Trés ImpressEEve, no?

So Thursday night was Book Club. I have missed it for two months and was eagerly looking forward to catching up with some great girls. We use the current book to influence the food item we bring each time. I love this because it's a great excuse to try new recipes but I also appreciate the acceptance of showing up with something simple if you've had a crazy week...
This month we read "My Life in France" by Julia Childs. An interesting read coupled with intimidating fare. Have you read that book? It makes your mouth water at all the crazy prep going into the art of cooking: hang drying the local venison in her window wrapped in liver and herbs, then slow roasting it to provide a succulent broth that will be used to cook the duck... and so on and so forth until they eat some amazing meal five days later. Sheesh! After reading that I was about to bring some 'fronch'* fries (and to drink, Peru!) but after talking to my sis-in-law Amy (i.e. French food expert) about something easy, she suggested éclairs.
And then I remembered this dessert from Martha in December and by dang I was going to give it a go. It was éclairs + 1 extra step: the caramel.
Let me tell you, friends... it was a piece of cake to do. And does that look impressive or what? I share this to inspire you all to try it yourself. The dough takes 5 minutes to make, the puffs bake up, you fill them with fresh whipped cream (a little vanilla & powdered sugar {I skipped Martha's caramel filling}), squeeze that inside puffs eating every other one as you go. Oui. I did. Done in no time flat and easier than cupcakes (and tastes MAGNIFIQUE). The caramel part was easy as well, though I over cooked the first batch making it too hard to coat the paté a choux pastries so I doodled with drizzles on parchment paper and made those swirls and swoops that I stuck on at the end. Like that little béret at the top? Nice.
Anyway, I wanted to share my fun experiment. Sugar is super fun. Sugar is your friend!
My creative time has been lacking lately and I think this burst of expression reveals that I need to focus on that some more. Geek alert!
(*Obviously I have practically mastered the french language. Don't be jealous. The mess of typos and incorrect punctuation are intentional to make the reader feel less inadequate to my splendid savoir faire**)
(**Total BS)

Some misc. recent hi-lights: My good friend Liz from my San Francisco days came through town so Scott and I lunched with her & her husband. So great to see them. And Brandon & Jackie the week before that! And just as I promised, Friday- at the end of Earth 'week', I loaded the kids bikes to the park and tried to get them to ride. The odds worked out well. Luke did it!!!! And Elliet is almost there. Sadie collapsed in frustrated tears but I probably shouldn't be trying to teach three kids at once so I'll get her this week. Hooray!

Amigos: We Ride!

The kids came home with a reminder for Earth week this week and encouraged reduced car transportation. We already carpool but I thought it would be a good excuse to experiment riding to school. They still don't know how to ride their bikes (sans training wheels- a goal of mine to get that taught soon) so they chose to ride their scooters. The weather has been so pleasant and perfect so Monday, while Scott was off, we all rode to school. I snapped this wobbly photo from my phone while riding my bike to remember how great the simple things can be.
We tried this again yesterday but they are starting to get frustrated with the scooters (yay). Here's to hoping I can fit in a moment this weekend for bike practice. I'd love to do this with them as much as we can before it gets too hot...

And start young, folks because riding a bike has it's magical powers and privileges. Look at this beautiful view I had while riding up to Red Rock last week early in the morning. Glorious!

Spring Catch Up

Things are chugging along at their usual rate around here. Now that soccer season has begun our lives have become a bit crazy{er}. We have things every night during the week so our weekends have been like rehab. And not long enough at that! We're enjoying it, though. Last Saturday all three kids did well at their games and had so much fun that it makes it worth it.
As I've been lazy on posting here, some fun things have occurred. The twins had their 6th Birthday this month (+ Mimi)!! We are having so much fun as a family getting older and sillier - I love it. Scott's sister Jen was in town all that week so the cousins played and we celebrated with a family party at the Leaver house that night. I also managed to fit in a class treat of cookies. Wow- it was a busy day. We had a quiet party with a couple of the twins friends and their families at the park that weekend (thrown together in one day because I couldn't think any further ahead than that) which was all they needed.
*Here is a pic of the Allen cousins visiting from Utah. So fun to see them! And note Elliet making the Peace sign. Ugh. She can't conceptualize the meaning yet (because she asked me) but has caught on to it's trend. It reminds me of me as a kid doing the same thing drawing Ahnks on my school folders and phsychedelic hippy doodles (now I know how you felt, Mom).
*Next pic is Luke eating one of his donuts (gifted from his awesome Primary teachers) which he wanted accompanied with cherry tomatoes.... (??)
*The cookies I made for their Kindergarten class.
*And a pic from our neighborhood Easter picnic. We had an egg hunt in our front yard. My family came that weekend and it was great (but not long enough!).

Mr. Fancy Fins

This spiffy goldfish condo makes me almost...
ALMOST....
wish we still had a wee fish.

Almost.


Pretty cool, right?
(Available here)

Day Glo

Until I get a window of time to catch up on posts of value like Easter/family/kids..."such as" (said like a true beauty pageantess, eh?), I at least have a moment to reveal yet another embarrassing trend confession: Neon. I don't know if it's the Springtime or what but I am digging brightness. I wanted a neon yellow T last summer and realized every time I put one on that A) it was a horrid color on me and B) I should probably avoid clothing because I wore that already as a teenager. But bits of it here and there is okay, right? Like this fab necklace from Jcrack or accents in shoes. The girl crawling on the mirror floor is a bit much but her shoes are HOT. The ad showcasing the bottle opener edged bucket arrived in my email this week and I loved the painted neon bottles. What can I do with neon in my home that won't look totally tacky? Any ideas? Anyway, I forsee cans of flourescent Krylon soon in my future. Could be bad, Could be good.
Though...I certainly won't do that to my bike.
(but I would a fixie! How cool would that be? Rich! Pick up a cheap bike and we'll make it wall art!)