The Search for Miss Direction: A Cherry of A Friday

Finally, an end to this week! Well, at least an end to school, meetings, outings, new hair cuts, picture day- geesh could we fit much more in? The answer is (and if you have ever read this blog or met before you know) well of course we can!

After getting both members of the Dynamic Duo off to school (including a very angry at me Noah who had been reminded countless times over the past few days that his library book was due back on Friday and he should put it in his bag to which I was told "I can handle it, Mom." who then 2 minutes before we left for the bus couldn't locate said book and couldn't get why I wouldn't drive him to school later when he found it. I am SUCH a mean Mom!) I was able to catch up with a friend (so glad to see you Stacia!) for coffee for awhile, race home to move some laundry and then back to OLS to pick up the Bean. We ran a few quick errands and then she came back and helped me with the aforementioned laundry and also helped me make these awesome Chocolate covered maraschino cherry cookies for tonight! You can thank . Ernest H. Wiegand, a professor of horticulture at Oregon State University, who during Prohibition in the 20's developed the modern method of manufacturing maraschino cherries using a brine solution rather than alcohol. So thanks Oregon for being the birthplace of the modern maraschino cherry and letting us try out this tasty recipe. All in all these were really easy to make, the dough was easy to work with, and the Bean had fun stuffing the cherries and rolling the cookies. May not be an actual chocolate covered cherry, but my crew managed to put a good dent in them tonight!

This afternoon I finished the never ending laundry and also managed to get in the Oregon scrapbook page. And while I didn't elaborate much on it last night - who didn't love how cute the covered wagon was last night! Three cheers for a Daddy who stepped up and was in charge last night AND did a State project to boot. As I type Superman is currently getting a ride... Anyway, scrapbook page done, laundry eventually finished, work gone to, Noah picked up from the bus (his mood only slightly improved, sigh) and all those other good Friday afternoon pieces of fun.

For dinner tonight I put together some Bob's Red Mill's Gluten Free Chicken Nuggets. Bob's Red Mill Natural Foods is actually headquartered in Milwaukie and claims to be "nation's leading miller of diverse whole-grain foods" I'm glad we don't have to deal with the food allergy thing here, but thought we'd try out this recipe. I really love the semolina flour for Bob's, as i use it in my pierogi dough! I decided tonight was the perfect night for "Dinner and A Movie" and so as everyone chowed away on their nuggets we settled in to watch The Goonies! (Did you guess right?) The movie is actually set in Astoria and was mostly filmed in Oregon. Well who knew! Well, most of us sat down. When he got home I told Noah he was not doing anything else (including dinner, the movie, etc) until he found the missing library book. He was uninterested in paying any attention or even attempting to look until I actually started making dinner, and it mostly consisted of him dragging his feet and whining about how he didn't know where it was even after Grant and I both gave him countless places to look. After I got everyone eating I actually (shock of all shocks) moved ONE item in the living room (which I had told Noah to check under over an hour before) and lo and behold - the missing book! So since I ultimately had to find the book (which I told him I would do if he agreed to the consequences of my finding it) Noah had to wait 'til we finished for a bath, and ate his dinner in a different room, not with the movie. Currently he's finished and is in watching. In the meantime, the Bean decided she didn't want to eat, so she threw her food across the room when we made her go to the table away from the movie. She got it back, threw it again. Warned her the next time she was done and would be going to bed without finishing dinner and no movie. Guess who just launched food for a third time? Ugghh, some days, I tell ya! So I have a very angry screaming little girl, a sullen little boy who is irked with me and a husband who is just ready for it to be bedtime tonight, I think. Me too :-p

I can't give you a for sure on the weekend right now since it's actually a bit in flux at the moment. But if all goes as planned I'm looking forward to it! And even if it doesn't, we'll make it work. So until then...

Oregon Fun Fact of the Day: In 1880 a sea cave was discovered near what is now known as Florence. Sea Lion Caves is known to be the largest sea cave in the world.