Happy St. Patrick's Day and Weekend!

WOW. First off, I cannot believe that it has been almost three months since my last blog post. Time just flies by - between the kids, work, and every day things - I can't seem to find the time at night to blog like I used to. The boys have been falling asleep later and later, which means my evening hours are dwindling very quickly. ;)

I wanted to blog about some recent happenings in our life, as well as recap our fun St Patrick's Day and weekend. When uploading a few pics from this St Patrick's weekend, I found some pics and blog posts from some in recent years. Here is my post from last year, 2017 - apparently the boys were sick - check out my title! HA. And here is the post from 2014 when we were staying at my Aunt Joyce and Uncle Den's house in Alexandria, VA, when I was pregnant with Conor and Caden.  I even have a post from 2013 - wayyyy back before kiddos weren't even on the radar. I was living in LA and flew to Boston to hang with my sister when she lived in Southie. We went to the parade and it was a blast.

The last few Mondays, I have taken the boys up to Skyzone in Danvers for some trampoline fun. We have had some serious cabin fever, so Skyzone is the place to go. During the week day mornings (10-11:30AM) they have "Toddler Time" for a discounted rate. It is $16/family when you have children under the age of 4 (with 4 kids being the max). Essentially, it is perfect for the Phelan phamily. I can bring all three kids, and it's $16 for an hour and a half of jumping and running around. A few weeks ago, we stopped at Dane Street Beach in Beverly to check out the waves. It was just after our first Nor'easter. The waves were gorgeous and it had that "post storm" vibe. The kids were feeling it too!

Here's a capture of Conor and Caden shoveling the driveway! Jimbo got them some smaller shovels and they actually do a pretty good job! :)

This was us as we went to school Friday morning. It was SUPER sunny with the sun bouncing off the snow - so they needed their sunglasses. Check out this website. It's where my sister and I got the boys their sunnies last summer.

Saturday morning we woke up, threw on our green and also threw the corned beef/potatoes/carrots/cabbage in the crockpots!  I used two crockpots this year, I put the corned beef, carrots, and cabbage in one - and then used a separate one for the potatoes since there were so many. They cooked slowly for about 4-5 hours on low. I also made a Guinness Chocolate Cake!

We visited our friends Shayla, Kyle, and Anna for a corned beef hash brunch. Of course it was like 10am and the Guinness and mimosas were flowin. All the kids played great together; and Conor Caden and Cal did NOT want to leave. They loved playing with all of Anna's toys!

Thanks for yet another delicious brunch guys. :)

Chocolate cake, crockpot #1, crockpot #2, and plate of finished corned beef and potatoes.

Later that afternoon, we visited Julie and her boys Brayden and Tyler. They had a lot of fun together.

Look at these Irish lads... Con/Cay 2016 and Cal 2018.

Cal Pal and his besties "woof woof" and "giraffe" lol

We decided to brave the freezing temps this afternoon and walk about a 1/4 around Horn Pond in Woburn. As I mentioned above, the cabin fever can really get to you...so we needed some fresh air. We lasted a total of about 16 minutes and we abruptly turned around and bolted back to the car to warm up.

Guinness Chocolate Cake anyone?  I made a quick recipe yesterday with the intention of bringing it over a friends house. Turns out, it took a little longer to bake than I thought, so then it was too hot to add frosting. So I ended up leaving it at home, and frosted it this morning. I just had a slice with some coffee and it was delicious. It reminded me a bit of a fourless cake, with a slight Guinness flavor at the finish. Definitely different, and perfect for this weekend.

Ingredients For the Cake:

1. 1 cup Guinness stout / oatmeal stout / chocolate stout.
2. 10 tablespoons (1 stick plus 2 tablespoons) unsalted butter.
3. ¾ cup unsweetened cocoa.
4. 2 cups superfine sugar.
5. ¾ cup sour cream.
6. 2 large eggs.
7. 1 tablespoon vanilla extract.
8. Butter for the pan

Directions:

1. For the cake: heat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9-inch springform pan and line with parchment paper. In a large saucepan, combine Guinness and butter. Place over medium-low heat until butter melts, then remove from heat. Add cocoa and superfine sugar, and whisk to blend.
2. In a small bowl, combine sour cream, eggs and vanilla; mix well. Add to Guinness mixture. Add flour and baking soda, and whisk again until smooth. Pour into buttered pan, and bake until risen and firm, 45 minutes to one hour. Place pan on a wire rack and cool completely in pan.
3. For the topping: Using a food processor or by hand, mix confectioners' sugar to break up lumps. Add cream cheese and blend until smooth. Add heavy cream, and mix until smooth and spreadable.
4. Remove cake from pan and place on a platter or cake stand. Ice top of cake only, so that it resembles a frothy pint of Guinness.  Slice and plate. :)

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! Back to the grind.

Til next time...

xo,

Shaz