suddenly

After I cut Malakai's hair, he made a transformation. From sweet baby with the whispy curls to little boy with a big kid style. Oddly enough it seemed that his mannerisms also matured just as suddenly. The very next day he started handing me every little speck of dirt or shred of paper he found {where before it would go straight into his mouth}.

As the past week has progressed, so has his little boy behavior. On Monday he found his shoes and tried to put them on himself. He got frustrated so I offered my help. He gave me an enormous grin and proceeded to stomp around the dining room.

Later that evening I did something I used to do with my little sister. I pulled him around in the laundry basket by a robe belt. He LOVED it. I was getting exhausted, but every time I stopped he'd protest for more by bouncing and grunting at me. This lasted for a good 20 minutes.

While we were out running errands at one point in the week I was feeding him a snack and he was able to eat out of the bag fairly neatly. I tried again at home and he snacked away without turned it over once!

He's also been sleeping better. Tuesday was a struggle at first because Ben usually puts him to bed, but was at worship band practice. He went to bed late, but slept all night. He has put himself to sleep for bed and naps the past two days. 

{doesn't his bed look comfortable?}

Kai has always been curious, and that hasn't changed much. However, he has been more observant here and there where he usually touches + grabs things. He stood watching Ben practice guitar for nearly 10 minutes straight before trying out the knobs. 

I also recently just put away a bunch of his 12 month clothes already. While I was doing that, I noticed his winter jacket that we got for Christmas last year. He wasn't quite ready for an actual coat so we exchanged for what size we thought he could wear by the time winter came this year. It's 24 months, and he's not quiiiite there yet. 

We both really enjoyed finding that out. I was laughing pretty hard at his little legs peeking out of the bottom of this long jacket and he loves making mama laugh almost as much as daddy does. 

Guess there are still some things he's not ready for, and that's just fine with me.

Happy weekend!

P.S. please forgive me any typos, I'm typing this as Malakai is fighting a nap and don't have time to spell/grammar check.

Thankful on a Thursday: growing older

Earlier this week while unpacking Ben + I found our  pre-marital counseling workbooks. Late last night we were reading through them.

Some things made us chuckle.

Like one of Ben's rules: "If the bedroom is messy at least have places to walk on the floor. (aisles)"

Other things made me really reflect on how our relationship has changed and grown, and how it's stayed the same.

Another thing Ben wrote:

Plans we share for our future include: "Living in a house, having kids, possibly owning a house, marriage."

I jokingly said, "well I guess we can die happy now" since we've done all those things. Obviously it was only a joke. But in seriousness, even though we've dabbled in all of those things, most of them we are still new at {relatively speaking}.

We've been married for just over 3 years. It has been wonderful, but there's so much more ahead for us that I can't wait to see what God has planned. Same with parenthood. We've been daddy + mama to Malakai for almost 15 months and it's new every day.

We moved into a house {out of an apartment} in August of 2007, a month after we got married. We rented until last March when we bought our new home. It was an amazing feeling and we love owning our home. We're so excited to open it up to family + friends in the near future for a fairly late housewarming. We've got lots to do, and 90% won't be done by the time we have that open house, and that's okay.

We all know that growing older, moving forward, + just doing life is something that changes every day. In some ways it's so insignificant we can barely see the change until we look back and see how far we've come. Other times it's something so huge it disrupts everything as soon as it takes place.

All I know is that I love doing life with those that God has blessed me with. I love learning how to be a better wife, mother, sister, daughter, friend + especially a better follower of Christ. Even when it gets hard and especially in the moments that seem dark because there is so much to be learned in it. And because it's what makes the joys in life that much brighter.

This week I'm thankful for:

321. the way my husband makes me laugh.

322. watching Malakai transform into a walking, talking, "reading", pretending,   laughing, playing little toddler.

323. provision.

324. homemade blueberry muffins for breakfast- every morning this week.

325. change.

326. cool, crisp, sunny days + the leaves starting to turn.

327. a full fridge + pantry after a quick grocery shopping trip.

328. the dozens of comments Malakai gets from strangers whenever I take him anywhere.

329. my dream job.

330. growth.

Join us...

What are you thankful for this week?

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Mima

Somehow I missed posting about our last "swim" of the summer on Mima's birthday {my mom}, which was September 25th. The weather was beautiful, just a week after our rainy lake weekend. It got up to 80 degrees, but unfortunately the cold weather prior to that day made the inground pool a little dirty. So we broke out the kiddie pool... for Mima to cool off in the sun.

Then Malakai joined her. And G'Pa came out to play too.

Later we showered my mom with her birthday gifts.

Then we ate dinner. And someone was VERY tired. He spaced out like this, even while the family was having a very loud conversation in the kitchen a few feet away. 

It was a fun day of celebrating my mom + enjoying the last day out by the pool. 

Challah

Last week I was flipping through a cookbook I received at a White Elephant gift exchanged about 3 years ago, for the first time ever. It's called A Taste of Oregon and I was hoping to find something new to bake. When I stumbled across the Challah bread and realized I had all of the ingredients, I knew I had to try it.

Ben + I first had Challah bread when we lived near the University of Oregon and had walked down to a local natural foods market called Sundance. I grew up going there with my grandpa, who had lived in the home we were then renting from my parents. We really enjoyed it, so I thought I'd try recreating this bread on my own.


The ingredients:

2 packages dry yeast (approx. 4 1/2 teaspoons)
1/2 cup very warm water
2 Tablespoons granulated sugar
6 Tablespoons oil
1 1/2 cups warm water
3 eggs
2 teaspoons salt
7 cups all purpose flour
1 Tablespoon cold water
poppy seeds (optional)

I halved the recipe because I only had 2 eggs instead of the 3 it calls for, which worked out to 2 loaves instead of the 3 the recipe usually yields. I have a feeling that it would have made 3 very large loaves of bread! I'll explain the recipe with the full amount of ingredients though.

I started the first round of mixing up the dough to let it rise while Malakai napped.

Dissolve yeast in 1/2 cup very warm water, stirring in sugar to speed the yeast reaction. Let stand until bubbly. I wasn't sure what "bubbly" would look like because this was my first time working with yeast {crazy, right?} but I'd liken it to seafoam. haha.

Pour oil and 1 1/2 cups water into a large bowl. Add eggs, reserving 1 yolk for the top of the bread. Add salt also, mix well.

Add yeast mixture to the oil mixture. Stir in 4 cups of flour, then 3 more cups. Turn out onto a floured board and knead until smooth + elastic, about 5 minutes.

I hate this part...I've never enjoyed dough sticking to my hands. This dough is super sticky. I tried adding more flour to my hands, which didn't help. I rubbed a little olive oil on hands and that did the trick. I was able to knead the dough without the frustration of half of it sticking to my fingers.

Place in a greased bowl, turning over to grease top. Cover with a cloth and let rise in a warm place until doubled in bulk, about an hour. I gave mine about 90 minutes. I used 30 minutes of this to clean up the mess I had made.

I had used a wooden cutting board to knead the dough, needless to say it was a sticky mess when I was done. I used a plastic spatula {the kind for flipping pancakes, not the rubber kind} and scraped it all off. New uses for ordinary things, love it!

Next, punch down the dough , divide into 9 pieces {I did 6 since I made a smaller amount}. Roll pieces into 8-10 inch ropes. I did this part on a dough mat that I remembered I had as I was cleaning up the wooden cutting board...convenient, right?

Braid together 3 ropes to form 1 loaf. Repeat to form the other loaves and place on cookie sheets, allowing room to double. Mix the reserved egg yoke with 1 Tablespoon cold water and brush over loaves.

This is where I had to find another new use for something else. I don't own a pastry brush, but my husband's BBQ kit he got for our wedding {which was in 2007...and he just opened it...} had this!

It was interesting to use because it has the world's longest handle. Just in case you need to brush marinade on something from across the room? I don't know... but it worked just fine. 

Next, sprinkle with poppy seeds, if desired, and set in a warm place. I didn't have poppy seeds, but I sprinkled half a loaf with coarse sea salt, just as an experiment. 

Cover lightly, to rise again, for about another hour. I set it out to do this while I left to run errands with Malakai. Errands that ended up taking 2 and a half hours. whoopsie. Luckily the bread hadn't taken over too much of my kitchen and Ben put it in the oven when he beat me home. 

Bake at 375 degrees for 45 minutes {which I think was waaay too long, I would check at 30 minutes}. Loaves should sound hollow when tapped and look lightly browned. Turn out onto racks to cool. I don't have racks...so I let them cool on the cookie sheet. They only stuck a little bit.

The pieces with salt reminded me of a pretzel, but the flaky consistency of challah is more like a croissant. I think if I had taken them out sooner they would have been perfect + moist. Not too bad for my first time baking challah...actually, my first time baking any kind of bread!

Sadly, it was pretty stale by the next day. Fortunately, I found a good tip here, that Challah makes great french toast. Unfortunately, Ben hates french toast. More for me!

If you try out this recipe, let me know how it goes!