Saturday Soup - Early Edition

We are headed out to Idaho today!!! Yahoo! The boys and I are so excited to see our family - and I'm especially excited to be AWAY from my house while we continue to sell it. For those of you who have gone through the whole house selling process you can sympathize! I'm sick of constantly cleaning, picking up, looking around at things I should be doing to perk it up - so I'm taking a "vacation from my problems" like Bob Wiley! Here's what we've been doing this past week. Sam still loves dressing up and playing pretend - this is the updated version of "Dr. Sam" - he's included the tie because Shawn wears a tie to clinic. Very nice. Sam can be the sweetest little guy, and lately he's been very vigilant about finding me flowers (dandelions) because they are "so beautiful, mom!" Sam is also loving the warm weather and we have been taking frequent bike rides, Gator drives, and checking on our flowers and plants in the yard. Sammy also is showing his ability to tight rope walk (something he learned from Wii Fit) and practices a little too close to the flowers, but oh well! The boys got matching shirts and I tried to take pictures of them together - well I'll just let the pictures do the talking! Jack has become a steam roller and just rolls and rolls around the room - I captured one of these sessions on film, and it took him about 2 minutes to get to the door and 1 second for Sam to ruin all of his hard work! He continues to amaze me at how HAPPY he is! Always, I mean really he doesn't cry unless hungry or tired - and even that is only a whimper. He loves to eat, but doesn't like to eat his baby food anymore - he wants the real stuff!! I can't say I blame him. He loves to "drink" water too! Here is what I found a few days ago. With a little help from brother Sam, Jack had his own kiddy pool to play in!! Nice huh?

We'll be taking a break from blogging for a bit - but we'll be back in a few weeks... until then Happy Friday, Cinco de Mayo, and so forth!!

TidBit Tuesday

As our time in Iowa starts to wind down - I've been thinking a lot about friends. A friend really took on a whole new meaning after moving out here to Iowa - 1800 miles away from our family. We have come to rely on our friends for more than just companionship and social outings. They've become our family of sorts.


I found this article online title 7 Friends All Girls Need that says our friends are not created "equal" meaning that different friends serve different purposes that we all need at some point or another. I thought about that and found that to be really true in my life.
Here's the list:

1. The kooky friend - the ones who helps you forget your troubles and just love the moment you're in
2. The new friend - the ones you get to know and keeps you excited about meeting new people
3. The friend you'll keep for life - your "kindred spirit", they are like your other half
4. The couple friends - the ones you and your spouse hang out with
5. The 9-to-5 friend - ones you see at work and help you get through the day
6. The friends who show up - the old reliable ones, who always pull through
7. The friend who's been there - the ones who have tred the difficult paths and hold your hand down your rough road

We all have different kind of friends – those who we see picking up our kids from school, those who we hang out with on the weekends, and those who we confide in, our high school BFF, etc. - and they all are important and are there for us. I have made all kinds of friends, and each and everyone is a "dear, dear" friends (as my mom would say). I don't have a picture of every friend, neighbor, or buddy, but I wanted to add some that I do have. I am forever grateful for all the friends I have in my life, because at some time or another they have been there for me! I hope that I can be one of the 7 for everyone of my friends too. This TidBit Tuesday is dedicated to friendship.
TidBit #1 - Amish Friendship Bread
Day 1 - receive the starter (the recipe for the starter is below)
Day 2 - stir
Day 3 - stir
Day 4 - stir
Day 5 - Add 1 cup each flour, sugar and milk.
Day 6 - stir
Day 7 - stir
Day 8 - stir
Day 9 - stir
Day 10 - Add 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar and 1 cup milk. Divide into 4 containers, with 1 cup each for three of your friends and 1 cup for your own loaves. Give friends the instructions for Day 1 through Day 10 and the following recipe for baking the bread.

After removing the 3 cups of batter, combine the remaining cup of Amish Friendship Bread starter with the following ingredients in a large bowl:
2/3 cup oil
3 eggs
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. vanilla
1 to 1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 cup sugar
2 cups flour
1 1/4 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda

Using a fork beat by hand until well blended. You can add 1 cup raisins and 1 cup nuts (optional). Grease two loaf pans with butter, sprinkle with sugar instead of flour. Bake at 325 degrees F for 45 minutes to 1 hour (individual oven temperatures vary). Cool 10 minutes, remove from pans. Makes two loaves of Amish Friendship Bread.

Amish Friendship Bread Starter
This is the Amish Friendship Bread Starter Recipe that you’ll need to make the Amish Friendship Bread (above). It is very important to use plastic or wooden utensils and plastic or glass containers when making this. Do not use metal at all!

Ingredients:
1 pkg. active dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water (110°F)
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup white sugar
1 cup warm milk (110°F)

Directions:
1. In a small bowl, dissolve the yeast in warm water for about 10 minutes. Stir well.
2. In a 2 quart glass or plastic container, combine 1 cup sifted flour and 1 cup sugar. Mix thoroughly or the flour will get lumpy when you Add the milk.
3. Slowly stir in warm milk and dissolved yeast mixture. Loosely cover the mixture with a lid or plastic wrap. The mixture will get bubbly. Consider this Day 1 of the cycle, or the day you receive the starter.

TidBit #2: Best Friend Pasta
1/2 cup red onion, chopped
2 green onions, chopped
sundried tomatoes in oil
1 tomato diced
1/2 cup fresh parmesan cheese
pancetta
1 can of artichoke hearts, chopped
basil
bow tie pasta
extra virgin olive oil

Directions: Saute pancetta, green onions, red onions in olive oil on low heat. Add tomatoes, sundried tomatoes and articokes. Add some shredded parmesan cheese and mix in cooked pasta.

TidBit #3: Friendship Cookies
1 cup butter
2 cups brown sugar
1 cup molasses
1 cup peanut butter
1/3 cup oil
1 tablespoon vanilla
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups flour
2 cups oatmeal
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 tablespoon baking soda
1/3 cup cocoa
1/2 cup coconut
1 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup walnuts
1/2 cup pecans
1/2 cup raisins

Directions: Preheat oven 400F. In a large bowl with a electric hand mixer, Blend butter and brown sugar together. Mix until creamy then add in peanutbutter, oil, vanilla and molasses. Blend until creamy. In a bowl combine flour, oatmeal, salt, coco, baking powder, baking soda, coconut, chocolate chips, walnuts, pecans and raisins. Add half of the flour mixture to the butter mixture and blend well with wooden spoon. Add the rest of the flour mix and blend all together. With a teaspoon drop cookies on a baking stone or cookie sheet. Bake at 400F for 10 minutes then let stand for 5 minutes. But if you want a softer chewy cookie bake for 7 minutes and let stand on for 3 minutes.

TidBit #4: BFF Necklace: Finally here's a blast from the past - a Ying Yang necklace - so if all else fails, and you really need to find a way to tell a friend you love them - the ying yang necklace always does the trick:) (PLEASE not that I'm totally joking about the ying yang necklace, but don't deny it, you and your BFF had one at one time!!) Happy Tuesday and thank you all for being such great friends!

?Which friend (1-7) are you?

Saturday Soup

Sam driving his car listening to the iPod
All the boys in my house have a love obessesion with the T.V.!!

Mickey Mouse painting!
The weeks just keep flying by! I can't believe it's already mid-April. We've seem to have a busy week, and I really don't know why. The boys have been soaking up the sunshine the past few days we've been bike riding, visited the zoo, and had a garage sale! I have never done a garage sale before and it was a positive experience. We did it with 5 other families who are going to be moving soon - and we had a really good turn out. I couldn't believe how much STUFF we had accumulated! It is nice though to be rid of a lot things we weren't using anymore. Here are some pictures from the week, sorry not a lot to post about, other than the perpetual gloom of selling our house. We have had some people look at the house, which were SO grateful for - but no one has loved our house. In my mind I think, How could they not just fall in love with our little home?? Selling a home is stressing me out to the max, and creating a BEAST in place of my usual "glowing" personality;) but I'm trying to stay optimistic - and I'm really excited to take a little VaCa to Idaho on Friday! I hope you all had a fun week.

In Lieu Of .....

Because I missed the Saturday Soup and we had a GREAT weekend with my in-laws (we already miss you guys, come back!!) I'll be doing the Soup in lieu of Tidbit Tuesday today! We started off our long weekend with Easter Egg dying. We write everyone's name on at least one egg so they can go and hunt for it.Then we were able to enjoy the super nice weather on Saturday. Sam went golfing with the boys and loved it - Jack went shopping with the girls and hasn't quit talking about the "to die for shirt" I got since! We also finally put Sam and Jack's Gator together and Sam is amazingly careful and cruises around the yard with no problem. He also found the ginormous box to be a lot of fun too! Putting the Gator together turned out to be mad science as Shawn and his dad started out without the instructions at first; and then had to unscrew and re-do their work when they ran a few screws short!
Easter Sunday, the Easter Bunny braved the cold wind and hid the eggs outside - and Sam got a HUGE payoff for collecting all of his eggs. Seriously it was more like Christmas than Easter! I hope that Sam doesn't get the wrong idea about Easter - but when Grandma is in town the boys get pretty spoiled. Sam got a big boy bike called the VAPORIZER!! (and you have to say it with a really super-hero like voice for the full effect) and he loves it. He also got a cool laptop computer and Cars race track from Grandma and Grandpa. Jack got a fun helicopter toy and loved chewing on the candy carrot and basket filling! YUM!
Shawn and Jake - his not so "little" brother!

We had a yummy Easter dinner of leg of lamb, new potatoes and peas, and asparagus! We also had people come and look at the house; so that was encouraging! No one's made an offer, but at least we've had some nibbles! Thanks Kelly, Julie, and Jake for coming out - we had a great time!!!




Finally I saw this great clip on my friend Jennilyn's blog, and like her loved this talk given by Elder Holland. It really helps to put the Easter season into proper perspective. I am so grateful for the atonement and the sacrifice that was made for me. Happy Belated - Easter everyone!

TidBit Tuesday

Happy Easter to all!! I LOVE Easter - it's such a great holiday! Here are my Easter Tidbits:

#1: Easy Decor - Target & Walmart are always selling the cute tin buckets for super cheap, and with a bunch of spring flowers it makes an cute decoration. Another idea that I've loved is filling a clear vase with jelly beans, then stuffing the rest with easter basket rafia and getting flowers to match. I also buy the holiday dish towels and use them as center piece/table cloth pieces. I know I'm super cheap, but that's how we roll in our house! What do you do for easter decor?


#2: Ressurection Rolls - I got this Family Home Evening idea from my sister-in-law Brigit. Its a perfect way to teach your kids about the ressurection, and why we celebrate Easter. Not to mention it is super yummy. We ate ours with a little Whipped Cream and loved them!
Crescent rolls
melted butter
large marshmallows
cinnamon
sugar

•Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
•Give each child a triangle of crescent rolls. The crescent roll represents the cloth that Jesus was wrapped in.
• Give each child a marshmallow, this represents Jesus’ body.
• Have them dip the marshmallow in melted butter, which represents the oils of embalming.
• Then dip the buttered marshmallow in the cinnamon and sugar which represent the spices used to anoint the body.
• Then wrap the coated marshmallow tightly in the crescent roll (not like a typical crescent roll up, but bring the sides up and seal the marshmallow inside.) This represents the wrapping of Jesus' body after death.
• Bake for 10-12 minutes. The oven represents the tomb.
• When the rolls have cooled slightly, the children can open their rolls (cloth) and discover that Jesus is no longer there, He is risen. (The marshmallow and the crescent roll are puffed up, but empty.)

(NOTE- Another less messy option is to cut the large marshmallow in half, then put them into cupcake papers and baked them in the muffin tin. Less marshmallow will help them be more hollow inside.)

#3: Easter Egg Leftovers - Now this tidbit is mostly for people not from the great state of Idaho! What to do with all of those eggs you dye? You can make deviled eggs, which are good, but we use our in Potato Salad!! Yummo! Shawn's Granny is famous for her potato salad, and I've tried for 6 1/2 years to get mine to be that good to no avail! Alas ... here is my recipe.


4-6 Potatoes, peeled & boiled (take care not to over boil, makes salad dressing gritty)
Boiled Eggs, peeled and chopped
2 - Green Onion - thinly sliced
2 stalks of Celery - chopped
1 medium Cucumber - diced
Dill Pickle (optional) - diced
*Secret to Granny's recipe is that she cuts all the ingredients REALLY small!!
Dressing:
3/4 cup miracle whip
1 tsp sugar
1-2 tsp mustard
1 tsp vinegar
1 tsp dill pickle juice (optional)
salt and pepper to taste

Put vegetables into a large bowl. In a seperate bowl mix the dressing, then add to the vegetables. Refrigerate for at least 2-3 hours, overnight is best. Top with paprika for color!


#4: Easter Egg Hunt! My parents hid our eggs outside every year growing up. They always had the old "familiar" spot to hide eggs (like in the mail box, on the car rims, on the utility box, and in the tree), but they always seemed to find clever new ones to throw us off. As we got older and too cool to hunt, they upped the anty! They started to fill plastic eggs with $$$$! Needless to say we did some surviellance prior to the hunt, ran as fast as we could, knocking each other down in the process, & freezing our tails off because half of the time there was still snow on the ground! But is was worth it. This High Stakes Easter Egg hunt continues on to this day, and it's something I look forward to every year. So if you are facing some teenage attitude, or just want to try something new and fun try using a little bribery - its so much fun!!

Saturday Soup

This week was just another ordinary week at the Summers' - Sam dressing up and/or changing clothes about 6 times/day; and Jack trying to be bigger than I want him to be. Jack has learned how to get into the crawling stance from his bum and will reach for anything in front of him, FACE PLANT, and then roll back over on his back. He is so funny to watch, but I'm really not ready for him to crawl - I'd love for him to be immobile for a while longer!! Jack-O is also getting pretty strong and standing unassisted on the couch and chairs (only for a few seconds and then he tumbles.) We laugh so hard at our kids crazy antics and tumbles, that sometimes I feel like we have our own private circus show. But I think that is one of the perks that comes with kids!
Sam the SuPerHeRO!!!!
Sam the Weatherman - you need your rainboots, & your pjs over top of your clothes, duh mom!

Sam is going through a stage, but my mom assures me he's just being 3 1/2. Somedays I literally want to pull my hair out, and other days I think how grateful I am for having such a sweet little boy. After some "incidents" and a lot of heated words, and the occasional and very effective SOAP in the mouth (yes, its the only thing that works for Sam!) I always pray that Sam will forgive my impatience. This parenting thing is hard!! We just finished watching the morning session of General Conference, and feasted upon some yummy cinnamon rolls! I'm so grateful to be able to hear from our prophet and apostles and recieve counsel, love and direction, especially in uncertain and sometimes stressful times! Happy Saturday!