Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Tuesday.... I think I write all this down so when I try and figure out how I managed to accomplish NOTHING at the end of the day, I know where the daylight hours went.

After E finished yesterday's school work and we spent an hour combing the house for the girls' swim bag I called the gym and they had it there.  We picked it up and the girls got into their ( cold, smelly) swimsuits and after they had a wonderful swim I handed them their (cold, smelly) towels.  You better believe Ernie took special care to make sure the bag came home with us and the wet things made it into the laundry!

Last night's sourdough was a success- rose all made two nice loaves after lunch!  Super crisp crust, not great color, but very tasty- nice tang but not too sour.  Mimi and Cocoa spent all afternoon in the yard munching on warm slices of bread.  I finally pulled him in for a nap around 3:30.

 

(Guess what came in the mail today?  Ernie does not know yet...!!!)

I knew Cocoa was ready for a nap when he couldn't walk in a straight line.  Here he is, yelling at me to "Go to the kitchen!"  No joke.  He wanted to do something naughty, and didn't want me to watch.

While he slept the girls and I did a little painting.

I cleaned up the house a bit and made dinner- our new favorite recipe is chicken thighs baked in a mixture of maple syrup, yellow mustard, rice vinegar, and a dash of tapatio, and one quarter of a preserved lemon.  I cook the pan juices into a quick gravy and then blitz it in the blender to get the lemon in there.  I served brown rice and a salad on the side- as a treat informed the brown rice into balls with a bit of seaweed flakes in the middle.  The kids LOVE those and I love that they aren't doused in sugary yoshi sauce :). I wanted something sweet after dinner so passed around a bowl of jelly beans.  

After dinner J cleaned the kitchen and went to Lowes to get lots more window casing (our handyman came today and worked in finishing installing molding and casing in the house- it was half old and half new.). I started painting the kids' bathroom- got the ceiling done and most of the walls cut in.  I like the wall color!  It's Valspar, Eddie Bauer line in Craft White.  It's expensive, about twice as much, but the premium primer+paint really does do the job in one coat.  I was able to paint our gray straight over the green in the front room!