A New Tradition- If We Don't Have Heart Attacks First

School started on a Thursday in Springfield, New Jersey, which was kind of strange.

And I sure do love this family of mine. 

We miss the older girls every day, but we know they would be with us if they could. 

We started a new tradition this year, the Back to School Family Feast.

Earlier in the week, with the help of the family, I created the menu. 

I'd asked each person what they would have me serve if they could only have one thing- anything for dinner. It could be dessert it could be a drink, a main dish....whatever.

On Sunday, I decorated the table and presented the kids with our feast.

We had: 

hamburgers (Greyson)

mashed potatoes and gravy (Zane)

pizza (Parker)

sausage links (Mom)

grilled cheese (Dad)

and 

Dutch Apple Pie (Romy)

It was absolutely the most unhealthy thing on the planet, but we had so much fun. 

Each person set a goal for the year and we brainstormed about what our family mission statement would be for the 2014-2015 school year. 

We talked about things we are looking forward to, things we are thankful for and things we hope to change this year. 

We drank Cokes and laughed when people turned down foods that they normally would fight over, because nobody could eat a cheeseburger AND a slice of pizza AND a grilled cheese sandwich AND Sausage AND mashed potatoes AND pie- even though the boys certainly tried to.

 We had a lot of leftovers, but there are worse things than having leftovers of your favorite food.

It was a good way to start the year, it added some fun and the Olson silliness that we enjoy. 

It was fun to start a new tradition, we will see how it changes over the years.

We don't have that many back- to - schools left, after all. 

I hope the kids look back on this and it makes them as happy as it made Matt and I to see their shocked and amused faces as I brought out the feast food. 

I hope your back to school week included something fun, if it didn't- you still have time, there are plenty of weeks left n September.

As we celebrate and have fun, our hearts are with our dear friends in Murray, Sarah and Andy.  They were in our ward in T-ville and when they moved to Virginia, we were all so sad to see them go, but we were excited for them, too. Years later, they had returned to Utah and we were the ones moving far away. I was so freaked out and it was Sarah who gave me the confidence and comfort to trust that the Lord was with us and it would all be just fine- wonderful, even. 

Their son, Magnus, was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer and in the past two weeks, their life has turned upside down and inside out.

You can read their blog here:  http://sarahandandyfamily.blogspot.com/

We love you guys, your names are in the temple here in the big city, and we think of you every day and pray for you. I wish there was more we could do to help. If any of my readers would be willing to pray for and put their names in their local temple, I would be personally thankful.

Sarah, Andy, Laylah, Jonah, Daphne, Baron & Magnus Collette....we love you. 

And cancer sucks.

Hungry?

Food shopping here is always interesting.

There are seasonal, ethnic foods that fill the shelves alongside the Wonder Bread and Cheese Whiz.

There are so many foods I have just never even heard of.

There are so many foods I will never try as well.

I'll stick to my Kraft Macaroni and Cheese.

Matt told me today that Twinkies and Ding Dongs will be back soon, they sold the company.

My super healthy Raspberry Red Zingers had better come with them.

These are some of the items that we did not pick up today at the supermarket:

Butter beans, ackees, large green boiled peanuts in a can and callaloo.
I have no idea.

  Yum! Irish Moss peanut drink!!

 Care for a chocolate digestive?
Matt says it's just candy from Great Britain.

Better make sure you have the jumbo sized container of oxtail seasoning......

There is a giant assortment of various brands and flavors of plantain chips, as well as every flavor of Goya fruit soda/drink on the planet.

Pineapple is my favorite.
 I am just starting to develop a taste for guava, too. Okay- guava flavoring and guava filling, but I'm getting there.

These are wafer cookies from Europe, they also come in about a dozen different flavors. They don't stock them all in the same place though so you can find different kinds in the cookie aisle, near the checkout and in they make seasonal flavors, too.

Plum Butter.
Who knew?

PRUNE butter.
Who cared?

Note that plum butter and prune butter were in  different aisles. 

Prune butter is seasonal, I think it's for Seder.

We didn't buy any of it, but we did leave the store with these:

Matt had them at work recently and said they were wonderful.

Matt was correct.

They're  bite sized layered cakes with a layer of lemon, vanilla and almond cake. The filling between the layers is raspberry jam and they dip the whole thing in milk chocolate. 

The first bite will give you a cavity.

The 400th bite will give you diabetes. 

Totally worth it.

In the Kitchen

I hope that after we get through the first full year, it will be easier to have so many miles between us and our families. We were invited to a couple of places this year, but we stayed here so that Grey and Roe's dad could spend the day with the kids, too. 

Not my favorite, but it went perfectly fine.

I made too many pies this year- if there can be such a thing. 

I was a little disappointed in my beautiful magazine worthy pineapple custard pie. I'm going to make it again and tweak the recipe. It needed a little less pineapple and the custard needed to be heavier.  It was very good, but not quite at 'to die for' level.

Yet.

I taught Romy how to make pumpkin pie this year.

Do you remember the first time you ever made it, or saw it made?

I remember crying thinking I ruined it and throwing it away because the filling was just soup.

I didn't know that an hour in the oven was going to fix that. I made another one and it was the same. I put it in the oven anyway and still cried as I obsessively checked it every 10 minutes and it was still runny. 

I decided to leave it in there until it burned though, I was so frustrated.

Lo and behold, after just over an hour, it magically turned into pie. It looked terrible because I'd messed with it so much, but it was pumpkin pie.

Romy's first pumpkin pie turned out much better:

Good stuff. 

And even though our table seemed awfully empty this year, we had a good day.

The next day, we started our holiday baking.

You wouldn't know it was the next day based on Greyson wearing the same shirt every single day all weekend long.......boys.

The kids helped dip pretzels in chocolate, same as they do every year.

I also made these cookies with a recipe I got from Cousin Lisa. The recipe said that it was my mother in law's recipe, but Matt doesn't remember them.

I added too much flour anyway, so they turned out a little on the dry side. I dipped half of the cookie in melted chocolate later and they were immediately gobbled up by the family.

Today I made chocolate chip cookies.

One of the changes in having so many of the kids gone and not having ward members that live next door is that when I make a big batch of cookies, it tends to be too much. Usually a dozen or two will last us a couple of days. That same amount usually lasted one night and we would bring a plate over to someone in the ward as well.

It only dawned on me today to just freeze the extra dough and only make one pan of cookies.

And it dawned on me that one pan usually lasts a few days that the best way to store the dough was to take my handy cookie scoop, measure out 15 cookies and seal up one cookie sheet's worth at a time.

Now I have exactly three more batches of chocolate chip cookies all

ready to bake. No more wasting or making so many cookies that we get sick of them. I can't believe it took me this long to realize this simple solution.

I guess I could have also cut the recipe in half, but I like this idea much better.

(Please ignore the gross parchment paper, this was batch 2 of the day. )

We also made fudge and plan to start on the other candy this week. 

The holiday season has a lot of stress and chaos, but few things are more comforting than sitting with your family listening to Dean and Bing sing Christmas carols as you catch a passing glimpse of your sparkling Christmas tree. 

It's the most wonderful time of the year, indeed.

Fancy Food

Before Parker headed back to Utah, we made sure he was able to get  a taste of one more thing they don't have out west, White Castle.

 The burgers come in a "30 pack" box.

They're just sliders and I think they are absolutely disgusting, but teenagers and potheads everywhere love them.

He didn't actually eat all of those, they kids thought it would be funny to give him their empties and have him pose like Crazy White Castle Man.

Jane thought they were okay, but wasn't in love with them.

I hear you, kid.

Please ignore the kitchen that I just brought to your attention..we have been frustrated that the dishwasher barely works and realized that the moron who remodeled the house hooked it up to the cold water instead of the hot, so Matt fixed it right after we ate.

Parker left yesterday and is safely back in Utah. We will see him again for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

It was really nice to have all seven of my kiddos here in this still unpacked and new house.

For a few days, all was right in the world, even though nobody had enough hot water.

I miss him already.

Love love love my kids.

Parker's Visit So Far

This week my oldest, Parker has been here. I wish he'd just move out here with us, but he has a job, school and a serious girlfriend in Utah, so he wants to stay there. I can understand that and I'm proud of him for paying his bills and working to be more independent. This whole letting them leave the nest thing..I think they use that analogy because it's for the birds. Right now, I hope the rest of them stop getting older. Growing up is over-rated and Lord knows I've avoided doing it for as long as humanly possible.

(trying to sleep until noon on the air mattress)

Matt has taken  the time Parker is here off, on  Friday we took all 7 of the kiddos into the city.

A friend suggested we try and park on Staten Island and take the ferry into Manhattan.

She said it was less expensive and easier, so we tried it.

She was right.

 We've been stuck paying anywhere from $30-$50 every time we drive into the city and there are about $30 dollars in toll roads as well. It adds up fast. There are less expensive ways, of course, but too much to figure out  when you aren't confident about where things are and you have kids in tow.

 Staten Island was about 1/3 the total cost to use and you get to take the ferry right past the Statue of Liberty. It was the first time Parker, Emma, Kate and Jane have seen Lady Liberty and it was neat to notice their faces as they saw her. They all got quiet and you could see they were just in awe of the sight of this iconic representation of all that we hold dear as Americans.

Just the week before in her talk, Jane had told the story of a 13 year old girl who came to the states all by herself and how she felt when she saw the Statue of Liberty, and we talked about what that must have been like and all of the kids thought it was amazing to see it, and be on a boat crossing the Hudson River while doing it.

We walked through the financial district and saw the old Capitol building. There was a loud guy ranting about how evil the government is on the steps and Parker got to see his first crazy person screaming at people in NYC.

(According to this guy, we haven't had a good president since Milford. I wasn't even motivated by his ranting enough to look up how long ago that was.)

We had lunch on the pier when we needed a break-- Pizza Uno.

 Pizza Uno claims that they created the original Chicago pizza.

Maybe they did, maybe they didn't but we all prefer Giordano's. Gio's has more cheese and they use pizza sauce that isn't chunky. It was still really good, but if you're ever in Chicago and you can't decide- that's the biggest difference- a super chunky sauce and less cheese vs a smoother sauce and the approval of the Olson Bunch- because THAT is super important.

 Parker's biggest thing on his 'to do' list was to have lots of cool food so we have made sure he got to try pizza from our fave local dive, Saporito's, had a salted bagel with cream cheese, enjoys girls scout cookie candy bars and tried the salted caramel pretzel frozen yogurt. We still need to go to Carvel's tomorrow and order girl scout cookie milkshakes. This kid loves a Samoa in any form, just like his mother.

 At the Vietnam War Memorial in NYC

(Big Brother and Baby Sister)

We made his birthday cake out of Dunkin' Donuts munchkins.

His presents were kind of lame, but this year he was in need for a grown up present, his car had two tires that were shot and we paid to have them replaced as his present. Hey, it's what he wanted, Yo.

Today after church, we  headed over to the Hawkins' home for  lunch.

We'd been invited there for July 4th but weren't feeling good and had to ask for a rain check. We're really thankful that they issued one so soon, because it was so much fun. The girls have made some great friends in just the short time we have been here and you'd never think they haven't known the girls in the ward for years. Actually, Kate has known the niece of the Hawkins family for 5 years, she lives in Willard, Utah and was in Kate's group for Trek this summer. They realized this when Kate gave her talk on Sunday - another example of what a small world it really is.

The Ralstons came to lunch as well and I can't express how thankful I am for Cyndi and her family. They are the only other Mormons who are active in our town and they have two daughters who are the same ages as Zane and Grey. The girls are ecstatic to have a fellow Mormon in their grade and don't even care that they are boys. I know the Ralstonave a fellow Mormon in their grade and don't even care that they are boys.

 I know the Ralston

Cyndi and her husband are great, I am excited about the friendship and connection we already have to them.

Tomorrow is Parker's last day here and we plan to just do the slug thing again. Two days in the city were enough for him. Tomorrow I'll make sure his laundry is done again and we'll play board games and watch the Olympics.

We have the DVR recording five channels at once so we don't miss anything they air.

We loooove the Olympics here in the Olson house.

The opening ceremonies were kind of weird, we loved the first part but we all made fun of the part where they entered the digital age and told the love story of two teenagers. It was based on the premise that the girl loses her phone, the boys finds it and they connect as a result. The thing is that she loses her phone, he finds it and he texts her to tell her he found her phone. How do you text someone if you have their phone? It was dumb enough that we all have been making fun of that part of the opening ceremonies.

We hope Michael Phelps gets his spark back and crushes the rest of his races.

We also hope the Chinese keep falling in men's gymnastics.

I'm watching fencing right now.

Love the Olympics.

Are you watching the Olympics?

What are your favorites?