Culture Night: France

We had another fun culture night a couple of weeks ago.  For book club awhile back we read a book called French Kids Eat Everything by Karen Le Billon.  I had to buy it because I couldn't get it from the library in time.  The good thing about that was that there were recipes in the back of the book.  I also really enjoyed the book and it got me thinking about some of our bad eating habits here in America.  Anyway, so all of the food we made was from recipes in that book and it was all really good.  

Here's the table:

We kind of tried to have courses like they would in France.

We started with an endive and kiwi salad:

I couldn't find just endive in our grocery store so it ended up being some kind of mediterranean mix that had endive in it.  The best thing about this salad was the French vinaigrette dressing recipe that we found in the book.  Here it is, in case anyone is interested:

1/2 c. extra-virgin olive oil

1/4 c. red wine vinegar

1 1/2 tsp. Dijon-style mustard

1 Tbsp. maple syrup (optional--I put this in)

1 Tbsp. finely minced shallot, scallion, or onion (optional--I think I skipped this)

That's it.  It was super delicious.

For the next course we had some bread and cheese.  We got some imported French brie at Costco with their baguettes.

The kids all hated the brie but loved the bread of course.  I don't think brie is my favorite either.

Then we had Bouillabaisse for dinner.  We used this recipe for younger kids from the book:

Hopefully you can see enough of it to get the idea.  I took those pictures before going to the grocery store for ingredients.  I didn't get a picture of the soup but I thought it turned out pretty yummy.  I just used some tilapia from costco for the fish.  The kids all ate it pretty well.  I don't think Joe liked it much, but he's not too big on fish most of the time.  The leftovers were really good, too.  

For dessert we had chocolate mousse with fresh raspberries from our garden:

I don't think we let them chill quite long enough but they were still pretty delicious (and rich!).

Elizabeth talked about the French Revolution a little bit.  Natalie talked about French rules for eating (from the book).  Nate and Joe did sports.  Marsha talked about the relationship between American and France over the years.  I talked about the language.  

We finished it off by listening to some of our favorite French music for kids: French Bop! :)

Allen Reunion

The Allen Reunion ended up being in mid-June this year.  We were worried it might be cold but we had perfect weather all week.  We had a great time and definitely got some sun.  We loved having everyone there this year (although at different times--we just missed having a family picture with everyone by a few hours since JR had to leave early and Matt & family came late).

We spent lots of time at the pool, like always.  It wasn't a very relaxing year for me since I had to be right by Eli the whole time but we had fun.  Eli ended up loving the waterslide.  He even got to the point where he'd go down by himself and I'd catch him.  He could have done that all day.

Lisa took this great picture of the older kids lined up at the waterslide:

We also had two days at the lake this year.  The first day we got to go out on a boat Chris rented.  I skied, Joe wake-boarded and wake-surfed, and the girls had a blast on the tube.  We couldn't convince Nate to try anything but he had fun riding in the boat.  Poor Eli hated the whole boat ride and was scared for the people skiing now matter what we did to try to convince him otherwise.  Maybe next year... :)

Natalie:

Lizzy:

Joe getting a refresher course on wake-boarding.  He didn't have trouble getting up at all!

 

Wake-surfing was tricky but he had fun trying it:

Enjoying the ride on the front of the boat:

Of course there was lots of crawdad hunting and playing on the beach, too:

This guy loves any kind of beach:

 The second time we went to the lake we didn't go on the boat.  We did rent a paddleboard, though, and had a lot of fun trying that out.  It was a lot harder than I was expecting but none of us tipped it.  The girls loved going out on it:

Elizabeth:

Natalie:

I love that clear water.

Joe got some good golfing in with my brothers and my Dad:

He also went out one night with Elizabeth & Nate:

He's trying to make golfers of our kids.  We'll see how successful he is...

One night we had a lot of fun playing soccer golf.  They set up a course on the driving range and it was so much fun!

 

Two of the highlights for me were the FHE that Abby and Andrew did one night and the temple trip to do baptisms that Brad set-up.  They were both so great.  I also made a baby picture guessing game that was a lot of fun:

The temple-goers:

Those nieces and nephews of mine are growing up too fast.  They are all so amazing, though, that it's really fun to watch.  Pretty soon my kids will be old enough to go, too!  Crazy.

 Here are some group pictures we took:

That stinker Nate.... :)

Having some fun after pictures were done:

It was such a great week.

Until next time, Greenwood!

Summer

I need to catch up here on some of our summer fun.  School let out at the beginning of June.  I still have yet to go through and organize all the kids' papers/projects, etc, but I did find this gem in Natalie's backpack:

I love the "eating is my favorite sport" line. :)

I found these pencils in Elizabeth's backpack:

Natalie had been begging to do a lemonade stand with her friend the first day of summer vacation so we did.  She made homemade lemonade and juiced them all by hand.  I helped her make some cupcakes too.  Then we went to the new park and set up their stand.  Sadly, I forgot to bring my phone to the park so I don't have any pictures of the stand.  They did pretty well, though.  They cleared $14 after paying me back for supplies, which they divided between the three of them (Elizabeth helped, too).  It was funny how excited they were.  Here's two shots we tried to get of Natalie throwing her new cash up in the air:

Here are the boys on one of the cool features of that new park:

I love finding them snuggled up like puppies some nights:

One night we let the kids sleep outside on the trampoline.  They were worried about mosquitos so we set up the tent.  Unfortunately, Nate got scared and didn't make it.  Maybe next time.

I love that Idaho sky.

Nate started t-ball.  The only t-ball they have here is pretty laid back.  It's actually supposed to be for kindergartners but they said we could sign Nate up if we thought he'd do alright.  He's definitely one of the better ones on the team after playing last year.  He's already gotten like 4 home runs.  I loved watching him as pitcher one night.  He was pretending to throw fast balls every time someone would hit. :) 

Here are those cute boys again, this time jumping on the trampoline in the water:

We sure do miss our pool.  The only pool here is super crowded all the time.  It has been the hottest June on record, too, so we've had to be creative with ways to cool down.

Here was our garden back when we were still pretty worried about it:

It seemed like some of our plants stayed tiny for forever and we weren't sure what would grow.  The peas and radishes always looked great, but everything else was iffy.

Here's our garden now:

It looks great!  We're still waiting on the tomatoes, beans, corn, squash, carrots and cucumbers, but we've had lots of lettuce, kale, peas, and radishes.  I think we planted a little bit late.  

We loved making our first salad with garden-fresh ingredients:

(I added some more things from our fridge, too)

It really is so fun.

The best thing about our yard is definitely our big raspberry bushes.  We've had tons of raspberries these last couple of weeks and it has been heavenly.

Nature's best snack:

I'm not sure if we'll ever be able to save many, though, since our family eats them too fast.

We've finally started working on Lizzy's quilt.  (Remember when she got it as a gift for her 9th birthday?  Yeah, she's 10 1/2 now).  

We cut all the squares and designed it like this:

With Marsha's help, we've now sewed all the rows.  We just need to sew them together and finish it all.  Maybe soon, though!

It's been a great summer so far.