Wordless Wednesday

Eastern Point Beach

It was our first trip to the beach since moving to Connecticut. I feel bad for any beach I visit since I've lived in Hawaii and have seen some of the most beautiful beaches this earth has. Although this beach wasn't as baby blue, it was nice because it was calm. The seaweed was everywhere and the ocean was cold. It took me at least 4 dips in the ocean before I finally decided to dunk myself in (it didn't happen again after that). Lil C loved the sand and even got buried. I finally got a beach chair and LOVED it!!! I enjoyed tanning (with my sunscreen on of course). We packed a lunch and it was an overall great day! I just love the warm sun. It's too bad that we're back down into the low 60's again. I'm really hoping Connecticut decides it's almost summer.

Lil C buried in the sand. Don't worry, even tho his face looks like he didn't like it, he LOVED it!

Catching hermit crabs (yes, we put them back)
Bucket of hermit crabs
Me and my new beach hat. Diva alert! just kidding. Farthest thing from a diva.
Eastern Point Beach

A day at the pool

Today was so beautifully and warm. I couldn't wait to get out to the pool for the very first time this year. Lil C did had forgotten how to use his arm floaties so it took him a bit to get used to but by the end of the time we were there he had been floating around the pool like a pro!!!! I got to work on getting a little sun and just relaxed for the most part. Which most mommies do not get to do during the day. We ended up staying for three hours and that's just because we had to pick up the older two from school. I really can't wait for summer vacation to begin. This school year has just dragged by and then of course all the snow days they've had to make up for. The price you pay for living in Connecticut. We then headed out to my husbands softball game. He hasn't been able to play since he tore his hamstrings a few weeks ago. Actually he tweaked it his first time up to bat. I could tell in his run. I keep telling him that he's no young guy anymore but he refuses to listen (but I love that about him). Tomorrow we're heading to our first beach in Connecticut so I'm sure I'll be blogging about that tomorrow. I got my huge beach hat to take, I've been wanting one for a few weeks. I'll be sure to post a picture with that as well. A heat wave is happening tomorrow. They are shutting some schools down, surprisingly not ours since they have no air conditioners at my children's school.

I love watching my husband play softball.

Lil C at the pool (yes, he's wearing two different floaties, One went flat and I had another pair!)

Lil C and his partners in crime.

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Peter Pack T-shirts!!

So I ended up making t-shirts for the family. I thought it was an awesome idea! All of us with our royal blue matching t-shirts. On the front I ironed on the letters to spell Peter Pack and on the back with our nicknames, i.e. Dad, Mom, Hannie, B, Little C. I love it. I know I got a little flack from some parents asking why I would make these or why they would be worn. I thought they could be worn for special FUN occasions. Going to an amusement park, camping, ball games, reunions, ect. My kids are still young enough to enjoy the fun out of matching with the family. I love our family nick name. We are the Pack!! The Peter Pack. Not to mention my husband is the biggest Packers fan EVER! The only thing was I was not wearing that awful color green. haha.

Kids Karnival

A few weeks ago our local town had a Kids Karnival. The kids had a blast because they got to enjoy the rides over and over and over again. I couldn't wait to have some fried dough. Mmm Mmm. It was delicious. Snow cones, face painting, games and a beautiful day!! We hadn't had a warm day like that yet since last summer. I even ended up getting sunburn. Oops!

Hannie had her face painted. Beautiful!

Little C as Spiderman
B as Batman
Little C and his friend J were fighting over who could hold the gate. haha 3 year olds.
Little C and J having a blast on this beautiful day
Ryan and B on the ferris wheel
Little C enjoying his first ride

The boys flying the dragon
Hannie and Ryan going on the 1,001 nights for the 1,001 time.

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Fried Chicken & Friends

I am the type of person who makes fried chicken about once every five years. One, because it's not that good for you. Two, because it's time consuming to make. Three, because it's messy!!! I decided to try out a new recipe. The chicken is soaked in buttermilk for at least an hour. I had a good friend of mine over, another navy wife. Her husband is gone and being that my husband is on shore duty I always try to remember those boring days when your husband is gone and you don't have much going on. I was always far away from family and I know how lonely that can get. So we had her and her kids over and I decided to try out this fried chicken recipe. Yes, it was time consuming. The chicken takes about 20 minutes in the fry daddy. It wasn't quite as messy because you put your flour and spices in a big bag (don't know why I never thought of that one before). I loved using the buttermilk. It really helped bread the chicken! It was good but oh so bad for you! I know. I also made a yummy cole slaw (I LOVE COLE SLAW!!)! Another great recipe that I will share as well. It turned out really well and I have tried so many cole slaw recipes. I'm so stuffed now. Oh and of course some yummy cupcakes! I really love the funfetti cake mix. It's the only one I really buy anymore. Anyways, here is the chicken and cole slaw recipe. Oh and I did not make the gravy part of the chicken recipe.

Fried Chicken

Cole Slaw

Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?

We got this game in the mail from my father and his wife. My children love board games so of course we decided to try it out after dinner tonight. I can't even explain how smart my 1st grader is. He really surprises me. He knew the answer to "Who was the first major league baseball player to break the color barrier"? I told him if you don't know the answer just write any name down. Then my husband says "Jackie Robinson". B jumped up and down screaming and I had no idea why he was so excited. I looked at his paper and with the letter J backwards he had wrote Jaici Rodinson. I asked him how he even knew the answer and he said from a learning game he plays online. I was surprised. I had wrote something Jackson (I knew it was something close to that). Anyways, I ended up winning the game but we all really won because spending that quality time together at the table was amazing!!!! Even though my three year old doesn't know how to play he sat with us and drew pictures and to my amazement he drew a person. I had no idea he could draw anything other than lines all over a paper. Here is his picture that I will keep forever!!

Dinner Menu

If you're anything like my family, you must have a dinner menu. I do mine for 2 weeks at a time. Not only does it help me by having everything organized, bought and planned for but it also helps my children. I have one picky child and while I don't cater to his pickiness, it helps him prepare himself for a so so dinner night or an awesome dinner night! It takes me about 2 hours to put a menu and list together for the grocery store but from there I am set for two weeks with the exception of bread or milk. Tonight we are having Japanese curry chicken. It looks much like this but sometimes I leave out carrots and potatoes. Just depends how I'm feeling. Anyways, here is a sample of my dinner menu till the 15th of June.

Thursday, June 2 - Japanese curry and rice

Friday, June 3 - Meatloaf, green beans and mashed potatoes

Saturday, June 4 - Cheeseburgers and Hot Dogs on the grill

Sunday, June 5 - Breakfast (one of my fav nights) Pancakes, eggs, bacon, hashbrowns

Monday, June - Meatball grinders, fries

Tuesday, June 7 - Chicken Adobo and lumpia

Wednesday, June 8 - Fried Chicken (this isn't usually on my list but once a year, it's such a pain to clean up and prepare), corn on the cob, mashed potatoes

Thursday, June 9 - Stuffed green peppers

Friday, June 10 - Chicken Tacos, beans, Spanish rice

Saturday, June 11 - Crescent chicken, broccoli and potatoes

Sunday, June 12 - Baked honey mustard chicken (a new one I'm going to try), rice, green beans

Monday, June 13 - Spaghetti, salad, bread

Tuesday, June 14 - Grilled salmon, rice, carrots

Wednesday, June 15 - Homemade pizza

Bingo!!

When I first moved here I was introduced to bingo. I thought it's a night away from the kids to have some adult time so why not. I had no idea how much I would love that 4 hours to myself. Not to hear if someone needs anything or to referee a fight. For some reason I find bingo completely relaxing. I even love to daub!! My favorite color dauber is my red one. My friends and I go about once a month. I have yet to win but I still feel like I'm "winning" just getting out of the house and away from the mommy duties. Don't get me wrong now. I love my children so much but it's amazing how much more you love them after getting a few adult moments to yourself. Right? Anyone? We went tonight and I am always amazed at the people at bingo. The bingo trolls really make me chuckle. I remember those troll dolls from when I was a kid. I wonder how the trolls and bingo became connected (I will be sure to research it). I have seen a few people (hint hint) go around their chairs, they say it's to change their luck. Tonight we heard a few people get into arguments. It was a strange night but we all came home empty handed but I feel completely refreshed and ready to get through the next month before we bingo again.

This is where I go to bingo. This place is always packed!!

Surface Cleaner

So I'm sitting here taking a break from scrubbing my house and I'm thinking to myself, didn't my husband say he cleaned the house when I was gone all day Sunday? Then it occurs to me, he cleans like my children. They move things. They don't clean. I always tell them moving your toys from one part of the dresser to another isn't cleaning. That's pretty much the same thing my husband does. He just moves things around the counter, picks up but puts it in places I just clean later. I find it quite funny because then he'll use the sentence, "I cleaned all day on Sunday". Which really means, I watched tv and played games on my ipod and during commercials or when my eyes started to hurt from the screen of my ipod I got up and moved things around. haha. I always blamed Danny Tanner for my expectations. Leave it to a tv show to give me the image of a clean freak dad. What I wouldn't give to see my husband wearing a pair of cleaning gloves and pushing around a mop. Now that would be SEXY!!

Ooops apparently it's Wordless Wednesday. I'll do better next week

Is it okay to yell at other people's children?

The answer is absolutely not! Well in most circumstances. I NEVER thought I'd ever go through this in my life but today it happened. An ugly (and I mean on the inside) woman took it upon herself to yell at my son at a community splash park. This is a place where children are running around everywhere. About 10 minutes before this incident we had arrived and I just got through spraying sunscreen on all of my kids. My children had went to play and my oldest son had gotten water in his eye which also was mixed in with sunscreen and if anyone knows what that feels like (I know I do) it stings. While running with his eyes closed he ran into another child. On complete accident. The boy fell to the ground, hit his head and my son said he was sorry. Now let's explain my oldest son. He's afraid of bugs, he doesn't like to get dirty and he lets his 3 year old brother beat him up all the time. He wouldn't intentionally hurt a fly let alone a stranger kid. The child's mother got up and yelled at my son so badly that he was hysterical for about 30 minutes. She emotionally abused my child at a place where he's suppose to be having fun. Well the un-confrontational person that I am was ticked off. I went over and explained that it was unnecessary to yell at my child and that he was unable to even see. Well her chihuahua guard dog of a friend decided to step in. I let them both know it didn't matter, it was an accident and do not yell at my child again. 10 minutes later they left. I feel like this woman should only be so lucky that it was me that she dealt with and not another mother who would've probably taken it to another level. I had several different mothers come up to me and tell me what she had done was wrong and these are children and what they saw it was a complete accident. I am still pretty upset. I keep looking at my son and telling him how much I love him because I don't want what happened today to remain in his memory. He is loved and unfortunately he had to see the ugliness of some people.

Mother/Daughter Day in NYC

I finally was able to take Hannie to New York City. She has been begging me for months and now I felt comfortable enough take her around. What a better weekend than Memorial Weekend. We took the Metro North from New Haven to Grand Central Station. It takes about 2 hours. She was anxious with every single stop. How much longer mom?? is what I heard most of the way. It's okay though because I had that same excitement my first time to the city.
Here is Hannie on the Metro North. We got up early.

We had made it to our destination. Grand Central Station.

Look we're in Times Square!!

Where they happened to be filming for Sand Masters

And then she got a free Travel Channel Bag. She rocked it!

We went and sat on the Ruby Red Stairs

Then we went to my favorite store M&M!!

Hannie went on her first subway ride to Little Italy for lunch

We ate at Rudy's Pizzeria. Yummy. I wish I had gotten a picture of my broccoli and mushroom pizza.

But!! Hannie and I had our first Cannoli!!!

Then back on the subway because Hannie's in for a surprise....

Our next stop was American Girl Place!!!!

And then she took pictures with her favorite new doll Kanani

She got a couple new accessories for her doll and we hit up Jamba Juice (OMG haven't been to one since living in Hawaii)

She wanted to share with the Statue of Liberty

We hit up Rockefeller & Hannie totally wants to meet Al but next time baby!

We took a rest on the steps of Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church

We decided it was time to start heading home. We got to ride on a new train. It was pretty nice.

She snoozed the whole way home.


We are going back in October for Hannie's Golden Birthday!! Stay tuned....