It Sure Tastes Sweet

February 17, 2012

I wish you could smell my house right now!

Sugar Cookies
Row after row of cookies are cooling on the table – sugar cookies, monster cookies and giant gingersnaps.
Ginger snapsAnd then there’s the muffins! Dozens of them – all waiting to be packaged and delivered.

Why the baking frenzy?

Dagmar got a huge order for baked goods that need to be delivered to an open house tomorrow.
MuffinsShe decided on her recipes, figured out what she needed for ingredients, did the shopping herself and spent all day in the kitchen.

And everything looks and smells wonderful!

What was my role in this venture? Mentor, quality control, chief taste tester and proud momma.

I never saw this coming years ago when she was sitting on the counter beside me licking the spatula!

It sure tastes sweet.

By Country Gal | Posted in Children, Cooking and Food, Entrepreneurial Ideas, Teenagers | Tagged , , | Comment (1)

The Perfect Cuppa

January 25, 2012

the perfect cuppaI find it very interesting that I – a confirmed non-coffee drinker – should end up with so much coffee paraphernalia.

Would you believe there is – right at this very moment – a coffee maker, a French press, and a coffee grinder sitting on my counter?!

And two different kinds of coffee beans in the freezer, and an assortment of creamers and simple syrups in the fridge?

And I don’t even like the stuff! Honestly – how can something that smells so heavenly taste so nasty?!

I guess I better get used to it – with two highly-caffeinated, coffee-loving teens living in the house now.

I find it very humorous when they put coffee beans on the grocery list. What? You want me to aid in this addiction?

I stop laughing when I hit the coffee aisle.

Oh my! The choices! Whole bean or ground? Decaf or caffeinated? Flavored or plain? And how do want them roasted?  Light? Medium? Dark?  What’s the difference anyway? Then there’s all the brands to choose from!

So tell me – when did coffee drinking get so complicated? When I was growing up, coffee came in big tin cans and my mom brewed it in a peculator and would offer cream or sugar to guests.

Now you have the mocha, the latte, the frappe, the cappuccino, the macchiato, the expresso and even a half-breed frappuccino.

And they can come in almost any flavor you can imagine -  pumpkin, peppermint, gingerbread, vanilla, chocolate, caramel, almond, and the list goes on and on and on.

Do you want that hot or cold?

Steamed, pressed, brewed or dripped? Whatever that is.

How about some whipped cream on top? Sure. How about some sprinkles, too.

I’m sorry. It’s just all too confusing.

That’s why I drink tea.

A mug. Some leaves. Hot water. 6 minutes. Perfect.

Now – what kind of tea should I have? Black? Green? Herbal? Chai?  Earl Grey? Oolong? Darjeeling? Hot? Cold? Loose leaf or tea bag? With sugar or lemon or a touch of honey? Hot? Cold?

Photo courtesy of Julious Schorzman.

By Country Gal | Posted in Children, Teenagers | Tagged , , | Comments (6)

Slug Bug Yellow!

January 11, 2012

Slug Bug YellowWe did a little driving with the kids over the last few weeks – and I must say it’s a bit nerve-wracking to ride in a vehicle when they start playing the yellow car game.

We’ll be calmly and quietly driving down the road when all of a sudden kids will hit the roof of the car and yell “Yellow Car” (or truck or van or bus.)

I guess the idea is that you want to be the first to spot the yellow vehicle, slap the roof of the car and yell it out. Whoever has the most amount of hits at the end of the journey wins.

Now Jan and I play a similar game trying to spot Land Cruisers. It started on our honeymoon. The older the Land Cruiser, the more points you get. But we don’t hit the roof and yell – we just smugly point it out to each other and announce our new point total. :)

Even my folks make a game of spotting trains when they’re on the road delivering Winnebagos. Ten points for every train – another 10 for whoever spots the engine first and 50 points for a passenger train or caboose. Again – no hitting involved – just a little bragging!

These are both quiet, calm games with that don’t sound like we’ve just been hit by artillery fire.

I guess I shouldn’t complain. At least the kids are hitting the car and not each other. Remember the slug bug game we used to play? Whenever we saw a Volkswagon Beetle we would hit the person next to us and yell “Slug bug”.

It was a great game until somebody got hit too hard and Dad had to lay down the law.  :)

I will have to admit the kids are good at spotting yellow vehicles.

Really good.

On a recent adventure with my sister-in-law Julie, the kids were totally dominating us in the yellow car game. They were slapping that roof before our brains could register the fact that a car was coming – let alone what color it was.

So we decided to make up our own rules. :)

Anything yellow was game.

We saw a yellow house and slapped the roof of the van – “yellow house”.

We saw a yellow mailbox. Slap – “yellow mailbox!”

Slap – “yellow swing set!”

Slap – “yellow curtains!”

Then we got a little silly! You know that broken yellow line that divides a two lane road?

Yep! We did it.

Slap – “Yellow line!”

Slap – “Yellow line!”

Slap – “Yellow line!”

Slap – “Yellow line!”

The kids were not impressed.

But we sure had fun!

Slap – “Yellow line!”

We decided if you can’t beat them – just change the rules! :)

By Country Gal | Posted in Children, Family Traditions, Teenagers | Tagged , | Comment (1)

Oh Yeah – Like Awesome Dude!

November 5, 2011

My zany college roommate  Kimmer is here!

And anywhere that Kimmer is – there is laughter – lots of laughter!

We were browsing through the racks at the local thrift store when Kimmer quickly picked up on the fact that my kids thought our taste in clothes was a little dated – so she started pulling out ridiculous pieces to show them.

She was gushing and embarrassing them royally when – out of the craziness – Dagmar finds a nice pair of jeans of Pedro.

I look at them and say “awesome”.

Kimmer looks at them and says, “Precious!”

Dagmar almost chokes. “Awesome and precious?! Oh really! These are beastly sick pants!”

Kimmer and I look at each other blankly, “Beastly sick?”

Dagmar just shakes her head and moves on.

Okay – so maybe it’s more than our taste in clothes that’s a little dated. ;)

At home later on that afternoon -  I asked Pedro to try on the clothes that his sister found for him.

As he come out wearing his new pants, we looked at each other and tried very hard to remember the words Laura used to describe them.

Now – I should insert here that the night before we had stayed up much later than any two 40-something mothers of nine kids should – so we were pretty much brain dead.

As we were frantically trying to remember the correct terminology – Kimmer blurts out, “I know – the word starts with an F – I know it – they’re fruity!”

The room erupts with laughter.

There’s never a dull moment with Kimmer around! :)

By Country Gal | Posted in Children, Memories, Teenagers | Tagged , , | Comment (1)

Packing and theTeenager Male

October 21, 2011

PackingI spent a goodly part of one week helping Pedro pack for his 10 day trip to Teen Pact Venture in Tennessee.

With 5 days on the road there and back and another 5 days at camp – it seemed to me that he needed a little guidance.

I helped him find more jeans, a suit coat, dress slacks, a outfit for golf and raided his dad’s t-shirts to make sure he had enough.

I carefully counted and folded and made nice piles for him.

I even bought him new underwear.

All the while there was this annoying little thought that kept coming back – “Why am I doing this? Pedro is a teenage boy who has been known to wear the same clothes for days at time…”

But the mother in me couldn’t let it go.

I was even kinda proud as he drove off on his adventure because I knew that he was prepared.

It didn’t last long.

I was brought back to reality within minutes of picking him up after his return trip.

He looked good and was sharing story after story of his time away – laughing and joking with his siblings.

Finally the mother in me just couldn’t wait any longer – so I asked him, “How did your clothes work out? Did you have enough of everything?”

“Well”, he responded, “I basically wore these jeans pretty much all week.”

(His sisters slide further away from him on the van seat.)

“What!” (I’m remembering all those trips up and down the attic stairs digging through his winter clothes to find enough jeans) “How about t-shirts? Did you have enough t-shirts?”

“I had way too many – I really only needed a couple.”

“A couple!” (You were gone 10 days! What about my neat little piles of carefully folded and counted shirts?!)

“Oh dear. What about your underwear? Did you have enough… No! Stop! Don’t answer that. I really don’t want to know.”

Sometimes ignorance is bliss.

Next time I’ll let him pack himself. :)

By Country Gal | Posted in Children, Teenagers | Tagged , , , | Comments (0)