Red Robinhood

Let me start by saying that we rarely and I mean rarely go out to eat as a family.  I can list a myriad of reasons.  I prefer to eat home cooked meals, we have three wild kids, I think restaurants are crazy overpriced, we have three wild kids, I like to cook, we have three wild kids, we live off one income, and did I mention we have three wild kids?  I think you get my point.  But about every six months or so we suddenly think going out to eat would be F-U-N!  

We give each other reasons why this time it will be fun.  "Emmett no longer needs a bottle so he should be easy!"  "The kids have been acting so grown up lately."  When really we are just feeling lazy and don't want to cook.  Enter Red Robinhood.  You might know Red Robinhood to be plain old Red Robin.  Our family, uhem, Brooklyn, has a unique name for pretty much everything.  This is the same child that to this day calls french fries "somefries" because when she was a wee child we would ask her if she wanted some fries.  Awesome.  Anyhoo, We were out running errands and decided, wait did we decide?  No.  Brooklyn shouted, "RED ROBINHOOD!" as soon as she saw it in the Bed, Bath and Beyond parking lot and that combined with our laziness landed us in a cozy booth for five.  

Brett and I decide to share a chicken sandwich because it took us 15 minutes to order...indicating that we wouldn't really have time to eat while filling three hyper mouths.  Once the order was placed we took time to observe every item hanging from the ceiling, introduce ourselves to our boothmates behind us by shouting BOO into the back of their heads (Jameson) and squawking like an injured seagull (Emmett).  Brooklyn was pretty quiet as she downed her strawberry lemonade.  While this might seem like a recipe for indigestion for most, we actually quite enjoyed ourselves.  The kids were so excited.  Brooklyn even thanked us for taking her to such a fancy restaurant.  Surely all fancy restaurants serve corn dogs.  While we did have a good bout of family fun, we'll probably gather enough gusto for a return trip in about, well, six months.

Fun, we are having fun!

Jameson, the boothmate terrorizer.

A classic shot of Emmett.

Trying to grab, then eat, the camera.

Big boy haircut.

Water from a straw, so fun!

I love strawberry lemonade!

Be Quiet Everybody!

As you might imagine, our car can be quite chaotic.  It has been especially loud lately thanks to Emmett's (I'm trying to drop the "Baby"...I can do it, I can do it.) FOUR molars that are working there way in.  Grow in already!  Anyhoo, this afternoon we were all in the car together laughing, playing games, being loud Krache's when Jameson shouts from his seat, "BE QUIET EVERYBODY!" So, we do as instructed.  As soon as it is quiet he calmly says, "I have something to tell you."  To be honest, I can't even remember what he told us because we were laughing so hard at his assertiveness.  Brooklyn even told him that he was, "so crazy."  I guess it's one way to get our attention, that's for sure!  I can pretty much guarantee that after the reaction we gave him we'll be hearing this happen again in the not so distant future.  I think he is finally holding his ground and isn't going to let Brooklyn do all the loud talking.

Food

Well, my camera cord disappeared and who knows where it could be.  Emmett has taken up the habit of hiding things lately.  I found my camera in the pots and pans drawer this afternoon.  Looks like I will be on a whole house scavenger hunt tomorrow!

Until the cord is revived, you'll have to hear about food.  My sweet tooth was in high gear tonight and after desperately searching the cupboards I put root beer and ice cream together to make a float.  Mmmm.  There are two people that I always think of when I make a float, my Dad and my Grandma Sonna.  My Dad makes these insane root beer drinks that can cure just about anything.  Better than antibiotics.  At sleepovers, my Grandma would make a "sludge" in the bottom of a float by mixing just a little ice cream with the root beer before adding the rest of the ice cream and root beer.  Genius.

Isn't it strange how strong the connection to emotion is through food?!?

You are welcome for your root beer float craving.  Soooo good.

Pinterest

Damn you Pinterest.  First Angry Birds and now Pinterest.  If you need a new, MAJOR, time drain...go ahead and look-up Pinterest.  Such a time drain...I went to look up the exact address for this post and was "window shopping" for five minutes before I had to mentally kick myself off.  It will give you to-do lists for days, years, millenniums.  I had poo-poo'd it for the longest time because I was so sick of people talking about it on Facebook but I now see why.  I mean, why wouldn't we make a chandelier out of mason jars while building chairs out of wooden pallets while dipping marshmellows in chocolate and crushed graham crackers.  Look it up, you'll soon see the light...and you'll also see why I have become a huge zzzzz over here at Blue Eyed Bliss.  Need. Motivation. Fast.

Molars

I said, MOLARS!  We have been blessed by a no fuss teething process with Emmett...until now.  Enter the molars.  He is working on two top molars simultaneously and is producing a lot of drool, a lot, and is in hip attachment mode.  As in, he is on my hip almost the entire time he is awake.  The negative is that my back is killing me.  The positive is that he is on my hip.  Let me explain.  While he is whining and drooling all over me I can't help but rub my back, kiss his head and eat up every moment because he will soon remember that he is not that in to me and won't let me cuddle him all over again.  Sigh.

No More Fish for Me!

On Thursday I chef'd up one of our family's favorite dinners, fish tacos.  We were a bit rushed after squeezing in a later than usual visit to the Y to work out so we plated the food and were eating in no time.  I warned everyone to watch for bones.  The kids are seasoned in the process as we eat fish probably once a week thanks to the freezer full of cod, halibut, rockfish and salmon caught by (insert back pat here) us.  

Brooklyn was putting any bones she found on my plate when all of the sudden her eyes got huge and she gasped, "A bone, a BONE, I swallowed a BONE!"  She has a natural flair for the dramatic so both Brett and I try to get her to drink some milk to wash it down.  How about coughing?  How about clearing your throat?  How about stop SCREAMING!  She was screaming.  Sheer panic.  We could not get her to calm down.  Brett popped her out of her chair and took her to the sink to get her to try and spit/gag/breathe, do something to get the bone free from her throat.  Nothing.  Just more panic, choking and gagging.  She then went into what I would like to call a hysterical fit.  She was gagging, yelling, saying it hurt so bad and she started to hyperventilate a little.  At the pinnacle of the fit, ta-da the bone freed itself.  She immediately stopped, looked at Brett and did a double fist-pump.  She then hugged Brett, exclaimed, "it's gone, it's gone!" and then skipped back to the dinner table.  When she sat down and the adrenaline rush was gone she looked at us very seriously and declared, "No more fish for me."  

I'll have you know while all of this was happening I was going over what I needed to pack for our second ER visit in one week.  Luckily we evaded the ER.  My nerves are fried. 

Wow, Wow, Wow!

Emmett is talking, a lot.  The problem is, it is his own language.  We have no clue what he is trying to say to us but he is definitely trying his hardest to communicate.  Two things that are coming through loud and clear are, "wow, wow, wow!" and, "yeah."  He loves to find something, anything, and hold it up while saying, "wow, wow, wow!"  It gets louder by the end and is always in threes.  "Yeah," happens at completely random times and is accompanied by a rapid head nod.  I am guessing he is copying us but doesn't have the context down yet.  He still babbles Da Da and Ma Ma but still doesn't associate it with us quite yet.  We are working on it!  He does "kiss" when you say kiss, but be warned...it is extra sloppy.