Supper this week (and next)

It's Wednesday!  Oops!  I still want to share my meal plans, though, because I'm excited about them!  And I've mostly planned through next week, too, though things are always subject to change when I plan that far in advance.

So, for this week:
Monday:  I roasted some bone-in chicken breasts with sliced potatoes, carrots and parsnips!  It was truly exciting to find a special on parsnips Trader Joe's, and reminded me of the delicious roasted veggies Mom used to make during her brief stint working at an organic farm.  She got to take home lots of yummy second-rate produce that they couldn't sell at the farmer's market, and I learned a lot about veggies!  Turnips are wonderful, too, and would have been quite yummy in this dish!  I couldn't remember how Mom used to season hers, but I used some old stand-bys--salt, pepper, garlic, sage.  And I made way too much, so we've had leftovers for fried potatoes, maybe some hot chicken sandwiches today, and just plain [microwaved] leftovers.

Tuesday:  We had chicken marsala with cacio e pepe (and I wished I'd used more red wine than white.  Oh well!)

Wednesday:  {Thai}

Thursday:  Baked potato soup!  This is another exciting thing about this week!  I baked my potatoes while Monday's supper was roasting, and I'm planning to make a double batch of the soup so I can freeze some for when the new baby comes!  (And even though the recipe is from Annie's Eats, I was inspired to try it by the path-less-traveled, so, thank you, Elizabeth!)

Friday:  Salmon and mashed potatoes.  My sweetie is getting tired of salmon and rice, so I'm trying to mix things up a little bit . . . he's asked me to help him get some good fats in other ways.  ;)  Next week we'll skip the salmon.

Saturday:  Hopefully we're going to a couples'-night-out with chilli and a bonfire!  We're bringing crackers and shredded cheese.

Sunday:  Beef enchiladas!  I haven't made enchiladas in quite a while, so this is exciting, too!

Next week: 
Monday:  Clam chowder!  Another warm fall recipe!  And hopefully we'll freeze some of this, too!

Tuesday:  Chicken tikka masala and rice 

Wednesday:  {Thai}

Thursday:  Pancit with chicken

Friday:  Pot roast

Saturday:  Refried bean enchiladas

There we go!  And, at some point soon we'll probably be eating the squash which is part of my little dining room centerpiece at the moment.  We didn't get a pumpkin this year . . . I guess I wasn't feeling too anxious for one!  And now that we have an Aldi near us, I can easily get pumpkin for $.99 a can, despite the BPA and all that. 

What are you cooking this week?  What our kitchen is truly lacking right now is baked goodies . . . any yummy ideas?

A New York Autumn

I love that my husband's birthday is in October and that he is as much of a traditionalist as I am.  :)  When possible, we like to take a trip up north to celebrate, and with two other family birthdays near his, it works out well!

October in New York is simply beautiful.  The colors tend to peak around Columbus Day or the weekend after, and it's usually crisp enough for jackets and wood fires.  This trip, Mom and I took Gemma Grace on a little day trip to Vermont, too!  We visited some of our old favorites--Merck Forest, Stewart's, and even did a little thrifting.

We love this place!  (And Gemma's hat from last year still fits!  I love it so much!) 

In addition to a network of hiking trails and campsites, Merck Forest has a working farm.  Mom carried Gemma the half-mile walk to the farm on her back in our soft carrier, and we got there in time for afternoon chores.  

They let us in with the piglets!  When we held still, the piglets did come over to say hi, but of course our little piglet didn't stay still for very long, so the others retreated around the barn.  

She loved the chickens!  She kept saying "hi!" and "tee tee tee!" to them, though I didn't do an excellent job catching it on video.  At one point, she kept peeking in the little hole they were coming out, and then she tried to squeeze inside the fence!

The next stop was a thrift store, where I bought Gemma a pair of pink dress shoes a few sizes too big for $1.  She had great fun trying on them, her rubber boots, and the soft little leather shoes which were also in the car with us!

At Stewart's, Mom let Gemma have a taste of her milk shake.  

Do you think she wanted to give it back???

October catch-up . . . 22 months old!

After hearing that one devoted reader was tired of looking at pictures of burp cloths, I am finally giving you a bit of an update!  These past weeks have been full!  We've spent one week in New York with our families and two weeks in Europe (surprise, surprise!).  There's so much to share . . . we'll see if it all happens!  Isn't it funny how the more there is to write about, the less time there is to write it? 

Well.  Here is our darling 22-month-old:

Looking back at October pictures of her from a year ago, it is hard for me to believe how much she has changed . . . and I'm very, very happy to say that she now takes one 2-3 hour nap a day, instead of one 30 minute nap a day, as that old post proclaimed! 

I've been trying to scribble down all the new things Gemma does, but I'm sure I've missed some of them.  Most notably, she is saying many new words!  In addition to "hi," "bye," "Mommy," "Daddy," "eye," and "ball," she is also saying "on," "off," "up," "uh oh," "eaty" (eat), "hopa" (either "hot dog" or "hop on pop," depending on the context), "yah" (yes), "yay!" (i.e. "hooray!) "bee bee" ("beep" for car), "knee," "Amen," "happy," and "baby" in context.  She also does some animal noises:  "ba ba" (sheep), "rah" (lion), "sss" (snake), "tee tee tee!" (very high-pitched, for birds), and "rah rah" (dog . . . yes, just a little different from her lion sound!). 

She's also started to recognize a few letters! "O" and "M" are her favorites.  She points them out in books and says "Ooooh!" or "Mmmm!"  But she also recognizes "A" and "X" and even today seemed to be adding a few more to her repetoire, like "D."  I'm pretty excited about "O" and "M," though, because she makes the sounds for them.  And, yes, it probably has something to do with the leap frog fridge phonics thing that Grammy found for her at a garage sale . . . technology for the win, as much as I hate to admit it!

 

 

Gemma loves playing outside.  She loves helping to water the rose bush and handing me clothes pins or putting them back in the basket when I hand them to her.  She loves throwing her diaper in the trash (we've been using disposables about half the time lately, because she's been pretty rashy and needs the high-powered diaper cream.  At least she's never constipated . . . )  She can get into and out of the bumbo by herself and we've started bringing her into church a bit.  She's added "shoulder" and "cheek" to her knowledge of anatomy.  She likes to tickle toes, including her own! and making a little "digga digga digga!" sound effect, which is just darling.  :)  She gives great hugs and kisses with sound effects ("nah!").  And she does seem to have some understanding that there is a baby in Mommy's tummy.  I thought she was clueless until we were around a real 8 month old, and she pointed to the baby and then pointed to my belly!  Of course, she then pointed to her belly as well, but I was nonetheless encouraged! 

 

Her baby doll is still probably her favorite toy, and reading books is also at the top of the list!  She also loves the head band in the top picture, which we brought home from a Euro shop in Florence.  And most of all, she loves her blanket . . .

 

 

I embellished these prefold diapers back in the spring to turn them into pretty burp-cloths, and I guess I wanted to show you!

 

 

I made them for my sister-in-law from new diapers and materials I had on hand.  They ended up taking me longer than I expected, but that's probably just because I was trying to do all five at once!

 

 

 

Source: petitelemon.com via Gretchen on Pinterest

This tutorial on pinterest was a big help, and the trim-only cloths were inspired by the Path Less Traveled Market blog, back before I knew about pinterest (probably before it existed, really).  :)

Fun?  I had 10 burp cloths for Gemma Grace, which was just about perfect, but I've since lost one of my favorites (the fluffy, diaper-like ones!) and a little someone likes to use the princess-y ones for dolly blankets, so I think I'll embellish a few more!

And sister-in-law likes them, too!

Upcycled Cardigan!

Autumn is coming, which means that it must be starting to feel cool somewhere.  :)  Anyway, even when it's super warm outside, I just stay in and make tea and pretend that it's cool.  :)

Soon, though, it truly will be sweater weather!  

I guess I actually did this little project back in March.  Hrmm.  But now that fall is nearing, I'm excited to wear it again!  

It started as a soft, comfortable pullover in a really fun shade of green, and it was actually a hand-me-down from my friend Jenni five years ago.  When I first saw all sorts of tutorials on pinterest for turning pullovers into cardigans, I was too afraid to cut into anything of my own.  But when I stopped and thought about it some more, I realized that a five-year-old hand-me-down probably needed some updating.  Thanks to breastfeeding and pregnancy, this sweater hadn't fit well as a pullover for a while, and at the time I was hoping that it wouldn't for a while more!  And it would be more versatile as a cardigan.  So.  

I ended up choosing this tutorial, found via pinterest.  It called for hem tape (which I had!), a little sewing, and it seemed very simple!  It was!  I'm so happy with the result . . . turning it into a cardigan even obscured the pick on the front which I'd been ignoring for at least a few of those five years.

Here's proof that I did this project back in the spring . . . I wore it with pink pants for my sister-in-law's baby shower!  Her twin girls have been good and born for almost two months now!

I also decided to finally use this cute little flower tutorial which I had pinned quite a while earlier.  (That's what happened to the sleeve on that tee-shirt of John's which I used for Gemma's bubble skirt!)  Instead of putting it on a headband, I glued it to a pin-back which I had leftover from a little corsage project last December.  Tee shirt, button, felt circle, pin back . . . yay for another free project!  Isn't it cute?

Now that it's (eventually) getting cool again, I have another black pullover from Jenni's sister, Gemma, which needs a makeover, I think.  ;)