Recipe Contest

Yay! It's time for another contest! Why? Because I said so and, despite what my children think, I'm the boss (well, here I can be)! This time it's a recipe contest, as I am looking to broaden my dinner horizons. So, here are the "rules," should you like to call them that.

1. Dinner recipe, please.
2. Get it to me via E-mail by midnight April 30th. (If you don't have my E-mail address, just put your recipe in a comment and it will be E-mailed to me.)
3. My kids are not super picky, but the recipe should be somewhat kid-friendly.
4. I am not an expert chef. If there are lots of ingredients that I can't pronounce or that aren't sold at regular grocery stores, or if there is equipment needed that I don't have, or techniques that I don't know how to do and aren't explained, I will not test your recipe. I will be impressed by you, perhaps, but that doesn't win any prizes.
5. I will test those recipes that fit my wobbly parameters.
6. When I have all the submissions, I will let you all know how long it will take for me to test the recipes and come up with a winner.
7. I will post the winner's recipe, so obviously you should not share something that is your prized family secret.
8. I don't need to know the entrant personally, so if you're a "lurker," or if any of my regular readers want to pass this along to other good cooks, all the more fun for me! Everyone is welcome.
9. If your recipe is not original, that's fine, but please cite your source.
10. The PRIZE is a $10 gift card, likely to Starbucks, unless I know (or you tell me) that you don't go there, in which case we can come up with a substitute.
11. If I missed something, let me know. :)

Now, go. Look through your cookbook. E-mail me. Now. GO! ;)

Hey, guess what! Jack is ridiculously cute!

Greek Easter

I told you holidays last forever around here! Today we celebrated Easter #2: Greek Easter. Justin's cousin Margi hosted and we had a great time with some of the local family. We timed our kids perfectly, it seems, because Margi has a four-year-old son, Grant, and their other cousin Jessica has a one-year-old son, Hunter, so both of our boys have a built-in playmate at family gatherings. Alexander and Grant totally hit it off and got along perfectly. They even included the little ones by playing "follow the baby" for a while! It was great the see the little cousins all playing together.

We also enjoyed Greek favorites like souvlaki, lamb, spanikopita, stuffed grape leaves, feta and olives, and we learned the traditional art of egg fighting. Here, Jamey coaches Grant on how to properly hold the egg before "bumping" eggs with his Mommy (not sure why blogger insists on rotating that picture- if you have know, please clue me in). Whichever egg doesn't crack is the winner! Then it was Alexander and Grant's turn!

Happy Easter, again!

Juiceman!

Alexander loves to play "supers," where we all pretend to be different superheroes. Today he was being Juiceman, and the following conversation ensued:

Alexander: I am Juiceman and I can turn things into juice!
Me: That's useful, because then you could drink the juice if you got thirsty.
Justin: Does the juice have any nutritional value?
Alexander: Oh, no! It does not have any [pronunciation garbled] nutrional value! That would be dangerous!

Randomness

Today while eating breakfast, Alexander was rather quiet. That is, until he completely randomly came up with this: "Mommy, did you know that Batman lives on Mema's roof, but he is going to take a vacation soon?" Yes, Dear.

Happy Easter!

One of the best things about having kids is how there are so many fun activities for every holiday, major and minor, that we can occupy ourselves for several weeks with holiday activities. There are holiday crafts to make, invariably something special to cook or bake, special events at the library, with friends and playgroup. Then comes the exciting actual holiday, which never really means that the "season" is over. There will still be candy to be eaten, new treats to play with, and late events! As a stay-at-home mom, I find it very enjoyable and helpful that there are so many ways to stretch out any holiday!

In any case, Easter was no exception. Jack woke up first on Easter morning, but didn't really notice/discover his Easter basket until a few minutes before Alexander also woke up. The Easter Bunny brought Jack candy (his favorite!) and a new play-doh toy. Alexander got candy and a Lightning McQueen "hopper." (It's one of those big bouncy balls with a handle that the kids can bounce on.)

The boys enjoyed their treats for a while, and then we headed off to NJ where we visited with 26 of our closest relatives. As usual the boys had a wonderful time with everyone, and Alexander claimed that he lived there, with Great-Grandmom and Great-Grandpop, and that if we took him with us at the end of the night, we would be kidnapping him. On the ride home we introduced him to the digital age by letting him watch movies on our new Zune. (It's the Microsoft version of an I-pod [a music player of sorts if you're still not helped by the previous explanation] that can also hold several movies.) He exclaimed, "It's like a little TV that you can listen to with headphones!" Yes, dear. Perhaps we should "take him out" more often.

Playgroup Easter Egg Hunt

On Thursday we joined our playgroup for an Easter Egg hunt. My boys decorated bags beforehand at home, got to eat a picnic lunch, and then hunted for eggs with their friends. They were extremely excited and had an awesome time! SO much candy! Who wouldn't be pleased? ;)

It was such a nice day out that later we ate our dinner outside also! Both boys actually enjoyed eating outside very much, although Jack did not want to be photographed. He was actually glaring at the camera, using his most frequently used word of the few he uses at all. "No!" Ah, well. Two outdoor meals in one day! Yay, Spring!