Halloween!!

Halloween weekend and trick-or-treat were especially great this year, because my mom was here for all the fun. I am not one of those people who gets all crazy over Halloween, but it is definitely more fun with a little one to dress up in costume!! This year, I also decided to take an old Waters family tradition and kick it up a notch.

For reasons I can't entirely explain, before heading out to trick-or-treat, my parents fed my brothers and me hot dogs, apple cider, and doughnuts. I understand that the hot dogs were just a way to get dinner on the table quickly before it was time to head out on our candy quest... but the addition of sugary doughnuts on such an already sugar-infused evening is, in retrospect, a little troubling. Nevertheless, tradition is tradition, and eating doughnuts on Halloween just feels right.

I'd never made homemade doughnuts before. So this was the perfect opportunity. We did the doughnuts on Saturday night, since trick-or-treat was on a Monday and the doughnut making was a somewhat time consuming process. Tradition had to suffer in the name of scratch-made-yumminess, but it was so worth it!!!

This is Crisco. Oh yes.

This is the dough frying up into a lovely, shortening-inspired shade of golden brown.

The finished product - half in an apple cider glaze, half coated in cinnamon sugar. Upon tasting, the glaze emerged as the clear victor.

More doughnuts than three adults and one small child could ever eat in one sitting (the leftovers were happily consumed over the next few days). Not to worry, we also had a veggie frittata to offset some of the artery-clogging sugar high.

Click for the recipe: Apple Cider Doughnuts. My little tips - (1) go for the shortening over vegetable oil. The recipe explains that shortening results in a less greasy-tasting doughnut because, unlike oil, the shortening becomes solid again once the doughnuts cool. (2) Ensure that the dough spends enough time in the freezer before you try to cut them out, and then again before you plop the doughnuts in the hot shortening. The dough is incredibly sticky, so it'll just stick to the pan and fall apart if it's not cold enough. (3) If you do cinnamon sugar, only coat one side - coating the entire doughnut was overkill. (4) It's really not as hard as you think it'll be - the whole frying part might be a little intimidating, but it is so, so worth it - the freshest doughnuts you'll ever eat!

Alright, moving on to trick or treat night!!! Several months ago, Lily decided that she wanted to be a pirate, and, surprisingly, she stuck to that decision. Given our ample prep time, she was ready with her pirate phrases - "shiver me timbers," "arrrr, matey," "swashbuckling," and "walk the plank!" I also managed to put together/sew portions of her costume without resorting to those awful store-bought ensembles (with a little help from Grandma, who bought the white shirt, and Grammy, who provided the hat).

We decided to go trick-or-treating out in Southern Pines, where Dave lives, which is a nice town about 35 minutes away with a non-military feel. It turned out to be a great decision, because the all and we had a beautiful fall night. Dave cooked us a great dinner of homemade broccoli soup and three types of grilled cheese sandwiches (way to impress my mom, Dave!!), and then we got Lily all dressed up:

Before we hopped in the car to find a good trick-or-treat spot we snapped a few photos:

Lily was so excited!!! At the first house we went to, when the people there opened the door, she said "Trick or Treating!!" It was very cute. And she of course remembered to say "thank you."

Unfortunately, the second house we went to was wayyy too scary. They had their yard all set up with smoke machines, a kid dressed as a skeleton hiding in the bushes, and these noise machines that made loud "PSSSHHHHHHT" noises, which scared Lily to death. After we got away from all that, she said she was done trick or treating and wanted to go home. We persuaded her to keep going, but before every house she said "is this a scary one? Please don't take me to any more bad houses, mommy." But then after we got candy from a house, she said "that was a nice house." She ended up having a blast and we walked for almost the whole two hours - she didn't ask to be carried even once!

A great Halloween, all in all. Although that night as I was tucking her in, she started talking about the scary house again - she said "that scary house made a pssshhhht noise. I didn't like it." It obviously made quite an impression, as she brought it up regularly for the next week or so. Lesson learned - should have turned right back around instead of pushing on through that house!

Her "mean pirate face"

Fall Fun with Grandma

After our weekend at the cabin, my dad headed back up to Ohio and my mom stayed with Lily and me for the rest of the week. Yay!!

I had a jump that week, and I was so glad that my mom was here for that - she hasn't actually gotten to see me jump before. It worked out pretty great - the aircraft was taking off from the drop zone, and the weather was great, so my mom and Lily came out and could hang out with me as I waited to get ready. I was pulling Assistant Jumpmaster duty on the jump, so I was busy, but because we got delayed quite a bit (as my fellow paratroopers know, this is fairly inevitable), I had some time to snap some photos with Lily, both before and after getting all rigged up.

We were supposed to jump at around noon, but due to aircraft issues, we didn't jump until almost 4pm!! Lily was a trooper - she usually takes a nap at around 1, but she didn't want to leave until she saw mommy jump. They got to watch us all walk out to the aircraft, load up, and then watch as we jumped out. I believe I'm the last one on the right in this photo:

It was a wonderful day for a jump, and I had a nice, soft landing. In spite of that, I somehow managed to pull a muscle in my neck upon exiting, and so for the next few days I was awkwardly unable to turn my head to the left. It was actually pretty painful. That's the first time I've had that happen on a jump, and hopefully the last!!

To complete the Army experience, my mom tried on my fully loaded ruck sack. She wasn't fan. Of course, neither am I.

It was so great having my mom here all week. We had plenty of time for playing tag and hide and seek:

And we made pancakes on the weekend, to include a special "L" shaped pancake for Lily :-)

I took Lily to a birthday party that weekend, and she had a great time playing with the other kids. They pretended that this swing contraption was an airplane, and that they were jumping out of it!!! Gotta love a bunch of Army kids!

They had cute little owl cupcakes, which Lily thought were cool but didn't really eat. I managed to help her out with the eating part.

Before my mom left, she got to see Lily in action on Dave's skateboard. Every time Dave comes over, she asks him if he brought it!! She just loves getting on with him and going fast. (I just hold my breath...)

Yep, it was a great week. I wish my mom could have stayed longer!! I am definitely looking forward to the next visit. We miss you, Grandma!!!!!

Catching up

Things have been a little crazy lately, so I hope you'll excuse the lack of blog posts. I've been slammed at work with a suddenly large amount of separation boards and courts-martial, to include a contested court-martial that starts this Wednesday (though I'm only the assistant trial counsel on that one, thank goodness). This is combined with Lily's dad getting a new job which involves even longer hours and even more travel than before. So.... I haven't had a whole lot of time to blog.

But - Lily's dad picked Lily up last night and will have her for most of today. This means I get a whole day to myself. Do you hear that, folks?? A whole. Entire. Day. Of course I've got some trial work to do, but first I'm sitting around in my pajamas, drinking coffee, and blog-writing. Later I'll go for a nice run (outside!! Not on the treadmill during nap time!!) in this beautiful weather we're having.

So, while I am working on and will post soon about all the stuff going on lately (like Halloween and my mom visiting) - right now I'll share a few pictures from this long weekend.

On Friday evening, while Lily and I took a walk, we looked up at the stars and Lily said "how can we get up there? We need a spaceship." So I suggested we build one. With some couch cushions, pillows, chairs, and a blanket - voila, we were ready for blast off!

The cool thing about home-made spaceships is that they can be almost anything. It turned into an ice cream shop, whose specialty flavor was Bubblegum. Then it was a tent, to hide from the scary Mommy monster.

Friday night we also watched "The Land Before Time" - it's the first time I'd seen it since I was a kid, and I remember loving that movie. Lily liked it, although the part with Littlefoot's mom dying was sad and hard to explain. Lily's favorite movie of the moment is "Lightning McQueen" (meaning Cars), so at least it was nice to get a break from that one.

Thanks to Lily spending yesterday evening with her dad, I finally got to cook Dave his birthday dinner. Almost a whole month late!! But, due to Dave studying for the GMAT and me not having a night without Lily, it's been hard to squeeze it in. Dinner turned out pretty darn good, so I want to share some recipes.

We started with some creamy mushroom soup, with blue cheese toasts - really great - if you like mushrooms you ought to try out this recipe!

http://smittenkitchen.com/2007/01/superlatively-souper/

The blue cheese toasts are just thin slices of baguette with blue cheese on top, popped in the oven for a few minutes.

We were so eager to start eating it that I forgot to take a picture before a few bites were taken.... I'm no food photographer but I swear it looked more delicious in person!

Since my normal cooking style is more seafood, fish, and veggie-centric, I decided to go meat-and-potatoes for a change. What is not to like about caramelized onions and beef braised in red wine until it's falling apart?? Yum.

And the best part - carrot cake!!! I love carrot cake, Dave loves carrot cake - so I was really excited to make one. This recipe is out of this world:

http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/best-carrot-cake-10000000257583/

- it involves pouring a buttermilk glaze over the cake layers when they come out of the oven, so the cake is incredibly moist and delicious. The only change I made was adding some golden raisins, which I think are essential to a good carrot cake. I topped it off with a cream-cheese icing (more cream-cheesy than sweet) and some broiled coconut.

Doesn't get much better than that!!

Happy Veteran's Day weekend..... more posts to come!!

Cabin, part 3

Finally getting around to the last pictures from our weekend at the cabin. We took a nice long walk in the woods - and Lily found a "walkin stick."

We made our way to the creek, and Lily had a lot of fun playing there. This place is a kid's paradise!

In the afternoon, we drove to Mabry Mill, an old mill off the Blue Ridge Parkway in Virginia. It was really pretty! And it was neat to see how an old mill worked.

They had a bluegrass band, and Lily had a great time dancing to the music. She was shy at first, but then she got going and was dancing like crazy! I couldn't get the video to load here, but you can check it out on my Facebook page.

The little girl in the pigtails kept trying to dance with Lily, but Lily was apparently in the bluegrass dancing zone and didn't stop for a second.

It was a great weekend!!

Cabin, part 2

Here are some pictures from our second day at the cabin. The weather was nice!!

Ed came back out and brought his two boys with him, to take us around some more. We piled into the truck (I sat in back with the kids!) and set out....

We collected some corn to feed the animals. Lily loved looking for the ears of corn, it was kind of like a scavenger hunt.

We filled up the back of the truck....

We fed the pigs first, and it was fun watching them eat. They eat it in neat rows. Then we took the rest to the horses. The horses ate the entire cob, with a loud crunch, crunch, crunch. Lily wasn't too sure about those big horses, but she did feed some corn to one.

We went back to the cabin and got ready to go fishing. We showed Lily how to put the worm on the hook ... she wanted nothing to do with that! (I wasn't too eager to get involved, either, to be honest). She liked holding the fishing poll and got so excited when she caught the first fish!

But, when the fish came flopping out of the water, she was a little freaked out - we couldn't even get her to stand close enough for a picture!! Oh well, it was a lot for a three-year-old.

After Lily had her nap, we took the rowboat out on the lake. We rowed and sang a few rounds of "Row, row, row your boat." Lily really liked helping Grandpa row.

Cabin, part 1

This past weekend, my parents met Lily and me for a fun getaway a little ways north of Greensboro, NC. A coworker of mine recently built a cabin, and he and his family generously offered it to us for the weekend. The cabin was so great - cute, cozy, and no TV or electronic communication (other than a landline telephone!) - but I think the surrounding 400 acres were even better! Here is the view from the back porch of the cabin:


We were lucky to have the perfect weekend. Warm, sunny days, fall foliage emerging, and chilly nights perfect for sitting around a fire.

The first day out there, we explored the nearby pond and dock. Lily blew bubbles and just about chased the bubbles into the pond:

We climbed big rocks!! (Lily says "I'm the king of the mountain!!")

And we found lots of different nature stuff to play with.

Later in the day, we found a swing tucked away in the woods. Lily loved it!!!

Ed (my coworker who owns the cabin) stopped by on Friday afternoon to show us around a little bit. He and I set out on four-wheelers. Believe it or not, I didn't ride too many four-wheelers growing up in the suburbs of Ohio, so it was a new experience!! We rode all over the place, and it was a lot of fun. Then we swung back by the cabin and Lily hopped on with me for a little (slow) ride back up to the barn where they are stored.

Ed set us up with the "ranger" - an all-terrain vehicle with a little bit more seating, so we could all explore together. There is a farm on the property that has pigs, goats, chickens, horses, and cows - we took the ranger up to see the pigs and goats!

The goats were "fainting goats" - when they get scared they stiffen up and fall over!! When Ed and I went up there, he was able to chase one and make it faint, but then when my parents and Lily were there, we ran around like idiots chasing and yelling at the goats and couldn't get either of them to faint!

Here's the truck we drove around - I think my dad liked driving it:

That night, we built a fire in the fire pit outside and cooked hotdogs and s'mores.

Lily really likes roasted marshmallows :-)

We really enjoyed sitting by the fire in the chilly weather, and looking up at the beautiful view of the stars so far away from any cities!! I'll post more soon on the rest of our weekend....