Those are Jack's hands on mine; they're tiny, as my hands are small, but how they've grown since he was an itty-bitty 2-lb, 10-oz newborn! On Saturday night, Chloë, Rob and I spent hours looking at Jack's baby book. Of course, as there are numerous references to Robby in the book, it was difficult and caused many tears among us, but it was well worth the unexpected trip down memory lane.
After the hands photo, we mugged for the camera together. Jack rarely does this with me, so such a photo is cause for celebration for his mom! I had to post it on Instagram, even if my face is hormonally broken out at the moment!
We all got up and went to the 10 AM service on Sunday morning, our second as a full family and my fourth time since moving to Miami. We're having a series on being happy, which is great, as I've renewed my quest for happiness and have re-started my work on Happify, too. I had my second session with my new psychotherapist on Tuesday, so it seems like this is all coming together at once.
(I gotta confess, though, that the thought of losing my Dark Passenger, as Dexter calls it, makes me a little worried that I'll lose the creative spark behind the book I'm writing.)
Chloë wanted to help me make dinner on Monday night, so we dug around in the fridge and freezer and found a goodly portion of organic chicken breasts, organic onions, and organic fava beans to cook. Also, I've mentioned the ubiquitious curbside flower vendors on many a Miami street - most notably Calle Ocho aka Tamiami Trail aka 8th Street - but I neglected to mention that many folks are out there selling fruits, too. I purchased a big bag of limes for two bucks the other day, and with those, a meal was made.
Jack and Sophia were excited for the dinner to be ready, because it smelt so good in our home while cooking. They eagerly cleared and set the table, so we could all sit down as a family together. Rob's junk, school papers, and innumerous other crappola has been piled atop our dining table for a week, making such a thing impossible, to my utter dismay. If I knew that cooking chicken in lime juice and adding organic purple potatoes would get them motivated to do some helping out around here, believe me, I'd have done it ages ago!
Jack and Chloë wanted to help me fix dessert for the rest of the fam, too. I couldn't pick what to make, and they couldn't agree between these strawberry tartlets we made first and the next dessert to be shown - so we made both! This one was a concoction inspired by Jack pulling the leftover phyllo dough out of the freezer (I think I used the rest of it at Thanksgiving, but I can't properly recall now) and a search on AllRecipes for "lime dessert" to make use of those limes. As you can see, no limes were actually harmed in the making of this gelatinized stawberry confection, but that's okay because now we still have some for next time!
The phyllo dough, which I should have photographed before baking and filling, was pinched into little cuplets from flat sheets. They didn't look nearly so pretty after a minute or ten in the oven, but these thingies tasted delectable! So much so, I binged on two of them (and regretted that almost immediately).
The other dessert, for which Chloë pushed, was a chocolate cake for her dad. We couldn't remember if I'd ever made him one for his birthday - it's his standard celebratory cake - but he'd been requesting one for a few months. I had just never gotten 'round to it, so that was the night. We topped it with a glaze I made simply and some sideways-sliced strawberries we'd gotten at Wally earlier in the evening. I dipped my finger in the glaze and decided it was ghastly, but to my surprise, even the frosting-loathing Rob liked it. To each his own.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, amidst many a Math-U-See lesson and writing letters to family, I worked on the collection sheets for Sweet Pea Academy's Spring Labels for Education submission. We've amassed over 5,000 points this year, which I don't know but I think is great for a small homeschooling family. The kids helped me collect, trim, and bank them, so I let them help me pick what to get, as usual: a pair of binoculars for each of them, a Lemon Twist something-or-other set (from the "Athletics" section, it's the doo-hickey that has a ring on one end for going around an ankle whilst the wearer jumps over the attached cord and ball), and a microphone. Something for Arts, something for Athletics, and something for Academics. I like it!
This has been a long week of nothing scheduled but schooling, and it's been a productive one. I've been rethinking putting them in public school next year. I think, at this moment anyway, we shall keep at it. And I'm joyed by this thought.
Fin.
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