sounds like life...

My sister sent me a song this morning, at her clinic they listen to country all day, so she started sending me her favorites that remind her of me.... to funny... even though country is not my favorite, those country folks are sure great story tellers....

Sounds like Life to me...

Got a call last night from an old friend’s wife
Said I hate to bother you
Johnny Ray fell off the wagon
He’s been gone all afternoon
I know my buddy so I drove to Skully’s
And found him at the barI say hey man, what’s going on

He said I don’t know where to start
Sarah’s old car’s about to fall apart
And the washer quit last week
We had to put momma in the nursing home
And the baby’s cutting teeth
I didn’t get much work this week
And I got bills to pay
I said I know this ain’t what you wanna hear
But it’s what I’m gonna say

(Chorus)
Sounds like life to me it ain’t no fantasy
It’s just a common case of everyday reality
Man I know it’s tough but you gotta suck it up
To hear you talk you’re caught up in some tragedy
It sounds like life to me

Well his face turned red and he shook his head
He said you don’t understand
Three kids and a wife depend on me
And I’m just one man
To top it off I just found out
That Sarah’s 2 months late
I said hey bartender set us up a round
We need to celebrate

(Chorus)
Sounds like life to me plain old destiny
Yeah the only thing for certain is uncertainty
You gotta hold on tight just enjoy the ride
Get used to all this unpredictability
Sounds like life

Man I know its tough but you gotta suck it up
To hear you talk you’re caught up in some tragedy
Sounds like life to me
Sounds like life

how did i not know about this?

Last weekend I did a fundraising event for the Rose City Rollers, Portland's local roller derby team. It was super fun, and I can't wait to take the boys to see the roller derby meets.

A couple of weeks ago we went rollerskating for Chloe's birthday, I was getting all cocky on my skates, I was starting to brainstorm my own derby team. Than I fell on my butt. I am still healing my poor tail bone! My derby dreams are out the window, cause that flippin hurt.


The event took place at Oaks bottom park, which I have walked by many times on the spring creek corridor, but never really gave much thought too. Well that place is pretty cool, on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings they open for pre-schoolers only. They only have pre-school rides open, do a storytime and give the kids milk and cookies. We found out about it just at the end of the season. Next week is the last week for the summer, but after that they take it inside and do a pre-school skate at the skating rink, which will be pretty awesome too! Can't wait for rainy days at the skating rink...

glimpses..

last night I had a glimpse into our future.

It was one of those feelings you want to freeze, or bottle and hold onto. We made breakfast for dinner, because for some reason I was on a Mexican food kick grocery shopping and just couldn't cook Mexican food for the third night in a row.... eggs and pancakes are always on hand and super easy....


The boys were sitting at the bar in the kitchen while B and I were cooking, they were fighting over a discarded graham cracker box I had found floating around the pantry empty. Ollie was pretending it was a hat, which only made Max want one to. So I cut it in half (not the first time I cut something they were fighting over in half, did I ever tell you about the blanket saga?) They weren't really big enough to actually fit on their heads like hats, so I cut them and extended them with the skills I remember from preschool..... measure your head..staple..staple... instant hat.


We than made them into crowns, Ollie wanted to be the king, Max wanted to be the princess..... haaaaaa, we don't assign gender roles, we just roll with it here.
Anyway Max wore his crown all through dinner. He kept us giggling by trying not to use his fork to eat his pancakes. Weird kid.


Ollie is super into racing lately and winning (competitive little sucker, we are working on good sportsmanship, he gets downright grumpy if max or I beat him at Candyland). He challenged Max to a pancake eating contest.
My two little men sat side by side and gobbled down pancakes, a glimpse into the future.... this will be my table for many years watching my two growing boys, racing each other, and heckling each other trying to shove the food down the fastest....

oh what did I get myself into.

Oh Max...

Terrible two's in full force... Max has great language skills, too bad he likes to use those skills all the time. He seriously argues with me.... since when did this kid become the boss. We are doing some serious parenting work over here. It is good though, rather do it now than when he is older. He totally has my personality. But look at that little face, how can you resist that!

the jury is still out...

On my homemade granola bars. I needed something to grab in the mornings that was quick, easy and healthy. I looked through a bunch of recipes and decided to give this one a try, I was stoked because it is basically a raw food. Well the buckwheat has to get cooked, so that throws out my raw food statement but whatever....

I had never cooked buckwheat, and I think I overcooked it. I had to add an extra 1.5 cups of oats and they still didn't dehydrate quite right, so I packaged them individually in wax paper and threw them in the freezer. I think they are awesome, Max thinks they are the bees knees, Ollie gets really excited to have one and than leaves most of it on his plate... Brian just rolls his eyes when I offer him one, but he will cross over to my raw food, natural sugar dark side ... he just doesn't know it yet....(I even added carob chips to half of them to entice B, it didn't work)So the jury may be out on my granola bars.... but a couple weeks ago, when our weather was teetering on fall like for 3 days, I made curried lamb pasties (Australian meat pies... pronounced pahhhsties.... not paaasties (those are the weird stickers woman sometimes use on their ladies... who thought of that, and who really needs them?))
I must say this will for sure be a fall and winter staple in this house! If you have never cooked with lamb before you should! I was really scared of it at first..... I have had some really gamey tasting gross lamb... but the key is to drain as much of the fat as possible, most of the gamey taste is held in the fat, at least that is my theory and I am sticking to it.
My family loved these and gobbled them up, the boys loved having their own little individual pies, and our table looked pretty fancy too.

I can't wait for fall. Pumpkins, soup, stews and warm drinks.

Soaking up the last days of summer....

The Yard clean-up...

It is 90 degrees today... what, I have to admit I like it. I was kind of stoked last week when it was grey and raining... than I had to leave the house and do a bunch of stuff, I realized the rain kind of sucks... and I am not ready to give up my flip flops yet, so I will enjoy this bright sunny weather, leave my skirts and tanks on for a couple more days at least. And than maybe I will be prepared to enjoy the change of seasons. I need rain boots!

We finally broke down and hired someone to come out and clean up the yard. It is an insane yard and we just couldn't get our heads around it. Michael was a crazy gardener, and left the yard in a horrible un-manageable mess! There was way to much stuff crammed into the yard and not enough time in the day to keep it from looking like the set of jumanji....

before.....

after..... (oh my gosh there is a house there)

before....

after....

Our friend Dan came out and did it in one day with his crew, they are amazing! We still have allot of work to do, but at least we are starting from a semi-clean slate, rather than an over-grown weed pit. I have to admit I wanted the yard crashers to come in from HGTV and re-do the whole thing... Dan was a good second best though!