the wild west

Way back when over Labor Day weekend (btw... I do intend to at some point in my life post things as they are happening or shortly thereafter! :) ) we went to visit Chad's sister Ellie, her husband Troy and son Cyrus, who live just west of Chicago.  The main event for the weekend was visiting a little wild west town... perhaps a little past it's prime, but still a big hit with the kiddos.

Creighton got to spend a little time getting to know his cousin Gramm.  I think this is the first time they've taken note of each other...

And here's one pic that Natalie took of Troy and Ellie's house.  I guess this room used to be a gross and outdated sun room but it's looking amazing now!  Troy has a gift for building furniture and doing creative projects to their house.  They've redone almost all of it and it looks great.. wish Chad and I were more talented in that area!

happy birthday to me

... only about a month ago. :)  I started writing this post when it was actually just past my birthday, but somehow it didn't get finished until now.

I celebrated the big 2-9... getting dangerously close to 30!  Which is fine - I really don't mind if I'm almost in my 30's, though it does sound kind of strange.  It was a nice birthday... low key and a blessing to spend time with my hubby and sweet little boys.

We (really I mean 'I' since it was my birthday :)) decided to have a nice little family outing Saturday morning and went to the zoo and then for a walk and picnic along the canal downtown.  Walking along the canal is one of those things that while doing it we ask ourselves, "why don't we do this more often?"  It's so pretty and we love being downtown.  It also makes us dream about living in a flat downtown in some city, walking to everything and enjoying the city life.  We're thinking maybe this will be our empty nest living situation since we didn't take advantage of the opportunity before kids :) ... or maybe we'll just do it with kids!

Our morning at the zoo was nearly perfect... the animals were out and about, the temperature was mild, and we got there early to beat the rush.  The only downfall was that my allergies decided to attack me for the first time this season that morning.  Sneezing.  Sneezing.  Sneezing.  Kleenex.  Kleenex.  Kleenex.  Good times.

There is a little pathway that goes right from the zoo and across the canal to the white river park downtown... perfect place to stroll and have a picnic.

in case you were wondering, Beck's stick is a leaf blower and he's blowing the leaves, of course :)

oh-so-easy banana treat

I'm always trying to come up with different ways to use up ripe bananas... not really brown, mushy bananas that can only be redeemed with banana bread, but bananas with lots of brown spots that are past their eating-plain prime.  Lots of them go into smoothies for Beck and I've discovered a new banana pancake recipe (with just bananas, egg, almond butter, almond meal & flax... so good!) that's also a great way to use them up.  Then yesterday I remembered an easy little treat I saw on pinterest - chocolate covered peanut butter banana slices... sounds too good not to try it out!

And it was very easy and quick.. just a little messy!

 Here's the steps:

1.  Lay 1/4"-1/2" banana slices on a parchment or wax paper lined pan and spread a little peanut butter on top of each slice.

2.  Melt semi-sweet chocolate chips in the microwave (I used about a 1/2 c. of chips for 2 bananas and also added a couple tsp of coconut oil to the chocolate for flavor and to thin it out a little).  I had to re-melt my chocolate half way through the dipping process, as it got too thick.

Spoon chocolate over the banana slice and then use the fork to drip off the excess chocolate.  This is the messy part! (or at least it was for me :))

3.  Lay the chocolate covered banana slices back on the lined pan.  Refrigerate to harden chocolate and then store in the freezer.

Hurry and eat some because they won't last long!

Oh, and be sure to make them in the company of a cute little baby.. it makes it much more fun. :)

Any other ideas for using ripe bananas??