This Week

This has been such a nice week.  On Monday we did something really great.  I’m not sure what it was, but I’m sure it was really great.  I do remember what we did in the evening when Brian got home.  We ate meatloaf and sweet potoato fries for dinner and then we all had family home evening. 

We read a conference talk about faith by Elder Russell M Nelson of the quorum of the 12 apostles.  It was a wonderful talk and after we read it, we discussed it.  I especially liked the fact that Elder Nelson quoted the prophet, President Monson’s words, “The future is as Bright as your Faith.”  I love that quote because it teaches us not to fear the future, but have faith and everything will be all right.  After that we bought ice cream and went to Barnes and Noble to buy a book

Tuesday morning I dropped Miriam and Katrina off at the church for girl’s camp.  They were there till yesterday afternoon, so during the day it was just me and Matt and Thomas at home for a few days.  I don’t know about them, but I loved it.  At home, we worked on projects; Thomas on making a drinking cup out of a coconut he bought himself at the grocery store, me on painting little scenes of Oregon on sand dollars to give our friends Rich and Luann as a thank-you gift for being such wonderful hosts and tour guides and company when we were in Oregon, and Matt on honing his video gaming skills—sigh.  Away from home, Thomas has been taking swimming lessons, playing with friends, and bike riding with me.  Wednesday we biked 10 miles and had a great time.  Matt hung out with friends and worked at Seven Peaks.   In the evenings when Brian was home, we did yard work and watched movies and worked on the coolers at Wash Hut.  Brian has work off yesterday, so he and I went out Thursday night.  We ate at a new place and that was fun.  Yesterday Matt worked and Brian and Thomas and I went out to breakfast.  After that we went walking on a new trail we discovered and had a great time.  While we were walking, the girls called.  They'd gotten home from camp early so we cut our walk and went home to see them.  Its been a nice week so far.

Father's Day

2011 06 23

Sunday was Father’s Day and I hope Brian had a good one.  We bought him steak for dinner and gave him some framed and matted WWII stamps that he saw at an antique store in Oregon and wanted.  I also made him a special treat, which is becoming a Father’s Day tradition around here.  The treat usually has cake in it because Brian loves cake.  The first year that I tried to make him a special cake was a disaster.  It was a round, two-layer lime cake with lime glaze frosting and for some reason the top layer did not want to stay together.  We had to hold it in place while we sang “Happy Father’s Day To You” and as soon as we let go, the cake split in half and each half slid off the bottom layer in separate directions.  He called it his earthquake cake and it tasted very good and since the taste of food takes total precedence over looks in this family, I considered it enough of a success to try again.

The next year, I made him a tres leches cake.  It was delicious and looked good.  I made it out of a cake mix and added coconut milk in with all the other milks.  It was easy and fun and he loved it.  Another year, after dissuading him from buying an ice cream cake from Coldstone for $ 30, I made him a home made ice cream cake with yummy ice cream and ganache frosting for less than 10 dollars.  It was a hit. 

This year I made him an ice cream cake roll.  He’s always loved those ice cream cake rolls that you can buy in the grocery store and which, frankly, are quite lacking in taste, so I figured he’d like a home made one even more.  I used a German Chocolate cake and Tillamook vanilla bean ice cream.  The cake turned out very well, and we frosted it with home made German chocolate frosting.  When Brian saw it, he was very amazed, impressed, and excited to eat it, but there was one problem.  When I made it, I turned down the freezer to -7 degrees so that it would set up nicely and I forgot to turn the freezer back up to 0 degrees, so when Brian tried to cut into the cake, it was hard as a rock.  I don’t know why we didn’t microwave it for a few seconds, but we didn’t, he just sawed away at it till he’d chipped off pieces for everyone.  When we finally got to eat it, it was delicious—another hit.  I love Brian so much and I’m so glad he liked his Father’s Day even though he had to cook his own steak and cut his own rock-hard cake.

For my Dad this year, we wrote our family's version of one of the stories he told his kids when we were small.  It is called “Fatty Tuna,” and I’m not so sure that our version did it justice, but we wrote it anyway.  Then, of course, we just had to make a Madlibs version of it, after which we sent it to my dad to enjoy which he said he did, and I hope that is the case.  It was so nice to talk to my dad on the phone on father’s day.  He is an amazing guy who has great ideas and carries them out, who loves his children and grandchildren with all his heart, and who is a wonderful example of faithfulness to his wife, his children, and his God.  Yay for dads!

P. S. I gave a talk on father’s at church.  I shared thoughts about my grandpas, my dad, and Brian.  It went pretty good except it was too long.

Thomas's New Groove

This morning Thomas informed me that he signed himself up for "Junior High Idol"  This means that he needs to show up at school today prepared to perform in front of a camera with a song to lip sync and moves to go with it.
 I didn't even know Thomas had any moves.  I'm sure you've heard of the song he chose to sing.-- "I'm... too sexy for my shirt... too sexy for my shirt... So sexy it hurts, followed by being too sexy for his car, his cat, your party, this song...etc.
 How can a skinny 80-lb seventh grader be too sexy for anything?
His big plan was to throw his shirt off at the beginning and dance the rest of the song shirtless.  Hmmm.  Being the modest mom that I am and also not wanting him to become a target of any weirdos at school, I convinced him to try my alternative.  We got a sharpie and drew a big muscly-torso onto one of his big brother's undershirts (hope Matt doesn't mind.).  Now Thomas can throw off his outer shirt, display his "muscles" and show off his new groove.