Granddads on his way!!

My dad left England this morning and should arrive in LA around 6:45 tonight, I have tried to plan some fun things for us to do but please post any suggestions for me that you may have, fun places to visit and fun places to eat, especially if you are not from here. Its my dads birthday on Friday so we are planning on taking him to Cheescake Factory. I am also planning a day out in Santa Barbara, I love that place, any good food recommendations there?

And, my beloved Civic sold on e-bay, we got about $1500 more than we hoped for so that was amazing but it was a little bit of a wrench dropping it off last night. A father from Colorado had bought it for his son, sounds nice right? well we drop it off and the guys, lets just say, one slice short of a loaf and drunk to boot. My poor sweet civic that has been so faithful all of these years, I didn't know I had such an attachment too it, I hope it has gone to a good home.

True Talent

My friend Julie sent this to me, one word, amazing, which is also a word to describe my friend Julie who call this morning, knowing that Kate has been sick for the last 24hrs and offered to watch Sara if I needed to take Kate to the Dr.'s. Always so thoughtful, I didn't need to take her up on the offer as Kate is doing so much better today. Thank-you so much Julie.

And the award for best dad goes to.....

ERIC!!

Today Kate got this really cute letter in the mail.

Rome - I'm going there someday...

You're a big city soul with a small town heart, which is why you're attracted to the romance of Rome. Strolling down picture perfect streets, cappuccino in hand, and gorgeous Italian people - could life get any better?

Should I have belonged in London? One of the fun things I like to do with these quizes is to change my answers slightly to see what the different outcome is, truth is, I always seem to think that part of answer A is me and so is part of answer B so I changed my answers to the other possibles and I did get London the 2nd time around. I have never been to Rome so I don't quite know if this is fitting or not for me, the description does fit though. Either way I love to travel and will be going to Rome some day so I'll let you know!!

What city do you belong in?

Willpower

Logically I know that this has no nutritional value and is going to assist in making me fat and rot my teeth but sometimes I just gotta have some chocolate!! All the time I am eating it there is a war going on in my head, why do I need it so much? I probably just need to develop more will power but for today, willpower schmillpower, it was delicious.

Pumpkin festival

I love hanging out with Eric and the girls on Saturdays, lately I feel the need to get out of the house and do something different from my regular weekly routine. Yesterday we headed out to a pumpkin festival in Santa Paula, it was cute and the girls had fun. They had a train ride, hay wagon ride, face painting, petting zoo, hay pyramid, sunflower forest, yummy treats like pumpkin pie and of course lots and lots of pumpkins.

And after bumping poor Sara's head a million times we have finally upgraded to a minivan and to be honest, I am not sure how I got this far without it. Many of you I know would always take the SUV over the van but one of my favourite features - sliding doors. I'm a minivan driving mom and I love it! Now I just have to sell the Civic!!

And finally, this is a picture of the bakewell slices I made today. They were cooling when I reached into the cupboard above for something and out falls a spice jar of cumin that I hadn't put the lid on properly, and so it fell and dusted the bakewell slices with its contents. Yum, Yum!! Frustrated as I was maybe its a blessing as now I do not have to consume all of those needless calories!!

Finally an update!!

Man, I promise to keep up on my blog, I have excuses but none of them will fly, mine usually involve the fact that I have two kids and am busy but Brooke has 3 and hers is way more updated than mine. So here is some of what has been going on.

Fun at the zoo with the cousins, we have lived in LA for 7 years and this is the first time we have been to the zoo together!! It was also the first time Sara really had fun looking at the animals, she was soooo excited!!

Passing the time, Kate wanted to play domino's, I don't really know a game for 3 yr olds so it just ended up with Eric and I making fun things for her to knock down.

Can you tell this is a house of girls? we love our chocolate!! Its ironic that Kate doesn't always share that well with Sara but she was really good at sharing the chocolate and Sara just kept eating it, faster than Kate. She was so good at sharing it that I eventually had to intervene and tell Kate to stop sharing!!

My girls love to swing, Kate a little more than Sara, if we are at the park for 2 hours they would swing the whole time, here is Sara in the big girl swing and Kate too, just can't wait for her to be able to pump her legs.

What are you guys feeding your kids? I have a lot of days when I just don't know what to feed them and Kate loves cereal so she asks for it all the time, I did sneak in some mango too though. Tonight we had pork chops with rice some potatoes and green beans. Kate only eats the pork and rice and I told her she had to eat at least one green bean and a small bite of potato. You would have thought she was eating something off Fear Factor with the faces she was making whilst trying to down her green bean and potato!!

Fun in the tub! Siblings, sometimes they just can't get along and other times I couldn't imagine them being apart.

Random Post

I just don't seem to have the time to keep up with this blog thing or it maybe that not too much of anything is going on so I have decided to lump a weeks worth of randomness into one post. I originally had an idea to post some baby pictures of me, Eric and Sara to prove that she looks somewhat like me, I have had numerous comments lately about how much like Eric she looks. I went through and got the pictures and realised that it was a mute point as the baby pictures really do prove that she does look like Eric!!

I made some soup on Saturday evening and it didn't turn out as good as it previously has, I also made bread which wasn't too great either. The pictures above are of soup and bread I made yesterday, a Moroccan Spiced Chickpea Soup and Rosemary bread, right out of the oven it is delish!! SO many people tell me they can't or are afraid to make bread but it really is so easy, here is what I did with the rosemary bread as the recipe is for a bread machine which I do not have but it is easy without, just mix the yeast and water (I just put my kitchen tap on the hottest and let it run for a minute, it is usually warm enough but not too hot), let it sit for 10 minutes. Then with dough hook on my kitchenaid I put the yeast mixture in the bowl, as the dough hook turns add everything but the flour, let it mix for about 30 seconds and then add all the flour, in one go, and as soon as it comes together a little I put on the timer for 8 minutes and let the kitchenaid knead my bread. It makes kind of a sticky dough, then I put it in an oiled bowl, cover with a tea towel and let it rise till doubled, my preferred spot for rising dough is a window that light has coming in through, otherwise just in my kitchen its usually warm enough, sometimes it takes a little over an hour to double though if its a little cooler than normal. Then punch it down, and its still very soft and a little sticky so just mush it in your hands to the shape of your loaf pan, into the loaf pan to rise again then when doubles again bake at 375 for about 30-35 minutes. A tip I just read is that iodized salt does not mix well with yeast, I usually use the kosher flake salt from Trader Joes. Anyway, try the bread, it really is good. The soup is great too and I think pretty nutritious, chickpeas, canned tomatoes, spices and fresh baby spinach.

Sorry for the picture but here is life with EB, Kates little toe got a blister, they grow and this one got away from us, it totally encased the whole toe before I popped it. Then to make it a little worse two nights later whilst she was sleeping she must have rubbed it as the skin covering it from the blister peeled back and just left a poor raw toe. Amazingly enough it has healed in a week and Kate hardly complained at all, although she is wising up to how this can benefit her as she explained to me "I have to watch a movie cos my toe is owie!" Anyway, why gross you out with all this? if you live in So Cal or anywhere that has a Ralph's you can sign your Ralph's card up for a community contribution. They will donate a percentage of what you spend to certain charities, it may not seem like much but I'm sure it all adds up. So to sign up (and you have to re-register every September) go to http://www.ralphs.com/ and click on community contribution on the menu on the left. Where its says participant click on sign up. On the sign up screen it asks for an NPO number, for the Epidermolysis Bullosa Medical Research Foundation type in 81963 and every time you shop money will be donated to to research for EB. Check out the EBMRF website.

Finally, need a good read? James Herriot writes my all time favourite books. I'm not sure why, my love of England, animals or longing for a simpler lifestyle? He paints with his words an absolutely breath taking picture of the Yorkshire Dales, I am actually from Lancashire but the counties boarder each other, always when winter rolls around (even though it doesn't feel too much like winter today) I feel the longing to re-read these books. The library has them, he has a few different ones but I believe this is the first, they are all great though and they also have the DVD's of the TV series but I am a purist, read the books first. For kids we just checked out Room on the Broom and its is a delightful read and great for this time of year too.