One of my household duties is bringing in the newspapers. This morning, I wandered down the stairs in my sock covered feet and looked out the front door.  It appeared to have rained during the night, so I slipped off my socks and headed outside in my bare feet to get the newspapers.  Heading back in, I walked into the dining room and set the newspapers on the table.

Later in the morning, my feet began to get chilly and I began searching for my socks. Not by the front door, where I remember removing them.  Not on the dining room table, where I set the newspapers.  There they were!  Sitting by the back door.  Apparently, I had carried them to the opposite end of the house and dropped them for future use.  I had become a bigger, older version of my absent minded sock dropping son.  Next up, the socks are scheduled to appear in the refrigerator, when I pick up the milk for my cereal.

My socks resting peacefully by the backdoor. The opposite end of the house from where I last remember depositing them.

Psyched that the CookiesbyDave.com post “That Part is New,” about the Hare punching the Tortoise, was featured on the Mixed Martial Arts web site MMA-JAPAN.net, under the Arts and Entertainment section. @Jiujitsu_Jedi thank you for sharing!

CookiesbyDave.com…  Fresh Baked and Fierce.

Every day after school, our Kindergartener Ben gleefully shows me all of the papers contained in his backpack. Today, a picture revealed that they had been reading “The Tortoise and the Hare.”  It looked like they were told to select their favorite character and explain why they liked them.  Ben’s handwriting indicated that he liked “the rabbit, because he hops.”  Good enough reason.  When asked to tell me about the drawing, Ben indicated that he was the person standing with a flag by the finish line.  Full of enthusiasm, Ben also added, “And the Rabbit is punching the Turtle in the head.”  Hummm, I don’t remember that part of the story, but that certainly would have helped the rabbit in his quest for racing glory.  Perhaps, in Ben’s version, the turtle won, because the hare was disqualified for unsportsmanlike conduct.  I guess I should give him credit.  It certainly makes the story more exciting than the rabbit deciding to take a nap.  Good thing it wasn’t the Grimm’s Fairy Tale version or else the turtle may have ended up eating the rabbit.  I guess things could have been much, much worse.

Breaking News… Kirby the Beagle completed his dog training class and came in (drum roll, please)…  Hey, wait a second.  Hold the phone.  This announcement needs a little build up, so please be patient.

A little over one year ago, we adopted Kirby the Beagle. Kirby was a once returned pound puppy.  Yes, we were Kirby’s second and probably last chance.  This pup was out of strikes.  How did Kirby show his appreciation?  Well, urine throughout the house.  Barking this way and that.  Chewing or tearing up many a random item (in particular, he had a grudge against the lattice under our back deck).  Escaping out of the house and running throughout the neighborhood at every available opportunity.  Kirby was bound and determined to play his last hand.  Little did he know that we had other plans…  dog school.

Last Spring, Kirby completed his dog classes, but was informed that he would need to repeat “Level One” in the Fall. Ugh, yet another Kirby set back, but we had come this far with crazed pup and we were determined to make this work.  So there we were, back in class this Fall and much to our surprise, Kirby started responding to the training.  Sitting without verbal command.  Coming to us, when asked.  Walking around like a good citizen and sitting still, when told to “stay.”  Our Kirby was really coming through with one exception, “Down.”  Kirby hates lying down upon command.  Sure this is a dog training deficiency, but Kirby has come so far, so I have grown to accept that this is one more hurdle that will take some time.

Well, tonight was the final class and at the end of class, they have a “Dog Show” and give out prizes. I went up to pick out our contestant number and I picked number one.  Sure it was a cocky move, but why not?  Show that pride.  Walk into the ring with a little swagger.  Showing our number one to my 10-year-old son Jacob, he expressed skepticism.  I reminded him that for rec baseball, he wore the number one.  Jacob then responded with a new piece of information, “Yes, but for old people, number one is bad luck.”  Ouch.  Old?  Bad luck?  I was unaware.  Double whammy.

Any who, there we were number one and going for broke. Kirby was doing great, other than at one point wandering off to inspect some hockey gear placed in the corner of the room.  Other than that, he was really doing well.  Then came the “Down” command.  Kirby looked at me and scoffed.  “Ha!  ‘Down.’  Say it all you want, big boy, but I hate the ‘down’ command.”  Ugh.  At least we did well at all of the other commands, now it was in the hands of the judges.

So there we were, Kirby the Beagle trying to make a full comeback, from the pound to top of his dog training class. We waited.  We wondered.  Even Kirby began to sweat and dogs don’t sweat, so it had to be tense.  Then came the announcement (now the drum roll, please), “In second place, Kirby!”  There he was, my little partially reformed pound puppy, not first place, but still a certified comeback kid and “Best of Show” in our pack.

Kirby the Beagle resting on the couch and contemplating his second place performance. That or else he is figuring out if he can eat his ribbon, probably the latter.

Look carefully…

10-year-old Jacob appears to have color coordinated his socks with his backpack and thrown all of them onto the dining room table (socks on top). Witness those sneaky stealth socks in their camouflaged afterschool environment.

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“What do you do, when your wife approaches you with some grated zucchini and says, ‘Can you bake something with this zucchini?’ You dig through some church cookbooks, that’s what you do.  The result was a delicious and moist zucchini bread packed full of chocolate chips.  Grab a glass full of milk and enjoy a perfect afterschool or after work or anytime snack.”  – Cookie Dave

ZUCCHINI BREAD

1 cup Sugar

1 cup Brown Sugar

1 cup Vegetable Oil

3 Eggs

3 teaspoons Vanilla Extract

2 cups Zucchini, peeled and grated

3 cups Flour

1 teaspoon Baking Soda

2 teaspoons Baking Powder

2 teaspoons Cinnamon

1 teaspoon Salt

1½ cups Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Grease and flour two loaf pans. I recommend greasing the pan bottoms, covering the bottom of the pans with parchment paper, and then greasing and flouring over the parchment paper, as well as the rest of the pan interior.

Mix together the sugar, brown sugar, vegetable oil, eggs, and vanilla extract.

Mix in the grated zucchini. Set aside.

Combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt.

Gradually mix the “flour mixture” into the “zucchini mixture.”

Stir in the chocolate chips.

Pour batter into the prepared loaf pans.

Bake for 1 hour or until the middle of the loaves are firm to the touch.

Makes two loaves of zucchini bread.

Revised Source: Amber Wendt’s “Zucchini Bread” recipe on page 143 of the 2004 “Sioux Falls Lutheran School Cookbook.”

Charlene said that dinner would be ready in about thirty minutes, the boys were happily playing in the attic, and I saw an opportunity. An opportunity for a Nerf gun ambush.  Gearing up, I knew that I only had one good shot at surprising the kids.  Crawling up the attic stairs with Nerf gun in hand, I took aim and fired.  Completely taken off guard, I landed several good hits and scurried down the stairs, as the boys squealed and shouted.  Reloading, I was met by a fully armed squad of Nerf children.

Exchanging fire with my youngest son Ben, suddenly there was a flash of light followed by pain. Sharp pain.  In my hurry to surprise the boys, I had forgotten my safety glasses.  The Nerf disk had slammed directly into my open right eye.  From the feel of the impact, my guess was that my eye had been pushed to the back of my head.  Crumpling up on the floor (there really was not any need to fall down, but it seemed appropriately dramatic and it did halt the Nerf barrage), I promised myself that I would never again forget my safety glasses.

Hobbling off to the bathroom, I looked into the mirror. Nothing appeared to be wrong and I could see, despite the sharp pain.  The incident made me wonder, why they don’t sell Nerf brand safety goggles?  Seems like an easy $15 bucks to be made.  Also, when did Nerf abandon their core business of sporting equipment?  When did they move toward supplying home armories?  My guess was that one of their foam rubber footballs still would have hurt really bad slamming into my retina.  If I’m not bleeding, is it really worthy of a trip to urgent care or would this be more appropriate for a scheduled doctor’s appointment?  Good thing that my eye appeared to have been plenty hard for deflection purposes.

Now on Day Three, the pain is nearly gone and all of the cones and rods appear to be functioning fine. Only every now and then do I stare into the mirror and wonder, “Is my right eye bigger now?”  No, stop it.  You are fooling yourself.  “Wait, is it getting red?  Is there bleeding against the grey matter in my hypochondriac brain?”  Never mind, there are children to surprise.  There are Nerf battles to be won.  Get back into the game, Nerf soldier.  Just make sure to first put on your safety glasses, dumb bunny.

My eyes still look the same (I think…), but oh no! Now, my nose is crooked!  #horribleluck #selfdiagnosedhypochondriac

Early Halloween greetings from Charlene’s toes…

Our Kindergartener Ben was very proud of himself, when he announced that he was awarded with a Subway kids meal gift certificate for helping out at school. Ben’s announcement came with one request from the little man, he wanted to eat his free sandwich with the whole family.  So yesterday, we piled into the car and headed out for lunch.

Subway is one of those places, where their marketing and menu choices almost make you feel guilty if you don’t select a healthy sandwich option. Staring at their big promotional sign for Poblano BLTs, I could not help but think that I was straying toward unhealthy menu options in the land of Jared the weight loss guy.  No, resist the Poblano BLT, look away from the poster, go healthy, you can do it, Dave.  Make Jared proud.  My turn in line fast approaching, I turned toward the tuna sub.  It sounded good, it sounded healthy, I was proud of myself.

Sitting down to each, our family soon found ourselves surrounded with nutritional facts. They were on the back of cups, on educational fliers, I was beginning to suspect that they were actually broadcast directly into our brains.  That is when my family informed me that the tuna sub was actually one of the most calorie packed sandwiches I could have selected.  Somewhere Jared was shaking his head.  Well, as the Taylor Swift and her Subway Sandwiches promotional onslaught seemed to be telling me to “Shake it off,” I enjoyed my tuna sandwich.  Then much to my sadness, I realized that crumbs from my sandwich had landed on my belly, which my calorie rich sandwich was not helping shrink in size.

In an act of kindness and love, my dear wife Charlene gently brushed some of the crumbs off my built-in tummy ledge and giggled playfully at my failed attempt to eat healthy. Looking around the table, my boys gleefully chatted and nibbled slowly (very, very slowly) at their sandwich selections.  Everything was right in my world.  I was surrounded by my beautiful family that I love.  I was truly blessed.  Well, all except for my fatty tuna fest.  With the exception of that one misstep, the world was just as it should be, crumbs on my belly included.

Our house has a pretty cool feature. As you enter the backdoor, there is a set of 12 cubby-holes that we have split up among members of the family and contain most things you need, as you exit the house, including shoes, backpacks, and jackets.  Inevitably, they also become a drop box for most things carried into the house, including papers from school, receipts from shopping trips, random sporting equipment, and most anything else that you are too lazy to properly stow.

The other night, I was helping our 2^nd Grader Sam finish up his homework.  Putting the finishing touches on his reading assignment, we headed to his cubby to find the appropriate paper for me to sign and have Sam return to school.  As we walked to Sam’s cubby, my shoulder (which is apparently ape-like in size, due the havoc it was about to cause) brushed gently against some items protruding from Charlene’s upper row cubby.  Unfortunately, this caused instability in her cubby’s pile of papers and the item on top slipped out.  Double unfortunately, the item now rushing out of her cubby was Charlene’s iPad.  Triple unfortunately, the floor directly in front of the cubbies is hard, cold, rock-like tile.  Gravity was leading us in a very bad direction.

In a rare demonstration of cat-like quickness, the palm of my right hand moved up in time to push up the iPad, which plummeting directly in front of me. The iPad flew back up into the air, somewhere over Sam’s head, as he looked up in response to the first skin on electronic device thwack.  Acting on pure adrenaline, my left palm then reached up and batted the device once again into the air.  Beginning to take on the appearance of an untalented and very expensive juggling act, my right hand then finally caught the iPadular device at belly level, about four feet above disaster.

Crisis averted and letting out a sigh of relief, I looked at young Sam who opened his eyes wide, as if to say, “That was a close one.” Still not exchanging a single word, I returned the iPad to Charlene’s cubby, placed it at a secure angle, and breathed a sigh of relief.  Crisis averted, catch of the day landed.  iLucky.

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“Looking for a cookie that will be a hit? Look no further.  At my son’s last baseball game of the year, Sandy brought these delicious cookies to the ballpark and they were a hit.  My only regret was that I had not brought a tall glass of milk to the game, because these cookies are perfect for dunking (my apologies for the basketball reference within a cookie post about baseball).  So grab a few, pour yourself a glass of milk, and enjoy, while watching your favorite team play.” – Cookie Dave

SANDY’S “PLAY BALL” CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES

¾ cup Sugar

¾ cup Brown Sugar

¾ cup Shortening

2 Eggs

½ teaspoon Vanilla Extract

2 cups Flour

¾ teaspoon Baking Soda

½ teaspoon Salt

1 cup Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cream the sugar, brown sugar, and shortening.

Mix in the eggs and vanilla. Set aside.

Combine flour, baking soda, and salt.

Gradually, mix in the “flour mixture” into the “shortening mixture.”

Stir in chocolate chips.

Drop by tablespoons onto parchment paper lined cookie sheets.

Bake for 10 minutes or until golden brown.

Makes about 44 cookies.

Revised Source: Chocolate Chip Cookie Master, Sandy Lotthammer Schow

Being new to Minnesota, it has taken me a little while to get used to the Fall Break concept, but when you think about it, it makes a lot of sense. Take a break from school and get outside, before everything dies and freezes for the next six months.  Yep, Fall Break makes a lot of sense.

As a result, the boys and I decided by taking a trip to the “A Maze’n Farmyard,” which is sort of a small farm theme park. The A Maze’n Farmyard, is kind of odd, but strangely delightful, which also describes me on my best days.  Well, any who, the farmyard has almost everything you could desire in a pseudo farm mini theme park experience, ice cream, putt putt golf, a giant slide, a petting zoo (which always sort of cause me to be hyper hygienic…  Purell, please), and course a big maze, which of course makes it an “A Maze’n” farmyard.

Getting our priorities straight, we first enjoyed ice cream and then headed out for fun. After a ride on the “train” and several trips down the big slide, everyone was ready for some putt putt action…  although our levels of skill and desire to stick to the rules varied greatly.  For a kid like our 10-year-old Jacob, who does not suffer the chaos created by family members with little concern for rules of the game, he found this particularly frustrating, especially when numerous situations calling for bending the rules come into play.  One particular situation seemed to foul his mood.  5-year-old Ben lined up to putt and sent the ball into Jacob’s sweatshirt, which was inexplicably draped across the putting green.  Seeing that he was actually the cause for concern, Jacob quickly picked up Ben’s ball and rolled it on its original trajectory.  Much to the “a maze’ment” off all, the ball landed in the hole.  A hole in one!  Our first one.  “A Maze’n!”  Well, to Jacob, this seemed wrong and unfair.  Sure he was at fault, but his brother did not deserve a hole in one.  Ultra competitiveness beginning to bubble to the surface, Jacob voiced his objection.  After pointing out that the situation was really created by his own careless placement of s sweatshirt and that we were simply accepting his proposed solution, Jacob turned decisively toward bitterness.  One child broken, two to go.

Entering the huge maze, I was really looking forward to the challenge. My excitement lasted for about the first ten minutes, when I then started to become mildly claustrophobic, tired of the unending maze, and tuckered out from trying to keep track of my three boys sprinting through the maze amongst the other throngs on children out to enjoy sunshine, before the unrelenting Winter blanket descends upon the Minnesota landscape.  Turning a corner, I caught up with two of my boys and much to my shock, the stress of the maze was visibly getting to 5-year-old Ben.  He had snapped.  His 7-year-old brother Sam had committed some egregious wrong in the maze and completely out of character, 5-year-old Ben was now pounding Sam with both fists upon his older brother’s shoulders.  The maze had broken young Ben.  Given time, the maze breaks everyone.  Judging from the height of the Sun burning high above the maze, it was past lunchtime.  Ben was also a tad hangry.  Blood sugar levels in need of adjustment, an “a maze’n” form of exhaustion was beginning to set in.  We needed to get out.  For me, for the kids, for mankind.  Running with that purpose in mind, we emerged from the maze, back into comparative tranquility of the petting zoo.  We all needed lunch.  We needed lunch fast.  Two children broken, one to go.

Having our “a maze’n” lunch delivered to the table, I began to see a transformation. With each bite of pizza, with each fried cheese curd gobbled, with each sip of blue slushy, our moods began to change.  The food had restored us, it had nourished our bodies, and fortified our psyches for one more go at the “A Maze’n” farmyard.  We had been fully restored… or so I thought.

Returning to the mini golf course, at the request of Jacob, who was hoping to redeem himself, we settled into an agreed upon relaxed round. Amongst the teaming masses of other families, “relaxed” is a relative word and as a result, I found myself encouraging the kids to play faster, in order to avoid too big of a line forming behind us.  Even letting groups play through did not seem to help, we were woefully slow.  We had to keep moving (or perhaps it should be phrased “mooving” since we were on a pseudo farm).  This new pace however, caused 7-year-old Sam a great deal of stress.  You see, Sam found it essential to doodle on the scorecard during the game, but also insist on us waiting for him, as he engaged in a rare and time consuming combination of sketch art and mini sport.  Seeing us nearly one hole ahead, the pressure got to him (mini golf can break the best of us).  The Sun, the maze, the high pressure mini golf action, the late lunch, it had all taken a toll on poor Sam.  Final child down, two fully restored by fried cheese curds.

Leaving the farm, I realized that we could never truly move on. This Fall Break excursion had changed us.  It would stick with us forever, sort of like the fried cheese curds, now resting in our bellies.  Our lives had been altered in an “a maze’n” way.  No matter how much Purell was applied, our souls would never glisten as bright again.  We had left the maze, but the maze would never leave us.

Someday, my children will despise me for “A Maze’n” photos, such as this one. Perhaps that day will be today.