The Search for Miss Direction: Pez it up!

Greetings from a rainy, wet, slushy yet somewhat warm Farmington. The weather has just been weird today, as when I was on my way home from MOPS to pick up the Bean at school I was driving in near white out conditions, which then changed to freezing sleet and rain. If the temperatures stay warm, though, I think we may be paddling to get anywhere with as fast as all the snow is melting. And it has turned the roads into a disaster now that the potholes are even more exposed. I'm so ready for winter to be over...

Yesterday I hinted about Mikayla and I going on a super secret Connecticut related mission. Tonight after dinner I finally let her spill the beans (she is almost as much of a blabber mouth as her Mama when it comes to keeping a secret) that we had made a trip to Clawson to Doc Sweets (they are our go to candy store as they hooked us up with chocolate covered insects and jelly beans last year when we were in need) to find a candy created and produced in Connecticut - Pez! That's right, the candy and toy combination was born and is now produced Orange, Connecticut. The dispensers appear in over 80 countries around the world and have inspired collectors everyone to get them all! Mikayla picked out one for each of us and we each had a sweet Connecticut treat after dinner while working on our "We've Been There" state. Since Connecticut is so tiny (third smallest in the nation) we decided to shorten the name to "Conn" for our purposes. Unfortunately no Gatchel's have been to Connecticut though if the Bean has anything to say about it, we'll be making a trip to New England in the near future for seafood.

Which meant she was one happy girl tonight when I told her we were having New Haven Clam Pizza for dinner. My original hope when scouring Connecticut recipes was to find the authentic recipe for Mystic Pizza. The movie that stars Julia Roberts is based on life in the town of Mystic, Connecticut. No such luck though, but I did learn that this Clam Pizza is iconic to the state. The pizza, which originated in Connecticut is loaded with clams, bacon, garlic, oregano and just lightly topped with parmesan and mozzarella. I even followed the recipe for the crust on this one (I usually make my own in my bread machine) and it was decided that this 'totally made the pizza' We somehow managed to polish off nearly the entire pizza tonight so I'd say it was a hit. I love that my kids enjoy things like clam pizza, makes me smile.

They also had a chance to color their Connecticut maps today when they made it home. I'm not even going to try to explain here, you'll just have to check out the pictures.

The Olympics also continued here with Snowflake Making tonight. I gave everyone a piece of oragami paper and a pair of scissors and told them to go to town over a five minute period. We then dropped the completed flakes from a certain height one on one. The one to hit the ground the fastest won. Check out our pictures and medalists below.

Looking forward to tomorrow. Grant and Noah are going to the Piston's game (Noah got a free ticket from school, apparently the Pistons are so desperate to fill the seats they gave one to every school age kiddo in the area and then reduced pricing to parents). So Boys Night Out for them and the Bean and I are having a Girls Night In. I told her she can pick what we do, what we eat, whatever she wants so who knows what my night might end up looking like :) Also plan on storytime in the morning and our Olympic event for tomorrow is Snowball Target Practice. So until then...

Connecticut Fun Fact of the Day: Although West Haven is Connecticut's youngest city, being incorporated in 1972, it is a community that dates back over 360 years, making it one of the oldest settlements in the country.