What to do?

I blogged a few weeks ago about needing a new bread machine. http://richterihart-meandmyboys.blogspot.com/2009/09/i-labored-on-labor-day.html My good friend Lynna suggested using a Kitchen Aid stand mixer. Richard got me one for my birthday last year, so I thought I'd give it a try.

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, but the bread dough isn't rising as much as it did when I used my bread machine. I dissolve the yeast in warm water (about 115 degrees) and then add the rest of the wet ingredients & then the dry. I even mixed the dough longer that I did the last time, but it still isn't rising like it should. Any suggestions?

I'm just warming up the oven to put my latest loaf in the oven, and it is so much smaller than the loafs that I get when I use the bread machine. Help!

Its Definetly Fall.....

I had to get up at 3:00 am this morning to turn on the heat! I kept waking up freezing, and finally got up and turned on the heat. That, and I had to put the cat outside. It was 61 degrees in the house at 3:00 am. It was 66 when I got up at 6:00 to get the boys up for school. I turned off the heat & its only cooled down to 64 over the course of the day. I did put fleece sheets & our blanket on the bed today. At Richard's request. :)

Tomorrow we get to sleep in! School is starting 2 hours late, so the bus won't come until about 8:30 am. And since school isn't starting until 10:00, Nathaniel doesn't have school at all, since he is only in school for 2 hr & 45 minutes.

Nathaniel's First Field Trip

Nathaniel had his first school field trip today. They went to a pumpkin patch to pick pumpkins. He was so excited to come home and show me his pumpkin! Its not very big, about 5 lbs or so, but its an almost perfect pumpkin. He is so proud of that pumpkin! But he was playing with it this afternoon. Rolling it around on the floor. I kept telling him that if it broke open we would have to throw it away. So he'd leave it alone for a little while, then I'd hear more thump-thump-thumps as it rolled across the hardwood floor. If it makes it till the end of October, we're going to make it into a jack-o-lantern.

I Got The Best Hug....

today from David. Just a little while ago. He crawled up in my lap, wrapped his arms around me and I wrapped my arms around him, and we just sat like that for a good 5 minutes. Not saying a lot, just sitting there. He told me I was his "best mom ever", and that he could never have a better mom. (sniff, sniff) I hope he never gets too old to say stuff like that.

He Shoots! He Scores!

Twice! David made 2 goals today during his first ever soccer game. His team won, 6-2. They dominated (can 1st, 2nd & 3rd graders dominate?) the first 2 quarters, then the other team scored 2 goals in the 3rd quarter and both teams didn't score at all during the 4th quarter. Both teams played really well for only having 3 practices.

Other than that, it was a pretty leisurely Saturday. I baked chocolate chip cookies while Nathaniel napped & David & Richard did their own things. Which included looking at 1980's Transformer toys on the internet. David's idea, of course. He is obsessed with Transformers. That's almost all he can talk about. Its almost annoying.

The boys (all 3 of them) just came in from shooting their bows. Time for snacks and then bedtime.

Soccer Practice!

David had soccer practice tonight. He was really excited to go, and Nathaniel was too, but mainly because he got to play on the playground equipment. I spent the hour chatting with a mom whose daughter is in Nathaniel's pre-k class. She is a 4-5th grade teacher. She gets the kids in 4th grade and has them through the end of 5th grade. Anyway, before we started chatting, I was watching Nathaniel play, and all of a sudden he says, "I pee, Mom!" and heads away from the play equipment and starts to drop his pants. I was like, "No, not there!" so he moves. "I pee on grass, Mom!" and drops his pants. So I kinda blocked him so he wasn't totally exposed, but there wasn't anywhere for him to pee, and not any trees close enough for him to hide behind. Oh well. He's 4.

Nathaniel threw up on the bus again today. He's not sick. Just motion sickness. They got him cleaned up at school, and I picked him up when class was over so he wouldn't have to carry the dirty clothes & backpack home. I was able to wash everything, including his backpack, so that's good. No more milk before school!

More Fresh Salsa!

Ok, so my friend Lynna posted a comment that I should roast the peppers before I add them to any fresh salsa that I make. So I searched the internet & found directions, and gave it a try this morning. I did it on our gas grill, as I didn't want to turn our oven on, since it was pretty warm today. Anyway, the peppers roasted fine, but even after leaving them in a plastic bag to sweat, rinsing them in cold water & cutting off the stems, I still had trouble peeling them. I ended up leaving a good portion of the skins on, since they wouldn't come off anyway, and chopped them up and added them to the tomatoes, cilantro & red onion. In total, it was 6 roasted garden salsa peppers. I did not sample it, as I wanted Richard to taste it first & see how hot it was. So he tried it when he got home, and said that it had a kick, but not too bad. So I tried it. Too much of a kick for me, but I don't like hot stuff.

Richard & the boys spent a little while outside this afternoon shooting their bows. David and Nathaniel are doing pretty well. Not very accurate, but they're having fun. Richard shot an arrow. With another arrow. Seriously. It doesn't happen often, but when it does..... he split the shaft of the arrow about half way down, and was not happy. Arrows aren't cheap.

Today was a dreary day....

it was cloudy and cool, but not cold, and very humid. Everything feels damp. I hate that. I had to dry my bed linens in the dryer because they never would have dried out on the clothes line. It did rain a little, but not too much, but we're looking at rain for the next few days. Hopefully it won't rain during David's soccer practice on Thursday, or during his game on Saturday.

Richard spent most of the day deer hunting since a class he was supposed to teach was canceled. He didn't even see a deer the entire time he was in the tree stand. He might go tomorrow. It depends on when he gets done with work.

FPU Week 2

We had a good class tonight. Dave Ramsey is a very smart, funny man, and he's right on the money. (excuse the pun, please) We had a good group discussion; usually we split into 2 small groups, but we were missing 4 couples tonight, so we all met in the same group. It was good.

Richard went hunting for the first time tonight. Didn't get anything, but is going to try again tomorrow after work.

I'm tired.....

and I'm heading for bed. Not much happened today that's blog-worthy. Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Fresh Salsa!

I made my first attempt at fresh salsa today. I searched around the internet looking for an easy recipe and found one. Of course, every recipe calls for jalapeno peppers, of which we have none. Didn't plant any this year. So I substituted garden salsa peppers, which are milder. Instead of 2 jalapeno peppers with no seeds, I used 3 garden salsa peppers with seeds from 2 of them. The result was an awesome flavored, very mild salsa. But since I was really making this for Richard, at his request, I added 3 more garden salsa peppers, with all the seeds. I'll have to get his opinion a little later on the revised version.

David had another soccer practice this morning. He had a lot of fun. They had a practice game at the end of practice, and he really enjoyed it. They don't play with goalies, and only 4 from each team on the field at one time. They have a half circle close to the goal that they can't go in unless the ball strays accidentally. It'll be fun to watch a game next week.

Toy Story in 3-D!

We just saw a trailer for Toy Story & Toy Story 2 as a double feature in 3-D! Starting Oct 2nd, and only for 2 weeks. We're going to take the boys if it comes somewhere near us. Nathaniel especially loves Woody & Buzz. He sleeps with them every night.

Oh, sleep. That sounds like a good idea. Night-night!

A Big Day!

Today was a big day for David for a couple of reasons. One, Daddy is home! Yeah! And two, it was his first day of soccer practice! He was so excited he could hardly eat dinner! I took the camera, but then realized that the battery was dead, so no pictures tonight. They have a practice on Saturday morning, then for the next 5 weeks its just practices on Thursdays and games on Saturdays. He's so proud of his new soccer cleats and socks & shin guards.

I got a call this morning......

from the bus barn. Nathaniel threw up on the bus, somewhere between David's school & Nathaniel's school. Its only about a 5 minute drive, even in a school bus. I think he just got motion sick because he's not running a fever, he hasn't gotten sick again and he's acting totally normal. But because some other kids in his class have been sick, I took him home just to be on the safe side. He took a bubble bath (cause he really smelled) and then laid down on the couch to watch Tom & Jerry. He fell asleep around 10:00 & slept till about noon.

While he slept, I took the opportunity to continue cleaning up my computer/scrapbooking room. As I type this, I'm sitting at a totally clean computer desk. Yippee! I filed papers that needed filing & sorted through a bunch of papers & threw a bunch away. I had a bunch of stuff to burn, and Nathaniel helped with that after his nap.

Richard is in Chicago right now, awaiting his 8:00 pm flight to La Crosse. He's thinking he'll be home about 11:00 pm. I'll be out cold. The nice part is he has Thursday & Friday off.

David starts soccer tomorrow. He's really excited.

Its Only Tuesday??

It feels like it should be Friday! Today was pretty uneventful. Our lp tank (liquid propane) was filled in preparation for cooler weather & turning the heat on. It was a pleasant suprise when the bill came to only $365.40. It was $1.40 a gallon. This time last year it was around $2.00 a gallon, in the winter of '08 we paid as much as @2.30 a gallon. Hopefully the price per gallon will stay low.

One thing I forgot to mention that I did yesterday was that I went and helped in David's class in the morning. It was fun, and I started learning everyones names and started getting a hint of the different personalities in the class. David was so excited he could hardly stand it! I'm going to be helping on Mondays & Thursdays, so I'll be going back in a couple of days. I'm really looking forward to it.

Only 1 more day till Richard gets home! He's been down in Mississippi since Labor Day for training. Tomorrow is his travel day home. Unfortunately he won't get home until around 11:00 pm. His flight gets in about 9:00 pm, but he has to drive from La Crosse to Ft. McCoy to take a buddy home, the come back to the house. He does have Thursday & Friday off, however.

Monday night Football? Nah!

How about Financial Peace University? That's where I was tonight. It was great fun. Everyone seemed to have an enjoyable time & everything went smoothly (except a minor technical issue with the DVD player). We've got a good group.

I do believe that's all I have to say this evening. Except I'm tired & I have a headache. Time for bed.

It Was A Good Day....

Church service was good. I played piano for the worship team, which went well. We had a guest speaker today because our senior pastor is out with his family since their 8 year old son, Benjamin, had open heart surgery on Tuesday. I believe he had a hole in his heart, but the surgery was successful. Praise God! Benjamin is a great kid. After service we had the annual Hot Roast potluck, which was yummy. Always lots of good food, most of which my kids won't eat, of course. After the potluck, we had what was dubbed the Psalm 150 service. (you should read it) We had some people sing, play piano & the worship team did a couple of songs. It was fun. Nathaniel fell asleep during it, which was suprising since the music was pretty loud.

The boys were in bed about 7:20, but I had to go up about 8:00 to take Nathaniel to the bathroom. Twice in about 5 minutes. David was out cold. I wish I could sleep like that.

Tomorrow night is our first FPU class of our 2nd session. We had a last minute sign-up this morning at church, which brings out count to 19 people. I'm excited!

Tomorrow morning is my first morning to help with David's class. Its only for an hour, but I had a lot of fun last year, and thought I'd continue to help until he thinks its uncool for his mom to help in his class. :)

It was a lazy day....

and a no nap day for everyone. I was conducting a test of sorts, to see how Nathaniel would do on an ordinary day without a nap. About the only time he doesn't take naps is if we're out and about. He did ok. The boys didn't have any more tiffs than usual. We played outside, blew bubbles, kicked the soccer ball around (David wanted to practice before his first soccer practice on Thursday) and played hide and seek. Although Nathaniel's version of hide and seek is "Here I am!" after you count to 10.

The kids went to bed at 7:30 this evening. And I haven't heard anything from either of them since. Ah, silence. Blessed silence.

Oh, and you'll never believe what time David got up this morning. 6:30!!! He gets more sleep during the week! I told him he could never complain about having to get up early for school since he only slept a half hour past when I wake him up for school.

Its Finally Friday!

And I get to sleep in tomorrow! At least until the boys get up. 6:00 am is early to get up to get ready for school, but I bet that they're up by 7:00 am. 7:30 at the latest for Nathaniel. David has been known to sleep to 8:30-9:00 am, so we'll see.

I did a little more cleaning today, besides my daily chores. I took on the daunting task of cleaning off the top of the entertainment center, as well as sorting DVDs & putting DVDs in their respective cases. We're really bad about putting the discs back in the cases, especially the kids' DVDs. But now the top of the entertainment center is clean as well as the top of the TV. My next task is my computer/scrapbooking room.

As Promised........

Here are some pictures of our living room. These are all taken (with a couple exceptions) from the north doorway into our dining room. So the big window faces south.

Here is the west side of the room. All the kids' toys, and directly to the right of where I'm standing is the front door. And that is Stormy in the picture.
Here's the middle of the room. I love all the light that huge window lets in. We put our Christmas tree right in the middle of the window. And Midnight (on the left) and Stormy.

And here's the east side of the room. Entertainment center, kids' table & our free hide-a-bed couch. The piano is behind the couch. You'll see it better....
....here, in this picture. The piano, with the non-matching bench. Ask me about what happend to the original piano bench sometime. Its a long & interesting story. Oh, and that big greenish thing? That's "the rock". A big memory foam bean bag type thing. Very comfy.

And last, but certainly not least, the kids' toy corner. Its not usually this neat, but my new goal is for the boys to put ALL of their toys away EVERY night. The cool Star Wars tent was a Christmas gift from my parents to both boys. They love it.

Counter troubles

Out of curiousity, I looked at my cousin, Nancy's blog, and her counter is above 11,000 too! It was around 7000 the last time I looked. Hmmmm.......

What the heck?

I just looked at my blog to see how many visitors I've had, and its over 11,000! Last night it was 730 or something like that. I either got really popular all of a sudden, or the counter is messed up. So we'll see if it gets un-messed up.

So tomorrow (or whenever) when you read this, post a comment as to what the counter says when you're visiting. Just out of curiousity.

Why Is It....

...so dang hard to get the kids up at 6:00 am to get ready for school, but they're up and out of bed at 6:00 am on Saturday & Sunday???? Both David & Nathaniel are just like their dad. Hard to wake up & it takes forever to get them going in the morning.

Nathaniel didn't want to go to school this morning. I put his jacket on him & he took it off. Its wasn't until I had picked him up and was walking out the door that he wanted his jacket back on. Then he didn't want to get on the bus. Until it stopped in front of our driveway. But he won't give me a hug and kiss until he's on the bus. Its a good thing we're the first stop.

I put the kids to bed at 7:00 tonight. Well, it was actually 7:15 when I finally closed the door. But I had to go back up twice because Nathaniel was calling for me. He had to go potty. You can't argue with that. I think he's finally asleep now. It took David all of 5 minutes to go to sleep. Must be nice.

I think I'll take some pictures of my nice, clean (for now) living room tomorrow and give you all a look-see at our main living area.

If Its Not One Thing....

Its another. This morning, immediately after I put the kids on the bus, I got out my Rainbow vacuum. Now I've been having problems with the switch on the vacuum, not the canister, but the switch you have to squeeze to send power to the vacuum for it to actually work. Its been sticking for a while, and it was stuck this morning as well. But when I turned on the canister, the dang thing wouldn't work. I fiddled with it. And fiddled with it some more. After about 10 minutes, I determined that there wasn't anything I could do and that I'd have to buy a new vacuum if I ever wanted to vacuum the living room.

So I started researching the best place to buy a vacuum. But not just any vacuum. This vacuum: http://www.dyson.com/store/product.asp?product=DC25-ALLFLOORS. I've been wanting a Dyson for a while, and I just said on Saturday while I was talking to my sister-in-law, Elizabeth, that when my Rainbow died that I wanted to get a Dyson. I found this vacuum at bestbuy.com, and it was on sale for about $425. With tax, it was $450. I was able to do the in-store pick-up, but the store didn't open until 10 am. Here's where it got tricky....

Nathaniel gets out of school at 10:30, and it usually home (last week, anyway) around 11:15 am. I had to wait to get an email from the store that the vacuum was in stock, and I was out the door and on my way at 10:10 am. Its about a 25 minute drive to Onalaska, and I spent about 5 minutes in the store, and another 25 minute drive home. I got home about 11:10, and had time to go in, use the bathroom and go back outside before the bus pulled in the driveway. Never again will I cut it that close. If I hadn't been home, they would have taken Nathaniel back to the school and I would have had to go pick him up there.

Nathaniel helped me put the Dyson together, and then I set to work. Now its been a couple of weeks since the living room was vacuumed, and with 2 dogs that shed, plus 2 kids, it was in dire need of it. I had to dump the canister 4 times while I vacuumed the living room. Now before you are completely disgusted, let me say that the room is about 24' x 24'. So its not a small room. And it'll be way better after this. Now that the kids are in school, I have a schedule of chores to do for each weekday, and the living room will get vacuumed 3 times a week, not including the weekend. Yes, I am a nerd. :)

I Labored on Labor Day

I did changed the linens on the boys' beds, did 3 loads of laundry & made bread. Twice. I had a little guy helping me the first time & we forgot to put yeast in the bread, so I had to make it again. In a bread machine that is starting to die. I have to stay and watch it for the first couple of minutes to make sure it doesn't start overheating. If it does, I have to unplug it, wait a few minutes & then try again. So I've been researching bread machines on the internet. The only thing I use mine for is to mix dough, so it doesn't have to be fancy, but it does need to work well, so if you have any suggestions, please let me know.

Since today was a holiday, the boys didn't have school today. Nevertheless, Nathaniel was up about 6:30 am & David was up shortly after. We had about 20 minutes of cuddle time in my bed & then we headed downstairs. You know, I just realized the boys never ate breakfast. David was busy playing with his Transformers (he got some new ones on Saturday) and Nathaniel was playing with his Thomas trains while they sort of watched a Ben 10: Alien Force marathon on Cartoon Network. The day was pleasantly without much conflict even though Nathaniel only napped on the couch about an hour.

The worst thing that happened today was Nathaniel's total meltdown. We found a new show on PBS Kids this morning (before Ben 10) called Dinosaur Train. It looks cute and Nathaniel LOVED it. So this afternoon after his power nap, he starts asking to watch Dinosaur Train again. Of course its not on until tomorrow morning after they leave for school. That's all he wanted to do was watch Dinosaur Train. He threw himself down on the floor, kicking & wailing like it was the end of the world. I finally thought to look at the pbskids.org website to see if they had anything on it. Sure enough they had 2 little shows that make up an episode, so he watched those and was a happy boy after that. I didn't hear another word about Dinosaur Train the rest of the night.

Oh, did I mention that the boys went to bed at 7:30 pm? Yep. 7:30! I only had to yell at Nathaniel 1 time to go to sleep. Yippee for me! So I've spent the last hour picking up the remnants of the toys in the living room in preparation to vacuum tomorrow morning while the boys are both at school. Now its my turn to go to bed.

Home Again & Bows & Arrows & Soccer

We home again. Finally. Well, I really shouldn't say finally, as we've been home since about 12:30 this afternoon. However, I feel like I've done nothing but be gone for the weekend for 3 out of the last 4 weeks. Oh, wait. I have. :)

Within 20 minutes of us getting home, Richard & David left to go to a bow shop in a little town about 30 miles away so Richard could pick up the new bow he bought on Friday. And to let David shoot a youth bow to see how he liked it. David liked it so much that Richard bought it for him. Its a left-handed bow, since David is a lefty, and David is very, very proud of it.

Richard & David spent a good part of the afternoon shooting their respective bows, while I went and picked the dogs up from the kennel, fixed dinner & cleaned the kitchen up after dinner. We just got the kids into bed about 15 minutes ago (Nathaniel took a long nap so I wasn't in a hurry to put him in bed), and now Richard is packing to leave on a trip for work. David is devastated that Richard is leaving although it'll only be for a few days. The one bright spot is that we're signing up David to play soccer this fall. Practices start next Thursday, and games will be on Saturday mornings. I'll have to get some pictures of the practices & games. He's really excited.

Busy Day

We had a busy day today. We went to the park, went to an ice cream shop, Target and went swimming for a while in the afternoon. Richard and I went to see G.I. Joe. It was pretty good for a movie based on action figures & a cartoon. Left it wide open for a sequel, of course.

Its late and I'm tired. Have a great Sunday!

Not again!

I did it again. I forgot to post last night. We drove up to Richard's sister's place in the Twin Cities, and we didn't get there until after 8:00 pm, then we had a late dinner and a really late (9:00 pm) swim in the chilly indoor pool before sending the kids to bed about 10:00. They slept until about 7:00 this morning, and have been playing with cousin Conner's Transformers ever since.

Richard's sister is taking their dad to the airport to fly back to Idaho today. After that we're going to go do some stuff around town. Richard and I have a date night planned tonight, I think we're going to go to a movie and dinner.

A Funny Thing Happened.....

while I was mowing the yard this evening. I looked over to the house and watched Nathaniel walk outside and start down the steps of the deck. I glanced away and when I looked back I see him standing on the bottom step, peeing into the yard. There was a nice arc to the stream and at that moment I wished I had my camera. It was so funny! And cute!

Stormy has been stealing ripe tomatoes off the plants. I caught her eating one this afternoon. Goofy dog! Now I know where the one almost ripe tomato went that was on one of our hanging plants. And I was going to pick it today! It was gone this morning when I went outside to get it.

Tomorrow ends the first week of school. Its been a busy week but fun for the most part.

Volunteers? Anyone?

The other day I took some pictures of the volunteer pumpkins that we have growing in our yard. Richard threw an old pumpkin we had from last fall over into the cow pasture sometime during the winter, and just a couple of weeks ago we noticed this huge mass of leaves and vines. Upon closer inspection we found a mini pumpkin patch. It started on the pasture side of the fence & ventured into our yard.....
We have 5 pumpkins in varying stages of growth. Well, 5 that we can see. There might be more on the other side of the fence. There's another one that is smaller than this one.

This one and the one in the picture below are the largest of the pumpkins we've seen. To me it seem pretty late in the season for them to just be developing, but its been a weird summer for gardens, so we'll have to wait and see what happens.

Obviously I don't have a lot to talk about since I'm showing you pictures of pumpkins. :)

We have 7 couples registered for Financial Peace University. I'm ordering the kits on Friday so we'll have them in time for a Sept 14th start date.

We're going up to the Twin Cities for the weekend, not including Monday. The boys are excited since we're staying with Richard's sister & her apt complex has an indoor pool.

The First Day

Did not start out well for me. I woke up about 3 am with a horrible migraine. It felt like someone was pounding spikes through my forehead & I was naueous as well. I took an Imatrex and after an hour took another one, which Richard went and got for me. I was finally able to fall asleep, and then Richard's alarm went off. Mine went off shortly after Richard's, but I stayed in bed until almost 6:00; my alarm was set for 5:30. I still had a migraine, but it was almost gone, so it wasn't horrible to get the kids up and ready for school. The nice thing is that I don't need to worry about breakfast, since Nathaniel eats breakfast at school instead of lunch, and new this year at David's school is a free lunch program, so the kids eat breakfast in their classroom. So with that, I think we can safely get them up at 6:00 instead of 5:30. Here are some shots of the big day.

This first one is my favorite. David sometimes says he doesn't like his brother, but this just proves how much he loves him!
I was hoping that they'd hold hands on the walk to the end of the driveway, but they didn't. But its still a cute picture.

Nathaniel insisted on putting David's hood up on his jacket before we walked out the door. It was cold this morning. Not more than 50 degrees. David wanted to wear shorts this morning, but I talked him out of it.

Here's another cute pose. The white square on Nathaniel's jacket is a name tag with his name & what school he goes to. The pre-k school sent it in the mail. Apparently they want them to get to the right place. :)

Here comes the short bus. The driver, Barb, seems really nice. She brings Nathaniel home as well. The red barn behind the bus is our landlord's barn. So we're really close to them. Shoot! Just remembered I need to take rent over!

Nathaniel had no qualms (great Scrabble word) about getting on the bus. In fact, he was so excited I didn't even get to hug & kiss him goodbye! I didn't realize it until after the bus was gone. (sniff, sniff) But I didn't cry like I thought I might.

And here's the 1st grader! Didn't get a hug or kiss from him, either.

I went back to bed after the kids got on the bus. I slept until about 9:45 am, and after cleaning up I went out to wait for Nathaniel to get home. He was done with school at 10:30, but didn't get home until 11:45! Its a first day of school thing. Making sure everyone is on the right bus & then getting everyone home. Barb the bus driver said that it'll most likely be closer to 11:00 to 11:15 when he's dropped off once she gets the route down.

When David got home from school he said that the day was too short! But he couldn't really remember what he did at school.