Happy Birthday Papa Bear!!!

April 14th, 2009 Papa Bear turned 35 years old!!!

This year we got Papa a fun gift - Owen and I picked out racquetball racquets for Troy's present this year. He also got a spiffy new bicycle a few weeks before. And a helmet! Safety first!!

The requested birthday dinner this year: Spaghetti Spinach Pie, a salad with pepperoni, mozzarella, bacos, and Italian dressing, a loaf of garlic bread, and milk to drink.

Now I don't know how many people have attempted to make a spring formed spaghetti pie, but other than being multi-stepped, it wasn't so bad. And to toot my own horn- it tasted GREAT. Yeah to me for making a tomato meringue.

Dessert was a requested Poke-n-Pour cake. White cake, poked multiple times with a fork, strawberry liquid jello to pour over into the holes, and topped with Cool Whip. you might notice the crazy strawberry design on top of the cake. There was a reason for that. When the Cool Whip container says not to stir it up as causes the whip to get liquidy, well, they ain't lying. I failed to let it defrost for the suggested 4 hours before use so I tried to thaw it with a few stirs. Don't. Mistakes were made! So I decided to try to hide the soupish Cool Whip with lots of fresh berries. It may have been a bit ugly but it was still super tasty and we devoured it!

Owen put on the candles- there were MANY : )

Make a wish, Papa Bear!!!
Happy Birthday Sweetie. We love you so much. I hope all of your wishes come true!

Easter Breakfast 2009

This year for Easter we made bunny shaped pancakes!

Here is Papa bear and Chief showing off their yummy bunnies!

I'm not quite sure how I missed taking pictures of the goody basket, but I did! not that the child missed out on any candy. Not only did he receive a basket from the great bunny himself, but Grandma and Grandpa sent a chocolate filled delivery all the way from Georgia! We had (have) lots of goodies :)

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter!

Coloring Eggs

A few days before Easter Owen and I sat down to an afternoon of Easter Egg coloring. He had such a great time! I was going to be the super enviro-mom and treat him to all natural egg coloring with boiling vegetables, but the standard vinegar and water colored dye tabs beckoned me as we meandered through Target's isles. They were non- toxic, so what the heck :)

We used crayons to color on the eggs before we dipped them.

He started getting really good with the bent wire dipping spoon.

Look at that! the child was very proud of his egg coloring skills and I was proud of him, too!

I think he was more excited to eat the eggs than to color them. He loves the white part, not so much the yolk. A little sprinkle of salt and voila! An egg-stra special snack!

Maplewood Nature Center

This past week Owen and I went with our moms group to the Maplewood Nature Center. Even though there was a tiny turnout we had a really fun time. The child and I discovered this place (as in new-to-us) a few weeks back and had a chance to explore the place a bit.

It is quite a nice facility. The staff is really helpful and the naturalist they had on hand spent a lot of time with Owen and explained things to him in a very relaxed and unhurried way. I really appreciated that. I feel like I spend so much time trying to hurry him up (for what?) that seeing another person slow down with him and engage him was wonderful to see. A little reminder to stop and smell the roses. Or in this case, stop and make a picture of a butterfly's life cycle. He did great. The egg to the larva to the chrysalis to the butterfly. Poetic

As you can see in the photo there was a small turn out, but that's OK! We had the room to ourselves : )

I took a few outside shots of the water behind the nature center. There is a nice path to walk around, but it was too chilly to venture far on the water. Instead we played outside closer to the building and in the warm sun.

Did you know that a pair of Cardinals will keep a territory of 3-10 acres?

Nemo 1 and Nemo 2

A few months ago we bought the child a small fish tank and a few gilled friends to go in it. Originally we had two glofish. They were named Goldie and Stripey. Occasionally, their names were switched for a day or two and then promptly exchanged again.

Unfortunately, Goldie and Stripey were not long for this world and the fish tank was literally shelved until a couple of weeks ago when a spur of the moment trip to the local Petsmart brought us together with our newest aquatic friends, Big Nemo and Little Nemo. ( I don't even wonder about name choices anymore) Along with our new fish we also bought them a new treasure chest to swim through. Funny enough, they seem to like it and spend a fair amount of time swimming through it and poking around it. Little Nemo is quickly becoming as large as Big Nemo and we are running into the Yeager curse of overfeeding our pets. Since these new buddies are indeed Fantail Gold Fish, and I do not believe Goldfish are known for their longevity, we had better ease up on the flakey food if we want to keep them around awhile. We are trying to convince the child to get a few snails, but so far no go. What little boy doesn't want snails? I think I am close to breaking him down. (just kidding)

Chilly day fort

What do you do on a dreary, weary day? Well here in the Yeagerhood we take off all of the couch cushions, find a sheet, and grab a few Planet Heroes and build a fort.

Apparently there weren't enough pillows on the first attempt at fort building. I can't complain- it's pretty fun : )

Weather

So, on March 21st we had this beautiful day. In the evening we actually had the sliding door open and enjoyed a nice evening breeze. It felt like Spring was finally here......

Until of course, April 1st, when the view that greeting from my kitchen window was a bit less Springy than I had hoped for. What a cruel, cruel April Fool's Joke.

At least this time of year is warmer and the snow doesn't last long. But still....

Sushi

A few weeks ago Troy and I decided to try our hand at making sushi. You know what? It turned out alright! Not perfect, but for our first time I think it went well. A few weeks prior we visited with a few of Troy's friends who were sushi making gurus and they made it seem so fun that we had to try it ourselves. We stuck with the basics; crab, carrot, cucumber, egg, and avocado. Yum! This is something we will definitely do again. Maybe next time we'll try a little tuna or halibut.