The Force is strong with this one...and this one...this one, not so much...

The Yoda outfit is a riot. Especially when you consider Alex is perfect Yoda size.

Tagine or not tagine...

So I ventured into the culinary unknown today, and cooked up a recipe by Emeril for a North African Chicken Tagine. Don't know what inspired me to go Moroccan, but it involved me hunting down some preserved lemon at a Middle Eastern foods store (while I was there I picked up some rose water and pistachios in nougat-- yum.). The dish involved cardamom, cinnamon sticks, cumin, aforementioned preserved lemon...just a bunch of things that we Buitoni pasta people would consider faraway and exotic. The aromas that came wafting out of the pot were just wonderful.

Then the real test.

Serving it to three already impatient and very hungry children. (I took longer than anticipated to cook up the dish. The problem with all these Food Network recipes is that when they say "35 minutes cook time," they neglect to include the "one and a half hours it takes a non-chef-type-person-to-assemble-everything-else-time.")

Now my kids are not the most adventurous when it comes to foods. Michael's getting better, but if you asked Alex what he wanted to eat for dinner, 99.9% of the time, he'll tell you "white bean chicken chili." That's it. You could take my kids to a three star Michelin restaurant, and they'd be disappointed that they wouldn't be seeing any tires. Or traffic lights.

Luckily the response to dinner was fairly positive.

Michael: UMMMMMMM! It's actually GOOD! [Ed. note: I think that he was fairly hungry at this point.]

Alex (after picking chicken bits off of couscous): Is this a good dinner?

Sam: ... [Ed. note: Actually, Sam was just stuffing her mouth with apples, peas, and chicken.]

Well, I take that back about all the kids being picky. So far, Sam seems to pretty much happily eat anything you offer her (Hot Wheels cars included), so I'm hoping that she takes after her mother in this department and at least tries everything.

But I can't complain-- they finished off most everything except for the couscous, which was probably sitting in the pantry a little too long, so I excused them that. They also had peas and apples on the side. A fairly balanced meal.

Lesson #1 learned: Starve 'em, they'll probably try anything.

Lesson #2 learned: Couscous is right up there with sand and those little non-pareils as far as sweep-ability. I'm probaby going to be finding couscous on my kitchen floor weeks from now.

Smoothie operator

Sam loves her smoothie.

Another trip to the doc...

As I was leaving the doctor's office yesterday, I joked, "Well, hopefully you won't see us again with the other kids..." Little did I know!

Alex was up quite a bit last night. Initially we just figured it was Alex being disgruntled or having a nightmare. But this morning we heard the wheezing, and saw his little body struggling to breathe. It sounded like the teeniest little bellows in his chest. Evan called the doctor on call (ours is on vacation this week!) to bring him in for an appointment. They checked is O2 levels, and they weren't very good. So he had to get nebulized (is that even a word?) at the office. It's like a medicinal hookah, as far as I can tell. He recovered enough to be sent home, but only after a couple of hours. We then went and got our own nebulizer and medication. Something new to put next to the Neosporin in the medicine cabinet.

Hopefully the little guy recovers soon. Asthma isn't very pretty, especially when you're watching a little three year old struggling for each breath. He couldn't even move around a lot today, he was so focused on getting air.

It really makes me wonder about the poor souls who can't afford to get the equipment...I couldn't imagine standing by, unable to do anything because we couldn't afford the nebulizer (which, by the way, is not covered by our insurance plan. Sucks.).

Three little monkeys on a Plasmacar

Aches and Pains

Number one baby stayed home from school today with an ear infection. His first reaction when I told him that he was going to stay home? "I won't be able to turn in my library book today!" (Gramma S. would be proud.) Then, "I have to do the CALENDAR in school!" (I guess this is some sort of classroom duty, and it's his week to update the calendar with the date and weather.)

Number two baby is coughing. A lot. Hopefully he doesn't follow Big Brother's lead and get an ear infection too.

Number three is just snotty. Snotsicles, snot-terfalls, snot-on-my-shirt...ugh.

Cold/flu season has officially arrived.

They are getting to know me very well at the doctor's office. I was there yesterday to pick up extra urine sample collection bags for Sam. For her one year checkup, they want a few drops. Just a few drops. You would think that this would be an easy task. To date, I have already gone through four different collection bags. These little torture devices have an adhesive and you stick 'em...well, you know where. With my boys, NOT AN ISSUE. With Sam, I might have to go to the doctor's office to request more baggies. They're gonna think that I'm inhaling them or making balloon animals...

...but yes, I'm still thankful I have my girl. Really! I'm just looking forward to the day that she can pee in a cup by herself.

Pumpkin patchwork

The guys...








the baby...








the wagon ride...








Went to our local farm for their Harvest Festival. I think all the "city folk" from LA/Valley drove in for a taste of the country and farm life. Counted the following at the Harvest Festival:

• 3 other Phil & Ted's E3s in doubles configuration
  
• 2 Mountain Buggies
• 2 Bugaboos
• 3 Obama t-shirts, including a little girl's that had a sheep on it and said "Obaaaaaama"
• 1 "No on Prop 8" shirt (yay!)

Purchased one big, oblong pumpkin to carve. Really. I'm going to carve a jack-o-lantern this year. I feel that if I look at this as a "culinary exercise" instead of an "amuse the children but end up doing all the work yourself" type of enterprise, I might summon up the energy to actually do it. Pepitas anyone?

Ketchup

Wowwee...look at the time. Let's see, in the time since my last entry, I've:

• popped out another baby,
• acquired some new family members (Auntie Alexis, niece Madison, and cousin Hikaru)
  
• said farewell to a few family members (Gramma Malilay and Bubby),
• sent a kid off to public school,
• sent another kid off to preschool,
• gained a lot of weight,
• lost some of it (ten pounds left???? It's all water retention...)
  
• signed up for Facebook,
• climbed Kilimanjaro to see the last remaining pieces of ice left.

Okay, so I didn't trek up Kilimanjaro...unless you count the Kilimanjaro-sized load of laundry that needs to be put away. I guess I should start with Sam...oh, Sam. Sam is what some would call a surprise, others a blessing, and yet others, an "Erin-don't-you-know-about-birth-control-yet???" Yes, I had my teen pregnancy at 33. Yes, I've since learned the wonders of birth control. Very well, thank you.

But now we have SAM! (Samantha Kyomi Sherbrooke) Her middle name we made up (kyou - the character for "surprise" in Japanese, mi - beauty...thus our little "surprise beauty"). She's the easiest baby of them all...so far, and she fits in quite nicely in the zoo that is our household.

She's already ONE now. (Boy, I'm really bad at the blog thing) Her birthday was September 25, 2007. So actually, right after my last post, I probably discovered our little bun cooking in the oven.

The boys, fortunately, haven't done her in, and she is quite capable of holding her own.


Michael has started FIRST GRADE already at Flory, a "science and technology magnet school." And believe me, they do A LOT of science. Ask him to sing the water cycle song to you sometime.

Alex is going to Pinecrest now, Michael's old preschool. I think he's given more attitude to the teachers than his older brother did, but that's Alex. We were having a tough time of the twos, but shortly after he hit three, he started to mellow into a funny little guy.

Evan has started YET ANOTHER company, and he's still holed up in his office and comes out for the occasional diaper change, or watch-the-baby-while-I-run-to-the-bathroom moments.

And me, as usual, I'm just trying to get by. Maybe I'll actually be good about the blog this time around. My excuse for stopping last time was that last pregnancy test...boy, was it a doozy...

Oh, and for the record-- Michael is pooping in the potty. From my posts, it sounds like he never learned. Alex is almost there, but not as much drama and grief about the whole thing. I guess one advantage of being the second/third kid is that the parents are less freaked about body fluids leaking on the kitchen floor...