when the weather's nice...

.. you get to eat outside!

 

new food blog!

due to my need to have things organized and compartmentalized, I could never figure out how to incorporate food posts into this blog... it just wasn't working out for me.  BUT, I love to be in the kitchen and talk about food and want to blog about it, so, my fix is to create another blog, solely devoted to food!  the website is delitebite.blogspot.com, or you can click the "my food blog" link above.  come and visit!

side note:  credit for naming the food blog goes to chad!  my creative juices don't flow very well when it comes to creative play on word games.  one of my suggestions:  "fun in the kitchen"... I think we're all glad for chad's creativity. :)

have a bite dad!

how nice of beck to share his cone with dad, huh?  you'll see his "sharing" gets a little more aggressive in each pic.  :)

children's museum

krya and I took the kiddos to the children's museum for an afternoon of fun the other friday.  although they are a little young to enjoy the entire museum, there is a special kids play zone for young guys that they throughly enjoyed (for the most part!).  beck did get called a "she" by a little boy and his mom (or female adult chaperone), which never happens.  does he look a little girly in these pics?!

please get me off the horse... I'm not having fun anymore! 

fun lights and buttons to push.  I think that right after this pic they both were going for the same button and someone pushed someone... someone cried.  silly boys.

oohhh... more fun lights!

hi emerson!

ah, beck found the train table (or I took him to it b/c I knew he would love it!).  of course his tongue is out a little and he is making his typical truck noises while driving his train.  :) 

clear excitement about the trains.  once he found the trains he didn't want to do anything else and crawled around on the floor driving them.  this is the only part where we didn't have fun for a little bit... when I decided it was time to play in the water and leave the trains beck didn't like that so much.

but the trains were soon forgotten and the water fun began!

beck is splashing vigorously in this pic.  those little water guard things they have for the kids are nice, but they don't really stop too much water from soaking a shirt (and a face) when the splashing gets going.  needless to say we went home with just a coat on and no shirt!

going for the same thing again :)

recipe of the week

I decided that I'm going to start posting a recipe of the week.  something I made that was new or extra delicious.  (ok, this post has 2 recipes, but they were both so tasty neither can be left out!)     

the setting:  chad is out of town for work this week, so last night jaimie came over and we made dinner and did DIY projects.  

the menu:  quinoa flatbread topped with hummus, shredded chicken, tomatoes & cucumbers, and feta. and asian cucumber.mango.avacago salad.  mediterranean and asian go nicely together. :)   

input on the quinoa flatbread, which was a new one - J found the recipe.  they were pretty bland if made according to the recipe, so I added some extra seasonings which helped - paprika, garlic salt, coriander.  I also didn't have rice flour to meet J's gf needs, so I used chickpea flour.  another modification was that it needed an extra 1/2 - 1 cup of water.  not sure if it was the chickpea flour that absorbed extra liquid, but it was way too thick without some extra water.  

you could also go the sweet route with the flatbreads, topping them with berry sauce, lemon juice, yogurt...  I would probably add a couple T sugar or honey, vanilla, and cinnamon to the batter if I made them sweet...

recipe for the asian cucumber salad:

3 tsp fish sauce or 2 tsp soy sauce

1 tsp lime zest

2 T lime juice

1 T canola oil

2 tsp honey or a drizzle of agave nectar

1 tsp rice or cider vinegar

1/4 tsp crushed red pepper

 - combine in a bowl and mix.  chop/cube the following and add to the dressing:

1 medium english cucumber

1 avacado

1 mango

1/4 cup cilantro

* sprinkle with chopped peanuts if desired - I think it adds a nice crunch and flavor contrast

what the goof's been up to...

being goofy!  and getting into lots of things!  jabbering, jabbering and being and loads of fun.  it has been so entertaining to watch beck get more of his own personality and even act like he knows when he's being cute and funny.

scattering q-tips across the floor and then putting them back in  random places was a frequent activity.  I finally decided to move the q-tips to a jar he can't reach after this incident... picking up q-tips got old very fast!

getting into the kitchen cabinets of course.  love the shirt, no pants look!

sharing cereal with cousin dela - great face beck!

helping dad put together his bike stand and being oh so silly.

chad got this flashlight for christmas and beck thinks it's quite fun, especially if the light is on.  he moves his head back and forth, either trying to figure out where the light is coming from or b/c he thinks its fun to watch the light move.

beck also thinks it's a fun game to randomly bite down on his spoon during breakfast and hold it in is mouth... camera flash + just waking up = very squinty eyes  :)

kitchen things again!  this bowl into that bowl and out again, and pushing lids around on the floor (usually accompanied by car noises) are his favorite things to do.

ahah!  found the snacks!

while cooking the other day, I looked over and beck had pulled my laptop case onto the floor, was sitting on it and making some pretty funny faces... one of those times it seemed he knew just how cute and silly he was being!

to the lemon lovers

ok, I will just put it out there.  I'm not a girl scout cookie fan.  and I have found that lots of people are.  they have a favorite kind of cookie that have loved since they were kids.  not me.  in fact, I try to avoid girl scout cookies.  one look at the ingredient label has me choosing to buy boxes to send to the troops instead of bringing them home (sorry chad :)).

however, this year something changed.  a cute little girl at church asked me if I wanted some girl scout cookies and I couldn't tell her no.  I ended up with a box of samoas for Chad and savannah smiles for me. I love lemon and they had a little 'no hydrogenated oils' label on them, making my decision quite easy.

these little cookies are bites of deliciousness.  crispy. sweet. lemony.  very tasty.  and the ingredient label isn't perfect, but it's better than most others and good enough for a once-a-year treat.
so if you're in the same boat as me and find yourself in front of a cute little girl asking if you want to buy some cookies, I recommend these.  and if the girl scouts keep this cookie around, I will likely find myself buying another box and just might become one of "those" people who has a favorite kind. :)