The mall the nearest our home has built one of those indoor rubberized playgrounds, so during the winter we have made several trips there so Jack can have a good time and burn off some of that pent up energy. Since we didn’t have Emily with us last week, we were able to get out more easily, and Thursday we made it to the playground. When it was within sight,...

The Columbus Metropolitan Library has been rated #1 in the nation for a number of years, and it really is one of the things that makes living in Columbus nice. I used to go to the downtown library pretty regularly before we moved to Chicago, but yesterday was the first time I’ve been down there since we moved back a year and a half ago. Every time I walk into...

I have made this chocolate cake recipe several times and it is a wonderfully rich chocolate cake. This last time, I shaved white chocolate over the top to make it pretty. I’m sure there’s a fancy tool for shaving chocolate, but I just used a vegetable peeler and it worked pretty well! The recipe is from the back of the Hershey’s Cocoa Powder...

Sometimes it’s interesting to see how people end up at your blog. My statistics program tells me what search terms people used that landed them on my site. Yesterday, someone googled ‘Post Toasties burn victim’ and paid me a visit as a result (I had mentioned Post Toasties and burn victims in two separate posts). What exactly was this person...

Fridge googling… well, I do more pantry googling than fridge googling.  But nonetheless, I’m glad to finally know what the appropriate term is for it. Fridge Googling is the practice of looking through the contents of your refrigerator to see what raw ingredients you can easily lay your hands on, and using those words as a basis for...

“…I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take. Amen.” What kind of a prayer is that to teach to small children? I ran across this prayer on something the other day, and was just wondering who ever thought it would be a good idea to plant in a child’s head that he might die in his sleep? No...

Jack’s language has exploded over the past month. He’s always been very verbal, but now we can often understand what he’s saying. At his 18 month appointment, he was in the 95th percentile for height- he’s even tall enough to climb the stairs without using his hands. He likes movies on his DVD player above all things, and sometimes...