Cinnamon Rolls, check!

I've got this mental check list of life skills to learn, or at least to stop fearing. So far, I've tackled gardening, canning garden produce and now I'm in the midst of learning to bake with yeast. I learned about baking with yeast as a kid in 4-H and then again in high school when my grandma gave a couple baking lessons to my cousin and I. But high school was a long time ago. Since then, I let yeast become this complicated and intimidating thing that was too scary to actually use. 

So on Snow Day number 3 I decided it was time to bake. And then I allowed a crazy idea to enter my brain - cinnamon rolls. Most of my motivation to tackle yeast has been my desire to bake my own cinnamon rolls. 

And thanks to the Buns and Platz recipe from the "Mennonite Girls Can Cook" cookbook, I did it!

They're not perfect looking, but they taste good. Levi was so busy playing that he missed out on helping me roll the dough up. So he was sure to be paying attention when it came time to frost them!

He worked so hard to get the thick frosting on each roll.

He did a mighty fine job, too!

Next time I'll make my grandma's recipe. Her recipe assumes that the person making the dough is familiar with the process. Thankfully, the recipe I used this first time around did not do that and gave a nice step-by-step process with photos for me to follow.

Cinnamon rolls, check!

Snow Days part II

When snow was blowing around outside,

we hung out on the couch, 

and when that got old we got creative....thank you Pinterest for helping me find this fun idea:

milk jug toss.

 We had a ton of fun with this simple game.

  This morning when the snow had finished falling, we were amazed by the winter wonderland all around the house.

 The boys were thrilled to have snow day number 4, making a 6-day weekend for our family. We packed our tennis shoes in Levi's backpack to keep them dry, slipped our boots on and made our way over to the neighbor's house to play basement basketball.

 Grandpa made the over-the-door basketball goal work in the basement which gives us more space to play (and keeps it quieter upstairs....).

The boys think it's pretty amazing. 

After being inside for a while, it was time to head back outside to play some more .

 We shoveled, played, had snowball fights, walked through lots of deep snow, got tired and took a break. Then later on we built our families first snowman. Full disclosure: for a while that snowman even had some male parts....I totally live with boys. There was lots and lots of giggling about the snowman being a boy.

 Thankfully, the weather was warm so we could enjoy being outside.

 But, it's a lot of work to walk through snow and throw snowballs so eventually we had to go back inside.

 One more creative/Pinterest project to round out the afternoon.

 The celery stamp actually worked! And I'd never carved shapes out of potatoes to make stamps but that was really fun! Noah made this creation,

 and Levi claimed, "This is the best picture I'll ever paint."

We wrapped up snow day number four with more basement basketball and some kitchen dancing. Good times. It was wonderful to get a break from our normal routines, to watch the world around us change to all white, to slow down and spend more time together.
Now to get ourselves ready for a regular school/work day tomorrow.

Snow Days

"Look! Look! It's snowing, it's snowing!!" The boys, heck all four of us, were pretty excited to see it snowing....and snowing....and snowing!

Thursday was a snow day for all of us. We made the trek across the yard to my parent's house (and it literally was a trek - we had to walk backwards to avoid having our faces plastered with snow) and spent our time playing games.

 Card games, Quarkle, basketball and

games on the iPad.

 Then the snow finally stopped and the wind died down so we could go outside and play!

 At first Levi wasn't sure he wanted anything to do with sledding, but then he changed his mind.

 We had to shake snow out of their gloves several times, nothing worse than snow in your gloves!

 It was pretty cold but the boys did great outside, lasting much longer than I thought they would!

 We didn't get any substantial snow last year so this has been a huge winter treat for us.

 Unfortunately, these snow days haven't been quite as much fun for me. I've been working and re-working travel schedules for board/staff meetings at work for the past two days. It's been frustrating and stressful, but I'm still thankful for snow, even if I don't like its timing.

 It is beautiful. I love to see the world around me changed, appearing clean and fresh thanks to the magic of tiny little snowflakes. The moisture is good, the beauty is good, the change of pace is good, the memories we're making with the boys are good.

I can't wait to play in the snow on Sunday when my meetings are finished and I can put work tasks on the back burner.

Photos from Sunday

Photos from Sunday:

 Noah spotted this water pump, we decided to give it a try and to our surprise after four pumps, WATER! Out in the middle of a field.....it felt like we discovered gold or something.

Noah turns 7!

Happy 7th Birthday Noah! 

 Friday was Noah's birthday. Because of the music program on Valentine's Day, the classroom Valentine's parties happened on Friday at Noah's school. I arrived for the party, just as the kids were giving Ms. Goering a list of all the things they like about Noah, the birthday boy. It was so sweet to hear what the kids came up with to say about Noah: He's good at P.E., he's nice, he's good at soccer, he kicks the ball far, he runs fast, he's good at art, etc. The best part was seeing how proud Noah was.

 The party was a lot of fun! The kids in Noah's class are so sweet. They enthusiastically participated in all the activities we had planned for them and they listened so well. They loved the relay race!

  And of course, opening up their Valentine's was the best part of the party. They were so sweet - shouting thank-yous across the room to each other as they opened each Valentine.

 After school I took Noah to the Perk at Bethesda for a special birthday treat.  He chose a Cake Batter Blender - perfect for a birthday treat.

Then it was time for Noah to open his birthday presents from us. The movie "Cars" and walkie-talkies!

 And to round out the birthday, we went to McPherson for dinner and bowling - Noah's activity of choice.

 Noah did a lot better than when we bowled a year ago. And it was really, really interesting to watch the difference between Levi's ability and Noah's. They're only 22 months apart in age, but there's a big difference in their physical coordination and strength.

 The bowling alley had this simple contraption for the kids to use.

 Levi didn't always want to use the contraption, so sometimes he flung the ball down the lane all by himself.

 Noah did great! He got a few spares and felt the joy of victory

 and the agony of bowling inconsistency.

 My mom won. That's never happened...you just never know what'll happen, right mom?

 Noah amazes me daily. He's getting better and better at reading, he beats me in soccer and football, he's caring and sensitive, he pays attention to details and he wants to do his best and be kind. We love you Noah!