Ovens and Hammers, and Banana Muffins

This morning I needed to bake two dozen banana muffins for the blood drive.
So I turned on my oven and started mixing.
Then my oven turned itself off.
And wouldn't turn back on again.
<insert cuss words>
I did what any rational person faced with a time crunch and weeks of sub-optimal oven operations would  do: I went to the tool box and got the hammer.

Then I beat the tar out of the oven control panel.

My oven started working again.

I think it's scared of me.
What? You already know The Hubs has said we're getting a new one. As soon as he can show me the money, I'll go get it. Until then we are eating soup, stir fry and anything else I can make on the stove top.
Crisis one, averted.

Banana Muffin Recipe

2 1/2 cups flour

1 cup white sugar

1/3 cup brown sugar

1/2 tsp salt

2 t baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 cup sour cream

1 1/2 cups smashed bananas

1/2 cup milk (maybe, I eyeballed it)

1/2 cup oil

2 eggs

THREE.DAYS.

Swimming lessons are over, thank heaven. During the second week, The Boy would.not.get.in.the.water.

It took him three days and losing the privilege of going to Cars2 on the second day to tell me why. He didn't like it when the teacher let go of him. SERIOUSLY!?!?! THREE.DAYS.

Tonight at dinner was more of the same. He was refusing dinner until I guessed that he wanted me to cut up his burrito. He was going to skip dinner, rather than tell me he'd prefer it if I cut it up for him.

We had a big fat discussion about how you get what you want faster, if you come out and SAY IT.

Shades of his father, coming through. I may try sticking my head in the still-broken oven again. Seriously.
At least The Hubs is learning. The Boy still has a ways to go.

This week he also said stuff like, "When is the world going to be over?" and "I'm ready for the world to be over". Talk about giving a mom a heart attack. He said it so solemnly, I'm considering taking him seriously...and to a child psychologist.

In happier news, Zsa Zsa has turned into quite the little fish. She's so daring and adventurous it's a little nerve-wracking. Every once and a while she scares herself and gets less (much less) adventurous for a while.
The Boy seems to really be enjoying tumbling. I'm not sure what I'm paying for since the  first day I asked what he learned, and he said, "jumping over a pillow". Every time we drop him off and drive away, Zsa Zsa says, "I lost my brother!" Once, she was sleeping at home when I dropped him off and when she woke up, she said, "Where my brother go!? Get my The Boy!" She's started to refuse afternoon naps because she's afraid he'll leave without her, which is kind of cute. MUCH cuter than making Mom guess what might possibly be wrong. Equally cute is how fast they both went to sleep tonight. The Boy was snoring before Daddy finished stories. That never happens. Thank you swimming, going to the movies and tumbling all in one da...zzzzzzzzzzz.

Nostalgia in Dinner Planning

I grew up in a home with no air conditioning. In the summer, sometimes it was just too darn hot to fire up the oven and cook. (We also didn't have a microwave until the 1990's, but that's a different post.) My mother was awesome at finding cool meals for us to eat and a frequent summer staple was Bush's Baked Beans and buttered toast (from homemade bread). Eating cold beans had the added effect of cooling us down, as well.

I adore Bush's Baked Beans to this day. I can't stand any other brand (again, a topic deserving it's own post). When the temperature topped 108 today, I slipped a can of Bush's into the fridge for dinner tonight. This being Arizona, the cans don't stay as cool as they did in Idaho (especially after we added on to the house and got a basement storage room for canned goods).

Come dinner time, I heated up Husband's plate of beans (because he didn't grow up eating them the right way-cold), toasted some bread and sliced the tomatoes. Then I called the family for dinner.

When Husband saw what was for dinner, he looked as though I'd kicked his puppy. Beans for dinner? And that's it? 


Normally, Husband raves over my cooking. Not so much tonight. It turns out he thinks beans and toast are a snack, not a meal. My response? "Well, I can open another can."

It's seriously too hot to cook. And I even own a microwave.

What Kind of Day?

Do you ever judge how good a day you had based on the number of times you had to use your kids' middle names?

How about by how much of you screaming, "GET OUT OF MY ROOM RIGHT THIS INSTANT!" got caught on the phone message you were leaving for a new sister on your visiting teaching route?

Do you ever judge your day based on the amount of chocolate/apple pie/sugar you ate to keep you from killing your offspring?

Yeah, me either. Just wondering.