Banana-Chocolate Chip Muffins

I decided to post this recipe here because it is probably the children's favorite breakfast and I've figured out some tricks that make them fast, easy and non-messy! For some reason these muffins aren't crumbly like some muffins. The original recipe used twice the amount of chocolate chips but I cut it in half and no one noticed so that's what I do. First the recipe:


Banana-Chocolate Chip Muffins

1 cup sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1 cup/2 medium ripe bananas
3 T milk
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup white flour
1 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1 t salt
1/2 cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease muffins tins (I spray Pam into the paper muffin cups inside the tins). Cream butter and sugar for 3-5 minutes. Add egg. Add bananas. Alternate adding dry ingredients and milk. Finally add chocolate chips. Scoop into muffin tins and either bake for 10 minutes or until done OR put in freezer until frozen and then store in ziploc bags until you are ready to bake them.

So, that's the recipe. My tricks are:

*Quadruple the recipe and freeze the uncooked batter in paper muffin cups so you can have warm muffins at any time.
*Spray the paper muffin cups with Pam so the muffins come out easily.
*Use mini-chocolate chips to spread the chocolate out more evenly.
*Buy fun paper muffin cups when on sale to surprise the kids (I use my Michael's 40% coupons for this as well). We are currently enjoying Winnie the Pooh and Tinkerbell muffins.
*Use 1/2 olive oil and 1/2 butter for a healthier recipe.
*Buy a ton of bananas when they are super cheap and make oodles of these.

Monday, Monday ...

Our day started with Mike preparing for a 6:30 am call (his office is in our bedroom for those of you who didn't know) and a tiny little pixie named Rachel crawling into bed with me. The older kids have an exciting day ahead with a birthday party for the neighbor, Shayla, at 1:00 and then leaving for Denver to see a Rockies game with Mike at 4:30. Mike took the 3 little boys a few weeks ago and now it's the big kids turn. I'll have to post pictures of the first trip as well as this one when they return.

Mike is taking vacation time this week as we had planned to go to South Dakota. Unfortunately our trip to South Dakota fell through so now we will be vacationing from home. We hope to go hiking in Estes on Wednesday and to the Greeley Stampede Independence Day Parade on Friday. I'd also love to take the kids all swimming but we'll see how it all works out. If nothing else it should provide some great pictures to post!

Luke's Party with the family

Yesterday we had a wonderful party with the family to celebrate Luke's 11th birthday. John, Joanie and little Winston came as well as Patrick, Marcy, Sophie and Thomas and my parents, of course. A great time was had by all. The boys love it when "the uncles" come because they play baseball, football, hockey and any other crazy came you can imagine. Luke chose a cake from King Soopers that looked like a computer game. So, to tie in with that we bought a pinata that looked like a record and with construction paper turned it into a Narnia game cd. He wanted a Narnia cake but I couldn't find one and had no time to make one. Here are some pictures:

Because he was the birthday boy, Luke took the first swing at the pinata and broke it! That was a short activity but I guess it was his party so ....






Sophie, Anna and Rachel playing in the playhouse. Rachel isn't smiling because they were baby tigers and Sophie had to give her medicine that didn't taste good. I'm hoping she just pretended to eat the "sand medicine".





Little Thomas eating cake ... look at those curls ... oh, my goodness they are cute and his face is even cuter!







Elizabeth can scooter with the best of them. I think she was in the middle of the baseball game but around here you just have to leap over any babies in your way. It makes the game more exciting.









Look at these cake eating cuties ... Jacob, Timothy, Anna, Sophie and Rachel. Wow, the kids were filthy by the end of the day. Sand, dirt, candy, cake, barbecue, lemonade, sweat ... ewwwww!





I dropped my cake (not unusual for me) and before I could blink Jacob yelled, "I claim it!" and dove to the ground to get it. It was hilarious! Wild man!

A Stephens Family Pizza Record

We set a new record this evening during Family Night by polishing off 4 pizzas AND Timothy (a/k/a Tiny Tim) was still requesting more! I'd like to blame it on the big kids but I think Benjamin, Jacob and Timothy ate the most. Running around outside all day really makes them hungry!

Friday Chores and so on

It's been a great week with lots of fun summer stuff thrown in. I've exercised consistently all week which is a big accomplishment for me. Two nights I've gone for walks with the older kids ... one was 4.8 miles and the other was 4 miles. The other two days I just went to the gym which I don't enjoy very much ... sooooo boring. I want to post pictures of my walk through the Cathy Fromme Prairie. It was absolutely beautiful but with lots of hills which I am still feeling in my legs.

Tomorrow we will be having a family birthday party for Luke since Mike and Josiah were out of town on his birthday. He'd like a "Narnia" theme which party stores don't have so I'm thinking of blue, black and gray streamers, swords, shields and, because it's summer, water balloons. Typically I'd make a cake but I think I'll check with King Soopers and see if they have a Narnia theme cake for him. I saw one online so someone must make them. We'll have bbq pork, potato salad, baked beans and watermelon as well.

In order to enjoy tomorrow we need to get a lot done today. On top of Friday Chores, I need to get some shopping done for Luke and food made for the weekend. On our dry erase board I've divided up the chores this week in this way:

XJosiah - Room, dust basement, vacuum basement and his laundry (I was too behind on Wednesday for him to get his squeezed in.)

XMary - Room, kids bathroom, sweep and mop hardwoods and bake

XLuke - Room, basement bathroom, move couches/tables so Ben & Jacob can put away what has escaped beneath, vacuum main floor, laundry

XBenjamin - Room, collect trash, put away things from under couches/tables

XJacob - Room, bags in trash cans, put away things from under couches/tables

XTimothy - Room, vacuum both sets of stairs

XLittle girls - help me (I use the word "help" very loosely)

XMe - Help girls with their room, pick up/dust my room, vacuum upstairs, clean my bathroom, cook (it's always tricky to get my room done because Mike is working up there.)

I hope to get both the baked beans and potato salad made today and also a bundt cake for Sunday morning. I'm leaning towards a Pumpkin Spice Bundt cake this week. I'll post the recipe.

Off I go to begin the day!

Pictures of Josiah's Encampment Graduation

I got the pictures from Josiah's Encampment graduation back today and thought I'd post a few. Every day he has a new story that he's remembering which is so fun. I'd like to say that in 8 days CAP was able to remarkably change his ability to clean a room sufficiently but I guess only the hand of God can perform miracles. Although he definitely appreciates the finer things more now ... like the internet, movies, sleeping, reading, eating what he enjoys and so on.

Josiah is the 3rd from the left. His flight was the top flight for the week and was called the Alpha Apaches or The Big Red One. Isn't he handsome!










This was Josiah's flight marching in front of us. It was really impressive as all six flights marched onto the field with Josiah's flight leading. Of course, we thought Josiah's flight was the most impressive.









This is the entire family as we were leaving the Air Force Academy. Josiah was such a sight for sore eyes and they made us wait for a long time after the ceremonies to finally retrieve him. It was torture.





This is a picture of the kids minus Josiah in front of the Air Force Academy Chapel. What a beautiful place.

Hiking Survival Kit in a film canister

Today at Barnes and Nobel's Story Time we learned about hiking safety and for our craft we made a mini survival kit that fit in a film canister. It was really interesting and I can see having the kids each carry one when we go hiking. Here is what was in it:

A square of tin foil folded tightly (to reflect light, to catch water or to heat water)

3 waterproof matches

1 fish hook

a little wad of fishing line

2 bouillon cubes

1 piece of candy

a little wad of lint (to help start a quick fire)

Then the kids tied a string through holes poked in the lid and canister and added a whistle.

She also recommended they carry a backpack with snacks, a brightly colored bandana, water and a poncho.

Pretty cool, huh! She told them what to do to avoid getting lost (having a plan, telling someone where you'll be hiking, marking your trail, watching the time and weather ...) and then told them what to do if they do get lost (hug a tree, make a shelter, conserve your food and water, make a fire that produces smoke, put something reflective/bright for searches to look for, blow your whistle three long blows which is the sign for SOS). It was really interesting. She was a wealth of great information. She did warn the kids about making fires and talked about all of the horrible forest fires in California. I doubt any of us parents would honestly give their little kids matches to begin with but I definitely would let my older kids carry them. She also told us how to make fire starters by putting lint in paper egg cartons, melting wax over the top and then cutting out each egg section to make individual starters that will burn for 5-10 minutes.

Apparently REI has a summer kids program where the kids track a few hikes in a log and at the end of the summer they get a free REI whistle so I think we might go sign up for that this week.

I've added a section in the blog for recipes. Today when I ground wheat I made a batch of Waffle Mix times twelve ... what is that ... twelvedupled? Usually when I make waffles I quadruple it which makes almost 2 breakfasts (the late sleepers sometimes miss out on the second breakfast worth and get toast... you snooze, you lose ... but not always) so I figure this will get us enough for four batches. I'll post my Whole Wheat Waffle Recipe.

I intended to have a big salad with my garden lettuce tonight but the cottonwood is impossible to remove from it sufficiently. I tried and tried but any bits left turn into cobwebs when they get wet which is just too icky to eat. And since I thought I'd have my own lettuce I didn't buy any at the store last week so my big salad plans were kaput. I did use some of my kale to make a hot greens dish. I just sauted garlic and red onion then added the kale at the end. I sprinkled it with balsamic vinegar at the end. I loved it. Mike ate some of it but I'm pretty sure it was a little too green for him ... and I didn't remove the stems so it was kind of stringy.

The Letter "G" was fun. We colored green gorillas, chewed gum, ate Golden Grahams and grapes, used granola to make the letter "G" with glue and "glued" ourselves to the garden gate, the green grass and the garbage can. Good games! Hehe ... I don't know who gets a bigger kick out of the alliteration, me or the 4 year olds. Oh, and of course, we ground grain.

Our cable/internet issue is still not fixed. Our landlord is "working on it". Mike is doing a chunk of his work at Panera still and I'm sneaking on whenever I pick him up. I'm picking him up because our little car is not running ... I think the battery is dead ... I hope the battery is just dead. We'll work on charging it tomorrow.

Tomorrow ... hmmm, Wednesdays are usually a down day but we'll see what transpires. Our yard needs work and we need to get some school squeezed in especially for my new readers. It's Luke's turn to go to the orthodontist tomorrow ... Lucky Luke. But for now I'm off to bed.

Internet access is still out ... oh, woe is me ....

I had no idea how dependent I was on the Internet until we lost all access. I search for recipes, ping my family on Instant Messenger, print off things for school ... so, now I'm at Panera to get a few brief words in, check my e-mail and drop Mike off to work. Jaylee arrives in 25 minutes to learn about the letter "G". The Letter People picture is of a Girl chewing Gum so we will each have a piece of bubble gum while coloring a picture of a Green Gorilla. We'll also eat Grapes and Golden Grahams. Very fun. Story time at Barnes and Nobel is at 2:00 but I can't remember who the speaker is ... I'm sure it will be fun though. And Mary has an orthodontist appointment at 4:30 (poor Mary HATES the orthodontist).
The frisbee dogs were awesome and I have some good pictures. The pool was not so awesome as it clouded over in the afternoon and was a mere 78 degrees which made for COLD swimming. The kids toughed it out for a little while and then scurried in to warm up.
I need to race. I will post more later ... I need to get my weekly menu finished up and posted as well. I need to Go to Get Grapes to Greet Jaylee to learn about the letter "G". Ha!

We're home, Josiah is home ... what a great weekend!

Our conquering hero, Josiah, has returned. He had a wonderful time despite the long days, hard work and stress of keeping everything meticulous for eight days. His flight won the top flight out of six groups totaling two hundred young men. He had a great leader and roommate which was a huge answer to prayer for us. When we arrived at the Air Force Academy we were shown a video of their week which began with blurry pictures and the theme song from Music and Lyrics, "Pop Goes My Heart". We were definitely confused at what blurry pictures and a sappy love song had to do with the cadets until the sound of wheel screeching stopped the video and the Commander came on to say, "What's going on here?" ... and the real video began. It was very funny and nice to see that the leadership had a sense of humor and gave the boys splashes of fun in the midst of the work at hand.
After retrieving Josiah we headed to Holly's house to see my dear high school friends, Shannon, Jennie and Lori and their families. All of the kids played beautifully together and we visited and reminisced. I could have talked all night long but by 5:00 it was time to leave. I so hope that now that the lines of communication have been reestablished we can all stay in touch and see each other more often. We then headed to our hotel where the kids ate pizza and the grown-ups ate Chinese food while watching Horton Hears A Who. We had planned to swim but the pool was closed which was disappointing for the kids. Grandpa shared a room with all of the boys (lucky him) and Mike and I had all of the girls in our room. All of the kids absolutely crashed and slept soundly all night long. We headed home in the morning and enjoyed a peaceful, relaxing Sunday.
Our internet access and cable are both down and will be until we get an electrician to reinstall some random cable in our basement. So, my posts for the week will be sporadic. I can't wait to post pictures from the weekend!
For now I must go. The library is having Frisbee Dogs this week and I have the kiddy pool water warming in the sun for a treat when we return. (For you Southerners, water from the hose in Colorado is freezing cold ... and unless the sun has time to warm it it is not terribly fun to play in ...) I'll have to post pictures of those events as well .....

Two Praises ...

My first praise of the day is that little Elizabeth has slept straight through the night without a single fuss for two nights in a row. This may not seem like a big accomplishment for most 14 month olds but as of late she had resorted to crying, "Eeeee, Eeeee" throughout the night. "Eeee" is for Mary who shares a room with Elizabeth and at some point sweet Lizzy realized this and decided that Mary could possibly rescue her from the horrors of being confined in a crib to sleep all night. So, when Mike left town on Sunday, I had Mary sleep in my room and spent the week re-training Elizabeth to just sleep. What a relief to have that done!

My second praise is that Rachel made it through the night without her Nuk and without complaining about not having her Nuk. I have been telling her for weeks that 3 year olds don't use pacifiers (well, actually 2 year olds shouldn't either but ...). So, yesterday morning, the day after her 3rd birthday, I tossed them all and started the battle. At nap time she was pretty weepy and I offered a special afternoon snack if she could rest quietly without the Nuk ... it was difficult and there were lots of tears. But then last night, she didn't even ask for it and when she woke up around 3:00 am fussing I just covered her up and she fell right back to sleep.

These actually might qualify as miracles. If I accomplish a 3rd miracle don't I get Sainted? Hmmmm ....

Today we will prepare for our trip to Colorado Springs to pick up Josiah. Oh, my goodness, I am so excited. I actually get teary eyed thinking about seeing him tomorrow. It should be a really wonderful experience for us all. We get a "debriefing" about what the boys did at 10 AM and then there is a graduation ceremony at 11 AM. I know the 3 little boys will be very impressed with it all. The Air Force Academy is just beautiful and we will have a picnic there before we leave. Then we will go to my dear friend Holly's house to see several of my high school friends and their families at 2:00. I'm very excited. But before all of the fun can begin here is a list of what needs to be done:

Friday Chores
XMajor room clean-up (under beds and all)
Clean all bathrooms
XVacuum entire house
XDust
XMake Sunday meals
XSweep and mop hardwoods - not mopped
XFold all unfolded laundry (this one will be a doosy this week)
XClean out van and vacuum it
XClean up garage to look for Rachel and Ben's missing shoes (argh) - shoes still missing!
XPack
XPrepare food to takeXChiropractor appointment at 3:00 for ME (ahhhhhh)

If we divide and conquer I think we'll get this done pretty quickly. I did some of the Friday work yesterday and the little boys kept up on the basement all week which should help.

So there you go. I need to go and get breakfast finished so we can begin!

The Letter People

My neighbor, Susie Box, and I are alternating days teaching Timothy, Anna, Rachel and Jaylee the alphabet using The Letter People. I'll keep posting as we progress up through "Z".

A is for Ahchoo, Apple, Apron, Airplane and for snacks we had "Ants on an Apple"







B is for Bunnies. *

*I didn't get pictures this day so I thought it was a good opportunity to find my own "B" pictures.





C is for Cottonwood and Cotton Candy.
Susie had real cotton candy on white paper cones for the kids but it was eaten before I could get a picture.






D is for donut and dog. We had yummy Lamar's Donuts for snacks. Yummy!*

*I'll post more pictures when I get them on a disc.





E is for Elephant and Elbow Macaroni. We had and extremely excellent time and for snacks we just chose to "eat".







"F" is for flags and funny feet. Rachel misses out on Thursdays at the Boxes because she is such a mama's girl. Her loss I guess.










"G" is for gum, green gorilla, Golden Grahams, grapes, garden gate, green grass and garbage can. Everyone wanted the snacks this week!






"H" is for horrible hair! Susie used washable hair spray colors to make Anna rainbow hair and Timmy polkadot hair. Extremely funny. Timmy looked exactly like this Dr. Seuss character from Take Me To The Zoo! They also put hearts on a large letter "H" and made hand prints.













"I" is for Incredible Inventor. This is an Incredible Insect Invention the kids made. It is to protect insects from bad weather and provide food for them. We also made the letter "i" out of inchworms and ate ice cream.





"J" is for junk. The kids glued junk on this paper, ate jelly and made the letter "j" out of jelly beans.







"K" is for Kick. We made the letter "k" out of Kix cereal, ate Kit Kats and had a kicking contest. The second picture is of the kids standing at the point where their ball landed after they kicked. Timothy won the contest. Ben was
our ball holder.









"L" is for ladybug, lollipop and lemonade! The lemonade and lollipops were eaten before I could get pictures and Susie also made "L" shaped sandwiches for "l"unch!









"M" is for mini-marshmallows, M&Ms, mice and "M"arvelous Mary! On this day Jacob cut his hand and I wasn't here to teach so Mary, Kyla and Shayla did it for me without my even asking! What "M"agnificent girls!





"N" is for noodle necklaces, Nerds and noisy noses. Susie found that a little cup full of Nerds helps occupies the kids while they color. She's a genius! Anna and Jaylee typically tell me their hands are "too tired" to finish their coloring so they can run off and play.





"O" is for "oh" I'm hot and "ouch" my throat hurts! Plus "octopus" which Anna made at Jaylee's but Shayla had to make one for poor Timothy.






"P" is for Pioneer People. We had pretzels, popcorn, pistachios and pickles for snacks.







"Q" is for quiet, queen, quarterback and Q-Doba (where we went for snack time!)







"R" is for rubberbands and rice.








"S" is for Super Socks and Secret, Silly Snack (Snakes in Soggy Sand a/k/a gummy worms in chocolate pudding)







"T" is for Tooth Zone where we went on a field trip to learn about tooth care. One the way home we got tacos and tortillas for lunch.









"U" is for under Grandpa's desk where Timmy was hiding.











"V" is for vests and veils which the kids made with Susie.








"W" is for watermelon.








"X" is for xylophone.











"Y" is for yawning.











"Z" is for zippered zoo.








We finished off our summer by making laminated alphabet cover sheets for our binders using alphabet stamps. We also ate alphabet buttered noodles for lunch. What a great summer!

I survived 3 days of extra kids, birthdays, field trips and outings ....

Ahhh, I will sleep well tonight. Mike comes home tomorrow, Josiah is just 3 days away from coming home and we don't have another birthday (except a family party for Luke) until October. Tomorrow I will catch up on all of the laundry and cleaning I have neglected for the last several days. The 3 littles will go to the Boxes and learn about the letter "F" for Funny Feet which should allow me a bit of time to catch up. My niece, Sabrina, will leave around 11:00 (boohoo, we love Sabrina) and Mike will arrive around 1:00. Mike is taking me out for Indian food for lunch when he returns and then I will take all of the kids out while Mary hosts dance class at our house. After that, maybe we'll curl up on the couches all together and watch a movie or maybe I'll just escape to a bubbly bath. Ahhhhhh ....

Pictures from the last few days ...

The yard is thick with Cottonwood. It looks like it is snowing and has covered the entire yard.







"E" is for Elephant.
Timothy (age 6), Anna Grace (age 4) and Rachel (one day before 3rd birthday!)






Luke's 11th Birthday candles! What an awesome kid!








Elizabeth really enjoyed Luke's birthday meal choices. Baked Beans and cake with icing ... I wish I'd taken a picture of the BACK of her hair! Oh, my!





Rachel's 3rd Birthday candles! What a doll!









5 Little Princesses wearing the crowns they made.
Jaylee, Anna Grace, Rachel, Sophie and Sabrina






Rachel wearing her boa.