After our Heidelburg adventure the Friday before we tried to go into Easter weekend with the mindset of LOW KEY! The only plans we had as of Friday morning were that we had invited over 2 couples from church for a casual Brunch on Easter morning.

On Good Friday we took a long walk by the river and talked to Jackson more about the meaning of Easter and specifically Good Friday. We had been reading to him in the weeks leading up to it but it was neat for it to be the real day.  While we were skipping rocks by the river Jackson and I found a rock with lines on it that looked like a cross. He held onto it and thought it was so neat since we were talking about the cross.  If I can get him to help me find it I will post a picture.

We colored eggs together and just enjoyed a quiet day at home.

On Saturday some friends invited us to go on the boat on lake Thun. It was a nice unexpected outing. It was a gorgeous ride. The first half we had glorious sun and the second half we got to watch as a storm rolled in. We got off the boat just as the rain got going. The boys had a wonderful time! I think I had expected the boys to be content to watch the water and look out over the side of the boat..for at least a few minutes. After about 10 minutes they were both ready to run laps around the boat deck. So it goes. About halfway through we gave in and bought them ice cream so that we could all sit for at least 10 mins and enjoy the scenery!

handsome “little BIG boy”

our friends Karen and Andy brought their dog Bella. She and Jackson kept each other company throughout the boat trip. Check out the color of the water!

this may become Seth and I someday if we never have a daughter! This was for real! This dog belongs in Paris!

The Easter bunny did make it to our house in Bern. He brought us a basket for all of us to share. He seemed to focus less on candy this year and more on Spring activities. The basket had a new ball, jump rope, a kite and a bubble tumbler! (since the boys are learning to share (ie fighting over toys constantly) we decided to do a joint basket to reinforce this)

Karen brought a fruit salad…almost too pretty to eat!

the guys showing Jackson how to play an egg knocking game

Jackson happily joined in

We kept the menu simple with my mom’s sausage egg bake, fruit salad, rosti (Swiss hashbrown-type dish) and bread with some berry whipped butter. We finished it off with mini cheesecakes!  I got away with only making the egg bake, whipped butter and the cheesecakes!

Monday we really did nothing but take a long walk together and laze around the house.

This post may seem so random to most people.  What on earth do Nilla Wafer Hamburgers have to do with Easter?! Years ago my grandparents (Grandma and Grandpa Seckinger) came to visit us for Easter weekend when we were living in Zanesville, Ohio. If I was home at my parents house I would scan in some pictures just so you could appreciate the history of past Easter dresses and holidays gone by. You can invision poofy sleeves on a nautical navy dress, wavelike bangs (on both myself and my brother Ryan…his was more of the trendy surfer type wave…mine, not so hip.) I am thousands of miles away so luckily there will be no pictures!

Anyhow, that particular year my grandmother brought super fun edible “crafts” to make. For some reason I am having a hard time remembering the rest of them but yesterday as I colored eggs with Jackson the memory of making nilla wafer hamburgers at Easter with my grandmother popped into my head. They were so cute. You use 2 nilla wafers for the bun, a thin mint (or grasshopper) cookie for the meat, color some shredded coconut for some lettuce and use red and yellow icing for ketchup and mustard.  So creative! I don’t remember them having an amazing taste but as a kid I thought they were amazing! Thanks for the memory, Grandma! I am hoping to make these with Jackson some day soon!

Here is the link for a real “recipe ” for them if any of you are tempted to do them with your little ones! Send me a picture if you do them!

Nilla Wafer Hamburgers

Happy Saturday everyone!

This morning was the perfect Spring morning. The sun was streaming in the kitchen windows and the house was relatively quiet except for the hum of the load of laundry I had just dutifully started. Owen was down for his morning nap and Jackson was cheerfully waiting to bake cookies with me. I told him after his morning cartoon he and I could make some Easter cookies.  The kitchen was sparkling and smelled of lavender from the homemade cleaner I had tried. I did some Spring cleaning yesterday. Anyone that has been to my house knows that I love to cook and that I don’t so much enjoy or stay on top of  the aftermath. So, this is a RARE morning with a super clean kitchen at our house.

Jackson and I got to work. This recipe calls for lemon zest so I asked Jackson to go on the hunt for the zester. He didn’t know what it was so I described what it looked like and let him look for it in our utensil drawer. I measured the dry ingredients while he hunted…this is a trick I have learned. Send him on a hunt and get some of the messy stuff done while he’s gone. We mixed up our dough, rolled it out just right and cut out the most clean cut bunnies, carrots and flowers.

Now to the real story..The kitchen was sparkling clean but ONLY because I cleaned yesterday. And in the case when you are about to bake with a preschooler it really isn’t ideal to have just cleaned the kitchen! Owen was napping, but only because I had gotten him back to sleep after Jackson woke him up. Jackson woke him up because he ran down in a panic to confess he had gotten too busy and had had a potty accident upstairs.  And our baking didn’t go that smoothly or neatly because, well, it just doesn’t when baking with a little one.

About once a month I get inspired to bake with Jackson. Or let him help me with dinner. I know it’s good for him to learn new things and I know he is old enough to be involved. It all sounds good and developmentally appropriate until we get going. My blood pressure instantly rises and I find myself having to monitor my tone of voice. He drives me crazy in the kitchen. He enthusiastically grabs the spoon from the first bowl, consequently tossing out some of the flour, when I lunged for the spoon before more damage is done he is not disheartened for he is already reaching for an egg. When the egg gets rescued safely from his hands he pushes his finger into the stick of softened butter to see how soft it feels.  Is he doing anything wrong? Nope. Is he listening to my many instructions? nope, not really, but not purposely. He is so excited to be with me and to be learning something new that he cannot control his enthusiasm. And the final product, well, they weren’t clean cut outs like I was dreaming about previously, they were lopsided bunnies and flowers with broken petals.

This morning as Jackson and I baked I had to remind myself why we were baking cookies.  It was so humbling.  I don’t like my impatience and how I get after him for things that really aren’t wrong. I don’t like how I want him to do it my way and I like for the end product to look nice. It isn’t always about that.  He is proud of his work and he is so pleased with the cookies that resulted in the end. Now that the kitchen is re-cleaned and my blood pressure has returned to it’s normal high I can stand back and see that it was a worthy exercise for both of us. Jackson enjoyed himself and it was yet another learning experience for both of us. At naptime today he said “mom, when I am bigger maybe I will get to zest all by myself”.

Friday is Easter egg coloring day! Sheesh, how did we end up with 2 of these projects in one week. Maybe Friday I will catch myself before the dye starts dripping and the eggs start cracking. these years are going far too fast. I want to learn to enjoy it better.

For those of you that would like a good sugar cookie recipe I came across this one in Southern Living at Valentine’s 2 years ago. Like I mentioned, it calls for lemon zest which I think makes them extra fresh and reminds me of this time of year. Here’s the link…Lemon Butter Cookies  .     Sorry I don’t have any links for how to bake patiently with your enthusiastic preschooler. That is a trial and error kind of thing.

One of our most favorite types of food is Tex Mex. It’s probably good we have no access to those endless chip bowls and bubbly queso dip..but every once in a while we just NEED it. I have been on the hunt for some healthy recipes that remind us of back home. I have been googling knockoffs for some time now. The most recent find was a Chipotle knock off for barbacoa beef. I did it in the slow cooker and served it with cilantro rice and lots of fresh toppings. I had always wondered what people used the chipotle peppers in adobo sauce for. This recipe was a way to try them out!   They smell, smokey and warm but are super spicy! I made the mistake of sneaking a little of the sauce after smelling it just to gauge how spicy I wanted out meet. Wowser! It’s hot. Both times I have made this recipe I have made it with less peppers.  The meat never came out too spicy…in fact Seth had to stop the boys from eating it all one evening!

Gina’s Weight Watchers blog is one I have been finding some good finds on lately, including this barbacoa recipe.

http://www.skinnytaste.com/2010/04/barbacoa-beef.html

I followed her recipe mostly…I used less peppers, added a little beef broth (because I cooked mine on low all day in the slow cooker and I didn’t want it to dry out, and I used the whole roast without cutting it up so I could cook it longer and not have to check it through the day).

When I looked up the beef to add to this post I saw she has a slow-cooked pork as well. We will be trying this soon!

http://www.skinnytaste.com/2011/01/slow-cooked-sweet-barbacoa-pork.html

Don’t be scared away by the Weight Watchers name. I personally avoid all things Weight Watchers because I know my personality enough to know that if I ever attempted it I would become OCD about the points system. That’s another story altogether but anyhow, I like her recipes because they are lots of fresh, simple recipes. If she calls for reduced fat stuff we normally use regular because Switzerland isn’t on the low fat, fat free craze that the US is on. I prefer the real stuff in moderation than the chemically stuff. But that is just me.

Pappasito’s with the Seckinger clan before coming to Bern.

I think Seth would be lying if he tried to say it’s only worth it to fly home for family. I am pretty sure if I talked enough about tex mex over the next couple of days he would book us tickets home. But that would be super manipulative so I will continue to try my knock off recipes and save the money on flights home.