Life Lyn Style

Preschool Visit Day

Adventures with Nick and Sally No Responses »

May 182012

Wednesday, I dropped Sally off at a friend’s house and took Nick to his preschool mini visit. We signed him up for preschool a couple of months back. This visit was to meet the teachers, other kids, and play.

He loved the “How Does a Butterfly Grow” poster since we currently have chrysalises in a habitat ready to hatch. Actually, one became a butterfly today. He also loves trains. So, he didn’t waste any time in getting some track put together.

He also enjoyed a couple of puzzles before it was time to clean up.

He’s one happy kid!

I purposely didn’t take photos of the other kids, but rest assured that he met a few new friends and had a blast! I was surprised to find out that the director had recently left and they are currently searching for one. Luckily, the teachers have been around for years and seem to have it all under control.

I’m hoping that maybe with a change in management, we can have healthier snacks. Currently, the snacks are cookies, crackers, Goldfish and the like. I’d love to see blueberries, grapes and orange slices. I don’t mind Nick having other things once in a while, but I don’t want preschool to be exciting because there is a yummy snack. They probably don’t even need a snack since they are only there for 3 hours.

We opted to keep Nick home this year, so when he starts preschool in September, he’ll be one year away from kindergarten. With his playroom time at the gym, visits to museums and other activities, I think he’ll do just fine with one year of preschool.

Now, I just hope he’s 100% potty trained by September!

1/2 Mile Swim

Exercise No Responses »

May 172012

On Wednesday, I met up with a friend in the pool for a swim. Lyle updated the workout for me. I made a couple of minor changes and swam 1/2 mile! I haven’t swam that far in one session since college. I am very happy.

Here’s the workout:

WARM UP

4 lengths flutter kick with kickboard

WORKOUT

4 lengths timed front crawl (It took me 3 minutes and 30 seconds)
4 lengths front crawl

2 without paddles, 2 with

4 lengths breast stroke (It’s still a weak stroke, but it’s getting better)
4 lengths lengths front crawl with buoy
4 lengths front crawl

2 with pool buoys
2 with pool buoys and paddles

4 lengths timed front crawl (It was also 3 minutes and 30 seconds. I would have expected it to be slower than the first set.)

COOL DOWN

4 lengths flutter kick

2 front
2 back

then I threw in an extra lap of flutter kick to round out the yards to 850

I’m going to keep my swim at 850 yards for a few weeks. I am going to spend time on technique and speed. I didn’t time this workout, but it was about 45 minutes. I’d like to do this in 30 minutes. I have no idea if that is even doable, but it’s a goal.

It’s been so nice to get back into the pool for more than water aerobics. I didn’t realize how much I missed swimming laps.

Friends Forever

Adventures with Nick and Sally No Responses »

May 162012

Our Saturday night ended with dinner with friends. Our visitors from Italy were in the states for 5 weeks. They left to go back to Rome on Monday, but not before we got together one last time.

We ended up with 5 couples/families getting together. The fun part is that I went to high school and in some cases junior high with them. It really awesome to have friends that I’ve known for 25 + years.

We’ve traveled the world, went to college, married, divorced, moved a way, moved back, had kids, etc. and we are all still friends. I am blessed with many wonderful people in my life.

I didn’t take many photos, but here are a few to share.

It was a beautiful day for the deck. Nick and Sally loved running around the yard.

We enjoyed grilled chicken. A checked out the corn hole game. Sally blew bubbles.

Aaron had never heard of corn hole. I guess it became popular after he left for Africa. We didn’t stay for the game, but I heard that they didn’t let him win his inaugural game.

Thanks to our wonderful hosts. Let’s not wait so long to get together again.

Cheers to friends!

A Mother’s Day Eve visit with Great Grandma

Adventures with Nick and Sally, Family 1 Response »

May 152012

After our trip to the Farmers’ Market and hiking on Saturday, we picked up lunch and visited with my parents. Once lunch was over, we headed over to my grandma’s house. Nick and Sally were very excited to see Angel (the dog). Grandma spent a few weeks in Florida and this was our first visit since her return.

It was a beautiful day, so we played outside.

The balls needed air, Stephen was happy to help. It’s so fun that Nick and Sally really know their Great-Grandma.

It’s also fun that she’s willing and able to toss a ball with them and play.

There were smiles all around.

Uncle Frank stopped by too. Here’s a great photo of Nick and Sally with him.

I also snapped this shot of my brother with Grandma.

It was such a great visit!

Spree For All–part one

Adventures with Nick and Sally No Responses »

May 142012

9 years ago, the Metro Parks Serving Summit County started a program called the Spree For All. It was somewhat modeled after the Fall Hiking Spree. But, this program is on level trails and is intended for everyone. So, it’s perfect for strollers, wheelchairs and everything in between. This year, we thought we would do it with the kids.

On Saturday, we headed to the Everett Covered Bridge after we left the Farmers’ Market. This bridge is near where Stephen and I were married. We even had a few wedding photos taken here. So, our visit brought back great memories.

Nick and Sally really enjoyed checking it out.

It was such a beautiful day for a walk.

The Spree for All hikes are all 1 mile or less. There are turn around symbols at 1/8, 1/4 and 1/2. This enables everyone to pick their distance. It also makes it easy to do with the kids. Many of the trails are close together so we can do a short walk, take a break and drive to another park and do another hike.

After the covered bridge. We stopped at the Ira Trailhead of the Towpath Trail.

Nick was super excited to tell me all about the pit toilets and how they work. He’s pointing out where they get pumped out. Soon, we were on our way to the trail.

Nick and Sally weren’t thrilled with the number of dogs on the trail, but they were very happy when we arrived at the turn around.

On the way back to the car, we stopped to check out one of the old locks. Stephen took the opportunity to explain the lock system to Nick.

Life is full of teachable moments. Our Spree for All hikes were no exception.

We need to hike 5 trails to complete the spree. I’m hoping to finish it up on our next trip to Akron.

A Fresh Fork Pizza

CSA, Recipe 1 Response »

May 132012

Tonight’s dinner was pizza with all of the ingredients courtesy of our Fresh Fork CSA. Many weeks our CSA bags are themed. Some weeks I just use all of the ingredients in whatever I am cooking that week and other weeks, I use many of the ingredients in one dish. This was one of those weeks.

For our pizza, I used the following:

pizza dough
Pope’s sauce (tomatoes, oregano, basil, thyme, parsley, garlic, olive oil, salt, black pepper)

I love that the sauce doesn’t have any SUGAR!

Mayfield Creamery Gouda
spinach
ramps

I’m sad that ramp season is over. I’m going to chop and freeze my last few.

green peppers (from the freezer from last summer)
Italian sausage

We actually got smoked Gouda in our bag this week, but I didn’t want to overpower the other flavors, so I used regular Gouda from my fridge. We have quite the stock of local cheeses at the moment.

I also used my pizza stone for the first time. It was a bit challenging, but I think I just need more practice.

Here was the final result:

Since the pizza stone needed to heat in the oven for 30 minutes, I had that time to prep the other ingredients.

I browned the Italian sausage. I washed and chopped the spinach and ramps. I chopped the peppers a bit finer (they were frozen in bigger pieces than I needed for the pizza). I drained the sausage on a paper towel and used residual grease to sauté the ramps, spinach and peppers. Everything had a few minutes to cool before I put the pizza together.

Once the pizza was in the oven, I grated the cheese.

In just over 10 minutes, I took the pizza out of the oven and sprinkled on the cheese.

The end result was total deliciousness. It was really one of the best pizzas that I’ve ever had.

I’m not sure if it was the sauce, the cheese, the dough, the toppings or the combo. But, it was great.

Now, I’m off to see if I can get more of that yummy sauce!

Countryside Farmers’ Market at Howe Meadow–Opening Day

Farmer's Market No Responses »

May 122012

We had plans south of Akron late today and decided to make a day of it. We left our house around 8:30AM and headed to the Farmers’ Market at Howe Meadow. I love this market!

It wasn’t too hot out today, but we still wore our hats to help with the sun. Since Nick wears glasses, hats are a good option for us. I was surprised to see this sign about the ATM. It’s probably great for business. I’ve been to the market several times in the past and decided that I wanted meat or some other high dollar item that wiped out our cash.

Nick and Sally have seen display bee hives before, but they never seem to tire of them. I’ve never had a croissant from Summit Croissants, but they had the biggest line when we were at the market early. After running into some friends, we found out that if you want a certain flavor, you get there early. Apparently this is a well known fact among the regulars. Today, we had a breakfast pie from another booth, but maybe we’ll try a croissant next time.

The market set up a bit south of its original location. It’s still in Howe Meadow, but this open space gives them room for more vendors and the market is a bit more spread out. I think I like the new set up, but it will be hotter during the summer markets.

Today’s music was Mr. Bob. He played guitar, harmonica and sang (not all at the same time). Nick and Sally love the music at the market. We found out that one of our friends is playing in a quintet here on August 18th, so we’ll try to come back that day for sure.

We ran into Diane from Humble Pie Bakery. It was nice to see a familiar face. We were surprised to see Mayfield Road Creamery at the market. We love their cheese and get it from our Fresh Fork CSA often. Today, we picked up a pack of blue cheese and chipotle gouda. We also bought 2 jugs of our favorite honey from Schmidt Family Farm. We told her her honey was the best. She told us that she’d tell the bees.

We perused the grain selection from Mud Run Farm. Nick wanted some puff cereal. It’s not hard to get me to buy cereal with one ingredient. It was only $4 and I thought that was very reasonable.

Before we left, we also purchased a couple of loaves of bread, onion chive cheese, Munster cheese, and some red pepper Ohio City Pasta. I was prepared with a cooler bag and ice packs since we knew we wouldn’t be home until late in the day.

I’ve only been to a few local markets, but I’ve always really liked this one. I’m hoping to visit at least 5 different markets this summer.

Pool Workouts Continue

Exercise No Responses »

May 112012

A couple of weeks ago, I posted about my first pool workout. Last week, I completed a second pool workout. This workout consisted of the first workout with an additional 100 yards. Before the cool down, we added 4 lengths of the front crawl.

Since Tuesday had worked out better that week, I swam the 600 yards including warm up and cool down before my usual water aerobics class. I was so exhausted when I was done. I spent a total of an hour and a half in the pool and worked the entire time. I even finished a whole water bottle. I was starting to think the water aerobics class was getting too easy, so a few weeks back, I switched to the heavier weights. Now, I know the secret to making the class hard is to do a pool workout of laps first. After that workout, my shoulders were pretty tired and maybe even a bit sore. But, I really felt great.

On Tuesday this week, I planned to do it again. I got in the pool a bit before 9AM and started my swim workout. This time, we added another 100 yards – 2 lengths of crawl with only the right arm and 2 lengths of crawl with only the left arm. This is suppose to help with stamina and breathing. It was hard, but also doable. After the 700 yards, I did the water aerobics class. I was exhausted on Tuesday, but I felt great.

I have a friend who wants to swim 2 miles next Wednesday. I don’t think I’m up for that quite yet, but I’m definitely planning to keep up with pool workouts in addition to the water aerobics class. It feels good to get in the water on a regular basis.

Fresh Fork Winter CSA–week 15

CSA No Responses »

May 102012

Today was the last pick up for the Fresh Fork CSA winter subscription. Now, we have to wait until the week of June 4th for the summer season to begin. Meanwhile, this week’s pick up is definitely pizza themed.

Here’s what we were expecting to receive this week:

1 8 oz. package smoked gouda
2 frozen pizza dough balls
1 lb. Italian sausage
1 lb. ground turkey or chicken
2 lbs. rolled oats
1 pint pizza sauce
1 package veggie burgers (2 burgers)
1 bunch ramps
1 veg (will likely include kale, chard, spinach, lettuce, and other spring greens)

Here’s a group shot:

I’m hoping to use the ramps and spinach on pizza this week.

We’ve never received ground duck before. We had our choice of duck or chicken. I’ve had ground chicken before, so duck was the easy choice. I’m not sure what I’ll do with it, but I am thinking about making wantons and using it in some kind of filling. The Italian sausage will go well on the pizzas.

I’m excited to try Clark’s sauce. I’ll be using it on pizza with this dough.

I’ve never had the Luna veggie burgers before, but they look delicious. For now, they are in my freezer. I’ll use Gouda on our pizza too.

Stephen and I eat oats for breakfast most mornings. These will be gone in no time.

With a few weeks until our next pick up, we stocked up on yogurt. We were also out of eggs, so I picked up a dozen of them as well.

It’s been a really fun winter season. I can’t wait for summer to start.

The Return of the Dreaded Gym Workout

Exercise No Responses »

May 092012

Usually, my trainer workout is on Thursday, but due to scheduling conflicts, we moved it to Monday this week. I cringed almost immediately when Jen said that we were heading to the gym.

I really hate the gym workouts. They are outside of my comfort zone and they are extremely difficult for me. I guess that means that I need more practice.

It probably didn’t help that I was tired and had taken my typical Monday morning spin class earlier.

I tried not be grumpy as we did this workout-

2 sets of the following:

Side Shuffles 1/2 court x 2
Tennis Ball Shuttle Run 5 balls x 2
Wall sit 2 x :30sec
Overhead Walking Lunge 18lb bar x 1/2 court x 2
Multi-Directional Reaction 3 x :30sec w/ :15sec rest
Curl + Press 18lb x 30
Bicycles 2 x :30sec w/ :15sec rest

1 set of:

Pushup Walk 1/4 court

I’m not much of a jumper or runner so anything involving running and shuffling isn’t so fun.

The pushup walk was impossible. I tried and fell at least 3 times. I only made it a few feet. Remember when you were little and used to bear walk for fun? Imagine that from a traditional push up position. Fun right?

I must admit that I left this workout a little defeated. But, I’ll be right back at it next week.

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