Yummy pan-fried chicken nuggets with curry

These were awesome but I have to admit that any kind of frying is a pain. The taste is worth it though!

1 1/2 - 2 lbs. chicken cut up in chunks (maybe 2" pieces)

1 1/4 C flour (you may need some more)

1/2 cup warm water

1 1/2 T curry powder (or any spice mixture really)

salt and pepper, to taste

Rub the chicken all over with rice vinegar (or cider vinegar). This is pretty easy if you put all of the chicken pieces in a big freezer ziplock bag, pour the vinegar in, seal and shake it up. Then add the salt, pepper and curry and shake again. Whisk flour with the water until you get a paste about as thick as yogurt. Heat up to 1/4" oil in a skillet over med.- high heat. Dredge chicken in mixture and pan-fry in batches. Approx. 4 servings and takes approx. 30 minutes. Great with steamed rice and veggies with a little curry.

Silly little Vibye!

Oh this girl loves to have fun! She's so social and loves to be a part of it all. Cliffton has always been a much more independent personality. Not so with our little princess. On this day, I was baking bread and Violet wanted to be involved. So I gave her some flour to play with. Flour power!

As we were going through more boxes of clothes and stuff we found a swimsuit for Violet and she tried to put it all herself! I think she got one foot though the hole and then I helped her with the rest.

Waterfront Park

Again, we found a way awesome park! However, this one had geese poo everywhere. Ugh! So nasty. So even though it was freezing and nasty, we still had fun. Violet wanted to give the geese a BIG HUG! We eventually scared them all away.

I sure do think they're cute!

My cuties!

Oh Cliffton...

He is just the darn cutest lil' bug that Cliffie! Cliffton really likes to say prayers. Today while at the park he said he had to say the prayer and he immediately ran off a few yards and said a very-fast-and-not-so-intelligible-prayer. He will do that while were playing at home too. Yesterday, Richard was helping him with the dinner blessing on the food and Richard prompted him to say something like, "and help Mommy to have patience with the kids" or "please help Mommy deal with the kids" something, and Cliffton repeated it word for word until "the kids." Without hesitation, he said simply, "Violet." Apparently Cliffton is just too mature to fit into this category!

In our "backyard"

There is a closed pool in our 'backyard.' It is open from about Memorial Day to Labor Day. To the east of the pool is a little BBQ area and a small grassy area for play. The kids like to ride and push strollers (with Violet's blankie as a passenger) around the sidewalks. Violet also likes to pick up rocks and throw them or eat them. She also likes to throw woodchips down the drains. Here she is pointing out an airplane to me. Oh, she LOVES airplanes! Its so cute how she looks around desperately to find it. Cliffton would not pedal his bike around before we moved to NY. He would just "Flinstone" it. Now he's one groovy lil' biker.

I have never seen this before...

Can you read it? It says FALLOUT SHELTER. I had to get a picture. Its on the town hall.

*Some history: This town officially became Freeport in the mid 1800s (it was called Raynortown or something like that before) but there's been a community here since about 1660 or so. 350 years! Yikes! I was born in Reno and I'm pretty sure it wasn't 'settled' 'till about 1860. Orlando, my home from 1992-2004, was sparsely populated by native Americans until Europeans came around 1836. Not so up here! A lot of cities have roots going back to mid 1600s.

Haircut pix and family pix

A picture each of Cliffton and Violet on our last trip to a Hempstead park (now that we're officially Freeport residents we belong to the southside gangs, not central ;) This park was close to the Chirinos' home). This is also Cliffie before his haircut. They had the COOLEST lil' fire engine chair for kiddos at the salon! Cliffton hated getting his hair cut at first but I think the fire truck really helped take his mind off of the supposed torture. The last two were taken at our branch's hispanic cultural celebration. There were tables set up and/or presenters for Columbia, Peru, Guatemala, El Salvador, Dominican Republic and Ecuador. Sis. Chirinos' is a wonderful translator and was a big help to us English speakers that night! She is the one with short hair in the second to last picture and she also translates for ASL speakers as well.

This is one of the cutest parks!

This is one of the closest parks and its pretty cool. There are some 3 playgrounds, an exercise area, a huge field and a smaller one, tennis courts, trails, boat ramps, water area, picnic tables, grills, beach, etc. We haven't checked where the shoreline is yet but I know its near the picnic areas (there are a lot of bushes and trees that separate the park area from the beach).