Feed 'Em Fridays

So, it's Sunday, not Friday, but here is my Feed 'Em Friday contribution. Pizza. A bit of a no-brainer, but it's easy and can be better for you than you think. Round here, we have two variations of what we loosely call Mexican Pizza. My adorable kitchen assistant shows you Variation 1.

 Varation 1 is a store-bought pizza crust. Sure, you could be like me and wish you could make pizza crust from scratch, but you're also probably scared of making dough. We need a support group, or someone who can make the dough and show us, I think.

Anyways, get your store-bought dough (I hear Trader.Joe's has good stuff), and spread it out. Then, puree 1 can of drained diced tomatoes and one can of drained mild Rotel. That is your sauce. If you're really hungry while cooking, it also makes for a good salsa, even if you only have crackers to use as chip. Add some chopped cilantro and a dash of cumin and kosher salt to the sauce for a little extra pep.

For toppings, use whatever you have that is "mexican". I like black beans, mozzarella cheese (we only had cheddar on this particular day), shrimp sprinkled with fajita seasoning (look closely, you can see them). Look closely again, that baby boy is so damn cute! Good lordy I love those boys. Ok. Pizza. We're talking about pizza. The boys really like "macaronis" on their pizza, so I put pepperonis on one side.

I should pause and admit that while they did eat some pizza, they picked off the black beans. Sometimes we like them, sometimes we don't. And that's OK, in this house high praise is given for trying a new food. Or a food mom has served 25+ times and is still rejected. Whatevs, at least try it, will you?

Variation 2 is my favorite, but the boys are not 100% on board with this variation, so I dont make it as often. Take the pizza dough, or tortillas. Cook 1 can of black beans, add 1 packet of Jamon seasoning from the ethnic aisle at the grocery store. Cook the hell out of the beans, and if you have it, add some chicken or veggie broth. Or water, if you don't. A little cumin and kosher talk makes it all better, too. Now puree/blend the beans into a paste. Here is your pizza sauce.

Spread over dough or tortilla. Top with mozzarella, spots of goat cheese, shrimp or meat, chopped cilantro ("salad"), onions, peppers, whatever you have on hand that you want the kids to turn their noses up at/pick off. Go crazy.

Bake per dough instructions. If I use tortillas as my pizza base, I prefer to use the pancake griddle to crisp the bottom. Tasty.

Now, my other feed 'em Fridays mention is about something a lot more fun. Hot cross buns! Yes, people, it's that holy time of year when the powers that be rose from the dead and gave us...hot cross buns, amongst other things like eternal salvation.

The last two years I tried making them myself. See? Last year was OK, but lacked a little something. Well, my cousin Hans' wife, Melanie, so very kindly commented with a new recipe to try. We leave for vacation in 3 days, but I'm hoping to make at least 1 batch before we leave. Melanie, cross your fingers and hope I don't mess up that recipe. I sure would love a good hot cross bun.

This picture below is to show that I don't always aim high. My, and sister Karen's, coffee place is selling them this year! We got some, obviously. And ate them pretty quickly, so they must not have been that bad. They did contain strawberries, which was different...so I"m still hoping to make my own. We'll see if that happens.

Greggers and Grampie

I'm not even going to address how tardy I am with this post. Shush it, people.

Greggy, our oldest nephew, turned 10. Yes, Karen has a kid in double digits, and recently started coloring her hair to hide that fact. No, you shouldn't share anything with me that you don't want everyone else to know.

I don't know how she, or anyone else, does 3 kids. I think the pic below shows one of those (fleeting?) moments that she must have melted at the sight of her three. L-R, we have Rhettford, Sara, and birthday boy Greg. Gregory Lourens, to be exact. He's a thoughtful, artistic and very sensitive young man who reminds me of his Oupa (they call him Grandpa) in many ways. 

We should have a captions contest here. Their aunt Janelle brought them these cool glasses. Mostly I'm struck by how much Rhett is resembling Karen. Look, even the same uneven dimples.

Happy birthday, Greggers! We love you, big dude.

And, we're coming up on the one month anniversary of Grampie's bday! I would make excuses for not finishing these posts earlier, but honesty, I've got a lot of shit to get done, ya know?

We did make Grampie some awesome art. We didn't mail it till weeks later, but whatevs. Here's a behind the scenes look at the art in the making...with soundtrack provided by our favorite character on PBS.



We, and our boys, love Grampie. He's a tough outer shell with a lot of love for dogs and little ones, and he always has pinot graaaaagio for me. How can a person not love that? Grampie drives Grandpa Ellerman's truck, which is a GMC. Last May, when we were in Peru, the boys played in Grampie's GMC and Grampie made a little G-M-C chant that had accompanying dance-moves. Now, at random times, we'll hear the boys chant G-M-C when they see a similar truck. Or sometimes they say G-P-C. It's at least close, you know?

In my mind Grampie is perpetually oiled and sunning at the beach, but his talents and interest are varied-from picking a good pinot graaaaagio, to helping me beat the redheads GG and Keith at pinochle ( go team brunette!), to making the cutest boys' side/toy containers (to look like these), giving my dad the best tour of the Naval Museum, and of course, most important, dancing, and chanting G-M-C, complete with arm pump.

This picture is one of my favorites, it's 4 generation of Ellerman men.

We lost Grandpa Ellerman not too many months later, but we are so glad that he met these two. Grandpa Ellerman had an uncanny ability to remember small details about a person and then to ask about that detail later. When we saw him last and he was not doing well, he remembered about my little black dog, Madam, and asked about her. Grampie shares this same ability-he remembers the small things and asks about them later, often surprising all of us at his interest in the mundane and minute details of our lives. It's how he shows he loves us (besides the big bottle of pinot graaagio). Happy belated Bday, Grampie, we love you and can't wait to get all suntan-oiled up on the beach with you*!

*this applies only to me. The boys will have kiddo SPF, and their ghostlike dad will also be hiding under a t-shirt and sun umbrella.

Art in the Afternoons

Finally, I give you captions. 

Art. These boys love it. They don't call it art, they call it "a project". Many a night I get them to go to bed quietly because I promise that we'll paint/use glitter/cut and glue stuff when we get home from school and work the next day. Sure, act like you don't bribe your kids.

So, several, several weeks ago, we painted GG her bday card. We painted several cards, and then selected the best to be mailed. Here Grady is explaining one of his creations, entitled, "Weally Big Monstew". His left arm is raised because he's showing me how scary the monster is. Madam is so scared she's walking away.

As you can see from the different color paper here, we did not stick with one project for long. A few splatterings of paint, and then we're ready to move into the next one.

This one was either "Hippo" or "Crocodile". I can't remember.

Another day we did some glitter paint, but I'll tell you more about that when I post about Grampie's bday tomorrow.

And another day we got out those stamps we got for their bday party.

Each time we do a new "project" I learn something new. Here's what I've learned so far

1. Paint is awesome, but needs to be washable. I also need to pour their paint into little bowls so the cross contamination issue isn't, in fact, an issue.

2. These glitter glue things are still a little too hard for all of us to use without getting frustrated. 

3. I need to get some cheap thin sponges to make my own stamp pads for the stamps above. As you can see, I poured paint into flat paper plates, but that allows for paint to clump and make it hard to stamp on the paper. Lessons learned, this momma will regroup and be better prepared next time.

Also, I've learned its a good thing we buy our paper towels at Costco. You need a lot. 

Sickness & Some other Stuff

A coworker recently told me that once March rolls around, we'd all be much healthier again. No more colds, no more coughing, no more cranky kids. Uh-huh. Suuuuuuure.

It's now April, and we're still battling rounds of DayCareFunk. This picture was from a few weeks ago, when our poor G-baby just wasn't feeling quite right. He did NOT, i repeat, NOT want to take a bath, and the only thing that cheered him up was being swaddled in this blanket and sitting on the couch with Momma and Madam F. Then we enjoyed a few sickness free days. Whoot. This weekend we all headed to see our friends at their family lake house, and barely an hour or two into our visit, the kid looked a little feverish again. You know that look, right? Eyes get a little glassy, cheeks a little rosy, and something just doesn't look right. Yep. Sickness.

I have a new favorite bodywash. It smells so good. The boys helped me unpack it from the shipping box while we waited for Dada on the front porch one afternoon.

When they realized it wasn't edible they lost interest and resumed playing with trucks again.

And hugged.

I'd hate for you to think the boys are always happy and loving, so here's what happened a few days later. We get home, and somebody does not want to come inside the house. I'm not sure what started this-maybe I unbuckled his seatbelt in a manner that he did not appreciate, or maybe Cole looked at him wrong, or maybe he did not like hearing that we were having quesadillas for dinner. I don't know. What I did know is that I was getting the evil eye from the kid. Naturally I grabbed my camera to document this important event as Cole and I stood inside the door and used our best happy voices to lure Grady inside. It's not at all unlike when your dog gets out and you call him in a happy voice so he think you love that he's outside.

Cole was less patient than I, and after a minute started saying "Grady, get in da house now, I want to watch George!". He was not happy that his brother was keeping him from the curious monkey. Here is is, staring out of the door at his brother.

Who did finally come inside to pick at his quesadilla and ignore me when I asked if it was tasty (using my fake happy voice). Some days I have to dig a little deeper than others to find the happy.

Feed' Em Fridays.

Fellow twin mom (who is also expecting another, phew!) AP started a What to Feed 'Em Friday blogging thing. I would explain it, but I think the title sums it up pretty well, no? If you need more clarification, go to this blog entry of hers for the criteria, and then you can see what she made this week here. This Friday she made quiche, which we adore in this house. I make little quiches in the mini muffin pan to put in the boys' lunches when we sense they are getting tired of PB&J sammiches cut into little shapes with cookie cutters. As a sidenote, Nana makes the best, BEST ham and gruyere cheese quiche. I've used her recipe and made it, and it just doesn't taste right. Nana, make us some quiche, why don't you. We'll be home around 5pm. And GG, if you could come over and do the pile of ironing that is glaring at me every night, that'd be great. 

Heh. If only life could be that easy. 

But, easy is making muffins. Or, mussins, if you're not ready to pronounce the "f" sound and it sounds like "s".  Muffins are a weekend morning favorite here, so my Feed 'Em Friday contribution is muffins. The boys really love helping in the kitchen, so I'll get most of the ingredients lined up, and I'll get to help stir or mix. And Grady can even crack an egg neatly, I was really surprised, to be quite honest. Yes, we did was the raw egg off his hands. Anyways, Grady can be a strong willed little child, but put him in the kitchen and he mellows out and becomes a very helpful little man. And Cole loves just being around Momma, so he's eager to help, too. 

This particular day we made this Banana muffin recipe.  AP's #3 criteria was Health (or at least not bad for you), and I'm sure there are healthier options for banana muffins out there, like this recipe, but for now let's all pretend the muffins don't have butter and white sugar, k? 

I've long thought the key to making a good meal is a messy kitchen, so that's why you see the onions from the grocery store trip 3 days prior to this picture being taken on the counter in the background, and if you look close enough there are a smattering of dirty dishes and other random items. I can't wait for my sous chefs to take on dish duty.

But back to the muffins. The boys both helped with the mixing part, then I split the batter and let them eat pour the muffins into the cups. I used little liners here, which is not necessary, but they asked for the liners. So I let them have it. Sticking our your tongue aids in concentration. 

So does goofing for the camera.

There was only one meltdown each during this process, which is not too bad, given the boys' meltdown potential. Cole was really intent on getting his cups filled perfectly.

Grady, less so. He was going for a  more artistic look to his muffins and really was not open to guidance, which is why he had his meltdown. But he rallied and we filled the cups and Momma put them in the oven.

And they were pretty darn good. It's hard to go wrong with a banana muffin recipe. I have learned not to bother with nuts in these muffins, the boys just don't like the texture, and I spend my time walking over to them so they can spit nuts into my hand.

Another muffin staple in our house is the Oatmeal Muffin recipe from one of my favorite baking books. I was prepared to type the recipe out here, but thankfully someone already did that for me! Phew. I'm too lazy for all that. Here is the recipe, but note this person added blueberries. I've also tweaked the recipe a bit-I toast the oatmeal in the oven for a few minutes before I soak it in milk, it just adds a little extra nuttiness to the muffins, and I also add more cinnamon than the recipe calls for, too. 

There. My Feed 'Em contribution. Go make yourselves some mussins.