No Superheros for this Boy - just Cookie Dough Brownies

Our oldest, Jacob, turned 11 on July 1st.  If you've met Jake, you know two things quickly stand out about him.  1 - he has a smile that lights up his whole face!  2 - he is rather small for his age.  While height is a trivial thing we can do nothing about, there are days when it is tougher than others to be "the little guy".  When people first meet our family they are often surprised that Jake is 2 1/2 years older than Keeley - they have been asked if they are twins on several occasions.  The other time it is particularly hard is when it comes to sports - try as hard as he might, his size sometimes holds him back.  It's hard to have a pitcher that has 2 feet on you hurling a ball towards you or a linebacker coming at you that's double your weight.  As parents Scott and I can only continue to cheer him on, work with him as much as we can, and not let him give up.  That said, there are also some other unique traits about Jake that make him unlike your "typical" boy.

Jacob lives for Thursdays because it is newspaper day - how many other tweens can't wait to read up on the local news?!?!  He uses it in conversation with people for the rest of the week, "Hey, did you see that there were guys arrested for stealing cattle?!?"

You will not find any Superheros in our house - Jake has never gotten into Superheros, Pokeman, Digiman, Minecraft, Skylanders, Clash of Clans or any other trend I'm sure to misspell.  He loves tractors - both RED and GREEN - despite his clothing and farm being dominantly RED.  Jake does play a few video games but usually sports or Mario.  His favorite game of all time is Farming Simulator - Yep, you build and run your own farm!  Buy/sell equipment, crops, land...he can "farm" for hours!

 His other love is Legos - but only Lego City so he can build and control his own town, mainly transportation, construction, and mechanic sets - no Star Wars or Pirates here!  He also is kind enough to let his sisters store their "girly" Legos in his room as they have no place to in theirs.  (Any Lego storage/display ideas welcome as we are drowning in them and even when they're "set up" in never lasts for long!)

I have my great-grandmother's dining room table in our basement and Jake slowly took it over with tractors, grain set-ups, and a machine shed among other things.  This worked fine - until we wanted the table for holiday entertaining!  Right after Christmas Scott had the idea to build Jake his own farm table where everything could be displayed and played with and it would all be self-contained.  He did an amazing job building and finishing off a "L" shaped double-decker table which I happily snuck out to the shop to paint to keep it a surprise for Jake.  Scott was surprised when were ready to bring it home and he realized it would not fit in a pick-up bed!  Luckily Uncle Tom has an enclosed trailer we could borrow or it would have come home in a reefer!  The biggest surprise was when Scott, his Dad, my brother, Zac, and I were trying to get it down the basement stairs and make the turn over the open side of the staircase - it got a little stuck, the stairs got a little paint, and we lost a little spackling, but with a little pushing and shoving we made it through and it now happily has it's acreage in the corner of our basement.

The Runge Farm :)

This is Jake turning 11!

Lunch at Jake's Pizza with Runges and some cousins, including my sister's oldest, Damion, who turned 13 on the same day.  Birthday Boys!!!

One of Jake's favorite foods is kabobs.  We ran tight on time so I improvised and made hot dog, brat, mushroom, pineapple, and cherry tomato kabobs - ironically the spur of a moment meal was a hit and there was nothing left!

We had been discussing cake for weeks because he usually has a particular passion each year be it farming, tow trucks, baseball...  When it comes down to it I guess he is still stuck on his tractor pull cake from last year (which is really simple but has been re-pinned on Pinterest over 80 times since last year) which you can see here:  Case IH Tractor Pulling Cake.  I finally explained to Jake that he didn't HAVE to have a cake just because mom decorates them, he could have whatever dessert he wanted - I would be TOTALLY fine with it.  He thought about it and finally told me the day before his birthday that he really wanted the Cookie Dough Brownies I haven't made in over a year.  They are ALWAYS a hit and I'll share my recipe at the end!  Back to the presents!

Scott and Jacob are really into customized replicas of their real life passions.  For Jake's birthday Scott had a custom builder make him a 1:64 replica to scale of the actual G&M Runge, Inc. shop.  Kicker was that the little stinker has watched so many videos of custom builders that when he saw the return address on the box he already had a good idea what was going on!

G&M Runge, Inc. at the Runge Farm

Jake had his birthday party with some extended family on July 5th.

This time he had me make him a mint ice cream pie with a chocolate crust and a cool whip and Andes Mint topping - simple but perfect!

Later that afternoon we had some Slip-and-Slide fun!

Sure are a lot of girls compared to boys!

Another party for supper with our favorite neighbor girls who couldn't make it for lunch, Barbara & Sara!

We had to put a candle in Barbara's pie, too, because the boys were at livestock training and missed her birthday party on June 15th.  All HAS to be fair!!!

COOKIE DOUGH BROWNIES

I had originally tried this recipe from The Recipe Girl, but have adapted it to the way our family prefers them as shared below:

For the Brownies: 

4 oz. Unsweetened Chocolate

1 C. Butter, melted

2 C. Brown Sugar

4 Eggs

2 tsp. Vanilla

1 C. Flour

1/2 C. Chocolate Chips (mini, semi-sweet, whatever you want!)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Spray a 9 x 13-inch pan with nonstick spray. In a small glass bowl, melt chocolate in the microwave in 30 seconds intervals; stirring after each and remove from microwave when melted and smooth. Set aside. In a larger mixing bowl, whisk together the melted butter and brown sugar. Whisk in the eggs and vanilla extract and then the melted chocolate. Whisk in the flour and mix just until combined (don't over-whisk). Stir in the chocolate chips. Spread batter into prepared pan. Bake 30 to 35 minutes. Watch closely and remove from oven when toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Let cool completely.

For the Cookie Dough:

1 C. Butter

1 C. Brown Sugar

1 C. White Sugar

2 tsp. Vanilla

2 T. milk, cream, half & half - whatever you have on hand

1/4 tsp. salt

2 C. flour

1 C. mini chocolate chips

1/2 C. mini chocolate chips (optional)

Cream the butter and sugars with a mixer.  Add in vanilla and milk.  Combine salt and flour in a small bowl.  Add flour mixture to sugar mixture.  Add the 1 cup of mini chocolate chips and mix until even.

Evenly spread the cookie dough layer over the top of the brownies using your hands to apply light pressure to ensure the layers stick together.  If desired top with the additional 1/2 cup of mini chocolate chips or as many as your heart desires ~ ENJOY!   (Cool in the refrigerator for easier/quicker cutting.  Yield 48 brownies-although the one shown in the pic is at 24 servings!)

Dirty Laundry

As we adjust to summer vacation - all 3 kids home all day - a lot of running and late nights - we are having issues with attitudes and listening.  Since I am a stay-at-home mom I am with my children 24 hours a day and they are also stuck with each other for the majority of the day.  Lately I have found myself yelling and losing my temper by 10 a.m.  I don't like yelling at my kids - it doesn't make me feel good about myself, it doesn't make my kids feel loved, and it very often has no impact on the situation besides making it louder.  Our particular issues are LISTENING, MINDING OUR OWN BUSINESS, and COMPLAINING.  Our children are each loving and wonderful creatures but they have their difficult sides, too, which have been showing up much to frequently.  I refuse to spend the next 3 months angry and frustrated instead of enjoying my time with all the kids home.  Scott and I have discussed at length how to "fix" our kids and continued to come up empty handed.

Scott deals with enough stress at work everyday and when he comes home he doesn't need to come home to an unhappy house with a frustrated wife and disobedient children.  I am not saying that the kids are never well behaved - thankfully they are usually quite well behaved when we are in public and the good moments at home far outweigh the bad - it is just that I know WE can do better - especially under our own roof.  Scott brings me the driver paperwork that comes in the mail each morning so I can review it for him.  Thursday morning things were already difficult with the kids by the time he stopped and he knew I was getting frustrated.  I happened to hop on Facebook for a bit when he left and I'm convinced it was God's will that one of the first things that popped up was an entry from The Better Mom.  It was about using God's word to correct in your family.  I sent the link to Scott right away so that we would both be on the same page - it is impossible to have a loving, peaceful, obedient household if both parents aren't united and consistently have the other's back.

Since it was raining our extra-curricular running was considerably lighter and it gave me the perfect opportunity to have a long conversation with the kids about truly listening, helping with a happy heart, and treating everyone with love and respect no matter what.  We opened up a couple different Bibles and read the verses cited in the article.  We learned that obedience is not optional, it is commanded by God.  My favorite verse that we read was Philippians 2:14, "Do everything without complaining or arguing."  We have revisited these passages daily since then - as a matter of fact, several times a day I will say "Do everything..." and they will finish the passage - it makes them think twice before saying they don't want to or dragging their feet.  It's easier to insist that they take care of their belongings or help clean the house not because Dad or Mom says so, but because God says so.  I hope you will take the opportunity to read the full article - The Bette Mom - Using Gods Word to Correct in Your Family.  It's not easy to put your short-comings out there, but if it can help someone out in a similar situation, then it's all worth it!

To encourage helping and cooperating I put them to work yesterday afternoon baking a couple loaves of banana bread - they did pretty well and kept the squabbling to a minimum!

Enjoying the fruits of their labor!

Since we're airing our "dirty laundry" today, I thought I'd share the recipe we use for homemade laundry detergent.  I have sensitive skin and even break out from All Free and Clear - this is a SUPER CHEAP, easy alternative.

LAUNDRY DETERGENT

1 bar Fels-Naptha

1 lb. 9.3 oz. Borax

1 lb. 2.3 oz. Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda

1 lb. 5.3 oz. Arm & Hammer Baking Soda

1 lb. 2.6 oz. Oxiclean

Only 5 ingredients that can all be found at your grocery store or Fleet and Farm.

Start by grating the bar of Fels-Naptha (or whatever soap you would like - Ivory, Dove...)  After the entire bar is grated, blend it up as fine as you can get it.

Use a kitchen scale to weight the rest of the ingredients.  Add in the measured amount of Borax and blend again - this helps break the bar soap down even more.

Empty the blended ingredients into a container with a lid (we use old ice cream buckets).  Then add in the Arm and Hammer Super Washing Soda, baking soda, and Oxiclean.  Put the cover on tight and shake it until it's all mixed.  We use about 2 tablespoons per average load.  A bucket lasts several months!

Note:  I broke down a larger scale recipe hence the random amounts - You don't need to be super particular for it to work!

Family Business...With Kids

Working in a family business is challenging enough most days, but when you add in the fact that it's a trucking business, well, that raises the challenges to a whole new level.  Ya see, the thing about trucks is that they are always coming and going to haul you what you need.  Want Gatorade for your ball game?  We haul it.  Your kid wants a LunchMaker for a snack?  We haul it.  You want strawberries, lettuce, bacon, even beer or wine?  We haul it.  With 14 trucks coming and going days, nights, weekends, holidays - that doesn't give the dispatchers/mechanic/bookkeepers much time off - especially when it's all handled in-house by Scott and his parents, Glenn and Mary.

Add to that for the past 5 years Scott has also been the Transportation Manager for one of our local farmer cooperatives, WFS.  WFS is based out of Truman, MN, about 20 minutes from St. James.  Scott is responsible for hiring, firing, dispatching and managing 22 grain trucks. Of course he doesn't leave it as that and is involved in everything from purchasing to maintenance.

It is probably a good thing that this is the only life I've known with Scott as it's not the easiest, but it has become OUR life.  Scott and I have been together since we were 17 - that's A LONG TIME AGO!  When we started dating he was learning his way around the shop.  During college Scott was a grain hauler - often leaving late at night to sleep in line to be one of the first to dump his load in the morning so he could get in the most loads possible each day.  After we completed college at SCC in Mankato he started hauling livestock.  Livestock haulers don't have an easy gig - they have to deal with a live load - and the smell of it and smelling LIKE it!  Not to mention often loading and driving through the night or early morning hours to provide the livestock with the safest, most comfortable ride possible - and having to continue on even if the weather gets nasty, as their load is exposed to the elements and can't wait.  When we were newlyweds cellphones were still up and coming.  We started out using prepaid phone cards on pay phones!  Boy would I wait for that call to come at night!  There wasn't really time off when our kids were born, either.  Scott was back at work 48 hours after Keeley was born - although she was induced at 10 days overdue, she was an easy baby... for Mom at least...

Anyhow, here we are almost 13 years of marriage and 3 kids later and this is what happens when Grandpa and Grandma take a few well-deserved days off of work...  Although I am a stay-at-home mom, I'm also a work-at-home mom.  I take care of the paperwork for the WFS drivers, among miscellaneous things.  When Scott is alone at the shop he gets desperate enough to call in the back up - ME - to answer phones and take messages!  The kids are almost 11, 8, and 5, but still too young to spend the whole day home alone - so we bring them to work with us as we have done, when needed, since they were born...

They were lucky it was National Donut Day and started their morning with Schmidt's Bakery!  Feeling pretty BOSS with milk in their coffee cups!

Keeley - the dog walker when she visits the shop - above is Buster and below is Sophie...she was distracted by picking clover at the moment!

For lunch we took the easy road and ordered Jake's Pizza!

While the girls spent some time on "technology" as we call it at our house, Jake went out to do his job - mowing all the flat land at the shop.  He doesn't enjoy it at all ;)!

The kids do their best to "self entertain"...

Keeley's "Welcome" for the day!

After 5 o'clock we spent a little time on target practice with BB guns.

Dad found it to be a good stress reliever before heading to his shop work.

Mom didn't do too shabby...always enjoyed shooting guns!

Win-win when even Keeley enjoys it!

My boys!

Added bonus to their patience for the day - Mom finally cashed in all our Pampers Rewards points we've been accumulating for 10 years and we got a free Plasma Car that arrived on Friday!

Goodbye School!

There has been so much stacked into these past last 2 weeks of school for all the kids - picnics, field trips, practices - it's hard to keep it all straight!  We thoroughly enjoyed spending our Sunday and Memorial Day together - it was a much needed break and family time in the middle of May's chaos!

Here is a behind-the-scene look at our last 2 weeks of school - I'm so grateful that I am able to be a stay-at-home mom so I can actively participate in our kids' lives on so many levels and that, even though Scott's job is highly demanding, he is able to sneak away to participate in the big stuff.

.

Last Monday we enjoyed our time with Betsy and then Keeley had her first Godahl Softball practice of the season - now if the weather would cooperate so we could get on the field!

Tuesday...she didn't want me to take her picture, but this is cute Kate entertaining herself while mom mows and bags the lawn.  Yes, Mom takes care of the yard work here as Dad already works enough hours (and mom is more particular about outside than dad is!)  After this I got cleaned up and went to court - just to be a body who represents Clint.

Tuesday night was the ECFE/Wee Saints End of the Year event - there is months of planning that go into an event like this...finding a performer, place, food...only to have to adjust it all because of the weather - God Bless Minnesota!

Wednesday I chaperoned Keeley's 2nd grade field trip to the Sioux Falls Zoo - a great time with these 4 girls!  Good thing I had a backpack filled with gum, paper, colored pencils, pens, pencils, and a Find It Games tube.

Me and my "forgotten middle child," Keeley. ;)

Wednesday night was the "Fifth Grade Fiesta".

Thursday was the (rescheduled due to rain) Elementary School Picnic...

and incoming 1st grade open house.  I can't thank everyone who volunteers to help with these events enough!  Planning this picnic was extra challenging as all the volunteers were lined up for the week before and 1/2 were unavailable for the rescheduled date.  I apologize to those I call on time and again to help with events - please know you are appreciated - it takes a special person to be left in charge of 20 kids in sib care, welcome families to school, or serve 350 people food without a break!

Jacob received his long awaited Regional Science Fair Award from AgStar (still waiting on the medal and money, though...)

Friday we took a semi to the last day of Wee Saints Preschool - the kids had a blast getting to climb all over a truck and trailer and learn some interesting facts, too!

After we visited Preschool we were off to 5th grade to check out their "Decades" projects.  Jacob and Hayden had 1900-1910 - of course it was filled with information about Case, Ford, and Hershey! :)

Mrs. Carlson's Room

Mrs. Meyer's Room

Mrs. Winrich's Room - we had SUCH an educational and good time visiting with the students enjoying what they learned and their outfits!  Well done 5th grade & teachers!!!

Kate's last day of Preschool - Officially a Kindergartner!!!!

After a day catching up at home on Saturday and celebrating Scott's and my birthday with his family on Sunday, Jake had his baseball blitz in the afternoon.  

After selling coupon cards for one last hour in the rain, Jake ended up with a grand total of 88 coupon cards sold.  He was the top seller and earned some money and a new baseball glove!  Thank you to everyone that supported this fundraiser!!!

Tuesday both Jacob and Keeley had field trips to the Cities - I was a 2nd grade chaperone again.  Ellie, Keeley, Payton, and Mia in front of the Landmark Center before watching "The Tortise and the Hare" and "The Ugly Duckling" at The Ordway Theater.

As soon as we got back from our field trips we did a costume change and piled in the car and headed to Godahl for another indoor softball practice - maybe we need a bus!

Wednesday afternoon there was a Promotion Ceremony for the Northside 5th graders who will be moving to the High School next year.

Jacob receiving his certificate.

Congrats, Jake!

Some foil packet fish on the grill to celebrate!

Supper on the deck on a beautiful night!

The last day of 5th and 2nd grade...

Northsiders with perfect attendance - way to go kids and moms and dads!!!

So proud of Keeley!!!

Now to prepare for having Katelyn in kindergarten at Armstrong School, Keeley in 3rd grade at Northside, and Jacob in 6th grade at the High School...I'll worry about that later...BRING ON SUMMER!!!