Tryptofan

Julie's brother Ryan and his wife Jenna, decided last minute to join us NC folk for Turkey Day and boy were we glad. Things would have gotten rather dull without them.

Much to the disapointment (and that's putting it lightly) to all the male members of the family, we rented a cheerleading game to play on my sister's Wii after we ate. Haylee was probably the most enthusiastic about it even though we all enjoyed playing it...very reminicent of DDR...


Cambree found other ways to keep herself occupied while everyone else played the Wii...



Can you say cheese? I mean seriously folks, CHEESE! This has become her trademark grin.


Thanksgiving sugar cookie decorating...per BJ's request.

Not too late!

So I just realized that I haven't posted Halloween pictures yet. That could be because I was so mad at myself for somehow misplacing all the pictures we took on Halloween night or it could be because I just forgot, your choice. These ones from our Trunk-or-Treat are pretty cute though too!

A Not so Haunted House

My family has always done gingerbread houses around Christmas time so I had this great idea to make a Halloween house (not a scary haunted house, c'mon, Haylee's only 3 years old) with Haylee. All the prep work took a little longer than I anticipated so Haylee only got to do a little bit of the decorating before bed and I felt bad doing the rest without her but it was one of those nights when we both needed her to go to bed and I really needed to finish asap before my royal icing turned into royal cement...

It was worth it though. I was rewarded in the morning with plenty of oohs and ahhs and wows and "thanks for making this house for me mom!" oh, and several "can I eat it nows?" thrown here and there too.

It took more time than I planned but it really was a lot of fun. I recommend this project to anyone, with or without kids.

Tactile Snacking

What better way to teach your kids to enjoy different tactile experiences than to finger paint with chocolate pudding? You can tell which one was a little more into the experience than the other! I love these pictures because they show how vastly different these 2 girls' personalities are...

Haylee likes to take her time with new things until she's more sure of herself and only then she will let loose - a little. She also likes to have everything clean; she really couldn't believe I was encouraging her to do this. Also I think she went and washed her hands 5 times during our 20 minute finger painting experience.

Cambree, on the other hand (someone else's other hand) knew immediately the purpose of this experience was to allow her to figure out how much of this gooey sweet stuff she could consume in the shortest amount of time and if, along the way, she happened to make some sort of design on her tray, well that was just an added benefit. She ended up needing a "refill" from the paint pot about as often as Haylee washed her hands!

Chicken Like You've Never Known it Before

This recipe is also from Bon Appetit. It is so different from all the flavors and spices that I am used to but it was delicious! This is mostly due to the smoked paprika that is in it which was the only ingredient I don't normally buy...I learned it is considered a "gourmet spice" but it was worth the extra effort it took to find - please don't cheat yourself and just use regular paprika because you will not get the same flavor.

This dish was also so beautiful that I can imagine myself serving it at a dinner party someday...that is, someday when I start hosting dinner parties.

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/ROAST-CHICKEN-BREASTS-WITH-GARBANZO-BEANS-TOMATOES-AND-PAPRIKA-242113

Delicious!

Ok, so everyone knows I like to cook. But here's the thing, I mostly start out with a recipe and try to follow it best I can. I often make tweaks and changes here and there, mostly to scale down, make things more affordable, and satisfy my need to make every meal my own.

I've tried 2 recipes lately that all (including the girls) of us have really enjoyed. This first one is from Bon Appetit and it's a beautiful summer pasta dish. It has goat cheese in it (my new favorite expensive ingredient). Yes, it's a little more pricey, and no, it's not good, old, comfortable cheddar, but it is surprisingly mild and delicious!! I did make a lot of changes on this one though, because I was determined to use what I had on hand. I won't bore you with my changes here so if you are interested, let me know and I will pass them on or feel free to try the recipe as originally written as I plan to do soon considering how much I loved my version. Who knows, maybe the original is even better!

Here's the link: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/FARFALLE-WITH-CHICKEN-TOMATOES-CARAMELIZED-ONIONS-AND-GOAT-CHEESE-242501

Enjoy!

Comic Relief

So Haylee has this doll that pees in a mini potty when you feed her water from her bottle. I'm sure you've all heard of these dolls. (C'mon, don't you remember those pink Mattel commercials when you were young? These things have been around for a while.) From day 1, I (Julie) wanted this cute little doll to remain a cute, dry, little doll but someone, and I don't even remember who, showed Haylee how to "feed" her baby. So now she does it all the time. She even takes her in the bath tub on occasion but I never thought it'd be a big deal because if water got in, she'd just pee it out into her little potty, right?

WRONG!!!

This little doll, Haylee named her "Big Baby" has been sitting on her potty for 2 weeks straight, right on the ledge overlooking our dinner table. No pee. We tried adjusting her legs, arms, posture but still no pee. The other day as BJ and I were enjoying a leisurely evening of watching TV, I finally got fed up with it and asked BJ to drain her out by pulling off her legs. To my surprise, I turn from Everyday Italian to see him giving Big Baby mouth to mouth! (I guess he was tired of having all kinds of training and never getting to use it.) Giada forgotten, I fall on the floor laughing. I mean, seriously folks, just try to picture it!

Here's the thing though...it worked! Well, kind of. As he blew air into Big Baby's mouth, water started dripping from a little hole between her legs! Yeah!!! But then it stopped working. Don't worry, he tried reverse CPR too and no pee. Her arms and legs, we learned, are impossible to remove without a machete (anyone have one we can borrow?) and there is still a puddle of water sitting inside her. We'd like to keep Big Baby around since, well, aside from being a cute doll, our whole family has sort of grown a bit closer to her lately. I'm thinking the only way to drain her is to drill holes in her mini behind.

If you or anyone you know has experience with this kind of thing or you think you might have a creative solution to our little problem, please pass it on.