A Two Muffin Kind of Day

You know you are having a bad day when:

• You wake to find a kid standing at your bedside at 5AM


• Ovaltine milk is spilled on the wool area rug


• A lunch is forgotten


• Pants are filled in the local toy store


• Shirt is sacrificed due to "the incident"


• Someone (don't worry Laney, I won't tell them it was you) needs a second shower due to the pant filling incident


• It is only 10:30 AM

All fixable events, but certainly not the best way to start off the week.

You know, there is only only thing that can done when something like this happens - bake something, something good, and, as many of you know, streusel always brightens my day. Banana Crumb Muffins - I'll take two please. This recipe can be found at AllRecipes.com.

Banana Crumb Muffins
from: Lisa Kreft

INGREDIENTS
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 bananas, mashed
3/4 cup white sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
1/3 cup butter, melted
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 tablespoon butter

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Lightly grease 10 muffin cups, or line with muffin papers.

In a large bowl, mix together 1 1/2 cups flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, beat together bananas, sugar, egg and melted butter. Stir the banana mixture into the flour mixture just until moistened. Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups.

In a small bowl, mix together brown sugar, 2 tablespoons flour and cinnamon. Cut in 1 tablespoon butter until mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. Sprinkle topping over muffins.
Bake in preheated oven for 18 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into center of a muffin comes out clean.

Slow Motion

You know the saying "a day late and a dollar short", well, that seems to sum up me as a blogger recently. For example, here is a Friday Find on Saturday. I think about this time every year I start to feel like life is moving in slow motion. We are still busy as usual, but time just seems to inch along in the cold, snow and ice. Maybe we are all suffering from frostbite, or maybe it is because as a family we have spent a lot of time being sick this year. At the moment Owen has a double ear infection and a limited appetite, so when he requested pancakes for dinner last night I got busy.

We received these molds from my step-mom and, honestly, have not really used them. I attempted them once, but the pancakes stuck and all we got were blobs and a big mess. After seeing them used on another blog recently, I decided to give them another go. This time I used a pastry brush and a little bowl of vegetable oil to grease the insides and it worked really well, and unlike cooking spray I didn't get it everywhere. My other mistake was filling the molds too full, so this time I filled them halfway. That way when it was time to take the mold off and flip them over they came right out. Owen selected the duck and the cat and was happy as a clam and, so was I.

They are made by Norpro and among other places, you can find a good selection of them here. Wouldn't these be fun for Valentine's Day?

Poof

I walk the three steps from the microwave oven to the kitchen island to get a bowl for Owen's chicken noodle soup. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a blue and maize streak duck in and out of the tall cabinet that houses the mixer, baking supplies and microwave. In an instant, I heard a thud followed by "yeaha". As I turn my head to look, I hear the pop, I blink and open my eyes to find this:

He was "very sorry" and, I must admit, it was hard not to laugh while asking him just exactly what he was thinking when he jumped on the brand new 5lb bag of powdered sugar - he wasn't sure and neither was I.

Love For The Lens

My mom got the Sigma 50mm macro lens for Christmas and she let me try it out. I love it and Laney loves it too. The minute Laney saw the camera she wanted me to "taka pitsure meee".

Guilt Free Doughnuts

Ever since Sam and I visited my grandmother for New Year's in the Netherlands 7 years ago, we follow her tradition of making appleflappen (rings of apple battered, fried and coasted in cinnamon sugar) and ollibollen. This year, the kids had their minds set on doughnuts for New Year's Day. Nothing says Happy New Year like a bit of fried dough, so with the same vat of oil that we would use for appleflappen, we made doughnuts instead. We used this recipe and they were delicious and not at all greasy.

Here comes the guilt free part... We got about 12 inches of snow the night before, which meant lots of calorie burning shoveling.

A true calorie free snack.

Time Transfixed

For Christmas, instead of exchanging gifts under the tree Sam and I do stockings. The two rules are the gifts must not exceed the predetermined dollar amount and they must fit in the stocking. This year amongst the gifts in my stocking was a card with the details of the 3 day trip he had planned to Chicago. Although it blew the spending limit, it did fit in the stocking.

In addition to visiting at every bathroom on the Magnificent Mile, our trip to the city was filled with many of our usual stops like Gino's for Chicago style pizza, Chicago dogs, Frontera for tamales, the Corner Bakery for the raisin bread crisps - seems we are a bit food obsessed doesn't it?

We also made it to the Lego store another can't miss in our family.

This time we decided to try a few new stops. Since we usually go to the Notebaert Nature Museum in Lincoln Park (it's in a very cool building, hard to resist the butterflies and Thursdays are free), we decided to check out the Children's Museum at Navy Pier. It was a nice museum, but I have to say I was a little disappointed in the quantity and quality of displays. We have amazing children's museum right in town and having been to Cosi in Toledo and the Exploratorium in San Fransisco, I was expecting something bigger from Chicago - especially for the $23 parking fee and $45 admission for five.

The second day, Spencer and I headed out on an adventure while Sam stayed with Owen and Laney back to the hotel for naptime. Our destination was the Art Institute of Chicago. Unfortunately, that happened to be the day of the big storm. The weather was miserably cold, the wind was blowing and we were getting slammed with hail and snow, oh and we had a 1.2 mile walk. At one point, with his jacket zipped to the top, Spencer pulled his hat over his eyes and I led him with one hand and protected my face from the ferocious hail with the other. In hindsight, we should have taken a cab, but it was one of those situations where I kept thinking it was just up one more block. Anyway, as we approached the museum we discover a line, a long line, outside - in the snow. By this time, our feet were wet and coats were saturated. I didn't have a hat and the neck of my coat was filled with snow. We decided to wait in the line and see how fast it was moving. It was one of those lines that just as you were about to give up there would be a big advance and hope would be restored. We waited for at least 45 minutes and made it though the door, only to find that after the ticket line, we had to get into another line to check our coats. Not one complaint from Spencer the entire time though. We unzipped Spencer's dry fleece lining from his wet coat, turned it over to the clerk and headed into the museum.

It was magical and a day I will never forget. We walked around the museum hand in hand looking at the marble sculptures, famous paintings, furniture and talking about the different styles and artists. After an hour or so, we took a break in the cafe to refuel and decide what we really wanted to see in the time we had left. As we were sitting there, in between bites of his giant Oreo parfait, Spencer said that this was the best time he had ever had in Chicago. Not only was it validating, but at that moment I almost forgot that shoes were still wet and my toes numb. Spencer had found a small picture of a painting with a train on the museum map and decided that that was what he wanted to see.

We walked into that wing of the museum and he instantly recognizes a Picasso from playing Mr. Picasso Head. We wandered into another room and from there he saw the train painting - appropriately named Time Transfixed - and before I knew it he was off. He loved the painting even more in person. After taking it in, he found another Magritte nearby and instantly started to laugh. I showed him some of the Dali's, but, for him, it was the Magrittes. He loved them.

After pulling him away from the surrealist room, we wandered on to see some more Picasso's - he likes those too, just not as well.

The next stop, some of my favorites: Rodin, Van Gogh and Toulouse-Lautrec and by that time, we needed to go because we were meeting Sam, Owen and Laney for dinner at Frontera. We were able to squeeze in one more look at the Magritte and, as we were walking out to get our coats, Spencer said, "Mom, this was well worth the wait".

We stopped in the gift store to pick up a book on Magritte. You would have thought I just bought him a toy because when the man handed him the weather safe double bagged book, he was ready to open it up and have a look right then and there. As we waited for Sam and the kids in the restaurant, Spencer opened up his bag and looked though his new book, again, laughing. Crazy kid.

Hey Spencer, it was the best day I have ever had in Chicago too!