seems like I am the topping fate to fill the rest of my calendar that week, you know? IT MAKES SENSE IN MY HEAD.

Anyway, apropos of nothing, Minnie an I made the cutest preschool Valentines last week after school. SO easy! Less than $20! (Would be even cheaper if you had envelopes lying around, but we did not) And so darling!

I took a bunch of pics of her in this fancy Costco dress she insisted on buying but never wants to wear:

And made my faves into a collage with the Layout app, which I printed at Walgreens for 40% off because Walgreens always has a photo coupon

Her teacher sent home a photo roster for class so we could have access to everyone’s names and suggested sticking the pictures on our valentines so kids could pass them out independently. One pack of A6 envelopes and a roll of heart stickers later, we had the cutest v-day cards