Praise the Lord - SUNSHINE.

Yes, it's happened. 2 days straight of sunshine. I am grateful!

A few cute words from this week. Justyn and I were attempting to explain the Olympics to the girls and decided to describe it as having a race and someone wins. We asked Alicyn what type of winter sports people could have a race with. The sweetest reply, "Maybe snowman making or snow angels." It was precious. We then found some figure skating on t.v. and she says, "Daddy, can you dance on ice?"

I've been playing volleyball now on Tuesday nights. We play, but do not win. Anyway, I finally ordered some knee pads since we moved up a league I figured I may have to up the game a little. Alicyn saw the knee pads and says, "Daddy! Now we have knee pads to play monster with!" (His knees are always sore on the wood floors.) Also, when I left to play ball on Tuesday night, she gave me a pep talk, "Mom, go hit the ball over the net and win!" My reply, "Okay, well dear, I'll try to get the ball over the net, but we don't usually win, we just play for fun." She looked confused and said, "You can just play for fun?"

Gracyn and I had a chance to volunteer in Ali's classroom on Tuesday. She was very much a big girl, pulling herself up a chair with the big kids (4 year olds). She just loved it, snack time, rug time, dancing, centers and the teacher said she wanted to take her home she was such a sweetie. Yes, we are blessed with two sweet girls.

Menu-

S - fz pizza, salad

M - left over ckn fried steak, salad

T - broccoli and tofu popovers, salad

W - blk bean avocado taco, pineapple

R - blk bean taco avocado, rice, baked apple

F - ckn wild rice soup, carrots, corn bread

S - frz veggies and broccoli stir fry with tempeh, coucous

I make up a general menu, but don't put it here until the end of the week because it always takes a few changes which is good b/c I can just carry over what didn't get made for next week. I'm all for stretching it...

Have a super weekend! We'll try to put up some new pics this weekend.

Blah. It's Gray.

We are in the mood for some sunshine. None to be found. Blah.

Spent the weekend with Grandma Dawn. Jenna, Ed and Ella joined us. Very nice time had by all.

Justyn is adjusting to the new assignment. It looks like it'll provide some challenge for him and stretch him professionally. So first week down and we like the job.

Gracyn is busy climbing around the pack-n-play. We've been doing a nap every other day, so we don't have to fight about it. It seems to be working out. Last night, she looked at daddy and said, "You play duck, duck, goose with me." It melted daddy's heart and I think they waited until supper was over to begin playing. We looked at some birthday cakes online yesterday. It's time to start planning, so I'd show her the Hello Kitty, George, Princess, Candyland, Rainbow, etc. Each response was the same. "Yeah, I have THAT one!" So basically, I have no idea what we will be having. Alicyn on the other hand has requested a princess castle that goes all the way to the ceiling. ... I'm trying to sway her towards a Tinker Bell or Princess this year. I'm pretty sure she wouldn't care what it was as long as it involved pink and purple - now that green is out.

Alicyn was leader for her class today. It's a very important role for a four year old, so we made the cutest little snack (stuffed celery sticks with a pb and cream cheese mix and stuck animal crackers into the mix) and found the perfect show-n-tell after much deliberating (a paper plate cow she made at library time this week). She's all jazzed up and I can't wait to hear about it when she gets home. Gracyn and I were going to be her guest today, but the little guy I sometimes watch appeared this morning, so we will go in a different day.

It was warm enough to get out a bit. We did some sledding and met up with friends this week.

Sorry girls, I'm not going to post recipes because I don't want to take the time to do it and ...I rarely use a recipe. Anything I make can be googled or browse the allrecipe site (my fav)and find something similar. I generally get the ideas going and work with it. What had this week:

S - pinto bean quesadilla, salad

M - chicken noodle w/lots of veggies, salad

T - left overs

W - cheese ravioli w. hm tofu marinara (fz it in summer), broccoli, salad

R - butter bean burgers, baked zucchini chips, salad

F - pancakes and green smoothie

S - chicken fried steak, frz. green beans

did you catch the salad theme? we scored on a box of baby greens on sunday afternoon ($3) and had to eat it all up before it spoiled. budget saving tip. never toss anything away :)