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Berry Madness

One of the best parts of Brittney's massive yard is the berries! I only caught the tail-end of the strawberry season, but I was super excited about the fact that the back corner of her yard is crammed with raspberry bushes! I love raspberries! Can there be anything more exciting than pulling them off the bush and cramming them in your mouth? As a scientist, I postulate that it would be hard to beat!

 
 

Thomas, however, was not quite so sure what the red thing his momma pulled off of the bush was and why was she encouraging him to eat...? 

 
 

After carrying it around for about 5 minutes and pretending to put it in his mouth, he finally got brave enough to eat it.  And he loved it! I guess you can't fight genetics. :)

 
 

Soon enough, the little guy was helping by trying to pick the berries with us. Of course, he was much better at smushing them, but his enthusiasm was certainly appreciated. Look at the haul of berries we (Mom, me, Brittney, Holly & Thomas) managed to pick! 

 
 

We enjoyed some of them right away on some amazing  Lemon Buttermilk Sorbet that we had made earlier that day. If you have an ice cream maker, take the time to make the easiest sorbet ever - you won't regret it. 

 
 

And what else does one do with a ton of leftover raspberries? Make jam, of course! It was quite delicious on the French Toast I made the next morning. The growing season might be short up here in Alaska, but I sure do appreciate the produce while it is here! :) 

When You Mention Craziness...

When you mention the "craziness that is life" on your tag-line, it shouldn't really come as a surprise when life hits one of those crazy times. For me, that's been the last two months and I went into full "hunker down and power through this" mode. But now, the time has come to breathe easy again and go back to keeping people updated!

So what happened, exactly? I'll give the short version as I tend to ramble on about most things...

I quit my job of seven years in Houston and moved up to Alaska to start a new job.

Brittney and Duncan took me into their home and Brittney practically gave me her to use most days (before mine arrived and now so mom has mine)!

I came back to Texas after two weeks to fetch Tommy and my mom joined us in Alaska to watch Tommy.

Matt stayed behind to finish projects at his job and sell the house. (He did the single dad thing with Tommy for a week, then my parents had a week to spoil him!)

Matt will be driving up with the dogs after his motorcycle trip in mid-September & his dad is road-tripping with him.

We have to find a new house!

I'm going to need more winter clothes!!

That's the bare bones of it. It was the hardest decision I've ever made to leave a company I really liked, but it was an amazing opportunity to move to a state we fell in love with during a back-packing trip in 2008. And life is short, so if it turns out we were crazy, oh well! Now that Tommy is up here, the updating should pick back up, the two weeks without him I was pretty unmotivated to do much updating. He's a much more interesting subject than most of the mundane settling in I was doing.

And so far, I think he likes Alaska! :)


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Birthday Yummies!

Since Heather came down for her birthday, she got to choose the birthday food. Not surprisingly when I told her about our new Porterhouse cooking method, she wanted to try that! And since she had given us enough warning, we decided to go the extra mile and dry age the steaks for a few days. 

If you're curious if dry aging really can make a steak taste better, the answer is yes. Definitely yes. You should go try it right now. I'll wait. ;) 

We also learned that you really shouldn't let your lump charcoal get rained on. It looked dry when we started the chimney up, but the moisture inside of the pieces would explode out in a shower of sparks. Matt managed to keep anything from catching on fire, but it was quite the firework show! 

 
 

And of course, there had to be yummies for dessert! I promised her Nutella cupcakes last year, but it never actually happened (I blame having a 2 month old!). But this year I was determined to make them happen. These cupcakes are not the easiest or fastest ones I've ever made (quite possibly the opposite!) But incredibly delicious!

Heather approved of the birthday yummies, so I'm calling it a success!  Of course this means I'll have to find some way to top it next year... ; )

Life's a Beach!

By Wednesday, Thomas was mostly recovered - just in time for his Aunt Heather to show up for a long weekend. Her birthday was on Friday and she decided that she would rather spend it with "the cutest nephew ever" than anyone else. (Can't say I blame her!) Mom and Dad came in Friday night and we all packed up Saturday morning and headed to the beach at Galveston. Technically Thomas has been to the Galveston beach before, but I think he was only 4 months and not terribly sure what was going on...

 
 

This time he was ready for fun! Mom and I failed to communicate prior to the trip and both ended up buying a bunch of beach toys, so I think we had the most prepared beach toy arsenal of anyone on the beach. Since we went to Stewart (the beach we went to *all* the time as kids), I even paid for us to have beach umbrella and chairs. I was more worried about Thomas getting sunburned than the rest of us. (And it showed - I got sunburned and he was fine!)

Not surprisingly, it wasn't actually Thomas who did all the sand castle building: 

 
 

I even helped - look at the awesome sand mold I found when I went a little crazy buying him beach toys!  How could I resist that??

After a snack break, we finally coaxed him down to the water.  As long as he was with me, he didn't care about the size of the waves, but once I handed him off to mom - he had a different opinion about even the small ones!

After splashing around in the ocean for awhile, we went back to the shade and Thomas found something even more exciting that a big ocean...! A plastic bucket filled with water!! 

You take the boy to see a ocean and he crawls into the plastic bucket of water. Yup - he's obviously has my genetics... crazy kid! 

And Again...

Things were looking so well. We had our happy healthy kid back again:

 
 

Then Sunday night Matt woke me up to tell me that Thomas felt warm. Another fever?? The next morning when he woke up I could tell as soon as I picked him up that he was burning up again. So Matt got to stay home with him and take him to the pediatrician's office.  

As an aside to this, we finally gave in and took him to an ENT since a lot of these fevers have been caused by ear infections. He has had more than the recommended 4 in 6 months, so we went to get a consultation on his ear situation. The verdict  - his left ear is completely full of fluid and the right one is "slow" to respond to a pressure test, but it responds. The left is blocked to the equivalent of having an ear plug in it. We decide that ear tubes are the way to go and they book us for surgery on July 25th... July 25th?!? He'll have 3 more infections by then! Argh!

So we're on the cancellation wait list.  And of course they call Monday. I get all excited that we will finally have this taken care of. We just will get the all-clear from our pediatrician that this ear infection won't interfere. Yay!

 
 

Except it's not *just* an ear infection. It's an ear infection and a bronchial infection. No way we are getting a surgery on Wednesday. Matt texted me a photo of Thomas sitting in his lap at the doctor's office with Thomas in the nebulizer mask. Is he trying to make me cry in a work meeting? Luckily Thomas didn't seem to mind the mask and it had a huge impact in only a few days.

On the follow up appointment today, our pediatrician said this is the best his ears have ever looked - they are actually fluid free! So who knows if it was the right antibiotics or the nebulizer somehow helped. I'm just glad my little guy is back to his usual self. Sleeping like a champ!  

It Was A Rough Week

Warning - Not for the faint of stomach or those who are eating...!

My parents stayed a half day on Monday because Thomas had developed a case of diarrhea Sunday. It was bad enough to deal with that, but it was super smelly too! At one particularly bad diaper change, I just opened the window in his room and threw everything out on the driveway instead of carrying it through the house to the laundry room. Very nasty stuff.

Obviously he couldn't go to daycare and potentially get them all sick! 

Nope, it was much easier to keep him home where he could get us all sick. That's right, my son, whom we all love and care for sooooo much - got all four of us really, really sick. Everyone got varying degrees of it - I think Mom and Matt tied for who was worse off. I think the last stomach bug that he gave me helped keep me out of the worst category, but all of us had varying degrees of nausea to outright throwing up. Can I just say that throwing up seems way worse as an adult? Really could do without that for the rest of my years. I'm just saying.

 

My son, the harbinger of nasty stomach bugs. ..

 

I think this morning was the first time all week that I felt like myself again. Of course, Matt had to work until 2am that morning, so Thomas and I hung out and tried our best to be quiet so he could sleep in. How could you stay mad at such a cute little germ factory?

 

He's attacking me with the chair in this photo in case it's unclear. ; )

 

Thanks to the bug, I missed out on making Brittney her awesome birthday dinner the day she flew into town. It killed me to cancel it, but I figured she would prefer to spend her time in Houston without getting sick. So considerate, I know!  

After I missed seeing her, it sounded like there was a small chance she might be able to come by another night that week. So I did what any good friend would do - I sanitized the heck out of everything I could. All of the soft toys went in the wash. All of the hard toys got sanitized. And I sprayed or wiped down everything else I could. It seemed to work - she didn't get sick when she stopped by.

So Casa de Hoyt is back to normal for now. Given our recent history it may not be our last battle with a bug, but hopefully he'll stop picking so many up or we'll start to be more immune. (One can only hope!) 

Happy Strawberry Rhubarb Pie Day!

Last weekend, we had great plans of working on the yard since it was mostly destroyed / neglected during the house reconstruction. It quickly became obvious that it would be impossible for both of us to work on it unless Thomas was asleep. The little guy has gotten very mobile and is very curious - meaning someone must have eyes on him at all times. So this weekend, I got smart and called in the cavalry (aka my parents!).  

 

Thomas was super excited to see them, especially since they brought him such colorful toys to play with!

 
 

He showed off his mad balance skills for them. He's had that skateboard since he was about a week old. First time to stand on it and he was super excited. It's only a matter of time before he has it in motion...

 
 

Awesome bed head - he comes by it honestly. Most of my baby photos look like this. (My parents would like to add that he should be screaming to look exactly like me... Har har...)

 

Sodding the Yard

 

This part is more of a patch job. There used to be a tree here & now there is a hole. We have to fill in the hole and then sod over it. This part got delayed because Matt found another huge root he had to pull out.

 
 

Mom & Thomas in the back yard - this was by far the biggest impact. It went from bare dirt to a beautiful carpet of green grass in no time! That's the best part about sod - instant gratification!

 
 

More sod in the side yard. It was between plants & mulch and sod. So we went with sod and potted plants we can scatter in the grass if we so desire. I love my Black Eyed Susan's - they were getting upset last week, but seem pretty happy in their new pot.

 
 

Ok, so you can't really see the front beds & their new plants all that well, but... How cute in my mom in this photo?? Thinks she likes her grandson much? ; )

 

And Finally Pie...!

Best part of having extra people around to watch Thomas? I can bake! Both of my parents can be bribed with baked goods, so they were more than happy to support the Strawberry Rhubarb Pie Day celebration efforts!

Pie!! You might notice the pie is a little flat looking - certain individuals refused to wait the proper cooling time before sampling, so a lot of the filling ran out. I had to wait for it to cool and try to do some tidying up to get a good photo. But it was as delicious as it looks.

What's that you say? You see something off to the left? Oh, that's just Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookies, NBD. ; )

 

Busted! I had to fight dad off long enough to get a good photo of the pie, but as soon as I was done, he swooped in to claim the spoils. He more than approved of both baked goods. :)

 

Flare It Up!

Theresa got me into photography (again!) by getting an awesome camera last year - which then led to Matt getting me the same awesome camera!   So the two of us are learning as we go on the tips and tricks to making better photos. We certainly have different styles, she is an "Aperture Always Wide Open" kind of shooter and I'm a more "Change Up Everything and See What Happens". Both styles have their advantages and disadvantages. Add on to that we have one lens in common and one different, well we're bound to notice some differences.

Thus the Flare. Theresa has been trying to get Lens / Sun Flar in her photos. I'm not that into it, so I figured she would figure it out and let me know. Apparently, she's decided to toss that ball in my court...

So I googled it some today and made an attempt at it:

 

Ok, I can kinda see the draw to the flare when it's highlighting my cute little guy...!

 

There are a few tricks from the article I read that I found to be super helpful! 

First - line your subject up so there is a line between camera, subject and sun. Easier said than done with a crawling baby and a yard I can't use because it just got doused the previous day in fertilizer. So the porch was our only option!

Second- the better the lens, the harder it will be. My Prime lens really struggled to flare, but my zoom lens had no problem - the extra glass in the zoom might have helped as well.

Third - close the aperture! I was on the high end of the f-stop. That first picture was f-20. So, I can see why Theresa might have had so problems with it.

Fourth - take the lens hood off. My zoom doesn't have a hood, so it didn't really matter. But the article said to do it, so I did take it off for the Prime. 

Lastly - you have to move around to line the light up with the right spot in your lens to catch a flare. I was laying on the porch shooting up toward the sun. If you can't see the flare, the camera won't see it either. I may have almost blinded myself a few times getting it right...

I think these photos are more flare than I would usually try to get in a photo, but it was more about the "can I?" than the "make it perfect!" 

 
 

And obviously, it's much easier to do when your subject isn't moving all over. I had to manually focus the camera on Thomas because the sun kept throwing the sensor off. Was much easier when he didn't move too much...

All that to say, Theresa it isn't really your fault. The next photo was the best I could do with the Prime lens. Maybe you can get some flare next time I show up on your doorstep if I simply hand over my zoom lens! ; )

 
 

Not the Only One With New Hobbies...

Thomas has new hobbies too. The most prevalent of which is removing things from shelves and drawers. Basically the opposite of cleaning... 

 
 
 
 

At least he seems to be a little bit interested in helping clean the house as well - though those events are much fewer and further between... ; )  

 
 

Memorial Day Weekend

Since this weekend was memorial day, it was a three day weekend - that kind of awesome only happens a few times a year, so we definitely took advantage of it! It really wasn't that adventurous, but we managed to pack a lot of fun into it. The only downside to the weekend, was that Thomas had a fever when I picked him up from daycare on Friday… Apparently that ear infection is not going away. We have a follow-up appointment on Friday, I would not be surprised if he ends up having to get ear tubes. :(

But back to the fun stuff of the weekend!

​First order of the weekend was Springfest! Which meant getting up early, shopping for BBQ supplies, hanging out in the heat and letting people critique my beer. It was awesome! Mostly because everyone liked my Hef!

​First order of the weekend was Springfest! Which meant getting up early, shopping for BBQ supplies, hanging out in the heat and letting people critique my beer. It was awesome! Mostly because everyone liked my Hef!

 
 

​Thomas liked having a huge open space to run around in. Of course, he generally went for the picnic table or concrete fire pits that could hurt him, but overall is was a pretty low danger area and there were two of us to keep an eye on him...

​Thomas made a ton of friends mostly because they all wanted to ride in his sweet wagon. Any new or future parents take note - this wagon is awesome!

​And passed out in the wagon. The heat finally lulled him to sleep for a little while until he was back in action. Seriously, *best* *wagon* *ever*.

​When we got home, we decided to break in the "swimming" pool, he had a grand time splashing around. Even if it doesn't look like it here - Matt took the photo when he first got in and I wasn't pulling my camera back out once he started going crazy with the splashing! ; )

​Sunday we decided to tackle the back yard. Thomas tried to help by feeding Natalie... Natalie actually tried to eat what he was giving her, but dirt isn't really her thing.

So I recently discovered that adding spaghetti sauce to Thomas' food will make him chow down like nothing else. Unless of course, he's overly tired and then nothing makes him happy. This is quite possibly the best mad face I have gotten of him to date. Is it bad the mad face makes me giggle? ​

​Steak Time!


And a perfect end to the weekend was our new steak cooking method we (of course) learned from an Alton Brown episode. So we bought a new/bigger charcoal chimney from Home Depot and the proper hard lump charocal. Then I went and got a fabulous looking 24 oz Porterhouse from Whole Foods. Then after a 1 hour warm up for the steak and 15 minute light for the charcoal - it was grilling time!

But it's an AB method, so it can't be something ordinary like cooking the steak on the grill! Nope, the steak goes under the chimney for 1.5 minutes on each side. See it getting all seared and lovely under there??​

Oh baby... Come to momma! ​

I know this one is blurry, but you get the drift. After the 3 minutes under the chimney, you move the grate up top and cook it for an additional minute per side under an upside down metal bowl.​ (Forgot the bowl, had to improvise - will be buying a bowl!)

Seriously, this was the best steak we have made to date. I think most of it was paying for a good piece of meat and then just not messing it up. Next time we're going to try dry aging it - possibly the only way to improve on it! :)