a song about bug repellant

Eloise was just singing me a song from Sunday school: "Deet and wide, deet and wide, there's a fountain flowing deet and wide!"

pray for Stellan

Please pray for MckMama's baby, Stellan. You can click the button on the right to get all the details, but the poor little guy is having a very rough time!

they're watching me...

Almost a year ago, Eloise and I were chatting while I was applying my makeup. A few minutes later, she came back in looking like this:

First, I scrambled to take this (blurry) photo to remind myself of the influence I have on these three little lives, lest I ever forget that they're watching--and imitating--everything I do! Kind of scary, eh? Then I helped her wash the marker off her face. Thank goodness for the super wash-ability of those Crayola Pip Squeaks! (And no, I was not wearing blue eyeliner.)

from the kitchen of...Evie

Banana Cake by Evie Ingredients (also sometimes called recipes):

• 1 cup milk
• 4 bananas [quantity based on the number of bananas in our house at time of recipe composition (3); she wanted to make sure Mom had to run to the store for one banana]
• pinch of salt
• 3 eggs
• pinch of brown sugar
• 1/2 of 2 cups of white sugar [she did know that 1/2 of 2 is 1, but she liked the way the longer version sounded]
• 1 cup white flour
• 1 cup wheat flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder [quantity determined after much thoughtful inspection of measuring spoons]
• 6 tablespoons melted butter or Grandma-safe butter

Mix wet ingredients together in one bowl. Mix dry ingredients in another bowl. The bananas are dry on the outside, but kind of wet on the inside, so they can go in the wet ingredient bowl. Melt the butter before putting it in with the wet ingredients. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients. Pour into a pan [we ended up using a 9" square pan after much deliberation]. Bake at 350 degrees for half an hour. Let cool. Serve with cool whip, sliced bananas, and sprinkles on top.

We made the cake this afternoon, and it turned out quite well! My grandma (Evie's great-grandma) helped, per Evie's request, and we all had a good time. However, you know that saying, "Too many cooks spoil the broth"? Well, somehow we all forgot to add the white sugar (you know, the 1/2 of 2 cups of white sugar). The finished product was not terribly sweet, but definitely palatable--especially topped with cool whip (sugar-free) and bananas--and totally diabetic-friendly! Maybe next time we'll try it with the sugar...

just humbling...

Evie: Mom, I wasn't bothering Eloise. I wasn't even talking to her. I was just humbling to myself. [Was she mumbling? Humming? Both?]

Not Me! Monday

Wow...when I titled my last post "So Long, Darewell," I didn't realize I'd be taking a little break from my blog! I'm back now, though, and it's Monday, so you know what that means: Not Me! Monday.

1. Part of my lack of "blogginess" had nothing to do with Evie having scarlet fever. No, she didn't have scarlet fever, so she couldn't get excited to have the disease that made Mary Ingalls (from Little House on the Prairie) go blind. My children would never be excited about being sick.
2. I did not lose my car key some time between arriving at the grocery store (and using it to lock the van) and coming back to the van to load the groceries I'd just purchased. This did not happen a mere hour after a conversation I had with my dad where he told me how expensive it is to replace or copy that type of key. I did not work myself up into a near-frenzy looking for the key, dragging along my screaming infant and whiny preschoolers. I am not at a loss for words to describe the relief and gratitude I felt when a man found the key and brought it to a cashier!
3. I have not had only three headache-free days in the past six months, and all three were not this past week.
4. I did not leave my six-month-old, nursing baby--and my other two girls--for 30+ hours to attend a conference this weekend. I don't have an awesome husband who would allow me to get away for some encouragement, and I certainly wasn't in dire need of the break! If I had gotten away, I would not have been absolutely tickled to see how thrilled Audrey was to see me again.
5. Since I didn't go to that super conference, I won't be posting a lot of the great insights and ideas I took from it in the near future, so don't watch for them!

Would you like to play along? It's fun! Check out MckMama's blog to see what she and a lot of others haven't been doing, and then add your own!

So Long, Darewell

My house is alive with The Sound of Music: we let the girls see the movie a couple of months ago, and they LOVED it. I checked out the soundtrack CD from the library, and we listened to it in the van every time we drove somewhere for four straight weeks. We let them watch the movie again this week while Evie was sick, and they sang along with all the songs. Their own versions of the songs, of course. For example: "So long, darewell, and you and you and you. [Voice goes up one full octave] Goodbyeeeeeeeeee!" "How do you solve a problem like Maria? How do you catch a cow and pin it down?" "IIIIIIIII'm ev'ry mountain!" And neither Evie nor Eloise seems to be able to go straight up the stairs these days...no, instead they must sit on the stairs and slowly go up while sitting, all the while singing like little Gretel, "The suuuuun has gooooooone to bed and so must I-I." (If you are not familiar with the music or the movie, none of this will make much sense or be very funny. Sorry!) Because they have been so intrigued with the vonTrapp family, I also checked out from the library a neat pictorial biography of the actual Trapp Family Singers, as well as Maria Augusta Trapp's book The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, which served as the inspiration for The Sound of Music. We have enjoyed studying the pictures together, and I'm very much enjoying reading Maria's biography and sharing many tidbits from the story with the girls. Maria shared her story with such enthusiasm, and you cannot help but catch some of her spirit while reading it. The other day I read part of a chapter that really resonated with me and the particular stage of life in which I seem to find myself right now:

It will be very interesting one day to follow the pattern of our life as it is spread out like a beautiful tapestry. As long as we live here we see only the reverse side of the weaving, and very often the pattern, with its threads running wildly, doesn't seem to make sense. Some day, however, we shall understand.

In looking back over the years we can discover how a red thread goes through the pattern of our life: the Will of God.

I really do look forward to the day when I shall understand so many things. Until that time, I cling to Ecclesiastes 3:11--"He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end."