Heard tonight.......

Maya, Evan and I were having family night. We said a little prayer and soon Maya chimed in. She had her own things to be thankful for.

Maya: thanks for wipes....play with boys, play with boat, play with girls.

The 'play with boys' and 'play with boat' is in reference to nursery. Maya loves nursery because:

*She is the only girl amongst 3 boys
*There are boats AND trucks in there

The only good reason for living far away from friends and family.....

Yesterday I opened my back door and found a little brown box awaiting me. I LOVE (can't emphasize enough) mail. It makes me oh so happy. And in this little brown box was this:



Well no, Kevin Bacon wasn't really in the box....but FOOTLOOSE was! Mandy knows me all too well, and knows that I love this movie. I know it's a little cheesy, and it's from the 80's but I love everything about it. I mean, who can pull a this kind of hair off? Only Kevin Bacon. I remember watching this when I was about 5 with my older sister Amy and wishing I could be in the movie. I've been teaching Maya some of the dance moves, my favorite being when Willard does the great move with one arm up in the air and one down. Maya is working on that one. Maybe it's also that the movie is filmed in Utah, and I'm going through a serious mountain withdrawl out here; needless to say Brynn and I had a great night watching this.

What Minnesotans make.....

We soon found out that to live in Minnesota, there is a food staple in the wintertime. That would be wild rice soup. The first time we had it, we were in heaven and now I've resorted to making in double batches and then freezing it. It's hearty, filling, and delicious. We had it in soup bowls for Christmas Eve dinner, and it was fabulous. Here is the recipe:

WILD RICE SOUP

Makes 8 servings
3 cups water, or more
3/4 cup uncooked wild rice rinsed
1/2 cup chopped onions
3 garlic cloves, minced
1/4 cup butter or margarine
1/2 cup flour
4 cups water
4 chicken-flavored bouillon cubes
1 1/2 cups chopped, peeled potatoes (I leave the peel on mine)
1/2 cup chopped carrots
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1 bay leaf
15 oz. can whole-kernel corn, undrained
2 cups half-and-half
3 cups (1 lb.) cubed ham, fully cubed ham
2 Tbsp. parsley

1. In a medium-sized saucepan, combine 3 cups water and wild rice. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer 35-40 minutes, or until tender. Check after 20 minutes, and again after 30 minutes, to make sure the rice isn't cooking dry and scorching. Add more water if needed.

2. In a large saucepan, cook onions and garlic in butter until crisp-tender. Stir in flour. Cook one minute, stirring constantly.

3. Gradually stir in 4 cups water and bouillon cubes into onion and garlic. Add potatoes, carrots, thyme, nutmeg, pepper, and bay leaf.

4. Bring vegetable mixture to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer 15-30 minutes.

5. Add corn to vegetables. Cover and simmer for an additional 10 minutes.

6. Stir in half-and-half, ham, cooked wild rice, and parsley. Cook until heated through.

7. Remove bay leaf and serve.

Maya's new glasses

Love this picture.

Adjusting the new glasses.

Maya pulling her train with the glasses-a hard task when her glasses keep slipping down her nose.

Maya has a slight obsession with my glasses. At any given time I'm wearing them, she'll run up, snatch them off my nose and put them on. Last night she was playing with her train and had to play one-handed while adjusting her new glasses.

Merry Christmas!

"Maya wants to go to a ballgame with Dad!"

Maya has been saying for weeks that she wanted to go to a ballgame with Dad. So we went last Wednesday night, and she loved it. The local NBA team is the Timberwolves, and their mascot is a wolf; Maya is obsessed with wolves. Every time she saw the wolf or heard it howl she was giddy. We stayed for the whole game, and we had a blast. If you notice, in both of the pictures Maya can't take her eyes off of the game. She has been asking to go to another game ever since we got home.

On an interesting sidenote, we saw the "World's Most Flexible Man" at halftime. Incredible and disgusting. They carried him out in a tiny box. He passed his whole body through the head of a regular sized tennis racket and performed many other physically impossible feats. See for yourself.

"Meseversary" (aka Mensiversary)

She is a month today. Evan affectionately calls it her 'meseversary.' Mes=month in Spanish. This lady loves to kick her legs wherever she is, hence the one leg sticking completely out of blankets. Last week she started grinning at us, the best present in the world.

Balmy Minnesota

The HIGH, by the weather forecast was supposed to be -1 degrees. Too bad it didn't get above -8 degrees all day long. Before coming to Minnesota, I joked that we were moving to the 'freezing tundra' and I'm thinking it's true.

Snow is here

You know it's cold when you lick your snot, but it's already frozen after 10 minutes outside.

Maya running on her favorite lake, yep, you heard right, she's out on a lake. It's what we do here in Minnesota.

At the lake, giving Evan a look like 'don't you dare take me home yet.'

The littlest lady

This face makes waking up in the night to nurse acceptable. Look at those long arms...and those are three month jammies.