Food for a Party

When feeding a large group of college students, it is always important to have enough food. However, one does not want to spend the entire night cooking or doing dishes. So, for our party I came up with a nice menu that could all be prepared ahead of time. Thus, once people arrived all I had to do was set the food on the table.

Menu:
stuffed mushrooms
tortilla roll-ups
pretzels and beer-cheese dip
potato chips and french onion dip
tortilla chips and salsa
lemon poppy-seed bread
seven layer cookie bars
lemon bars
carrot cake
gluten free choc. cake

soda
sweet tea
strawberry lemonade
white Russians
gin and tonic
wine
beer
water
I planned on making coffee, but it never seemed to be necessary

I was able to make everything ahead of time and the result was a much more relaxing evening. My kitchen was even all clean when people arrived (which was very important as all of the drinks were in the kitchen). I have decided that the more that can be done ahead of time, the better, as I am then able to converse with people, which makes them feel more welcome, vs. if I am a harried mess.

My Social Son

Last night we had all of Patrick's (30+, number, not age) Hintenmeyer students over. They arrived at 7:00 for an evening of food, drinks, games, and general socializing. It was a lot of work, and a lot of fun. But, I think the individual who enjoyed it more than anyone else was Sebastian.
When the first few students arrived Sebastian informed them that: "We have lots of stuff for you" (meaning food and drinks). He then took them outside to give a tour of the yard and point out such interesting attractions as "the herb garden". Next Sebastian informed Patrick that he wanted "LOTS more students to come."
When the next car load arrived, he ran out to tell them that, "we have beer and water for you" (these were the items listed in his mind as he had just helped Patrick put the beer and wine in a cooler with ice). All this to say, Sebastian excitedly greeted each new arrival and ran around enjoying their presence. He had informed me earlier in the day that he wanted "someone to play with" and I am happy to say that he got thirty someones. As he had taken a three hour nap earlier in the day, we let him stay up and enjoy the students. He played hide and seek in the yard with some of the guys, got books read to him (a lot of books), played monster and chase with a few more students, and in general, had a wonderful time.
As I was putting the food out and Patrick was pouring people drinks, Sebastian was in the living room entertaining everyone. He is extremely social and representing the family well. It is nice that I don't have to worry about talking to everyone, as I know Sebastian will. =)

Case in Point

Yesterday afternoon I swept and mopped the kitchen floor. Yesterday evening after dinner I dropped a Tupperware of oriental cabbage salad all over the floor. Clean floors are a magnet for food.

Style vs. Fashion

I recently went to a talk about personal style, and, as I really enjoyed it, I thought that I would share my notes. I'm afraid that these notes may be a bit disjointed, as the talk was a few weeks ago. The speaker said that she took most of her stuff from a book called, It's So You! by Mary Sheehan Warren.

First, there is a difference between fashion and style. Style is our personal style, how we dress, whereas fashion is the world of fashion. Yves Saint Laurent once said, "Fashion changes, but style is eternal." The point of this talk was to discuss our style. We need to determine what our personal style is; style is important because we are visual experiences to each other. Epictetus said: "Know first who you are, and then adorn yourself accordingly." We want to aspire to being told, "YOU look wonderful" vs. "what a nice skirt."
Our personal lives include the work of the home (the home is our professional work). We must dress the whole self, as we are diamonds, not cheap glass.
Style must promote modesty. Modesty is a quality that helps us respect ourselves, others, and to be respected by others. Modesty can elevate the human tone of our homes, as well as society. We are, therefore, bringing beauty back to all of these temporal realities.
We need to be more reflective and selective in what we buy. Style, should always lead to the face. The face should be the focal point of one's body, particularly the eyes. Fashion changes often, it shifts from moment to moment and does not focus on the face. The focal point of style, however, is the face.

Elements of Style:
1) Body type - Pear (little top, wider hips and legs), Heart (Wider at the waist and top, thin legs), Box (more athletic), Hourglass (small waist). Our body type does not change. Wanting to lose weight does not change our shape. We need to design a wardrobe that designs an illusion of proportion. Clothes should always fit correctly.

2) Fashion Personality - a) fosters self-confidence b)avoid bad purchases c)provides consistent theme for our wardrobe. If we know our fashion personality, and dress towards it, we will always appear polished and complete. [Here we took a quiz to determine our fashion personalities. There are four types of fashion personalities: relaxed, classic, romantic, and expressive.]

Everyone Should Have:
*pair of black slacks, a black skirt, and black Bermuda shorts.
*they should also have one of each in khaki and white.
*a cardigan, whether long, or short.
*a white collared shirt that fits, but is not too baggy. (cotton, sleeveless is good)
*wraps and scarves are great accessories.
Also, if we spend money on our wardrobe, make sure to take care of it.

Great personal style makes other people feel important as you look great for them. We are communicating that they matter.

Sebastian's Room

Sebastian has been very excited about his "new room." We got him a bunk bed, and then discovered that we need to rearrange all of the furniture. Personally, this is a task that I love as, as a child, I think I rearranged my room once every couple of months. But the rearranging process is a lot more difficult with a bunk bed. We have now finished his room, except for new paint and such. However, after finally getting everything set up and in place, I think the paint will just have to wait for a while.


This is the book corner and kitchen area. To the left is his closet, and to the right, is the bunk bed. I think that this is a rather cosy corner, especially when his chair is there, as it usually is.

This picture shows a bit more of the closets, as I was standing by the window when I took it.

The dresser. To the left of the dresser is the window, and the open door that you see is the door to the hallway.

Finally, last but not least, the new bunk beds. The bear blanket was Patrick's when he was a little boy. We have a few things in the room that used to be Patrick's, which is a lot of fun. Sebastian loves having things that were his daddy's and Patrick likes seeing his stuff in his son's room, so I am very grateful to Patrick's mom for keeping these things.

Recipe of the Week

This is a recipe that I got from my sister-in-law, Melinda. I love it! We especially enjoy this with grilled cheese sandwiches. It is also something nice to eat on Fridays, when we never eat meat.

Tomato Soup

1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

5 carrots, peeled and chopped

1 large yellow onion, chopped

1 Tablespoon dried basil

3 (28oz.) cans, whole tomatoes

1 (14 oz.) can, low sodium chicken broth

2 cups milk or half and half

Salt and pepper to taste

Fresh basil and parmesan to garnish

1) Heat oil in pan, then add carrots, onion, and basil. Sauté 10-12 minutes

2) Add entire cans of tomatoes and broth, bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer 20 minutes.

3) Put in blender and blend then put back in the pan. Add the dairy, salt, and pepper.

This recipe makes a ton! I always cook it in my large Dutch oven, and it is almost entirely full. We get many, many meals out of this one. If you don’t like the taste of canned tomatoes, before adding the milk, put in 1 tsp. of baking soda, this makes it a little less tomato-ey.

Bunk Bed

Today we finally got a bunk bed for Sebastian. We have been looking for a new bed for him ever since we moved, but had not yet been able to find anything. As you can see from the picture, he was a bit crowded in his toddler bed. Due to the number of stuffed animals, or “friends” as we call them, that he likes to sleep with, there was barely room for him.
We didn’t want to spend tons of money on a bunk bed (no one ever desires to do that), but yet we didn’t want to get anything that was too cheaply made. We had, therefore, been looking at craigslist quite a lot. Yet every time that we found something, it was already sold by the time we got a hold of the owners.
Then, the other day my dad found an add in the paper for a sale on a pine, real wood, bunk bed, with two free mattresses thrown in. Today, we went to the store and discovered that the “great deal” was actually a misprint. The salesman, Jude, who was a very nice gentleman, even showed us the fine print where it basically said, “There may be price mistakes in our advertisements, but we don’t have to honor them.” We were rather disappointed, and about to leave the store, when Jude came back and said he would give us the deal price—this was very exciting as that meant we would be purchasing a bunk bed and two mattresses for less than we paid for our, very cheap, Target crib and mattress.
I took down the crib that Sebastian has slept in since he was sixth months old while Patrick assembled the bunk bed. One more furniture purchase down.

Sebastian is very excited to sleep in his new bed tonight, and notice that most of the friends have moved to the top bunk.

Fact of Life

I have come to the conclusion that it is a fact of life that if you clean your house, it will immediately get dirty again. And, the more that you clean your house, the faster it gets dirty. It inevitably happens that the day I sweep and mop the kitchen floor, someone spills something all over it, usually something very messy and sticky. The day that I vacuum the house, will always end up being a windy day where leaves and dirt blow in every time someone opens the door, or a day that we all work outside and track in tons of dirt. The day that I do the laundry, that night Sebastian will wet his bed, or Patrick will spill something on his shirt and pants at work, etc.

I think that it all comes back to the Fall. The Bible says, “just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, thus death spread to all men because all sin.” When it should actually read, “just as through one man sin entered the world, and mess due to sin, the mess will continue to spread throughout mankind, because you have all sinned.” I firmly believe that one of the curses of sin is that I have to clean the toilet, a lot. Cleaning is a vicious cycle. You can either choose to give into the mess and not worry about it, or you can battle, which means that you will be cleaning for the rest of your life. I’m battling, but let’s just say, I’m not happy about it.

Sebastian decided to put on Patrick's glasses. Here he has that "deer caught in the headlights" look.

Patrick has been reading Sebastian a chapter book about a pioneer boy. In one chapter, a boy broke his arm, so Sebastian is pretending that he broke his arm.

I love the additions of Patrick's slippers and his great-grandpa Ford's hat.

Some of our yard projects

Here are a few pictures of all of the work that we have been doing in the yard. The garden has been a lot more work than expected, so it will probably be a fall (vs. spring) garden this year. I have been able to plant a few herbs and tomatoes though, which is better than nothing. I am also working on tearing out most of the overgrown bushes in the front, and replacing them with bushes that I actually like. This project has been slowed down by the fact that I recently badly sprained my wrist. Hopefully, however, it will heal soon so that this lovely spring weather, when it is nice to be outside, doesn't go to waste.

These are some of the flowers that I have planted in the front.

Here is a picture of a few of the overgrown bushes. The plan is to trim back the azaleas and pull out the giant evergreen thingys.

The garden project (to the right) and a picture of our house from the backyard.

The garden. The boards are now level and in the ground a bit (our yard is very slanted), but this is where the garden will be.

Our garden where, hopefully someday, we will grow food. We still have to dig out more of the clay and add lots of top soil.

Yard Work

When we first bought our house I always said that I would never take over the job of mowing the lawn. Then one day, as Patrick was so busy with work, I mowed the lawn and discovered that I really enjoyed doing it. Now, I mow the lawn all of the time and I love the visible change that takes place between the start and finish of the job. Today I mowed the backyard (hence the picture) or rather part of the backyard as right now a lot of the yard is taken up with our garden project. The one downside that I have discovered to yard work is how long it takes and the fact that it is never-ending. There are so many things that we want to do, but I feel like I spend all of my time just trying to keep up on the basic maintenance. For example, the time that I would like to spend planting flowers, is instead used for pulling weeds. The other frustrating thing is that, being seven months pregnant, there are a lot of things that I cannot do, and the things that I can do, tire me out a lot faster than normal. At least I can still have the satisfaction of getting somethings done.

Oh the things they do...

Yesterday Sebastian was finishing up his dinner by eating his fruit, or should I say, not eating. He had a banana and the child informed me that he didn't want to eat it. Being a kind, patient, and understanding mother, I said, "I don't care, eat it anyway" or something like that. =) When I next look over I notice that the banana is all gone. I ask what happen to the banana, fully prepared to praise him for having eaten it so readily, when he points to his shorts. Apparently, he sat on the banana. When I asked him why he said, "I didn't want to eat it." Well, it worked as he didn't have to eat it.

Decorating Style

One year ago, we bought our first home. I have really enjoyed getting to pick wall colors, curtain materials, and just decorating in general. The one frustration is that our budget doesn't extend to my immediately doing everything that I want. Over the past year I have had to learn patience (a trait which I have very little of).
Our dear friends Matt and Amy just bought their first home and Amy and I have been talking about decorating. Amy recently took a "decorating style" quiz, which made me want to do the same. I did, and my decorating style is, apparently, "Country French." This knowledge would be extremely helpful in decorating my house, if I weren't married. Fortunately, (or in this case unfortunately) I am, and Patrick has a definite opinion about how I decorate our home. "Country French"?!?! This is not a decorating style that Patrick would really want in his home. For those of you who don't know, this is what "Country French" looks like, http://www.bhg.com/decorating/decorating-style/country-french/country-french-decorating-ideas/?ssot=7f521a41&ssop=1007
Thus the question arises, how do you decorate your home when you and your husband's opinions vary so much? The answer, with great difficulty. Of course, the other draw back to decorating is a lack of imagination and decorating finesse. The best things in our house were recommended by my friend Erika, not me. This is where knowing one's decorating style would be extremely helpful, but again, not so much here. I think if we were extremely wealthy, then we wouldn't have this problem because I could just buy some really nice stuff and then, as long as there weren't too many flowers, Patrick would probably like it. Alas and alack, this is not us. However, I do love attempting to find items that work in our home and, if I leave something that Patrick isn't sure about, in place, long enough, than he usually gives in in the end.