Things that make me smile

 In case you were wondering...

We had to work in a doctor's visit last week because Caleb had a cough that was worrying me.  Everything checked out OK and, while he didn't like being poked or prodded, he LOVED making faces at himself in the mirror.  "Oh no, YOU are the cutest widdle baby..."

You all know how I love a good deal and CHECK THESE OUT!!  Seriously, $1 for organic hearts of romaine??!!  Yes please!!  I do believe Scott will shoot me if I sneak another bag of snow peas into his lunch, but you can't pass up $1 produce!  Thank YOU, Mr. Manager for your clearance decisions!

And back to my son, who is going through a crazy developmental stage right now.  I don't remember the girls doing something new every day, but he seems to figure things out a little more every time I turn around.  His latest trick is grabbing the puffs off the high chair tray, although he can't seem to get them in his mouth yet.  If you look closely, you can see the blurry little varmint escaping from his mitts.

And not to be overlooked, the dynamic duo makes me smile too...most of the time.  They've recently become obsessed with the play cell phone and walk around "talking" to their friends with the thing propped between their shoulder and their ear.  The other night, Elizabeth told me she couldn't come to the dinner table because her friend Piper had a crisis on the phone.  Yes, my four-year-old knows the word 'crisis.'  *sigh*

Who knew they made coconut milk coffee creamer??  It is saving my life on this Paleo kick, since I can't have dairy and think that black coffee is almost as pointless as decaf.  The Bailey's is there in case any of my sane friends drop by for a cup.  

And speaking of the Paleo challenge, CHECK IT!!  BUH-BYE 140'S!!!  This was day 3, after I had been stuck in a rut at 141 for two weeks!

When my grandparents moved, I received boxes of boxes of their slides and photo albums from their travels and I've truly enjoyed the process of transferring them to digital.  Every week when I talk to my grandma, I get to tell her what trips I took with them that week.  This shot is of my grandpa overlooking the Bad Lands, S.D.  Right now, I'm in the middle of their trip to the Hoover Dam and last week, it was Mt. Rushmore.

Don't you just love big mugs?  We now all have the sniffles and for some reason, tea just tastes better in these Christmas mugs I keep out all year round.  

And finally,

these guys.  Life just wouldn't be crazy (or worth it) without them! So blessed!

Happy Wednesday, my friends!

30 Days of Cah-razy

So Scott and I decided to do a 30-day, strict Paleo eating plan, beginning today.  Originally, I thought it was just going to be him and me and I was just going to cut all the sugar I could control out of the girls' diet.

And then last night, we had a treat of Mexican and chips and I proceeded to watch my four-year-old and two-year-old eat straight chips.  No chicken, no lettuce, just chips.  Oh, and cheese.  

When I caught Rachel doing a shot of shredded cheese, it was very literally the last straw.  Their diet was spiraling out of control and their little taste buds craved nothing but salty and sweet crapola.  They were coming along on the journey as well.  

And this morning, it started.

Now, as fun as you might imagine detoxing preschoolers can be, after two meals in the results have not been pretty. 

This morning, we had "rainbow eggs," which was a beautiful mix of peppers and tomatoes and spinach in scrambled eggs.  

Elizabeth cried and Rachel poked at them.

For lunch, we had roasted tomato and pepper soup with chicken salad lettuce wraps and some tropical fruit salad.  

Rachel refused to eat the lettuce and Elizabeth told me there were little black bugs in her soup (also known as spices...shudder).

So here's to 30 days of cah-raziness!  More details to come regarding the how and why's... but right now, I have to go be a cooking fool...

Chicken Pesto with Squash Noodles

By the end of last week, I was getting close to the end of my vegetable stash and didn't want to haul all three kiddos to the store so I began the grueling task of figuring up a meal with what I had.  

You know those shows on the Food Network where they give the contestants just a handful of ingredients to come up with something edibley awesome?  Yeah...I wouldn't do good on those shows.

So when Scott called and had a stressed out tone to his voice, I decided to go with chicken pesto pasta, which was one of his favorites.  The only problem was that I didn't want to eat spaghetti when I was just getting the scales to move in the right direction, so I started looking at some options with the summer squash I had on hand. 

(Now, before I go any farther, I will tell you that I did not feed this to my children.  In fact, I didn't even attempt it.  They got noodles and red sauce and were as happy as clams.  I just wasn't in the mood for a fight this particular night.)

Me:  "Rachel, eat your beans."  Rachel:  "What beans??"

Earlier in the day, I had thrown a whole chicken in the Crockpot with salt and pepper and set it for about 6 hours.  After it was cooked, I shredded the meat and then threw the carcass in the pot to make stock later.

I had three yellow summer squash and three zuchinni, which I washed and cut the ends off and then peeled into strips with the vegetable peeler.  I loved the look of the yellow and green!  After tossing them with salt, I put them in the strainer and let them drain for a while.

I heated some olive oil in a skillet and threw in my squash for a couple minutes - just not long enough for them to get mushy.  I would love to tell you that I then whipped up my own pesto, but I didn't.  Not when Costco's is so tasty...

Topping the squash with the shredded chicken, I added about a tablespoon or two of pesto to each plate and then sprinkled the whole shooting match with a little bit of parmeasan cheese (making it technically NOT Paleo, but who's counting...).

Scott walked in the door during bath time (which was much needed, as I refer back to the earlier picture of Rachel) and, after getting the kids to bed, we enjoyed this dinner and a well deserved date night in our own dining room.  The verdict?  For the little bit of extra work, this is definitely something we'll do again.  It had more taste thank pasta could provide and really didn't take that much longer to make.  And I could even look my scales in the eye in the morning... :) 

Enjoy!