Oh, Afton...

Schoolwork makes me laugh - Josh and Ben edition

I love Josh's confidence. He is important. And I can't think of a better reason to go to China than to become Emperor. 

And I was so impressed with Ben's illustration of "suspicious." How did he know to do the eyes like that? The hand on the chin? The desperation in the accused's expression?

Mario Snack bags for Andy

Happy birthday to Andy a couple weeks ago. He had a rockin' Mario party. It seemed like theme-inspired snack bags were the way to go for his gift.

This one was double-sided...

...see?

Afton sans siblings

It has been interesting watching Afton react to being home without her brothers or sisters for a few hours each day. She reminds me a bit of me when I was little, the way she likes to play. I used to spend hours in my room playing with the little dollhouse and the little people. At some point I would always line the people up, snaking them around the room. Afton likes to spend some quality time with the little people also. (She includes the robots and ponies too.) For about the first two weeks of school, Afton made a new arrangement of all her things lined up on the floor every single day.

Scott = Awesome

Remember how Scott was all like, "Yeah, I've never really done any running before but I just went and busted out 8 miles. Whatever." Oh that guy.
So Saturday we ran in a 5k with some of our fellow Ragnar team members. I made it in just under 29 minutes which I was excited about (broke through the 10-minute mile barrier--good for me!). And Scott? What did Scott do? Oh, just placed third in his age group. Just brought home a medal, that's all. Just ran that steep-hill-infused 3.1 mile course in about 23 1/2 minutes. Who is this guy??

A treat so delicious they were eaten before I thought to take a photo - S'more Truffles

For Lydia's birthday this week (hello, five-year-old) she requested oreo truffles instead of a cake. Wonderful choice. As I was nearing the end of my truffle-dipping I realized I'd have a good portion of melted milk chocolate left over. I would never, ever let good chocolate go to waste, so I started thinking about what else I could dip in it. Graham crackers came immediately to mind, then I remembered the bag of huge campfire marshmallows sitting in the pantry and the rest wrote itself. While I finished up the oreo truffles I asked the kids to smash up a sleeve of graham crackers and bring me the marshmallows. I was thinking bite-sized, so I sliced the jumbo marshmallows into four discs each (key to slicing marshmallows: wet knife). Then I dipped each slice in the chocolate and rolled it in the graham cracker crumbs. They were de-lic-ious. They looked cute too, wish I'd thought to take a photo before they were gobbled up. I'll be making them again.

How to encourage your darling children to kindly put their dishes in the dishwasher

Step One: Find a photo of yourself in a threatening pose taken by your eleven-year-old the night before she left for Washington DC (if you don't have one feel free to use mine, I can scare any kid straight).

Step Two: Add some threatening text.

Step Three: Place threatening reminder by the sink in hopes that your kids will realize you mean business and are sick of telling them in person.