Smile!

Yummy Foods!



Vanilla Spiced Oatmeal-I love apricot oatmeal in the slow cooker so I'm always looking for another one that is just as good. I would make this again but it definitely needed the raisins!




Turkey Chili-My new favorite chili recipe! We had this for dinner yesterday on National Chili Day! (I like celebrating food holidays because it makes it easier to decide what's for dinner) A lot of the commenters on the website recommended doubling the spices so I did (except I kept the chili powder the same). I found this because I wanted a recipe that used yellow bell pepper.



Quinoa-Almond Salad- This was super easy to put together and I loved the crunchiness!



Banana Bread-I used my favorite banana bread recipe for this one but split the batter and made four variations: Chocolate Chip, Maple Walnut, Cinnamon Raisin, and Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip. I thought Peanut Butter would be everyone's favorite but I think everyone liked Cinnamon Raisin more. We had this and big bowls of broccoli for dinner on National Banana Bread Day!




Granola Bars-This was the first version I made (raisins, sunflower seeds, peanuts and mini m&m's) and it held together really well, everyone liked it. I changed the formula around the second time and used apricots and chocolate chips but I was the only one who liked it better! I had substituted some plain cheerios for the oats and the bars kept falling apart.




Pasta Salad-we had a highly successful macaroni and cheese night where the kids got to add any number of healthy mix-ins they wanted to their bowl so I decided to try it with pasta salad. It went great! This is a picture of what Owen chose for his pasta (yellow pepper, tomato, peas, corn, cheese, chicken and red onion).




Another salad!



Paige!

What's been happening lately...



Playing with a friend




Paige has been really concentrating on her coloring. She colored a picture for a friend's birthday where she did a super impressive job staying in the lines.



50 cents bought this much happiness!



She's totally into this princess book from the library. She'll start out asking us to read it to her and then usually says, "How about I just look at it?" and then she takes it  and flips through the pages one by one, naming all the characters.




Paige got a Snow White doll as a reward for saying goodbye to Paco! We tried it another time about 7 months ago and it didn't really stick...



President's Day!

We were very presidential on Monday. We made mini Abraham Lincoln hats and colored pictures of him and George Washington. Owen actually had a lot of questions about the presidents and I think I answered most of them with the help of a newspaper feature from the day before! Owen said his favorite president is Abraham Lincoln because he's famous and Paige said her favorite was Barack Obama. She didn't say why but she has told me before that he looks like Prince Naveen from The Princess and the Frog so I think that might have had something to do with it...

We watched Beauty and the Beast for the first time (with some strong-handed editing from me)



Abe Lincoln hats!




Coloring sheets and some freshly popped popcorn go very well together!



Some More Salads!

Spinach, Iceberg, Feta, Red Onion, Yellow Pepper, Tomato

Spinach, Red Pepper, Chickpeas, Couscous

Valentine's Day!

We had a busy Valentine's Day this year! I stuffed a healthy snack into their Valentine mailboxes because I knew they would be getting a lot of treats later and luckily the kids didn't seem to mind :) We even snuck in a quick heart photo shoot before school (past years- 2009, 2011, 2012)!

Quinoa Salad with Pears

Salads just have long names. This one is Quinoa Salad with Pears, Spinach, and Chickpeas in a Maple Vinaigrette. I don't know what originally drew me to this salad but as I was making it I was thinking, "This is going to be super gross." I went through with it anyway and....I was wrong. This salad was super fantastic! Go check out the link for a prettier picture and maybe you too will be drawn in.

Chinese New Year!

There's a lot to celebrate this week and yesterday was all about Chinese New Year! We made some red paper lanterns, dragon masks and snakes because it's the year of the snake. I was especially impressed with how Owen colored his mask and Paige's scissor skills (I didn't realize she had any...). We even listened to some "traditional" Chinese music (Pandora's word, not mine!) while we did our crafts and later had some chicken fried rice for dinner. (We made lanterns in 2011 too!) 

Winter Salad

This is actually called Cheddar & Apple Winter Salad with Balsamic-Feta Vinaigrette but that's a bit wordy so...Winter Salad it is! This salad was really good and not as time-consuming to make as I thought it would be. I made a few small changes to the original recipe - I didn't put in the raisins, I used a different kind of cheese, and I thought half of an apple was way too much for my lunch-sized salad so I probably did about a quarter. Also, taking the time to toast walnuts makes a huge difference in flavor, they were one of my favorite parts of the salad! 

Don't let that look fool you, Paige wanted to take a picture of my food too.

Paige's Phone

I needed a new case for my phone so Paige and I turned my old case into a phone for her. Her phone actually has a lot of features; it has games and the ability to contact all the princesses although Paige seems to mostly be talking to Tiana. We made two sides-one with princess "buttons" and the other with Sesame Street "buttons" but so far, Paige only seems to be talking with the princesses. Owen thinks it's hilarious and will sometimes play games on it with Paige too!

It's Salad Month

It's Salad Month here on the blog! I've done 30 days of breakfast (twice!), 30 days of oatmeal, a 30 day photo challenge (did I ever finish that?) so I thought I would try a salad month since they're easy to make and easy to customize. I have some interesting ones in mind but I won't go crazy every day and won't be posting them all since I'm sure most of them will be variations of the first and third picture here. The good news is that salads are really easy to photograph-look at all that color! The other good news is that the word "salad" has a pretty loose definition so I can pretty much mix anything I want and call it a salad:)



Lettuce, cheese crumbles, red pepper, green pepper, red onion, Italian dressing.




Lettuce, cheese, tomato, cranberries, yummy dressing I don't know the name of, and savory granola (this salad was courtesy of Lisa and Alex)




Lettuce, tomatoes, green pepper, red onion, cheese, cucumber, Italian dressing (I had this same salad today without the cucumber and added in walnuts)



Arts and Crafts

I'm trying to make more of an effort to plan art activities with the kids because it feels like we're stuck in a rut! The cold weather makes me want to just curl under a blanket and turn on the tv. Don't worry, we've definitely been doing some of that too but it's nice to have other options! We made some groundhogs for Groundhog Day and Paige and I made some Valentine's wreaths to celebrate the month of February!

Party Stuff

 Here are some closer shots of the food and decorations we had at Owen's party!



The birthday boy was anxiously waiting for his guests to arrive-still sporting his birthday crown from school!



The cupcakes!



The more exciting end of the food table-the desserts. (We also had sliders, pasta salad, texas caviar and all the other normal party fare)



Party favor bag for the kids-soccer ball, chocolate soccer balls, cake pops and a necklace





This is a bad picture of a very fun circle garland I sewed!



Parrrrty!

Owen's birthday party had a soccer theme this year! This was the first year he knew the theme before the day of the party which made planning a lot easier on me but that we lost out on the morning excitement of him running out and discovering what it was! 

Kids playing Goooooooal! Bingo! (Pat's masterpiece)





Owen had some trouble blowing out his candles, he kept aiming the wrong way!




The kids!