Self-awareness

Feeding the baby real food has forced me to acknowledge that I don’t eat enough fruits and vegetables. How can I feed her almost exclusively fruits and vegetables, tell her she’s had enough cheese toast and to eat more peas, and then turn around and eat a handful of semi-sweet chocolate chips?

The solution…When she eats, I eat. This involves a lot of sharing. Also, kale under everything is a really good way to add vegetables and a nice flavor to a lot of dishes (think soups, pastas, sauces, etc). Sautéed kale is pretty good on a sandwich too.

So this looked like someone else’s fridge after my trip to Trader Joe’s, and that bag of kale is GONE.

Look at all those vitamins!

And in addition to this crap that I got at Russo’s (crap being the best damn sourdough bread on the planet, a baguette, and chocolate cayenne cookies)

Delicious crap I might add.

I also got a bunch of kale, tomatoes, strawberries, bananas, a mango, and avocado, lemons, limes, and another basil plant. Not because I killed mine, but because I need more basil.

These ingredients made a fabulous panzanella (sans shrimp) last night.

 

FRESH

Then for lunch, I had leftover bolognese over kale, while baby had a piece of that fabulous bread with cheese on it, grapes, and peas. Hungry little bugger! We’ve had some good runs together the last couple days. The first was good because she slept and because I can run 3 miles pushing a jogging stroller without stopping, and the second was a good 2.5 where she was awake and kept looking at me. What’s cuter than that?

 

So very motivating

Starting to believe I can actually do the halfs that I want to run this fall. I’m going to need to be in shape anyway to keep up with this. Might as well get some races in.

Standing for a solid 17 seconds.         We took a video.

 

 

Growth Spurts

So,  I should probably look up the timing of these growth spurt things so that I don’t get so overwhelmed and surprised when it happens. Then I can prepare by stocking up on Trader Joe’s sea salt and chocolate almonds. Oh and also be a better mother by skipping the confusion period and jumping straight to the acceptance that this will be my life for a couple days…

a baby that can’t be set down, who develops a temporary but intense stranger anxiety, eats constantly, and only sleeps on mama. At least this nursing pillow arrived so that if I plan it well before the next feeding, I have my hands free to do something like crochet or peruse the new Real Simple.

Anyway, last week, when I said I was going to make those smitten kitchen sausage stuffed potatoes that looked so delightful, well, there were a lot of different cooking steps and temperatures and blah blah blah. It just morphed along as I cooked it and ended up being a spinach, onion and sausage stuffing in a sweet potato. It was almost the filling from the spinach sausage pastry squares that I love so much. I always use precooked italian chicken sausage for those and did for this as well. This would be better if I either used a regular potato with the italian sausage or the sweet potato with a differently seasoned sausage. But basically sautéed onion and chopped up chicken sausage links and added 5oz of frozen spinach with the moisture squeezed out and then added this to a sweet potato that was hollowed out after being softened for about 5 minutes in the microwave.

Baked the whole thing at 400 for about 15 minutes and then devoured it with a nice green salad. Since then we’ve had Rachael Ray’s butternut squash macaroni and cheese (Crystal reminded me of the recipe), and ordered a pizza :). But tonight, I’ll post if it’s delicious, but another Rachael Ray recipe for “Aussie Meat Pies” that involve puff pastry and ground beef so, how can it not be? Apparently I don’t care about losing this last 10 lbs.

On a separate, totally unrelated note…does anyone understand this long pointed nails trend that I’m seeing around? I hate it. Everyone looks like a witch. I hope it’s a trend that sticks to the Kardashian-osphere.

 

 

crochetstoeat?

Until I get a jogging stroller, I think the blog needs a revamped name…

My general week, aside from tons of diaper laundry (not as bad as I thought it would be, will post more about it later) and scraping together meals, simply includes keeping the baby entertained and working on the never ending project that is a blanket for my sister. Most of what I’ve knitted in the last year has been for the baby…

Her hat

Her blankie

Last year, everyone got hand-knitted Christmas/Hannukah presents from me. I had a good amount of time to put into it so each person got a scarf or a  hat or a dinosaur hat. This year, nieces and nephews got books, parents got random things, sisters got….Well Jacquie got a kitschy dinosaur planter from Etsy and Sandy is patiently awaiting this…

Granny Square Blanket

I made one of these granny square blankets for myself last year out of scrap yarn,  buying a color to use for the edging, and it caught her eye and went on her wish list. This is just a typical granny square pattern and one of the first things I learned how to crochet. I like how each square is a separate, small project that I can actually complete.

Cuter with a cat

And I’ve been cranking out squares as fast as my baby-nursing, diaper changing, dinner cooking hands will allow. My blanket is a comfortable 9×7 squares and hers is hovering at a solid 6×7 which I’m pretty pleased with! It’s going to be a birthday/graduation/Hanukkah/housewarming present and by the time it’s complete it’s going to be 8,000 degrees in her new Birmingham apartment. Perfect.

Jenna’s crock pot chicken tortilla soup was a delicious homey dish for the freezing-ass cold weather we’ve been having. I’m hoping it freezes well because it made a huge batch! YUM. I didn’t use tortillas, just added tortilla chips afterward. Yum Yum Yum.