Remodeling

Since a the week before New Year's, we've been doing some remodeling of our house. I always enjoy the look of a freshly painted room and rearranged furniture. In fact, I am great at starting a project, it's just the "seeing it through to completion" that I have trouble with. This particular project was in our den. We were using it for a computer room, but it seemed to collect junk more often then not. Papers were stacked all over the roll-top computer desk, books and toys haphazard, excercise equipment, file cabinets, and the wood floor was getting torn up by the rolling desk chair. It's just not enjoyable to be in a room that looks like a small hurricane hit it. It was time to make this room into a usable space...

The boys and I took the roll-top desk apart and took it up to the master bedroom. It matches our furniture and we have the room for it. Then it was time to attack the wallpaper. Have I mentioned that I have come to thoroughly dislike wallpaper. The stuff is a pain to put up, but even more of a pain to take down. Only one of the walls had wallpaper covering it, but I think they put it on with gorilla glue. It took off parts of the drywall with it.

After doing a massive, two hour job of mudding to fill in the gouges, rough spots, and exposed drywall paper on the far wall, I painted the trim. Early the following morning, my two ambitious boys asked if they could start painting the walls. "Sure." It took me until I was half-way through with making breakfast to realize that I hadn't sanded the wall that was almost entirely covered with mud! I went into an utter panic. I was mumbling words that weren't really words, just jibberish. I'm sure the kids thought I was going nuts. The wall looked horrible with bumps all over it! It is impossible to sand after it's already been painted because the paint will gum up the sander. There was nothing to do but scrape off the big bumps and mud the wall over again...

We finally got the painting done. I wasn't sure how the dark color would look in such a small room, but it really gives it a warm, cozy feeling. The den/computer room now has a new name... The Study. Sounds formal. It is as it sounds. A quiet place to read or study. Toys, games, rough play and loud noises have been banned from the room. It has come to be one of my favorite rooms in the house to sit and read while enjoying a hot cup of tea, and I can rely on it to be a clean and orderly place to escape :)

Designer pancakes!

Recently, we discovered what I call "designer pancakes". The kids can have personalized pancakes that are SO simple to make. The kids love coming up with designs and the possibilities are only limited by your creativity.

First, you'll need a griddle. Despite the precious cupboard space these things take up, I've decided that it is a necessity to have an electric griddle for making pancakes, grilled cheese, frying eggs, or anything that would take FOREVER to cook one at a time in a skillet. I previously used a one burner cast iron griddle because of my disgust of teflon. Since then I've found Wolfgang Puck's awesome griddle. You can store it on it's side (I store it with my cookie sheets), and it's coating is made of something harder than teflon since the instructions actually say you can use metal cooking utensils on it (although I still don't).

Second, you need a plastic squeeze bottle like in the picture below. I cut off the tip to have a bigger hole, but you wouldn't need to. You can find one of these at Walmart for about a buck. I use them for LOTS of things (homemade salad dressings, honey, maple syrup, oil for greasing pans, vinegar to add to my salad with the oil, pancake batter...). I recently found a heavier duty set at Sam's Club. I was thrilled. Really, it doesn't take that much to make me happy...

And third, you need pancake batter. You could use the "just add water" stuff, but making pancakes from scratch is pretty simple. We've even drawn out the ingredients on a recipe card so that my non-reading five-year-old can mix up a batch in the morning. Here's the basic recipe that I follow (halving or doubling as needed) that can easily be made into gluten and/or dairy-free if needed:

2 cups flour (whole wheat, white, gluten free mix, or whatever you have)

2 T. sugar or sucanat (unrefined cane sugar that looks somewhat like dirt, but tastes... YUM)

2 T. baking powder

1 t. salt

1-2 t. cinnamon

Mix dry ingredients, then add:

2 c. milk (whole, almond, rice, or whatever)

2 eggs

2 T. olive oil

Whisk together. It will thicken as it stands. If you want it thinner, add more milk. Thicker, add a little more flour. We use this basic recipe and mix it up by adding chocolate chips, mashed banana, blueberries... you can add a bit of nutmeg, ginger and cloves for a spice pancake. We've even had grated carrots, mashed sweet potato, and finely grated zucchini. For designer pancakes, you'll want to use the basic recipe...

As you're making the pancake batter, you can start heating your griddle to about 300 degrees. Use some of the batter to fill your squeeze bottle. Once your griddle is fully heated, grease your griddle if needed and then use your squeeze bottle to draw a design. Use your imagination, but remember, if you make letters, numbers or names, you need to draw them backward so they will be the right way when you flip the pancake over. Let your design cook for a minute or two and then move to the next step.

Once you've cooked your design a bit, pour a ladle full of the bowl of pancake batter right over your design, making sure to cover it completely. Keep cooking until bubbles start to form and you can turn it over without making a mess. You don't want to cook it too long because you want contrast between the design and the surrounding pancake.

After flipping, you can now see what you drew, and you will continue cooking for another minute or so until the pancake is cooked through.

Serve it up with some butter and real maple syrup and you'll have one smiling face! (or in this case, TWO of them :)

Kalahari Waterpark

It's mid February, and although we've had a mild winter, we decided to again escape this blah time of year with a trip to an indoor waterpark. I found a whopper of a deal at Wisconsin Dell's Kalahari, the "largest indoor waterpark". They were running a BOGO (buy one night, get one night free) deal. Since we rent two rooms for our family (no one wants to let us pile kids all over the floor to sleep), this works out great. Two rooms for $140 per night. Sweet! But oh, read on... it gets sweeter!

I asked while making reservations if I could have ajoining rooms (you know, with the connecting door between the rooms) and they said that the hotel didn't have any.

Hold on, I need to back up a bit... In the last month, since we made the reservations on our credit card, we have felt the need to follow God's plan when He says "Owe no one anything, except the debt of love". We've decided that that plan includes our mortgage (more about that in another blog), and we've decided to put all our extra cash into paying it off. That being said, we were feeling a bit bad about spending money on this trip, but we had already made the plans and felt committed. We brought all of our food from home, except for a planned trip to a pizza joint (for their special Valentine heart shaped pizza) and ice cream from Dairy Queen for the drive home...
Now, back to the story...

As I was waiting in line to be checked in, I prayed that we could get a family suite or something that would hold our whole family instead of two rooms (for the same price, of course). I politely asked for ajoining rooms (knowing that they don't have any, but hoping they'd work something out). She looked up my reservation and said, "The hotel randomly picks people to upgrade. Your rooms have been upgraded to a family suite". Not just ONE room, BOTH of our rooms were upgraded! We had two family suites next to eachother. I was thrilled! Read on, it gets better...

We couldn't check in yet, so we went to swim a bit before getting our keys. Paul and I talked about calling a family to drive the 4 hours to meet us or trying to get a refund on the other room. While Paul and the kids swam, I went to get the room keys. The check-in lady told me that the cancellation policy would require the entire amount of the room because it was the same day. She also looked at me kind of sideways when I asked about another family using the room (with the long drive, late night, and snowy weather). Then she said, "OH, WAIT, let me check this... huh? Normally this room is taken, especially this late in the day, but it's open. If you guys want to forfeit the second room, I'll put you in the Formal Presidential Suite. It's a $900 per night room. Two whirlpool tubs, huge TV, two bedrooms, a steam shower, fireplace, a wet bar, and a four person hot tub on the balcony. Would you like that for no additional cost?" Um, that would be a YES!!

I was so excited! I virtually ran back to get the family so we could go check out our cool room together... AND to thank God for the upgrade He gave us (via the hotel lady). It was huge (aka: just our size).

We're getting ready to jump in the hot tub with the kids and our complimentary "his and her" hotel robes.

Who needs a waterpark when you have a room this nice?

Answer? KIDS.

They wouldn't buy into the whole, "let's just relax in the room and enjoy our stay" thing. The next morning we headed straight for the waterpark and had some incredibly fun, chlorine-filled days!

The waterpark was great! There were play areas and slides for all different ages. VERY well layed out and designed.

Each of the kids loved trying all the different slides. Even Nathan, my brave little 3 year old, went down the big slide. It kind of freaked out the protective mommy in me when Paul took him up to the top platform and sent him swirling down. I'm used to the 5 foot kiddie slides, not the 200 foot big kid slides. Nathan didn't miss a beat. He got up and went right back up the stairs.


We went to Moose Jaw for lunch (the same restaurant we went to last year on Valentine's day), donned the cardboard antlers, and ordered heart shaped pizzas. Before heading back to the hotel, we made a quick stop a Walmart for Mr. Bubbles bubble bath. It's not everyday that we get access to a whirlpool tub, much less TWO of them ;)

Whirlpool jets and Mr. Bubbles... what could be more fun?
One for the girls...

and one for the boys...

The morning of the day we were leaving, the express check-out receipt was shoved under the door. It showed a charge to our credit card for $140 (plus tax) for the two nights. We were expecting to be charged $280 (plus) originally, for two small rooms. Not only did we get the huge luxury room, but our bill was cut in half. $70 a night!!

I believe that this hotel room was a demonstration for our family right now, and directly connected to our decision to take a different direction with our money. Because of our decision to pay off our house and get out of debt (and not knowing how or where the extra money is going to come from), God was showing us just a smidgen of His resources. We asked for a little extra, and it's like He got a twinkle in his eye and said, "Watch this."

Selah's ONE!!

My Beautiful Baby Girl is ONE! Well, technically she's just over 13 months because I've been a slacker at my blogging. "Slacker" at blogging, but NOT in my busy, ever bustling little life...

Selah had a happy, yet odd birthday. I am realizing what everyone who has a birthday around Christmas knows. The Christmas birthday kids get jipped. I guess they don't always have to, and we'll try our best to not mix birthday and Christmas, but it's gonna be different than the others.

Grandma Connie and Grandpa Les headed out to South Dakota for Christmas (and Selah's First Birthday), so we celebrated before they left.... Selah's first party. She got a cookie cake, had no clue how to blow it out, and knowing her love for music, probably enjoyed hearing everyone sing "happy birthday" to her.

Grandma Betty and Grandpa Harold came over on her actual birthday (the day after Christmas) and we sang once again. I think we improvised with the cake. I think we stuck a candle in a decorated Christmas sugar cookie and she enjoyed it just the same.

My fun little girl had a fun little day and we enjoyed watching her. Next year, we'll get this whole Christmas/ birthday thing figured out....