I know I say this pretty much every week, but holy smokes, this week flew by. It’s Friday already?! It’s been quite an eventful week, to say the least. We had a great weekend–Jerry and I went mini-golfing and to an escape room. Then on Monday, we let Eli play hooky from school so that we could all go to Cedar Point (Eli’s girlfriend got the go-ahead as well). I took less than five pictures! As I get older, I take fewer pictures but at least try to taken in the moments as they are happening.

I lost (very badly) at mini golf. Why do I never get a hole-in-one?! Because I always hit it in the rocks somehow. Jerry was nervous about this shot because if I made it, he would owe me $1 million. (Clearly, I did not make it from the rocks into the hole.)

This picture is just of Noah and me as we were waiting for the others. They’d gone on a ride we didn’t want to, so we went on a different roller coaster while we waited. (Noah and I like the very twisty-turny rides, but it’s a big no to the big hills. I get vertigo going up and down the hills and it is a super uncomfortable feeling.)

The only photo of the four of us

I was pretty proud of myself for going on a new-to-me coaster called The Gatekeeper. I like rides that are familiar to me so that I know what to expect, and I was terrified to go on The Gatekeeper because I didn’t know what it would be like. I always worry about 1) vertigo, and 2) will it mess up my back? Haha, I’m 100 years old. Some of the older rides are a bit rough, and I’m pretty sure I shrank a couple of inches when I went on the Mine Ride and the Blue Streak several years back.

On the way home, Eli and Ava fell asleep in the back seat. I feel like that’s the normal teenager reaction after a day at Cedar Point. I remember how exhausting it felt! (Well, it’s still exhausting; but every teen around here has a story of a super long, hot day waiting in lines at Cedar Point.) It’s funny–considering how impatient teens are, they are all very patient and well-behaved while waiting 90 minutes in line for a 2-minute ride. Several times, I noted that Jerry and I were (literally) the oldest people we could see in line. I never really realized that Cedar Point is mostly crawling with teenagers.

After such a great day, it was more than a little upsetting to get a phone call from Eli just an hour or so later, saying he’d been in an accident.

A friend of mine sent me a picture of her toddler making a “Jerry face”, so we took a picture to send back to him.

After the issues we had with the dishwasher, I noticed that the silverware was looking really dull. I’ve never polished silverware in my life–I’ve only ever washed it in the dishwasher (or by hand). So, I read online how to get silverware to be clean and shiny again. Basically, you line your sink with foil and mix baking soda, salt, and vinegar right on it. Spread the silverware on it. Then add boiling water to cover it all.

It worked pretty good. They definitely look much better than they did before.

Jerry surprised me with passion fruit yesterday!!! I adore passion fruit, but I haven’t seen it anywhere since we were in Punta Cana in 2014. These ones that Jerry found are tiny and they don’t feel ripe, so I have no idea if they will be any good, but I love that I get to try them!

Yesterday, I made a double batch of seitan patties (kind of like chicken breasts) to marinate and put in the freezer. I also made a quadruple batch of sesame sauce and put it in these 8-oz jars. I like having sauce in the freezer, so I can just pull it out and heat it up for a fast dinner–rice with tofu, veggies, and sesame sauce–so good!

If anyone is interested, this is my recipe (this one is doubled; I used two times this recipe for the jars above). One jar is a good size for a block of tofu (or equivalent volume). (You just shake everything in a mason jar, then pour into a pot and bring just to a boil, then lower heat until the sauce is thickened.)

1/2 cup water
1/2 tsp. salt (hold off on this if you want to taste before salting)
1 Tbsp. corn starch
3 Tbsp. maple syrup (or brown sugar)
3 Tbsp. soy sauce
2 Tbsp. rice vinegar
1/4 tsp. ground ginger
2 tsp. minced garlic
1 Tbsp. sesame seeds
1 tsp. sesame oil
1/2 tsp. crushed red pepper flakes (I use about 3/4 tsp because we like it spicy)

I laughed when I saw this tweet… I definitely remember the owl pellets!

I absolutely love this pair of jeans, but the big hole in the knee was growing every time I stepped into the pants and caught my foot in the hole. Also, when I went to garage sales a few weeks ago with my parents, my knee bumped against the trailer hitch on my dad’s truck–and left a big brown spot. It didn’t come out in the wash, so I figured I’d just make the hole a little bigger and patch it. I just used dark denim on the inside and then, because I really didn’t feel like getting out my sewing machine, I used embroidery thread to attach the patches.

I also took in the waist with darts (bottom right). It used to say “AMERICAN EAGLE”, and now it just says AME. These are heavily altered, but I love these jeans! The button fly and mid rise make them perfect.

I fell down the denim embroidery rabbit hole on Pinterest yesterday–people do the coolest things with embroidery thread! I want to try something fun, but it’s intimidating to even know where to start. I’ll try practicing on a scrap piece of denim.

And finally… Jerry and I have been playing Trivia Crack again. Remember when this was popular several years ago? I have NOT ONCE beat Jerry! He’s super good at trivia, and I am clearly not. I still have fun trying to answer the questions, though. And one of these days, maybe I’ll get lucky and actually beat Jerry. (We also play Boggle, and he’s never beat me at that! We each have our strengths and weakness.)

And that’s all I’ve got. I am dog-sitting for Nathan this weekend; I’m going to bring Joey over there to hang out with his cousin 😉  Have a great weekend! xo