Cooking with Matt

A few nights ago, Matt "asked" me if he could make up some oatmeal chocolate chip muffins. "Knock yourself out!" was my response. :) I've been slacking on making baked goods for Matt's breakfasts lately. The last time I made these, I tripled the batch and made them the jumbo sized muffins. They are just that good!

Anyway, Matt started collecting all the ingredients for the recipe. After spinning the heck out of the spice rack, Matt finally found the baking powder (he was looking for a box like baking soda) and asked me about nutmeg. Since I didn't recall putting nutmeg in the recipe before, I told him that I think I left that out. He then went to find the cinnamon, and I started to think, "Are we making the same recipe?" Turns out, we weren't. He accidentally skipped over to the opposite page and started following a different muffin recipe. Good thing he caught it in time!

After gathering up all the ingredients, he got to work while Charlie and I played in the next room. Before I knew it, the whole house smelled like those delicious muffins... so I followed my nose into the kitchen where Matt was just finishing up the dishes and putting things away. He then confessed that he got out the vegetable oil, but upon putting it away, realized that he never actually used the vegetable oil. Matt looked at me and asked, "What's the purpose of the oil, anyway?" I think I made up some answer about adding moisture... which is probably totally wrong. At any rate, the oil never made it into the batter.

Turns out, the muffins are still yummy without the oil! Matt made 6 jumbo muffins and 4 regular-sized muffins, and those buggers rose and everything. (I'll humbly admit that I was a little jealous of those beautiful peaks on the tops of the muffins... how does he DO that?!) A little bit later, Matt went to put the pizza stone back in the oven, and he was surprised to find a muffin stuck between the oven racks! Facing out, no less. Like someone pushed it in there. It was funny! And very crispy. I guess Charlie was super close to getting his hands on the side of the oven when Matt was pulling out the muffins, so he yanked them out with reckless abandon and slammed the oven door shut, thus popping out one of the muffins. All the while, Matt was thinking, "I thought I made 4 of those regular-sized muffins..." while only 3 of them sat on the cooling rack. Hysterical!

As if that weren't enough funnies for one story, it gets a bit better. I was putting away the dishes the other day - the ones from the muffin making experience - and went to put away the measuring spoons. Matt used the ones that I don't normally, probably since the ones that I use have all the measurements rubbed off because of so much use! The spoons he used are all attached by a ring and there's only about 5 of them, as if implying that the cook should just use the ones needed and then dunk the whole ring of spoons into the dish water to clean up. Well, in Matt's excitement to make the muffins, he pulled that ring super hard, forcing it open when it wasn't meant to open at all. He busted my measuring spoon ring! :( I didn't shed any tears. Rather, I laughed. Turns out there's more than one way to get things done in the kitchen.

April Photos

This is from the end of March, but I did want to throw it in here. The last Saturday in March we went to Salida for the day, about an hour west of Canon. They have this great hot springs pool and happened to be having kiddie swim from 10-12 on Saturday morning, so we got in on the fun! The kiddie pool area is a near-constant 98 degrees, but the bigger pool is 10 degrees cooler. It's warm!! Charlie's cheeks were flushed from the warm water, and I even had to sit with half my body out of the water for a while because it got too hot! It was wonderful. Charlie didn't know what to think at first and didn't crack a smile for a good 30 minutes. He was pretty serious! I thought we would have to leave early because he didn't like it, but after a long while, he started to enjoy it. The facility provided all kinds of floaties for the kids, and we were all able to get in for $7 instead of the usual $25 daily fee. Sweet savings! It was a great time! We were in the water for over an hour and finally decided to head out only because Matt was getting hungry. We'll definitely be going back for more fun!

When my parents were out at the beginning of March, we headed to Royal Gorge to see the sights. Well, they generously upgraded a few of the tickets to season passes for Matt and me, so we took in the gorge a few weeks ago since Matt hadn't actually been in the park before. It's going to be so nice having those passes!

Some Daddy time!

Oops, I spilled my Cheerios, Mommy.

Last weekend for Easter, I made 2 salads to bring over to a friend's house who had invited us over for Easter dinner. I made a twist on an orange salad and made it strawberry instead. My little taster helped me lick the bowl. :)

Easter egg hunt in Florence! The grass was hard for him to balance and walk on, so he just stood there for a while and took it all in. Notice the winter gear? It was only in the mid-40's that morning, overcast and rainy! Of all days to be rainy... I enjoyed it though.

Our little family on Easter. We kinda look like Easter eggs.

Doesn't this remind you of a Gap ad?! He's so posed it's ridiculous. I had asked Matt to snap a few pictures of Charlie while I was blow-drying my hair and this is what he got! Several of our handsome guy just smiling for the camera. What a ham!

What's New?

Uff. I'm way behind. Again. :)

Matt:

- shot a turkey during turkey season this spring! He only hunted for about 12 minutes before he pulverized the thing and came home. Score! Matt grilled up some of the breast last week and it was delicious. The bird was huge so Matt was able to get 5 bags of meat out of it. Another successful hunt!

- has been busy training for the Fargo Marathon on May 21. He just ran 20 miles last Saturday and will train up to 22 miles in the next few weeks. Matt's been faithfully getting up early 4-5 times a week to hit the pavement and I think it's really going to pay off. I'm not sure how many marathons Matt will run in his life, but his training has been going well and he's stayed healthy and uninjured. I'm SO proud of his dedication to finish the race strong (and fast!).

- is a working fool. :) Matt's been out once a week during the month of April doing Mexican Spotted Owl surveys. He has to go out in the evenings, so once a week he works a full day, maybe comes home for a quick hello and some supper, and then heads back out from 5:30-10/11pm. It makes for some long days for both of us! Matt's also headed to Glenwood Springs tomorrow and Thursday for some meetings. It will be fun for him to get back to the western slope!

- is growing a container garden for us! (What doesn't Matt do, right?!) He planted starters in the window sill of the garage and has transferred them over to milk jugs when they're ready. Matt planted tomatoes, zucchini, lettuce, broccoli, bell peppers, and cucumbers... I think. Honestly, I've lost track of what he's planted! Matt said last night that he's "cautiously optimistic" about the garden. The only fear is that the plants might grow out of their containers and not produce any produce. I guess we'll find out! At any rate, it can't be worse than our epic garden failure in Carbondale where we planted 10 fruits and vegetables and only managed to get 1 green bean, 2 pea pods, and a handful of beautiful half-eaten (by deer) cantaloupe. No joke.

Charlie:

- is walking all over the place! He started walking at the beginning of the month by just taking 6-8 steps away from furniture all on his own, and within a week, he just took off. He's actually really steady on his feet and really enjoys being upright. How do we know? Because Charlie just walks around the house for the sake of walking around the house! He does laps in the kitchen, comes into the living room, goes back to the kitchen, etc... Adorable! I wasn't sad to see him walk at all - probably because he was so ready to do it. He'll walk, stop and look at something, and then keep on going! Charlie doesn't know how to stand up in the middle of the room yet, but that will be next!

- "Where's Charlie?" "There he is!" OK, Charlie should have probably learned this trick a while ago, but just the other day figured out that he can hide his face with a blanket and then wait for the question "Where's Charlie?" It's sweet. Last night, he was doing the trick and moving his bath towel up towards his face, but it wasn't covering his face at all. He thought it was because his hands were moving the towel, though! Maybe you had to be there...

- will give high-5's if you put your hand out.

- now notices anytime we eat or drink anything. If we're consuming something, he thinks he has to, too. I guess it's his way of helping out my diet plan! It's not that he didn't notice before, but now will stand at your knees until he gets a bite.

- has figured out how to show his frustration. (Good thing or bad thing?!) If Charlie gets upset or wants something, he'll arch his back, stick out his belly, and tuck his chin into his chest and make some kind of grunting sound to let you know he's unhappy. While it's funny, I feel bad for the guy! It must be hard to get frustrated - which is a legit feeling we ALL get - and have no way to communicate that feeling.

- has one new molar (top left). As far as I could tell, we really couldn't tell that he was teething. We've been blessed to have an easy teether!

- went on his first Easter egg hunt last weekend! It was tough to walk in the park on the uneven grass, but Mommy and Daddy helped him find some candy. We actually came home with a whole bunch - WAY more than we needed. Just as we were walking out of the park, a lady asked us if we even got any and then handed over a HUGE handful of candy. My hips thank you, sweet lady.

- has had a few playdates with some friends - yes, we're slowly making friends! My really good friend, Karen, has two kids and we get together with them at least once a week. We also watched Karen and Kurtis' kids a few weekends ago (so they could go out on a date) in hopes of starting a date-exchange babysitting deal.

- just likes to play, play, play!

Julie:
- started teaching piano lessons! Alright, piano lesson. A family from our church has three daughters, the oldest being in first grade. I just started teaching her last week! She's a brand new player and is very eager.

- has taken a slight hiatus from couponing in the last few months. We've tried to eat out of the pantry and freezer, and I've enjoyed the break. Deals will always be there. Because I'm shopping less, I'm still saving money and spending only a fraction of our normal grocery budget. It all balances out in the end! I'm sure I'll get back into it when I feel we've depleted our stockpile enough.

- is now a part of the MOPS Steering Team (leadership) for the next school year. I've really enjoyed attending MOPS twice a month and have decided that if I want to continue to participate, I probably need to help plan and lead, too. It should be a fun group of women to work with!

- we all have been attending a small group on Sunday nights through our church. There's four (maybe five) families in our small group so it's a nice size.

- has just been trying to be joyful in the daily tasks of being with Charlie and keeping house. Some days are easier than others!

Maybe a picture post will be next. :)

Charlie's Walking!!

Spring Turkey Hunt

My spring turkey hunt lasted all of 20 minutes this year, but it was a fun 20 minutes. This was my second time turkey hunting (the other time being in Illinois) and I set out by myself with a few tips from some friends that proved to be very helpful. I was able to call in a tom off the roost and he strutted right to my decoy. After maneuvering a bit to get pointed in the right direction, I was able to pull off a 12 yard shot. Amazing how shooting a turkey can give the same thrill as shooting a deer.

A picture where I actually shot the bird. This is on some BLM land where I actually elk hunted at as well . . . unsuccessfully.

Charlie is pretty excited his daddy got a turkey as well.

March 19, 2011: The Day our Baby Turned 1!

We had a great day celebrating Charlie on his birthday! I feel like I'm emotionally ready to blog about it now. :) We played, played, played all day long, skyped with both sets of grandparents and the rest of Matt's side of the family, opened gifts, ate blue and green layered cupcakes, took the necessary post-cupcake bath, and flipped Charlie's car seat so it faces forward now. Oh, and took pictures. Like 200-something pictures. :) Good morning, birthday boy! Playing with balloons.

Charlie would bite the tied end and then pull the balloon away from his face and let go with his teeth. The balloons didn't pop and we were watching him like crazy, so rest assured.

His shirt says Baby's First Birthday.

Opening presents with Daddy... he got lots of great things!

Little People Amusement Park. It's wonderfully annoying, but he likes it.

OK. This picture was staged after he devoured a cupcake and took a bath. When I lit the candle the first time, we started singing Happy Birthday, I brought the cupcake over to Charlie, and halfway through the song, he reached over and put the candle out with his finger. Yep. Finger. Then he got a little scared, so he cried for a second and then was over it. Needless to say, we halted the song and kinda freaked out that our child just put out fire with his bare hand. No pictures of that (maybe that's a good thing?!) since Matt was holding the webcam while we were singing. Anyway, I really wanted some pictures of the candle, so we staged these. If the cupcake looks big, it's because it WAS big. I made them in a Texas-size muffin tin - about 2.5x larger than a regular muffin tin. :)

Since he had a chocolate cupcake at his party earlier in the month, I made blue and green layered vanilla cupcakes with vanilla frosting. I just dyed some of the cake batter and alternately poured the batter into the tin to create the layers. Super easy, super cute. Of course, it now looks like pulverized crumbs.

His cupcake-eating outfit was a onesie.

The bath after eating. Charlie got cupcake everywhere. EVERYWHERE. He even stuck his finger up his nose at one point and filled his nose with all kinds of cake crumbs, which he then proceeded to sneeze out. He probably sneezed 20 times in 7 minutes. And just after I pulled him out of the bathtub, I spotted a crumb in his ear.

My dad thinks he looks like an e-Trade baby here with his hair all combed. Businessman Charlie?!

Our sweet 1-year-old.

Forward facing car seat! We went for a drive and he smiled the entire time. So much to see and look at!

It was a fun, memorable day. You don't have to grow so fast, Charlie. It's not a race! Let's slow down and enjoy each day together. We love you, Charlie! We couldn't be more proud of our baby boy!