Camping Round-up

Last weekend we made our annual trek to the mountains of WV for our family camping trip. This is Andrew's 3rd trip, even though he's not yet 2 1/2.

I had more concerns this year as Andrew is more mobile, more curious, and more vocal than ever.  Fortunately, he had a wonderful time and we avoided the numerous hazards all around us such as ticks, hornets, the river, boiling oil, etc. He kept saying he had to sit on the potty, when the potty was a fly-filled latrine, and I was reminded of how fun potty training is going to be. A huge bonus was that I didn't have to milk myself like a cow the way I did on Andrew's first trip.

Andrew LOVES being around people, and having space to run around. He was already thrilled with being outside, so the throwing rocks in the river, staying up late, and eating all manner of junk were the icing on the cake for him.

Speaking of cake/food, we had our annual Fry-day Fried Food Fest, but we added some healthier options this year as well.

Some favorite deep fried items:

Dill pickles (cut into thin rounds)
Shrimp
Wild Turkey
Potstickers
Fish (for fish tacos with cilantro mayo)
Mozzarella sticks
Sweet potato fries
Okra
Chicken strips
Nutter Butter cookies (OH MY, YUM!)

Some favorite healthier items:
Cole slaw
Black bean and rice salad
Chipotle Corn Salsa (copycat version) RECIPE HERE
Pasta salad

6 dogs at our campsite provided entertainment, and my sister's addition of a brand-new camper was a great place for Andrew to nap, or as he says, "Have a moment."

My Aunt was able to drive over and see us for the afternoon:

And, of course, we had a great rare bird sighting with this bald eagle:

It was a lot of prep work and schlepping for 2 days of fun, but I'm grateful for time with family.

p.s. If you've never tired a honeybun cooked over a griddle, you are missing out.

Valentine Gratitude Box

If you recall last year we had a Valentine Gratitude box in the kitchen in which to put sweet notes to each other. We read them aloud on Feb 14th.

Margaret doesn't want to do it this year, because even though Jack apparently chose NOT to participate, he was a big part of the activity last year. I blogged about my favorite funny responses last February, and I think they illustrate the sweet and playful way Margaret related to Jack and our whole family!

I really hope you'll check that post out, replacing Molly/Margaret and Jake/Jack.

Here are some others that didn't make that post, but that sure DO make me miss LAST Valentine's Day a lot:

Jack, I love your loyalty. Love, Dad

Anna, I love your mothering instincts. Love, Tim

Thanks for getting me up on time, Margaret! Love, Mom

Tim, You are a stud. Love, Anna

I like the way Margaret didn't get upset when I forgot to wash her pants. xo, Mom

Jack, you are a good friend. Love, Mom

Margaret, you are a ton of fun! Love, Mom

Margaret, I love how you are my early morning buddy. Love, Dad

Jack, I love how you have a compassionate heart, especially for people who are less fortunate. Dad

Shadow, Thanks for being such a good car rider. Love, Mom

Tim, Thank you for cooking yummy food for us! xo, Anna

Mom, I like your chicken soup. - M

Shadow, I like your cuteness!- M

Margaret, I love your sense of humor! Love, Dad

Jack, You have the cutest hair ever. Sorry Justin Bieber, you lose! Mom

Margaret, reading "Holes" with you is fun. I wonder how it will turn out?!" Love, Mom

I love the way Jack doesn't let his nosebleeds get him down. Love, Mom

I love how Tim has gotten the kids into skiing! Love, Anna

Who is the best builder? Jack is! Love, Mom

Jack, your artwork looks great! Love, Mom

Margaret, I love watching you dance Hip-Hop Love, Mom

Jack, I love how you keep your promises. Love, Dad

I love the way Margaret and Jack help calm me down when I get stressed-- xo, Mom

Margaret, Shopping with you is FUN! xo, Mom

Margaret, I love watching you play soccer! Love, Dad

I love the discussions Jack and I get into at bedtime. Love, Mom

Margaret, you are a good friend. Love, Mom

Like, OMG! Margaret is sooo funny! xo, Mom

I enjoyed my lunch date with Dad. xo, Mom

Shadow, I love your enthusiastic greetings. It makes me feel loved when you are always so happy to see us. Love, Dad (editor's note: the longest note is from Tim to a dog.)

Jack-- Go black diamond slopes! Impressive! xo, Mom

Jack, I love playing games with you. Love, Dad

Anna, I love the way you write. Tim

You get the idea. If someone could send me a time machine for Valentine's Day, I'd be mighty grateful.

Love to you all!

Valentine Gratitude Box

For the week or so before Valentine's Day we have been writing down things we love and appreciate about our family members on slips of paper and putting them in this little heart shaped box (.99 at Michael's)

We will read them out loud on Valentine's Day.

...at least I hope the other members of the family are doing it too. Mama wants some love.

Please Take Me Home, Country Roads

Family Ski Trip: The Highs and the Lows

So we took the kids skiing this weekend. Here are some highlights and lowlights.

Low: Driving in a full-blown snowstorm up and down treacherous country roads.

High: Dramatically improving my lackluster prayer life during the drive.

Low: Having Tom scream, “Shut up! Shut up! Won’t you two ever just SHUT UP???” to the kids who were fighting, weeping and wailing in the back seat the entire car ride.

High: Finally sealing the deal that we wouldn’t ever be allowed to be judge-y with other parents. If you had told us 10 years ago that we’d use such language with our spawn, I mean precious children, we would have told said were crazy.

High: Saving $10,000 when Tom yelled at the kids in the car, “We were PLANNING on taking you kids to Europe this summer. Now I know we can’t take you ANYWHERE, EVER!”

Low: Saving that $10,000.

High: Taking a Jacuzzi bath with Molly in our hotel room.

Low: Having Molly look at me au naturel, scream in horror, and say, “I’m never growing up!”

Low: Wasting $100 upon discovering it was “Donate A Canned Good and get $10 Lift Tickets Day,” but finding ourselves absolutely can-less.

High: My saving us tons of money by generously abstaining from skiing (as I have since 1989).

High: Finding enough quarters in the crappy waiting area to buy a treat from the vending machine.

Low: Pushing the wrong button and getting a Baby Ruth.

High: Can't think of one.

Low: Having Molly, all zipped up and outfitted to ski, tell me she hated me, hated skiing and she would never ever ski in her whole entire life.

Low/High: Spending 2 hours talking her off the ledge by appealing to her Disney Channel and I-Carly sensibility by sharing with her that I always felt left out when my friends and BOYFRIENDS could ski, since I'd never learned how.

Super High: Seeing her go off with her class for a beginner’s lesson knowing she would kick skiing’s butt (and not mine for at least another hour and a half).

Low: The fighting, the fighting, did I mention the fighting?

High: Watching the kids swim and laugh together in the indoor pool, having more fun together than they have had all year.

High: Reading books inside the crappy waiting area while my family skied in 10 degree weather.

High: Watching Molly feed a cow-sized deer a kernel of corn without being stampeded by the deer's 6 cow-sized buddies.

Higher High:
Seeing Tom’s attitude and outlook on life improve as he shared his favorite pasttime with his smiling, skiing kids.

High: Finally getting ready to drive home!

Nadir: Mere moments after finishing a book about being a good Christian wife and mother, when Jake started wailing because he didn’t want to carry his skis, finding myself so pissed at his infantile behavior that I threw his ski boots onto the floor (sending one boot down a flight of stairs), snatching out of his hand the pack of Resee's Pieces I had just bought him, and storming out of the (very public) building.

Infantile? I’ll show him infantile!

Not sure how to wrap it up except to say that both kids really took to skiing, Tom and I have started talking again, and we're already planning a day trip before spring.

Is it Taco Tuesday Yet?

Today over at Emmacallsmemama there is a “Traditions Party.” Head on over to read about bloggers' cherished family traditions.

I have a few family traditions to share with you, and I don’t mean just yelling at everyone to get ready in the morning, fighting in the car on the way to church, or eating at Taco Bell twice a week. Let’s just call those See-family HABITS, not traditions.


Birthdays:

The birthday boy or girl uses a special red plate, and has a birthday flag hanging from the flagpole in his/her honor. Yes that's a toaster strudel you see on the plate. I didn't say I cooked for them.

Christmas and Easter:
We used to do fondue before church on Christmas Eve, but Tom and I were the only ones who actually liked it. After our celebrity sighting at Chevy’s in NYC, we developed a new Christmas Eve lunch tradition—Mexican food—of course. I bet you didn’t know Mary and Joseph stopped at a Chevy’s on the way to Bethlehem. A girl’s gotta have her tableside guacamole, you know.

For present opening on Christmas morning, we do the taking turns thing, and for the final gift, Tom writes an elaborate poem that leads the kids all around the house on a treasure hunt. He knows his way around a rhyme, that guy. The final clue leads to the “big” present of the year. Warning: Don’t turn on the dryer on Christmas morning —there might be a Wii or a hamster in there.

We also make the kids locate their Easter baskets this way, or by attaching yarn to the basket and having them follow the yarn around the house.

Ice Cream for Breakfast Day:
I’ve already told you about “Ice Cream for Breakfast Day” on the first snow day of the year. Since you don’t know exactly when that will be, I suggest doing what I do—never letting your ice cream stash dip below ½ gallon. Yum.

Geocaching:
And, if you aren’t bored yet by this post, I’ll share our family’s new hobby, which is morphing into a tradition of sorts: Geocaching!

We combine our love of hiking, treasure hunts and gadgets (that would be Tom, not moi) to find little hidden “caches” in the most unlikely places. They are placed there by people all around the world. We choose a hunt on the Internet then head out with a handheld GPS. We hope to geocache in all 50 states by the time I am too decrepit to participate.

Want some outdoor, unplugged activity in which the kids don’t even realize they are exercising? Geocache. Our team is called “Team Shadow” because the dog always comes with us. If we ever make it to Hawaii, however, I think she’ll need to stay home

I guess the bottom line is that childhood is fleeting, and family traditions help make memories. They help connect us, and I want more of those connections. Traditions remind us there’s a lot more to life than homework, crow's feet, and cleaning the kitchen counter.

I’d love to hear some of your traditions, too!

Camping with An Inch of Gray (Or, Why Get Your Roots Done When You Can't Even Wash Your Hair?)

Just back from our annual camping trip in WV. Here are my impressions of some of what transpired:

Buying, staging, packing, transporting, unloading, using, re-packing, transporting and cleaning 2 carloads of stuff for a trip lasting less than 48 hours: Sanity-questioning.

Breaking out in boils from the medicine I was taking for Road Rash: Painful.

Waking up surrounded by mountains, and seeing eagles overhead: Awe-inspiring.


Spending time with my brother, sister, cousins and friends: Validating and uplifting.

Tubing down a river in a raft with my slightly nervous sister: Empowering and Memory Making.

Being confident enough to sit at a picnic table reading books while everyone else was drinking copious amounts of beer and chewing tobacco: I am who I am-ing.


Indulging in the deep fried delicacies of Fry Fest (this year’s items: onion rings, chimichangas, wings, nuggets, French fries, fish, jalapeño hush puppies, and Twinkies): Delicious and Artery-clogging.




Using latrines and having no running water except for the river: Fine. Really.




Having the honor of dislodging a tick embedded in my sister’s bare butt: Pee in my pants funny.

No Photo Available.

It's My Party and I'll Fry if I Want To

I enjoyed the Olympic segment on all of the strange fried foods you can get in China. Scorpion on a stick, anyone? It reminded me of a family tradition I’ve been meaning to share with you.

Each summer we go camping in West Virginia with my brother. We stay at a rustic campground (toilets, no showers) in the mountains. We tube slowly down a river (beer cooler in tow), and make S’mores on demand. My brother is an expert camper, so Tom and I just need to show up and pitch our tent while he takes care of the rest.

One of the highlights of the weekend is “Fry Fest.” My brother heats up a vat of oil on his camp stove, whips up a batch of beer batter and starts to fry stuff. My son Jake has never enjoyed any type of fried food, so I usually sneak him a yogurt out of the Igloo cooler at this point. I tried to supplement our menu with a bagged Caesar Salad, but it was met with derision by the die-hard fryers in the group.

Within minutes, my brother and his best friend Will are dumping large quantities of fried food onto the picnic table. We sit around in camp chairs eating ourselves into a stupor.

Past experiments have included:

Whole onions, corn dogs, hardboiled eggs, chimichangas and doughnuts.

Here’s what we had this year:

Fish (caught that day)
Fish (frozen)
8 lbs of french fries
Chicken nuggets
Chicken breasts
Jalapeño jack cheese
Zingers (like Twinkies covered in raspberry jelly and coconut)

And my personal favorite: fried OREOS! Check out the photo above. Yum!

If just reading this makes you feel queasy and maybe a little bound up inside, you get the picture. Considering the rustic bathroom accommodations, and the fact that I try to make it the whole weekend without using the facilities for certain acts, Fry Fest works out just fine for me.

The BIG City

We were strolling through Times Square on Saturday night, looking for a place to eat dinner. We wanted something distinctively New York, but we didn’t want to pay a fortune or have the kids embarrass us. That cut out a lot of options. When we finally saw a Mexican chain restaurant “Chevy’s,” I said, “Let’s do it!”

Tom rolled his eyes, thinking it a bit pedestrian, especially since we have one in our very own town, but I was just excited to find something we would all like. When we walked in, another party followed us.

With a quick glance back, I saw the most bodacious pair of breasts imaginable. These things were enormous. They were only minimally covered. They appeared to be “working breasts.” I don’t mean that in the same way that my own, marble in a tube-sock, saggy from breastfeeding, breasts once gave my little ones sustenance. These appeared to have been purchased for a specific mission or purpose. I was so busy glancing while not appearing to glance, that I barely noticed the woman’s 3 male companions.

We walked up the large staircase together and waited to be seated. As we walked to our table, I recognized the distinctive voice of one of the men. It was rapper Ice-T, one of my favorite actors from Law & Order! The breasts belonged to his Playboy model wife Coco! I was so glad that they were seated two booths away. This provided us the perfect buffer to tell the kids who he was, and to shield the kids from a view of the boobs.

We had a fantastic dinner, and enjoyed giggling about our small brush with fame. I felt vindicated when we had the best guacamole of our lives and because if a famous rapper and tv star would eat at Chevy’s, perhaps it wasn’t such an odd choice while out in the big city.

The kids wanted me to ask him for a picture, but I didn’t have the nerve, so here is a pic of me with my real iced tea, with Ice-T’s head in the background. Can you see it?

If it's too blurry, and I think it is, I will provide you with a shot of Tom and the kids in their best rapper poses. I guess now you can see why it's good there was a buffer zone between the See family and Ice-T.