Bella

We finally watched Bella tonight. All I can say: Very worth it. Good movie. Rent it.

Long Baby

You know your baby is super long when the car seat shade is always at his feet! Never happened with Sophia or Will, but Nicholas' long arms can actually reach the shade to play with it.
Nicholas has consistently measured off the charts on length & head circumference.

You also know you have a future basketball player, when your six-month old infant fits

into big brother's size 18 month clothes!

Tribute to Pope Paul VI & Humane Vitae

Homemade Bagels

Well, I guess this is turning into Emily's Food Blog with as many food entries as I've posted recently. I really don't eat all the time! I've just been trying to make more things at home.

I finally got around to making bagels today. Don't know about you, but I've been making Sara Lee a wealthy lady with the number of bagels I've been buying at the store. I figured since I have a bread machine, I can make them too!

Here are pictures from my bagel experiment:

Above: forming the dough into that classic bagel style. Just wondering ... what other shapes could I make?
Above: Kitchen utensils kept Nicholas happy while I was forming & boiling.
Above: Bagels had to be boiled for 1.5 min. per side before being baked.
Above: End product ... goldenly browned bagels!

Cooking is much easier than potty training....but that's another blog:)

My Husband, the Athlete

I'm very proud of my husband of nine years. On top of losing 40 lbs in 2007 & keeping it off for a year, he has started to really get into shape by racing in triathlons.

This weekend he biked 43 miles on Saturday morning and ran 12 miles on Sunday morning.

I can't even imagine those miles!

Way to go, Michael!

My sister's father-in-law died this week.

Pete, or Popo to the grandkids, was a very likeable guy.

Here is a tribute to his family:

Swim Lessons & Grilled Pizza

We've been busy the past couple of weeks with swim lessons for Sophia. She took Level 2 at the local rec center (indoor pool). I remember swim lessons when I was a kid. Lessons always seemed to be at, like, 7 AM in frigid water! Sophia has it made - 11 AM in a heated pool in a hot, humid swim center. Well, she gets to do Level 2 again next summer. Alot of new strokes & going under the water. She definitely learned something, but not enough to pass.

While Sophia was taking lessons, Will, Nicholas & I have been hanging out at the baby pool. I seem to be one of the only Moms to put my suit on & swim with the kids. We had a good time playing in the water with the other kids and meeting some new families.

Post Swim Lessons Snack & Picture: Nicholas is really beginning to sit up well. Next step...driving! Okay - Here is my second attempt at grilling pizza. Turned out much better than my first try (see a couple blog entries ago). I was successful in transferring from the cool stone to the 500 degree grilling stone. It was very good, very tasty. For some reason, it is getting burned on the bottom though. Need to figure that out....

John 6

Here is a really cool site, Wordle.net. It makes "word clouds" out of word texts. Here is John 6:35-71. Enjoy!

Thanks to Janet for sharing the site!

Family Wordles:

Nicholas, six months old, has turned a corner in his babyhood. He is beginning to sit up on his own. So, he has graduated from the exer-saucer to the highchair! Now, he gets to join Mom, Dad, Sophia & Will at the table.

The kids LOVE it! The first night they had to take turns sitting next to him, until Mom solved the problem by placing him in between them. Then it became a contest seeing who could pick up the toys that he dropped every two seconds.

BTW, he isn't actually eating yet, but that will come too......

Grilling Pizza & a Baptism Anniversary

In our attempt to keep our oven off as much as possible this summer, I decided to grill our homemade pizza on Sunday. I prepared our crust in the bread machine, preheated the pizza stone to 500 degrees on the gas grill, and then attempted to slide the pizza from one stone to the grill-stone.

Okay, so it wasn't as easy as the recipe sounded. In my defense, I didn't have a "wooden pizza peel" to make the transfer. It wasn't the prettiest of pizzas, but it sure was tasty!
Call it - Half Pizza / Half Calzone.

Sunday was also the 5th anniversary of Sophia's Baptism. At the recommendation of our parish priest, we've begun celebrating the day. We bring out the candle used at each kids' baptism, light it, sing

"Happy Baptismal Day", & have a little dessert. It's a great way to remind us that we are each God's children.

Harvest

We harvested the very first produce from our first vegetable garden today. It was a momentous occasion for us. The kids and I discovered a RED grape tomato on one of our plants. We were so excited that we waited to show Michael before we picked it. I was going to cut our very small grape tomato into four sections (one for each of us) but fortunately Will & Sophia both turned up their noses at it:) It's fun to plant & water & watch it, but don't make me eat it, Mom!!

BTW - we probably should have left it on the vine a few more days.

Surviving Totus Tuus

Update on Sophia's Totus Tuus experience:
Sophia survived 3.5 days of Totus Tuus. We might have been jumping the gun a bit by sending her this year. You are supposed to be going into 1st grade to attend, but they made some exceptions in our Parish as we are a pretty small group.

I now understand WHY you should be a K-Grad for Totus Tuus. One extra year makes a big difference in what kids can handle in a "school" environment. Sophia & the other little newly 5 year old seemed to both have problems following directions, sitting still, etc. Now I KNOW! Everyday she would come home & say, "I don't want to go back." But then every morning she wanted to go. I think mostly for the juice box in the lunch bag! I would go to Mass with them at 11:30 AM and stick around through lunch & recess to help her out.

She did learn some cool stuff - like all about the Tabernacle, where Jesus lives, and how the Tabernacle candle works.

Now she is looking forward to next year - when she'll be SIX!

Totus Tuus at our parish

Well, Sophia is participating in Totus Tuus at our parish this week. Today was the first day. If you don't know, TT is a summer youth catechetical program. Kids learn about Jesus & have LOTS of fun at the same time.

So, I'm happy and excited and nervous for Sophia all at the same time. You see, this is the first time she's ever done any kind of "day" school. This must be how parents feel when they send their kids off to their first day of school during the fall. She seemed very brave walking into to Church with her little bag on her back. Fortunately, we are hosting the TT team here at our house, so she knows all the team members. I'm keeping close to the phone today in case she needs to come home early.

This is the reason why children need both a Mother & Father. I called Michael right after dropping her off - kind of feeling sad for my "baby." She didn't really know many other kids. Michael reminded me that what Sophia was probably feeling was - Yeah, I get to go to kid's school (as we are calling it) all by myself with these other kids & those cool adults!
So, Dads tend to be more objective....

Praying it goes well for her.

How does your garden grow?

We've chosen our plot of land to cultivate.
We've planted our seedlings.

We are tending our little plants daily.

Our "Garden" is Growing!

Mary, Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells, and cockle shells,
And pretty maids all in a row.

First Blogging Day

Today is my first day blogging. Don't know exactly what I'm going to have to write about...but we'll see. I've enjoyed keeping up with friends', family members' and even stranger's blog sites. (Did I use too many apostrophes there, or what?) I want to give it a try also. Call it blog envy.

I envision this space to be a collection of family pictures, accomplishments, struggles and stories. We will be starting our first year of homeschooling this fall, so that should give me plenty to ruminate about.

Fun with cousins

Sophia, Nicholas, Sean, Joshua & Will - playing mostly well together!