LEPPARD LIFE

Homecoming

2012-02-12T19:05:00.002-05:00

Who is excited to see Daddy?!?!

Well after 7 months and two days we were finally able to welcome Ben back home last night. This was a very special time and I sat thinking about it this morning and decided that I had to share some of what we military families experience. While Ben has deployed four times, this was the only time that I was there to experience the WHOLE arrival scene. It is etched in my mind right now and I hope that my words can capture the moment.

They have us guard the day and time of our loved ones arrivals very carefully as there will be a whole plane of Navy personnel on it and they want to keep them all safe from those who would like to hurt them. Those who live on my street knew and were able to get excited for us as they are fellow military, but I didn't even really let family know. I just told them a time frame. As it got closer to his homecoming they began to let us know the approximate time on the day that he would arrive. I was a bit of a negative Nelly when I heard it was 10 p.m. as this did not fit in with my image of our reuniting. I had this beautiful picture of a sunny, cloudless afternoon where the kids are well rested and I am looking my best. Then I would whip out my camera and capture in slow motion the boys leaping into Ben's arms and it would such a stellar shot that I would blow it up and hang it on the wall. Lets admit it, I thought I would win prizes for this picture. :) So this 10 p.m. business did not cut it in my plan. But then it got even later. The day of his arrival we heard that it was going to be a 3:20 a.m. but they recommend getting there an hour early. Sheesh, I thought, reality is not quite the dream I wanted.

Finally it hit me that WHAT I was fussing about and I remembered that this 3:20 a.m. arrival brought home my Ben. And as I have friends all up and down this street who still don't have their husbands home, I knew I needed to embrace the moment. As the principal of Leppard elementary I declared it a holiday. We did no school other than to meet up at lunch with our fellow home schoolers. The boys and I went out to breakfast and talked about what we were most excited to show Daddy. Yared wanted to show him his room and how big he had gotten. Nati wanted to show Daddy, "Just my cute face." I just wanted to have my friend back to share my days with.

After breakfast we hit the store to stock up on all Dad's favorite goodies, especially cereal. We then came home and the boys painted homecoming signs. We had already done Mom approved ones for the house and yard but these were little signs that that they got to make all on their own. I find that I am a control freak with art projects and want it done my way so it was a big leap for me to dish out paint and let them go at it. Nati needed helping knowing what letters to put where but Yared's sign was all his own. I recruited the little men for a house cleaning. This kind of makes me smile as the house wasn't dirty and I know Ben wouldn't really notice anyways. However, he hasn't been in this house with us but one night before he deployed so I wanted him to come home to a perfect home. The boys were great at cleaning and just let me in on a way to make cleaning go WAY faster in the future.

The interesting thing about Yared and I is we experience life very similarly. I found myself all week kind of irritable and stressed. I was very excited to have Ben on his way home but maybe the thought of change or the unknown made me grumpy and short with the boys. Yared also got like this especially on Friday. We are so much alike it is strange that he is my adopted son. Later as we were talking he told me he felt nervous to have Daddy come home. He was excited but he was able to realize the huge event that was happening and it made him nervous. Nati of course jumped on board and said he felt "nervooos" too.

Finally the yard was decorated, the house was clean and it was bed time. I had the boys in warm pjs and hats and coats ready to slip on. I loaded up the van with a stroller, signs, flags, water, snacks and a movie. I tried to sleep a few hours but it felt like I had just gone to sleep when my alarm went off. I was so worried I wouldn't hear the alarm that it wasn't a great two hours. I got up and tried to make myself look nice for the big welcome home. Realistically it was dark and cold so Ben wouldn't really see what I looked like and I am often cold anyway so I had on layers of clothes and looked like snowman. My eyes were so exhausted that I was forced to where my dreaded glasses. BUT... as soon as I woke the boys up to get in the van the fun began. It went from a nervous tiring night to a wonderful magical adventure.

Yared woke up with a huge grin on his face and even Nati was thrilled to be woken up in the middle of the night. We bundled up and started the 20 minute drive to where we were going. We followed the crowd to a parking lot across from the airfield. But then I didn't want to get out of the van and walk over to stand in the cold as we still had an hour until scheduled arrival. I called someone who would know more and now the flight wasn't due until 4:15. As I sat there I saw a friend walk by with her son. He jumped in the van and started watching movies with the boys. This made the night even more exciting as we were with a friend and could chat and join in the anticipation together. Finally at 3:30 we decided to walk across and join the crowds just in case anything happened.

There were big white buses for the troops who didn't have a ride to base. This made me feel sad that someone would come home from being gone so long and walk past crowds of people waving to loved ones and have no one call their name or give them a hug. Right at the fence where we gathered was the Red Cross. They were out there on this cold wet night to serve snacks and hot drinks. There was another group handing out small American flags, flowers and flashing necklaces for the kids. You could sense the excitement in the air. Nati was bundled up in the stroller but Yared pushed his way to the front with his friend and found a crate or bundle of sorts to sit on. They had a group of vets there with large American flags. They form a tunnel of sorts with their flags for the men and women to walk through on their way off the airstrip and out to where family is. It got so misty that at times we had to pull out umbrellas. I had to smile at some of the younger ones who were dressed in tank tops, t-shirts, or thin dresses to look nice for the boyfriends or husbands. One was sneezing her head off. I guess the advantage of being old is knowing you can look good even covered up. After about 40 minutes you heard a small murmur in the crowd and it rose to a joyful yell.

There in the mist and darkness was a small glowing light getting bigger and brighter. We all knew it was our plane. The boys were yelling with the best of them. Nati jumped out of the stroller and had to be held. He grabbed two flags and was waving them so dramatically that a group of uniformed military nearby were quite taken with his response. He was screaming over and over, "I see Daddy's plane. I see it Mom. Yeahhhhhhhh" His whole body was shaking and he was kicking his legs. Then he would stop and hug me tight and start it all over again. I really hadn't expected this response in the middle of the night as he is my moody one and needs his sleep. Yared was up at the fence with is friend yelling and telling me all he saw. The screaming would die down only to rise up again as the plane landed or taxied closer or the door opened. The ladies next to me had tears in their eyes and this got me going a bit. I started looking at those all around me. There were the teenagers jumping around with their phones as their Dad's texted them where they were on the plane. There were the older parents there to great their son or daughter, looking weary but pleased. There were the mothers holding babies that had been born while the dad was gone. There was the occasional young guy with a sign and a flower for his girlfriend or wife. I had painted a sign for our battalion that said, "No longer blue now that we have you." Nati must have remembered this as he says to me, "Mommy, now we aren't blue." It took me a second to get what he was saying. Then he asks, "What color we are now?" I asked what he wanted to be and he said red. So we are now red with happiness.

It might have been dark and cold and wet and hard to see but it was a wonderful moment. Then the doors opened on the plane and sea of camouflaged men and women flowed down the stairs, trudged across the tarmac and finally walked through the flag tunnel to a crowd of people all looking for the one they had ached for all along. I saw a Dad hold his new little baby girl up to his face and close his eyes as he breathed in the smell of his new little girl. He had never held her before and she was only about two months old. It was beautiful and still brings tears to my eyes thinking of it. There were about three hundred on the flight so I had about 15 minutes to watch the rejoining of families and friends. I was actually really glad Ben was one of the last to leave the plane as I got to witness so much joy all around me. One by one a man or woman would walk through the people and meet up with someone calling their name. Small children were either staring in shock at the person holding them or they would be clinging joyfully to that person's neck. As people were reunited they would begin to walk way. It cleared out and soon our friends were gone and we were standing in the now thin crowd. Then I heard the boys yell, and there was our Ben. The same walk, same smile, same wave as he wound his way towards us. It is strange that you forget small things about someone when they have been gone this long but the minute your eyes rest on them this feeling of peace comes back as you soak in the familiarity that you had forgotten. The boys grabbed their signs and waved like mad. I was able to capture a picture of them hugging Dad and him holding them close. Nati was so excited he just giggled as he kept hugging him. Yared held on for a long moment and quietly kept a tight hold on his Dad's hand. They did let me hug and kiss him too:). It is amazing that after 7 months all is well just to be reunited again. As we walked through the dark parking lot to our van it felt right to see Ben and Yared walking ahead followed by me and Nati. This is how we usually walked places before. I once again felt sad to see the now full white buses with tired faces waiting to be taken back to base. I wish they call could have had a loved one there to jump and clap and hug them.

I for one am so grateful that I got to be there in person this time to experience Ben's home coming. We have another deployment coming up in a year and I hope it is our last. Maybe this time I will get that perfect sunny day picture of Ben and the boys first hug as they are reunited. But for now, I have a beautiful memory of a dark, damp, middle of the night image of two small boys and a tired mom holding tight to the one they missed more than they even knew.

Thanks for all your prayers and encouragement through this deployment. To those of you who have thanked and supported Ben for serving America, please know that means a lot. Thanks to my family and friends for making this deployment bearable. Thanks to Jesus for keeping Ben safe, for never leaving either of us:) and for bringing us back together once again.

Here are some pictures of our adventure but they are in backwards order:).

First hug

Waiting for Daddy to get off the plane.

The first wave of weary Navy Seabees.

The flags.

Waiting in the cold.

The signs on the grass and house wall saying welcome home with a leopard theme.. something I never thought I would do.

Nati's sign.

Yared's sign.

Mrs. Olson's Coffee Hut for breakfast.

This guy loves a cooked breakfast.

Prayer for our sweet Emily Grace

2012-01-19T19:28:00.000-05:00

The cuite pie that Yared is holding is Emily Grace our two year old niece who is a walking miracle. She was what you call a mircro-preemie. She has been doing super well but right now is in the hospital as she has an infection and can't get the oxygen she needs. Her lungs have never worked well since she was born so this is a bigger deal that it would be in a normal two year old. If you want to follow her parents blog here it is. Erickson But for now, please pray with us for this sweet, feisty little one that she will soon be 100% better. If you met her you would love her, she is walking joy.

January in California

2012-01-14T01:02:00.000-05:00

There are many reasons that I do not like California. I don't like the pollution, the traffic, the crowds, the politics, need I go on? But there is a reason so many people want to live here. It is BEAUTIFUL year round. There are many things I love about California, the diversity, closeness to family, the oak trees, the range of adventures it offers and most of all the WEATHER. I am not a sun bunny. I am fighting pre-skin cancer all the time, so sunbathing does not enter my thinking. I don't like the extreme cold unless it comes accompanied with snow to play in. I don't like the dreariness of long winters with no green leaves on the trees. I don't like the sweltering summer humidity that seems to be in many of our Navy locations. However, I do love dry heat. I do love sunshine. There is much about California with its two seasons and dry landscape that reminds me of Kenya and for that reason alone I would love this state. I am very content to be back here.

This week we took off to the beach just because we can and because my niece Cherith is visiting us. The boys didn't care that it was 65 with a cool breeze, they were down to shorts in 1 minute flat and in that water. I really didn't feel like being a 40 year old scary version of Bay Watch, so I threatened the boys severely to only get wet up to their knees. These boys love the ocean, the beach, the outside. I am so blessed. While I was sitting out there looking at this beauty with my sweet boys running wild around me I felt caught up in a God moment. I was so thankful to Him for the chance to see this ocean, this beach, on this day and to be with not just my sweet boys but my also my now grown up niece.

My little warriors.

New Year's Eve 2011/2012

2012-01-01T22:55:00.000-05:00

Me and my sister-in-law on New Year's Eve.

We stayed on at my parent's place for New Year's Eve as it gave us more time with them and a bunch of family was arriving for New Years. My brother Ian and his wife Lori and their four came for one night and my sister Meg with her husband Tom and little Jo Jo came for two nights. The boys love love love all this time with cousins on both sides of the family. They love the connection of being with family and they love the chaos and noise of cousins big and small.

My parents live out in the country so there is always something wild happening around them. This weekend it was the chopping down of a giant oak tree to get fire wood for the year.

Here is little Jo Jo posing for me. This is a big DEAL as Jo Jo doesn't like to pose for pictures at all. She is at that adorable age for pictures so I must confess I spent a lot of time trying to capture her moods.

Tom, Ian and my Dad finally getting the beast to budge. It was quite the effort.

Nati loves Uncle Ian who he says is "Silly like my Daddy." He also loves the bald head which he rubs like Budda's belly.

There is always time for a Polaris ride.

The kids got so hot and sweaty running like mad men all over the hills that we through them in a giant bubble bath on New Year's Eve. Lori thought it would be a good time to give them some sparkling apple juice to start bringing in the new year. They love this.

My beautiful niece Gabi who couldn't resist the bubbles and jumped in too.

My brother and nephew Nic who BBQ'd dinner for us.

Cousin time.

We let the little kids stay up until 9 to watch the New York ball drop. They had party hats and noise blowers. I love this picture of the big and small cousins.

Ben with is Nana.

Cheers.

We did more celebrating outside today with silly string and noise blowers.

Jo Jo was done with the noise blowers.

Yared was not done.

Although the weather was in the 60's the local stream was still frozen which gave us hours of entertainment.

Mom and daughter.

Happy New Year everyone. We are most excited that this year brings Daddy AKA Ben home to us soon!!!

Christmas without Daddy

2011-12-27T21:14:00.000-05:00

Well we survived Christmas without Daddy. It was in fact a wonderful day but with moments of quiet where I missed my friend and husband very much. I wanted him to be there to see the joy on his boy's faces as they opened their stockings and gifts. They are at such a magical stage and I didn't want him to miss this. It is also just a fact that you want to be with the ones you love all the time but even more so at Christmas. All those sappy Christmas songs never affected me before this year, but I found myself switching the station on the van radio more than once on our road trips.

Where were we for Christmas you might ask? After a visit to Redding to see Grandma and Grandpa, and a magical few days with my sister in Oakland, we came over to Mariposa to spend a week or two with my parents. We also had my two oldest nieces join us here for a Christmas. My oldest sister moved to Morocco this summer so they were left without the traditional home to return from college. The boys loved having their giant cousins around.

Literally the hour we arrived here, Mom had a leap in the Polaris and run around delivering Christmas cookies to their neighbors. We sang "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" at each door. They live way out in the country so the neighbors were rather surprised to find us at their door. We made quite the motley crew as my parents are in their 70's, my nieces are two towering blondes at 5.9 and 5.11 and then two little brown boys and myself. One neighbor had really gotten overwhelmed with some sad events in her life and let her beautiful yard go to the weeds. We offered to come back the next day and help her out. We did just that and spend two hours weeding, raking, mowing and hauling to make her yard look beautiful once more. It is one of my favorite Christmas memories as the neighbor was so touched and you could tell it meant the world to her that we did this.

Here is Babu helping the boys with an old Erector Set.

The beautiful wood stove that kept us all warm.

Christmas Eve we went to the local Lutheran church to join in their Candlelight Christmas Eve service. The boys did amazingly well and sat still for almost an hour. It was all worth it in their minds as they got to hold their own candles for the last song. I thought Nati was going to burst with excitement.

When we got home we once again did the squishy present on Christmas Eve. This time we included all the grown ups so we all got new PJs.

The boys in their new footie jammies. Yared is going to have to give up footies soon as it is hard to find his size, but he loves them so much.

Mom and the big girls in their new PJ's.

Nati wouldn't pose with everyone this time but wanted you to see his monkey ears.

The stockings laid out for Santa.

I normally feel like a tall girl until I am around these two.

Christmas morning we let the big girls sleep until 7 and then we released the little boys into their room.

We came out and found a note from Santa that said, "To the two good Little boys staying here. I was too tired after my long night and the chimney looked too small so I am taking a little nap in the round house near by. Please let me sleep until after breakfast and then come wake me up." Both boys knew it was Babu but Nati still has enough childness in him that he isn't quite sure what to believe and was all excited to wake Santa up.

Cherith opening her stocking.

Mariah with hers.

I got a cool new scarf from Ben in my stocking.

Mom got fake moustaches in her stocking and had to model them.

After breakfast we walked down to the Yurt to find Santa. My dad did a great job with a fake snoring and Nati was in hysterical giggles as we walked down.

Mom was hiding in this box and then Yared had to do it too.

We have a similar picture from last year when my parents dressed up for the boys in Norfolk

The family shot.

My little brown Santa.

The boys got each other presents and Nati chose this Superman notebook for Yared.

Nati got a bubblegum holder from Yared and they both LOVE this.

I know this is blurry but he was jumping around in sheer joy. He has wanted this motor home for about a year now. I am so glad we got it. He loves it.

Christmas dinner table with Christmas crackers.

The cousins.

Super hero masks were also a big hit. In the background is Miner Bob, a family friend. We have spent many a fun afternoon down on the Merced river at his mine and home. He now lives in town and didn't have anywhere to go for Christmas so we were glad he came home with us to have dinner with us. The boys enjoy his silly jokes.

Toys, toys, toys.

Mariah was a good sport playing pretend with the boys. This is just before the big girls left us today to visit friends in San Francisco. They will be missed.

Another great Christmas full of good memories, but we are already looking forward to next year when we will have Daddy home with us once again.

Ice Skating and Sunsets

2011-12-21T23:14:00.003-05:00

Those of you wondering about the flurry of blog entries this week can give credit to Ben and to school vacation. I find I am much more likely to blog when I am not teaching Yared as well as being full time single Mommy. Also Ben mentioned that seeing our Christmas adventures makes him feel a part of them so you can expect even more in the next week:)

Last night I caught some shots of the San Francisco bay from my sister's deck. She has an amazing view and I was super proud of these two pictures.

This is a zoomed in shot of Alcatraz island. How cool to say you can see that from your deck.

We had promised the boys that we would take them ice skating and Nati was NOT going to let us forget this. It was quite the feat taking three small children on the ice when none of us adults were stellar skaters ourselves. I mean we can all ice skate just fine if we weren't being dragged down, knocked down, tripped or pulled over by kids. I was desperately missing Ben here as he is great on the ice and takes over teaching whatever child is most likely to knock me down. I had the giggles so bad but I was also hunched over helping Nati while I had the giggles so I literally think I hurt by back from laughing. Who does that? Me. I was so tired at the end that when I put Nati down to sleep for a nap I feel asleep too and woke up with a Ferris Buller line of drool across my face. I felt every day of my 40 years today:). But it was fun and the kids had a blast. I am not sure why as none of them did a super job. Yared was able to go on his own but it was a kind of skate shuffle thing that led to a face plant every so often but he loved it.

My sister skating Jo Jo.

How Yared spent the first 20 minutes. I got to give him credit he is TOUGH. He just kept going.

Me and my merry men. See my manic grin. I was having fun:).

He is definitely the easiest to skate with.

Action shots of Nati bringing uncle Tom down. He did the same thing to me too. As I lay next to him he looked at me, smiled and said, "I took you down Mommy."

Yared during the last half and hour.

Family Shot.

Another fun day with our Bay Area family.

Christmas in the Cily

2011-12-20T00:20:00.000-05:00

Today was a day I had been planning for awhile now. We were driving this year through some city or other and the boys saw a subway system. They wanted to know all about it, so I decided there and then that we would go on BART next time we got up here to Oakland to visit my sister. It was as extremely fun and entirely exhausting as I thought it would be. I LOVED it. The kids loved it.

We road the BART into San Francisco. Here we are waiting for the train. We thought it would be really cold but it turned out to be a stunningly beautiful day in the city.

First stop was Union Square to see Macy's giant Christmas tree. The boys were suitably impressed.

We watched the ice skaters. We promised the boys we would take them to a bigger rink in Oakland later in the week.

We stopped in a fancy hotel to see their giant castle made of sugar. It was rather impressive.

Next we waited in line to catch the Cable Car. A trick I learned when I lived here was to NEVER wait in the long line down at the BART but to walk a few blocks up and then catch it. It served us well today and we caught the first Cable Car that went by.

My sweet niece doesn't like hugs much or pictures but faithful posed for this one.

Cool Shot.

From the Cable Car.

He got to stand on the way to Fisherman's Wharf and was enthralled.

Well you can't go to the pier without going to Ghirardelli. We got free samples!!

The were dressed matching without even planning it.

Playing in the sand was a highlight.

I caught a smile!!!

Big jump.

Young at heart forever!! I love my big sister. This was in honor of our bigger sister who takes these sort of family pictures.

My mothership!!

Waiting to take the Cable Cars back and watching the Golden Gate. I do love this city.

Coit tower and Lombard street - you can't see the street but it was there.

We were one tired bunch by the time we caught BART back. Entertaining themselves.

Where is my train.

It was a special day full of amazing weather and good memories. It also brought back a lot of other memories of my trips to the city when I lived near by. It really was a lot of fun but it sure requires a lot more energy to take three small kids to a city than to go with just adults:).

Early Christmas in Redding

2011-12-17T21:45:00.002-05:00

This last week we came up to Redding to celebrate and early Christmas with our Leppard side of the family. Grandma and Grandpa just moved up here to start a new job at a new church so it was nice to see their new home. The four cousins had many fun adventures together. The only thing that would have made this perfect would be to have had Ben here with us. It is hard to hear how many hours he is working while we are here having a blast. But he is so supportive and excited for us. Tomorrow we move on to our next stop of our California Christmas Tour - Oakland. We will spend four days with my sister and her family. As I am taking pictures left, right and center I wanted to upload some now. I had a hard time limiting them as there were now four cuties instead of just two.

The four cousins at pj time.

We took an afternoon to make gingerbread houses. The boys are now experts at this as they did it two times already with friends at home.

I tried to tell him it was a weird look:).

They live right near Old Shasta so we went down there to get some family pictures.

Adorable little K.

Our miracle niece Em who is learning words every single day and is a sunshine kiddo to be around.

Ok I had a better shot of the four but I was looking at thumbnails and got the wrong one. So imagine this but even cuter!!

We were able to visit Great Grandma at her apartment and see Sully, who used to be our cat but is MUCH happier with GG.

My little snowmen.

The Leppard Christmas morning - kiddos waiting to open stockings.

I love it.

My fellow photographer for the week.

It is huge on him but he loves it.

Superman and his princess.

The gift to Grandma and Grandpa where we told them we would all be together for their 40th Wedding Anniversary. As you can tell it meant a lot to them.

This is a slot car race track that used to be my other nephews but is now a HUGE hit when we come to visit the grandparents. It was such a bit hit that Yared woke up one night at 3 to help his little cousin go potty and NEVER went back to sleep. He was waiting to race cars. Needless to say this did not go over well with me. But the race track is very fun.

Besides seeing my two smallest nieces I got to see my two biggest nieces as they go to school up here.

My blueberry.

The boys got new Razor scooters from their Grandparents and Grandpa couldn't resist trying them out.

It wasn't raining but don't tell my little niece that.

It's a bird, it's a plane it's Supermen.

Don't mess with the princess.

Baking treats together.

Backside view:).

Tired boy.

Word

It was a fun week and we feel so blessed to have such a great in-law family who are a blast to be with and help me out so much with the boys. Now off to the Bay!!

Someone Turned 40

2011-12-11T02:00:00.001-05:00

In November I turned 40. I did not like the sound of that but gradually as the day drew closer I realized that I wanted to be 40. I love my life right now. I love being a wife and mom. I love home-schooling. I love having the confidence of years under my belt. I still feel about 12 most days:). Truly somedays I feel so ridiculously immature and find myself laughing along with the boys about toots and poop and bums. I mean there are days where I am exhausted and feeling crabby and boring rather than young and energetic but honestly I think those are few and far between. I don't want to be in my 20's again, even though I had much better skin and no grey hair yet. My 30's were fun and I really enjoyed them, I mean I got married and became a Navy wife and Mom. I taught Junior High and Kindergarten. They were good years. But I have been told by quite a few older ladies that the 40s are the best and I think they might be right. I just need to learn to cover the greys, laugh at the wrinkles and invest in Advil for the aches:). So don't feel sorry for me for getting old:). I think I accepted this decade with a whole lot more dignity than I did when I turned 30. I fought that tooth and nail.

Of course it helped that when I turned 40 I was spoiled rotten by friends, family and my wonderful husband.

A few weeks before my Birthday two friends came to visit. I knew they were coming but they surprised me with a mini party for me and the boys. It was so sweet and I was very touched. The boys are ALWAYS up for a party and loved this.

I got the party girl hat, but I shared with the boys the next day and it became the horn of a one horned charging bull.

Yared was recruited as photographer for the three of us.

Then the next week we went up to my parents house for Thanksgiving and while I was outside the family planned another surprise party for me. This time the boys got party hats too.

Ben was able to be apart of this one as he skyped me while I opened gifts. Notice the grass in Nati's hair. There is a hill outside that the kids and their cousins spent hours wrestling and sliding down. Nati's hair becomes like velcro and he walks around like this.

Then Ben and his sister had been working together since the summer to try to plan something special for my big day. Plans fell through once and I decided to be grown up and call off my Birthday party. But Ben's sister informed me although other plans had been cancelled they had a new one. First her and her husband were going to load their two two year olds up in the car and drive the 2-3 hours to come see us on my big day. We would all get lunch together and then I would go to a spa for a massage while they baby-sat. When I got back they would make me dinner. Then they would drive home after the party. I know I have the BEST in-laws ever!! They did just that. It was a wonderful day. Many of the party touches were Ben's idea. This is huge as Ben is not a party sort of guy but he has learned I love Birthdays.

This is the kids making my cake. (Yes I did say 2 two year olds. My little niece was born prematurely and so theses sisters are pretty much as close as two biological kids can get.)

The theme of the party was over the hill:). I mean I am four years older than Ben and 6 years older that his sister so they had to give me a hard time. I loved it. Everything was black. Black balloons, black decorations, black cake, Noir wine, and black pirate hats for party hats. The beautiful flowers of color were from my Ben.

This is me seeing my surprise gift from Ben. He got me a beach cruiser bike. I love riding a bike sitting up like you do as a kid. I don't enjoy being hunched over the handle bars. This is exactly the bike I wanted.

My sister-in-law gave me a cool new journal and a bunch of magnifying glasses. I was puzzled by them until I saw the reading glasses and realized my old eyes were being insulted:). I had to laugh at how it took me a minute to get the joke.

My cool in-laws and the boys. It was a special day and a great memory. It meant so much to me that my family and friends did so much to make sure that turning 40, while having my husband deployed was not sad and lonely but fun and festive.

From Ben.

My neighbor and good friend joined us for cake.

One side note on my blog silence is that on top of being insanely busy my computer has locked me out of the external hard drive that stores my pictures. It is a pain but I am working on getting that fixed. Hopefully the new year can start off with lots of blog adventures for you all.

Waiting for Daddy to Come Home

2011-11-19T10:40:00.001-05:00

I definitely feel like we are on the down hill slide to the end of this deployment. We only have the rest of November, part of February and the months in between. See, you can put a positive spin on ANYTHING:). I decided to share with you some of the ways Ben and I have tried to make this deployment a bit easier on the boys. Let me say that overall they are doing amazing. They are so loving, positive, outgoing and fun that at first glance you might not see how it does affect them. But then there is the increasing amount of nightmares, fear of the dark and occasionally a MAJOR melt down if I go somewhere. There is also the more obvious one like just plain crying for Daddy. The biggest issue right now is the fear of the dark. With Nati especially it has reached insanity levels at times. He won't go in his closet with me sitting literally 3 feet away from him during the day time hours, because it is dark. He won't go to the bathroom at all unless he can see him from the doorway. In the midst of the tears and terror I will hear snatches of "I miss Daddy", so I think this is a root cause. But overall they are doing well. They get to Skype with Daddy about once a week, which is something unheard of from our last deployments. We also get the occasional phone call. Ben has been GREAT at sending small gifts in the mail to all of us as well as letters and cards. Here is what we came up with at home.

First is the Countdown Chain.

My friend Alicia actually sent me this idea AND the supplies. Talk about a good friend. You write down fun ideas like "go to a new park", "make your favorite cookies", or "eat Ethiopian food" on a small piece of paper and then link all the papers together. I only did one per week that Ben was gone, but I think some people do one per day. Then every Friday morning during school we cut a chain off and get a surprise for us to do. We also count the chain and cheer at how short it is getting. Some of the biggest hits have been "slumber party in front of the TV" and "go to indoor trampoline place".

Second Kisses from Daddy

This idea came from another friend. You buy a big jar and fill it with Hershey Kisses. Then every day the kids get a Kiss each from Daddy. As the Kisses get lower in the jar they know it is getting closer to Daddy coming home. I count them periodically to make sure we have about the right amount for the days left. (Because let's be honest sometimes a curly haired mom will walk by and need a Kiss from Daddy too and she might mess with the amount of kisses in the jar.) This jar makes me giggle every time I look at it. I have a SERIOUS issue with spatial things. I am the person putting a cup of leftovers in a gallon tupperware. I will guess that there are 50 people present for an event and Ben will look at me like I am nuts and say there are at least 250. I just cannot estimate sizes or quantities. So when I started this project I got the biggest jar I could find and realized once I put the kisses in that I could have gotten one about 1/4 the size.

Third Leppard Snuggle Buddies.

Ok so this idea was all me:). I got the boys these stuffed leopards before Ben left. I just thought it was a cool idea as our last name is Leppard. Inside is a voice recording of Ben talking to each boy. I am going to take the T-shirts off this week and mail them to Ben so he can write a Christmas message. Again I was a bit challenged spatially when ordering them online and got the giant size instead of the small more kid size version.

Nati calls his Leppy.

Yared has started calling his "Daddy".

What about Mom you might be asking? Well I found this necklace on Etsy before Ben left. It is a painting done on top of a Hymn called "This is My Father's World". When Ben first deployed six months after we were married, I was so worried for his safety and stressed that something might happen while we were apart. Then one day I was at church and they sang this hymn. I have always loved it but the words just struck a cord with me. I remember clearly realizing that God is in control. This is His world and Ben is his and He will take care of Ben. This is not a guarantee that my husband will not die but rather that God knows what is best. I felt I could trust God to know what was best for us all. Here are the words from the last verse that mean so much to me.

This is my Father's world

O let me ne'er forget

that though the wrong seems oft so strong,

God is the ruler yet.

This is my Father's world:

why should my heart be sad?

The Lord is King; let the heavens sing!

God reigns: let the earth be glad!

These last three pictures are just something fun we did in school this week. We made these cute Turkey cookies. There are much more elaborate versions but we just threw ours together, took a picture and gobbled them up.

Happy Birthday Dear Ben

2011-11-07T23:32:00.001-05:00

Happy Birthday to my wonderful husband who happens to be in Afghanistan for his 36th Birthday. I know his day will consist of work, work and maybe a little more work. But we here at home will be celebrating the day in honor of him and missing him very much!!

Moira's Halloween

2011-10-29T11:53:00.002-04:00

This base we live on now has a Halloween party for the grown ups. I had heard about this from Ben. It becomes a big competition between the different commands and I have to say everyone goes all out. Our command is in Afghanistan so just two of the wives, myself and my neighbor were able to go. We chose to go as Seabees. Their motto is We Build. We Fight. We found a bee costume and a kids construction set. The glasses definitely made the deal.

The boys had two nights with a babysitter and they had a great time but this little man wasn't too excited that I was leaving last night. But I promised both boys that I have no plans to leave them anytime soon.

The two bees.

Some other friends in their outfits.

At the actual party all the wives of the deployed officers became the judges of the competition. It was fun but also rather challenging as I am not kidding the costumes were REALLY well done. They also had a pumpkin carving contest that had at least 4 amazing pumpkins.

It was a fun night and I had some good belly laughs at the crazy antics of some of the newest Seabee officers who are just finishing their training here.

Hair Cut Military Style

2011-10-24T23:00:00.000-04:00

Where or where has Moira gone. It really is almost impossible to stay on top of a blog right now but I am flattered that enough people notice the silence so I will try to keep putting up little tidbits of things happening in our lives. This last week we decided we wanted to get hair cuts done. We were talking to our fellow home schooling family and they said they did too so we made it a field trip of sorts. We loaded up the minivans and hit the Military barber shop. It was empty when we got there but by the time we left there were three young men waiting and I think they had a good laugh at three little boys giggling and shrieking for joy. It was fun and Yared's hair looks amazing. I am not quite as fond of Nati's as I think I can do as good a job on him but hey he had a blast.

Before

This was a yell of joy.

His hair is a little harder to cut but he was so good and did the happy dance with the boys afterwards.

The after shot - 3 handsome boys.

This is at the grocery store afterwards. They have a tv you can park your kids in front of while you shop. We had never done this before but as all the kiddos were together we figured they were fine. It is on the base so security isn't a huge issue.

The rest of these are bonus shots. The boys can't decide what they want to be for Halloween but luckily we have three separate events and so they get to try out a variety of costumes. I didn't get a shot of their first one but this was from yesterday. I said it looked like Nait was going poo and Yared thought that was hilarious. I love that I can mention poo and bring the house down.

A few weeks ago we went and visited friends with a very new baby. The boys were dying to hold her and now they both want a baby sister. I tell them to ask Jesus:). Nati even includes "his baby sister" in family drawings.

This picture is for Dad. Nati is oozing personality these days and I wanted Dad to see it in picture form.

Charlotte's Web Party

2011-09-30T17:02:00.002-04:00

Well with Daddy gone we are going to try to do some school themed family nights. In fact we had one today to celebrate Charlotte's Web. We just finished our 4th week of school and the book on the same day. This is part of the Read Aloud section of our home-schooling and we all love it. Nati comes running from whatever he is doing to join Yared and I on the couch for reading. I really thought the book would be too much for him but both the boys loved it. Yared shed a few tears for Charlotte when she died and wasn't sure he liked all the dying talk but other than that he loved the book.

We invited our neighbors/home-school buddies/ friends to come join us for the day. I was Charlotte, Nati was Wilbur, Yared was Templeton and our friends came as Lurvy, Fern and the Goose. I got a few cute ideas from the Internet and with the help of the boys we created a fun morning in the Leppard Elementary School.

We started with pictures as I knew Nati would not last with his nose and ears. Then we played some games and had a Charlotte's Web feast. We actually ate hot dogs which felt a bit wrong considering we read about saving a pig's life so to even it out we ate spider cupcakes.

Lurvy, Goose and Fern

The four kids and in the background our Pin the Word in the Web game and bean bag game.

I hid farm animals all over the yard and the kids had to run find them.

Notice the horse on the fence that he is running by:).

The cutest Fern ever!!

They all kept going around the side of the house where I hadn't hidden any animals.

We tried to get rice bags in the barn door. So easy to make but so much fun.

Yared loves to dress up and kept his outfit on the WHOLE time. I had to make him take it off to finish up the rest of school.

Mom was really a good aim.

Templeton's tail.

Our lunch.

I forgot to get pictures of our Pig's in the Blanket that the boys made with me. They were gobbled up. You stuffed cheese in a hot-dog and wrapped them in a Pillsbury Crescent roll and baked. Delicious. I did make a Wilbur Fruit Salad and a farm field of vegetables.

The silicon spider cupcake holders were from Target. You would think the boys decorated these but actually it was me:). The eyes were sugar cookie icing but I didn't realize it until late last night when they started melting off the spider's faces. It made me laugh and I was too bothered to fix it.

My costume is panty hose over my head with googily eyes. I added 8 legs, made my face gray and dressed in gray. I realized wearing panty hose on your head is very itchy. I was not meant to be a bank robber.

It was a fun day and I hope to have a few more of these days during this school year.

The Fair

2011-09-22T01:43:00.003-04:00

The State Fair is something that holds so many things I hate, crowds, heat, twirly throw-up rides, rip off price food, country music and animal poop. However, in reality I love a good State Fair. It seems to capture so many good things about childhood and blend them all together into a wonderful panorama of sights, smells, tastes and memories. My parents live in Mariposa and we have been going to their Fair as much as we can over the years. Ben and I had been talking up the Fair and the Demolition Derby for awhile now. It happened to coincide with Nati's Birthday and I am pretty sure he thought all the hoopla was for him. It was such a treat to take the boys to the Fair and watch them experience it for the first time.

I seriously felt my inner child bubble up and want to be free to enjoy the fair for the first time again too. The rides, the sticky food, the noise, the crowds, and the heat became a beautiful thing and I smile just remembering it. I can't really explain why I like it so much, I just do. The boys of course absorbed it all and loved it. They were fascinated by the Derby. What little boy isn't going to like watching cars crash? They loved going on the dance floor and showing off their moves. They wanted to try every ride I would let them. They begged for an Icee for three days and I finally gave in. Now we are back in the swing of things and the Fair seems a lifetime ago, so I post these pictures to recapture the feelings of warm summer nights, music drifting on a cool breeze and tired little boys holding my hand as we walk away from a fabulous day at the Fair.

My sister was wearing a shirt claiming to be Mom's favorite. I had to make my own to declare the truth.

Who doesn't want a brain sucking alien balloon on their head?

Mom and just a few of the prizes she won for her amazing art.

My sister and niece in the cow barn. I love the silhouette.

With Daddy in Afghanistan I had to brave at least one twirlly ride. It looks tame but this thing goes pretty fast and I really thought I was going to see my lunch. I did smile for the camera.

My niece showing exactly how I felt to leave the fair behind:).

Until next year.

Little Man turns Four

2011-09-08T23:31:00.003-04:00

Wow how is it possible that the teeny tiny baby that I first held 2 1/2 years ago is already four? How is it possible to love him this much? How is it possible that time continues to speed up no matter how much I try to just enjoy the moments that fly by? It just doesn't seem possible that he is this big, this old, this grown up, but he is. And he is a blast. This past weekend little, well not so little now, Nati turned four. It was a great day for him. He really seemed to get Birthdays this time and was so excited and happy about everything. The number one thing on his wish list was a Buzz Lightyear, but he had very specific requirements. It had to have a working face mask, working laser, working buttons and wings that came out and went back in. Oh yeah he also wanted the karate chop action. Basically he wanted a Buzz like Andy got on Toy Story. My sister-in-law came to spend a few days with me before his Birthday. She and the Grandparents had gotten the much requested Buzz. He had a little party with his two little cousins and got Buzz. I have it on video and I am so glad. I do think he might have been the happiest little boy on planet earth when he saw Buzz. The only downer was he loved Buzz so much he woke me up the next day at 5:30 and said, "Mommy, me have deam that me pay with Buzz. Me pay with Buzz pease?" This happened two mornings in a row so Buzz was removed from the bedroom at nights on day three.

Nati and his Buzz. Sheer Happiness

Then we went up to my parents for the State Fair. It worked out well as this was his Birthday too. He got to be around his Uncles, Aunts, cousins, Nana and Babu. He was spoiled rotten getting literally everything he asked for. Even big brother got in on the excitement and chose a candy bar to give Nati. Yared did great at watching his brother get so many gifts. He is catching on that presents for Nati eventually just mean more toys for both of them. I made a Toy Story theme cake. It was Andy's bedroom with chocolate bed posts. I was excited with how it turned out.

The finished Birthday Cake.

It is so great to be near family and let the boys feel the love. The weekend at the Fair was great and I will post more pictures of that later. Thanks to all the family for making one little boy feel very special. Here are a bunch of pictures in random order from his two Birthday celebrations. Crazy enough I can't find the picture that I have of him on his Scooter he got from Daddy. I'll have to take another picture and post that picture later. It is an awesome Radio Flyer scooter.

The Hero of the day.

Playing with cousins.

Waiting for the party to happen.

A guitar from Nana and Babu has been a great hit. He likes to climb on the highest thing he can find, call it his stage and rock out.

Uncle Ian and Auntie Lori scored with this skateboard. He loves it.

Spider-man lunch box - check. Skateboard - check. Lightning McQueen helmet - check. Yup ready for trouble.

Cousin Cameron with the Birthday Boy.

He was pretty sure this was Buzz so it was a good thing it turned out to be Buzz and not something else.

Cupcakes and cheesy smiles.

Kind of sad but true, he already loves getting "nomey" $

I think it is love.

My final Birthday thoughts are a little m ore on the somber side. I watched Nati a lot this week as he is the exact age that Yared was when we first met him and brought him home. Our gottcha day was the day before his 4th Birthday. But we didn't know this until later so he waited so long for his first Birthday party. I think of all that he had to adjust to and the transitions he faced at 4 and I am just in awe of how he handled it all. I mean he didn't speak English. He spent four days with us in a hotel and then was loaded on a plane and seat belted in for the first time in his life. He then arrives in another country where he is now a minority and no one understands him. He has two people taking care of him but he is scared, 4 and overwhelmed. Watching how happy and joyful Nati's 4th Birthday was made me ache for Yared that he can remember more of the fear, confusion and loneliness. I wish I could erase that and give him a fabulous 4th Birthday too. But I can't. The pain and his past is part of our beautiful story of becoming a family. I have to accept the good and the bad of it. But I can be left admiring my son for all that he adjusted too and how amazing it is that he is so full of love, joy and happiness. Buzz Lightyear might be Nati's hero but my hero is Yared.

Just for Daddy.. more for the rest of you later:)

2011-08-31T16:21:00.008-04:00

I know, I know, where did I go? Well it has been a crazy, busy, fun, stressful, amazing, hectic, unending, family filled, tiring, wonderful summer. I feel like I don't know where anything is. I don't know were to start to get organized. I need schedule like I have never needed it before. I need order. I need...dare I say it... BOREDOM:). So I am way behind on our summer adventures. However, I do need to post some pictures just so Daddy can see how big his boys have gotten. So the rest of you will have to hold your horses to read about our amazing summer. This is for Daddy and the rest of you can enjoy their cuteness too if you want to:).

A montage of pictures of the boy since I last blogged oh so long ago.

Bath time!

Nati getting his Buzz Lightyear present. I was woken up at 5:30 today and informed that he had dreamt about Buzz so we needed to get up and play. I was not feeling the same passion for Buzz as my little man was feeling.

Sweet sunshine smile.

Super Nati!!

Jungle Gym Yared.

Boys with Grandma and Grandpa..we had to practically BRIBE Nati to smile nicely.

Yeah I am cool.

Boys loved these homemade boy and arrows some one gave them.

Sometimes the looks on Mr. Mischief's face scare me.

Meeting GG for the first time.

They love a hot tub...just like Daddy.

I love this shot of us. He is my snuggle buddy.

Anything on wheels is good in the boys world.

They love having big kid cousins.. who spoil them terribly!!

Water + dirt = two happy boys.

You looking at me?

One Month Down Six More to Go.

2011-08-06T16:54:00.006-04:00

Ben left exactly 4 Saturdays ago today. I can't believe how fast time has gone but also how much we have done in that time. I think September, routine, and school are going to be a real shock for the boys. Right now life is one big adventure with family, friends, pools, rivers, sunshine and lots of ice-cream.

This last week, my Aunt, my cousin and his two kids have been visiting. It has been great to spend time with them and show them a bit of the area. Yared is having to learn that not everyone has his love of cuddles and closeness. He needs zero body space to feel comfortable and is always surprised to meet someone who doesn't like to be as close as possible at all times. Once I convinced him to back off a bit he had a great time with his relatives from across the sea. Nati is at a truly adorable phase right now and seems to win everyone over. There are still the random tantrums but overall he is a bundle of fun. Yared is his usual outgoing, full of life little man.

Before my sister moved over seas she and her family were out here for a weekend. One of the crazy adventures we had was trying my Dad's water slide. He built a slide from the pool up at the house down to the tree where Ben and I got married. It was fun, wild, and slightly dangerous when they tried a train. It has since been re-routed and now ends in a pond of sorts that works much better with less injuries. Here is my brave niece flying down the first more dangerous run.

Yared loved every second until his stomach met a rock.
Cousin Daniel thought it was a blast until a pile up left his wrist aching.

I didn't get a picture of Nati as I was too busy trying to slow him down. The smaller you are the faster you go.

I will post pictures of the new and improved version soon. Babu has spent many hours padding the ditch he dug with old carpet and plastic. It really is good he has 5 acres to dream up these crazy schemes and then make them into a reality. This is meant to last the summer only and it is a good ride.

Celebrating my big sister's birthday a month early as she will be so far away when the big day comes.
Rides on all the toys are a daily occurrence. There are bikes, trikes, wagons, go-carts and even a Polaris. Never a dull moment out here.
We took the British relatives into Yosemite. It is always breathtakingly beautiful but honestly the crowds took away some of the joy of going there this time.

Snack time at the river.

Bridal Veil falls is still big even in August as CA had so much rain this year.
Stop taking our picture mom.

First Big brother gives the little man a ride and then...
the other way around.
We miss you Ben/Daddy. Glad that one month is down!!!

Anniversary and the Flu

2011-07-29T00:31:00.008-04:00

That sounds like a bad combination doesn't it. Well the flu was horrible but my anniversary was pretty good, even though Ben was miles and miles away. In what seems like a never ending road trip since we left VA, we took off last week to go visit a friend for a night. Aya and her kiddos were our regular Friday playdate in VA and as she was out here for a visit to in-laws we managed one more play date. The boys had a great time seeing their friends and getting spoiled rotten by my friend's in-laws. They had their first slumber party or lack-of-slumber party. They went to bed at 10 and were up at 5:30.

We continued on from this visit to Northern CA to cabin camp with my two sisters. The view of Mt. Shasta was amazing and the lake water felt great BUT... I managed to catch a stomach flu on the drive up. By noon our first day up there I was out of commission. Lucky for me my mom had decided last minute to come with us and she was there to help my sister with the boys. I don't know what I would have done with out my sister and Mom. I don't remember being that sick in a long time. Thanks to Nana and Auntie Meg and all their cousins, the boys had a great time. They got all sorts of treats and adventures. I was just thankful to be left in a dark, quiet cabin by myself.

Kayaking with their cousin.

Yared learning to Kayak by himself.
Taking his little brother on a ride.
Nati with his cousin who is SO good with him and he likes her A LOT.

My sister and her husband are moving overseas this week so we were glad to get time with them before they left. This was taken on their Anniversary, one day before my Anniversary.

The whole group of cousins watching movies at our cabin.
Yared covered himself in mud and then started giving hugs.

Reason 1005 why I love my mom is she took the hug and then grabbed him and wrestled him into the water.

Plus she is classy:).
My sister and little niece, again she was a massive help through the flu and then managed to catch it herself the next week.
Relax time.

Mom helped me drive back to her place and I am planning to sit still here for a few weeks. On the way home Nati started complaining that his stomach hurt. We had stopped for dinner and he ate two bites. As we walked out the restaurant everything he had eaten all day came exploding out of him. I was so thankful to be out the restaurant and with my mom. I was still feeling lousy as I think I managed to get seriously dehydrated. We stocked up at the store on all sorts of things we might need for a sick kid. But he sat back in the van looking 100% better, in fact he was better. That was the extent of his flu. Yared's lasted about 10 minutes and he was better.

One night that week I gave the boys a bubble bath and was doing something while they played. I heard hysterical giggling and thought they were up to mischief. I walked in and found that my mom in swimsuit had jumped too. They loved this. Reason 1006 why I love her.

Tuesday of this week was our 8th Wedding Anniversary. It could have been a sad day as we were far apart. But Ben did a great job of remembering it and had a present here waiting for me and we got to talk on the phone. Also we were married at my parent's place, so I was able to walk down to the wedding tree and just be thankful for that fun day and the great 8 years we have had. We took a picture under the Wedding tree. The boys wanted some of themselves too.

First week without Daddy

2011-07-21T00:34:00.007-04:00

Ben has been gone almost two weeks now and I wanted to capture a few of our adventures since he has left.

Many of you are probably wondering how the boys are doing. I would say overall they are doing super well. But there are still tears and many "I miss Daddy" 's. There are sleeping issues withNati, but I still think both boys are handling this well. Ben has been great at calling, skypingand emailing. Both Ben and I are rather amazed with how much things have changed since he last deployed. It is definitely easier to stay in touch this time. He works a lot but that is to be expected. But in usual Ben fashion he is enjoying the work and doing his best to make this a positive experience for himself as well as us.

We are having a great time visiting with lots of family. We literally unpacked for one day and then came straight up to my parents. By the time we get back to our house it will have been almost six weeks since left. We thought about waiting and moving in later in the summer but this way much of the big stuff is situated and Ben was able to help us "move in". Also we weren't sure of housing availability at the end of the summer so we took the first house they offered us. We also happened to get a house on base right next door to our good friends from grad school so who could turn that down right?

Here are a few pictures from our first week without Daddy. We miss you every day Ben!!

This one was taken this morning when both boys got to talk to Daddy on the phone.

Hugging his cousin.
My big sister and my Mom. Yes they are related:).
We had my cousin from England come to visit us with his four kids, all teenagers... but nice ones:). They spoiled the boys rotten and carried them around everywhere. The boys loved them and were very sad to see their big playmates leave.

Here is one teen being Nati's horsie.

The first cousins hanging by the pool.
Yared did VBS at my Mom's church our first week here and loved it. Nati kept telling us he would go, "me go VBS...maybe me not." but he never did. He got his own shirt and got to dance with the mascot at the closing program, so he was happy.
This is for Daddy. Yared volunteered to read a Bible verse but freaked out when he got to the microphone. He didn't tell me about this at all so I was super surprised to see him going up front. That should explain my terrible shot.
Yared singing in the VBS performance. He loved it but he looks pained here:).
Second cousin spoiling him rotten but it made a nice shot. We went to visit our friend Bob's gold mine property. It is just outside Yosemite and beautiful.
With Bob and Babu(my dad) down by the river. (if you are an 80's child you'll hear Chris Farely saying that)
artsy shot
sweetness..this was right before I managed to flick a wasp with the towel and really tick it off. I had a rather embarrassing time of running madly in my swimsuit and flipflops clambering over rocks up and down screaming all the time. Finally realized this thing could smell me and jumped under water. It did the trick but it freaked the boys out who somehow thought I had died by going under water. I am sure my hysterical antics did not reassure them. I came out of the water all pleased with myself not getting stung. Then I looked up and saw my two teenage 2nd cousins each holding one boy. Both boys were wailing their heads off.
My second cousins swimming in the waterfall.

We finally convinced him to jump. I had to hold Yared back from jumping.

The water is snow run off so rather cold.

These last two are for Daddy. I took them in Norfolk but never put them up. It just shows our mischievous boys up close.

Road Trip Part Two - the Wild West

2011-07-11T23:48:00.010-04:00

Sorry to leave you hanging. We did finish our road trip across country with the cats, the kids and the occasionally crabby parents and overall it was loads of FUN. We loved it. But at the end of the week we were glad to get to CA and see Ben's family for the weekend. We then had a few busy days in Pt Hueneme moving into our new house and getting Ben ready to deploy. We are very excited to live on base and everyone was so welcoming. He is now in Afghanistan and we are resting at my parent's house. The last half of the trip I managed to summon the energy for the big camera so here are those shots and a brief summary of our days in the West.

These pictures our of the cool Carousal we found in CO. Yared is making Mickey Mouse ears for me.

I often get presented with dandelion flower bouquets. They are some of the best flowers I have ever received. Who knew that weeds accompanied with sweet smiles can be beautiful.
How we ate lunch on our trip in the heat with the kids and the cats.

I thought this horses's face was hilarious. It would be exhausting carrying kids in circles for years and years.

Day Five - Denver CO to Grand Junction CO 244 miles

This was a fun day as we planned to make it short and see a few of the local sites. We got up to the Grand Mesa and also to the Colorado National Monument. The highlight of this day was wandering through downtown Grand Junction in the cool of the evening. It felt like a small western town you would see in a movie. There were awesome statues through the town and we had a great dinner at the local pub. We spent sunset at Colorado National Monument playing on rocks. I love this part of the US and we spent dreamed about moving somewhere like this.

Here we are looking at the amazing Rocky Mountains. We met some German men who had shipped their motorcycles to Seattle. They were driving across the USA and then shipping their bikes back to Germany from NY. What a trip. They let the boys have a picture on their bikes.

Grand Mesa - the valley below is all desert but you drive 45 minutes up to the top of the mesa and you are in a different world of lakes and forests.

The fun statues we saw as we wandered through Grand Junction CO.

Colorado National Monument. One word - BEAUTIFUL.

Climbing rocks with Daddy.

Climbing smaller rocks by himself.

It was so cool watching the rain move across the sky.

Catch a rainbow and putting in your hand lately?

We even managed a small hike. With the elevation and my cold, I was going the same speed as Nati. We weren't fast but we made it.

Day Six - Grand Junction CO to St. George UT 391 miles

This was amazing scenery but no gas stations or food for miles in between. I have some great shots that I took on the small camera as we drove. However, Ben had to take that camera with him so I can't show you those pics. We did have one adventure this day. We were going about 80 through the dessert and Yared says, "Mom I'm bleeding." I looked in the rear view mirror and he had blood all over his face. He was having his first bloody nose. It freaked him out and it rather freaked me out to see all that blood and be on a highway going so fast and not be able to help him right away. He was crying and trying to stop the bleeding. Nati was fascinated and was saying over and over in his sweet squeaky high pitched voice, "How Ya ya get owie in his nose? How Ya Ya get owie in his nose?" I radioed Ben we needed to stop pronto. We got is sorted out and explained to Yared that a nose bleed was no big deal. I am not sure we convinced him. He had another later at the hotel so I think it was just the hot, dry weather. We stayed in a great hotel in St. George. The pool was perfect for Nati and he really was swimming on his own this day. It is always so amazing to see your kids learn something new like that. I was so glad Ben was here for that event. I feel like both the boys are on the brink of learning so many new things this year and I don't want Ben to miss it all.

Day Seven - St George UT to Banning CA 375 miles
It felt so good to be on the home stretch. We were excited to be back in CA and celebrated by going to In-N-Out. Of course a million other people love CA and In-N-Out so it was super busy. I went inside to let Nati go to the bathroom and missed the excitement. Our silly cat escaped the harness and Ben spent 5 crazy minutes chasing the cat under cars and through a ridiculously busy parking lot. I would have died of embarrassment but when I asked him if people were watching he gave his typical answer, "Who cares if they are." He is right I shouldn't care but I do:). This is the same cat who tried to escape earlier in the trip. I am beginning to think she didn't like our road trip!! We got to Ben's sister's house in the early afternoon and the boys were so thrilled to meet their cousins and play with their Auntie and Uncle.

The last three days had the most incredible views. It changed all the time and often took your breath away. Ben and I loved it. I had managed to catch Yared's cold so the elevation changes were a challenge. My ears were plugged for nearly the whole three days and I found myself telling the boys to be loud rather than to be quiet:).

I am not sure the cat liked being a car plllow/table but I thought it was funny.
Poor Woody and Man getting held up in the hotel room.

We took this picture the night before Ben left. Yared had just been in tears about Daddy leaving and napless Nati was beyond tired but with Grandma making them laugh we managed to get one last family shot in front of our new home.

Stage three of our emotional triathlon

2011-07-04T23:48:00.004-04:00

It is the 4th of July and I sit in a hotel room watching my youngest sleep peacefully. Yared just went off with Daddy to watch fireworks and while he wanted to go I saw him cling tightly to me and Nati before he went out. I am beginning to see the signs that the changes we have been experiencing are affecting the boys and I feel the weight of the role of becoming a single parent hitting me.

I feel like the last few weeks have been a three part triathlon of challenges. The first was to pack out and clean our Norfolk VA house. I had never done with this kids. I don't know what I would have done without our amazing network of friends who stepped in to watch kids, cook meals and host us in their homes. It actually turned out to be better than I had expected. I had some great times connected with friends before we moved. On the last day as I mopped the floors of the empty rooms I was hit with how amazingly God had changed my dreams. I was in the small bedroom that I had hoped we would fill with a small Leppard baby during out time in VA. But as infertility hit us full force and we moved down a different path this small room became a classroom and the bigger bedroom next door was filled with two small Leppard boys instead. And I was SO overwhelmed with how perfect it had turned out. I could not have planned my life out better and I felt joyfully thankful to God for bringing this dream to me rather than the one I had wanted.

Then came the next stage of my emotional triathlon - 2 cars, 2 kids, 2 cats across the entire United States. I was worried that this would be long, exhausting, tense, tiring and all sorts of other negative adjectives. However, to my surprise this turned out to not be a challenge but another great family memory. There were moments of exhaustion but for the most part we all enjoyed it. Ok I'll be honest the cats did not but the rest of us did.:)

Now to our final leg of this triathlon.. sending Ben to Afghanistan. Now this one cannot be better than I expect. I have done a lot to try to prepare me and the boys for this. But as we drove into Pt. Hueneme today I felt the tears rise up. Soon we would be saying goodbye and there isn't really a way to make that easy. I am NOT complaining as I am SICK of people in the military complaining about deployments. If you don't want to deploy, get out. There is not a draft on right now. However, I am saying that it is still hard to face a deployment. There are parts of Navy life I love; the friends, the travel, the unknown. But this part of it is hard and I am sad. I will say it. I know I will be fine but right now I am sad and I sit writing this with tears that I need to shed now so I can have some control when the boys are awake. I am sad for myself as I lose my best buddy, biggest fan, strongest encourager, and the person who makes life so much fun. I am sad for my boys as I want to shield them from any more pain. I worry about how this might affect them as I know adopted children have their own hurts that they are already dealing with. I feel an extra burden to make this transition easy for them. But even in my hurt I am so grateful that this deployment takes place from CA. There is family within a 2 hour drive and grandparents only a day away. In fact my in-laws are coming down this week to help us move into our new house. Then after we send Ben on his way, the boys and I will go hang with my parents in one of the prettiest parts of California for the summer. So I have much to be thankful for.

If you read this blog and you happen to pray for us. We could use your prayers this weekend. We say goodbye sometime on Saturday and I know Yared especially will need your prayers. He feels things very deeply. Nati will also need prayer as he is just now becoming Daddy's little man. As for me, I need prayer to know how to be strong for the boys and be the best Mom and Dad I can be for them while he is gone. Finally Ben heads off to a dangerous part of the world and so he too will need prayers for safety. We would greatly appreciate it.

Two Cars, Two Kids, Two Cats driving 2800 miles - part 1

2011-06-28T22:11:00.006-04:00

This is at the top of the St. Louis Arch. Our one site seeing adventure so far.

Yup that is right we are half way through our road trip across the country. We have both the car and the van, the two cats and of course the sweet boys. I was dreading this trip a bit but it has actually been an good. There have been only two downer moments and the rest has been laid back and fun. The boys have risen to the challenge and really seem to not mind the driving. They do get to watch a lot of movies but there is still plenty of down time and they play, talk, read and keep me entertained with silly comments. Ben and I have a radio to chatter to each other with and I have books on CD that I listen to when the boys are watching a movie or when I drive the car.

The cats are doing well also. They hated each other for a long time and they haven't ever really enjoyed the kids but all that has changed. The cats snuggle with each other and sit on the boys laps while we drive along. The kids love it although Yared has taken to calling them his dogs as he walks them on the leashes. I like my cats but I ALWAYS feel like the biggest idiot in the world walking around with a cat on a leash. So I don't mind handing that joy over to the boys. One of our downer moments was when Nati needed to pee for the 100th time. We are super glad he is telling us and extra glad he is a boy as we just pull off at the side of the road. On one such adventure Yared was "walking his dog". We were really in the middle of nowhere. Nati was peeing into some berry bushes and on the other side of them was a thick overgrown forrest. Yared let go of the leash and his dog, I mean cat took off. Ben and I were sure we had lost her. Yared proceeded to do what any six year old would do, he howled at the top of his lungs about losing the cat. His screeching wasn't about to attract said cat back to us so he was quickly put in the van. I truly was saying goodbye to the cat in my mind as I was not going to spend hours looking for her. We just didn't have the time. Then we heard her terrified little cry from in the bushes. We captured the cat and Yared now walks his dog with a serious death grip on the leash and squeezes the life out of them as he holds them. Nati loves to carry them but it is often around the neck which has me in hysterical laughter every time.

Here is a brief overview of the trip by days

Day one - Norfolk VA to Lexington KY about 600 miles - best memory from this day was the incredible scenery of West Virginia and Kentucky. It was breath taking. Worst memory of this day was the traffic we hit in the first hour. That is not how you want to start your long road trip.

Day two - Lexington KY to St Louis MO about 400 miles - best memory from this day was meeting up with good friends. Yared and his friend Nathaniel were at the same orphanage together in Ethiopia. I made contact with his mom and we have stayed in touch. She has become a good friend and now all four kiddos have a blast together. Her daughter is Nati's future wife if I have my say:). Worst memory - using our Denny's coupons that I got when I wrote a letter of complaint about our last trip. It took 25 minutes for our food to come out and we were then almost late to meet our friends. Combine this with a tired Nati and a grumpy stressed out set of parents and it was a bomb that almost exploded. We had to have a family apology and hug before we met our friends:).

Day three St. Louis MO to Salina KS about 400 miles - best memory of this day was eating in this little local diner for dinner. The sign said "Home cooked food since 1963" It felt like we stepped back into 1963 when we walked inside. I got the pot roast and it came out with a scoop of mashed potatoes and dark gravy all over it. The boys saw my food arrive and Yared said, "You get chocolate ice cream for dinner?" The food wasn't great but it had atmosphere. Worst memory was poor Yared's face when he almost lost the cat.

Day four - Salina KS to Denver CO about 420 miles. - best memory was finding some old carousel that had been fulling restored and getting a ride for $.25 each. It didn't go up and down but it did go fast enough that I got motion sick. Still it is a summer memory etched in my mind of laughing boys, warm dry heat, hot wind blowing over a small country town. I also really thought it was funny when Nati tried to pee in the bushes and found out about about strong winds and why Daddy was yelling "Pee down wind". He came back wet and glared at us saying, "Me peed down wind and it went all over me." He doesn't even know what down wind is so this whole scene made me laugh. Worst memory.. I don't really have one from today other than the scenery was dull. It was a good day.

Here are a few of the pictures of our trip. We have been using the small camera as it is way easier.

This is just as we were leaving Norfolk. Yared was having a hard time saying goodbye to our good friends Ann and Paul. These friends let us stay with them our last week in Norfolk and it made the move so much better. THANKS Millers!!

We bought the boys their own little cameras and it is so funny to see what they want to take pictures of.
Nati on cat duty.
Our good buddies in St. Louis. The kids had a blast. It made our first long day of driving worth it to get the time with friends.
This is proof that the cats now like the kids.

Moving Time

2011-06-17T22:13:00.004-04:00

I know some hear those words and shiver in horror and others are more like me and tingle with excitement. I actually really like the adventure of moving. I think my Dad blessed, or cursed depending on your point of view, me with his nomadic heart. He loves to explore, travel, move, wander. The best way to describe him is with the quote, "Not all who wander are lost." That is my dad in a nutshell. He was born to be free and explore the world. I really think he should have been born 100 years before his time so he could have really explored. In fact he has his PhD in Nomadic Peoples. Because of my parents missionary nomadic lifestyle, I have lived a very restless life. I don't regret it at all.

Yet, as I sit here in our home for the last weekend and just rest in the peace of HOME, I have for the first time a sense of sadness of leaving my own home. We have been in this home four years and that is the longest continuous amount of time I have ever lived in one house. This made me do some quick calculations of my moving history. I lived on three continents, in six countries, and in 7 states. The longest I have ever lived anywhere is my boarding school in Kenya- a total of 8 years. While there you were required to pack up your room at the end of every three month term so I am a pro at packing and also moving.

There are some great things about moving, it is like traveling. However instead of being a tourist you get to be a temporary local. You get so see so many new things, people and places. It really broadens your horizons. You get to be immersed in a whole new culture. I love the adventures I have had, the places I have seen and the friends I have made. It is always so mind boggling for me to meet people who have never moved, or worse yet never traveled. In college I worked at McDonalds with a 20 year old who had never been outside of the city limits. He used to brag about spending all his off time doing drugs. He seemed like a nice, intelligent guy when sober, so I one day suggested to him that he should go on some real trips instead of drug induced ones. He laughed me off but I do think it might have cured some of his drug addiction to see something outside his own town. Moving can be a wonderful adventure. It is like getting a present from a secret admirer. You never know what you will get. It might be amazing or it might be awful but it is something new and therefor exciting in my humble opinion.

There are some hard things about moving, the packing, the goodbyes, the uncertainty of a new area. As a child it was the new schools. Arrggghh. I went to a total of 7 different schools but as we were moving back and forth I had to switch between these schools a total of 11 times. I HATED going to a new school. I was always lost and felt like I had a giant sign on me stating that I was the new kid and therefor the looser. Some schools were worse than others and it definitely got worse as I got older. My sophomore year of high school I was home-schooled for about 6 weeks, went to a massive California public school for about three months and finished up the year in a very SNOBBY private school. (I was there on scholarship.) But being the new kid taught be to look out for the other new kids. It taught me to be compassionate. It taught me that one school was not the be all and end of your life.

This July Ben and I will celebrate 8 years of marriage. In those 8 years, we have moved 5 times. This move is an exciting one for us. It gets us back to the West Coast where 90% of our family lives. Of course we just found out that my sister and her family will be moving to North Africa one month after we arrive but.... at least 80% of our family will still be in California:). For the first time we will be living in base housing. I am really excited to try living on base. I went to college close to where we will be living and I loved this part of California so I am thrilled about that. Both sets of Grandparents are with in one days driving distance. My brother and Ben's sister are within a three hours drive. Oh JOY to be near family again. But this move is overshadowed with Ben's deployment so as much as I love the adventure of moving, I dread the arrival in CA as we only have about 10 days together after we get there.

I guess what I am trying to say is that while I am VERY aware of the challenges of moving, I really love it. I know that when it comes down to the time for us to settle permanently I will struggle. I also know this move has unique challenges with two small boys to comfort and encourage and a deployment looming. Also I love my home here in VA so it is hard to say goodbye to that and the friends we have made here. However, I am genuinely excited to move and to learn all about a new area, to make new friends, to find a new church, to experience a new everything. Yeah life is good and this nomadic girl finds her heart beating faster at the thought of being on the road again.

Spring adventures that got lost in the craziness

2011-06-14T08:28:00.013-04:00

We did so much this spring that many of our adventures got lost in the shuffle. Here is a quick overview of our fun.

Boston

When we were up in RI we spent a day in Boston. It was so cool. This was one of my to-see cities on the East Coast. I wish we had longer to explore but as the day was FREEZING, we were more than ready to leave. We meant to just stop and take a picture here but Nati went into full blown hunger temper tantrum so we ate lunch here too. It was fun but no one new my name.

Making poor Yared try to appreciate American history. He is always a good sport but I had to laugh at my Ethiopian son sitting next to his American Dad while his British(Red Coat) mother took a picture of Paul Revere's grave.
I just liked this angle. He said looking up made him dizzy.

Goofing off.

Free tour of the Boston Fire House. They even let the boys wind up the old siren.

We went and visited the USS CONSTITUTION.

The best part of Boston was meeting up with my friend from elementary school, Norma and her husband Tim. Norma and I went to school together from 5th-12th grade. After high school we lost touch. If she is reading this she will be the first to admit she is lousy at staying in touch. It was so amazing to see her again. It felt like we were never apart. I truly value her friendship in my life. Boarding school can be a blast and it can be rough. Norma was one friend I could ALWAYS, and I mean ALWAYS count on to be kind, to make me laugh and to have fun with. I cannot recall her ever being unkind. While other girls could get moody and turn on you, she was always Norma, my friend and fellow laughter enthusiast. It was great to meet Tim as well and let them meet Ben and the boys. I do wish we lived closer and I certainly hope it isn't 20 years again before we see each other. Hint Hint Norma!!:)

Savannah

This city was also on my to-see list and it was beautiful. Again I wish we had longer but the boys were more than ready to go to Disney World and skip more site seeing.

Site seeing from the trolley. He looks mad but he actually loved the first hour and then fell asleep.
I love these little hands
What a three year old does once he is bored of site seeing on a trolley.

We loved the WWII memorial.
These stairs were like mountain climbing for the boys.
Home School
We read Stone Soap so of course we had to make a big pot of it. It was delicious.
I love this picture. Who is the student and who is the class clown.

Virginia Air and Space Museum

We had been meaning to go here for awhile and when we heard they had a Military Appreciation Month we took a day to go see it.

Something I never get tired of. Little hands holding mine.
or seeing little hands holding Daddy's hand.
Yogurt mustache.
They had awesome flight simulators for the kiddos to play with. This kid took them very seriously.

He liked the pretend baggage carousel the best. He got to throw suitcases on it and watch them get pulled around.

Go NAVY!!
After touring the Museum, we went a little crazy. I am not sure what we were thinking but we took them to a 3D movie . It was their FIRST movie experience. They did the surround sound blast at the beginning and both boys started wailing in fear. After awhile Yared liked it and kept trying to grab objects that got close to him. Nati hated the whole thing and would have left if he could have gotten all of us to go with him. He didn't want to be there but he also didn't want to miss out on something Yared was getting to do. He survived but he still tells me, "Me not like Mars Needs Moms."
That is a few of our spring adventures that got overlooked. But as I dragged my HUGE camera around all these places I thought I would share!! Less than 10 days and we will be hitting the road for California so stay tuned for more crazy adventures from the Leppard Clan.

Learning to Cook Ethiopian Food

2011-06-08T14:12:00.004-04:00

A number of people have asked me for my recipes for Ethiopian food. The problem is this; as with any great dish it is more an aquired skill then something I can write down. I can point you in the right direction and if you have a taste for Ethiopian food you should be able to adjust it to make it taste right. I am still a beginner for sure but every time I make it, it seems to get better.

Here are the two basic rules and one side note that I learned from my friend Seba

1) - always use more onions and fresh ginger root than the recipe calls for. When I am making Tebs or Doro wat I use about six onions. I cook them dry until they mush down and then I add the ginger and garlic. Seba chops these two up and then blends them together in the blender. This seems to work well. I use a LOT of ginger.

2) - use the real butter they ask for. It isn't hard to make and you can make a big batch and keep it in the fridge and then just break chunks off to add to your dish. It is a small thing that makes a big difference to your dishes.

3) - side note most wat dishes are done when you see the oil separate on the top and move to the sides.

here is the recipe I follow for the butter

Niter Kibbeh (Ethiopian spiced clarified butter)

Servings: about 2 cups
1 lb Butter, unsalted
2 cloves Garlic, crushed
2 Gingerroot, ¼" slices
3 Cardamom Pods
1 Cinnamon stick
3 Cloves
½ t Turmeric
½ t Fenugreek Seeds

Add butter to a small saucepan and melt over low heat.

Add all other ingredients and simmer on lowest possible heat for about 1 hour.

Pour the clear golden liquid off the top leaving all solids in the bottom of the pan. Strain through cheesecloth if necessary. Discard solids.

Store in the refrigerator or freezer and use as needed.

The spices and amounts are not set in stone, so don't get upset if you don't have all of them

Shiro

I don't follow one for Shiro, but this link is the most similar to what I make.

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbook:Shiro_Wat

Seba adds chopped tomatoes or sautéed meat to her Shiro. I use the Niter Kibbeh to add some more flavor. I also have at least three different Shiro powers, some with berere, some without. I personally like at least a little spice in my Shiro. Many of the shiro recipes I tried before Seba helped me out had you using cups of shiro powder. She was horrified when I told her that. Spoonfuls is MUCH more practical and works!!

Doro Wat

this is the original recipe I started with. I use about 4 cups of onions and 2 Tablespoons of ginger. I also go heavy on the Berbere.

Ingredients:

2 lbs Chicken Pieces
2 Tbs Lemon Juice
1 tsp Salt
4 Tbs Vegetable Oil
2 cups Onion, finely chopped
1 Tbs Minced Garlic
1/2 tsp Ginger (ground)
1/4 tsp Fenugreek, (crushed)
1/2 tsp Cardamom (ground)
1/8 tsp Nutmeg (ground)
2 Tbs Berbere
4 Tbs Paprika
(for a spicier Wat, use 4 Tbs Berbere and 2 Tbs Paprika)
2 Tbs Tomato Paste
1 cup Water (or more, as needed)
2 Tbs Butter

Steps:
1) Traditionally, a whole Chicken is cut into 8 pieces.
2) Sprinkle chicken with Lemon Juice and Salt
3) Let Chicken stand while preparing other ingredients
4) Heat Vegetable Oil
5) To Oil, add Onions, Minced Garlic, and Ginger.
6) Cover and cook on low heat until Onions are just browned
7) Add Fenugreek, Cardamom, and Nutmeg and stir well
8) Add Berbere, Paprika, Tomato Paste, and Water
9) Bring to a boil and cook slowly, stirring often for about 45 minutes (should be the consistency of heavy cream) - add a small amount of water if necessary
10) Add Chicken pieces to the sauce, turning to coat
11) Add Butter
12) Lower heat and cook chicken for about 1 hour, turning often to prevent sticking and to cook evenly
13) Serve with injera and enjoy

Injera

I don't make it:). For the last two years, I have been blessed by Seba and her connections here in VA. I must confess to peeking at other people's blogs as they attempt to make injera and giggling at their results. Most do not look very tasty at all. One thing I know bad injera is NOT worth it to me. Born in Ethiopia and being raised in Africa let me grow up eating the real deal. This set high standards for all my family. We have searched out restaurants based solely on their injera:). Thus saying, I will not attempt to make it. I have ordered online here and I will probably have to order from here again next year. This stuff is pretty good. Also you can freeze the extra and reheat it in the microwave.

Have fun and enjoy the food. If you happen to be blessed with wee ones from Ethiopia like us, remember all the hard work to make the food right is worth it. It is priceless to see them sitting with Ethi food all over their little faces smiling at you and holding their full bellies. If you happen to be an Ethi food junkie yourself, you can smile back at them with food all over your face holding your own belly:).

Family Night - Nati's Half Birthday

2011-05-31T13:27:00.005-04:00

Last night we had our last family night in Norfolk. Ben will be in Afghanistan for Nati's 4th Birthday so we decided to celebrate his 3 1/2 Birthday together and get Ben in some Birthday pictures. It isn't his official half Birthday but he doesn't know the difference and was very excited about his "hap Birthday."

During nap time Yared and I ran to the store and got the last minute supplies. As we were running around the store he looked at me and said, "I love having special time with just you sometimes." It made me realize we need to plan some more one on one time in with the kids.

He helped me decorate the room while his brother slept. We had half plates, half napkins, half cups and only half the guests had party hats.

We only decorated half the room and half the table.

I had grabbed black t-shirts at the thrift store and cut them in half. We started the night by pinning half a shirt to our shirts and taking a silly picture. As all this happened on Memorial Day we took a picture with our flag too:).

Our meal was made of halves too. Half a watermelon (sort of).

We had half hamburgers, halves of corn on the cob, halved roasted potatoes, and a salad with halved tomatoes and halves of cucumber slices. But the highlight for the kids were the half sodas. They were a HUGE hit. Yared and I tried to get the mini soda cans but the store didn't have any so we found these mini cokes.

I was trying to show off my pony tail that had been halved into pigtails but with the hat I looked like a wizard.

Of course we had to have half a cake too.

He had 3 1/2 candles on his cake.

We had decided that it wouldn't be about presents. But we did have two nerf guns I had picked up to give the boys sometime and tonight seemed perfect for it. They each got their own and I set up half a target in the living room.

Daddy gave each boy some instruction on using their gun right.

The instruction was a little more useful on Yared than on Nati but he had fun.
Side note on the guns. I am not super excited by the idea of the boys playing with guns. But I have caved with water guns and Nerf guns. Part of this is as they were playing guns no matter what I did. We don't watch violent cartoons or shows. We never have the news on with them around but the boys love guns. Nati has been turning toast, sticks, toys, and his hand into a gun almost since day one. I figured if he is going to make guns out of all that we might as well have some fun with them.

We had a fun night and are only hope is that the boys don't assume they will now get two Birthday parties every year:).

My Letter Campaign is working

2011-05-20T09:08:00.003-04:00

BUT can I handle the guilt. I wrote a blog post about a month ago about the horrible service we received at Subway and Denny's. I actually took the time to write letters of complaint. But I didn't want to be a negative nellie so I also wrote some letters of praise to other companies who gave us great service or who had a great product. I just got an email today informing us that due to our complaint the girl at Subway was fired.

Honestly the service she gave us was probably the worst I have received ever, but did I want her fired? Not really. I thought they should give her a reprimand and remind her that it is her job to be nice. I feel awful that she lost her job. What if she really needed it? What if this sends her in a downward spiral? I think she pretty much hated her job but she was young and might have just needed a reprimand. I seriously feel sick to my stomach at the thought of her getting fired because of me.

Now I am going to live in fear that the poor manager at Denny's gets fired. Truly I didn't think any company would fire an individual based one customer's complaint. I am hoping that maybe we were just the straw that broke the camel's back. This will really make me reconsider ever complaining.

Maybe I will just stick to writing only positive letters to companies that have impressive service and stellar products. I have done this in the past and gotten perks like free products for my letters. That is a much better result than someone losing their job.

But for now I live with my guilt and consider this a lesson learned for me as well as the Subway girl.

Lancaster County - A GREAT family weekend adventure.

2011-05-18T08:54:00.009-04:00

On our way home from Rhode Island last month we spent two nights in Lancaster County PA. I have always wanted to visit Amish country and as we are leaving the East Coast next month it was the perfect time.

We stayed a farm B&B. There is a website out there just for them. The kids had a blast here and would have been content to just play all day on the farm. I highly recommend this trip, especially if you have smaller kids. It was beautiful and had plenty to do for a weekend trip.

Here the boys are practicing their farm skills.

They got to gather eggs in the morning and terrorize the chickens.
Our farm had miniature goats and Nati got a huge kick out of holding them.
They let Yared tromp around in their gardening boots or wellies as I grew up calling them.
One of the many beautiful churches.
Our Amish boys.
Seriously, it is mind boggling the work that goes into something like this.
Yes this picture was taken just for the name. Ben and I are such teenagers sometimes:). We couldn't stop giggling about it.
The highlight of the weekend was stopping by at a working Dairy Farm and lets you play with the calves, cats and dogs. We ended up coming here twice as we missed milking time the first time. Nati bawled his eyes out both times that we left this farm.

This picture is for my friend Viv, who is the biggest animal lover I know. I knew she would get a kick out of it. This cat has figured out if he goes near the older calves they will lick him. He was literally covered in slobber and purrrfectly happy about it.

Day old kittens.
We spent 20 minutes watching the cows get milked and then Yared and Ben got bored. Nati on the other hand was enthralled and ready to stay for the whole time. We had to bribe him out of here with home made ice-cream made on the farm:). Yum.

One of the covered bridges. Ben, the engineer, was fascinated.

Cool train museums around too.

Ben being Ben:). This was the rope swing at our B&B.

I wasn't quite sure if I was allowed to take pictures of the Amish so I tried to do it all through the windows of the van. I am sure they get quite fed up of tourists snapping shots of them. I got caught by one girl:).

It really was a fun trip and a great family memory. Who knew farms were that much fun for the smaller members of our family. We might have to find some more farm Bed and Breakfasts in the future.

Now I know my ABCs Next Time Won't You Sing With Me

2011-05-17T07:29:00.002-04:00

We are just about ready to finish up Kindergarten here in the Leppard Classroom. Yared is too easy to teach. He is reading and writing way above where I expected him to be. He seems to have a natural knack for math so I find I am not pushing us at all just kind of letting the days flow. One thing we started with the curriculum was an Alphabet Book. Every week was a letter that the week was themed around. Most letters where represented with an animal or something inanimate from nature. We did a small art project for each letter and collected them for a book. Both boys did their own book and so I took pictures of the year's work. Some pages are from Nati's book and some from Yared's book. They are quite proud to be authors and illustrators. I laugh as I look through it as you can see which weeks Mom/Teacher was feeling creative and which weeks she was just skating by:).

Enjoy!!

Just in the last hour

2011-05-04T11:35:00.003-04:00

My boys crack me up constantly and I try to post as many comments on FB as I can but sometimes I can't keep up. These last two things happened in the last hour.

First we were leaving the YMCA and I had totally ignored the weather forecasters and had gone in with no umbrella. So we just calmly walked through the rain to our van, which was parked a good four blocks away.

Nati says, "me hear drip drop drip drop on my head."

Me "On your head"

Nati "Yup. One drop fell on my boobies. "

Me laughing "On your boobies?"

Yared "You don't have boobies buddy you have nipples."

Ha ha. Good thing he has a big brother to give him important life tips.

We were almost home and a Police K9 car was sitting next to us. Yared started reading the words as he now reads constantly. He wanted to know why dogs were needed by the police. This led to an explanation of the amazing sense of smell dogs have.

I came upstairs to start on a laundry and heard the boys start a game of hide-and-seek. But then I listened in and Yared was sniffing and sniffing and sniffing. They were trying to find each other my smelling each other.

These are just the things I hear, I am sure I am missing out when they are playing out of ear shot.

Deployment News for Angela:)

2011-04-30T22:28:00.003-04:00

(Picture from one of Ben's other deployments.)

This post is for our friend Angela and anyone else we haven't given the news to:). She specifically asked so she gets mentioned by name. Way to go Angela.

A few months ago we found out that Ben had been chosen for a job with the Seabees. He loves this part of the CEC so he was rather excited to get this job. I on the other hand was thrilled that this job got us back to California. We are really excited by this as it gets us near our families again. We have been on the East coast now for 4 years so we are ready to have some more frequent family time. We have to thank our families for making such big efforts to come see if us they could afford to. We really appreciate all the trips out here guys:). We really have enjoyed the East Coast a lot but I am ready for my coast:).

Anyways, at the end of June we will pack up the van, the car, the kids and the cats and drive from 2800 miles from Virginia to California in one week. While we have brain washed the kids that road trips are fun, I think even energetic Ben and I will be hard pushed to make this a fun trip. But we will try that is for sure!! And I am confident we will form some great memories.

We will arrive around July 4th and with a week or two Ben will leave for Afghanistan. He will be there roughly six months. This is the downer of moving to California. We have been talking the boys through it a lot but I know their little minds can't really grasp what will happen. But we are blessed with so much family and so many friends in CA that I feel we can really make this separation as easy as possible for them. We will be living on base there which we have heard wonderful things about. I am excited to apart of that Navy community there.

This new job of Ben's will last for two years and he will have two deployments but as I am learning with all things in life, it is best if you take it a day at a time. Jesus said it best when he said, ³⁴"Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don't get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes."

We have a "For Rent" sign in the lawn and on Monday the listing will hit the internet. We already had a showing and they claim to want to the house. They have the application so we will see if they turn into possible renters. That would truly amazing as the sign only went in the yard on Wednesday.

There dear Angela is our news.

Rhode Island

2011-04-27T11:51:00.011-04:00

We just got back this weekend from another family adventure. I'll have to post it in pieces as we saw a lot. I had never really been to New England so when Ben found out he had a two week class in Rhode Island, I hopped at the opportunity of going with him. He was busy with his class but at least we got to see him at night and on the weekend. It is less than three months now until he deploys again so we are trying to soak up every family moment we can.

It was a great two weeks although I must confess I was slightly worried after our first full day. We were all in one small hotel room and the weather was still quite wintery. The first day we woke up to a dense fog that stayed all day and it didn't get above 45 degrees. I went to the local tourist information place and had this conversation.

me - excuse me we are visiting the area for two weeks and wanted to know what do you have in the area for kids? (at this point I am waiting with my pen poised for a list kid friendly places and events.)

man - nothing. wait let me think about it.... yeah we don't really have anything.

another local listening in says - yeah in the summer there is the beach but there really isn't anything.

We walked back out in the freezing fog and Nati starts to fuss about how cold it is and I saw two longs weeks looming ahead of me. But once I found the local library and YMCA we were set for a good time in Rhode Island. The boys were fine outside as long as we were at the beach or playground. If we were site seeing they suddenly became cold and teary:). I really enjoyed the area and could see myself living there for a year. The winters and late spring would not let me stay too long:). It did remind me of England so I think New England is a great name for it.

The boys had fun too but we were all thrilled to arrive home to 80 degrees and full spring with leaves on all the trees and long grass. (Side note here, I thought we should fertilize before we left so I put fertilizer on the lawn the morning we drove away. It worked!! It worked so well our lawn was out of control when we got back. We actually got a city notice to not be white trash. Ok.. they didn't say that but that is what they were implying. We were threatened with $1000 fine or 6 months in jail. This made both Ben and I laugh as we tried to imagine being in jail and telling someone we were in there for not mowing our lawn. )

This is from Cliff Walk. It is this cool walk that goes in front of a bunch of the local mansions.

We found this hat and it cracks us up so I found myself taking too many pictures of it.
Ok, so the boys weren't the only ones who were cold. If I had more clothes and I would have put them on.

Stopping to jump off the wall and play in the sand.
Nati found all the changes of the last month a bit much and has started this habit of just crying and repeating things over and over if he is upset. These tantrums can last up to 20 minutes and start for no reason. He might get bumped, he might not want to do something, he might not be able to put a piece of lego together..... Even if we tell he doesn't have to do it he will continue to cry and cry and cry. So of course I had to capture it on camera.

Ben trying to reason with Nati during tantrum number 747734747932845938495 of the day. We ended up coming up with a plan that if he could choose to use his words and not have ANY tantrums for a whole day he could have dessert that night at dinner. This was a life saver for making our trip fun. I am actually glad this all came out on our two week trip. It showed me that I have lots or preparation to do to make sure Nati finds our transition to California less stressful. He is normally a bundle of fun so I think this showed me clearly that our youngest does not like change very much. Armed with this knowledge we can make sure we do all we can to help keep things stable for him.

On the weekend we took the boys bikes to a fort that is now a state park. This was the best weather we had up there. It was beautiful. And bringing the bikes to Rhode Island was BRILLIANT. Ben is just a genius sometimes.

He was actually really sick here but still had a great time.
Silly faces
He can walk on clouds.

After we had done a bunch of jumping pictures Yared kept thinking he had to jump every time I pointed the camera at him:).
Very cool bridge.
Town of Newport

Another tantrum. This one because I bumped his leg with his bike. After 10 minutes of hugging and saying sorry he was still crying. When asked why, "Me not know." So he got left to admire the fort wall while we walked on for a bit. He was welcome to join us, he just didn't want to.
At the local library Yared got to read a book to a dog named Yogi.
Some buildings in Newport.

The base up there is beautiful so on the way out of town as we crossed the cool bridge I stuck my head out the sunroof and caught a few shots of it and the light house in the middle of the water.

In the last month we have driven through NC, SC, GA, FL, VA, DE, MD, NY, RI, MA, CT, and PA. These sweet boys have been amazing and spend many an hour like this:). Soon they will hit an even longer road trip as we take two cars, two kids, two cats across the whole United States in under a week.... ahhhhhhhhhh... just think of the blog stories will I have for you then:).

Southern Hospitality?

2011-04-15T14:15:00.002-04:00

One thing I have found to be true living in the south or on the border of the south is the people are very friendly. I kind of take their hospitality for granted and have come to expect it. However this is an introduction to 24 hours of the worst behavior I have experienced in a long time.

On our trip to Florida this month, we booked a hotel in the small town of Yemasee SC. It was a random pick but we were able to use some bonus hotel points so we didn't question it. This was the first day or our trip and we had been in the car for 7 hours when we checked in. The hotel was great. The staff were friendly and spoiled the boys. But everything started to go down hill when we stopped by the front desk and asked where we should go for dinner. We hadn't really noticed that this "town" was not a really a town. It was basically 4 hotels, 2 restaurants, 3 fast food places and a gas station. The manager of our hotel wrinkled her nose at our question and said, "I guess the Waffle House would be your best bet, but just order eggs." She suggested we drive another 30 minutes and go to a bigger town. There was no way we could load two boys back up for this so we braved Yemasse's food gauntlet.

Ben was for Waffle House and I was for Denny's. He hates Denny's and I hate Waffle House. Being the kind husband he is, he caved and let me take the family to Denny's. We were seated promptly as the restaurant wasn't very full. We sat the boys down and picked out our meals. We colored every possible piece of the kid's menu. We sat there for at least 10 minutes with no one greeting us, offering drinks or saying they would be right with us. Then I watched a group of kids get seated nearby. I was getting grumpy now as I knew Nati would not last that long and he was now shredding his kid's menu. Then after another 5 minutes I saw a waitress go take the orders from the kids. We were trying to flag her down when the manager seated a new person near us and took his drink order. Now normally Ben would be the one to get worked up about this. But after waiting so long and knowing the kids were going to go crazy before food came, I made the whole family leave. Nati started screaming as he thought we weren't going to let him eat. Ben couldn't quite believe I was stomping out of a restaurant carrying a distraught 3 year old and saying in passing to the manager, "We've been here 15 minutes and you were taking everyone's order but ours."

We walked outside and I felt a bit sheepish now but what could we do. We looked around at our bleak options for food and voted on Subway. This was a Subway that is part of a small store. No one was at the counter and so Ben yells out "Hello anyone there?" No one answers so we are about to walk away when a girl walks out and just stands there. She makes no eye contact. You can tell she is mad as all get out. She doesn't greet or welcome or ask us what we want to eat. She stands there glaring at the ground and smacking her gum. Ben tries to be courteous and starts ordering. She slams around putting the sandwiches together. The Junior High teacher in me is intrigued to see if she will make eye contact. She was acting like she was 13. I watched her the entire time and she never once looked at us or the boys. Finally another worker comes and rings us up and is friendly and polite. The first girl continued to glare, smack her gum and in general look furious with life. Ben and I were almost laughing before we left the store. I had never seen such outright contempt before from a person in customer service.

We laughed with the hotel manager about her remarks on the food in the area. She listened to our story and told us to call ahead next time and she would have her Mama make us some real southern cooking. Now that is more what I expected in the south.

Ben and I laughed at me being the one to walk out of a restaurant and the one to be staring down the glaring waitress. It was such a role reversal. I realized it was because they were messing with my boys. The boys were hungry and we were trying to feed them and these people were not helping me out:).

The next day we stopped for lunch at Cracker Barrel. I love this place. We were waiting to put our names on the list and a woman walks up behind me. She asks, "Are you waiting to put your name on the wait list?" I say, "Yes, but this group is in my way so when they are out of the way I'll go up." She thinks about this for a minute then shoves by me and the group who just at that moment started moving. She says her name to the hostess. I am so surprised it takes me a second. Then I say to both the hostess and the rude Southern Woman. "Excuse me but we were here first and you knew that." She looks at me and says, "Yeah but there are four of you two of us so it doesn't matter anyways." and she stomps off. I tell the hostess she should change the order but the poor girl isn't sure what to do. Well the greedy pushy woman and her husband do get seated before us AND they are sitting at a table set for four very near us. Ben sees me getting all riled up again and starts laughing. Once again the kids were waiting longer than they needed to be because of rudeness. When the woman was eating and we were still waiting I almost walked up to her and said something. I spent much of my meal sending her dirty looks. This is not like me but I was so astounded by these three encounters with rudeness that I was losing my own good nature. I asked Ben why he wasn't doing anything and he said he didn't need to get worked up as I was doing it for him. He decided he liked the roll reversal. I did not and have firmly decided to let him be the confrontational one from now on. I think he is more intimidating than me anyways:).

The rest of our trip we met with the Southern Hospitality we have come to know and love.

Disney World

2011-04-08T09:01:00.014-04:00

Wow Disney World was GREAT GREAT GREAT. I had thought it would be fun but I was prepared for melt downs, tears, heat, crowds, and exhausted little ones. Once again the boys surprised us with their amazing behavior. It was so much more fun than I thought it would be, which is saying a lot as I had high expectations. I loved watching the joy and imagination of the boys as they walked in this crazy wonder world. Doing this with Ben is just extra fun as he has all the energy to keep going and going. He loved the rides, shows and 3D movies as much as the kids. I could go on and on but I will leave you with a small batch of pictures(ha.. this really is just a sampling of our pictures, but we decided to spare you the 543:). Disney could have made money from filming Yared and his reactions. He walked into Magic Kingdom on day one and saw the castle. He then proceeded to jump and scream. "The castle, the REAL castle. Mickey's Castle!!!" He had quite a few people staring, smiling and laughing.

Day One Magic Kingdom

Taken within minutes of entering the park.

Our first ride, Dumbo. I remember this one from when I went as a kid. Nati loved it.

This was a highlight and a terror fest for Nati. He LOVES Buzz but the giant life size person made him shake in fear. I'll post the video of this meeting next post. It is hilarious.

First of three 3D movies. They are amazing. Yared spends half the time reaching out for the things that look like they are right in front of him.
Rest on Tom Sawyer Island. By now the park was PACKED and Mom was ready for a break:).
Watching Mickey Mouse show. This was the first time they actually saw Mickey in person. But they quickly became huge fans and would scream and wave like banshees when they saw him through out the rest of the time.

Waiting for the parade to start.
Ben's artistic shot of Nati' waving.

Day Two - Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios.

I was really impressed with the beauty of this park.

The boys meeting Pluto. He and Marry Poppins were the only characters that Nati showed no fear of.
Meeting Mickey in person. I thought the boys would wet their pants.
We also did Hollywood Studios on Day two. A rain storm started and cleared out the park. Here we are waiting to meet Buzz and Woody again. They have these brilliant photo ops while you wait. When I went to Disney as a kid the characters just walked around and you might get to see some. Now they have character stations and you wait FOREVER to meet them. We did this three times and then stopped. We ran into one lady from England who had spent 6 hours one day waiting to meet three princesses. Arrrgggghhh

Nati backed out of the photo shoot at the end but he was still thrilled to see them from the safety of Mommy's arms.
Cool backdrop where we told the boys to act scared and got these silly faces.

Day three Downtown Disney

CRAZY thunder and lighting storms with tornado warnings so we went to Downtown Disney instead of a park. Yared had Birthday money to spend. He insisted on giving $10 of it to Nati and they both came out with a toy to play with at the hotel.

Day Four - April 1 Yared's Big day so back to Magic Kingdom.

It was the day with the most perfect weather and honestly it was a wonderful day. We started by getting to Magic Kingdom before the park opened and watched Mickey and friends officially open the gates. Here the boys are enthralled with the magic and drama.

We had taken everyone's advice and booked a character breakfast for his Birthday. This is where you get a buffet breakfast and characters come around while you eat. We chose a brunch with Mary Poppins, Tigger, Pooh, Mad Hatter and Alice in Wonderland. Here we are catching the boat to his breakfast.

Tigger won Nati over by attacking Daddy in a giant hug and from then on we heard, "Igger is funny. He hug Daddy." Yared loved all the characters and would jump into their arms.

Birthday boy admiring his Birthday cupcake.
They both loved her.
We stayed at a hotel with a kitchen so I was able to make this cake for Yared the night before. He was so excited that it looked like the Disney Castle.
Birthday Pizza on our porch after a nice long swim in the our hotel pools. Three pools and three hot tubs:). Yeah baby.

Then we loaded the boys back in the van to go back to the park and watch the Light Parade. It was well worth it.

Day Five Epcot

The day we were supposed to drive home but stayed on as we had missed one day with the rain. We went to Epcot and it was really relaxing with some great rides for Ben and Yared to enjoy.

He caught on to the map idea about 10 minutes before we left on our last day:).
We took this as a joke as we left the park. I was actually less tired than I thought I would be.
Great times. Great memories.

Family Day - Going Green

2011-03-20T14:14:00.006-04:00

Last Saturday we celebrated Family Night number 5. As we had spent the morning celebrating St. Patrick's Day with a parade going down our street, it made sense to keep the green coming with a Family Night - Going Green/St. Paddy's Day theme.

We had left over hats and beads from the parade to use for decorations. We started the night by having everyone dress in green and I made a green meal. I am not fond of corned beef and hash so we went with our new favorite Peanut Ginger Chicken Wraps, but I went and got us green tortillas to wrap them up. We also had peas and broccoli to make sure our plates were completely green. Believe it or not our boys like vegetables so this is not a punishment to have these as part of Family Night. We also let them have green soda. While I cooked, Ben and the boys decorated their green place-mats. I was rather impressed with Ben's Leprechaun.

The Green Meal!

Yared's Green Meal

Nati with a green burrito almost as big as himself. He didn't finish it:).

Mom with her manic new pose. I don't try to do this look, it comes out naturally so if you want to achieve it, I have no helpful tips. Wait I do have one thing that helped contribute to my manicness. I got something in my eye in the afternoon and my eye was streaming tears most of the day and all of our Family Night. In fact Ben sent me to bed at 9 and I didn't get up until 8:30 the next day as I was so exhausted from it. SO if you really want to look wild in your next modeling shoot, poke something in your eye.

We then played find the shamrocks. Ben and I hid them all over the downstairs and the boys raced to see who could find the most. Nati would have won if we hadn't evened things out by helping Yared. Nati is definitely the most observant of the two. Yared is the empathetic, see every emotion people are experiencing one and Nati is the notice every detail in a room sort of person.

(No picture of this event as we were trying to make the race be somewhat even to avoid tears from either boy.)

We also played a coin toss game to see who could get the most coins in the hats. See Family Night can be as simple as that.

Then we finished by making Leprechaun ice-cream men. I made chocolate meringue beards for bowls. Then we put a scoop of mint ice-cream. We made paper top hats for them and put faces on with mini M&Ms.

Me with my red eyes posing with my Leprechaun.

Ben helping Nati finish his.
Ben's creativity had run out by now so he put one M&M on and said his was a cyclops Leprechaun.

Then we put two very tired, happy and sticky little boys to bed. It had been a great day with a parade, a walk through our local Botanical Gardens and then Family Night.

St. Patrick's Day

2011-03-17T09:08:00.005-04:00

I have never really celebrated St. Patrick's Day as I am English not Irish but... there is a parade that goes right down the street we live on. I mean, I did the wearing green thing but that was it. Well this parade is a huge hit with those who live in our part of town so you kind of get caught up in the excitement of the day. As it is our last year at this house we invited a bunch of friends to come join us for brunch and then the parade. It was the best weather for it we have had in the four years we have been here and the kids loaded up on candy so it was a great day.

Our friend with her kid's candy stash.

Look what I scored Mom!!
All the kids calmly sitting and watching the parade before they realized that if they..

Jumped up and down they would get candy and beads. I had to tell Yared three times to leave the jello-shots that were being thrown alone.

My good friend Aya joined us last year and this year. Aya is from Japan and this has been a crazy time for her. Please pray for peace for my friend and for her family still in Japan.

It was a fun way to celebrate St. Patrick's Day.. which I TOTALLY forgot about on the real day:)!! See I told you I wasn't Irish.

A few good recipes.

2011-03-15T19:53:00.004-04:00

I did finish my February challenge but I just stopped posting the stuff:). I went to Cooking Light and did a few of their best ever recipes and they are well worth the name. I wanted to make sure these share these with you. The funny part of this whole thing, is that I did this to get some new ideas for dinner. What happened was I discovered the joy of cooking again. I now enjoy planning ahead and having a great meal planned. I like trying new recipes and have continued to do so even though we are well into March. I will try to post my favorites with you.

But here are a few that I liked from Cooking Light.

Chicken Biriyani

This is an indian rice dish that is amazing and makes you feel so good about your own cooking skills. The first time I did not have saffron so I used a tiny bit of tumeric to make my rice yellow and it was amazing even this way. I did this again and didn't follow the recipe quite as closely and it wasn't quite as good. But the whole family loved this and gave it a three out of three. Your house will smell amazing. Click on the link above and don't look back.. yummy, quick and so unique.

Tomato-Basil Lasagna with Prosciutto

I love a good lasagna but always feel guilty as they are so full of calories. This lighter version is really yummy and lets you eat without the calorie guilt sitting on your shoulder. We gave this a 2.75. I made my own tomato-basil sauce as I rarely buy that stuff. I also used the lasagna noodles that didn't need pre-cooking. That is the one thing I would do differently. I think it made it drier than it should have been. Otherwise very yummy. Not too much work but not something for a quick dinner.

Ginger Peanut Chicken Salad Wraps

This was the family favorite for the February challenge. It is super super easy to do. You won't believe how easy. The picture above is misleading as I didn't end up capturing our favorite meal but this one looked a lot like it and my little men are it in so... It does show my attempt at home made naan. Something I vow to perfect as I love the stuff and this recipe had the right flavor I just need to work on the flattening technique.

Back to the recipe. It is amazing. I left out the red pepper as we don' t like peppers in our family. Well we LOVE the spicy ones but not bell peppers. I had super fresh tortillas and this meal was literally licked clean. No one had any left and we were all looking around for more. This is the recipe I would say ALL of you should try.

This is our last New February baking recipe. It really isn't a new recipe as the cupcakes are from a box. BUT.. this is a new decoration. There is a LONG story behind it. Last summer I got accosted in our local grocery store parking lot by some charming college kid selling magazines. He conned me into buying a year's subscription to Family Fun. After I coughed up the money to buy the unwanted magazine and support this young man's college dreams, I never got the magazine. Finally three months later a magazine called Outside started coming to our door. This magazine is actually really interesting but is as polar opposite as you can get from Family Fun. It is all about extreme sports, death defying adventures and luxurious vacation ideas. All the stuff you will never do with a 3 and a 5 year old. Reading it is exciting but makes you feel a little old and dull. Anyways, I had a good chuckle that this college kid had misread my true self and sent me the magazine he thought I should be getting. Then low and behold 8 months after paying for Family Fun it does finally arrive at my door. It is the sort of magazine you read in 10 minutes and grab two ideas from. That is where I got this awesome fish idea. I made it for Yared and Nati's little friend's 4th Birthday. So now I get two magazines, one for the empty nest years of my life (I am going to follow in my parent's footsteps and become more adventurous with age) and one for the years I have with my wee men.

And that is that for my February meal challenge. Stay tuned for new recipes as I find them as I am on a quest for delicious, easy, healthy meals.