6 Months Today

Oh my gosh- when did it happen? I blinked and you are SIX months old. Half a year. I feel like I just had you and saw your face for the first time, that magical day in the hospital. And yet, I feel like I've known you forever. You look up at me knowingly. You smile and pet my face and wrap your arms around my neck and even though you pull those little hairs at the base and it hurts like crazy, and even though by "pet my face" I mean sometimes you squeeze and swat at my face, you KNOW me. And you fill my heart so full I think it'll burst every single day.

Father's Day

A few days late... here's a shot of our super dad. He's a popular guy in our home and we are SO grateful for him.

This Father's Day was interesting for me. I definitely thought of my dad a lot. I had flashes of the silliest memories going through my mind all day--- it made me want to write each of them down in case I run out one day. It's just a scary feeling to not be able to make more. I miss my dad and was grateful for a special day to reflect a little more on him.

But the day was wonderful--- and as always, I felt especially thankful for my step-dad, Kirk who serves and teaches and loves me so much, and for my father-in-law, Steve who raised his sons to be kind and gentle and patient like him...

And especially for my 72-and-sunny, very own, Ross. I still feel lucky every day.

Father's are so incredibly important. Happy late Father's Day.

Camping... Without CAMPing

This last Friday, we went up to Hurkey Creek, which is up near Idyllwild, in the mountains. Just over an hour away, it's elevated enough that it's SO much cooler and gorgeous and green. We went with a bunch of friends slash Ross's business partners. The guys went mountain-biking for an hour or so while we hung back and watched the kids play. (I'm not gonna lie, I may have made a couple of comments beforehand going something like "so I get to watch the kids in dirt and red ants while you go mountain biking?hmmm") Should I not admit that? Makes me sound like such a perfect wife right?

But nobody got bitten, and my kids were in heaven, even if they did have dirty faces and fingernails, and there's just something soul-warming about a campfire, tinfoil dinners, s'mores, hoodies, and good friends.

Beforehand, everyone debated sleeping over-- and then decided to just make it a day trip.... I think we all regretted it a little. I'd written it off because of Finn, but once we were there I kept thinking we should have just gone for it-- that it would have felt so good to wake up buried in this beautiful landscape.

But then we pulled into our driveway with three sleeping kids-- tucked them in their beds, and rinsed the campfire off of our skin, and got to snuggle into our own pillows...

Genius.

My dinner-group meal this week

We do a lot of easy meals with ground turkey. Costco sells this kind and we love it. Not too turkey-y, not too fatty. Not too pricey--- at Costco at least.

Anyway... this is a staple of ours. I have a thing for a small burger. Or should I say multiple small burgers. There's nothing that bothers me more than when you get a HUGE potato bun or something at a BBQ, but their patties have shrunk up so they leave like a half inch ring of meatless bun around the edge. No thanks. Somehow if I make my patties the size I feel like they should be, they always seem to fit much better on a little bun. Even when you think they're too big for the little bun. Even better. My favorite bun is some kind of little kaiser roll, toasted. Even better if they're a dollar in the day-old section like these. Once toasted, good as new.

I've never tried a real recipe for burgers... and I'm sure I always break all the rules. Since really I just shape 'em and sprinkle them with a bunch of whatever. But since this was dinner group, I tried to put more thought into it and while I still have no idea how much of anything I put, here's what I put.

- A bunch of ground turkey thawed and dumped in a bowl

- Many splashes of worcestershire. Holy cow, I just made Ross peek in the fridge to spell that right. That is wild. A whole syllable longer than I thought. Again--- many splashes.

- A bunch of coarse salt.

- A bunch of garlic salt.

- A handful of chopped fresh parsley.

- One egg white (I've found my turkey patties to be pretty fragile and didn't want them too fragile for dinner group. I think it helped.

Stir it all together and form little patties. Grill on grill-pan or BBQ for just a few minutes per side.

I could grab almost every veggie in the produce section and pile it on top if someone chopped it for me. I LOVE toppings. This is what we did this time:

-grilled onions

-raw red onions

-fresh jalapeno

- tomatoes

-lettuce

- turkey bacon

-avocado

-cheddar cheese

P.S. Since Monday, we've stayed up too late and slept in too long (well maybe just me) and certainly formed some new tan lines. Summer's feeling SO good so far.

No Reason

I got home from a shoot the other night and Ross was pulling up with the sitter. The light was so pretty and the weather was so nice (and my hair was washed and down- excuse that it's all over Mila's face) and my camera was on my back and Brittany had two free arms so.... I grabbed her to snap one of my family.

So here we are.

SUMMER!

(Thanks for the source Erica! This photo comes from this darling blog.)

I want one of these. Or maybe I'll just print this up life size and tape it to our wall and see how many of them we can check off this summer.

We are SOOOOO ready for summer in our house. Maybe mostly me. Who'd have known that one measly year of kindergarten would get me so revved up for some Biesinger-standard-time (meaning there is no designated time for anything) FUN!

Tomorrow starts the first full week. Will I eat my words? We'll see.

As a thank you for Sophia's teachers

...we did some homemade bread and almond butter. I was desperate to try and make my own almond butter after seeing it on Sheena's blog AND getting my first real food processor. It felt like magic to me, watching them go from nuts to creamy butter. I LOVE almond butter.

I used Lizzie's yummy whole-wheat bread recipe... For almost as long as I've known her (8 years?) I've searched her kitchen for some of her homemade bread when I'm at her house. I was always way too intimidated to make it myself, especially because the recipe was so huge. But I finally remembered how to divide by two and went for it.

I'd link you to her blog but she shut it down. A sad day. :) Here it is copied in.

I love how she has it down to such a science so there's not much waiting... it feels so much quicker than most bread. And you don't need a bread machine.

Lizzie’s Whole Wheat Bread

6 2/3 C hot water

3 T yeast

2/3 C honey

2/3 C butter (I use olive oil because Tanner and Kate can't eat dairy)

2 T salt

2 C flour

1/2 C wheat gluten

2 C oat flour (or grind up oatmeal in your blender)

14-16 C whole wheat flour (we use half hard red wheat and half hard white wheat)

Mix water, honey yeast. Let proof. Add white flour, oat flour, gluten and half of the whole wheat flour. Mix. Add salt and butter/oil. Mix. Add the rest of the flour until it barely cleans the upper half of the bowl when mixer is running. Knead for 10 minutes in mixer. Dough should be smooth and elastic, but sticky. Let rest 10-20 minutes. Set oven to 170 degrees. Spray Pam on your hands and shape into 4 loaves. Put in oven and immediately turn OFF oven. Let rise in oven for 22 minutes then turn oven to 350 degrees and cook 28-30 minutes. Immediately turn out onto cooling racks.

*The amount of whole wheat flour you use will just depend on how dry your wheat kernels are and how humid it is where you live. For example, here in California I add almost a full 2 cups LESS than my Mom does in Oregon because it is a lot drier here.

*This batch is made in a Bosch. If you have a Kitchen Aid, halve the recipe. If you don't have a mixer, ask my Mom how to do it by hand.

Will I ever get used to being a grown up?

I don't know when it happened, but as of today (well then I guess it happened today) my first is DONE with kindergarten.

What on earth.

This little girl could not make my heart burst with any more pride.

BREAD

I remember when carbs first became evil back in high school. I mean for the first time in MY memory. I know Atkins came out years before, (which to me, sounds like the worst diet in the world, thank you.) But it was back--- my mom read "The Carbohydrate Addicts Diet" and relayed some of it to us and I remember it being SO new and strange to me that bread and cereal and all of these 'fat free' things could be trouble. what? Remember when they were all getting fat off of fat-free yogurt on Seinfeld? Good thing it's just TV. I thought.

Now it's just this known thing. And while I don't have any intention of cutting grains out of my life EVER, and sort of think it should be illegal to... I'm pretty sure they don't HELP with the post-baby goals.

I wish I could go back in time. Before I ever knew that. Because all I want to eat right now is this bread. And not sliced thinly with an egg white and tomato. I want it thick, with butter and jam. A lot of butter. And then I can't decide if I want just butter or butter with jam, so I have one of each. Thanks a bunch Sheena.

Just felt like it should be recorded, since it's been a serious phase in our house

I think this hit is old news now. So I'll use the timing of our obsession with it, as proof that we weren't exactly ENCOURAGING our children to have a premature love for pop stars. But they have friends, (Kate) and their friends have siblings (Madi) who also have friends (Mary) who thwart our attempts at keeping them singing only primary and princess songs. Thanks a lot girls.

And so we've conceded, and maybe even let them watch the video on youtube here and there. (What a cute kid? I had no idea.) And after hearing them singing it so many times, I thought I should record it before they've moved on. I just love hearing the words they come up with sometimes. They think I'm full of it when I try and correct them, "it's, 'are we just FRIENDS', not 'DENDS.' " They'll have no part. Psshht. "No MOM! Sophia said it's "dends."

Here, I caught Mila in the car (yes I'm driving but I could see the reflection of my camera in the review mirror so once I got it in the right spot ... I was all eyes on the road. Swear.

A Recap

I was going through Ross's iphone pics tonight and realized there were things in there that I'd wanted to record... but of course, if it's not on one of my memory cards, it's not in my memory. So while I'm thinking of it, I'm gonna play catch up... and record a few of the things we've been up to lately.Ross took the girls fishing at a local country club. Catch and release... and they keep it well stocked... so they had success... even with their flimsy princess fishing poles. They loved it.

Finn had his first go at a REAL swing... he liked it... but then I saw his mouth go for that metal thing that a thousand kids have touched and that game was over.

But now I feel like a fraud. Because if you know me you know I let my kids eat food off of the floor and walk into the park bathroom barefoot. I'm certainly no germ-a-phobe.

Just soaking up the last of our gorgeous park-weather before we hit regular triple digits even when the sun drops. There's nothing like some take-out on a blanket at a park on a NICE night with my family.

(I don't think my calf is actually as big as my baby. Let's blame the iphone camera, k?)

Moving on.... LAST weekend.. like two weekends ago now I guess, for Memorial Day, we got a room at a Hyatt in Newport on Priceline. We met up with my sister, Mel and fam at the beach on Monday and enjoyed their FLAWLESS beach weather. I tried not to cry the whole way home.

We love the beach.

And we love hotels. I still feel like a kid in that way. Even though I love my own bed with the foam topper and my special pillow and my SPACE, there's just something about sleeping in a hotel and using their little soap and not having to make my bed that is sooooo fun. My girls were NOT disappointed.

Although she kind of looks it.

That's better.

Our lazy ritual of letting them watch movies on netflix on our iphones when we want to sleep in. Not even a little guilt. Not 'till like 8 at least.

ok those were with the real camera. In a dark room with high iso. I love my camera when I'm up for hauling it.

And moving on again.... DISNEYLAND!

In the past, we've had season passes. But we let them expire when I was super pregnant with Finn, thinking we might not go for a while. Well we've missed it... and a friend of ours somehow got her hands on like 90 free twilight tickets!!! Long story... don't really get it... friend of a friend is an event planner and couldn't use them? But LOTS of us benefited. THANK YOU JENIE! So with one day's notice, we decided to take off this last Friday after school and enjoy an evening in THIS park. Again... gorgeous weather..... so fun.

If you can't tell... the weather makes a HUGE difference in my attitude. Wandering around outside when it's beautiful makes me want to skip instead of walk and sing from the rooftops. For reals. If it's too hot, I turn into a pumpkin.

I think that gets us about up to speed... for now. Going into Sophia's last week of school!!! I never knew I'd be so excited. I'm just ready for a few days of pajamas and then lots of swimming, frozen yogurt, and whatever the heck we want.