We’ve been struggling with breakfast these days. We make breakfast, but they don’t eat it. And then we shuffle them into the car to go to school or some other destination, and suddenly they’re hungry. So breakfast? It needs to be portable.

Muffins are a great answer, but I’ve been struggling with creating the perfect one. There are those really yummy ones that have no nutritional value, which, of course, they love. Then there are the really healthy ones that are chock full of nutrients, but they just pick out the raisins and leave the rest for the dogs.

But I think I’ve struck upon a happy medium. I start with a Dr. Oetker muffin mix. Then I add a whole chopped apple, a generous amount of raisins, finely grated carrots, several scoops of protein powder, and some extra cinnamon. Yes, these muffins are pretty high in sugar, but they’re pretty high in other nutritional value once I’ve packed all that other stuff in, too. And the kids? They gobble them up. In and out of the car!

Next time, I think I’m going to sneak in ground flax seed as well. Let’s see how far I can push the envelope.

Now if I can just figure out which box in the basement contains my muffin top pans…

When I die, I wish to be reincarnated as Lauren Child so that I can create the amazing collage-y illustrations that I adore in our new favorite books and DVDs about a boy named Charlie and his little sister Lola.

Okay, maybe I don’t need to BE her, but I do want to do those amazing illustrations. Plus, I want every outfit that Lola wears to immediately be made into a real outfit and stashed in our closet.

But back to the actual stories. What I truly love about these characters is that they are siblings who actually get along and love one another. Every book is narrated by Charlie and begins, “I have a sister named Lola. She is small and very funny.”

Since the books originated in the UK, all the characters on the DVD speak with an English accent. Neko has picked up some of the intonations, and sounds a bit like Madonna these days.

Other than Charlie and Lola, the other character that has staying power is a dog named Sizzles that Lola and her friend Lotta promise to keep an eye on at the park (and promptly lose). Of late, there has been a heavy campaign to change Daisy’s name to Sizzles.

I was super-excited to find this re-release of Pippi Longstocking updated with illustrations by Child. I’ve put it on the list for future bedtimes.

All around the world, as the sun begins to wane, people gather in their kitchens and prepare an evening meal. Many of these people have children. In my career as a parent, this is the one thing I still cannot figure out. How do people do it? How do you peel the children off for long enough to prepare a meal for which the preparation is a bit more complicated than “cook for six minutes on HIGH”?

Some people use television. This would be fine if I could actually count on both of my children being glued to the television for 30 consecutive minutes at the same time. This has happened, oh, I dunno, like three times in my parenting career. So that’s not useful. Others say, “I simply tell them they have to leave me alone.”

I tried this today. I informed everyone that I needed 30 minutes to cook dinner. Neko, in frustration, promptly went to her bedroom and fell asleep. I suspect the subconscious passive-aggressive in her of thinking, “Evict me from the kitchen? I will foil you by sleeping, thereby totally ruining any chance you have of a smooth bedtime.” (Plan successful.)

Ellery, my ever-sunny baby, burst into tears and continued to sob unless I was holding her. And Shep, literally, had to have skin-to-skin contact for the full dinner prep time.

As I cooked, I began hurling kitchen implements to the floor, just hoping I could distract them for long enough to chop an onion. I managed captivate Shep for a few minutes with these magnetic spoons.

A few weeks ago, when we got snowed in on a Saturday, we decided it would be a great idea to start unpacking all those thousands of boxes in the basement. Turns out, this is a really great idea for a couple with no children, and, say, 72 uninterrupted hours on their hands. But for a couple with three kids who have maybe twice in their lives played quietly in the corner? Not so much.

Needless to say, we got just to the point where you’ve taken out all the boxes, unpacked just enough that there’s a pile of boxes of trash, a pile of boxes for Goodwill, and a pile of boxes of thing you care about and they’re all mixed into one big explosive pile that you can barely walk through.

Anyway, for the past month, the basement has been pretty much unusable. We take the kids down there periodically, but it’s more like one of those school exercises where the nuclear bomb has exploded, and you have to try to figure out how to survive in this brave new world. Neko and Shep have piled packing paper into the jungle gym and the bounce house, and created little pathways in between. We keep losing Ellery in between boxes.

So today, in lieu of basement time? A morning shower with a special bonus. Apples IN the shower. I’m sure that’s in some Montessori book somewhere.