mr smarty pants

CONGRATS GRADUATE!!

Zeb had preschool graduation last night and it was a blast.  It sure is nice that not only does Zeb have great friends- but his friends have great moms!   the graduation was a great reason to laugh with friends and eat good food.

 This kiddo is willing and ready for kindergarten come this august.  I can't wait to help him with homework and read books with him and see him grow.

this group of kiddos sure was fun to get to know this year!  and graduation was so much fun.  Kent was even able to be there!

 Here are Zeb's pals Quincy and Ethan- with Barrick in the back :)  I never take enough pictures at these types of events.  I'm way too busy talking to friends!

 Zeb LOVED the little yearbook that one of the moms made.  He has been looking at it all day today still.

 and Ike loved the food. We've got to watch out for this kiddo and his appetite. He's going to be our little chunk if we're not careful.

 I have the coolest kids.  they are so funny. and totally weird.  Today Zeb and Ike were in the car having an argument about who loves whom the most.  Zeb says he loves me way more than Ike loves Kent.  Ike loves kent "super 100" and Zeb loves me "super above infinity".  Kent says Ike wins because Zeb's number isn't real.

Ike is such a goof ball.  always making funny faces and saying the weirdest stuff. If you ask him what his name is- he'll say: "Ike Miller poopy pants".   He knows just how to push the limits and even though bathroom words are off limits- I can't help but giggle when he says it.

This is our very favorite Ike face.  I tell him to act surprised or excited and this is what he does.  so so funny.

Zeb is being such a good brother to metta spaghetta. He always asks to hold her and loves to make her smile.   Isn't this picture so stinking cute?!

he reads books to Ike every day and is such a champ at cleaning. I love that he can clean his room and the toy room all by himself.  And he's such a good teacher to Ike.  He loves to be the big brother boss.

and this metta.  So so cute. and so so good.   We were so spoiled with our two baby boys that her nasty weeks almost did me in.  There were only about four of them- but those four were ROUGH.

 She's totally chunking up- finally! and that means she's sleeping better at night! no more midnight feedings.

 She's also spoiled rotten and has never worn the same outfit to church more than once.  That's ten dresses. and I'm sure she'll get more when we go to buffalo to visit the Hawes :)

 I tried to get a picture of her little fuzzy head here. Her hair all fell out and is now growing in like perfect little peach fuzz.

my three favorite healthy recipes as of late.

 I've been doing my very best the past four weeks to eat super healthy.  I've been doing an almost strictly vegetarian (and low dairy diet). I have a MAJOR sweet tooth and retraining it is no easy task!  Last week I ate two ENTIRE pineapples by myself. I've also been scouring the internet for great recipes to keep me excited about eating this way :)

Thanks to pinterest- I've found some super amazing and fabulous menu items. These are three of my recent favorites. I was super lazy and didn't take any of my own pictures- but surprisingly the recipes are super easy to recreate and looked pretty darn similar.


#1 Quinoa and veggie cakes from "exclusively food".
These were sooooooooooo good.  I loved them.  even cold the next morning for breakfast.

Of course- I made several changes. The biggest being more veggies and quinoa instead of rice.  I've included my recipe here.

1.5 cups prepared quinoa

1 small/medium grated zucchini (leave peel on)
1 small chopped onion
1 tsp garlic crushed
3/4 cup grated carrot
1 cup finely chopped fresh spinach
2 large eggs (I used egg substitute)
1/3 c parmesean cheese

1-2 cups steamed broccoli chopped small

freshly diced tomatosivelyfood.com.au

saute all veggies in large saucepan for 5-10 minutes until all are soft.
Remove saucepan from heat and transfer vegetable mixture to a large bowl. Stir in cooked quinoa. Allow mixture to cool for 10 minutes.
Stir eggs and parmesan cheese into rice mixture. Spray muffin pan cups and fill (about 6-8) with firmly packed mixture.

bake 25-30 minutes at 375.  top with freshly diced tomatoes and sweet chili sauce.

#2.  sweet potato slices!!!  this one isn't much of a recipe but it's DELICIOUS.  from edible perspective.  I could eat these every day of the week.  honestly.

1. Preheat oven to 350*
2. Slice sweet potatoes ~1/2” thick
3. Lightly coat with olive oil + a sprinkling of salt (or brown sugar!!!)
4. Bake for 20min [turning once]
5. Turn heat to 400*
6. Bake for ~15-20min more [turning once]

#3 Baked Veggie egg rolls.   

from "for the love of cooking"  These were so delicious and amazing. and not fried!!  I could have eaten all fourteen. I've made them three times now.

• 1 tsp olive oil
• 2 cups of savoy cabbage, chopped
• 2 cups of shredded carrots
• 2 cups of bean sprouts
• 1 can of water chestnuts, chopped
• 2 tbsp green onions, sliced
• 1 tsp fresh ginger, grated
• 2 tbsp soy sauce
• 1 tbsp corn starch
• 1/4 cup water
• 14 egg roll wraps
• Sweet chili dipping sauce or sweet and sour sauce (for dipping)

Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Once hot add the cabbage, sprouts, carrots, chestnuts and ginger to the pan and cook, stirring frequently for 4-5 minutes, until the vegetables just begin to wilt but still remain a little bit crisp. Mix the corn starch with the water and mix thoroughly. Add the corn starch mixture and soy sauce to the pan along with the green onions. Cook for an additional 1-2 minutes or until the sauce thickens. Remove from heat and let cool.
Place two tablespoons of the cooled mixture on the center of the egg roll wrap. Fold the bottom up over the filling. Next, fold the two sides over, making it look like an envelope, then roll it up like a burrito.
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Spray a baking sheet with cooking spray. Place the rolled up egg rolls on a baking sheet. Once you have rolled them all, spray the top of each egg roll with cooking spray.
Place in the oven and bake for 8-10 minutes then turn them over. Bake for an additional 5-7 minutes or until crispy and golden brown. Serve with sweet chili sauce or sweet and sour sauce. Enjoy.

days 2, 3, and 4.

I think it was Zeb and Ike's dream come true vacation.  A hotel, super friends, racetracks, legos, and lots of fun.  Pure heaven.

We drove to Indianapolis and partied it up for three straight days!  we are big fans of hotwire.com to get fabulous hotels and super cheap rates.  Unfortunately this time the listed pool was an outdoor pool and not open yet.  Kent was the most disappointed!  the boys were happy with baths.

and free fruit loops and waffles for breakfast.  I think Ike ate six of their oranges in the few days we were there, too :)

The best part of indy was the great company!  Lindsay and kiddos were fabulous tour guides!  the past few times we've been to indy I've been running a race of some sort and we haven't been able to enjoy the sites.

First stop: Indianapolis Children's museum.  The biggest and best in the USA (or so they say!).  It did not disappoint.

Check out this crazy lego car!!

and the dino dig.

Sam and Max are pretty close in age to Zeb and Ike and they've all known each other since birth so they make for great playmates!

I loved the Chihuly exhibit at the museum.

the water stations were a hit with the boys.

Here they are making music in Egypt.

we had a total of six kids and several people commented that we were probably 'pretty busy'.  Seeing Lindsay with her three boys made me a little jealous that I don't have my own little trio of boys!!

Luckily this metta is getting more and more fabulous every day.  I'm pretty satisfied with her.

one day we got to take a driving tour of the Indianapolis speedway where the Indy 500 is run!  the place is HUGE.  I had no idea the track was over two miles. 

look at these buddies.  I hope they can be roommates at BYU one day :)

The boys loved it and picked out toy race cars to take home.  I think most people that come here are major nascar fans but everything I know about racecars involves Lightning McQueen and Mater.

one of my favorite part of vacations is food. For the past three weeks I've been on an almost entirely vegetarian diet.  LOTS and LOTS of fruits and vegetables.  While it's been great- and I feel great (albeit a little hungry)- I sure have missed meat.  We decided to make up for it in Indy. One night the dockters made us J-Dawgs (from the provo hot dog stand) and one afternoon Lindsay watched all three of our kiddos while we went to Fogo de Chao- a really fancy Brazilian restaurant! there was so much meat I thought I'd die.  Check out how long this piece of meat is.  They just kept piling the most amazing tender and fresh pieces of meat onto our plates.  I could only take a bite or two of each piece.  I don't love red meat- but the parmesean encrusted pork tenderloin was one of the best things I've ever tasted.

I can't wait for the day when we get to have a big reunion with all of my wonderful friends in Toledo.  Have I mentioned how wonderful my friends from Toledo are?!  thanks again, Linds (and Eric!) for the fabulous three days!!

day 1 of the Miller family vacation

Day 1 of Miller family vacation

Today starts a week of vacation and we are determined to make every day fabulous :)  I figure if Kent isn't going to work- we had better be doing some fun stuff while we've got him.  nine straight days (minus one measly little night shift tonight!).

So today we took a little roadtrip to the "Ohio Caverns".  Again- why have I just now heard of another ohio treasure?  those toledoans sure know how to keep secrets.  At least the Daytonians are willing to give up a few more of their secrets!

Given our family's history of cave drama- we told the kids were going spelunking and exploring-instead of telling them that we were going to hike deep into dark wet caves. They loved it. Until the very end when they got tired.

 Kent held miss metta because we forgot the baby carrier :)  somehow the two of them stood under every drip of water.  Her head was sopping wet by the end!  I don't even think I was dripped on once.

 The caves reminded us a lot of Timp caves- without the long steep hike.  Much easier with kiddos. The only climb was sixty stairs at the very very end.

 Zeb was impressing all of the other people on our tour by talking about all of the 'stalagmites and stalactites'.  Kent had given him a little tutorial on the drive and he hadn't forgotten a thing,

 We also saw several bats.  The boys were super excited about it and Zeb had quite the eye for finding them on the walls and flying past us.

 Our tour guide was an awkward lanky teenager with a terribly dry sense of humor- but he was nice.

 At the very end of the tour- the guide hits a button- and the song 'Beautiful Ohio' plays on a loudspeaker hidden somewhere. It was pretty tacky and really funny. I love Ohio.

 Here's the tired face.

 and here's our baby cow. She was so good the entire tour.  Didn't make a peep for the full mile and a half!

After the tour we drove into the quaint little town of West Liberty, Ohio, and stopped at Marie's- the world's most delicious chocolate shop.  I'll make the hour drive just for the chocolate. Honestly- it was AMAZING.   The Sea Salt Sallies and Mac-a-cheek chocolate fudges were my favorite.

Hopefully we have several more days of exciting vacations posts to come!

Miss Met loves to sit in her carseat and look out the sliding door into our backyard.  She also looks a lot like a boy if shes bundled up in the carseat under a blanket.  I have to make sure to plaster one of these little bows to her head so people know she's a girl.  Everybody always asks how it stays in place- and when I say 'corn syrup'- they give me the weirdest looks!

This little girl has almost morphed into an Ike baby over the last week or so.  Easy to calm down- rarely cries- sleeps often. It's an answer to prayers. And she's SMILING!  Both of our boys smiled before six weeks (I have several pictures to prove it) and when she wasn't smiling I thought for sure it was another sign she was broken :) But she's getting smilier and more talkative every day.

 Despite what some of these pictures seem to portray- she's actually still pretty skinny and small.  I'm interested to see how much she's gained at her 2 month check up (already this week!).

Both boys love to sit and make Metta smile - and they're pretty good at it.  One of their soccer teammates almost had her laughing at practice this week!  She's a little down syndrome girl named Justine and and the two girls LOVE each other.

Every time I plan on getting pictures of soccer- it ends up raining!  hopefully we'll have some good luck this next week.  Today we shivered in the freezing rain while they ran around and played!

This past week Zeb got registered for Kindergarten!! He was beyond excited.  On the drive to the school he couldn't stop talking about it.  When I asked him what he thought the school looked like- he told me: "I think there are butterflies painted on it!".  I have no idea where that idea came from! when we pulled up I think he was shocked at how big it was! It's a brand new school and has 'excellent' ratings.  A friend here does substitute teaching all over the area and she says it is by far the best of the schools.  He'll be going full day every day- and I'm just hoping he doesn't get bored! He's social enough and excited enough that I think he'll love it.

This week he was trying to teach Ike his book of sight words from preschool.  On every page Ike would just say "I give up. what is it?" and zeb would try to teach him to sound it out. It was pretty funny.  Ike doesn't care too much for the alphabet.

Ike is funnier than ever right now.  He's a tricky little boy and has Kent wrapped around his finger. He loves to talk about Obi wan Kenobi and Darth Maul. He's also obsessed with choosing the right.  Just this week Zeb was talking about somebody who wasn't 'choosing the right' and Ike asked: "Did he choose the left?" It was so funny.