On Monday the 16th and Tuesday the 17th, the boys spent hours putting together Lego sets. They have a large enough space to assemble several dozen sets. We have city sets and Star Wars sets predominately, and they used both in their play. To store, we put the sets into plastic Ziplocs. Many sets fit while still fully assembled; a few need to be broken down just a bit, and only one or two need to be entirely dismantled. It takes some time, but not as much as we might fear. I'm so happy they are getting use out of them!
Caleb is solidly into six month clothes. Although he isn't as chubby as some babies, I certainly admire his chubby cheeks!
Most babies do not pee in their sleep. They wet first thing on waking, but while they sleep, they remain dry. To potty train, I've had good success in the past making sure I put a recently-woken infant over the toilet and making a "sss" sound, then praising the baby for doing what comes naturally.
I don't really have a toilet, of course, but I do have a sink, and Caleb had a historic day on Wednesday the 18th: he peed where I wanted him to, when I wanted him to. Yay!
That was good.
There was bad on Wednesday, too. We are getting ready to go on vacation and had 16 Granny Smith apples, ready for pie. Rather than hope the apples won't go bad, we figured we would make pies and enjoy them all day tomorrow as we pack and such.
Phil didn't think the five apples I had used in pies last time was sufficient. Also, he doesn't like the cut of the apples from the peeler-corer-slicer: they are flat, as opposed to wedges. (I am not as opinionated about my apple shapes: I just want to eat any kind of pie!) So we embarked on a pie-test.
I had over made pie crusts, doubling a recipe that was already doubled (oops). I didn't allow enough time for the crusts to thaw, so the rolling out was a bit frustrating. Phil was doing all the apple prep, which was good, but since the crusts took so long, we didn't try to fill the crusts until all 16 apples were ready to go.
That was a disaster. Way too many apples for the pans.
So we ended up making one thin slice pie, one wedge pie, and one pie with a crumble top. Now my issue was that I had three pies to bake, but only one cookie sheet to put below the pies to catch drips.
I stacked the three pies on top of each other in my oven. It was only my first or second time using the larger oven, so I expected some smokiness.
About ten minutes later, I noticed that the smokiness, rather than abating, increased. I asked Phil if he would check, and when he opened the oven, smoke poured out, and my top pie had flames shooting up off the top crust. (Did I mention that none of the pies was supposed to be flambe?) The top pie was, apparently, touching the heating element. Oops.
Phil blew out the pie. I grabbed pot holders and pulled the blackened top crust off and tossed it outside. Then I put the filling and bottom crust back in the oven (on a lower rack this time; I had lost enough of the pie that I was no longer worried about it spilling over the sides, so the cookie sheet protection did not matter any more).
It really was a huge bummer, though. That pie turned out to be inedible: the smoke damage made it unpleasant in the mouth. The wedge pie was mostly fine, albeit a tad smoky in flavor. But the crumble top, perhaps because it didn't have a solid top to make it impervious to smoke, definitely had an aftertaste.
So on Thursday, rather than a day of delicious pie for every meal, it ended up being a day of picking at smoky pies and wishing all had gone better.
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