Double Trouble

Ella loves looking through her baby book, especially now that Sophie is part of our family. I’ll mention to her, as I’m feeding Sophie, that when she was a baby she loved sweet potatoes, and then I’ll show her the picture of her grinning in her high-chair, covered in orange mush. Or I’ll point out one where she’s wearing the outfit that Sophie now fits in to. She loves the idea that she was a baby once, and rushes to the book any time I mention anything “baby” related. I wore those jammies when I was a baby, Momma! I was in your belly when I was a baby! I could sit up when I was a baby – let’s find my picture!

It’s kind of adorable that she gets so excited about the concept, and I love looking at the old pictures just as much. Maybe it’s a mom thing – Tom’s not that in to it, but I could look at them every day. You never get that time back, so it’s fun to reminisce. And I’ve noticed, more and more, that Ella and Sophie look a lot alike. Ever since Sophie’s hair turned blonde (which we knew would happen as soon as she was outside for more than a minute) the similarities have become more apparent. They are still obviously individuals – Sophie’s Princess Personality is nothing like Ella’s Laidback Legacy (as a baby – as a toddler, not so much). But there have been more and more times when I’m looking through recent pictures, that I go back to Ella’s baby book and see an almost identical image in Sophie’s Big Sister. It’s probably a good thing that we live in a different house now, or I might not be able to tell the difference in the future – especially since they’ve shared so much clothing.

Take this shot, for instance – a picture of Tom and Ella:

And here, a picture of Tom and Sophie, wearing the same sleeper (although she’s wearing it about 6 months before Ella did – that kid has Schroeder height genes for sure):

And then there’s this one of Ella:

That looks pretty similar to this one of Sophie:

I know they aren’t really identical, but with the way Sophie is growing, she’s going to catch up to Ella and people are going to mistake them for twins. I’m thinking Halloween next year will be the perfect time to dress them up as Thing 1 and Thing 2. Porter can be the Cat in the Hat.

Amish Country=Good Times

We’ve been working on our little foyer for a few weeks now, and it’s almost done. The painting was officially finished today with (hopefully) the last touch-up.  The light fixture has been ordered, and I have a pretty good idea of what I want on the wall – we just needed a new entry way table to complete the transformation. The one we’ve been using is actually an old, broken computer desk, and it’s not old and broken in a cool way either. So we headed down to Intercourse to pick one up at an Amish run furniture shop that I’ve browsed several times in the past.

And you can’t go to Amish Country without learning something new…

• If you tell a toddler she has to whisper because Daddy is on a work-phone-call, she will scream, “Daddy is NOT working – he’s IN THE CAR!”
• Sophie may need to trade Princess Ladybug, as her nickname, to Don Quixote – she had quite the conversation with some miniature windmills.
• Forget plastic deer for your yard, how about a plastic horse? I’m still not sure what that was all about.
• In Lancaster County, you can live on a farm, and also be within 100 yards of a Target. I’m so jealous.
• The day you forget to bring an extra outfit, and two extra diapers for your baby, is the day you’ll need them. Luckily, Sophie can wear Ella’s diapers without too much adjusting. (I know, right? She’s a chub.)

And last, but definitely not least,

• When singing Love Shack, at the top of your lungs with your husband and 2-year-old, pink spatulas make the best microphones.

Broken Record

I feel like every time I talk about a home improvement project I automatically add the phrase “it’s done – for now.” Because it’s true. Our bedroom has mirrored doors on the closet that I’m not a fan of, in fact, all the doors could stand to be updated. There are crafty projects sitting in my head that are waiting to be added to both of the girls’ rooms, the hall bathroom needs a new vanity, mirror, and updated floor tiles. The list goes on, but I think you get the point. And I’m fully aware, as this is our second home, that there is ALWAYS a project on deck, or five. Especially when we try to avoid using credit at all costs – it means things like replacing that teal vanity will just have to wait until higher priority items are accomplished.

One of the reasons I fell in love with this house – that was not my dream house, but ended up instantly feeling like home – was the beautiful gardens. Three large, well-manicured beds in the front yard, one on each side, and two more in back. On the day of closing, we were chatting with the owner’s son who revealed the reason for the large beds – turns out he was in charge of mowing the lawn so when they designed the gardens he kept sneaking the line they had for the border out further and further. Tom was nervous about the amount of work they would take, but I felt like I was in heaven.

At the time, I didn’t really know what was planted, and where. It was Fall and a lot of the plants had already died back and been mulched over. Therefore, each month since early Spring has been a surprise. Tulips, Daffodils, Peonies, Black-eyed Susans, and Lilies, have all arrived, pushing up through the mulch to create a 3-season garden. Beautiful. Except I can’t leave well enough alone. I found my love of gardening at our first home in Utah, and I wasn’t about to stop and be happy with what I had.

I’m not planning on replacing everything – I’m very happy with over half of what we have. But there are plants that I love, that I want to be a part of my garden (like the whirling butterflies I put into my mailbox planter, and the hens and chicks I planted near our walk-way). There are definitely some that I want to remove as well (the roses that are prone to disease, the ugly evergreen bushes that house multitudes of spiders) and of course I also wanted to add a vegetable garden, something that wasn’t already in place.

With Tom’s help (despite his worrying, he loves gardening almost as much as I do – at least when it produces edible results) we got the vegetable garden in, and he built 2 rain barrels to harvest the abundant East-coast-rain-fall for my potted plants and the rare dry-week. I tried (and am still trying) to restrain myself from coming home with the entire nursery, and instead focused on a few key areas. We ripped out an insane amount of ivy out of our front bed that was choking out everything else, and there was a gaping hole left to fill. That was main goal. And I’m happy to say that I got a lot of it done. The bed won’t be finished until next year when we attack the ugly evergreen bushes, but it’s close. I also ripped out a disease-ridden rose and replaced it with a clematis, planted a few strawberries, added some low-maintenance perennials in each of the other beds, and Tom cleared out a small bed on the side of our house to make room for squash, cucumber, and pumpkin plants.

I have to say that I was so thrilled with the idea of gardening here. There is real soil in the ground, very few rocks, and abundant rain. It was going to be so much easier than rigging irrigation systems and trucking in soil. Right. I’ve become so frustrated that I’m longing for the days when water was my biggest problem. Turns out that lots of rain and humidity=black spot on your tomatoes and peppers. I managed to keep it at bay for a long time by spraying the plants with liquid copper, but while the peppers have rallied, the tomatoes are pretty much gone. We did get a good crop the last two months but it was just sad watching everything wilt away, and I neglected them too much when I got distracted with other projects.

The tomatoes weren’t the only casualty – my squash, cucumbers, and pumpkins were killed by either a bug or virus or both. We got a decent crop of squash and cucumbers before they died, but not one single pumpkin. And the bugs. The bugs! I couldn’t even stand to be outside on humid days because of them. I kept thinking I must have looked like Pig Pen, from Charlie Brown – only my cloud wasn’t dirt, it was gnats. The mold is super fun to deal with as well. Turns out I’m allergic (although it’s mild) – something I never noticed in Utah. Plus, as an added bonus, we have a whole slew of critters that like to steal, chew, and destroy. Bunnies, groundhogs and squirrels, oh my!

But! I have hope. Next year will be better. I am determined. I found out, much too late, that my neighbor is an organic gardening expert. I’ve already decided on several new attack plans based on his advice. It will also be easier to get things started next Spring since we won’t have a newborn to take care of. I’m very excited for the possibilities and steeled for the challenges.

Check out flickr for more detailed pictures – I’ve added notes on most of them, showing what we’ve done and still plan to do.

Currently Reading

Fargo Rock City, by Chuck Klosterman

As a high-schooler, I used to belt out Queen’s “Somebody to Love” in the shower with great conviction – I really, really wanted a boyfriend. When I was 20, I sat in my car and sang along to Dixie Chicks – the line “now my sense of humor needs a break” – I felt it was written for me. There were so many songs that I related to – that I felt were my story. That feeling is not what this book is about.

In Fargo Rock City, Chuck Klosterman describes how un-rock-n-roll his life was, and how this was the exact reason he loved heavy metal. Heavy metal was nothing like his life – it was everything he wanted it to be. Cool, dangerous – hard core. He goes into great detail, analyzing bands and specific songs, but his core message is that the best way to enjoy metal is to keep it simple – love it for what it is – fun, raunchy music that you can rock out to.

A lot of the book was completely beyond me. I hadn’t even heard of a quarter of the bands, and even the ones I’d heard of – maybe half of them were ones I’d listened to. But I still enjoyed it. I laughed out loud several times, I got very excited to see the Cure referenced, and I had some nice nostalgic moments (Damn Yankees’ “Can You Take Me High Enough” was another shower favorite, as well as Extreme’s “More Than Words”).

My favorite part of the book is his take on the differences between men and women and the way they each love music.  The basic idea all boils down to men being more analytical and women being more emotional. That a guy loves everything about music – the culture, the background, the details – but women will throw their entire soul into one song – they love it because it speaks to them. He says all of this in a semi-apologetic way, not wanting to offend any females by possible insinuating that men are, as he puts it, “better” at liking music. I don’t take offense to this at all. I agree whole-heartedly. I love so many songs by the Cure, but I have no desire to own every album they’ve ever made. If I don’t like that particular material, I won’t waste my time on it. And I don’t feel that I’m a disloyal fan in any way. I think he nailed it on the head, and it’s the reason I really liked the book but Tom and Colt (my cousin, who recommended it) probably loved it.

I had no plans to read this book – it was a gift for Tom, and he insisted I pick it up after he was done. Despite that, I would recommend it to any fan of heavy metal music, even if it was only on the perimeter of your musical library.

Next up: The Lost Symbol, by Dan Brown

She’s Going To Be One Of THOSE Girls?

Blonde hair, big brown eyes and a captivating grin. A combination that’s guaranteed to please. If that combo is paired with an escaping giggle and a shy duck behind her hands? Apparently a spell is woven and the inflicted is compelled to hand over whatever is within reach. Sometimes it’s just a barrage of compliments, sometimes a sticker, a lollipop, or a scrawled happy face on the back of a receipt. Once it happened to be a candy bar from the attendant at a gas station, and most impressively, once it was a small blue bag from a certain store on 5th Ave.

The most recent incident occurred at our local vegetable stand. Said angel was desperately pleading for a pumpkin. I had denied the request, telling her we could come back in a week or two and pick out several to decorate the front porch. The denial led to a desperate shriek, and this little angel put her hands up to her cheeks, opened her eyes as wide as possible and whimpered, looking straight at the 19-year-old boy running the stand. “Buuuut Momma – I need a pumpkin!” You’ll never guess what happened next.

Risotto With Roasted Vegetables

Risotto is NOT hard. It’s NOT time consuming. There is NO cream in it (that’s just the starchy wonderfulness of the rice). It IS delicious, easy, and impressive enough to be Company Food. I was intimidated by it for a long time – up until about a year and a half ago, to be exact. I had seen an episode of Good Eats where Alton made risotto – and it seemed easy, but I was skeptical, and hadn’t bothered to try the recipe. But then, Tom and I had dinner at a wonderful little restaurant in the tiniest town, in the middle of New York. I had the risotto, with roasted vegetables. It was fantastic. Fan-tastic, people. So much so, that I decided right then and there that I would need to try and duplicate it.

When I came home, I looked up some recipes, and settled on one of Rachel Ray’s 30-minute meals. Alton would probably be horrified that I turned to Ms. Yum-o, but he himself said it was about the “method,” not the recipe. In fact, I didn’t even use more than the first 3 steps of her recipe at the time – although I tried it later (it’s a “drunken risotto” made with wine) and it is delicious.

My point is, once you realize how easy and simple the process is, you can do anything with it. It can be a simple side dish, or the main event. Here’s what I came up with as a copy-cat for the version I had in NY:

Risotto With Roasted Vegetables

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS

• 1 1/2 cups arborio rice (if you can’t find arborio – just use short grain, it’s basically the same thing)
• 4-6 cups chicken or veggie stock/broth (in other words, make sure you have a little extra on hand)
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 medium onion, chopped fine (red or yellow)
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped fine
• salt and freshly ground pepper
• 1 cup Parmesan cheese, freshly grated

And that’s it for the basic risotto – but to make my version add:

• 1 medium yellow squash
• 1 medium zucchini
• 7-10 shitake mushrooms (stems discarded)
• 1/2 bunch of asparagus (bottoms trimmed)
• 1 red or green bell pepper

All chopped, to a relatively uniform size. I usually do them in 1 inch chunks. The mushrooms are the only exception, I tend to cut them in long, but skinny slices. (Obviously the veggies and the amount you use can be tailored to your taste and what looks good at the store. You’ll notice in my pictures I only had zucchini, asparagus and peppers – and I was making it for 2 people, so it’s scaled back.)

DIRECTIONS

• Preheat oven (for veggies) to 425
• In a small saucepan, heat the broth/stock over medium-low heat. (Start with 3-4 cups and just keep an extra can/box nearby, adding if needed.)

• In a large skillet, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the onion and garlic, season with salt and pepper and cook for a couple of minutes to soften. Add the rice, stir to coat and cook for 1 minute, until it starts to look translucent.

• Add 2 ladles of warm broth, stir, and leave alone! Once the liquid has been almost completely absorbed, add another ladle or two, stir, and let absorb.

• Dump veggies on to a cookie sheet, spray lightly with cooking oil (I prefer olive oil, but canola works too) and season with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Stir them around, and make sure all sides are coated, spraying again if necessary. Put in oven, on the second to lowest rack position, for approximately 10-15 min, turning veggies over, midway.

• Continue to add stock as necessary to the risotto.
• While the risotto and veggies are cooking, get out your cheese and grate approx. 3/4 cup. This is not the time to use the pre-shredded, flavorless stuff – it does make a difference, trust me. (Don’t forget to stir your veggies at this point!)

• Using a paring knife, or vegetable peeler, shave off several curls of cheese, approx. 1/4 cup worth.
• Once the risotto hits the 15-18 minute mark – taste it. You’re looking for an al dente texture – creamy and rich, but a little bit of bite left. Soggy risotto is not good risotto. This is the point you may need additional broth – add as necessary until you obtain the right texture.
• Pull the veggies once they are nicely caramelized.

• Once the risotto is done, remove from heat, and add the veggies and grated cheese. Stir to combine.

• Dish up in large bowls, top with shaved cheese.

Enjoy.

I Doubt He Meant That Particular Shade

As I’m changing Sophie’s diaper, Ella climbs up on the side of the crib to get a better view of the changing table…

Ella: Mommy, is Sophie poooopy? Ew!

Mommy: Yes, Ella. Sophie is poopy, and it is definitely ewww-y.

Ella: What color is Sophie’s poop?

Mommy: It’s mostly green.

Ella: Green poop? Green is Daddy’s favorite color!

Suspicions Confirmed

Tom’s sister left this morning after a brief visit on her way back to Wisconsin from accompanying her sister-in-law who was dropping off her daughter at school in Massachusetts. She brought her 3 month old, Penny, along for the very long ride. I can’t say that we did anything out of the ordinary since they were only here for 2 days, but I did get lots of cuddling in with my newest niece and of course great conversation, including several stories about Tom and what a pain-in-the-butt he was as a kid (always entertaining).

Terri had mentioned how big Penny was getting and that she had obtained some new fat rolls recently. I had a sneaking suspicion that not only did she not have anything on our Chub McChub, but that Sophie may in fact see Penny as a delicious snack. I was right.

I believe her exact words were, “mmmm….tastes like cheese…”

It Takes Green To Be Green

We moved in to this house in December. A month later I received our first gas bill. $300. Just in gas. No other utilities. We have an electric stove and dryer so it was costing us $300 just to warm our home and water. After picking myself up from the ground, where I had fallen over in sheer disbelief, I walked straight to the thermostat and pushed the down button 6 times. We were pretty cold the rest of the season, but it was bearable, if uncomfortable. Unfortunately the bill didn’t go down that much. We knocked about $100 off, but since we never went above $100, even in the coldest months, at our old house, it was still a painful bill.

The oh-so-funny part is that when we bought this house it was touted as “energy efficient.” The windows had been replaced just a few years ago! Right. The upstairs windows had been replaced and are very nice, but there were two older windows downstairs, and the front and back door, along with a sliding glass door were all extremely inefficient. The back door wasn’t even an “outside” door – it was just hollow wood, the same thing we have for every room inside the house. When you walked past it, you could actually feel a breeze. The sliding glass door was almost as bad, along with the fact that it stuck every time you tried to open and close it (which somehow didn’t happen when we were shown the house). The front door had a storm door that seemed to keep most of the air inside, but it was still perceivably cold to the touch and there were cracks in the wood base where you could see sunlight streaming in, during the day.

So Tom and I made the decision, once we confirmed that we’d be getting a tax refund, to have the doors, plus one basement window (the one that had a crack) replaced. We did research and finally decided on making the plunge to get the best. We’ll get a tax credit next year on everything but the sliding glass door (turns out the credit doesn’t apply to a full-glass door) but it still managed to almost completely wipe out our savings.

The kids probably won’t be able to go to college, but they also won’t have to risk frostbite this winter to try and control the gas bill. Toes are a much better benefit than a bachelor’s degree anyway.

(It didn’t occur to me to take “before” pictures  until after they had started replacing everything. All the “after” pictures, plus an old one I found of the front door can be found on flickr.)

6 Months

Sophie had her six-month check up yesterday. She got a clean bill of health, 3 vaccinations, and a lot of cooing from the doctor. We confirmed that she is chubby (didn’t see that one coming), that there’s still a possibility she won’t have to hem all her pants, and after having my finger grabbed and shoved in her mouth (by Sophie, not the doctor), that she had cut her first tooth that morning, and another is on its way.

Length: 26 1/4″ (68%)

Weight: 18.48 lbs (87%)

Cuteness: Off the charts