Mason is 9 months!

How did my baby grow so fast?  I love this little baby - he is so good to me, still so cuddly and loves to be tickled and is just plain happy.  He loves to eat and eat - real food, that is, and sadly, not nursing as much anymore.  But he won't take a bottle of formula either so the nursing has to keep up til he at least will drink milk from a bottle or sippy cup.  He loves water, though.  He will drink water from a sippy cup or bottle, whichever, he doesn't care.  He loves bread, vegetables, fresh green beans, bananas, pizza, lasagna, and tonight he even tried chicken and rice divan with broccoli.  He loves food!

He can say mama (but only when he really needs me!), and his latest feat is standing up by himself, unsupported for a brief 2 seconds.  He loves his baths and loves to play with Zaney.  He is such a good sleeper too, especially during preschool on Tue/Thurs.  I think he is in tune with me!  He wakes up at 6 a.m. and then nurses when he gets up. I love that he sticks his foot up in the direction of my face and holds on to my hand and hugs it with his two little hands while he nurses. I will miss that when he stops nursing! Naps from 10-1 p.m. then he is ready to go down again around 7 p.m. at night.  He sleeps the full 12-13 hours!  He has two little teeth and chubby toes.  We love this boy to pieces, and so glad he is a part of our family. Pictures are hard to take now, since he is always on the go, and tries to grab my camera when he sees it.

Monterey Bay and Lego Kids Fest Trip 2013

August 29/30, 2013 was the Lego Kids Fest in San Jose, CA.  Collin is a huge Lego fan and so Kevin thought it would be fun to take him to the kids' fest in California.  So they flew there and also went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium one day.  They even drove by the house we almost bought in Watsonville back in 2012.  Fun short trip for the boys!

 Farms of Watsonville

Strawberry fields in Watsonville

Watsonville house (old and small! but full of charm!)

Collin says sleeping on the plane makes the trip go a lot faster.  I agree.

Easter - Jerusalem Dinner Menu

I am cutting it close!  But last night I finally laid in my bed and thought I probably should plan our Jerusalem dinner for Thursday night.  Gotta be as simple as possible, and one my kids will eat.  So combining what I've already tried in years past:

Main Dish - Chipotle Ranch Chopped Chicken Salad (in the past I have done chicken noodle soup, substituting matzah balls for the noodles)

Side Dish -  Homemade Matzah 

Beverage - Grape juice cocktail

Dessert - Matzah-Almond Chocolate Bark (a favorite from year to year!)

Recipes Below!

And for the first time I got us this Seder plate, which we will talk about at dinner:

That makes it official, right?

And of course, we will dine with oil lamps in dim light. Just for ambiance.  Enjoy your Jerusalem Dinner!

RECIPES:

Our all time favorite recipe for matzo is here: http://zelittlechef.blogspot.com/2010/04/egg-and-onion-matzah.html

and here is another that gets rave reviews:

Basic Recipe for Matzo from allrecipes.com, but here it is in case the link is broken:

INGREDIENTS:

1 teaspoon all-purpose flour for dusting*

1 cup all-purpose flour*

1/3 cup water, or more if needed

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, or as needed

(optional)

1 teaspoon olive oil, or as needed

(optional)

DIRECTIONS:

1. Move an oven rack near the top of oven and preheat oven to 475 degrees F (245 degrees C). Preheat a heavy baking sheet in the oven.

2. Dust a clean work surface and a rolling pin with 1 teaspoon flour, or as needed. Place 1 cup of flour into a mixing bowl; set a timer for about 16 minutes (18 minutes maximum). Start the timer; pour the water, about 1 tablespoon at a time, into the flour. Stir the water and flour together with a fork until the dough forms a rough ball, remove the dough to the prepared work surface, knead rapidly and firmly until smooth, about 30 seconds to 1 minute.

3. Divide the dough into four equal pieces; cut each piece in half again to get 8 pieces total. Swiftly roll each piece into a ball. Roll each piece of dough out into a 5-inch pancake, dusting the top and rolling pin with flour as needed. Gradually roll the pancakes out to a size of about 8 inches, increasing the size of each by about 1 inch, then letting the dough rest for a few seconds before rolling again to the finished size. Roll from the center out. The bread rounds should be very thin. Using a fork, quickly pierce each bread about 25 times, all over, to prevent rising. The holes should go completely through the bread. Flip the bread over, and pierce each piece another 25 times with the fork.

4. With at least 5 minutes left on the timer, remove the hot baking sheet from the preheated oven, and place the rounds onto the baking sheet. Place the baking sheet onto the rack near the top of the oven, and bake for 2 minutes; turn the breads over and bake an additional 2 minutes, until the matzot are lightly browned and crisp.

5. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Lightly anoint each matzah with olive oil, using a brush, and sprinkle generously with salt.

SALAD: Chipotle Ranch Chopped Chicken Salad

The Salad:
Grilled chicken breasts or rotisserie chicken breasts, chopped

Oranges, 2 *or can of mandarin oranges, drained

1/2 green pepper (or yellow works too), diced (my kids will eat if cut really small)

Cherry tomatoes, 1 pint, halved

1/4 c Fresh cilantro, coarsely chopped

Romaine hearts, 4 cups, sliced (we love Costco's artisan romaine hearts sliced fairly thin)

Large avocado, 1, peeled and cut into bite-sized pieces

Optional: my family loves mexican food, so any time I get the chance, we make it.  To make this salad with Mexican flair, add a cup of corn and pinto beans.  Yum!!

In a large bowl, combine the oranges, tomatoes, and cilantro.  Add the romaine and your dressing of choice (make sure it is kosher!) and toss to coat. Season the salad to taste with salt and black pepper. Gently fold in the avocado and serve right away.

The Dressing:

Chipotle-Ranch Dressing:
1/2 c or mayo ***homemade kosher recipe follows
1/2 c. sour cream
Taco seasoning (add as much to your liking)

- Mix all ingredients together until smooth.

Homemade Kosher Mayo (if you want)

1 1/2 c oil
1 egg
1/2 garlic clove (optional)
Juice of half a lemon
1/4 tsp. salt
freshly ground black pepper

Use a tall jar, add all ingredients and mix with an immersion blender.


Dessert: Matzo-Almond Chocolate Bark

Photo: Martha Stewart (hers does not have the crushed almonds but sea salt, which should be good too!)

5 to 6 pieces plain matzo

1 cup unsalted butter

1 cup sugar

12 oz. semisweet chocolate bits (we use milk)

1/2 cup slivered almonds, crushed

Heat the oven to 400 degrees. Line a cookie sheet with aluminum foil and lay the matzo in a single layer so that it completely covers the bottom of the sheet. In a saucepan, melt the butter and sugar over low heat. Raise the heat and boil the mixture for 3 minutes. Pour the butter and sugar mixture over the matzo and spread it with the back of a spoon. Place the matzo in the oven for 5 minutes. Remove the cookie sheet from the oven and immediately pour the chocolate bits over the matzo.

Return the sheet to the oven for 30 seconds to melt the chocolate. Remove the sheet from the oven and smooth the chocolate evenly over the matzo with a spatula. Sprinkle the crushed almonds over the top. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour or overnight. Break into pieces and serve. Serves 12. 

Valentine's Day 2013

Oh valentine's day with a preteen is quite fun!  She got three candygrams from a friend and two boys crushing on her.  One of the boys (Cory) previously wrote a love letter to her.  I'll have to post that sometime. We did our annual heart attack FHE again this year, and Allie got the purple heart from Collin - ha ha!  It says, I Love Allie because she is weird." Probably the funniest heart of all of them.  Allie's "I love Dad's ugly 'stylish' shirts" tops it.  What a tease. Just like her dad.

This was so funny to watch.  I asked them to put their arms around each other and smile at the camera.  And they acted silly!  Like a mix of awkward and "why is mom making us do this again?"

 One of the fun valentines Collin got.  This one actually said something cool about Collin.  It said, "you are really good at spelling!"

The Bruder trucks got the extra heart stickers.

I spent the wee hours of the morning making valentines for the kids and Kevin. This year I gave them coupon books, and for Kevin a list of 100 things I love about him.  I was going to give it in a book form to him for our 15th anniversary last year but didn't finish in time.  Sadly I didn't get it done in time again for V-day, so I just printed it out and maybe by Father's Day he will actually get the real book.

And a new tradition:

 This year I made a banner, inspired by pinterest (aka pinspired), of hearts with blank coupons.  The goal is to have each member of the family do something nice for someone else during the month of February.  

At 3 a.m. this is what the valentines looked like :).  I was glad with how it turned out.  They were all so excited to see they had something to open when they first got up.

This photo is for Anna, I finally got to changing my bedding out for something a little cleaner looking and fresher too.  I really like it, and glad I got it done.

Allie is now 2 inches taller than me - we had to "model" our heart banner before we took another heart out to give to Grandma and Pop.

Me and Little Man on his first valentines. 

Maddie sporting blue fundip teeth and the valentine for grandma and pop - before we left to go over to their house to deliver it.

My fun Tue-Thurs preschool class after their valentine party.  Zane cracks me up.  He really was closing his eyes on purpose not just caught at a bad time. Silly boy!  He comes regularly to preschool now and starting to get to know how to behave.

He loves pretending to drive.  And last but not least,

Me and my valentine - our 16th valentine's together

This one is more like what it was really like - trying to get just one photo and the kids running around us.  If there was a sound byte to the picture it would be the sound of kids being loud, baby crying, Allie yelling at them to get out of the frame, and Collin laughing his head off.  Something like that.  

We usually don't go out on Valentines day so we just went out to deliver our valentine to the grandparents, visited for a bit, grabbed dinner on the way home, and called it a day.