Mongoose Mayhem

We didn't have any nasty weather like last week (when we had the tornado sirens go off three times) but these were still pretty cool.

But I finally cleaned the oven! I know that's not very interesting but I had never bothered to do it because I thought it would be a big job. It so nice to open it and see it look like an oven instead of an encrusted black hole.

It didn't even take me very long - just an SOS pad and some elbow grease.

Our winter/spring semester of co-op started recently and we are enjoying participating again.

I signed up to teach geography to the 8-12 year old. This past week I decided to make things more hands-on and fun by creating some 3-D continents and having them identify several physical features with tasty treats. I made sugar cookie dough and cut out the continents. The kids worked in teams to mark the world's main features, like forests,deserts, mountains, etc.

Then we really enjoyed ourselves by eating our creations! We all had a good laugh as they asked for certain sections and walked around saying, "Mmmm! Antartica is delicious" and "You should try southern Asia!". One student, Evan, only wanted Japan. Maybe he was still full from lunch?

This is a picture of Mike, sitting next to his older friend Andrew, both of them working hard in anatomy class.

Why is there an underline??? I didn't hit anything!!!! And now it changed to blue on my screen...argh!!

Wow...I'm almost thirty! LOL

The boys (Jim, too) took me to my favorite Italian place, which is down near Jim's workplace in Garland. They used to be a little hole-in-the-wall but expanded into a nice big place a few years back.




Sicilano's is the only place I've been here that knows how to do Baked Ziti right.









And...they have a fantastic Chocolate Ganache cake that is divine. The best of both worlds!!




We had a very nice time and I gave the boys my free birthday cheesecake. I didn't drive that far for cheesecake!

In late January, Mike's Cub Scouts held a Pinewood Derby Race. Mike and Jim worked on a car and it turned out to be very streamlined and sleek. Mike choose a dark, metallic blue for the paint color and, after several coats and some clear coat, it turned out very snazzy.

Mike ended up winning "Best Paint" - this was the second year he did that!





We've had a fairly normal winter, with very little precipitation, but we finally got our annual ice. This was the front of the house mid-morning. The boys did play around with the ice in the back yard but decided the didnt' want to risk falling on the hard driveway. I'm sure Mike's soccer coach would be pleased to know that...