Silver Lake Beach.

This morning the girls woke up grumpy. Claire got sent to time out before 8:00, and both girls went down for a morning nap before 8:20. It was one of those mornings. So Ross told me to take a fun day. It was 90 degrees before 9:30. I loaded up the car with beach toys and sun screen and the second the girls woke up they were strapped in their car seats. I'm pretty sure Aoife wasn't sure what just happened.

There's a free ferry 20 minutes away. Someone told us about it when we first moved in. It runs 24/7 until the lake is frozen and it only takes about 7 minutes to get across the lake. So we parked at a park nearby and walked over to the ferry. Obviously I was a genius and didn't think about just driving the car on and taking the girls out once we were on. But it worked out nicely. We didn't even get off on the other side.

Wisconsin has enough lakes that you could go to a different lake every single day and never run out. Lake Wisconsin is pretty big. Looking around the shoreline I couldn't see any swimming spots. Luckily our GPS has a section labeled 'beaches', so I just hit that and it came up with a list of nearby beaches. I love technology. Silver Lake beach was the first to pop up. It was about 12 miles out, but i decided to give it a try, and I'm so glad I did!

When we pulled up, all you could see was tons of white sand and a roped off swimming area. Claire was antsy so we changed into our swim suits quickly and grabbed the toys. It was wonderful. There's even a snack bar and a couple life guards. And the water. I cautiously toed the water. and then dragged Aoife in as deep as she could stand it and sat down. It was BATH WATER warm. I have NEVER been in water that warm. Obviously this is now our favorite lake/beach. We're so excited to take Ross with us soon.

We spent the afternoon there playing in the water, laying on the beach, and drinking juice bags. And the best part: We got home and the girls settled in for long naps. I love Wisconsin summers.

And seriously. When is that kid going to start walking?!

July So Far.

I've decided Wisconsin summers are awesome. They are fantastic and possibly worth the months of freezing. On Fridays, I don't have class so I get to workout with my favorite. The girls and I meet up with Ross at the gym after he gets off work. Otherwise, he usually wakes up early and hits the gym before work. So Friday morning are also my favorite.

This morning, Ross got the girls up ad changed and turned on the Primary songbook playlist we have. Aoife played with the car, and Claire danced around singing with Ross. And I was barefoot in my robe in the kitchen cooking up pancakes, sausage, and eggs. Some mornings are just perfect. We've had a fantastic week and it's just really great to be in the place we're at. Life is wonderful. And it was just how a Friday morning should be.

The girls and I have been busy this week. The weather honestly couldn't be any better and I want to check as many things off of our summer bucket list. We have a pretty good routine going. We head to the gym first thing. While the girls nap, I clean. Then we have lunch and go out to explore.

This week we hit up the zoo, the arboretum, the Capitol, and downtown. I wish we could have stayed downtown longer, but the girls were exhausted, so we'll be doing the museums another day.

I love our little zoo. I love that it's free. We can come and go as we wish and I don't feel like we have to see everything and push the kids for a long afternoon.When they're tired, we go!

I've heard great things about the Arboretum, and I was hoping it would be like Washington Park back home. We didn't get to see a lot of it, but it didn't disappoint. But we did realize that Wisconsin has bugs. A lot of them. Especially on the trails by the lake. I sprayed myself and Claire with bug spray and it worked well for the first half. But poor Aoife was getting eaten alive and the way she sat in the carrier I couldn't help her. Halfway, the bugs started getting Claire. She'd walk with her hands over her ears and cry every now and then. I ended up picking her up and running with both girls to the car. But she enjoyed our little hike and couldn't wait to tell Ross about the bugs.

My poor bug bite baby.

After breakfast this morning, we headed downtown. Originally, I wanted to take the girls to the UW Geology museum, but could not find a parking spot to save my life. So we changed our plans and decided to check out the Capitol. I wanted to do a tour, but after seeing all of the stairs and no one else waiting for the tour would need to use the elevator, I decided to poke around on our own so we wouldn't make anyone wait for us.

Claire loved pushing the elevator buttons anyway and loved that she got to do it so many times as we checked out each floor. And she loved the acoustics and her voice echoing. I'm sure everyone in the building could hear us. But it was a really cool building. It was fun poking around looking at everything.

It was really bright.

Then we strolled down State street. We stopped off at Jamba Juice, since that's the only one around here. They even had kid's sizes. Of course the girls loved them and drank them as fast as they could. It's been fun finding all the things to do. And you can't really beat a Wisconsin summer.

Fourth of July Weekend.

I'm a little weird. I love Mondays. It's the busiest day of the week for me. I use it to clean, grocery shop, do laundry, and just get things done. But we just had the most perfect weekend and it's making my impending to-do list a little depressing. All because that list means it's back to real life.

School this week was pretty relaxed. For whatever reason, Madison does all of its Fourth of July celebrations BEFORE the Fourth. We had Thursday off from school, but almost everyone skipped Thursday as well. A friend and I still went, and we spent the evening sipping our Sonic slushies and playing games. I think that was the fastest time has ever flown at school.

Thursday:

We started the morning with brunch with church. It was at the park right across the street from us, so we just got to walk over. They had a little program, great food, and of course it was at the park with the splash pad, so the kids were set! Claire and Aoife just played on the play structures until they wore themselves out. We all took long afternoon naps before going swimming.

Poor Aoife was so tired, she was falling asleep in her floatie. It was kind of adorable. We took the girls back for one last nap before the big party. Our friends invited us over for the fourth. People here sure know how to throw a party. We had a blast. Claire still talks about it. It was probably my favorite Fourth of July in YEARS. I probably can't even do it justice talking about it, so I'll let the pictures do the talking.

Friday:

I was still in party mode, so I swept up the girls after their morning nap and took them out to Devil's Lake. I've heard a lot of good things about it and wanted to explore. We started off with a McDonald's lunch where Claire serenaded everyone.

 Then we took off to the North side of the park. We started off at the Nature Center. They had a few reptile exhibits that the girls liked, and the entire downstairs was hands-on exhibits for kids. We didn't stay long, but it was a fun little stop.

Turns out the North side was beyond packed and we got sent to the South Shore. Luckily, they had plenty of parking. We started off with a hike. Aoife was pretty restless and threw her binkie before we even started. It made for a long afternoon. Claire saw a trail that was full of big rocks and started climbing. She did really well and got pretty high up before other hikers told me that on the trail ahead, you had to climb up rocks that had a drop-off on either side. So we turned around. I'm not sure how much longer Claire would have lasted anyway. It was time to go cool off in the lake!

My girls are water babies. Especially Claire. They went crazy. Aoife would walk out with me as far as she could, or crawl around until the water came up to her face. For some reason, she prefers lakes to the pool.

On the way home, we stopped off at Dairy Queen for ice cream. Claire barely finished hers before falling asleep. We had so much fun, we decided to take Ross back the next day and invite some friends. Unfortunately, I wasn't as camera happy, and didn't really take any pictures of Saturday.

Since I went to school earlier in the week when no one else came, I decided to skip class on Saturday and take a long weekend. Despite the short notice, a few friends came out to the lake with us for a picnic lunch and swimming. Claire loved it and talked about her friends the whole way there and back. The weather was wonderful and we're all a little toasted. Ross doesn't get to go outside much, and he got the worst of it. We ended up getting an annual State Park pass, so we have lots of exploring to do. Hopefully we'll get him all sunned out before summer is over. After a couple long naps, we made a spur of the moment decision to take the girls to see Despicable Me 2. I was a little worried about taking the girls to the theater, especially with them being so tired, but they were actually really good! Claire was a little restless and would talk a little about what was happening, but what kid doesn't? Aoife was too tired to do anything, so she just sat with her binkie. The theater here doesn't charge for kids under 3, so we might be taking them more often!

We've officially been here for six months, and I think we're finally starting to like it here. Wisconsin is a million times better with friends. And sunshine doesn't hurt either. (Unless you forget to take the sunscreen to the lake.) We're looking forward to putting our annual pass to good use, exploring, and having many more perfect weekends.

The Fire Station.

I've been trying to do some act of service with the girls each week this summer. Nothing big or amazing, just something small and simple and usually involves a baked good.

I've been thinking for a few weeks about taking the girls to the fire station with a thank you card. Yesterday we baked a ton of white chocolate macadamia nut cookies to take.

First off, the inside of our fare station is gorgeous with a lot of neat things on display. The first fire engine in Middleton is refurbished and inside along with some pictures of it while it was in service. There's also the bell that used to call in the fire fighters and a beam from 9/11.

We met with a gal who took us on a really cool tour. We got to see all of the different trucks, and Claire even got to get a closer peek. Claire got a good look at all the gear, though she wasn't interested in trying any of it on. It was really interesting learning about the different trucks and how everything works.

It turns out only the chief and two supervisors are paid full-time. The rest (over 100) are volunteers. I knew a lot were volunteer, but I had no idea that many were. We've been fortunate enough to have never had the need to call 911, but I'm still so grateful for all of the sacrifices fire fighters make. Plus we got a fun tour out of it.

We had enough time afterward to explore and play a little bit so we went over by the high school and checked out Fireman's Park before I had to get ready for class.

And some sister snuggles. Cause what's better than that?

Sausage, Noodle, Broccoli thing and Chow Mein.

The last couple days, I've been one of those annoying people that posts pictures of their food. I took pictures for the sole purpose of trying to entice Ross into coming home early from work. I was not successful. But a bunch of people asked for recipes so here we go!

We'll start with a dish we don't have a name for. My family whipped it up in the kitchen out of random things we had in the house and it's been a family favorite ever since. Ross and I have taken to call it the 'Sausage, Noodle, Broccoli thingie'.

Here's what you'll need:
1 box penne, rotini, or bowtie pasta (any bite sized pasta will work)
1 pound hot Italian sausage
Sun dried tomatoes
Broccoli (In the past, I've chopped a head of broccoli, but I've found frozen pre cut was faster and easier)
Roasted Red Pepper Alfredo (Really, you can use any jar of Alfredo, but the most amazing one for this dish is the Roasted Red Pepper by Classico.)

Start cooking your pasta. In a large frying pan or skillet, brown the sausage. While it's cooking, I like to drain and rinse the tomatoes. I don't like the heavy oil taste so I prefer rinsing them, though it's not necessary. drain the meat. return meat to pan. Add broccoli and tomatoes and heat through.

When your pasta is tender, drain and put back in the pot. Add in your Sausage/veggie mix, add your sauce, mix it up and you're done! Generally I've found everything is already hot enough where I don't need to heat up the sauce. It's a super simple tasty dish that we love to serve whenever we have company. My parents like to add in capers and artichoke hearts, too.


Now for the Chow Mein: Remember when I did my 30 Day Vegan experiment? I came to really appreciate vegetables.  I felt amazing, and I had the best body I had ever had. There were a lot of great things about the plant based diet, but there were a few downfalls. I like to do a vegan/vegetarian dish once a week to get my vegetable overdose. It's a great way to get in a low calorie meal that's high in nutrients and super healthy. I've found a lot of new tasty recipes this way.

Chow Meain-

Here's what you'll need:

13 oz box whole wheat spaghetti (normally I wouldn't push my whole wheat everything on people, but for this dish, the thicker/denser noodle makes all the difference.)
2 C broccoli florets (Again, frozen is nice and easy)
1/2 C frozen peas
1/4 C Hoisin sauce (you'll find it in the Asian aisle by the soy sauce)
1/4 C vegetable broth (Any broth will do)
3 T Soy Sauce
pinch of red pepper flakes (optional)
2 T Oil (canola, coconut, olive, peanut, take your pick)
1 onion thinly sliced
1 carrot cut into matchsticks
4 green onions thinly sliced
3 cloves garlic
1 t ground ginger
1 C bean sprouts (optional)


Start your spaghetti. (again, I'm assuming we all know how to cook pasta.)Add in your broccoli and peas during the last few minutes of cooking. I was short on my frozen broccoli when I made this, so I used a lot of peas. The girls seem to like peas more than broccoli anyway. Drain and set aside.

While your pasta is cooking, mix the hoisin sauce, broth, soy sauce, and red pepper flakes in a small bowl. The red pepper gives it a slight bite.

In a large skillet or frying pan, heat oil and saute onions and carrot until they are lightly browned and slightly tender. Add green onions, garlic, and ginger. It should be smelling pretty fantastic by now. Let cook for just a few minutes longer.

Add the spaghetti, broccoli, peas, and sauce and cook until pasta is heated through and coated with sauce. And you're done!

CrossFit.

I heard about CrossFit a couple years ago and have wanted to do it ever since. I love everything that CrossFit is about. I checked out multiple affiliates, but they weren't in our budget. That was always my excuse: That CrossFit was too expensive.

I looked around our gym and decided there was no reason why I couldn't do it on my own. The WOD is posted every day, and it's scaled down in a forum when there are exercises I can't quite do yet.I've been doing CrossFit for about a month now. Ross joined me a couple weeks ago and we get to work out together on the weekends.

I have a pretty good routine going. After Aoife's morning nap, we go to the gym. Then we do lunch and both girls nap again. I've noticed major changes since starting this a month ago. Not just physical changes, but other beautiful, important changes have been going on.

I don't make excuses anymore. I am strong. There is no reason why I can't do something. My house is cleaner. I'm happier. I don't yell at my kids anymore. We have fun and we play together. I'm more confident. I feel so much better about myself. My days are more productive. My kids are happier. I cook great dinners. And I still treat myself to a morning Diet Coke and I don't even feel guilty about it.

A lot of good things have been going on.

My first workout looked like this:

My palms and knees were destroyed, but I loved it. And I've come a long way since then. I've had a few workout where I've barely made it to the toilet in time to throw up. This is probably the hardest I've worked. Ever. And it feels amazing.

Summer Bucket List.

The problem with having young kids, is that you don't really get out much. They have nap times, and they NEED naps, and I feel incredibly lucky if I can get them to nap at the same time. I was excited about summer. I was looking forward to hot sunny days spent at the pool. Come to find out, we decided Wisconsin doesn't have summer. It has winter, more winter, and monsoon season. Followed again by winter. Most days we've had thunder storms and pouring rain. Which spoiled my pool plans.

It's only the end of June and I'm ready for fall. If it's going to rain, I might as well get some cider and fall fashion out of it, right?

In an effort to get excited about "summer", I made a summer bucket list. I made sure to include plenty of indoor activities, as well as the places I've wanted to visit, but haven't had the chance yet. I'm looking forward to some adventures and being able to explore Wisconsin more. Hopefully I'll learn how to balance the things I have to do, nap schedules, and adventures and make it a fun summer.