Cooking- Kitchen Fun

Wow! This was taken when we first moved into our house in August 2009! Everest looks so little!. He and Leaf still love playing in the kitchen. Everest is getting old enough that he helps in some real cooking. He still loves to be helpful.

He wanted to cook, like me. We had a discussion about ONLY playing like this if 1. he asks and I am right there, 2. the oven is not in use or does not feel warm. He is very good about staying away from the oven when it is warm. Even now, that we have torn the kitchen apart and the oven has been in the middle of the floor so we can do the drywall and windows.

Look how long his hair was. He looks so different now with short hair. He still wears his apron often.

Making sure dinner is done. When Leaf got a kitchen from my parents, I ordered kid size oven mitts. I got them from Montessori Services, kids can really use them for hot things. They are so cute.

I can barely remember the kitchen like this. It has been almost a year since we tore down the walls. I do not miss them AT ALL! I love my new kitchen, even though it is not done yet. We are getting there. Slowly, but we are doing it ourselves. Although we are exhausted from staying up working until 1 or 2 am, we both enjoy doing the work and working together.

Melissa and Doug products

I really like Mellisa and Doug products. They are very colorful, sturdy, and often wooden. All things I like. I have a few issues with them though.

1. They are made in China.

2. They usually come in a wonderful wooden box...WITH NO TOP!

3. For some, Joey for example, there is no imagination. Take a look at Joey.

This is a great toy for kids and a wonderful toy to play in the car or on an airplane. Joey is wooden and comes with a variety of outfits that are magnetic so they so not fall off of him.

The problem is that, you can only make them in their specific outfits.

Everest loves to mix things up. The other day he was a lifeguard fairy, and today he was Aloft (from cars) with his lion costume, swim suit, sunglasses, and backpack. So when he tries to be creative with Joey, this is what happens.....it is hard to tell, but they are overlapping so they do not stay on.

A few can go together, but still do not fit well.

Here is the wonderful wooden box, with organizing compartments...and NO TOP. It is hard to store these and hard for Everest to put them away, he always ends up dumping it. I put them in plastic bags. It keeps the pieces together, but not organized.
What happened to raising creative kids? I love the idea, but hate that there is only 1 right way to put things together.

Cabinet fun

Hmmmmmm....does anyone know where Everest and Leaf might be?????????
I think I see some fingers.....

...and some toes.

There they are.

Funny things kids say

Here are a few "classic" moments in our life from Everest's point of view....

On a warm Spring day, Nathan was cleaning out the garage. I was in the house doing some Spring cleaning, and Everest was outside playing. We told Everest we would play in a little bit, but he started to get bored. The neighbor kids were out playing across the street. Everest kept yelling "hellllloooo" to them. After a while of this, the little boy (about 2nd grade) yelled back "hello damn it." Everest ran into the garage and said to Nathan (who had heard the whole thing), I don't know why he said "hello Janet, I didn't even ask his name". Classic 4 year old.

When we play a game or get something new that has to be put together, Everest insists that we first read the "constructions".

When we told Everest we were having another baby, he was very excited. He told us he wanted two more babies. We told him this was the last baby we would have, that we would have 3 babies altogether. He has been telling people I am having 3 babies. We have gotten a lot of surprised looks.

Late in the summer, the boys and I biked to the local library. It is a block away from Nathan's building at Purdue. We decided to get some lunch and meet daddy outside to eat. There were a lot of college students hanging out, since the semester had just started. While I was getting Leaf out of the trailer, Everest said "Mama look, that boy's hair looks like a dragon!". As I turned around, sure enough there was a college student dressed in goth, with a long, blue mohawk. As he passed us, Everest turned and watched him, then he turned to me and said "Mama, can I get my hair like that?". He was in complete awe of this student. While Everest was saying this to me, the kid flipped off Everest. I was so mad, I almost went after him and said something. Here is a 3 year old, who thinks this is totally cool, but this kid took it the wrong way and flipped off a 3 year old. A 3 year old!!!! Who does that? I realize there are probably a lot of people who make comments about someone dressed like this, but if you can't handle the comments, DON'T dress like that!
When we met Nathan for lunch the first thing Everest told him about was this cool kid that looked like a dragon. After lunch Everest played on the lawn a little and I told Nathan what happened. I didn't realize how mad Nathan was, until the next day, when he said he saw a guy with a blue mohawk on campus and almost said something to him.

Everest likes to play with calculators. He pretends they are phones, computers, garage door openers, etc. He calls it his cockulator. =)

Making Beer

I have had this post in the works for over two years. I don't always remember to take pictures while Nathan is making beer. The boys love to help, so Nathan has made the process as kid friendly as he can. When Nathan started making beer, his first 4 beers were made from a can of supplies (they were all very good). -There are 3 types of brewing: from a can, dry malt extract, and all grain. As far as levels of brewing the can is the easiest. Dry malt extract brewing takes a little more skill, but is more expensive. All grain brewing is the most skillful but can be the cheapest. Nathan, of course, has found a way to make all grain as inexpensive as he can.- For his fifth attempt at brewing, Nathan wanted to try dry malt extract. He and a friend went to the brew store, he came back with ingredients to make an all grain batch. He said he had no idea what he was doing, but the owner JT assured him, he would be just fine. Turns out JT was right and Nathan has been doing all grain since.

Nathan buys large bags of grain to make it less expensive. Leaf was still crawling when I took this picture. (I know, it has been a while)

Nathan got an old grain mill from his mom. Everest loves to run the grain mill. At first it was a little hard and Everest would get tired after awhile. Nathan has since improved the operation and uses an electric drill to crank and he has mounted a plastic yogurt container on the top as a funnel, so we can put more grain in at one time. (He does this in the garage because it still makes a little bit of a mess.)

 The boys helping daddy boil the grains.

The beer fermenting in a carboy. If you look carefully enough, (and have been to our house in UT) you can see this picture was taken in Logan.

Nathan has been grumbling for a year that he doesn't have a spoon long enough to reach the bottom of his 10 gallon kettle. The ones at the brew stores are $40 or more. Nathan finally made his own "paddle" for $4. Can you tell how proud he is?

Getting ready to transfer the beer to the secondary fermentation. The carboy needs to be cleaned first. Leaf and Everest were both eager to help out with this. You can see the beer sitting in the bottling bucket, on the stool, on my washer.

Leaf loved helping wash the fermenter. He loves anything that involves water.

Everest wanted in on the action too. We have been working hard on sharing and "my turn, your turn" with the boys. They each got a few minutes to wash, and I think they each got 3 turns. It was definitely clean by the end.

Leaf says "Isheee" I can never resist, this beautiful blue eyed boys who is full of life. I have more pictures of him looking up at me and grabbing at the camera. I love all of them, and he is cute, so I thought I would share.