Another Day

I was like the walking dead yesterday. I guess the weekend just caught up to me. Also, my body was really ticked when it had to get out of bed after like 6 hours of mediocre sleep. Picky picky.

Anyhoo, on Sunday evening, we called the after-hours nurse about Tabby because she had some itchy spots on her arms. I thought she was just kind of allergic to something or other (I used to get this all the time as a kid) and wanted to give her some Benedryl. She'd also had flushed cheeks all day. The nurse put two and two together and came up with Fifth Disease. This is apparently no big woo for her … she will get a rash off and on for a while until her body builds up immunity … but it is potentially dangerous to her baby brother … yes, the one still leasing space from me. Chances are very remote, but it could cause him to have severe anemia amongst other things. So I was summoned to the lab yesterday (after work) to give blood to see if I am immune and if not if I have been exposed. We should know soonish.

After that, I went home to pass out in bed for a while. Normally I get Tabby and she naps with me, but she has been so ridiculous about the naps since the Binky Fairy came that I left her with her sitter. Matt got her a while later and foolishly tried to get her to lie down with me which produced much screaming and woke me up in the worst part of a REM cycle. I swear I never did fully wake up and spent most of the evening horizontal either zoning out or watching bad TV.

I did, however, manage to stand up long enough to make incredible cinnamon rolls for dinner (we had eggs too, don't worry) cuz Jenn told me to.

Wowie!

We had a busy busy weekend. I am so happy with what we got done though. Friday I used my work-free half day to clear out a ton of magazines and other junk from my office, reorganize our master bathroom and make a station dedicated to wrapping gifts. I also may have sort of passed out in bed for an hour. I can't recall. We made Baja Fish Tacos for dinner – AWESOME. We tried to go swimming but we mis-timed it and ended up playing at the indoor playground and then going to Sonic for cream slushies.

Saturday was our work day. My parents met us for breakfast and we had baby hand-off. Tabby had a fun-filled day going to the salon, MacDonald's, Toys R Us and then running around my parents' backyard. Matt and I meanwhile attacked our proejcts with fury. I extracted no less than five containers (bags, boxes, etc.) of crap from our master bedroom closets. They look organized and AMAZING. Matt got five hours closer to having Tabby's toddler bed done -actually maybe even closer than that since we made a decision at the end of the day that cut back the scope of the project, saving us money, time, and most importantly, space. Dinner with my parents and sister capped off the day.

Today was our play day. We earned it. Though we did start it of with a bit of housecleaning and a trip to Good Will, we went swimming at the rec center, had lunch at Sonic and played around. We started clean-up in the backyard, getting ready to plant the garden. Not so much playtime for us, but definitely play time for Tabby, our outdoor girl.

For our last trick of the evening, we
cooked dinner for tonight (chicken thing – it was OK) and a double-batch of shepherd's pie, one for later this week and one to freeze for after the baby comes.

It's Friday, Fools!

I love Friday. It means turning off my alarm instead of just resetting it. It is usually a short day for me at work. That's not bad either. I also turn over a “new week” of pregnancy. 34 weeks down, 5-6 to go.

This weekend promises a good balance of fun and work. This afternoon, I am leaving Tabby at her sitters for a little while and attempting one of the many projects on my “before Baby Boy Comes” to-do list. After Tabby pickup and a nap (fingers crossed), tonight we are making fish tacos and hanging out around the house. We may screen a Disney movie Tabby has never seen before.

Tomorrow, we are meeting my parents for breakfast and Tabby drop off. She is going to spend the day with them while Matt and I are at home. I am going to work on more of that to-do list and Matt is going to his wood shop for hours of (hopefully) uninterrupted work time so he can finish Tabby's toddler bed (and we can start the whole bedroom switcheroo). We plan to meet up with my parents later for dinner and relaxation. It is supposed to be gorgeous, so maybe we can eat outside.

Sunday there are no official plans yet. Since it is still supposed to be gorgeous, it might be a great time to play in the dirt and start getting our yard ready for summer.

Happy Friday, Y'all!

Honey Lime Chicken Enchiladas

from: http://phemomenon.blogspot.com/

Ingredients
1/3 cup honey
1/4 cup lime juice (about 2 large limes)
2 teaspoons to 1 Tablespoon chili powder
2 large cloves of garlic, finely minced or 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts (about 2 large breasts), cooked and shredded
12 corn tortillas
2 cups of Mexican cheese blend, shredded (1 small bag usually is 2 cups)
1 14-oz can of green enchilada sauce (mild or medium, to your taste)
1/2 to 3/4 cup of heavy cream
nonstick cooking spray
1 Tablespoon of chopped cilantro, to garnish

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Place the cooked and shredded chicken in a medium sized bowl. Set aside. In a small bowl, place the honey, lime juice, chili powder and minced garlic or garlic powder. Whisk together thoroughly to combine. Pour this mixture over the chicken and cover with plastic wrap. Allow to marinate while you prepare the tortillas, 30 minutes or up to 1 hour, in the refrigerator.

Heat a large griddle till a drop of water skitters across (about 350 degrees F). Spray the surface with non-stick cooking spray or a oil it with a little bit of canola oil in between each round of tortillas. Heat tortillas about 20 seconds on each side till warm and flexible and some golden brown spots have appeared. Remove the tortillas from the griddle and keep them between a couple of paper towels until ready to use.

Spray the sides and bottom of a 9×13-inch baking dish lightly with cooking spray. In a medium bowl combine the enchilada sauce and the heavy cream. Spread about 1/2 cup of the mixture in the bottom of the oiled baking dish. Add a large spoonful (about 2 tablespoons) of the chicken mixture to the center of each tortilla in a line. Cover the chicken with a large tablespoon (or big pinch) of cheese, then roll the tortilla up from one side to make a rolled enchilada – it will be more of an over lap on the seam side that rolled tightly. Place the enchilada seam side down in the baking dish starting at one end with the long edge parallel to the longest side of the pan so that you end up with two columns of six enchiladas each.

Repeat with the remaining chicken, cheese and tortillas. You will use about 1 1/2 cups of the cheese for the filling and set the remainder aside for topping the enchiladas in the pan. Add the remaining marinade mixture to the enchilada sauce and cream mixture, if desired. Pour this mixture over the top of all the enchiladas. Sprinkle with the remaining cheese.

Bake the enchiladas for 30 to 35 minutes, until the cheese is melted and bubbly and starting to brown on top. Serve with sour cream, black beans, and rice or a green salad for a great meal.

You Want I Should Post?

Alright. Links.

• Why does Japan get all the cool stuff?? Better cell phones AND giant walking robot coke machines. Not to mention Hello Kitty Karaoke Bars.
• People need to mind their own biznassss: Exhibit A
• Very cool Barbie Dream Houses
• Many ways to put a new spin on an old fave … popcorn!
• File under “C” for “Cool Craft” … the recycled phone book desk organizer
• Make You Tube safe(er) for the kiddies with the Kideo Player
• another fun kitchen experiment: make butter in your food processor (sounds easier than shaking a jar for like 80 years)
• love these fun Jello Watermelon Snacks!
• And in the same vein, Burger Cupcakes
• an interesting article about how to be a great parent (hint: it doesn't mean sacrificing yourself to the wants/needs of your kid)
• gotta love these call out cards for dealing with difficult people
• this teeny garden makes me smile
• check out this awesome birthday surprise
• my nerdy organizational self loves calendars … you can print custom ones at Calendar Labs
cute placecard holders made from wine corks … not that I've ever actually used place cards, but I'll pretend!

What's Cooking?

Gah things have been busy lately. Not that I can complain. Part of me would dearly love to fast-forward to Baby Boy's arrival, but I know better. I would miss too much in the meantime. Tabby has been so freaking funny and sweet lately. I am LOVING not having her binky. It seems like it encourages her to talk more, especially in the car. I'm just anticipating what she'll say next. But the trade off (at least right now) is that nap time has been quite the pain in the butt.

I am actually starting to freak out a bit that Baby Boy is arriving in like umm… 5.5 weeks? *Gulp* As I said before, I cannot go to the level of planning that I would like to. But even without a nursery to prep, there is still a lot I'd like to get accomplished before he arrives. A lot of it I want to get done because I'm starting to remember what it was like to have a newborn. Chaotic. So I'm going to PLANCON 3 (I generally exist somewhere between PLANCON 5 and PLANCON 4) and long lists will soon be generated.

And literally, things have been cooking! For so long, we were in the Winter Doldrums and cooking whatever we could be bothered to remember the recipe for. But now it's getting gorgeous (70s and upper 60s alllll week, fools!) and I'm coming out of my funk and cooking up some new stuff. I love new stuff.

Berry French Toast – This gets top billing because it came together in an instant and is hands-down one of the tastiest things ever. I ♥ breakfast for dinner. Matt and Tabby do too because they get BACON.
Apple Dippin Cookies – the author of this recipe said she was inspired by a favorite snack of hers … apples dipped in peanut butter. I said … “sold!” These cookies are unusual and very very tasty.
Chicken Pesto Pasta – this is my “recipe” brought on by a craving for pesto. I had to use the kind from a jar (not awful) but I am looking forward to fersh. From my garden. With tomatoes.
Spaghetti Carbonara – I left the ingredients for this so Matt could make it for Tabby while I went to Bunco. So it was easy and it had BACON. They loved it. I would eat it as well.
Sesame Chicken Salad – This was a tasty little pasta dish that we cooked up one night a week or so ago. It is very simple and you get your veggies in. Tabby loved it too.
• Stir fry. There is no recipe for this because umm… it's a stir fry. Little oil, meat, veggies (frozen, from Costco to supplement), soysauce, Asian Simmer Sauce from Target if you're cheaters like us. All over rice. We made one for the first time last week and it brought back memories of last summer, trying to use up all of our veggies from our CSA.

First Haircut

Seems like Tabby is intent on hitting the milestones lately. Turning 2. Getting rid of the binky. Insisting that she needs her hair cut. This has been going on for about a week. I'm guessing someone (more than one someone?) put the idea into her head, but she's been regurgitating it to us off and on for a while. “Need hair cut.” We couldn't really disagree … It looked great in pigtails (hopefully it still will), but it was getting pretty scraggly and she was constantly pushing her bangs out of her eyes.

So we took her down to Lollilocks to have it ceremoniously trimmed up a bit. They are a kid-specific “salon” with riding animal chairs and plenty of cute little barretts, etc. for her. The stylist knew all the tricks and trimmed her up in a jiffy. Tabby did pretty well for the duration, but was sort of over it by the end and fussed when she tried to style her hair and then take her photo. Luckily, she was easily bought off with a lollipop (yes, I know, choking hazard, bad mom, blah blah).

I definitely wouldn't take her back there everytime ($$ yikes!) but it was really fun to do that for her first experience. I don't know that I'll be taking her there for a baby pedicure anytime soon though … though she'd probably be all over that action. Continue reading “First Haircut”

Chicken Pesto Pasta

from: Matt & Jess

Ingredients
pasta (you choose what type)
pesto
chicken, cut into bite-sized pieces
garlic
S&P
olive oil
parmesan (duh)

Directions
Get the water going for your pasta (salt!). Heat olive oil in a big ol' skillet and add the garlic. While that gets going, salt and pepper your chicken. Toss the chicken in and cook, turning every once in a while, but making sure to get nice browning on it. This helps chicken to not taste so much like chicken.

Put in the pasta ASAP and get that cooked. Mix the cooked pasta, chicken and pesto all together. You shouldn't need to heat the pesto unless your pasta's gotten cold. In which case you should probably heat the pasta too. Top it all off with a mini snowstorm of parmesan. Dang it's good.

Spaghetti Carbonara

from: allrecipes.com

Ingredients
5 1/2 pounds apples – peeled, cored and finely chopped
4 cups white sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon salt

Directions
Place the apples in a slow cooker. In a medium bowl, mix the sugar, cinnamon, cloves and salt. Pour the mixture over the apples in the slow cooker and mix well.

Cover and cook on high 1 hour. Reduce heat to low and cook 9 to 11 hours, stirring occasionally, until the mixture is thickened and dark brown. Uncover and continue cooking on low 1 hour. Stir with a whisk, if desired, to increase smoothness.

Spoon the mixture into sterile containers, cover and refrigerate or freeze.

from: Barefoot Contessa

Ingredients
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 pound unsalted butter, melted and cooled
2 extra-large eggs
3/4 cup whole milk
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 cup mashed ripe bananas (2 bananas)
1 cup medium-diced ripe bananas (1 banana)
1 cup small-diced walnuts
1 cup granola
1 cup sweetened shredded coconut
Dried banana chips, granola, or shredded coconut, optional

Directions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Line 18 large muffin cups with paper liners. Sift the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Add the melted butter and blend. Combine the eggs, milk, vanilla, and mashed bananas, and add them to the flour-and-butter mixture. Scrape the bowl and blend well. Don't overmix.

Fold the diced bananas, walnuts, granola, and coconut into the batter. Spoon the batter into the paper liners, filling each 1 to the top. Top each muffin with dried banana chips, granola, or coconut, if desired. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, or until the tops are brown and a toothpick comes out clean. Cool slightly, remove from the pan, and serve.

from: Parenting.com

Ingredients
Salad:
8 oz long fusilli
1 cup snow peas
1 cup shredded cooked chicken
1/2 cup shredded carrots
1 Tbs sesame seeds
1 scallion, thinly sliced (optional)

Dressing:
1/4 cup creamy peanut butter
2 tsp brown sugar
2 Tbs reduced-sodium soy sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp rice or apple-cider vinegar

Directions
Cook pasta according to package directions; add snow peas to the boiling water about one minute before pasta is done. Drain and rinse under cool water.

Mix the peanut butter, brown sugar, soy sauce, sesame oil, and rice vinegar in a large bowl. Add the pasta and snow peas; mix well. Add chicken and carrots; toss to combine. Top with sesame seeds and scallions, if you like.

Nutritional Info (1 cup(
279 calories, 8 g fat (2 g saturated), 277 mg sodium, 20 mg cholesterol

from: Everyday Food

Ingredients
1/4 cup Basil Pesto, (two cubes defrosted)
2 precooked store-bought pizza crusts (8 inches)
1 sliced plum tomato
2 ounces grated mozzarella cheese
Coarse salt and ground pepper

Directions
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Spread basil pesto on each of two pizza crusts.

Layer each crust with plum tomato; sprinkle with grated mozzarella cheese. (Or, layer with just cheese, using 3 ounces thinly sliced fresh mozzarella.) Season with coarse salt and ground pepper.

Transfer to a baking sheet; bake until cheese has melted and crust is golden brown, about 10 minutes. Slice, and serve immediately.

from: kidscuisine.net

Ingredients
1 stick softened butter
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cup vanilla flavored granola clusters
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup apples, diced to about 1/4 inch (I used fuji)

1/2 Cup turbinado sugar, or other sugar of choice to roll cookies in

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In a stand or electric mixer, cream butter and sugars until mixed well. Beat in peanut butter until combined then add the egg and vanilla until well combined.

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, granola, baking soda, and salt. Slowly mix in the wet ingredients, then the apples, until just combined. With a medium cookie scoop, scoop dough, roll into sugar ,then place onto a silpat or parchment-lined baking sheet. With tines of a fork, press down slightly making an X on top of each cookie. Bake for 9-11 minutes. Cookies should look somewhat soft inside when you take them out. Let cool/finish baking out of oven for 5 minutes then transfer to a cooling rack.

from: Everyday Food

Ingredients
1 pound spaghetti
8 ounces (8 slices) bacon, cut 1 inch thick crosswise
Coarse salt and freshly ground pepper
3 large eggs
3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese, plus more for serving
1/2 cup half-and-half

Directions
Set a large pot of water to boil (for pasta). In a large skillet, cook bacon over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until crisp, 8 to 12 minutes; transfer to a paper-towel-lined plate.

Salt boiling water generously; add pasta and cook until al dente, according to package instructions.
Meanwhile, in a large bowl, whisk together eggs, Parmesan, and half-and-half. Set aside.

Drain pasta, leaving some water clinging to it. Working quickly, add hot pasta to egg mixture. Add bacon; season with salt and pepper, and toss all to combine (heat from pasta will cook eggs). Serve immediately, sprinkled with additional Parmesan cheese.