Derek's Birthday

So it was Derek's birthday on Monday- the man is back to a youthful three syllables at twenty-eight years old. He was king of the world for a day- even though he was studying for a test Tuesday morning. He picked his meals for the day: German pancakes with apple pie filling for breakfast, banana bread and smoothies for lunch (I learned that it's highly advisable to use the black bananas. Otherwise... it's just weird. It turned out white and a little mushy and way too banana-flavored. 'Course, I think I may not have cooked it quite long enough. But still.), and "spider pizza" for dinner. (This one turned out even better than the one pictured, but since I didn't take a picture this time, this is what you get.) Then of course, the usual as far as cakes go: Dark Chocolate with chocolate pudding "frosting".

Well, ok, maybe picking your meals for the day doesn't really make you king for a day. But I did give him extra back and head scratches (he's a very itchy guy) and back rubs. As for gifts, it was somewhat anti-climactic. Thanks to my dad and Ethan and Amiee (youngest siblings), he got a little pre-birthday something (a cd about Joseph Smith by Truman Madsen and some delicious snacks. He also hoardes snacks.). Thanks to Zan he got a weird rose card- which he then opened to read, "Ok, honestly, who cares what the card looks like? Just take your cash and be glad I remembered." He loved it.

So what did I get him? Well, first of all, we gave him a bag of fun-sized Snickers, some dark chocolate Cadbury bars and some other gourmet dark chocolate squares. Then I followed this up with a world map. Which begs a background story. We once had a world map. A lovely world map. It was mounted on this styrofoam-type mounting stuff (yeah, no idea what, can you tell?) and it was wonderful. Well, last year I started playing around with antiquing altered books and other things and thought it would be a good idea to try that on the map. Well, shoe polish did NOT work on this stuff. I ruined probably a good quarter of the map with it. About a month ago I started trying to mask the damage and used a stain- which worked perfectly on everything I hadn't already ruined, but did nothing for the damaged portion. So it's already ruined. What can it hurt? I took a match to the corner.

Well, I guess it looks... alright. But mostly weird. Not like a cool display piece. More like a weird burnt map that would need explaining anytime anyone looked at it. So I got him a new one. Frankly, I like this one better anyway.

Finally, I got him a new Lord of the Rings sword. He already has Anduril, the sword of Aragorn, which he reforged from the shards of Narsil; as well as the sword of the Witchking. I got him Herugrim, the sword of King Theodrin. Unfortunately, the sword didn't arrive until today, so it missed the actual birthday. In any case, he opened his package today and loved the sword. Here he is, weilding his new toy:

Meanwhile... what do you think was happening to the packing peanuts?







They had a ball. And then we spent at least 1 1/2 hours cleaning up the mess. It was atrocious. But I did figure out that you can eliminate the annoying static cling by spraying them with water. Amazing.

Beauty and the Beast

Avril and I were singing the opening song of Beauty and the Beast this morning. We're both looking kind of ratty, I'm in my robe, major bedhead, no shower, my glasses, no makeup.

In the middle of the song Avril, "Mommy, you look kind of like the Beast!"

Quips

"Mommy, now I'm a child of God!"

Yes, because a blanket on your head is the qualifying factor.

"Because I wanted a little house for myself."

"The puppies want some spaghetti."
(Actually, they didn't.)

"When Santa Clauses give people presents, they get to have mermaids."

I don't know either.

Quips Continued

Avril with her little Ariel doll: "Mommy, Mommy, Ariel's running to you!"

Me: "Oh no! Is she scared or is she excited?"

Avril: "She's, um, she's scared."

Me: "What is she scared of?"

Avril: "She's scared of a thing that's scary!"

Christmas Break Part 1: The Trip Over

***WARNING: This post includes pictures of gross doggy vomit!***

So. The Break.

Well, suffice it to say it was an adventure. We opted to drive halfway across the country, 24 hours straight through. With two children, ages 1 and 3. With two black lab mix puppies, age 6 months.

Thanks to my dear friend Alana, the girls were relatively well-behaved and enjoyable: she lent us their portable DVD player for the trip. 17 viewings of the Little Mermaid later, we arrived at our destination.

Oh, wait. How could I forget to mention? The puppies... yeah, those little mutts... yes, we love them, yes, they are a part of our family, but honestly! We were this close to leaving them to explore in the wilds of Nebraska. Just as a warning, I will mention here that there are some rather disgusting pictures that I can't help but include in this. So if you've a weak stomach, you may want to discontinue reading... or at least close your eyes when you get close.

Why, you ask?

Well, it seems that about 30 minutes into our trip, I heard their telltale pre-barfing noise. I mentioned this to Derek, at which point he started making fun of me for thinking they had a barfing noise, and that I knew what it was. Then Something started to smell... we still weren't sure what exactly had happened (and by "we", I mean Derek) and I looked back there and Corporal was licking off his blanket. I told him what I thought happened.

"Corporal's eating his barf."

"Yeah, right, he's just chewing on the blanket."

"No, seriously, I'm positive he just vomited and is now eating it."

"Shut up-- how sure?"

"Honestly, I'm 99.9% sure that's exactly what happened."

Next gas station, we got out and upon closer inspection discovered that, (surprise!) I was right.
In any case, at least the little monster had the decency to do his thing in the corner and then clean up after himself. Kitty was less thoughtful.
Not 15 minutes down the road, we looked at each other in horror as the pungent scent filled our cramped car. We immediately found a gas station and pulled over.

This is the worst part. Well, first the funny part, then the worst.

We went to the back of the car to check the damage. We opened the back of the car and this is what greeted us:


Yes, that's Corporal's head covered in dog barf. Kitty was completely clean. They both looked up at us like, "Hey guys! What's up?"

So naturally, we let them out to see what the damage was inside. Once out, Corporal of course needed to clean himself off, so he shook. Chunks went flying everywhere- on our car, the car behind us... even on Derek. It really was a good thing it was such a funny sight, because I think Derek would have just driven away at that point otherwise. Fortunately for the pups, he was still laughing.

After he shook himself off, Derek grabbed a windshield squeegee (gross, I know) and squeegee-ed him off. The poor little monster was shivering something fierce, but he was happy to be clean.

Unfortunately for us, Corporal wasn't the only target. Kitty (and possibly Corporal had thrown up through the back of the kennel. So the blanket they were on was covered (and now in the dump). There was so much vomit, that Derek had to fork it onto a plate:


After that fiasco, they really didn't have much left to throw up, so there was just a little dry heaving- which is, of course, disgusting enough on its own- they had nasty, smelly mucous dripping from their mouths. And that was just 300 miles into our 1600 mile voyage.

As it happened, the rest of the trip went rather uneventfully. We drove safely and averted the predicted storm (which we would have hit should we have broken our trip into two days), arriving in time for the, what is it now, fifth? annual Derek and Adam Zickgraf Christmas Party?

To be continued...

Thanksgiving Celebrations

Thanksgiving this year was fun. You've already read up to Tuesday before T-giving, so continuing on...

My cousin opted to come out to visit up in our little podunk 'Ville because she wanted a low-key, quiet Thanksgiving break to study for a business test she had coming up. So that's what she got. We kept it low-key. So low-key I can't really remember what we did besides a couple of movies and Thanksgiving dinner. We also, of course, were sure to hit up Pancake City for their amazing pancakes and both opted for the same pancakes as last time- Georgia Peach for me Cinnamon Apple for Camas. Mouthwatering.

Anyway, so actual T-giving was really cool. I'm really proud of my table display, which was also inspired by Melody.

I think I did a good job glossing them over with Picasa, too. I bought a 5 lb. turkey breast and we cooked that instead of a full bird. We had honey cornbread, delicious mashed potatoes and gravy, yams and apples (which I've decided for good that I really honestly just don't like), this amazing chutney that Camas brought with her for us, nutritious salad, Passion Punch and our famous and absolutely amazing crumble top apple pie.

The secret is in the preparation of the apples and in the crumble topping. For the apples, it's very straightforward but takes a while. Just use a potato peeler to peel down 4-5 large apples and follow whatever recipe you have. I'm too lazy to post the one I have. Unless I get requests. It's just the consistency of those apples is amazing. And my favorite apples- Rome- weren't available this year, so we used something else, I can't even remember what. It might have been honeycrisp, but I could just be thinking of Katherine's blog on those.

Friday was also low-key. We made sure to watch The Office and Seinfeld. That's our classic hang-out mix: funny movies/shows and cooking. That's our special time together.

Love you Camas! Even though I know you won't read this because "who has time to read blogs?!"

And then Saturday came much too soon and I dropped my favorite relative off at the airport. Until next time...