Symphony brownies - yum

We had a pretty busy week as usual, but not too much excitement thankfully! Derek is recovering well from his near fatal cat incident ;o) Salem is adjusting well to us and sleeps downstairs with Jack every night. We had a movie day on Thursday and put a bunch of pillows on the living room floor and got all cozy in our jammies and watched Bolt. It is a cute movie but way to hard for young kids to understand. My neice Mia was here too. Derek and I periodically rotate toys so the kids don't get too bored with them so I got out this tunnel they hadn't seen for a long time, they had so much fun. Jack carried that thing around for 2 days! He is laying in it in this first picture while he was watching Bolt. We also made Symphony brownies. They are so easy and so good. Everyone loves these.
Here is the recipe : 1 9x13 brownie mix (prepare according to package directions - do not bake) pour half of the batter into a greased 9x13 pan. Crumble up 3 Symphony candy bars (the kind with toffee) and put them over the batter. Pour remaining batter over bars and spread to cover all the bars. Cook according to package. Let cool and cut into squares. This week I also made German potato salad, it was my first time making this and it turned out good, I'll post the recipe soon.
Have a good week!

Oh nuts!

As Emma would say, "oh, nuts"! Guess where our new cat was this morning? Yep, he was stuck somewhere. This time in the ceiling in the furnace room! I don't think he really was stuck, just scared to get down. So I got the ladder and got him down. The furnace room is where we keep the cat food and litter so the dogs won't get to them, so I took it all out and put it somewhere else. That room is the only place where the ceiling and walls aren't finished so hopefully this will eliminate any future problems. Do you believe this, maybe these happenings are a sign that perhaps we don't need any more animals? Nah ;o) I called Derek at work this morning and told him and he just laughed!

the wounds

Here are Derek's wounds from the cat bite - do you even believe this? And this is 2 days later! Derek is feeling fine though, just a little sore from the tetanus shot. Emma was helping with the picture!

say a prayer

Please say a prayer for the O'Neill family. Derek and I went to school with Brian O'Neill , he was so young. He passed away Tuesday from brain cancer. Apparently he was diagnosed right after he got married. He left behind a wife and 2 sons. We lost track of Brian throughout the years but once in awhile got a random update on him. His wife seems like such a strong woman, makes me wonder how I'd be in a similar situation. I hope I never find out. She has a blog, get a kleenex if you read it though.http://keepbelievingfund.blogspot.com

here's the story

This is our brand new family member, Salem. He has adapted well to us and we are very happy with him. His predecesser on the other hand, not so much!! I think I left off where we could not find our newly adopted cat, Mitchell. We brought him home Monday at 5:30 and did not see him again until Tuesday at 8:30 pm. Guess where he was? Trapped in a wall under the stairs! Derek heard him meowing so we tracked him down -I have no idea why the font changed. I think I might keep this font, well anyway-he was trapped so my 6 foot 5 hubby got under the stairs and took out that part of the wall to reveal just a little part of the little bastard, er I mean poor little kitty. SoI reached in there and tried to pull him out, yah didn't work. Then Derek tried to pull him out, no dice. LB still has his claws and apparently very sharp teeth. He bit Derek on the forearm and it was pretty bad. It bled and started to swell, by the next morning it was bruised and swollen - more on that in a minute. So, we checked on LB a couple more times then went to bed. The next morning Guess where he was? still in his spot. Grrr... So I called the humane society and told them what had happened and they agreed that he was not the cat for us. No shit sherlock. So we needed to get him out so we could take him back, no easy task let me tell you! So they sent someone out and she was able to get him, thank goodness! In the meantime the lady from the humane society said that cats can pass a lot of diseases in their saliva and if you get bit you need to go to the Dr. Well, we can not have Derek getting sick because I need help with all these animals and kids! so I called our Dr. Of course he had to go in and get it checked out - he had to get a tetanus shot and antibiotics - do you believe it?! He gently reminded me that none of this would have happened had I "remembered " to discuss this whole cat thing with him in the first place ;o) So anyway I got my payback - I took Jack, Emma and my 3 year old neice to the humane society to pick out a new cat last night. Not fun! The kiddos were a little coo-coo. But we ended up with a sweet, loving cat. He is about 3, has long black hair and does not seem to be afraid of dogs. Thanks for being understanding of my love for animals honey! I promise next time I get an animal I will discuss it with you just right after it is too late to return it!!!!

next installment

ok, you all (all 2 1/2 of you who read this blog!) are not even going to believe what is going on with this whole cat thing! I will post a new installment of the cat saga this afternoon but until then I will leave you wanting more with this little hint, tetanus shot....

Ready for Spring

Man are we ready for Spring around here. Yesterday was so nice and today the weather is even better. We have spent a lot of time outside - the kiddos love it, and so do I because it wears.them.out. Yesterday Jack had a couple friends over and we had lunch and played outside. Then today my friend Jesica and her baby Aiden came over and we played outside and went on a walk and played outside some more. Emma loves to be outside. I was worried about this summer because she is so busy and has no fear but she has been very good. She just plays in the dirt right along her brother! When we walked in our neighborhood she didn't want to sit in her stroller very much, she walked almost the whole time. We got home and played a little more outside and then it was time to go in, rut roh! She ran from me then when I caught her she said "ba, ba-nigh,nigh". She was a pooped girlie. I can get used to this! Jack was up at 6:30 this morning which meant so were the rest of us, so he has been just a teensy weensy bit crabby. He is laying down right now, I am praying he will sleep his bad attitude and smart mouth away...
So, I am crazy and added to our family yesterday. I took the kids to the humane society and we adopted a cat! I know, just what we need, another animal! The cat chose Jack-he would not leave him alone so that is the one we adopted. His name is Mitchell. We tried to let Jack pick a new name but he is not real creative so we just left it what it was. Would you like to see a picture of our cat? Well, we have not seen him since we brought him home! I took him down to the room where we keep the litter and food, he hid and has been MIA since. I thought Derek may have let him go, so I told him that would not work because they microchip these beasts now so they would just find us! Derek is a little upset because apparently I forgot to discuss this new addition with him prior to bringing it home, oops! I hope Mitchell comes out of hiding soon, we have looked everywhere and can not find this crazy cat! I hope he is not stuck somewhere, but we figure if he was he'd be making a lot of noise. I'll keep you posted;o)

no picture

Sorry, I am doing something I hardly ever do, posting with no picture. We are a little down around here today, our friends Jason, Christina and Jaedin moved to New York yesterday. Boo hoo! I am going to miss them so much. We spent a lot of time together and they loved my kiddos so much. Emma loved Christina and Jaedin too - she calls Jaedin her baby and always says she is going to Tina's. It was hard to even go by their empty house yesterday to get the mail, we had so many good times there ;o)
Little miss Emma is in her crib right now crying and yelling "mommy, I need you". She usually goes down to sleep in her crib, has a bottle and plays with her baby for awhile then falls right to sleep. Not today! Don't know what is going on with that little girl, she needs a nap (so do I)! I mean I need for her to take a nap so I can surf the internet and watch tv - er, uh I mean play with Jack and clean my house, and do laundry, and cook dinner, and feed the bunny, and scrapbook, and pay bills, and did I say clean? Well, you get the idea.
This morning I was changing her diaper and she tooted, then laughed and said "excuse you"!!! She apparently thinks flatulence is hilarious just like her dad and brother!
Well, she stopped yelling for me so either she is asleep or has climbed out of her crib and is playing in the fishtank. Either way, I get some quiet time!
Hopefully I'll have some more exciting posts soon...

ut oh

Look who else learned "talk to the hand"! She has seen her big brother do it too often and she copies everything he does. Some new things she does, she says, "I do it", she calls her baby Mia (my neice) and she gets her baby all bundled up and puts her in her carrier and she says "bye" and when we ask her where she is going she says " tina's" (my friend Christina's house. Christina took her shopping yesterday and got her some lip gloss (her favorite thing!) and man oh man does she love that stuff! She knows just how to use it too. I'm tearing up, such a proud mommy moment, my 19 month old using make-up ;o) She is such a brute but also such a girlie - love it!
I cleaned out Emma's closet this week and Jack got ahold of her old Halloween costume - he looks so sweet!
We were in Target yesterday and I was buying "feminine products" and Jack said "oh good, you're buying me more of those purple things I like to play with". Rut, roh...

Daramaaaa

Jack Henry is dramatic! He says "talk to the hand lady"! The other day he was playing a video game and he said "come to papa"! Where does he get this stuff? Must be his dad because I'm not dramatic at all...

lipstick

My little girl likes to pretend she is putting on lipstick - with anything. We were coloring with markers one day and she decided to use the black marker as lipstick. She was trying to show me the marker on her finger - she was so upset that her hand was dirty. Uh, you got bigger problems there tootsie!! By the way, it was washable marker, this ain't my first rodeo people!

party

Last weekend we had a going away party for our friends Jason and Christina. They are moving to New York and we are sure going to miss them. Emma loves their baby Jaden and says he is her baby! We had a great time at the party and played American Idol all night.

hours of fun

So my kids have just about every toy out there, but look what keeps them busy for hours on end. Emma was even using this as lipstick - that's my girl! I guess we just need to stock up on a couple boxes of these and we won't hear a peep out of the kids for the whole 14 hour car ride on vacation - right?