January: The month of food and science adventures

January 2012 has been SOOOO much better than January 2011. My hope is that the remainder of the year continues to surprise us with even better things to come. I have truly enjoyed the past month. Having so much time with my children has been such a blessing. We have spent a lot of time at the park because we have been having an unusually warm winter. I have honed my basketball skills, but obviously not enough to beat my 10 year old :) I have also decided I need to find a Baker's Anonymous group to join! I have never baked so much in my entire life. The family has definitely been enjoying all my experimentation in cooking as well. We have tried many new pasta dishes, homemade breads, and plenty of cookies and desserts. When you give up dining out, it is a lot easier when you are cooking food at home that you truly enjoy.

I have also enjoyed making cakes for some friends. Here are some photos of some of my baking adventures:

Cupcakes for a friend's son who is away at the NC School of Science and Math:


My friend Lisa requested a blue and brown cake for her birthday:


A new recipe for banana pudding was a hit:


Annette's daughter Sarah turned 16 and loves purple like I do so it was easy to create a purple-lover's cake :)


Annette's son Samuel got married and I was happy to make their cake, he has been like a big brother to my boys:


In January we took a day trip to SciWorks, a hands-on science museum in Winston-Salem. We met cousins there and everyone had a great time. Tristan took a field trip there last year and loved the place and begged to go back. We purchased a 3 visit pass (because it was only a few dollars more than what we would have paid for one admission) so we will be making 2 more trips in the coming year. It is half-way between Auntie's house and ours so it is a great place to meet and have fun. We packed a picnic lunch and stayed for most of the day. There are lots of hands on exhibits and a few animals and the kids really had a blast:



They loved feeding and petting this deer:



This otter was beautiful:


They had a dental area where the kids could play in a large mouth structure and move teeth around, who knew teeth could be so fun?


There was an exhibit where you "raced" against various animals by racing a set of lights as they lit up in a line at the speed the animal ran. They ran a few times trying to beat various animals:


On the way home, we stopped at a Krispy Kreme donut shop. We don't have any that are very close to the house so we enjoyed the opportunity to watch donuts be made and to eat them while they were still warm. A good time was had by all (well, maybe not by my husband, he is not a fan like the rest of the family):




These photos crack me up because they had word bubbles stuck to the viewing glass and some of the bubbles are right next to the boys heads like they are saying the statements ;)




Makes ya wanna make a trip to the Krispy Kreme doesn't it?


I'll end the post with a couple of cuties....They did this on their own and I was glad to be able to grab the camera and catch them in the act:

Hello, anyone there???