Rest of the cookie pictures

Here are the rest of the pictures I promised.  If I don't post them now, I never will.  

It's times like this that I regret letting Parker wear a shirt that is too small, inside out, all day long and not brush her hair.  Oh well.

Cutting out cookies

A leftover ball of dough scraps that she played with off and on throughout the day.

Decorating the very special longhorn cookies for Bob.  He likes red hots on his Christmas cookies, so Parker was in charge of those.

I finally let her eat one.

Close up of the decorations.  I do the icing (my signature squiggle style), and Parker does the sprinkles.  You can't really tell but they have sparkly sugar on top in addition to the few bits of colored sprinkles that I allow.

Christmas eve in the kitchen

How to you fill the looooong day before Christmas?  Cooking and eating worked pretty well for me.  I started early this morning making cookie dough, then Parker and I cut them out and baked them.  She made it nearly all the say to the end before getting bored.  I have pictures of her helping...I'll put those in a different post.

After we iced cookies, it was time for a special fancy Christmas eve appetizer I've never tried to make before.  Shrimp Dumplings!  I had shrimp in the freezer, and the other ingredients on hand, so if these never got made, I was only out a couple bucks for the wonton wrappers.  They were great - just like at a restaurant.

Next it was time for pizza.  (I bought frozen dough). Parker had canadian bacon and onion and we had canadian bacon, onion, mushroom and pineapple mango salsa.

And now I'm going to SIT DOWN for the rest of the evening and help Parker track santa on the NORAD site.  

Christmas eve cookies

Parker is literally skipping in circles with excitement.

Friday

It's friday (or it was when I took these pictures), and friday always ends with pizza.  Sometimes I make the crust, sometimes I get it from Whole Foods.  This was a busy day, so I did WF dough. The toppings are usually whatever leftovers I have that I know won't get eaten over the weekend.  One was red bell pepper, onion, chicken and jalapeno.  One was zucchini, tomato, onion, pesto and goat cheese.  Wanna guess who's was who's?  (did I punctuate that right?)  Parker has recently moved WAY out of her pizza comfort zone and likes black olives on hers.  Last week she had red bell pepper and if we are ordering delivery, she requests sausage. 
Parker was not so thrilled to take this picture as you can see (since it wasn't her idea).  She doesn't appreciate being rushed, and you have to rush when you set hot food down in front of Bob and then say "wait a minute...".  

Parker being a mime (she's trapped in a glass box)

The mime thing is Parker's newest "look at me!".  She's determined to do a mime routine for the school talent show...if she can figure out how to incorporate a headstand into the act.

The other two Parker funnies this week are the day she woke up speaking in a British accent and her singing her original song, Chlorine Spider.  I'm tempted to get video of the Chlorine Spider song, but it really sticks in your head once you've heard it, so probably wouldn't be nice to inflict on you.

SNOMG make it stop!

We're iced/snowed in again today...no school.  There was rain/sleet at about 5am followed by snow that will continue until noon they say.  They snow amounts are much less the predicted though, which is good and bad....it'll be gone sooner, but there's nothing to sled on.  Not that Parker would last long in 14 degrees and 25mph winds.  Brrrrrr.  

Some random pictures for your amusement:  

Buddy's fish tank setup - We settled on the name Buddy.  His color really shows up will with the camera flash...he's really not quite that brilliant in person.  He seems to love having plants, so I got him lots.  I cleaned/rearranged his tank yesterday and he had a busy day checking it all out.  Note to Paula - he won't eat the Betta burgers (pellets), they're too big for him.  He's medium on the fish flakes too unless we really crumble them up, but as of yesterday, he's been enjoying freeze dried bloodworms. 

Good snow day activity:  Making each Valentine's Day card by hand.  I do have a few packages of the little preprinted kind (shhh, don't tell), but I'm not getting those out until we've milked this for all the time killing it's worth.

My first double layer cake - made for Bob's birthday.  The cake part is a Devil's Food mix...I had no room for error so I used a mix, but I made the chocolate ganache frosting from scratch.  I'm not excited about trapped indoors with this big yummy cake today.

Happy Thanksgiving

This was my first year to try cooking the Thanksgiving meal. I did a ton of prep work and Bob handled the turkey situation, and it all turned out quite nicely. The way we reconfigured the counter tops (moving the cooktop off the island) really give me a lot more functional counter space for time like this.

Last minute preparations

Turkey breast carving lessons

The finished spread. (I put everything in the bar next to the dining room for easy access to seconds)

The menu was:

Herb Roasted Turkey Breast and Gravy
A spicy and a traditional Cornbread Dressing (store bought)
Green Beans w/ bacon and shallots
Roasted Brussels Sprouts
Sweet Potatoes with Streusel Topping
Roasted Root Veggies with Orange Maple Glaze
Mashed Potatoes
Cranberry Relish (regular and chipotle, both store bought)
Homemade Sourdough Rosemary Focciaca bread.

Luckily , we got a head start on Christmas, because we're going to use the rest of the weekend for napping.

Let there be light,cobbler

Here's a straight-on shot of the new window. I need to get a 'before' picture up there of the old, small, square one. Outside the window is the prettiest Japanese Maple that gives us beautiful spring and fall color, so it will be great to be able to see more of it.


Here's a picture of the cobbler i made in the toaster oven the other day. I'm really missing my oven, and I couldn't let summer go by w/out making a baked peach dessert somehow. I used cinnamon tortillas for the 'crust' and it was quite tasty. The Blue Bell Vanilla didn't hurt either.

Barley Jambalaya

Don't mistake me for a food blogger, but I wanted to share this recipe. It's super easy, delicious, healthy and filling and I did it all with stuff from my pantry and freezer.

I got it from a Dallas Morning News article, the recipe with my modifications is below.

BARLEY JAMBALAYA

**Notes:
I used frozen mirapoix veggies instead of fresh.
I made half the recipe and there were still leftovers, but I did NOT half the spices.
I added frozen shrimp at the end.
I didn't think it reheated that well for leftovers, it seemed very gloppy and stiff. Maybe I should have added liquid before nuking.e Your mileage may vary.

1 tablespoon canola oil 1 ½ cups onion, diced in 1/2-inch thick pieces 1 cup celery, sliced 1/4-inch thick 1 cup green bell pepper, diced in 1/2-inch pieces 2 cloves garlic, minced 1 (28-ounce) can tomatoes, chopped in juice 5 cups water or broth 2 cups pearled barley, uncooked (see note) 2 whole bay leaves 1 teaspoon salt ½ teaspoon ground cayenne pepper 1 ½ teaspoons dried oregano 1 teaspoon black pepper 1 teaspoon dried thyme 1 cup turkey sausage, sliced 1/4-inch thick (see note)

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Add oil to a large saucepan or roasting pan and heat on top of the stove. Add the onions, celery, green pepper and garlic; mix well. Sauté 5 to 10 minutes, scraping bottom of pan periodically.

Add the tomatoes (with juice), broth or water, and barley. Turn the heat to high and bring to a boil, stirring often. Add the bay leaves, salt, cayenne, oregano, black pepper and thyme; mix well. Cover, reduce heat to simmer and cook for 5 minutes. Stir in the sausage.

Place the covered pan in the oven and cook for 30-40 minutes. Check and stir after 30 minutes, adding more liquid if needed. Remove the bay leaves before serving. Serves 6.

Note: Pearled barley can be found in supermarkets, usually near the rice and dried beans, and in bulk form at health and natural food stores. Recipe instructions call for regular pearled barley. You also may use quick-cooking barley, which is pre-steamed to shorten the cooking time to about 10 minutes. Adjust the cooking time per package instructions.

You may substitute ham, beef smoked sausage, chicken or shrimp for the turkey sausage. Add chicken or shrimp later in the cooking process to avoid overcooking or precook and stir in during the final 10 minutes to warm.

PER SERVING: Calories 363 (16% fat) Fat 7 g (1 g sat) Chol 20 mg

Sodium 1,466 mg Fiber 13 g Carbohydrates 64 g Protein 16 g

more cookies

I thought it would be really funny to make gingerbread men with bites taken out of them, and sad faces. They turned out pretty funny! This wasn't my original idea...I saw it on a blog somewhere.

scooter and yummy salsa

After years of asking her if she wanted one, Parker finally decided she'd like a scooter. All the neighborhood kids zip around on them, and we were surprised she didn't want one sooner. It looks like such fun. She got the 3 wheel version. If she masters this, we'll get a 2 wheel kind. She mostly rides it in the house unfortunately. Usually round and round me while I'm trying to prepare dinner, while singing and asking me questions.

A couple people commented on my posts about stuff I make for dinner, so here's a picture of some salsa we made for fish tacos. I'm not trying to enter the cooking blog arena though, trust me. It's grilled pineapple and tomatillo - it was great on the fish tacos, but it was also good just with chips and would be good atop plain black beans too.

First Bob grilled the fresh pineapple. I bet it would work with the canned kind too.

All blended up in the food processor.

Recipe - makes a huge bowl full:

Grilled Pineapple-Tomatillo Salsa
15	tomatillos, peeled and washed
3	(1/2-inch-thick) slices pineapple
2	chipotle chiles in adobo
1/4	c. fresh cilantro leaves
3	T. honey
1	onion, finely diced
1/2	t. salt
Combine tomatillos, chipotle chiles, cilantro, and honey in a blender and pulse until a bit chunky. Transfer to a bowl. Dice the grilled pineapple into 1/8-inch pieces and add to the tomatillo mixture, along with the diced onion and salt. Place in refrigerator to chill, or serve warm.

Fun full family weekend

We had a nice full weekend at home. Parker is detoxing from being the center of attention last week at her grandparents house, so we've endured a lot of whining and fits, but I think maybe she's past it.
We planted a TON of annuals in the front flower beds...the usual zinnias and some verbena. I got Parker some sidewalk paint, and she painted and experimented with mixing colors. It's pretty cool stuff, and it kept her amused for several minutes.

Throwing a fit in the yard.....isn't she pitiful?

After nap, she finally came around and was in a pretty pleasant mood.
This evening after all the work was done, Bob turned the sprinklers on for Parker to run through while I assembled dinner.

She was pretty cold afterward.....here she is all bundled up eating dinner. She's eating a ciabatta roll in this picture. She got a kick out of the name.

As part our quest for a pleasant dinner time, we've started taking turns talking about the favorite part of our day. Tonight Parker said her favorite thing of the whole day was,
"Right now, eating this nice dinner". I'd believe her had ~I~not said the exact same thing last night. She realized that was a nice thing to say, and so she's using it now because she knows we'll say "awww, how sweet". Prior to this, her favorite canned phrase was to say:
"....and I put a heart on it....because I love you"
- a line she stole from her aunt Paula, and has gotten a lot of mileage out of.

Our lovely dinner - bbq chicken sandwiches (mine w/ mustard too) and quinoa/cucumber/tomato/chickpea salad and a tasty chardonnay (the brown thing is a rock).
A nice end to a nice weekend. Awwww, how sweet!