Scribbles and Scrambles ~ Woot Woot

Sick day courtesy of a tummy bug. Yay. Poor Rob, too. The worst is over and I am super warm thanks to my doggie lap robe.

Scribbles and Scrambles ~ Bravery

Bravery comes in all sizes of packages. 

I have a friend who is learning to live with cancer, knowing that the chemo she's on hasn't kicked the out of control cells and without a miracle, her time is limited on this earth. 

My kids each have unique struggles and have chosen to be brave in those. 

My husband currently has no knee but plenty of pain. 

Bravery can be oh, so heavy. But sometimes we can experience the joy in courage. 

Last night I got to watch our little 1-year-old exhibit a little bravery of her own. We have several steps in our house including sections that go to landings and have only two steps each. Our little roundhead baby is fascinated. Basically, when she's over and awake we do steps. 

Up and down. 

Up and down. 

Up and down. 

However, until last week the down was either an adult lunge to catch crazy baby or holding a tiny hand taking one step at a time. My daughter has been teaching her to go backwards down the stairs on the little landings. 

Yesterday, she initiated this on her own while I was able to take pictures of the very slow methodical process. Shall I mention she was headed to the dog chilling room and the kennel? 

Probably not. 

I won't post pictures of her favorite play area either, since it seems to be the kennel at the moment. If it helps, the older kids love it too, and the dogs don't really use it. Unless the kids corral them into playing with them.  

Scribbles and Scrambles ~ Is Acknowledging My Crazy as Crazy the First Step ?

eager recipe tester

I have a twisted tendency to over do. My mom, when she reads this is going to agree. 

See, before Rob's knee melted down I decided to host a little workshop at my church that will help newbies figure out how to add kale, flax and quinoa to their lives. A blurb would go into the bulletin asking the interested to let me know and I had a plan to teach hands on and then we'd eat our yummy experiments. I half anticipated that there would be next to no-one interested in this little adventure. But now that I have a dozen plus coming, I'm thoroughly committed. 

Sigh. 

It's completely my own. I could have yanked the announcement or rescheduled due to Rob's knee issue. Or I could show up with a bag of kale, a bag of quinoa and some ground flaxseed cookies and a few recipes to take home. This thing is under my control. 

But I want to make a Kale Pesto White Bean soup. And Rosemary Onion Quinoa flatbread. Mocha Peanut Butter Quinoa No Bakes, two kinds of homemade kale chips. Oh, and popped quinoa rice krispy treats. And a thai quinoa salad. Flaxseed cookies and.... 

Of course, these ideas are going to be something I'm going to have to at least pre-test because I'm just not content with one thing showcasing each of these ingredients. There have to be options. Lots of options. And I love to experiment and mess around with food so I'm not even going to just find a recipe and see if we can recreate it. I'm going to make this adventure fun for me. 

Good news, I have made the flat bread, just not the onion and rosemary version. And kale pesto and quinoa no bakes but those need to be tweaked. I do have bar recipes made with flax eggs, so I think those won't be an issue, maybe I won't even be tempted to veer. And honestly, I'm spending time at home with the man, so it's not a real big deal. 

No doubt you will see some recipes and hear some ridiculous feedback from the event. 

Scribbles and Scrambles ~ Just a Snapshot of My Day

Scribbles and Scrambles ~ Oh, Priorities

I was going to post this morning. But then I had to clean up after someone. So this is all we get.

Scribbles and Scrambles ~ Just Because You WERE Dying to Know

I think the caretaker gig is inspiring me to get my goals cracked out. Honestly, I got rid of three boxes and two more bags of stuff on Friday. Okay, I had a little help in a deadline kind of a situation. My son heads up a service learning team at the high school he teaches at and they are having a fundraiser rummage sale in a few weeks. With Rob's bumtastic knee bothering him, my son offered to take his dad's truck to go buy a recliner to make his dad more comfortable. Being the wife/mom of the whole situation I decided I should go along. And since he was using his dad's truck and heading right to his school's neighborhood it would be great if I could just go ahead and help his fill and then unload the truck at the school. Since I already had three bags, I decided I could give those to him, and then went crazy in the areas that have just been barely touched. Have I mentioned I love getting rid of stuff? 

Why on earth did I keep this stuff as long as I did? Some of it is just embarrassing. Last year I purged the stuff I saw all the time, stuff that was in my way. This year is the year of purging the hidden. Since Friday I've found a few more items that just need to go. 

On another note. Rob's sitting at the kitchen table/his desk doing some work. His leg is getting better, enough that he can actually do some sitting for long periods of time. While he's occupied I've written two articles for Out of the Frying Pan's blog tour and have begun an extensive list of what each blog wants from me. It feels so good to get things checked off my to do list, even if it's only in my head. 

Scribbles and Scrambles ~ Goal(s)?

I revealed a few goals I had for January. 

Results? 

I filled five bags that have now exited my house. Yay. 

I also did get three articles started for Out of the Frying Pan's blog tour. And through a friend, I scored several more opportunities. And inspired by that I went ahead and asked four more of my favorite book review bloggers to put Out of the Frying Pan on their radars. Win. Win. 

Violin. UGH! Total fail. I practiced once. In a whole month. I did have a lesson, too, and maybe got some more insight and help trying to figure things out. But. Fail nonetheless. 

February Goals (even though we are almost two weeks in). 

Going to go big. Three more articles and/or Q and A's for the virtual book tour. 

Three more bags/boxes of unwanted/unneededs. 

Violin. Focus on memorizing key signatures. Practice three times. 

Survive living well with a man with no knee. And working on my caretaker skills. 

Scribbles and Scrambles - Uhgles

Sometimes life throws curveballs. The last week was full of those. Rob got a new knee last July. Then started having some weird issues starting in November. Infection won. Last Friday he had his knee removed. For the next three months he's got an immobilizer and at least a month on IV antibiotics. I have learned I am not a natural caregiver. Not natural at all. Good news the girls are picking up the slack.

Scribbles and Scrambles - Snow Day Part 2

Another snow day. Another slumber party. Two of the three tag-team worked. The other had doctor appointments and half a snow day. Still the snowfall was very normal for our neck of the woods. So as much fun as the slumber party it was a wee bit of a quirk.

Scribbles and Scrambles - Snow Day

Baby took her first selfie while she stayed nice and warm inside with grandma. The g-kids and my kid spent the night last night anticipating the coming blizzard.  We stayed up late wondering if we were going to get the promised gargantuan snow that was promised for days prior. No snow by 11:00 p.m. and everything for Tuesday had already cancelled. Tuesday we woke up to snow but not of blizzard proportions. Several lost power due to the snow but we didn't and are grateful for that. Incredibly wet and perfect snowman and hot cocoa snow. (By the way, the temp on Sunday was mid-fifties and all the previous snow had mostly melted which made for some pretty ugly snowman body parts. Ha Ha) By this evening it was snowing like nobodies business. We are doing another sleep over just because who doesn't love being snowed in with people they love? Good news til we have to shovel again or lose power. Ugh.