I Do It Backwards

I'm the mom who hates to ask my children to do something more than once. Of course, I doubt there are many parents who actually enjoy repeatedly asking their children to do something. I just refuse to do it. And the wee ones know.

It makes me cringe inside when I see parents telling their children to do something then counting. One. Twoooooooooo. Two and a half. Two and three quarters. Don't make me say thrrrreeeeeee-eeeeeee.

Either count to three or don't.

But that's beside the point. I actually don't count to three. Just like I was driven to sing the alphabet backwards to Mister Man when he was an infant to keep him content in the car (why yes, yes I can say the alphabet backwards now - I had to do something different to keep my sanity), I somehow started counting backwards for the wee ones.

Five.

Four.

And by then they're moving 95% of the time. Three.

Two. At which point my tone has gotten far deeper, if I've actually made it that far. I haven't slowed down my cadence counting. And I've only gotten to one twice. Ever. Both times, they saw me march over and compel them to do what I was asking. But even before that, they seemed to respect the counting backwards far more than they ever did when I counted forward. Whatever it is, I'm sticking with it.

And it's possible - just possible, mind you - that I accidentally counted backwards to my husband once or twice. Interestingly, it works pretty well with him, too!

What do you do to get your kids - or spouse - to listen to you?

Tasty Tuesday - Maguerite Salad

There are some foods that are just a family tradition. I know that every time we have New Years, my family will make Bunsteads. I know that I will make my lasagne on Christmas Eve. And Christmas Day and Thanksgiving will always include both ham and turkey. And all those occasions also have another traditional dish, something my maternal grandmother used to make. We will always have Marguerite Salad.

Marguerite Salad

Ingredients:
10 1/2 oz marshmallows, small (the small ones work best, otherwise cut the big ones in half)
20 oz pineapple chunks in a can - save the juice
2 T gravy flour (in a pinch you can use the regular kind)
3/4 c sugar
2 eggs
6 oz COOL WHIP

Directions:
Mix the sugar and flour in a sauce pan. Add the pineapple juice and stir until dissolved. Beat the eggs in a separate bowl, then add them to the juice. Turn the head to low until the mixture boils, stirring occasionally. When it starts boiling, stir constantly until it thickens into a nice sauce. Remove from the stove and cool in the fridge for two hours.

Add COOL WHIP to the sauce after it has cooled. Add pineapple and marshmallows, and stir until well coated. Place into your serving bowl and chill until it's time to serve. This is best made a few hours to a day in advance. If you feel extra decadent, add cherries to the top of the salad. Yum.

Enjoy this and more with Blessed With Grace and Tempt My Tummy Tuesday. Also posting now with A Southern Fairytale and her Mouthwatering Monday.

Los Angeles Doesn't Exist

So do you remember when I talked about how Mister Man's teacher didn't do the best job correcting his math homework? I let it go because Mister Man needs to learn that people in authority aren't always right, and really... in the grand scheme of things, it isn't that big a deal. He was fine with it, and I chalked it up to a bad teacher book, though it wasn't the first time it happened.

Last night, we received his Daily Five (little bits of practice work students spend 5 minutes working on each day in school) for the past week. As always, I looked through it to see what I need to work on with Mister Man. And my jaw dropped.

The possessive correction? Meh. Yes, it should be "Mr. Tyler's" but it was a little hard to see where he put the apostrophe. It almost looks like a comma for the sentence above instead of an apostrophe in the sentence he wrote. He needs to work on his penmanship, but fine motor skills are one of his challenges common amongst those with autism. That's part of why he's in private OT once a week.

Ditto with the correction of "two." I can see that he wrote two with a "w" and not just to, but the "w" is half into the o, so it's hard to see what he wrote unless you're really looking closely. Again, he needs to do a better job writing, and that's fine.

Sock? I totally get why he circled that answer. It's something that goes on your foot. It makes sense, but it's wrong. They're really looking for the more specific "footwear" answer, so sock was out. Categorization is also something that he struggles with sometimes due to his autism.

But ummm Los AngelOs? That's the one that threw me for a loop. Actually, it had me questioning my own spelling abilities. Maybe I've been spelling Los Angeles wrong for more than three decades (hush, I learned to write early).

Oh. Wait. I googled it. I haven't been spelling it wrong.

Less than two months left in the school year. Less than two months remaining. It's the mantra I keep repeating as I wait to hear whether or not Mister Man's petition to attend Little Miss's school is approved.

What are the words that throw you for a loop when you're writing?

BlogHer Book Club: The Book of Jonas

I have a friend who left two days ago to go volunteer at an orphanage - with her neurosurgeon husband - in Ethiopia for two weeks. Again. And they'll go back again, and one day, they'll bring home a baby from there. To me, that is so foreign to my daily life, but yet I have connections there from my friends both now and growing up, as adopting from South Korea was very "popular" where I grew up in Minnesota.

When I had the chance to read The Book of Jonas for this month's BlogHer book club, I jumped at the chance, as it's a view inside the head of a (fictional) young man from an unnamed Middle East country whose village was bombed by US troops. Again, it's something that is so foreign to me, but yet something I want and need to relate to and understand on a human level.

Jonas survived the bombing, but his family perished. He miraculously makes it to a US hospital where he then is sent to the States to live as a refugee. He comes into contact with Rose, the mother of a soldier who is MIA after serving in that same country. The stories of Rose, Christopher, and Jonas are all woven together as Jonas tries to move past the events that killed his family but instead moves down a self-destructive spiral.

The book was so thought-provoking, which was just what I had hoped. The chapters were startlingly short, just one to pages for the most part, but in a way they had to be, given the story being told. In the end, it was a tragedy for all involved - just as so much of life is. The bare bones verbiage tells the story powerfully, although I think it could have done so just as powerfully without interjecting Rose into it. I felt that the author needed a female character and so put her in, but I think I might have enjoyed the book even more had it simply focused on Jonas and - through his diary that Jonas has - Christopher.

The book deals heavily with loss, and that is the topic this week in the BlogHer book club discussion of The Book of Jonas. When faced with tragedy, what is your reaction? Do you hide from it, do you seek atonement, do you search for the truth, or do you have another reaction entirely?

In the interest of full disclosure, I received a copy of "The Book of Jonas" by Stephen Dau for review purposes. This is part of a compensated campaign for the BlogHer Book Club, but all opinions remain my own.

Welcome To The 21st Century

I'm frugal. I'll readily admit that. And I'm absolutely ok with that. It means that I don't need the latest and greatest thing. I don't need the biggest and best simply because it is the biggest and the best. If I need or want something, I generally have a reason for it. Generally. That's why I bought $19.99 running shoes at Costco hoping that they'd replace my long overdue for replacement $140 shoes that have the stuffing coming out the sides and have since the third week I owned them (thank you, Nike). Unfortunately, the shoes have essentially no support and are too wide, so they're going back until I find another pair of running shoes I'm willing to purchase.

Electronics are another good example. I have an iP*d, but I bought it not because "ooooo, look, an iP*d! Everyone has one!" but because when I travel and bring my laptop or go to PTO meetings and have to record the minutes, my laptop battery doesn't last long enough, so I'm constantly in search of an outlet. I do the same with my phone. We were one of the first to get rid of our landline amongst our friends simply because it seemed like an unnecessary cost to us. We've been happy for a decade without it. That said, I was one of the last of my friends to get a cell phone because I didn't see the point in being constantly available. Obviously, I've changed my tune since then.

I love technology, don't get me wrong. I have an awesome DSLR, I have a newer laptop, I have my iP*d, etc. But for me to purchase it, I have to have a compelling reason. Something has to make it so that I can't live without it - live being somewhat tongue in cheek, of course.

So when my Droid - the original Droid - started acting wonky back in August (that's over eight months ago for those of you counting), I lived with it. I called my carrier to see if I could negotiate a better or different contract - especially since neither my husband nor I texted, as I refused to pay the $150+ that would require with our carrier). The only thing they could do was knock $9.99 off my data plan, which would also sign us up for another 2 years. I passed, determined to get out of this contract and into something far cheaper - and yes, I did calculate the break even for switching carriers at that point and paying the cancellation fee. It wasn't quite worth it, sadly.

As my phone continued to go wonky more and more, I found creative solutions. My power button broke so I couldn't turn it off anymore? I carried it in my hand until it fell asleep or used my iGo to turn it back on when I had to pull the battery to stop it from spinning madly. I brought it to the carrier's store where they tried to fix it - repeatedly. It didn't help. Instead I dealt with it, counting down the days until my contract was over.

In February, my phone became utterly useless. It would unlock itself (a pretty neat trick, actually). It would call people. It would try to text them. It would spin madly. It wouldn't let me dial calls. I couldn't stop it, and finally it wouldn't even let me voice search my navigation or accept calls. Frugal me, I put out a call for help to Facebook - knowing that I have friends who upgrade their phones far more often than I do. Two friends offered phones that they had outgrown, and voila I had a new phone without having to renew my contract because I had upgraded my phone (eBay was also an option, but my friends come first).

Fast forward to now. I spent last week researching carriers - who my friends like, the costs, the coverage, the plans, the phones. On Monday, I walked into Costco and had my new phones and plans set up in under thirty minutes. I'm pretty sure I made the day of the woman making the kiosk. (Why Costco? Aside from deeply discounted phones, the rebate the activation, and provide a whole slew of extras from a bluetooth to a car charger for free. Oh, and since I used my Costco AmEx, I have a second year of warranty free - I used it with the Droid, and AmEx refunded my Droid purchase price to my card, no questions asked.)

My husband has a smart phone for the first time ever. Watching him try to use it sort of makes me giggle, but I'm nice and have been helping him. I now text for the first time ever, and my friends are thrilled - for the moment. I'm finally not the one who says, "Wait - can you call me instead? I don't text" and get the weird looks from everyone. I am even paying about thirty percent less with this plan than I did with the old one, even though we're getting so much more.

Welcome to the 21st century, Me. And Swype? I love you. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go play with my new phone some more - and hope I don't break it before my $2.91 case (shipping included) arrives.

What is your relationship with technology? Do you always buy the latest and greatest, or do you have to justify your purchases some other way?

Tasty Tuesday! - Homemade Vanilla Pudding

For Easter, I was in charge of dessert. And because I'm a nice mom (every once in awhile anyway), I let the wee ones choose what to make. They decided on cookie pizza. It isn't the most traditional Easter dessert, but I want them to be invested in what we make and eat - so cookie pizza it was. I made a dairy free version of it for Little Miss and a dairy filled version for us.

As the dairy version was baking, I realized we needed to run to open gymnastics with the wee ones, so I set the oven to stop cooking ten or so minutes before it was scheduled to be done, figuring that it would be cooked pretty close to perfectly. When we arrived home after the hour and a half open gym, the oven was still on. Uh-oh. While they were miraculously not burnt, the cookies were very very crispy. I audibled and decided to make a trifle instead, figuring that the pudding would offset the overly crispy cookie. At least a little. Fortunately, it worked.

The focus for this week's Tasty Tuesday? The delicious homemade vanilla pudding I made. This recipe is perfect for an after dinner dessert for a family - and yes, it's good served warm, too. For the trifle, I doubled the recipe to ensure I had enough to cover the cookie layers. I also mixed in a small handful of chocolate chips (the good chocolate kind) into the warm pudding just before layering it, which made for a chocolate swirl pudding that was beyond awesome just by itself.

Homemade Vanilla Pudding

Ingredients:
1/4 c sugar
2 T cornstarch
1/4 t salt
2 c milk (NOT skim, please)
2 egg yolks, beaten
1 T butter
1 t vanilla

Directions:
In a saucepan, mix together the sugar, cornstarch, and salt. Turn the heat onto medium, and slowly add the milk while whisking the sugar mixture. Cook until it starts to bubble and get thicker, stirring periodically.

Reduce the heat once it starts to bubble gently, and stir constantly for two minutes to ensure nothing scorches on the bottom. Remove from the heat after the two minutes are up.

Beat the egg yolks in a small bowl. Add a spoon of the milk mixture at a time, continuing to beat the egg yolk with a fork while you do so to ensure that the egg doesn't cook. Once the bottom of the bowl starts to feel warm in your hand, you have added enough milk to temper the eggs (my very unscientific method, but it works!).

Slowly pour the tempered egg yolks into the milk mixture, whisking the milk constantly. Return to medium heat, stirring constantly. Once it begins to bubble gently again, cook for one more minute - continuing to stir. Remove from the heat and add the butter, stirring until it's melted and incorporated. Add the vanilla, and do the same.

Let it cool on the countertop for 15 minutes, stirring periodically. At this point, place a piece of plastic wrap over the pudding, which will help prevent a skin from forming on it. Chill in the fridge for an hour before serving. Assuming no one eats it all, this will last four or five days in the fridge.

Note: After the fifteen minutes, I added the handful of chocolate chips and placed the pudding on my cookie layers so that the cookies would better absorb the moisture from the pudding; had the cookie not been so crispy, I would have waited until the pudding was fully cooled so that it didn't make the cookies mushy.

Enjoy this and more with Blessed With Grace and Tempt My Tummy Tuesday. Also posting now with A Southern Fairytale and her Mouthwatering Monday.

The Tooth Fairy Rides A Motorcycle

Little Miss is officially without her two front teeth. She lost the first one on Thursday at school, and the second one came out last night. She's quite proud, and I have to admit that she's pretty cute without them. The morning after her first front tooth, she proudly announced that the Tooth Fairy had given her a quarter from Arizona, and she was thrilled.

Last night? Ahem.

I have to admit that I was once again down all weekend with a migraine. In fact, the only reason I even knew that Little Miss had lost a tooth was because she came (quietly) into the bedroom to tell me that she'd lost it and proudly display her grisly trophy. My husband, thankfully, took charge and insisted on finding a different state quarter for her. He went through his change bottle and discovered one from South Dakota that he put aside for her.

This morning, she announced that the tooth fairy didn't come.

Oh, that's too bad, Sweetie, I consoled her, while mentally wringing my poor husband's neck. What do you think happened?
Oh, she announced with no hesitation at all. Mister Man already told me that it was too windy for her to get her on her motorcycle. She has to wait until it's safe to ride it before she can come.

Huh. Who knew.

This afternoon, I made a quick visit upstairs to her room to verify the location of the tooth. It was under her pillow, as usual, and it again had a note included with it. I'm pretty sure the Tooth Fairy is going to tell her that she can't grant the power to fly, but ummmm how exactly do I bring this up with her to find out why she needs to fly and who and how she is challenging (which is what I think the note says.

So how did you kids - or how do you - show their imaginative skills?