Coldstone's got nothin' on us!

So, at precisely 8:00 last night it started to snow, like first it wasn't there, then there were three inches out there. That kind of snow. Which out here in Colorado Springs goes by the name of "Spring Snow". It's still cold, it still fills up our driveway, and it still blows into huge drifts in the back yard, the only difference, as far as I can tell, is that it comes after the 21st of March and in far larger quantities than plain old winter snow (WTF?!).

Being that it is in fact spring, I decided to use this snow day as a spring cleaning day, after all, it is a "Spring Snow" Day. I rearranged the play room (also known as the front living room to those of you that don't have kids that necessitate an entire room full of toys) and did a good clean on it. Read: down on hands and knees scrubbing the scum off the base boards, and removing a build-up of crayon that seems to have spread beyond the dining room (A.K.A. the art room... My house is like one big homey classroom). The great thing about having a three year old daughter? You can convince her that the Magic Eraser really is magic and if she scrubs at stuff it's like being Cinderella (bonus points for having the costume on hand so she can truly dress the part). Maybe life with two really is getting easier.

Once I got bored with cleaning (and that didn't take long) we decided to use the "Spring Snow" to make Ice Cream ala Paula Deen. I remember doing this as a kid while babysitting in South Dakota and it being yummy and figured that if I could make it back then, now should be no issue... thankfully, I was right.

Now, I mentioned before that it was cold out there and I really didn't want to get all bundled up for the 15 foot trudge across the back yard for the snow that hasn't already been yellowed. So I sent my kid. She likes any excuse to put her boots on, also, please note her cooking apron since again, in the spirit of dressing the part and this was a kitchen activity, said apron must be worn.

She got two of the required eight cups of snow before I was bundled up to trudge the 15 feet. Dang It!

Add to the eight cups of snow, one can of Sweetened Condensed Milk and a teaspoon of vanilla...

...Stir, and serve.

Haley was all kinds of interested in stirring it, but when it came time to taste, she just couldn't get over the idea that it was made of snow, and I couldn't have paid her to try some. The Dude on the other hand LOVED it.

He loved it A LOT!

Ate it like I've never seen him eat ice cream (or maybe he just wanted to participate, his sister might not hold out on this forever). In the spirit of a snow day full of spring cleaning, we ate it straight from the bowl sitting on the floor. What was left we packaged into little Ziploc containers and we'll see how well it freezes and stores. Haley jumped back into things to help me take the containers and put them in the fridge.

Then it was time for the clean-up crew to go to work. Mission accomplished. It was super yummy and well worth keeping a can of sweetened condensed milk on hand in the future.

The Dude and his Boots

So about a week ago we got a package in the mail from Jeff's mom. It included lots of great things for the kids, but the biggest hit by far was this pair of dragon galoshes from The Children's Place.


To say that Kale loves them could quite possibly be the biggest understatement ever, EVER, E.V.E.R.! He wakes up and puts them over his footie jammies, then comes into our room in the morning, he will wear them all morning, including when we go to the gym, he takes them off for a nap, but as soon as the nap is over back on his feet they go, they're there through dinner, then when it's time for tubby and we get him all undressed, the boots go back on. I have photographic evidence of this, but feel like I have to draw the lines of inappropriate pictures somewhere, but rest assured, if you have a daughter about his age, she might one day see it. What? It's my right as his mother. In any case... His feet are rarely not clothed in dragon.

Throwing a tantrum on the floor... in his boots.

Playing with the bathroom chair (I refuse to call it a stool for obvious reasons based on it's location)... In his boots.

The Robersons are Cavity Free!

Today was the kids' first dentist appointment... EVER. This is pretty much right on time for the Dude, but Haley was probably a little bit behind. We took them to Dr. Erickson just up Powers from our house and what a great office! What I really liked about him from the get-go (aside from the fact that he went to UW for dental school - even if it wasn't WSU, he's still from the Northwest) is that he's a dual specialist, dentistry and orthodontics so in the future (if we're here that long) we'll only have to go to one office.

We got to the office and the kids were immediately at home, I mean they had a football chair for Kale and a princess one for Haley to sit in in the waiting room. Plus, they had books and Duplo blocks and if you know my kids, you'll know that there are few things in the world that make them happier than the latter and you sure won't find those other few things in a dentist's office.

We were called back to the exam area and Haley climbed right up and let her hygienist get right down to business, she even got to pick her tooth polish flavor (Raspberry). She happily laid there watching and laughing at cars with her mouth open "big as a house". This kid did so well it made me wonder if someone had secretly switched out kids (I knew someone had taken my well behaved Haley and switched her with some kid with broken listening ears, I just knew it). She even let them floss her... WHAT?! I know you're jealous!

Watching Cars during her cleaning.

Then it was time for her to have x-rays taken. I'd heard horror stories about kids having them done at the dentist's office and freaking out so I was kind of apprehensive, but once again, she totally surprised me. I stood at the doorway (since The Man wasn't allowed in), but she got to play dress-up in a lead vest while they took pictures of her newly cleaned and shiny teeth! She kept wanting to spit it out, but once she understood what they wanted her to do, she was on it. As a reward she got to pick out a new Dora toothbrush - she chose pink.

Pictures of her clean and shiny teeth.

How did Dude-a-Man do? Not so much. He doesn't really like people touching his teeth, let alone strangers, in a new place so it just wasn't going to happen. He did decide that they were good people though when they gave him a new blue and green toothbrush with Dora on it (Diego too, but I had to put my foot down on him picking a pink or purple one with just Dora on it).

Showing you his new toothbrush.

Showing you how to use his new toothbrush.

Then Dr. Erickson came back and counted Haley's teeth - turns out he didn't know how to count very well so Haley had to help him... she has 20 teeth. He also looked at her x-rays and said that we're likely to have some crowding problems when her adult teeth come in (I guess it's genetic as Jeff had the same issues). He painted on some fluoride stuff that tasted like Cherries, she wasn't too sure about this, but it tasted too good not to let him finish. He was impressed with the fact that she uses a spin brush and said as soon as she's willing, we can start her with a Sonicare.

Dr. Erickson counting Haley's teeth.

Then it was Kale's turn. He gave me two options, not examine him, or examine him and let him scream. We decided that he was too young to remember this and since Jeff and I have no problems going to the dentist we might as well just let him scream, this is something you just have to do. I held The Dude on my lap and leaned him back so his head was on the dentist's knee and we went to town. Counted his teeth, checked for cavities, and also painted the fluoride on his teeth too. Painting on the fluoride I believe went like this in Kale's head: "AAHHHH!!! Oh, that's tastes really good! Oh yeah, I'm angry! AAHHHH!!! But it tastes so good! But AAHHHH!!" There are no pictures of this because 1) I was holding him and couldn't take any because it took both my hands to hold his down, and 2) we're just not going to remember that part of the dentist's visit. Our only concern with Kale is that teeth tend to create their enamel between 12 and 18 months and one of the things that can interrupt that is the use of antibiotics. Kale's first major ear infection was at 12 months and he was on antibiotics pretty consistently after that up until he got tubes, soooo.... it's a wait and see game, but we have to watch him closely and likely we'll have to deal with it as he gets older.

But the best part of the whole visit (for me)? NO CAVITIES!! For the kids? They gave them presents... a squirt toy, a new Dora toothbrush, flossing toys... DUH! And we get to do this all over again in September (hopefully The Man will figure things out by then).