Well, I decided to tackle dinner last night. Guess what ? No broken glass this time. :) I remembered not to put a lid on top of steaming-hot-just-cooked food. Oh, I didn't have a lid to put on anyways. The whole family enjoyed chicken marsala and mashed potatoes and I even had the leftovers for lunch today.
Throughout our journey while Elyse was with us, we met and heard from so many compassionate supporters. Kayti Chung heard about Elyse's story through Facebook and immediately organized a bone marrow drive in Philadelphia and registered 147 people. She even came to visit us here in California. We were so happy that Elyse, Faith and Erin got a chance to meet Kayti. It happened to be meal time when Kayti was here so she even fed them cereal. Well, Kayti is fighting her own battle right now. She has to undergo risky surgery to remove a tumor that's intertwined in the spinal cord in the C1/C2 area. It has no boundaries so the whole "thing" can't be taken out. Just to give you an idea of what she's going through right now...she lost feeling in her left arm...she has numbness in her left leg and tremors in her left hand. Her surgery is set for May 9th so please pray for God's protection and healing for Kayti.
It's been a while since I've written a post. I actually turned on my computer several times these past few weeks with the intent to blog but ended up crawling into bed exhausted. Lately I've been feeling so spent at the end of the day....maybe because the girls are much more mobile now. The girls are almost 15 months now. Time flies ! Faith has been walking now for over a month now. Erin wants to be walked by us with just one hand (not two !). Feeding times have been challenging sometimes. I've noticed that Faith is a finicky eater. I try my best to vary their menu but I can't seem to keep up with Faith's choosiness. It's really a hit or miss on some days. Erin, on the other hand, doesn't know when to stop eating. As soon as she finishes her meal, if she spots a box of cheerios or rice puffs anywhere, she'll make it very clear that that's what she wants. It's fascinating to see how different they are.
A few weeks ago, Tim and I bumped into Maria, a nurse at the Day Hospital (at Children's), while we were out shopping at Target with the girls. For those of you not familiar with Children's...Day Hospital is where we took Elyse for chemotherapy. She almost called me Elizabeth...probably because she remembered Elyse. I thanked her for her compassion towards Elyse. Elyse was one of just a handful of babies on chemotherapy treatment at Children's so she received a lot of love and special attention from dedicated nurses. She mentioned that it's nice to see me outside the hospital. Urgh...the waves of emotion just has no end. The vivid memories of Elyse crowded my mind as I was driving out of my parking space. My heart ached longing to hold her once again. It was one of my more difficult days.
As much as every minute with our little ones is so precious, I admit, I look forward to their nap times when I can carve out an hour or two to read, surf the net, or snooze. This past Wednesday was a bit of a hard day. For their morning nap, Faith woke up prematurely crying (I'm not sure why!!??...maybe teething). Her crying woke Erin. That was the end of that nap. For their afternoon nap, Erin wakes up prematurely... maybe 40 minutes into her nap. She woke up crying so this woke Faith. Once a sleep disturbance wakes them up they will not go to sleep again for a while. I had to keep them up until bedtime which is at 8pm. So since Tim came home early that day, we changed shifts and I went out for some grocery shopping while he spent some time with the girls. I had my heart set on making some chicken marsala for dinner. I went to Whole Foods to pick up some marsala wine, mushrooms and prosciutto. I always use Tyler Florence's recipe for chicken marsala...it's fast and delicious. Check out the recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,,FOOD_9936_24021,00.html
You're still probably wondering what the story is behind the photo. Well, here it is. Earlier in the week, I bought some green beans at Trader Joe's so I was planning on serving that with the chicken. Chicken marsala was done when I was getting ready to drain the boiled green beans. The chicken was steaming hot and for whatever reason I decided to put a lid on it while I prepared the green beans. The lid, made of glass as you can see, shattered instantly. I thought these glass lids were tempered and heat-proof. Well, evidently, they're not...not completely. Tim and I were just staring down at the pan with the lid handle resting so comfortably right on top of the chicken and we were both thinking....there goes our dinner. At this point, I was starving. Tim heated some dino nuggets and we both chewed some while comtemplating what we should now have for dinner. We ordered some hot wings and Tim quickly put together some beef stir-fry with the green beans. Not bad...the chicken marsala would have been good too. Well, I'll have to make it on another day. Hope you all try the recipe.
