clickinmyheels

Yesterday I was not feeling the greatest and my huge batch of Creamy Tomato Basil Bisque Soup that I had made last week was gone so I had to make another big batch to get me through the rest of the week. The kids have been back to school only a few short weeks and already they have brought home a lovely cold to share with me, my husband, and their younger sister. Oh how thoughtful and generous! So that tomato soup helped get me through this week for sure. Ok, I may have a slight addiction to it but if you haven’t tried it yet, you are missing out!  Get in the kitchen and make it!

As I’m making the soup, the girls are running around the house which is typical. We are a loud household for sure! I was using my immersion blender and blending away to that perfect consistency when I heard some screams from the living room. These sounded a little more elevated than the normal screams, so I ran in for a second to find that Zelda had destroyed a pair of ear buds that my 6-year-old had left out. There were tears and scolding of both the dog and the 6-year-old since she knows better than to leave stuff out. I’ve dug out a whole wardrobe of Barbie shoes, Strawberry Shortcake figurines and other items out of this dog’s throat, so the ear buds were an easy target for her. After I dealt with that and cleaned up the broken pieces of plastic, I went back to the kitchen to find my immersion blender cord burning. The cord  had gotten too close to the burner, which I left on. Thump on forehead moment. Why didn’t I turn the burner off? Maybe I need a scolding! Luckily I was done blending the soup, which goes back to why didn’t I just take it out of the pot away from any heat and flame when I ran into the other room? Damage was done. I was angry! I use that blender at least a few times a week for different things. It’s so handy. How will I get my weekly fix for my tomato soup without an immersion blender? Since I’m a mom, my little pout session didn’t last long because I needed to get my casserole made and in the oven. At least I caught it in time and didn’t have another kitchen fire. I vented to my mom later that night and she said maybe my dad could fix it. He is pretty handy, especially with electrical and could rig it up to work. Something about splicing the wire and tape of some sort. But, I knew I’d make a trip and get another blender this week. I didn’t throw out the burnt one just in case my dad can tinker with it and get it to work. Having two on hand wouldn’t be a bad thing!

I picked lots of fresh tomatoes from our little garden earlier in the day, well the ones that our Houdini dog Zelda had not gotten to yet. Even though we have the garden fenced off with 4 ft fence, she will hop over it like a little deer and help herself to ripe Roma’s and any lettuce that has sprouted up. I am not a great gardener so 5 or 6 tomatoes in a picking is a big deal to me! I wish I had those endless amounts of tomatoes like so many of my friends and family. So me and my black thumb get a little excited with just a handful of garden goodies. I washed the tomatoes and sat them on the counter and was planning on cutting and freezing whatever ones I did not use in the soup. After supper, I was folding laundry when my three-year old comes in from the kitchen covered in tomato seeds. She announces proudly that “The tomatoes made a mess!” I go into the kitchen to find all those freshly picked tomatoes that I had planned on freezing had been squished and squeezed to death with seeds and juice running down the cabinet, all over the floor, all over the towel she “tried” to clean her mess with and made a bigger mess. Her shirt was covered, seeds and tomato juice were in her hair and I was not happy. I cleaned up that mess and put that little monkey to bed early. I then came in to find the laundry that I had just folded on our ottoman had been kicked off onto the floor by the dogs during one of their WWE smackdowns. So I refolded the darn laundry and thought of a wonderful phrase that a dear friend had told me once. “The days are long, but the years are short.” In a blink of an eye, I won’t be folding and refolding that endless basket of tiny socks and Minnie Mouse undies and trying to keep track which kid those clothes belong to. Sometimes it’s really confusing when 75% are hand me downs and we just make whatever size work for the next kid. Someday, I will laugh when I’m chopping tomatoes and remember the bright-eyed grin of our feisty three-year old who finds trouble in record time. I won’t be making ten trips up the stairs trying to get those little ladies to be quiet and go to sleep. I really do think of this quote a lot in my crazy life! It helps get me through some of those mom moments when you want to pull your hair out!  I looked up the quote. It is by Gretchen Rubin. I’m not a reader, but I think I need to look into reading her work.

Today I made a little trip to Bed Bath and Beyond with my 20% coupon armed and ready to use. I splurged and decided to upgrade my immersion blender to a fancier model. My burnt one was pretty basic. Just a cup and no attachments. This new one comes with a whisk attachment, chopper/grinder attachment and more horsepower! I’ll try it out and let you know how it works. I’ve learned my lesson on cord and fire safety with kitchen appliances, I promise.

As for the recent trouble makers:

Zelda’s lucky we love her so much and you can’t stay mad at our youngest very long at all. She’s so stinkin’ cute and randomly says, “Mommy, I love you” with those big blue eyes which just melts your heart all over.

Again, I’ll repeat. I think it definitely applies to both kids and doberman toddlers –

“The days are long, but the years are short”  Gretchen Rubin