Sugar and Vinegar

I just put this into the oven:

Mom's Easy Mix Chocolate Cake (Not my mom, my former visiting teacher's mom)
3 cups flour
2 cups sugar
6 tablespoons cocoa
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons salt
12 tablespoons melted butter or margarine
2 tablespoons white vinegar
2 teaspoons vanilla

Mix (with electric mixer) all above ingredients - adding 2 cups of water and mixing well.
Pour into 9x13 pan or 24 cup cakes.
Bake at 350 degree oven for 25 minutes.

Notice what it doesn't have? Eggs. And because of the vinegar, I don't even have to come up with a substitute. This comes out very much like a red velvet cake, except it looks like a regular old chocolate cake on the outside.

Happy Family Home Evening treat to us!

The Reading Lesson

Peter is reading the dictionary. And Cooper is repeating everything Peter says.

Sweet and Low

I've been craving doughnuts, which I can't eat, because the sugar would seriously mess me up. So I've been thinking about making my own. I found some baked doughnut recipes online that I'm tempted to try, but I was wondering, do any of you have good doughnut recipes? Or recipes for things that are similar to doughnuts? Or things that are low in sugar but high in delicious?

I just want something sweet, and my juice-sweetened popsicles aren't cutting it.

Sunny Side Up

Last year the boys and I went on a walk almost every weekday morning. We would meet other moms and kids and walk around our complex four or five times, then the kids would play at the park for a while. It was nice. I miss it.

There are a few reasons we don't do it anymore. One is that our ringleader (hi friend, in case you're reading this post) has a fairly new baby. I know it's tough during that stage to be anywhere at a specific time because schedules are still being determined. It's even harder to organize your friends and neighbors into a walking group. No one else has volunteered to take over. Including me.

Another reason is that my very tall, first-born has outgrown my beautiful double stroller. The last time he rode in it he took great pleasure in sticking his feet between the seat and the footrest, acting as a human brake. We're afraid he's going to hurt himself, so Peter doesn't ride in the stroller anymore. The timing is good because the stroller will have a new occupant soon. But it's hard to go on a walk for exercise when I can't strap both boys in and go. I would have Peter ride his bike, but he's outgrown that too.

I think the final reason is that we went from winter to summer in the course of about a week. It's just now gotten nice enough to go walking.

Why am rambling on about walking? Well, we would go early enough that we wouldn't get burnt, but that much daily exposure sun-kissed our skin just the right amount. When we would go out in the afternoons, our chance of sunburn was greatly diminished, because we'd already had a little sun.

This is on my mind because yesterday the boys and I went on an almost two hour walk. We played at two different parks, bounced a ball, tossed a Frisbee, and all came home with sunburns. Even Cooper, who has Bryan's hard-to-burn complexion, is slightly more than sun-kissed pink. Peter is worse, I'm glowing. Maybe that's why pregnant women are said to have a glow, because some hormonal change makes them more susceptible to the hostile effects of the sun.

Or maybe I just burn easily.

The Secret Garden

Our big garden is having some trouble. Good thing we have a little garden too. We got the idea a few months ago. What if we put a garden on our little patio, just for small things like herbs that we use often? It would save space in the big garden and then I wouldn't have to trek to pick basil for dinner.

After some research, Bryan found this idea for a gutter garden. We decided to try it. The boys loved watching Bryan saw and drill to get the gutters to the right size and the drainage holes in appropriate places. Much brainstorming was needed to figure out how to attach the gutters to our patio fence, but I think Bryan did a great job putting it all together.

The boys and I planted in it a few weeks ago and we're beginning to see some progress. Radishes, basil, cilantro and green onions (I think, I forgot to label as a I planted) are starting to poke through the dirt. We're waiting on oregano, lettuce, and celery.


It's nice to know that something is growing.

My Colorful Soapbox

I've been thinking a lot about my wrestle with pink. Here's the conclusion I've come to:

So what?

Who cares if I don't like pink? To quote Tevye "Would it spoil some vast, eternal plan" if I don't like pink?

Nope.

So, I don't like pink. I also don't like peas. Or mangoes (the only fruit I don't like, actually). Those are my tastes. I have a friend (who reads this blog) that doesn't like watermelon. I could eat it everyday and be perfectly happy. Our opinions are different, and that's okay.

I think my daughter will still manage to be a balanced, well-rounded woman, regardless of my feeling for a particular color.

And what if she loves pink? Great. I hold no illusions that she'll be just like me. She might hate the color red, want to only wear pink, consume lots of peas, and select mangoes as her fruit of choice.

And that's just fine.

We Need More Legos

How To Be a Superhero

You need:

• a cape, preferably one made out of an old t-shirt
• gloves for your hands, or your brother's Lightening McQueen socks on your hands if gloves cannot be procured
  
• a place to run
• someone to run with
  

Cooper and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Week

Cooper has had a rough week.

It might be because he has quite a large head and is rather top heavy. It might be because he has an older brother. It might be because he bleeds and bruises easily.

Maybe it's a combination of all three.

Last Thursday, in a burst of anger, Peter threw a wooden train at Cooper. Cooper has an awesome bruise and a small cut on his forehead. He was fine within ten minutes, but the mark remains. Bryan asked his mom if he and his brothers ever did anything like that (throwing the train, not bleeding from their heads). Her response was intensely comforting: "All the time."

Later that same day Cooper accidentally got his head mildly squished in the front door. Again, he was fine within minutes, but we did check for a concussion before he went to bed that night.

On Sunday when Bryan went to retrieve Cooper from nursery he had to watch from behind the mass of parents there to pick-up their own children as a little boy had his knee in Cooper's back and was shoving Cooper's head into the ground. Bryan broke through the pack and came to the rescue. I found out about it when a shocked Bryan exited the nursery room holding Cooper. Bryan looked at me and said, "I just scolded someone else's child."

On Monday we went to a fancy science themed park for Family Home Evening. It was all fun and games until Cooper tripped going down some stairs, which resulted in a bleeding lip and a smashed (although not broken) nose. Bryan stopped the bleeding (Bryan takes care of most of the injuries) and Cooper eagerly went back to play for another fifteen minutes.

Yesterday Cooper was climbing on some furniture while I was hurriedly making dinner. Peter saw him and, in an effort to keep him safe, pulled Cooper from the wooden chair. Cooper fell and bit both the inside of his cheek and the side of his tongue.

The bruises are piling up. I've been considering my options. I can either wrap him in blankets and pillows like the stay-puff marshmallow man, or I can remove all furniture from his room and insist that he only play with stuffed animals.

I don't think either of those are practical.

Recall

This is probably old news to many of you, but I thought I should spread the word that Tylenol is doing a voluntary recall. You can read more about it here.

Bryan and I both get email notifications about all mandatory recalls, but because this one is voluntary I didn't get an email about it. (At least, I assume that's why it wasn't included.)

Between Peter's growing pains and Cooper's head injuries (he's had a rough week and has the bruises to prove it) we go through a lot of acetaminophen at our house, and it's usually Tylenol. We even have some of the recalled products sitting in our medicine basket high atop our fridge.

Do you?