Last night I took a shower before I went to bed. This made my morning fantastic. I wasn't faced with the age old dilemma of letting the baby whimper (or letting the 4 year old harass her) while I took a shower or just skip the shower again. I think this shower at night thing is getting added to my bedtime routine.
Day 9 included:
- Up and at 'em by 8:30am. We were all dressed and fed by 9am.
- Dishwasher emptied
- Laundry rebooted
- Calendar checked
- Today's dinner plan reviewed, revised and implemented (more below)
- Homeschool group attended
- Lunch, nap for Miss A, quiet time for Junior
- Cupcakes made and frosted while Miss A slept
- Laundry folded and put away, then rebooted 2x during Miss A's nap
- Kitchen tidied up
- Worked on event planning for about 1.5 hours - significant progress made!
- Got out winter/different sized pants for Mr. Amen to try on to take on his big Asia trip
- Dinner with parents
- Bath for Junior
- My bedtime routine completed (dishwasher, calendar, menu plan review, reboot laundry)
UPDATE: When my parents got here they told us that they aren't going. My mom was pretty ticked off because apparently everyone else knew before they did that they weren't going. Yup, suck on that logic for a moment. I guess my sister was supposed to buy their tickets, but hadn't done so yet (typical...she usually waits until the day before or the day of to buy airplane tickets). Well, I guess my sister has some clients coming into Washington D.C. to meet see her and she is leaving Alaska and heading to Washington D.C. for a few days. So she called my parents this afternoon and said she was too busy to have them come visit. They could come some other time, maybe in November. When Mr. Amen got home from work, my parents were here for dinner already and I was out picking up pizza with the kids. My mom said, "we aren't going to Alaska" to Mr. Amen as he was unloading all his work crap from his car in the garage. He mis-heard her as saying "we are going to Alaska" and he answered, "I know." My mom asked him how he knew and he said, "Dad told me." So because of that my mom was angry with me when I got home because I knew before she even knew that she wasn't going on this trip. Which was not even the case. I love getting in trouble for not doing anything at all.
Which led to making the cupcakes this afternoon. My dad like devil's food cake with buttercream frosting. Not just any regular buttercream frosting though, he likes the recipe that his grandmother used to make for him every year on his birthday when he was a child. This recipe is not, 2 sticks of butter creamed with some powered sugar and vanilla. This recipe takes time, and patience. Now, patience is something my darling mother does not posess, so after his grandmother passed, my sweet dad went many years without this frosting. His mom had the recipe, but lived in San Diego and never visited us in October. Since I am the baker in the family, the recipe was inherited by moi! So I am the designated birthday cake maker for my dad.
I'm not gonna lie. The frosting is a lot of work. But I think my dad is worth it. He is the most incredible example of a husband and father. We would be lost without him. But this frosting. Ugh, sometimes I just can't. And with the kids running around, it really needs to be done with them not running around. It involves simmering water in order to ensure the granulated sugar dissolves properly so the frosting isn't gritty. Once when I made it, the mixer bumped my hand as I was adding the simmering water, causing the water to splash ever so slightly onto my hand, causing me to jump like a crazy person, causing me to splash 1/8 cup of simmering water onto my face, causing a minor burn, a scab, but thankfully no scar.
So no great-grandma's buttercream today. Just regular buttercream will have to do. When we get the whole family together upon their return, I'll do the real deal and show you pictures.
Also, did you happen to notice that I slipped into list, ever so innocently, that we attended the homeschool group today at our parish? Junior loved it! He made friends with 3 other little boys about his age and he introduced himself to one of the older boys (a teenager - the son of a friend of mine from church) and asked him if he would show him how to play basketball. It was the sweetest. Not just because my darling 4 year old worked up the courage to introduce himself to an older kid and ask him to play with him, but because this boy actually took the time to play with my son. He was very patient showing him how to dribble the ball, showing him how to position his hands to shoot the ball, and even lifting him over and over as my son tried to throw the ball through the hoop. Junior even succeeded twice! He was thrilled and so was I.
If days like this keep up, good habits will live forever around this house!
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