Mid July Update

Last Thursday night Nichole got a call to go babysit two families at one time - in one house, a total of seven kids. We suggested that Kristine go along to help, which the mother thought was a great idea. She also asked to have Zoe come over because their kids loved Zoe, but we decided to decline that offer. Seven kids were a handful for Nichole and Kristine but they worked well together and had a great time. They were amazed how quick seven kids could put away three bags of microwave popcorn, leaving Nichole and Kristine with one small bowl to share. The night was not without its excitement because Nichole had to deal with broken glass.

Penni went to bed at her normal 8 pm and I stayed up to wait for the babysitters to get home. At about 9:30 Penni yelled from her upstairs bedroom “are the girls home yet?” which I replied “no” then Penni came to the stairs and asked to have them come say goodnight to her because she couldn’t go to sleep until they were home. To which I replied “then why don’t you come down and wait and I will go to bed, because I have no problem going to sleep” to which I got an inaudible response and she turned and went back into her bedroom. So at 10:15 the girls came home and I sent them up to Penni's room to say good night. Penni does this all the time, you go up to say goodnight and you find her fast asleep, you go up to the side of her bed and say “I am home” to which you are greeted to Penni popping her head up and giving you a quick/loud scream. How I have fun is sending the girls up to say goodnight and then waiting 15 seconds for the scream.

Home Cook’n

Penni gave me an awesome cookbook from my favorite cooking show for my birthday. The best part has been that she has been cooking with it and turning out some great food. Not that she has been a bad cook, I don’t want that read the wrong way but our dinners have definitely been taken up a notch. I came home one night and Kristine said that mom had made some great chicken on the grill and that it was better than the chicken you make Dad. The chicken was good but ….let’s not go crazy.

Also Penni has been trying to use all of the meat in our freezer. So she has been planning meals around what we have on hand instead of going to the store. On Saturday Penni asked me to cook some ribs. I have done ribs about five times and haven’t been really happy with the results. Penni did the last batch in her pressure cooker and they turned out really good, so she is the house rib cooking champion. So the pressure has been on me to turn out some great ribs. So on Saturday I spent five hours cooking ribs and I am glad to say that they finally turned out. I cooked them the right time and with the right wood. So we sit down to eat dinner, I am looking for feedback. Nichole has a preteen moment and says that she won’t eat the ribs because she doesn’t like ribs, then on the other end of the table we have Kristine that is getting carried away with how great the ribs are and how they fall off the bone and so forth. I couldn’t tell if Penni liked them are not (she worked and had a long day), she ate two but Kristine was driving her nuts carrying on and on about the ribs (you know sucking the marrow off the bones and sauce all over her face). But that was the feedback I was looking for. I thought that it was funny - but I like it over the top. So I had one that loved them, one that didn’t and one that was neutral or just tired. So I had one person left – the Zmaster, I looked at the end of the table and she had barbeque sauce on one cheek and sour cream from the baked potato on the other cheek. I asked her about the ribs and she said that the ribs were good so I felt great. She had previous said before we ate that it smelled like my beef jerky – which she hates the smell of. I told Penni that I was ready for a rib throw down.

At Sunday dinner Penni leaned over to me and said that my ribs were great and better than hers. I responded by saying – Are you just saying that because you don’t want to do a throw-down? She said maybe – but your ribs were really good.