Thanksgiving Dinner at nap time

It's amazing sometimes what you can get accomplished in a day. Some days nothing gets done... NOTHING. And other days I can get a whole faux Thanksgiving dinner done during nap time. Friday this happened. And ironically, ever since I rocked out this awesome dinner, Noah hasn't napped. Not once, not for five minutes. So don't think this is a brag blog post, because I'm not bragging about my no-napping toddler.
 
We missed out on Thanksgiving dinner this year and our Thanksgiving dinner wasn't even good. Last time we were in Hawaii for Thanksgiving we had T-day dinner at Mama's Fish House and it did not disappoint. Best food in Maui for sure. This year we could not get a reservation for us plus the Editor's co-workers families (9 total) at a time that would be suitable for Noah to eat dinner. So we picked another restaurant and the view was amazing but the food was subpar. It was like their regular chef took the night off. And they only had pumpkin pie or pumpkin cheesecake for dessert. I'm a apple girl. I do not eat pumpkin anything. I subbed my pumpkin for ice cream.
 
On our trip to the grocery store back in NC I picked up all the makings of an apple pie. And then I thought, well if I'm making the pie I might as well go all out. Note that 'all out' does not include an actual turkey!
 
Friday was the day. As soon as Noah went down for a nap I started on the apple pie. I make the recipe my mom taught me and honestly there is no recipe. I don't use a measuring cup or spoon, and couldn't tell you how much sugar I use. Pillsbury dough (not homemade), 4 Macintosh Apples, 1 Granny Smith, sugar, cinnamon, apple pie spice, and dollup of butter, an egg and milk wash and into the oven. And I use leaf cookie cutters to cut air vents in my pie.
 

I ate half the pie!

 
Next I started the cranberry sauce. I saw this recipe on a blog I read, Bella Mia and decided to try it. I usually make the recipe on the back of the bag, but this one was so much better. And cranberry sauce is the easiest thing to make, dump it in the saucepan and stir occasionally for 15 minutes. I just left it out on the counter until it was dinner time, room temperature.
 

 
While the cranberries were simmering I started washing and stuffing my chicken. I use Barefoot Contessa's Roast Chicken recipe and it has never failed me yet. So I washed, salted, peppered, and stuffed the chicken with lemon, garlic, and rosemary and put him back in the fridge until roasting time. I add the melted butter right before I cook it.
 
The last step is chopping vegetables. I pretty much loathe chopping. The recipes always say "Prep Time: 20 minutes" and it always takes me 2 hours. Seriously! I don't always take a short cut, but sometimes I do. Buy pre-cut vegetables at the store. They cost a little more, but you seriously just throw them in the pot. So I bought pre-cut carrots, sweet potatoes, and celery. I cut my own potatoes, onion, and cauliflower.
 
The carrots, sweet potato, half the regular potato, and onion go in the roasting pan with some rosemary, oil, and butter under the chicken. I just keep them in a ziplock in the fridge until cook time. I save a little celery and onion for the stuffing (Pepperidge Farm style!)
 
I used the cauliflower and half the potatoes for my version of mashed potatoes. It's 2 or 3 white, red, purple potatoes and one head of cauliflower. I throw them right into the steamer and just leave them there until I'm ready to steam them.
 

 
And that was pretty much it for my cooking, baking, and prep work during nap time. I even had time to cry my way through an episode of Parenthood, though it wasn't nearly as sad as the Season Finale of my other Tuesday night show- Flipping Out.
 
About 30 minutes before we were ready to eat I started the water for the cauliflower and potatoes. After they are steamed, I mash them up with an immersion blender, some butter, salt, pepper, and milk. Mashed potatoes!
 

 

Mr. Chicken and his veggies went in the oven for an hour and a half.

 
 

And of course, Pepperidge Farm Stuffing takes about 5 minutes, and is not deserving of a photo.
 
Everything was yummy, especially the pie! I'm so glad I did a faux Thanksgiving dinner and that it worked out so well. We even ate dinner in the dining room on wedding china. But this was the last thing I've done during a nap time. I go back to my original point. Sometimes you can rock out a nap time like it's your job and other days you are crying in the corner surrounded by dirty dishes, clean but unfolded laundry, and a dog eating Hanukkah presents for you in-laws. True Story except I didn't actually cry... yet.
 

The Itsy Bitsy Spider

I really struggled with what Noah should be for Halloween this year. In the past he was a cow, and Kermit the Frog. I was at a loss for cute toddler boy costumes. I wasn't hit with any warm and fuzzy feelings while scouring all the Halloween magazines that arrived at my door starting in August. Honestly, I'm tired of firetrucks and Thomas the Train already.
 
Pretty much the only idea we had was to dress Noah up as Tucker and Tucker up as Noah. Years ago, and I mean 2003 or 2004, we dressed Tucker up as a Carolina frat boy complete with a Carolina Blue doggie polo and croakies attached to kid sized sunnies. The only thing missing was doggie Rainbows. It was pretty funy. But I couldn't find any brown dog costumes that looked like Tucker for Noah to wear.
 
I went to my go-to, Pottery Barn Kids, and picked up a costume there. I didn't love it, but Noah still looked cute. And the Editor went to The University of Richmond so... Go Spiders.

Noah is generally agreeable about clothing and wore this costume to a Halloween Playgroup Party on Tuesday and for Halloween on Wednesday. We actually didn't even talk about it before Tuesday either, so that was lucky.

Noah's hungry caterpillar treat bag is also from PBK.

He was very proud of the pumpkin he painted.

We trick-or-treated in our neighborhood with four of Noah's girlfriends. We had two wagons, which meant that one child had to take a turn walking. Surprisingly, with a group of 5 two year olds, they were pretty agreeable about sharing the wagon spots; I don't remember any tears (and we treated from 6pm to around 7:30pm). Noah was quite the gentleman and pulled his lady friends around a bit too.

 

I made some Hot Apple Cider for the parents to carry around. Sadly I didn't have any alcohol that lended itself to a cider drink. But it was good and it actually got cold (you never know in NC) so I'm glad I made it.

 

Noah was super excited to trick-or-treat and ring the bell. With a neighborhood as big, and as laced with kids as ours is, he didn't have many opportunities to ring the bell because most people had a steady stream of kids, but he handled it all really well. Even the scary houses. He said "Trick-Or-Treat" and would take 1 piece of candy. Then we would tell us what color he got, "I got a red one!" He didn't eat a single piece, and I don't think he ever realized what he was getting was edible (last year for that I'm sure). He told anyone who asked that he was "a spider web."
 
 
Hot Apple Cider Recipe (adapted from HERE)

• 12 cups apple cider
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp ground cloves
• 3 cinnamon sticks
• 1 orange cut into 4 slices

Combine all ingredients into a crock pot, cover and cook on low for 3 hours, stirring occasionally. (I only had two hours, so I finished heating it up in a saucepan on the stove to get it piping hot).
 
 

Morning Tailgates

This year is my 10 year college graduation anniversary. For the past several years my friends and I have made a point to go to UNC's Homecoming game all together. It's a great chance to see everyone and re-connect. We actually start planning during the summer, though the date is noted as soon as the football schedule is released.

Now UNC is not really known for having an excellent football program, especially in light of all the drama surrounding the program in the last years- we don't even have Bowl eligibility this year. But usually our Homecoming game is a 3:30 game. This year, we didn't even find out the game time until 6 days before. Annoying! Adding to the annoyance was a 12:30pm game time.

At first the Editor and I were super bummed about this. But then I started thinking ... Mimosas! So this is how I put together a breakfast tailgate.

I had a few recipes up my sleeve and also used my pal Pinterest for some add ons. We started with bagels and cream cheese from Brueggar's and a Box of Joe from Dunkin Donuts. A little Bailey's and Kahlua made the perfect creamers for the coffee. The other store bought items were OJ and Champagne for Mimosa.

I made a double batch of Apple Cinnamon Scones a few days before and froze them until Saturday and just reheated them before we packed up. Somehow in my baking haze I accidentally left out the sugar! But they tasted perfect anyways. These scones are my go-to fall yumminess. Basically scones are my go-to all the time with different fruits.

Cinnamon Buns added some sweetness to the breakfast. I make Ina Garten's and really enjoy them once or twice a year. They are very sweet but as long as you don't have them all the time, it's okay. These were rolled out on Friday night.

From Pinterest I grabbed an Egg and Biscuit creation for a bit of protein. I used turkey sausage instead of bacon and they were delicious. These were actually the hit of the Tailgate. I was able to make them right before we left and keep them warm in separate tins.

And at the last minute I decided we needed a little bit of something somewhat healthy. So I found a Fall Fruit Salad on Pinterest and it was a great addition. This recipe calls for Flax Seed Oil but I omitted it because I didn't have any and it tasted great. I tossed it right before we left, though chopping fruit (or veggies for that matter) always takes much longer than I anticipate.

 

Friends brought blue Jell-) shots, a staple of our Homecoming Tailgates. We do toasts with our Jell-O shots. One of my favorite quotes of the day is a friend asking, "Tim's over 21 now, right?" Shoving a Jell-O shot towards my 17 year old brother. It will be a few more years before he's partaking in the Jell-O shots, but maybe he'll Tailgate with us as an alum one day.

We met at a free parking lot at 10:30am for our delicious breakfast and boarded a bus for the game around 12:15. We missed the first touchdowns by each team because we got to the game a little late, but we had the best time! UNC scored 50 points... and still lost the game (no defense anyone?)

Clearly I need a bigger table

 

I meant to take a few photos of my breakfast treats, but I forgot. We've got the fruit salad, scones, bagel guillotine, cinnamon buns, and some of our drinks and coffee 'creamers' in this one photo I took

So even though we could only tailgate for a short amount of time, I had fun, the food was yummy, and after the game we got to grab Noah from the babysitter and all eat dinner together at Nanataco!

A lot has changed since the early 00's and now that some of us have kids, some of us are pregnant with #2 (NOT ME!), we live in different states I look forward to Homecoming and it's always a must do Fall Activity because it brings us all together again (even though ALL of us don't end the fun at 2am anymore).

 

Celebrating My Birthday- At Home Edition

When I started to sit down and write this post about my birthday I realized I probably needed to separate it into to My Birthday At Home and My Birthday Abroad.  I am not one of those people who celebrates their birthday for a whole week; but since I have a Holiday Weekend birthday sometimes I get more than just one day or we celebrate on days that aren't actually my birthday.  This year my birthday seemed to stretch on for most of the week and it was actually a lot of fun.

Anytime Notes from a Mom in CH or The Stir Crazy Moms' Guide to Durham post about something Noah & I make it our mission to check it out too.  They have the best ideas and give you all the dirty details, so it's fair to say I hang on their coat tails often.   When one of them checked out Dead Broke Horse Farm I knew this is what I wanted to do for my birthday.  I rode horses from age 5 to 13 or 14 as my 'sport.'  I love horses and have ridden on my birthday with the Editor in the past.  Dead Broke Horse Farm is only 30 minutes away from us (toward Raleigh but actually a Durham address).  We bought a Groupon for a Hand Led Horse Ride and arrived at 10am on Sunday morning.  As far as you could see were beautiful rolling hills and horses!  Horses in pastures, horses getting saddled, horses getting sprayed down. They also had dogs, cats, chickens, pigeons, rabbits, mini horses, and who knows what else! You know how some people are dog-people or cat-people, but not people-people?  These people are horse-people not people-people.  We just looked around for about 15 minutes before anyone acknowledged that we were there and had us sign away our lives.  Finally it was time to ride.  We got Noah outfitted with a helmet (I chose to forgo... if I fall off while someone else is leading us I've got some issues), and I jumped up on Julie.  Noah immediately reached up his arms and said, "Baby riding too?"  We had been preparing him for this moment all week, "You are going to sit on a horse' back."  But you never know what you are going to get with a newly emotional two year old.  We seemed to have lucked out on this particular day.  Toddler was in!  

Dead Broke has big saddles and we both fit really comfortably into the saddle.  Noah was calm and so relaxed on the horse!  Bailey, our teenage guide, led Julie through the woods for about 40 minutes telling us about Dead Broke and all the horses (130 acres with over 100 horses!)  We went up and down hills and even got to 'jump' a fallen tree branch.  I had the best time; I really love horses.  It was also really nice not to have to worry about the horse at all because Bailey was in control of her; I only had to worry about Noah.  And bonus points because Noah loved it! He had a great time too and even a week later when I say, "We're going to do something fun today, " he asked if we were going to ride horses again.  The Editor could have ridden with us or walked beside.  He chose to walk and take photos.  There is no doubt in my mind we will be back.  I'm ready the next time anyone wants to check it out.  (For the 2yr old crowd you have the choice of doing Hand Led ride with a parent or a Trail Ride with your toddler accompanied by a guide.)

On Monday, I didn't do anything birthday related, but I had requested some homemade baked goods for my birthday this year.  The week before the Editor and Noah had a few quiet moments downstairs (I presume trying to decide what to make).  I don't love surprises and lucky for me when I came downstairs that day Noah proudly exclaimed, "Cake! Cupcakes!"  If I could just get him to be a little bit more decisive he'd be completely in my corner.  So on Monday I pulled my beloved Kitchenaide out with a few instructions to the Editor and retreated upstairs.  I heard a lot of banging and a few, "Don't touch!" but I was released about an hour later and the house smelled great!  Noah and the Editor baked Lemon Blossom cupcakes with a lemon drizzle on top.  And of course, we had to eat one right away.  They tasted great, especially since the Editor has never baked before.  I'd love for this to be a yearly tradition but I'm not sure the Editor agrees.

Tuesday was actually my 32nd birthday and we had a regular day planned, as in it was a Noah day.  We were going to give Kindermusik a try with a friend in the morning and had playgroup after lunch.  We did make dinner reservations at a favorite of mine, Acme in Carrboro.  Lucky for me, they have a Tuesday special, $12 Tuesdays where all entrees are $12 on Tuesdays (was that self explanatory?).  We started the day with presents, which is the best way to start! Noah gave me a book for us to read together about a day out with mom, Noah & the Editor gave me an inital necklace I've been eyeing for a long time with an 'N' in it, and Tucker got me a new vacuum.  I kid, I kid.  The Editor got me a new vacuum and yes I know as a woman I'm supposed to be disgusted by this blatant symbol of my role in the house blah blah blah.  But my vacuum has been slowly losing plastic pieces, and I've hated it since day one.  Honestly, I cannot wait to test out my Dyson Animal and have a whole new vacuuming experience.

Our day went really well until it was time for dinner.  We had the first reservation (5:30 pm) because we are taking a toddler to a more grownup restaurant.  Well we got stuck in some major traffic.  In fact it wasn't just regular UNC traffic, there was an accident.  So we were running way late.  We called Acme and they gave us their spiel about giving up our reservation after 15 minutes; if we got there after 5:45 they would seat us outside.  Okay, no problem, it was a gorgeous day.  Well we got there at around 5:53pm and they sat us inside with an "oh, it's no problem' attitude.  Good thing too because there were only about 3 tables occupied at the time.  Crab cake dinner was excellent and we did a little walk around Carrboro for ice cream after (let's face it the 6 cucpcakes were all but gone at this point anyways).  

 Stayed tuned for the Abroad Edition of Celebrating My Birthday.  And of course, by Abroad I mean New Jersey and NYC! Here are two sneak peak photos!

  

Noah's Birthday- On Fire!

Saturday was Noah's 2nd Birthday Party and I dare say it was a success.  I was not totally stressed out, I had fun, Noah seemed to have fun, and our guests seemed to have a good time too.  Since Noah's actual birthday isn't until Tuesday we didn't know if he should get his presents from the Husband and I on Saturday or Tuesday.  We decided on Saturday and he got a Melissa & Doug play kitchen that only took about 4 hours to put together.  But it is super cute and pretty much no one played with it at the party, naturally.

HERE is my first post detailing where I got all my ideas and products.  I felt like I kept the firetruck party theme pretty simple.  The decorations and invitations were red, black, and white with a simple firetruck design.  I used ellow table clothes with red plates and napkins, and white serving dishes.  Yellow, red, and white balloons and yellow and red favor bags with black firetrucks stamped on them.    I think it worked perfectly and all seemed to coordinate.

The Details from Get the Party Started

I actually did make the cake.  I am not crafty but I can bake (or I think I can).  I am impressed with myself on this one.  I think it turned out awesome, better than I expected.  Just the fact that you can look at it and know what it's supposed to be is a score for me.  Of course, when I asked Noah who made the cake he said, "Babci made it."  (Babci is my mom.)  We settled that pretty quickly.  And by the way, I could not get my chocolate icing and Wilton's No Taste Red Dye to make red icing this time.  It was just brown.  Luckily I had a can of red icing and it worked great, though I got a blister from all those stars.  I felt a little like cheating, but it looked amazing and tasted good too.

I made the cupcakes too.  I was really happy when I found red, yellow, and black and white polka dot cupcake liners to go with the theme.  But I started to run out of vanilla icing so I used chocolate (which I eventually ran out of too and the Husband had to pick up more).  The chocolate just kind of ruined the color scheme for me, but I think that is getting a little picky, right?

How cute is this kid sporting his firetruck shirt? (from Lil Sha-Bebe)

I didn't have any games set up because the kids are two or younger.  I figured that it would just be a big playdate with cake and singing.  But I did mention something about a surprise HERE.

About two weeks ago, we switched Noah's car seat from rear facing to forward facing.  We didn't really plan when we would switch him, but one of the car seats was out of the car at the time and it just felt right.  A few days later I took Noah and the car to Parkwood Vol. Fire Dept to have the car seat checked.  While making small talk, the fire fighter inspecting the seat asked when Noah's birthday was, to which Noah replied, "Party!! Cake!"  He asked what type of party we were having and when I said a firetruck party he asked when, confirmed he was on call and offered to bring the truck over.  He said even though we aren't in Parkwood's district they love doing community things and kids parties.  I was ecstatic and the conversation really went down just like that!  But I also understand they have calls to respond to, like actual fires.  I didn't tell anyone but the Husband and my mom.  

A week before the party, they called to confirm they would come at 4pm!  So I sent out a lame email to all the party guests asking that no one park in front of our house.  Again, I didn't say anything to anyone. I wasn't about to jinx myself or have everyone waiting around for nothing.  No one parked in front of the house, and no one asked why, even though my email was sketchy.  

Around 3:45 on party day, Parkwood called and said they'd be over in ten minutes!  I was so excited and put my mom and sister-in-law on lookout.  Most of the party guests got wind of the surprise at this point because of the phone call but we ended up having to wait about 25 minutes for the truck because they did get a call.  But it was worth the wait!  The fire fighters even brought hats and stickers for everyone so we added them to our favor bags.  We are a huge fan of Parkwood Vol. Fire Dept and brought them dinner and cupcakes tonight as a thank you.

Coming outside to see our surprise!  A firetruck at the party!

Noah's either waving here or doing a 'Westside' sign.

It was hot and the kids were excited, surprised, overwhelmed, and did I mention hot.  I wanted a group shot of everyone and pretty much managed.  A few kids stayed inside the truck for the shot and getting 10-12 toddlers plus parents to look all at once... well that just doesn't happen.

After the truck, we quickly ran back inside for singing and cake.  It was pretty much the only thing I could say to one or two kids to get them to leave the truck and come in.

We are holding his hat on here, not mashing his face into the cake.

  

How things change in a year.  Eating cake neatly with a fork! 

A truly awesome day with great friends.  And we still have the actual birthday to look forward to on Tuesday! I have a feeling it's going to be a little more low key compared to party day.

Planning BBQs

I really like it when everything goes according to plan.  Hello! This might be a slight understatement.  We always have grand plans for summer BBQs and having friends over and then it's September and we realized we never made time for it.  But we invited friends over for  this past Sunday afternoon/evening for a BBQ before we left for the beach.  And then we got a little bit overbooked.  Sunday morning swim lessons, Noah's bestie's 2nd birthday party at 3.  Oops! But we were not canceling.

By Friday we still didn't even have our BBQ menu.  This is not how I usually operate but I'm trying to be a little more ... laid back (which totally stresses me out by the way).  But actually it's really hard to come up with a menu when everyone's just had the cookout of their lives on July 4th.  Not to mention it was only about 100 degrees here.  

Saturday we shopped for our ingredients and that night I started prepping, chopping, and baking.  I've found that the key to being stress free a little less stressed on party day is to do almost everything the day before. I chop all the ingredients and put them in baggies according to what needs to be cooked together. I actually knew the dessert before I knew anything else, which is usually the case with me.  I've had this recipe in my back pocket for a while and if you have ever visited Pinterest then chances are you do too.  Hamburger Cupcakes!  The perfect way to get that BBQ feel without actually cooking burgers.

When I started preheating the oven I realized it was the first time using it since 'the incident.'  We left for the beach on a Saturday after lunch. So that Friday for dinner I was going to 'cook' a frozen (gasp in horror it was not homemade) lasagna.  After 40 minutes in the oven I pulled it out and the tray collapsed. The cooked lasagna fell back into the hot oven and dripped into the drawer below and  ANNOYING and grossly disgustingly dirty cheesy mess everywhere.  Plus now what the F do we eat for dinner? I'd already started getting rid of everything we had in preparation for our vacation.  So then I had to spend the evening cleaning the oven (everything going according to plans right there, huh?) So long story short, the oven was clean but full of gray soot incinerated lasagna.  Anyways I hope you enjoyed that.

I looked at a couple different sites for these Hamburger Cupcakes; there's not really a recipe. I first saw them on my real life friend Sarah's blog- Sarah Celiac and then took some inspiration from The Idea Room too.

The cupcakes are so easy to make.  Make yellow cake cupcakes, make brownies, dye some coconut green for lettuce, and then make mustard and ketchup icing.  Well I guess that's where it got hard. 

How in the world do you make red icing?  Seriously, I need to know.  And actually I really do need to know before Noah's birthday so tell me!  This ketchup icing turned purple!  I got No Taste Red Wilton's dye (because let's face it Christmas Red tastes like ass) but it still turned my white icing pink.  So I added coco powder and then it was purple.  Luckily I had some backup icing and just went with pink ketchup instead of purple.

When I wasn't doing a red dye science experiment I was separating sprinkles for the 'buns.'  I washed my hands- don't worry!  This took forever! And it's like picking blueberries.  You feel like you've been doing it forever and then you look at your pile and you have 10.

  

Besides the icing issue, this really went according to plan.  I set up a little assembly line and cut my yellow cupcakes in half for the top and bottom buns.  I cut out brownies into circles (or sorta circles).  Put mustard on the tops, ketchup on the bottoms; sprinkled lettuce on the tops, and the brownie beef on the bottoms.  Mashed the top and bottom together and stuck a toothpick in them.  The brownie middle is YUMMY!

I was really pleased with our final menu and how everything went.  Especially with our busy schedule on Sunday.  We literally arrived home about 10-12 minutes before our guests.  When in doubt, Barefoot Contessa always has the answer! 

Apps: 

Cut up Pink Lady Apples, Irish Cheddar Cheese & Crackers.

Main Dish off the grill:

Grilled Tuna and Chicken Orange Ginger Sandwiches

We grilled both tuna and chicken with the same marinade.  Topped them off with cucumbers, tomato, and a orange ginger mayo.  And yummy Harris Teeter kaiser rolls.

Sides:
Ina Garten's Roasted Broccoli - I omitted the Parmesan; I'm actually allergic or intolerant or something.  I only used lemon to top- no pine nuts either. 

Ina Garten's Confetti Corn

This was a good alternative to grilling corn on the cob.  This corn is good!

Noah ate everything, which is always the measure and we even ate it again for lunch today.  Yeah for everything actually going according to plan!  Either I'm getting better at this or maybe being more laid back is actually the key? 

Firsts

Last week Noah and I did a lot of things for the first time.  And not little things either.  My cousin, who is the closest thing I have to a sister, had her daughter's first birthday party on Saturday.  Of course, we wanted to be there.  Except she lives in New Jersey and the Husband was going to be out of town on business.  I felt like there were a lot of logistics associated with traveling alone with a very mobile toddler, but once I realized I'm going to a baby friendly home with a pack-n-play, car seat, toys I was pretty much sold.  Grab Noah, grab a suitcase and go!  Unfortunately, I did have to bring a car seat, which gave me heart palpitations.

On travel day, I was hitting up the bathroom while we were waiting for our taxi (if you know me, you know that I pee all the time!) and Noah kept coming in and out of the room.  This in of itself is not unusual.  But then I realized he was opening and closing the door.   I was proud and having an 'Oh Shit' moment all at the same time.  Luckily, he doesn't spend all day opening and closing doors yet. This coming from the boy who would climb the oven- maybe I'm finally getting a break!

Next came Noah's first taxi ride.  Less than 20 minutes later, we were at RDU and I had Noah, a car seat, a 44lb suitcase, and my old diaper bag; Kate Spade was deemed too small to make the trip.  Deep breath, and I threw Noah into the Ergo.  I bought a Brica car seat bag with wheels a few days before our flight.  Car seat rolling behind me in the right hand, suitcase in the left, OiOi across the body and into the airport we went with the baby monkey on my back.  It actually was very smooth!  I decided to gate check the car seat, which is a bit of a pain in the ass but I'm nervous about checking it and will take a free seat on the plane any day of the week (though both our flights were full this time).  Got through security easily, bought a coffee and lunch to go and played around at the gate a little bit.  Both of our flights were so easy and considering it was Newark, barely delayed (20 minutes late on the way out, on time on the way home).  Noah was very good on the plane, and just sat on my lap, read some stories, ate some snacks, played some games.  On the way home, the man next to us slept the whole time so I think that speaks for his behavior!  Of course, to Newark is only about 59 minutes of actual air time so that helps.  But seriously, the traveling was not as bad as I thought.  The Ergo was definitely the most important piece of the puzzle for us.

Have trains, will travel.

First birthday parties are always fun and Noah capped off the day with his first bath with cousin Paige.  He wasn't as excited about that as everyone else was, including Paige.  But it was so funny to see two little baby bellies in the tub together.

And our last first of the weekend was when we arrived home Sunday.  After a Father's Day dinner at our favorite, Nanataco, Noah got a solo bath at home.  It became pretty clear that some other business was about to happen to defoul the clean water.  I grabbed Noah and dangled him over the big potty and told the Husband to get his little potty from downstairs.  Now, we have this baby potty because a few months ago Noah was getting interested in the potty.  He will sit on it, but has never actually christened it.  But Sunday, Noah peed and pooped on the potty for the first time!  We were all very excited!  And the Husband took some photos that perhaps invadedNoah's privacy just a bit.  I won't share them here; I don't want his first boss to Google him and find them.  We'll just save him for his first girlfriend when he's 15 to break them out.  So we've been using the potty a little bit, but no pressure.  I'm not sure I'm ready and I'm pretty positive he's not either.

Strawberry Scones & Sentences

Last April we took Noah strawberry picking and had an amazingly awesome time.  We picked, took some pictures, and I baked my signature strawberry pie.  He wasn't walking yet, or grabbing strawberries with reckless abandon. 

This April, we met some friends right before going out of town to pick a few strawberries we could enjoy before leaving.  This trip out was a disaster for me.  I did not have any fun and I'm not really sure Noah did either.  We were both cranky and Noah just kept grabbing, squeezing, and eating all the berries.  Red, green, rotten, off the vine, in our bucket, smushed, dirty, it didn't matter; they all ended up in his mouth or squished to death.  He literally took a bite out of each berry we picked.

Once we returned from our trip we were ready for more strawberries.  This time I felt better about going because the Husband was coming to help reel in my strawberry-vampire baby.  This time Noah picked the berries we asked, was very helpful, and didn't put a single one in his mouth!

 

A week or so later we were out of strawberries again and I needed another fix.  I wanted to make strawberry scones (again).  So out Noah and I went into the heat to see which of his berry picking scenarios would prevail.  It was in the high 80s, and we went after nap (3:30pm) so I knew I was pushing my luck.  But Noah went along with berry picking trip #2 scenario and happily picked red berries and put them in his bucket; not eating a single one again.  In fact, Noah uttered his longest full thought.  It took about 60-90 seconds but he said, "MEEE!! Strawberry. Pick. Red. Bucket."  The translation is, "I'm picking strawberries!  Pick the red ones and put them in the bucket."  I have never been so proud of my little boy!

                                 

At home we made Strawberry Scones from an online recipe/blog (Confessions of a Tart) that I quickly pinned to Pinterest.  I made a single batch a few weeks ago and the dough was a bit sticky but tasted fine.  On this day I made a triple batch and it wasn't quite as sticky for whatever reason.  I always use 1/2 white flour and 1/2 wheat flour whenever I make any scones.  The only other substitutions I made were to use whipping cream instead of half and half and I used my Kitchenaid.  These scones are amazing!  I have two freezer stashes left, one baked, and one as dough to pop in whenever the mood strikes again.

The other thing I made with my strawberries is Strawberry Butter.  I thought it was going to be like  Apple Butter you buy in the mountains, but it's much simpler than that- strawberries and butter.  I think I'd use Country Crock butter if I were to make this again instead of Land o Lakes stick butter just so I could spread it easier but otherwise it is what it is.  It was very tasty on my morning bagel; the butter and the jam in one step.  I did roll it and freeze it, per the recipe but it was too messy in the fridge.  Instead I just stored it in tupperware.

Jean's Berry Patch is estimating one week left in their season and this is our go-to berry patch.  But a few others in the area think they'll have about a month left.  Blueberry season is next and we are very excited!