Granola that will change your life

Dudes.  I am about to tell you the secret to happiness. 

We went on a family vacation to Seattle a few weeks ago, and I innocently sat down to breakfast one morning without realizing my world was about to be rocked. 

Sitting so prettily in a crystal goblet was the chewiest, nuttiest, most flavorful granola I have ever had in my entire life.  Macadamia nuts.  Coconut.  Almonds.  Pistachios.  It's like all the world's perfect foods got together for a family reunion in my belly.  This granola and I were meant to be soul mates.  

As soon as we returned home, I vowed to recreate the best granola known to man.  It took me a few tries, and a little bit of tweaking, but I have done it. 

And, because I like you, I'm going to share the chewy goodness with you.

Definitely keep an eye on it in the oven.  I loved the chewiness of the original, and if you don't stir it or cook it too long, it will get crunchy.  Also?  I was unable to find unsalted macadamia nuts, so I just threw in the roasted & salted.  It by no means ruins the deliciousness, but next time I am going to try and find some without salt as you can taste a hint of the saltiness from the nuts.

I have been eating this for breakfast every day since we got home, combined with Greek yogurt and a bowl full of strawberries.  

One batch makes a TON, so be prepared to eat it quickly or toss some in the freezer.  For those of you who are interested, my calculations put this granola at 92 calories for a 1/4 cup serving.  Definitely less than the crunchy crap I've been buying at the store.  (Too bad I want to eat it by the pound, though).

Happy granola-ing! 

How to make a gallery wall just like mine

Way back in 2008, I posted a photo of what was then my favorite room in our house.  Lovingly crafted with the Husband's math skills, the photo gallery wall was a centerpiece of conversation in our home.  The soft sunlight in the late afternoon made that room a very cozy spot to curl up with a good book and ignore the children.  

Hours of my life were spent doing exactly that.

I mean, really.  Who wouldn't want to curl up in this room? 

With the invention of the Pinterest, I have received countless emails about the photo wall.  What are the dimensions?  How big are the photos?  Where did I get the frames?  Would I have an affair with a clown while eating a sandwich?

Okay, maybe not that last one.  I made that part up. 

But it could happen!  (Except not with a clown.  And probably not while eating a sandwich.  A cookie...maybe.)

Recently, with our move to Texas, the wall had to find a new home.  In our new home.  With wall space being at a minimum here, we were pretty limited in where we could hang it.  We settled on the big wall in our dining room.  I bribed and cajoled the Husband, and voila!  The wall was once again in my life. 

Since I got an email from someone just this week (hi, Julie!) asking about the dimensions, and I happen to have them all written down as part of the aforementioned hanging, I figured a post was in order to preserve the information for future Pinteresters.

So, here it is.  The dimensions from my favorite wall of all time.   

Oh, and we got all the frames at Michaels.  They are all the same frame, and it took four weeks and visits to three stores to acquire enough, as, inconveniently, they didn't carry them online.

You're welcome. 

Conversing with the deceased

When we first moved to St. Louis, I neglected to get a new cell phone number.  After several weeks, I had given the number to new friends, church members, utilities, and schools. 

Changing that number would have been a huge pain. 

So, for our six years there (and our one lone year in San Diego before that), I had a Boston area code. 

Which I loved. 

Except when no one would take my calls because they didn't recognize the number.  Or when I got wrong number calls from people on east coast time very early in the morning.  Or when I had the same conversations every week about where the number was from, and why I never changed it.

It drove me batty. 

As you can imagine, I planned to march my phone (and my children's phones) into the AT&T store within days of arriving so as not to make the same mistake twice. 

Which I did. 

Unfortunately, I made the misjudgment of assuming my teen/tween-age children could handle the errand with me. 

Within five minutes, Hannah was moaning and pulling on my arms because she was STARVING.   JUDAS.  STARVING!!!

Chase was single-handedly touching and manipulating every gadget in the store.  He was like a tornado, moving from one to the other, causing carnage in his wake.  It would not surprise me if he is the cause of why every display phone in the store now speaks Spanish and/or Mandarin Chinese. 

McKay just kept rolling his eyes and giving me THE LOOK.  You know it.  The one that says, "Mom, this is ridiculous and I will never forgive you the horror of this injustice."  It's a universal look and recognizable in every country on the planet.

Rather than risking therapy bills in the future, I wisely handed them my debit card and sent them to the burger joint around the corner.   

Once all the phone number changing had taken place, I headed out to find my children.  But before I pulled out of the parking space, I sent a quick text to McKay's new phone number.  Unfortunately, I misdialed and this hilarity with a stranger is what ensued.   

I'm betting that if I were somehow able to converse with this person's poor dead mother, she would commiserate with me on the traumas of shopping with children. 

Rest in peace, lady.   

And tell me heaven consists of solo shopping trips?

Diamond shoe problems and a run-in with the law

So when I last wrote, I left off with a teaser about my arrest in Oklahoma.

Which nearly happened. 

But didn't get blogged about sooner due to my tragic diamond shoe problems.  Brace yourselves.  You see, I have been without home phone or internet for about 10 days. 

I know!  How can one live in such dire circumstances? 

And it's all the more catastrophic because the lines to the house got cut accidentally by the guys digging our pool. 

Oh, the horror it is to be me!  How can anyone possibly be expected to live with such a travesty?  Sure, there are starving children in Africa, but WHAT. ABOUT. ME??

Ahem.

Anyway, we were driving from St. Louis to Texas after tearful farewells and a very stressful move.  

Anxiety and exhaustion hung in the air like a thick fog.   

So when I got off the freeway mistakenly in Big Cabin, Oklahoma and saw the red and blue lights behind me, I felt my stomach lurch.  

And possibly heard my mouth curse. 

Glancing in the mirror, I realized my dissheveled hair and smudged mascara would not go very far in helping me talk my way out of it.  I pulled out my license, registration, and insurance card in preparation of the impending ticket.

When the officer approached my vehicle, I rolled the window down and tried my best to look attractive and law-biding.  

        "Excuse me, ma'am, can you please get out of the vehicle?" 

Uh, sure.  

When a big man holding a gun and a badge asks you to do that, you don't really have a choice in the matter, do you?

I followed the officer back to his patrol car where he instructed me to get in the front seat. 

Yes.  You read that right.

With my heart pounding a mile a minute inside my chest, I did as I was told.  Warily, I glanced ahead at the car containing my children.  I could see my anxiety mirrored on their faces.

The policeman busied himself with calling in my plate number and running a check on my license.  I glanced around, noting shotguns, handcuffs, and all manner of police paraphernalia.     

And then it hit me:  I WAS SITTING IN A FREAKING POLICE CAR. 

I started shaking and had to sit on my hands to contain the fear.  

The big, burly police officer started making chit-chat and I really began to panic.  He asked me all kinds of questions.  Where I lived, where I was going, how long I had been on the road.   

He then proceeded to tell me that I was going the wrong way to Dallas.  He offered up the route that took me through his tiny little town as the best way to get there.   

Not really thinking, I blurted out, "Yeah, but who wants to go through tiny towns with slow speed limits and cops pulling you over every five minutes?" 

Well.  Was THAT the wrong thing to say. 

He closed his eyes and looked like he was counting to ten, trying to maintain his composure.  I think I saw a few veins on his forehead bulge. 

He turned to face me, put his hand on his revolver, and said, "I'm sorry that obeying the law is such an inconvenience for you." 

I mumbled something about it being a joke and turned my head to look out the window.  Wishing fervently for an invisibility cloak.  Or a time machine.  Or a suicide pill. 

What felt like hours later, my friendly neighborhood pig handed me the ticket and I had to keep myself from running like a maniac back to my car. 

What the eff?

Why did a simple traffic stop for speeding necessitate a visit to the front of the patrol car?  What happened to me waiting patiently in my own car to be served with a ticket?   Could I have refused him?  What are my rights in a situation like this?

I'm guessing none.

I'm just thankful that my smart mouth didn't land me into any more trouble.   

I mean, who would nag the pool guy to work faster if my large rear end is rotting in a jail cell in Oklahoma?

Moving Day

I have been loathe to post anything and push the lovely photo of my best girls down the page, especially given the fact that I am missing them something fierce right now.  My heart aches to text all of them and meet for a girl's lunch at the Smokehouse, just one last time.  But that would require shifting of the universe and isn't going to happen today.  Plus, lots of incredibly funny and crazy stuff has happened in a week and a half, and the show must go on. 

I am going to play catch up just a bit and tell you about our move and the drive down to Dallas. 

We have been planning this move for months.  Since about mid-November, we have known when we were leaving.  So, about five days before the actual moving day, it was not necessarily a happy surprise when The Husband came to me sheepishly, proverbial hat in his hand.  He had had a meeting come up, one that was important enough for him to ask me if he could attend it. 

No, I am not a tyrant who requires the man of the family to clear all work meetings with my busy schedule of nap-taking and shopping sprees.

This particular meeting happened to fall on, you know, the EXACT day we were supposed to be packing the truck.  As in, the day that he and I would be physically loading all our belongings into the back of a U-Haul.  And with him potentially in a very important meeting, that would leave me and my scrawny t-rex arms to load our heavy belongings alone.   

Since that wasn't going to happen, I told him, fine, you can go to your precious meeting, but you are hiring me some movers.   

He didn't bat an eye, good man that he is.

It was a win-win for everyone. 

Movers were hired at such a ridiculously cheap rate that we both kicked ourselves for not doing that in the first place. 

What did leave me slightly in the lurch, however, was the picking up of the moving truck and driving it to the ghetto for loading.  I was really, really, really (did I mention really?) nervous to drive the big truck.  (see aforementioned t-rex arms) 

My friend Maren had offered to drive me to pick up the truck, and mentioned earlier in the week that her husband could possibly help with the driving.  We found out the day before what our pick-up time would be, and, unfortunately, her husband was going to be busy with meetings.  Making peace with my new career as a truck driver, I bottled the anxiety up as much as I could.  I watched YouTube videos on how to make wide turns.  I visualized being able to do it, but dreaded the act itself.  

When she came to pick me up the morning of the move, she told me she had a surprise for me. 

The surprise?  Her husband had rescheduled his entire morning to be able to help me. 

I. LOST. IT. 

It was a spontaneous explosion of tears, wracking sobs, relief, and overwhelming love at the kindness they would provide to me.  I have never quite literally BURST into tears like I did then.  It was uncontrollable and a whole lot more than just tearing up out of joy.  It was hysterics. 

I can never tell them just how much that meant. 

So instead of crashing the U-Haul and sweating it out while playing a giant game of Tetris with moving boxes, I watched others drive my truck and sat on the couch with my friend Mindy while men did all the work for me.  It was lovely.   

Who needs feminism, anyway?  I'm all for being a damsel in distress on moving day. 

What was not lovely, however, were the goodbyes.  An uglier scene has never graced the fifth grade hall before.  Crowds of girls gathered around my Hannah and sobbed and sobbed.  I'm sure the teachers were thrilled. 

I held it (mostly) together as we said -- not goodbye -- but see you later -- to our peeps.  Getting in the car and actually driving away was another story.  There were ugly tears. 

And then we drove off to start the rest of our life... 

Stay tuned for tomorrow's edition:  My arrest in Oklahoma. 

Blessed, indeed

Tonight, after an emotional day filled with teary goodbyes, belly-busting laughter, and heartfelt hugs, Chase summed it up so well at family prayer when he said:

"Heavenly Father, thank you for blessing us with such good friends."​

My heart is as full as my limbs are tired.  I ache to the bone, but am more whole than I have ever been.​

When we moved here six years ago, we felt fortunate to already know one family in St. Louis.  Good friends from grad school lived here, and we rekindled that friendship instantly and effortlessly.  ​

It wasn't long before we were embraced by many others.​

I have been surrounded, for my entirety in this city, by the most fabulous group of women.  My adopted sisters.  Ladies who respond happily in the affirmative to my weekly texts begging for lunch out together.  Women whose children love my children like cousins -- better, even.  ​ Women who willingly said yes when I sheepishly asked for a ride to, of all things, a colonoscopy (eek!  THAT is devoted friendship, people).  We have laughed until our bellies hurt, and cried on each other's shoulders.  We have thrown parties together and done carpools.   We have been supportive and supported. We have even gotten our mammograms together!

I can hardly bear to get in the car tomorrow and leave you all behind.  ​

I thank you from the bottom of my heart for loving me, for letting me complain, for laughing with me.  For knowing that on a really bad day, a diet coke and a bag of cookies can do wonders for my soul.  For thinking up a really great spring break trip, and then making it actually happen.  For letting us put all the ugly guys on your team. 

I thank you for making my children feel as loved by you as they are by me.  ​For letting them into your homes, and into your pantries.  For track coaching sessions and girl time.  For deep conversations and laughter so heavy it ended gloriously in tears.

I love you more than I can ever say.​

You have made me a better friend because I have known you.​  You have made my life rich just by being in it.  I don't know what I will do without you.

So, it's got to be this:  See you tomorrow, girls.

Because we really don't say goodbye around here.​