Forever Starts Today: Goodies. Goodies. And More Goodies.

My blogging presence/inspiration is consistent with life of a mother with young children. Lots of thoughts and bright ideas that may not materialize as quickly as desired floating playfully in the air dripping with anticipation like grown-up dialogue made up of half finished sentences. I'm not sure that analogy even makes sense, but I guess that's the point.

Pete just returned from the store after finding our cupboards void of coconut. Not a big deal except I innocently mentioned my intention to make a coconut cream meringue pie which would go marvelously with fresh coffee day tomorrow.

Yay for stand mixtures providing white noise to push this post along while whipping up the fluffy peaks to top off the pastry!

Allow me to interject the confident chimes of the nearly two year old Augustine with his famous word...

Why?

Why in the world would we start making a pie at 11pm (especially now that we've decided to get up early and workout before Pete heads to work and I tackle whatever presents itself on any given day)?

I blame Luke.

It all started when Luke was gathering ingredients and working diligently making an imaginary lemon meringue pie. "One of Dramma Schafer's favorites" he said. Thus the seed was planted. And nurtured by the two fresh lemons resting in the refrigerator. Then of course the thrill of trying something new. And so the thought of, Hmmm...I've never made a lemon meringue pie before, became the refreshing raindrops that were photosynthesized into a light, cool, refreshing dessert.

Pete wasn't too crazy about the idea at first having been fooled as a child by meringue that didn't measure up to what appeared, in his mind, as whipped cream. Thank God for second chances and the stamp of approval declared by his adult tastebuds. Grandma Schafer also approved, "the tarter, the better!" She's darn lucky she even got a piece that took every ounce of willpower to reserve since we first sliced into the treat on Sunday night and she just claimed her piece today! Grandma acknowledge her good fortune and added the comment, "Leave it to Pete and Elise-read directions in a book and just do it"

All this NATURALLY led to the "need" to try coconut cream meringue pie. (Plus it was the recipe next to the Lemon meringue pie in the cookbook ;-)

In case you missed it... the fashionable background of the pie pictured above is, in fact, our brand new kitchen countertop!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It arrived 7 weeks after we ordered it. Both Pete and I found this quite frustrating having been told in the beginning of the process that it would only be 2-4 weeks. At that point Clement was still in utero and we wondered which would come first-baby? or countertop? When they finally called they scheduled the installation for August 13th between 2 and 4pm. I was ticked by this proposal initially knowing that we would be traveling to Columbus that weekend for Pete's cousin Heather's wedding which connected to the home visit of his sister sister (previously known as Michele now Sr. John-Mark Maria of St. Peter the Apostle) who gets to visit Ohio for only 3 days out of the year. This made for a packed full schedule of family get togethers and undeveloped plans of when exactly we were going to remove the old countertop. Upon revisiting the issue having all the parties helped keep us out of the house and therefore out of the dismantled kitchen while providing plenty of food without having to cook amidst the disarray.

Unfortunately, we don't have a single picture of the wedding weekend in Columbus (Congratulations Heather and Alex we had a great time!!!) where we also got to meet up with Uncle Andy but here's some snapshots of the other blessings.

Thank you to Matt that came over on his day off to help Pete remove ye olde countertop. Pete's prayers to St. Joseph were answered as the task was completed only 45 minutes after Matt's arrival and the later installation of the new plumbing went relatively well and no leaks have been discovered as of yet. The finished look and satisfaction of having the project complete has nearly erased the fact that the installers came two hours early without notice which just happened to coincide with my departure time for my first full day back in the office at Walsh. Before we got everything put back together we took the time to scrub the grout in between the tiles of the backsplash that needed a little TLC. Overall, we are very pleased with the finished product and hardly can remember what the room looked like before.

In other exciting news we welcomed back George Angelo for the first time on Tuesday. I dressed Clement especially for the occasion.

The day went well except for a slight hiccup at nap time when I wasn't exactly sure where to put everybody. After a few deep breaths, some Hail Mary's and some lunch we revisited the possibility and the three younger boys got in some Zs. I was a little anxious preparing for George's return considering when school ended in June he wasn't really walking around on his own yet. I started worrying about stairs, and gates, and lunchtime, and climbing, and.... well we know what scripture says about worrying! We're glad we get to enjoy the company of George again even though there are bound to be some busy days with four little boys to tend to. Hail Mary, full of grace...

Some other tasty tidbits include: