soccer, slides and supper

T and I arrived home on Friday and discovered a large box in our front hallway. At first I thought it was a huge truck (scraper or quarry truck) for D but no. It was my KitchenAid stand mixer!

So exciting! Thanks to my lovely D for letting me buy this with his work anniversary gift card. Although I did pay extra for the pasta attachment which is also on its way.

Saturday was a busy day. After breakfast

a few games of leaping lizard and soccer Star Wars, some grocery shopping, we headed off to soccer. T ran around with his friends and scored a goal and got to be the wolf in on round of "what time is it Mr. Wolf"? After soccer, D dropped me off at a local school to meet up with friend of T's and his mum and play games at the Spring Fair. The boys went down the huge bouncy slide many times, on a tea cup spinney ride once and through a bouncy obstacle course a few times and then down the slide many more times. Then the boys had ice cream and covered themselves in blue bubblegum and chocolate respectively. Then it was time to go and wait for D to pick us up, so the boys dug in the dirt with a truck until D arrived. Home.

Dinner was pasta with swiss chard and sausage, adapted from a recipe I love for creamed spinach.

I chopped the swiss chard

 and let it drain while I prepared the sauce. I sauted 1 diced shallot, 3 mild italian sausages, casings removed and diced, and 1 tsp minced garlic. When the shallot was soft, I added 2 cups of sliced mushrooms, 3 tbsp butter and cooked until the sausage and mushrooms were brown. Then I added 1 3/4 cups milk (I used 1%) and 3 tbsp flour and stirred well until the flour was well blended. Cook for 5 minutes until thick and bubbly. Meanwhile cook your pasta, I used penne. Once the sauce is thick, turn down the heat, grate in some nutmeg and add the drained swiss chard. Stir to mix

 and let cook for another couple of minutes to warm up the chard. Add the pasta and serve with grated parmesan cheese.

Yum!

boy oh boy

Last week T asked D – “how do you make people?” D was caught off guard and consequently can’t remember what he said. He did at some point talk about babies being in their mummies tummies (we have a picture of me in T’s baby album entitled “waiting for Figlet” with a massive bump which T always comments on “is that me in your tummy before I was born?”). D thought kids didn’t start asking this until they were about 8. Hmm – maybe he needs to reread the parent book. Even I knew that it was coming any day….

Later in the week we were talking about planets (that’s what they are doing now in preschool). I asked T, “what is your favorite planet?”

T: “Mars.”
Why?
T: “Because it’s bumpy.”
Who knew?

The other day we went to visit Auntie Kerry’s “farm” (the place where she rides) and saw the horses, a bunny and a duck. Later T was explaining what he learned about horse poo (he saw the big pile of horse manure) – they roll it out and make it into fish and crab meat. Really? (D says it is no wonder he won’t eat fish and crab!)

And there has been much more submarine construction, of the lego variety. One night I heard T and D talking about submarines and next thing I know we have a whole submarine station in our bedroom with many submarines large and small including bathroom submarines (which if like me you don’t know what they do – bring bathrooms to houses). It is parked next to the shark submarine which has a special shark stun probe. Not to be confused with the shark looking submarine which is easy to spot as it has a window.

Then there is the message he left his Uncle Mike on the weekend. It went (according to Mike) like this: (shouted) Hello, Hello, hello … (D in background, “you have to leave a message”), then there was a long pause, then a whispered “this is T”. Mike phoned back to see what T had wanted to tell him and it goes as follows:
– can T see the Big Rocket before it leaves
– can Uncle Mike come over for a play date
– T had scored a goal on his soccer team

Yes, now T has soccer on Saturdays. He is part of a pre-school soccer “class” where they run around with soccer balls for 30 minutes and play a “game” for about 10 minutes. Lots of fun! There is much excitement when anyone scores a goal, half the time they score on their own nets but nobody minds. The teacher/coach is trying to explain the rules to them but mostly it’s all about the running and kicking (and playing what time is it Mr. Wolf?).

T also moved up to Killer Whales in swimming last week. He really had fun in his last Dolphin lesson. As an end of lesson treat they got to go down the Big Red Slide, several times. Killer Whales is a bit more serious swimming than Dolphins and T is worn out by then end of the 30 minutes. But he still loves it. Even though he struggles with the float board exercises. He makes me so proud. Except when he doesn’t listen to his teacher and then I’m embarrassed. All within 30 seconds.

4 year olds can be very sweet. Occasionally T comes up and gives me a drawing or a flower and says “I made this/found this for you, Mummy”. Aw – just melts my heart. Yesterday his little friend C gave me a flower too. So sweet. And they still are very huggy. At least the ones I know are. It could be a cure for the world – Hug a 4 year old! (Lots!)

Saturday

This was our Saturday yesterday. Awakened just minutes after the clock rolled over to 7AM by T - " Mummy.....Mummy.......Mummy.......Mummy - when are you waking up?" Then he decided to start wearing my glasses and I figured for the future of being able to see, it was better to get up and keep the boy somewhat amused with things other than my glasses. Of course, as soon as I get up and give him juice and breakfast, he can amuse himself with making lego roads and reconfiguring his trucks into new positions on the roads. So I took myself to the kitchen and roasted rhubarb. Once that was in the oven I made banana chocolate chip muffins (again) except I only had two remaining bananas in the freezer so I added one very ripe pear to the mix and used white sugar instead of brown. I guess I zoned out during the mixing process. D ate two muffins seconds after they came out of the oven and pronounced them delicious. The roasted rhubarb

was also declared delicious as dessert after supper. I debated making lemon yogurt cake but in the end decided against it as I would likely eat it all. (This morning I read this post and think that might be made soon.)

We all got ready and off we went to run errands and then it was time for soccer! Yes, yesterday marked the second week for T's pre-school soccer - mostly a 40 minute running around session for 7 kids T's age with some soccer balls thrown into the mix. T doesn't listen very well to instructions, so during the drills was the only child continuing to run around the room when all the others were stopping their ball with their heads or ears or elbows as instructed. He did better with the airplane kick the ball into the net drill and actually played "what time is it Mr. Wolf" this week although he is still a bit unclear on the rules. I think we'll be doing some soccer drills and playing Mr. Wolf a bit today. Then it was time for the game - 10 minutes of kids running in a pack after the ball, all around the room! Very fun. The kids don't really have a sense of which net they are supposed to be defending or shooting into. T scored a goal in his own team's net this week....Oh well. The kids all end the class with pink cheeks and they have fun!

After soccer we met up with some friends visiting from out of town for lunch. After a long visit we came home in time for me to make almost vegetarian chili and for T and D to play with trucks.

Almost Veggie Chili
1 onion, chopped
sliced mushrooms
1 sliced red pepper
2 carrots sliced into thin slices
1 c. frozen corn
1 tsp garlic
1 tsp dry mustard
1 tbsp brown sugar
2 cans (or cooked equivalent) of beans (red kidney, black, navy)
1 jar tomato sauce (I used a batch of frozen sauce from last year's harvest)
2 tbsps tomato paste
chili powder, cumin, smoked paprika to taste
4-5 bacon rashers, sliced

Saute the bacon and onion together until the onion is soft. Add the pepper, mushrooms, carrots, corn, garlic, chili, paprika, mustard and brown sugar and cook about 5 minutes. Add the tomato paste. Then add the rest of the ingredients and cook together for at least 20 minutes until the flavours are melded. Adjust seasonings to taste. Serve topped with grated cheddar cheese and sour cream.
Note - I sometimes add chopped zuccini to this recipe - yesterday I added 2 c of cubed roasted winter squash (from the freezer) - it added fiber and texture to the chili.