Seeking Persephone with Stephanie

Nichole and I introduced our friend, Stephanie, to the movie, Seeking Persephone, in February. We watched the movie and drank herbal tea.

In March for our Girls Gather (Girls' Night) activity, we had a green foods potluck (because St. Patrick's Day was earlier that week) and introduced Seeking Persephone to even more friends.

I brought alfredo pizza with artichoke hearts and bell peppers and spinach and Nichole made cucumber sandwiches (from the cookbook, Whisk Me Away). There were some other green foods and we laughed because nobody brought a salad which is the obvious choice for green. At our February Galentines potluck, so many people brought salads. They were good, of course. I like a variety of salads. 

Now I'm craving alfredo pizza. Thanks a lot, blogging. I'm too busy to make alfredo pizza right now.

A Couple More March Holidays

Beware the Ides of March which we celebrated on March 15 with Caesar Salad.

On March 16, however, we celebrated Artichoke Hearts Day with alfredo pizza. Mmmmm. Sooo good. 

I'm a Helper

Saturday, February 7, had nice weather. I'm glad of it because I walked over to someone's house in the neighborhood to help paint platforms for the school play... twice. Base coat in the morning, texturing in the afternoon.

It was Play Outside Day. It was nice to get out for that short walk (four times because of back and forth) because I have just gotten over a cold so I haven't been out for walks much lately.

Between trips to do that service I made sure to eat ice cream. It was Ice Cream for Breakfast Day. Several people in the family celebrated.

Sadly I was too tired to take anyone to the library for Take Your Child to the Library Day. Oh well. 

It was National Fettuccine Alfredo Day but we didn't have any fettuccine so we had rotini alfredo. Mmmm. I love the homemade alfredo sauce we always use. It's from ourbestbites.com and it uses ingredients I always have on hand. Guiltless Alfredo Sauce.

Saturday was a good day.

Bread and Butter and Cider, Oh My

I'm still thankful I know how to bake and cook.

November 17 was Homemade Bread Day as well as National Butter Day. I made homemade wheat bread which we ate with butter (not homemade). I used the recipe I always use for wheat bread from Mel's Kitchen Cafe. "Darcy's Whole Wheat Bread."

I also made homemade alfredo sauce to go with spaghetti. I used the recipe I always use for alfredo sauce from Our Best Bites. "Guiltless Alfredo Sauce." 

A few people had toast for breakfast on homemade bread (Pantry Secrets White Bread recipe).

 

November 18 was Apple Cider Day. Several people had apple cider.

Balloon Bonding

Real quick- August 22 was Be an Angel Day. It's become tradition to have angel hair pasta that day with alfredo sauce and chicken. Yumm. 

 

Now to what I really wanted to blog about.

 

Every year, Jeremy volunteers to build a balloon sculpture in the children's section of the Orem Library for the Summer Reading Program. He's been doing it for over 15 years. This year, because of construction, they didn't have him do that. He and Lucky did teach simple balloon animals at the Kid's Art Gala and in August, they built a balloon sculpture to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the children's wing of the library.

I'm very impressed with how Lucky is picking up the balloon sculpting. He built the number 30 and the hat. Way to go both Jeremy and Lucky. I love that Lucky's getting into this and they are getting to have this bonding time together.

Since they were building on Gene Kelly's Birthday on August 23, when I went to deliver some missed items to them (I'm also a helper), I found Lucky dancing around to celebrate.

Later to also celebrate Gene Kelly's Birthday, I wore my bow earrings and pirate ship necklace and we watched "The Pirate" which Gene Kelly was in with Judy Garland.

 

That evening, we went to an end of the Summer neighborhood barbecue. I had a great time socializing. I love our neighborhood.

Catching Up February 2025 part 1

Saturday, February 1, was World Read Aloud Day and Take Your Child to the Library Day so what a great day to go to the Orem Library's event, "Bring Your Child to the Library Day." Jet and I went to do some activities and get little stamps (stickers) in his "passport." 

His favorite was the dragon sticker. He noticed that it matched the dragon in the junior fiction area of the library and was excited to see it.

That day was also Ice Cream for Breakfast Day. Sometimes I keep this holiday to myself. This year, we had some fun with it as a family. We all had ice cream in waffle cone bowls.

Sunday, February 2, was Groundhog Day and Tater Tot Day. We had our traditional imitation groundhog burgers but this year they were black bean burgers based on "Buckbean Burgers." We had tater tots on the side.

Monday, February 3, was Feed the Birds Day. How appropriate that that was closing night of Lucky's play, Mary Poppins Jr. For Christmas Lucky got a shirt based on a line in the play. Mary Poppins uses a measuring tape to find out that Michael is a "noisy, mischievous, troublesome little boy." Lucky's shirt shows a measuring tape and the shirt says, "I'm not really a '...noisy, mischievous, troublesome little boy.' I just act that way."

Tuesday, February 4, was Homemade Soup Day. I made Bowtie Minestrone Soup from "A Season of Family Meal Plans," volume 1, by Jordan Page.

Wednesday, February 5, was World Nutella Day. We had Nutella sandwiches. 

Friday, February 7, was Fettuccine Alfredo Day. We ate fettuccine alfredo with the yummy alfredo sauce we always make from ourbestbites.com, "Guiltless Alfredo Sauce."

Sunday, February 9, was National Pizza Day. Since it was also Superb Owl Sunday (we're not really sports fans but we are fans of birds), we started with pizza and ended with a big spread of appetizers and snacks. Yumm. I, of course, also wore the owl earrings I got as a prize from the UCB challenge.

Monday, February 10, was Cream Cheese Brownie Day. We made cheesecake brownie bites from "A Season of Family Meal Plans," volume 1.

That's enough catching up for now. More later.

Bye. 

Spinach Days

March 26 was National Spinach Day. It was also Make Up Your Own Holiday Day and Jeremy wanted to make up the holiday, I Don't Have To Go In To Work Day, but it didn't work. Poor guy.

But we did celebrate Spinach Day. To go along with Spinach and salad dressing (our kids are into simple salads- spinach with or without dressing, lettuce with or without dressing), I made Creamy Garlic Pork Chops, Classic Mashed Potatoes (both from "A Season of Family Meal Plans" volume 1), and applesauce. 

I don't make pork chops (I didn't even know pork chops could come boneless, I never look for them in the store), I don't make mashed potatoes from scratch (I am an instant mashed potatoes person- they're so much easier), but I made both for this meal. I am definitely trying new things with these books by Jordan Page and The Page Company. And we're actually getting through the bags of potatoes that we buy from the store. Yay.

I'll tell you my true opinion. Pork chops were yummy. Mashed potatoes weren't as good. They were easy but I need to do a better job at seasoning them. More garlic, that's what we need. And the spinach wasn't part of the meal plan, but it was a good side dish and fit the holiday.

Speaking of spinach, the next day we had spinach again with our dinner, this time with more than just dressing. We had Best Ever Fettuccine Alfredo (with spaghetti instead of fettucine) and Butter Lettuce Salad (with spinach instead of butter lettuce). We also had some homemade wheat bread to go along with it.

I'll tell you my true opinion. I definitely did some shelf cooking with the alfredo sauce recipe. I combined cream, half and half, and powdered milk with water. Used up the rest of the cream that we had in the fridge and the rest of a container of half and half we had in the fridge. We still have another unopened container of half and half that Jr. Jr. brought home from a youth activity where they were making ice cream, so no hurry on that. Anyway, the alfredo sauce was good. I still prefer the alfredo sauce we usually make and will probably stick to that one, but it's okay to try new things, especially when you have ingredients you need to use up. The recipe I usually use is Guiltless Alfredo Sauce from ourbestbites.com and most of us in the family love it. O.K. About the salad. It was good. The green olives in it were a pleasant surprise for some people. Honestly, I got myself a bowl of the olives to munch on while I was making dinner. I like green olives. It was a good salad but not craveworthy.

As far as the homemade bread goes, we did the traditional tear into one loaf to snack on and slice the others after they've cooled. I know we're not the only family that does that. Jet used to tear into all the loaves. A little bit of this loaf. A little bit of this one. Thinking about that makes me laugh. So many fun memories with this family.

On a different note, March 27 was Manatee Appreciation Day. I did sing, "Barbara Manatee" to celebrate. And thinking ahead when a picture of a manatee popped up on the laptop a few days before, I took a picture of it so I could look at it on the holiday. Celebrating in simple ways. Tee Hee.

It's a blessing to be able to celebrate what we do. We have friends in Haiti who are dealing with things that we don't even have to think about dealing with. 

To take their children's minds off of what they are going through at this time, our friends set up Google Meets with people to take time to talk to the girls, read books, or whatever. Jeremy signed us up so we got to chat with them, show them silly Jet. Jeremy put together a presentation about animals and birds of Utah so they could learn about them and find out what birds Utah has in common with Haiti. Then he made a couple of balloon animals for them to see since that's what we do. I hope it helped. They seemed to enjoy it.

Pizza and Fettucine (but not in that order)

February 7 was Fettucine Alfredo Day. We had chicken alfredo with linguine because that's what we had. #shelfcooking

 

February 9 was National Pizza Day. We made pizza.

Bow Ties and Birthdays

We celebrated Jr.'s birthday in August. We celebrated it on August 28 which is Bow Tie Day. It worked out because Jr. wanted bow tie pasta with chicken and alfredo sauce for his birthday dinner anyway. He also wanted apple slices, carrots with dip, and pineapple pop. If it's not orange it's pineapple in this family.

The dip he wanted was like one he had recently. I don't know what was in that dip so I looked around for dip recipes and found one for vegetable dill dip that I thought I'd take a chance on from Six Sisters' Stuff.

He was pleased with that dip. He said it tasted like the other one and he liked it. Success!

I will definitely make that dip again, though next time I might use a little less seasoned salt. Several of us thought it tasted a little too salty (but who knows? Maybe when I halved the recipe, I accidentally put the normal amount of salt in. I'll have to make it again soon to see).

When planning out cake and ice cream, Jr. asked for his siblings' input. Lucky suggested chocolate ice cream so Jr. asked for Death by Chocolate. Jr. Jr. suggested lemon frosting then Nichole thought of something that would go well with lemon, strawberry cake. So Jr. asked for lemon frosting with strawberry cake. "But make it tall. I don't want a short cake." Get it?

So he got two round cake pans instead of a 9X13 pan. With frosting between the layers of course.

I think he enjoyed his birthday. He ate so much dinner he wasn't sure he felt up to cake and ice cream but later he did, which made some brothers very happy.

Since we weren't sure if we'd do cake and ice cream, we sang to him as we were giving him his present. After we got done singing, he blew out the "candles" on the present. Lit candles and wrapping paper would not be a good combination so I'm glad we got to do the real candles on the cake later and yes, we did sing to him again.

Happy Birthday, Jr.