Bamboo Sprouts

I made this cold pasta salad last week when Rick was out of town because he doesn’t consider stuff like this real food!

Cook a pound of pasta.  I like it slightly more done than aldente for this, but not overcooked.  Rinse with cold water.

Cook 16 oz of frozen peas for just a few minutes and then stop the cooking by rinsing with very cold water.

Chop up some carrots and cucumber and whatever else sounds good to you.

Dump peas and chopped veggies in with noodles and toss around.

In a small bowl, mix up some mayo (about 3/4c) and some mustard (start with 2-3T and add to your liking) or some honey mustard.  I didn’t have honey mustard so I mixed a little sugar (about 1T or so) in with my mayo and mustard.  Also add a bit of onion powder and garlic powder.  Once mixed, pour this mixture over the pasta mixture and toss it around.  Yum.

This week:

Monday- burgers, corn on the cob, PW onion rings

Tuesday- Spaghetti and meatballs, garlic bread, salad

Wednesday-chicken sandwiches, sweet fries

Thursday- Meatball sandwiches with leftover meatballs, salad

Friday- navajo tacos

Saturday- The MaMa is going out with friends from high school so my peeps are on their own (with their Daddy!)

Sunday- meatloaf, mashers, green beans, salad, applesauce

Fall is in the air a bit right now and I can’t wait to start making soups and stews and homemade breads!

We have a nice splash park in town that we usually visit for swim days but this week some friends invited us to their neighborhood pool.  With most kids back to school already, we had the place almost to ourselves!  Very fun and got the kids more in swimming mode than the splash park does. 

If we have a great swimmer in the group, my guess is it is Levi.  He looooooves the water!  Thus I have no pic of only him because he can’t take the time to come check in like the girls do.  He doesn’t like to miss a minute of his swimming time! 

Sophie started back at piano lessons at the end of May and buzzed through the first level at a crazy pace.  She expressed an interest in writing her own music after just a couple of weeks and I suggested we hold off on that until she knew the notes better.  Her Grpa Glen got word of this and sent her a lovely package in the mail with some supplies to go ahead and start writing her music.  I did not know she had picked it up and done anything with it until this week when I saw her get it out and I noticed she had written a couple lines of music.  When I saw that, I asked her if she had copied it from one of her music books (we do some copy work for school so this seemed possible) but of course she looked at me like I was a big dork and said no she did not copy it, it was her own music that she wrote.  Well ok then.    I also asked if she could play the music she wrote and again I got that duh mom look.  lol

Later, I played it myself and noticed that she isn’t writing it technically correct.  She knows what she means though!  Basically she is not reading two sets of lines as the grand staff but instead is reading (writing) them each as a line of music.  She also isn’t noting the sharps quite right.  But again, she knew what she meant and all in all, it isn’t too bad considering she had no instruction!  I have requested some extra lesson time with her teacher because I don’t want to take playing time away, but I do want her to get some extra instruction on written music. 

Here is a little clip of her playing what she wrote. 

 

Sophie is good at every single activity we enroll her in which is wonderful!  And difficult!  Because no way can she be in every activity and this makes it very hard to narrow things down.  However, I think we have found a real passion of hers with the piano.  I don’t have to tell her to practice because she practices many times a day for way longer than she needs to.  One time I even had to tell her that it was time to take a break from practicing!  LOL  I took years of lessons when I was a kiddo and certainly can not relate to any of this talent or passion that she has.  It was a real struggle for me.  It is so fun to hear her play and play and see her be so excited about it.

Levi lost a tooth this week!  This was the first to come out for him and he was pretty excited. 

The fairy came in the night and traded the tooth for $2 paper dollars and a bucket of toystory toy soldiers.

When Sophie and I went to California for a week, Bella was broken hearted.  She is a total MaMa’s girl and she was not happy with this plan.  Rick took the week off and kept the kids well entertained and cared for and I knew they were in good hands so I wasn’t so worried.  Still though, her broken heart was heartbreaking for me.  She never did throw a fit or protest.  At one point, just after I told everyone what was going to happen, I heard Levi ask her if she was going to miss Sophie and Mommy and Bella literally pretended not to even hear him even though she was standing right there when he asked her.  Then she would say things to me like how she wanted to go on a sleepover hot date with me sometime and could she please have a soupcase with ice cream cones on it.  Things like that.  Then at the airport when they were dropping us off, I saw her quiet tears through the window of the car so I had her come on out of her seat for some extra hugs.  Anyhow, I kept thinking sheesh a full out fit might be easier to handle than all this tough but sad girl business! 

Anyhow, just before I left I got the idea to ask her to take care of one of my special treasures for me while I was out of town.  My Dad gave me this bracelet when I was about Bella’s age so it was a perfect fit on her little arm and the love you heart (that is what they call hearts) on there made it extra perfect.  So I asked her if she thought she could take special care of my bracelet for me while I was gone and I told her that my Dad had given it to me when I was about five years old.  She agreed readily and seemed extra pleased about it and each time I would call her she told me the status of the bracelet.  I asked her to either wear it or have it on her dresser.  No playing with it, no breaking it (!), no losing it.  This was a big assignment and she took it very seriously.  I think it brought her some comfort while I was away and I loved seeing it on her little arm.