Surprise!

Yesterday Daniel was turning the laundry over when he informed me there was some mud still on the clothes. But wait. No. What's that smell? Okay, so it's not mud. It's poop. In the washing machine.

Mommy Sleuth deducted that a certain potty training child must have had an accident, put the dirty underwear in his hamper, gotten dressed again and gone about his day. How nice of him.

Lest You Think We Are All Frowny Faces...

My pediatrician called late last night to let me know Mister Man has no visible fractures and should be walking better by Monday. He took a few steps in shoes this morning but has since returned to scooting around the house. Either way, I'm glad to know he shouldn't need any bandages.

And, as much as I complain, the Terrible Twos are not taking over our entire lives. But I make sure to have one Mommy Meltdown per week, just to keep Daniel on his toes. You know, the whole "you get to go to work tomorrow, but I have to do this all over again" kind of speech. Today I am much better.

One thing I have been working on to simplify our lives and help the kiddos get more into resourcefulness with their alone time - getting rid of toys. We have so many. Generous friends and family members have filled up our buckets and closets and shelves over and over again. But we've gotta let it go. Yesterday I filled up two garbage bags full of excess balls, things that take batteries and things that don't really lend themselves toward pretend play.

The result:

"Look Mom, I made a duck!"

As a parent, that is much more fulfilling than watching him push an actual plastic duck around the floor. And really, he wouldn't do that anyways. He'd just hold it for five seconds then follow me around, asking me to make up a game for him.

Notice I also put up our old gates to keep a certain nine month old from destroying his brother's towers.

An excerpt from my favorite book for this age, Making the Terrible Twos Terrific:

A child doesn't learn to do a lot with a little if his parents gift him with a lot of store-bought toys. Too many toys overwhelm a child's ability to choose a plaything and keep himself occupied. Too many toys prevent the emergence of imaginative play. Too many toys make it all but impossible for a child to learn to make do. Invariably, children who complain a great deal of being "bored," or having "nothing to do," are children who have been given too much. They can simply make no creative sense of the clutter of toys in their environments.

Thus, I will continue to pick and choose which toys stay and which toys go. And thus is why we are having a NO GIFTS birthday party when Andrew turns one. Sorry mom!

Not Our Best 24 Hours

Thursday afternoon, Mister Man took a brave leap off the top of a climbing toy at the mall and hurt his foot. He can't walk, or even bear weight. While he claims the pain is concentrated on one big toe - and it doesn't seem to hurt him when we poke and wiggle at the rest of his foot/ankle/leg - we decided to go ahead and take him in for x-rays this morning. That was at 10:00 a.m. When the pediatrician's office closed at 5:00 p.m., the radiologist still hadn't reviewed the films. Annoying. Part of me really wanted to call the imaging office and say, "Can someone please just tell me if my two year old fractured something and needs a splint?" Guess we get to wait until Monday for the results.

Daniel and I are pretty convinced it's just a bad sprain. But you never know if a two year old is properly describing his pain. For now, he is in decent spirits and has mastered scooting around the house to play. And wearing his cushy Lightning McQueen slippers seems to keep him from bumping his toe too much.

In other news, he has also decided to stop eating. We are in the middle of a fairly large pile of power struggles with him, so I'm guessing he just wants to tick us off by living on air. Today I gave him Kid Crack (Nutragrain Bar) for breakfast, then two peanut butter crackers while waiting for x-rays. He had a few sips of a milkshake as a reward for putting up with nurses having to hurt him and hold him down at the imaging center. Then he went the rest of the day refusing every plate we put in front of him, except for a handful of Cheerios. A child with no calories is a really nasty child. He is no fun.

Last night I read in a book that 30 months is typically the peak of tantrums and defiance. Mister Man is 30 months. I'm happy to hear this may be as bad as it gets.

Here is a picture after an "I'm Tired" meltdown at 5:45 p.m. (We didn't let him nap today in case we needed to take him in to get his leg wrapped up after the imaging results came in. Nice, right?) He fell asleep with a dried prune in his hand.

Daniel works tomorrow. I have a feeling we are going to watch a lot of movies.

Blah Blah Blah

I really don't have anything special to blog about. I just decided to pen out a few things we've been up to. Sorry if this is a snore. I've been...

• Really digging the recipe for homemade enchiladas I found here. It is so easy, and it already won a spot in my "favorite recipes" cookbook. Like the blogger recommends, we only used a tad over one can of cream of chicken soup. Next time we probably won't bother with opening a second can. For meat, we simmered rotisserie chicken in a taco flavor packet and then tossed it with black beans. We are going to make these for a second time tonight, and as an experiment, we are going to add a layer of enchilada sauce.
• Using the Bob Duallie (when the weather agrees) and occasionally driving up the street at 6:15 a.m. to do workout videos with a friend. I've lost ten pounds since September and only have about five more to go. My summary of the best possible run/walk: it is at least 45 minutes long, Junior sleeps and Mister Man stays awake (so he will be tired for naptime/bedtime later). Today, the magic happened. It was bliss.
• Finishing a humongous editing job. I turned it in and billed out $338.47, but I haven't heard much back from the client. Sometimes I can't help but wonder if they think I changed too much, too little, just the right amount? Either way, I know my Stylebook, so if they want it right, they will hit "accept all changes!"
• Being patient with potty training. After two solid months, we are back to having about two accidents a day. It's still better than diapers.
• Crossing my fingers this mostly-mild winter lasts. How could anyone with two kids under the age of three actually like snow? It traps us inside. And when we do go outside, there is much slipping and cold and fumbling with gloves.

Two More Wins

The crockpot cooking continues! This week I've had two more successful dinners. And not having to ask Daniel to cook when he gets home (which happens to coincide with at least one kid's bedtime) is nice. Unfortunately, the blog where I gleaned several of my new recipes has shut down. Luckily I had already copied these onto paper.

The first, Orange Beef Stew, is a good alternative to pot roast because the meat has no connective tissue or fat to scare meat-phobics like me away from the dish. My mother-in-law was here the afternoon we popped it in the pot, and we were so convinced the steak wouldn't defrost, cook and soften in four hours that she actually prepared something else in the meantime. But it was ready - and it was good. The spinach and water chestnuts really made the dish for me, and the orange flavor came through without overpowering. It was perfect served over rice.

Orange-Beef Stew

4-5 pounds of flank steak (cut into smaller sections, not tiny, just enough to fit into the bag, you can cut them up more after they are cooked)

2 cups orange juice

2 tablespoons of cornstarch

2 tablespoons of soy sauce

1 tablespoon of sugar

2 tablespoons of minced garlic

8 green onions chopped

Add day of cooking:

2 packages of frozen spinach

1 8 ounce can of water chesnuts

2 teaspoons of beef bouillion 

Assemble all ingredients (except spinach, water chesnuts and beef bouillion) into two freezer bags. Place in freezer. Day of cooking, place in slow cooker and add spinach, water chesnuts and beef bouillion. Cook on low for 8 hours or on high for 4. Serve with rice or couscous or make sandwiches. 

I was excited about the second, Healthy Mama Barbecue Chicken, because the freezer bag included the components of a homemade barbecue sauce (tomato sauce, Worcestershire, brown sugar) and vegetables. I opted for chicken breast instead of thighs and drumsticks, but Daniel requested I give the "scary meat" a try next time. The sauce was sweet and the chicken fell apart when cut along the grain with a fork, but I think it could have come out before the four-hour mark because the peppers, zucchini and onion were a tad mushy for my liking.

Healthy Mama Barbecue Chicken

3 medium unpeeled sweet potatoes, cut into 1/2 inch pieces

2 large green pepper, cut into strips

1 large red pepper, cut into strips

1 zucchini, chopped

1 medium onion, sliced

1 tablespoon quick cooking tapioca

2 pounds chicken thighs or drumsticks

1 8-ounce can of tomato sauce

2 tablespoons packed brown sugar

1 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon yellow mustard (I wasn't sure if this meant actual mustard or the spice so I did a little of both)

1 clove garlic, minced

1/4 teaspoon salt

Dump everything into two gallon freezer bags, shake it up, seal, label and put in the freezer. The day you want to cook it, put it on the counter for 30 minutes then in the crockpot on high for 4 hours.

Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures for you. But I am glad I have one more bag of each of these in the freezer. IMPORTANT: Each recipe makes two freezer bags worth. I only cook one at a time. Unless you have an oversized crockpot, two probably would not fit anyways. Also, one bag of Orange Beef Stew could have served about four adults. Because I only put two chicken breasts in each bag of Healthy Mama Barbecue Chicken, it is really better suited for two adults. But had I followed the recipe and used thighs and drumsticks, it may have gone farther.

Chuckle.

Tonight I was reading Mister Man Go Dog Go when he pointed to the yellow dog in this picture and said, "Look Mama! He's going to do a helicopter!"

I thought. And thought. And thought some more. Then I realized what he meant:

It Will Do

Chattanooga used to have a really great indoor playground for kids called Playworld Down Under. Think Chic-fil-A playplace on steroids. It was huge. And it had a cushioned toddler area, plenty of tables for snacking, a little merry-go-round and video games. (Video games with tickets, which of course you exchange for prizes. Very important.) Unfortunately, Playworld went out of business last year because the building's owner raised the rent too many times. I keep crossing my fingers the family who ran this place will find a new location. It was too good.

Anyways. We have discovered a similar indoor playground in Cleveland. It's a 22-mile drive, but it was worth the distance considering how much energy the kids burned once we got there. In a warehouse on the corner across the highway from the YMCA, Jumpin Junction is part climbing/tunneling/sliding and part inflatable bouncy houses. I took the boys up there with some friends this week, and they were thrilled. Mister Man thought sliding into the ball pit was the best. I wasn't a fan of the "toddler area" (basically a bunch of old toys without batteries, a play kitchen and a cushy slide), but the woman running the register told me they were expanding soon with some new features.

In the open area between the fun stuff, there were quite a few Cozy Coupes and other ride-on toys to make the trek from slide to slide more interesting. I stole these pictures from my friend's blog:

Thumbs Up and Thumbs Down

The Year of the Crockpot has begun! (Note: my spellcheck just suggested I change the word crockpot to "crackpot." Is that like a crack pipe?)

Last weekend I bagged up six dinners and threw them in the freezer. So far we have had one failure and one success. The Loser was Crankberry Chicken. The textures were great, the chicken was moist and it was more of a meal with sauce than a stew - which was what I wanted - but even when served over rice it was too sweet. When fresh, it wasn't unbearable. But we agreed we wouldn't make it again. When I tried the leftovers the next day, I liked it even less and ended up dumping it in the trash. It didn't help that I bit into a lemon peel and chewed it a few times before realizing my mouth was sad. (By the way, if you attempt this regardless of the poor review, pick out the lemon slices before you serve.)

The winner, in a big way, was Green Chili Stew. I got this recipe out of my old Fix It and Forget It Cookbook, which I just realized has a blog (yah!), and made it straight away, without freezing. I was so surprised at how two little cans of chopped green chilies could spice this thing up so well. With beef and potatoes, it is far better than any chili I have ever made and is perfect for this winter weather. You have to try it.

Green Chili Stew

3 Tbsp oil
2 garlic cloves, minced (I used the jarred stuff)
1 large onion, diced
1 lb ground sirloin
1/2 lb ground pork (I used breakfast sausage)
3 cups chicken broth
2 cups water
2 4-oz cans diced green chilies
10-oz pkg frozen corn
4 large potatoes, diced
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp crushed dried oregano
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp salt

Brown onion, garlic, sirloin and pork in oil in skillet. Cook until meat is no longer pink. Combine all ingredients in slow cooker. Cover. Cook on Low 4-5 hours, or until potatoes are soft.

I love any recipes that says "combine all ingredients in slow cooker." If I can get away with only browning a little meat and chopping a few vegetables, I'm happy.

Tonight we are trying Orange-Beef Stew. Will report back tomorrow.

Junior, 9 Months

Here are a few of his favorite things:

• Taking a bath.
• Trying to climb into the tub when it's not bath time.
• Standing at the side of the tub watching his brother take a bath.
• Copying Mister Man - specifically shrieking and shaking his head back and forth really fast.
• Pulling up on everything.
• Begging for bites of our food.
• Crawling towards his favorite blanket, sticking his face in it and biting it.
• Sitting on the mini trampoline.
• Sitting on Mister Man's bed.
• Family dance parties.
• Trying to beat us to the dog water bowl.
• Banging things together.
• Pulling things out of buckets and boxes.
• Crawling over to give me kisses.
• Racing his brother on their push cars.
• Only drinking three ounces of formula at a time - a big change from a month ago.

Here are a few of his least favorite things:

• Tart fruits. He prefers them cut with yogurt or cereal.
• Being banished to the playpen so I can leave the room for a few minutes.
• Getting pulled off the fireplace ledge.
• Teething (he's working on number six).
• Falling over (happens regularly).