Spring Break at Home

My daughter asked me what season came next and I  told her summer. It's already so hot here in Florida that I completely forgot about spring. It's still happening on the calendar and spring break is coming up. As usual, we're staying home for spring break. But I want to try to make it fun for the kids and to keep my sanity (and the TV off). So I have a flexible plan for outings and fun things we'll do over the break. The students get this Friday off plus all of next week, so I have six days to fill with something besides our normal daily schedule (which the Kindergartener declares is "boring!" every time she hears what we did while she was at school).

Day One: Summer clothes shopping!
Okay, the exclamation point might be a bit much. The kids will kind of like doing it because they get to look at all the toys at the consignment shop while I find clothes for them. And I'll have fun up until the point that the baby is no longer happy in the stroller. So after a morning spent shopping, we'll all be good for some downtime in the afternoon.

Day Two: Library, Read-a-Thon, and Movie Night
In the morning we'll go to the library and fill up on new books and movies. In the afternoon we'll throw out all the pillows and blankets on the family room floor and read our new books. Do they have read-a-thons in school anymore? I think some Twizzlers will be necessary. Since we'll all be lounging around anyway, that will be a good night for a movie.

Day Three: Splash Pad Day
We'll tell friends that we're going to be there, but with or without them, we'll be there. When we come home, Mom will be exhausted even if no one else is, so we'll relax in the afternoon.

Day Four: Orlando Science Museum
We have a year pass so it's free--minus the stress of the drive of downtown and parking our van in the parking garage. The girl's could spend all day there, so we'll stay as long as the baby will let us.

Day Five: Cooking Day
The girls want to make homemade peanut butter. I want to try lemonade slushies. It will be good to have a day at home after a day at the museum.

Day Six: Picnic at the Park
We have a park close by. I hardly ever take the kids alone (it's too hot and crowded by the time school gets out). A simple picnic will make this outing seem extra fun--especially if juice boxes are involved.

Ideas for the rest of the time:
Play games
Play with toys (what a crazy idea)
Color or paint
Water table outside (and invite new neighbor girl)
Sidewalk chalk
Make new playdough
Mosaic art

Am I the only one who has to plan out school breaks or risk turning my kids into TV zombies?

Pretending Autumn

My two-year-old is starting to make an important distinction between what's real and what's "just pretend."

What used to be my favorite season has become a time of seasonal-envy depression. (I made up the term and am self-diagnosed, but it's a thing.) We've cooled down about two degrees and are still hot and sweaty all the time. So this isn't autumn, but we did our best to pretend.

Yesterday we baked pumpkin bread in the oven; apple cider warmed on the stove. We ate soup and grilled cheese for dinner. A late rainstorm helped the illusion. But my kids wouldn't be running around barefoot in a real autumn rainstorm. (And an attempt at being grateful in the circumstances: what kid doesn't want to run barefoot in a rainstorm?--mine get to.)

Fall 2014 Bucket List

Fall is my favorite season. Or it was. It's still hotter than Hades in Florida and will be except for the two days this winter when it's a little bit chilly. I miss crunching through leaves in boots and bundling up in sweaters against the cool breezes. I miss the colors of changing leaves and picking apples to make homemade cider and sauce. But since we miss out on these things, I'm even more motivated to do the fall themed things we still can. Here's my list of things I want to do as a family this fall:

Fall 2014 Bucket List

Outings:

Visit a Pumpkin Patch

Go on a Nature Walk and Collect Leaves

Go to a Football Game

Go Camping

Arts & Crafts:

Paint or Carve Pumpkins

Make Leaf Art

Make Handprint Turkeys

Make Thanksgiving Centerpieces

Indoor Activities:

Write Thank You Notes

Watch Charlie Brown Halloween and Thanksgiving

Make a Thankful Tree

Family Room Fort

Food:

Drink Apple Cider Floats

Make Pumpkin Bread

Make Pumpkin Cookies

Have an Apple Dippers Party

Seasonal Sadness

We moved to Florida in May and jumped right into summer. It was summer a bit early, but close to my expected summertime nonetheless. I haven't loved the heat and humidity and the fact that it's too hot to play outside and when we try to it's five minutes tops before my little girls are pink cheeked and drenched in sweat. I have loved the summer afternoon thunderstorms which are common here.

And then the calendar switched to September. And other people who live in a land of seasons started posting about fall weather and trips up the canyon and changing leaves and pumpkin recipes. And I got sad. Really, really sad. Fall is my favorite season and it simply doesn't exist here. We will still have Halloween here, we can still make pumpkin recipes, and I think there are even pumpkin patches to visit. But there will be no sweaters and boots. No crunching leaves and crisp, cool mornings. No eating apples picked right off the tree or pressing cider in a 100 year old press. No jumping in leaf piles and tossing them in the air. All these pictures are from last year. They're frozen in time and the experience won't be repeated this year:

So forgive me if I post about camping and family walks and picnics while you're stuck inside in January. It's the trade off for me not getting to experience Fall this year. And I'm not so sure the trade off is worth it yet.

(I have considered decorating my house like Fall, but I don't decorate for anything but Christmas and don't really know how. Plus the whole money thing.)

Pumpkin Season

Above: Pumpkin Cinnamon Streusel Coffee Cake

I love anything made with pumpkin. It makes everything moist and delicious. And it's often paired with cinnamon and ginger and other warm spices that I love.

My passion for pumpkin started with making homemade pumpkin puree for baby food when my first daughter was a baby. It turned into making pumpkin muffins for her as a picky toddler who would eat little else. And it’s continued in the rest of my cooking. In the fall I make homemade pumpkin puree and freeze it. And every time I go to the store, I buy a few cans of pumpkin to stock up for the rest of the year. I had one can left when the holiday baking displays started popping up.

I used to make pumpkin muffins from scratch for my daughter, but when I was expecting my second child, I started making an easier recipe. She likes them just as much and they’re a little healthier, so I’ve kept it up even as I have more time. Here it is, take notes because it’s complicated:

15 oz. can of pumpkin (I’ve tried a few brands and I like Libby’s best)
1 box spice cake mix (any brand will work, but Duncan Hines is recommended)

Combine ingredients. Bake at 350. It will take about 10 minutes for mini muffins and 15 – 20 minutes for regular muffins. Test doneness with a toothpick. You can add chocolate chips if you’d like. Mini chips means you can use less but still have chocolate in every bite.

I’ve seen this method used with chocolate cake mix, but spice cake keeps it more pumpkiny, which I like.

Here are a few of my other favorite pumpkin recipes:

Homemade Pumpkin Puree Tutorial (this is what started it all for me)

Pumpkin Gingersnaps (not just my favorite pumpkin cookie, my favorite cookie period)

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies (most pumpkin chocolate chip cookies are cakey, these are chewy and reminiscent of a regular chocolate chip cookie)

Pumpkin Granola

Pumpkin Alfredo (a savory way to use up that last bit of pumpkin you didn't use in the cookies)

And there are ever more delicious pumpkin recipes to try out. I loved pumpkin breads and pumpkin pancakes, but have yet to try one that stands out above the rest. I made the Pumpkin Cinnamon Streusel Coffee Cake yesterday, and everyone loved it. To keep track of all the pumpkin recipes I want to eventually try, I have a Pumpkin Board on Pinterest.

Apples

Pick

Eat

Wash

Chop

Press

Drink

Plan

Slow Cooked Apple Butter

Applesauce

Apple Cider Caramels

Apple Cider Floats

Dream of Christmas:

My Husband's Family's Wassail Recipe

2 quarts apple cider

4 juiced oranges

2 juiced lemons

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

1 tsp. whole cloves

1 c. sugar

Simmer for 15 minutes.

Farewell to Summer

The calendar says it's the last day of summer. And I'm almost ready to concede. Our forecast says it's going to be almost 90 degrees tomorrow, but it will cool down after that. It's definitely been cooler in the evenings and early mornings. Summertime is fun for kids, but autumn is my favorite season--boots and jackets, warm soup and cider and cocoa, pumpkins and crunching through leaves.

This summer I made a bucket list of things to do so that our whole summer didn't get wasted away indoors. We didn't get to a couple of items, but some of those can just go on my list of things to do in the fall--especially any indoor things like making homemade play dough or soap clouds. We never did have a picnic, though we could always do that on one of our last warm days we have coming up. And I never made homemade lemonade. That one might wait till next year. Here's a list of some of the fun things we did.


2012 Summer Bucket List 

- Go To the Park
- Go To the Bickleton Rodeo
- Go To the Farmer’s Market (we did this lots of times and is my daughter's favorite)
- Visit the Library
- Go To the Zoo
- Go Fishing
- Go Camping (this only happened in the yard, but my daughter loved it just as much)
- Visit Portland's Saturday Market
- Go Swimming
- Go To a Garage Sale
- Play in the Sprinkler
- Color with Sidewalk Chalk
- Take a Nature Walk
- Stay Up and Look at the Stars
- Watch Fireworks
- Fly a Kite
- Blow Bubbles
- Paint the Sidewalk
- Play Ball
- Family Movie Night
- Have a Dance Party
- Paint Toenails
- BBQ Hamburgers & Hot Dogs
- Homemade Popsicles
- Smores Over the Grill
- Bake M&M Cookies
- Homemade Ice Cream
- Frozen Bananas
- Rootbeer Floats