I’ve been slacking off on the blog for about ten days or so. Which feels like a long time. Because around here a lot happens in ten days. I have more blogging material from ten days than most people would probably have from ten months of a normal life. Seriously, never a dull moment, that is for sure. Plus, I have a lot of blogging to get to –answering all y’all’s questions and all. So, in an attempt to try to catch up quickly on just the most rudimentary basics of the past ten days here, I present the following ten bullets:
- Thanksgiving was good, except that for me the whole thing sort of flew by in a blur of yet another bought of bronchitis. The photo at the top is of a painting made by Kyle the other day. In a strange way it sort of visually depicts how I felt over Thanksgiving and the several days leading up to it. Kyle is so uncannily intuitively perceptive of people’s states and emotions that it seriously would not surprise me if he were somehow channeling my raw energy through his paintbrush. Anyway, this is my eighth or ninth (I’ve lost track) upper respiratory infection in the past twelve months. Each time it takes a round of hard-core antibiotics to kick it. Given that I have never smoked a day in my life, and have a track record for being very healthy, this whole thing is completely bewildering, not to mention beyond bothersome (I mean really! I don’t have time for this sickness stuff!). It is also a bit unnerving. My doctor is completely determined to get to the bottom of it (thank God), and called for chest x-rays, an appointment with a specialist, and a whole gamut of blood-work this time around. Hopefully we’ll begin to figure out what the heck is going on with me. Bottom line: I had very limited energy for Thanksgiving, very low tolerance for the annoyances of young children’s not-always-perfect behavior, and very little patience for anything that required it. Nonetheless, it was not disastrous by any stretch of the imagination (thanks to MorMor and MorFar being here and doing everything). I’ll put up a J-M T’Giving Photo Post soon. In the meantime, here’s Kyle creating his masterpiece (I know I’m biased, but I seriously love this painting):
- Yesterday, in an attempt to use up the rest of the T’Giving leftovers, I made soup. What started as just-about-everything-left-from-T’Giving-dinner-thrown-into-a-pot, somehow turned into The Best Soup I’ve Ever Made In My Entire Life. I can’t explain it. It seriously was as if magic had happened in that soup pot. I know it had something to do with the fact that I dumped a huge tupperware full of my mom’s delicious butternut squash in there. Speaking of butternut squash… someday real soon I’m going to post about our new favorite salad (spinach salad with goat cheese and butternut squash —- to die for!).
- It is officially basketball season. That’s how we roll these days—seasons are not about the weather or the temperature or the foliage anymore. No, the season is defined by the sport. We went to our first Lehigh basketball game last week (LU vs. Cornell). and it was – just as it always seems to be – completely inspiring to the two boys in our life. Their love affair with football has not fully ended (not by a long shot!), and before we can blink an eye it will be baseball season (i.e., spring), but I think it is safe to say that we are fully in the throws of basketball now. This (this focus on sports) never ceases to amaze us; it is so entirely not like our life pre-K&O. They’ve rocked our world those two.
- On the Monday before T’Giving we had to put our beloved cat, Cooper, to sleep. I had to be a real grown up and bring Cooper to the vet and make the final decisions, etc. Our Cooper was just about sixteen years old. Braydon and I grew into our adulthoods with him, and the bambinos have never known life without him. For as much as we were ready to let Cooper go (we’d known for a long, long time that Cooper was nearing the end), it was – and is – sad. Of the five of us, Owen and Meera have taken it the hardest. Owen, especially, is missing Cooper.
- On a high note: over the past ten days I had the honor and privilege of personally welcoming home two new babies of two different sets of family friends of ours. Both adoptive families! In my opinion, there is absolutely nothing that compares with the miracle of adoption (and that’s coming from someone who has done it both ways). Biological/physiological reproduction and bonding I can intellectually comprehend and explain. But the creation of, and the attachment that goes on within, adoptive families?— it is a miracle. A true and utter miracle. Witnessing that special form of human-relationship-building goes beyond the comprehensible and is, truly, profound. Our friends the Kulps recently brought Gracie Li home to take her place as their second beloved daughter from China, and as Joy Lin’s long-awaited little sister. After months of looking at photos, it was beyond spectacular to see Grace being held by my friend, her mommy, right here in Pennsylvania. And our friends the Goodmans finally brought home their beloved beautiful black baby boy, straight from the hospital, through domestic newborn adoption. I brought them a gift of some of our favorite skin and hair products and had the pleasure of talking another white mama through her first entrance into this wonderful world of black hair and skin care. It is a special bond to connect with other adoptive families and we feel so grateful to have forged friendships with so many to share these life moments with. It is a true gift to be able to watch a new family form this way. Adoption is hard. But adoption is so, so good. Every new child home feels monumentally miraculous to me.
- Speaking of black hair… we re-twisted and trimmed K & O’s locs this weekend. And they look amazing!!!!! (and my oh my what a lot of work that project always is!!!!) Photos below = after re-twisting (with Meera’s “hair being done too”) & after the whole day-long project was done (deep cleaning, twisting, and trimming… x2).
- You might be able to see in the photo above right that Owen lost another tooth. This one, he pulled out himself. Which saved all of us a lot of drama this time around. It is sitting in the tooth fairy pillow, waiting for Kyle to lose his.
- MorMor and MorFar were with us most of the week of Thanksgiving. We took them to the skating rink where Kyle has been taking ice skating lessons so that he could show off his skills. For the fun of it, we all skated. Including Meera. Who loved it. But what a work-out that is! (skating while leaning over and holding up a two year old, barely balancing, between your legs) Here is Little Miss Meera her first time skating:
- Speaking of Little Miss Meera… I’m taking the advice of all of you and have decided – at least for the time being – not to push the bottle issue. And if she’s still drinking a bottle when she goes off to college, then so be it! (and I’ll blame it on our blog readers).
- Speaking of going off to college… big news here in the education realm. Now, granted, I’m a professional sociologist (who has written a book on schooling decisions, no less), but this has been feeling ridiculously huge for us… I mean, really, kids’ schooling = the whole dang sociological deal: race, class, gender, and a (the?) major pillar socializing institution of our society (education), etc., etc., etc…. it feels, at least right now, like decisions don’t get much bigger than this. So, last but not least, by far the biggest bullet of this post: today K & O started at a new school. Yes, you read that right. In the past month we’ve undergone a major upheaval, a total uprooting, a big turn in life’s road (which ultimately, ironically, has wound up feeling like a huge sigh of relief and a deep breath of fresh air), resulting in our decision to pull Kyle and Owen out of the Waldorf School where they’ve attended for the past 3+ years. They had their last day at their “old school” last Friday, and then took this past week to re-group and re-orient in the direction of their “new school.” Today we dropped off our precious cargo, the terrific and tenacious twinny twosome that they are, at United Friends School for their first full day. And… it was just plain all-out-awesomeness all around! Upon pick-up this afternoon we received huge hugs and beaming smiles from K & O, and an amazing report from their teacher. We got in the car to head home and Owen exclaimed from the backseat, totally unprompted, “School is GREAT!!!!!!!” That’s just about all I needed to know that this – what has felt like a really hugely important decision – was exactly right. Finally I feel like I’ve been Mama long enough to trust myself, to listen to my inner voice, and to go with my gut instincts when it comes to my boys. I’m so proud of myself for that. I’ve come a long way babies! And I’m so happy for my boys! Big huge blog post soon to come on this subject.
The Menu:
– Moroccan Chicken & Butternut Squash Stew
– Plain White Rice
– Baba Ganoush (from Wegmans) with Pita
This stew is my attempt to recreate a dish that a friend made for our family when our son was born. The original version did not have butternut squash and it was also made by someone Algerian. So yeah, not exactly the same dish. Plus, the original was made with love and tons of thoughtfulness…no way to duplicate that.
At any rate, my recipe (below) is a modification of one that I found in one of those recipe cards that they have at the grocery store. I’ve made it twice in the past and my daughter really liked it….so I’m trying again, hoping for a similar reaction.
Moroccan Chicken & Butternut Squash Stew
The recipe calls for harissa, which is a hot red pepper spice paste/sauce used in various parts of North Africa. The only reason I call this dish Moroccan is that the particular brand of harissa I use comes from Morocco. If you don’t have harissa, I think you can easily replace it with a teaspoon of all-spice and some red pepper flakes….and designate the dish from whatever part of the world you please 😉 The recipe below serves 4.
– 2 teaspoon olive oil
– 1 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into cubes
– 1 medium onion
– 2 carrots, peeled and chopped
– 2 cloves garlic, minced
– 1 tsp ground cumin
– 1 tsp harissa paste (more if you like it spicy)
– 2 1/2 cups chicken broth
– 1 diced tomato
– 1/4 cup tomato paste
– 1 small butternut squash, peeled, seeded an cubed (about 4 cups
– 1/2 cup golden raisins
– 2 tbsp fresh lime
Method:
– Heat oil in large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add chicken and cook till browned.
– Add onion, carrots and garlic. Cook till softened and then add cumin and harissa.
– Add broth, tomato, tomato paste, squash and raisins. Bring to boil, then reduce heat and simmer ~20 minutes till squash is tender.
– Stir in lime juice and serve with plain white rice.
The Verdict:
Overall the Moroccan stew was a success at our house. Alex really truly enjoyed it…never met a raisin that he didn’t love. Kavya ate it…liked it well enough…or in her words, “it’s really actually alright, Mummy.” Dave and I enjoyed it as much as we did in the past. The heat of the harissa balanced pretty well with the sweetness of the squash and the raisins. An enjoyable meal for sure and worth cooking again in the future.
Heather’s crock pot dinner had mixed reviews…the kids enjoyed it. Kavya was impressed that the chicken was not at all “chewy”. Alex also never met a noodle he didn’t love…so a hit there too. Dave enjoyed the meal while I thought it was alright. Given how easy the recipe is and given the kids’ response (and given the fact that I actually got to use my crock pot, aka dust collector), I might give this recipe another try sometime soon. Thanks, Heather! Also, thanks to your mom for the recommendation!
I own a crock-pot. It was a college-graduation-gift from my uncle. I rarely use it. I think over the sixteen years since I graduated from college, I’ve maybe used the crock-pot sixteen times total. But I am a crock-pot cooker admirer; I believe in the cleverness of cooking with a crock-pot; I totally understand the allure of throwing stuff in there before heading off to work in the morning and then coming home to a yummy-homey-comforting-family-supper. I get it! I just have never quite jumped on the bandwagon. I think the reason, mostly, is this: although Braydon adores this kind of food, it is just not my kind of thing. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll eat it (I’ll eat just about anything, from the most mundane to the most exotic — I’m not a picky eater whatsoever), but if I’m the one choosing what to eat and I’m the one cooking it, then there are lots of things I’d choose first over the crock-potty-type dinners. Nevertheless…
A couple of weeks ago my mom sent me an email with the subject line: “Try This!” She sang the praises of this new crock-pot dinner that she’d discovered, and she suggested that I try it for Swap. I’ll admit, when I first looked at the recipe, I thought she was crazy. But she swore that she’d actually eaten it (twice no less!) and that it was delicious and that the Swap Kids (i.e., my kids and Shalinee’s kids) would all love it. Since this was my first Swap recommendation from anyone ever, and since my mother is always right about everything (I swear!), and since I was having a seriously over-extended/stressed/overwhelming week last week, I decided to take the risk and try this super easy crock-pot dinner for Swap. We’ve never used crock-pots for our Swap before, so this was a first. For the J-M’s this was a huge, huge hit! I liked it just fine. But the rest of my family loved it. Particularly Owen, who could not get enough of the chicken.
MorMor’s Crock-Pot Chicken
4, 8, 12 even 16 chicken thighs / or drumsticks. Bones and skin and all. (note: I, Heather, used 6 drumsticks and two large breasts cut in half for each family)
1/2 cup orange juice
1 can whole cranberry sauce
1 package Lipton Onion soup
Cook 6-8 hours in the crock-pot.
I served this with buttered egg noodles and sweet baby peas. I’m sure that Owen will be requesting this dinner many times in the future. Maybe the crock-pot will start seeing more appearances around here!
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
This week Shalinee’s dinner was a delight for Braydon and I. We really liked it a lot. K, O, and M, on the other hand, in a strange never-before-seen twist, all refused to eat it. They all tried it, and ate tons of rice, but would not eat the stew. My theory is that they had eaten way too much baba ganoush and pita before dinner and were simply no longer hungry. It all worked out, though, because it meant that there were more leftovers for lunches for Braydon and I later in the week! 😉
Wowzas! We’ve got our work cut out for us with the blogiversary blogging we’ve got on the horizon! Just compiling the Top Ten List from the past year will take a big chunk of time. And then there are all those questions! Thanks to all of you who commented and emailed! We have the best blog readers ever! I have to be honest with you, the blogging might be slow in the few days to come. We will get it all out there. But it is just going to take a little while. We’ve got MorMor and MorFar arriving tonight for our Thanksgiving Week (yay!!!!!!). And we’ve got a lot going on here with some big happenings on multiple fronts (which will be blogged about soon). So, I guess this is just to say: THANK YOU! & We’re already composing our answers to your questions (if only in our minds and conversations). Lots of love going out from the J-Ms to our readers!!!!
Never did we think our blogging would evolve to what it has become! Crazy, crazy, crazy, but we’ve been blog-blog-blogging for FOUR years now! I’m posting this late (technically our blogiversary was in October), but, don’t worry, we did not forget…
Let me tell you friends, to celebrate this year we’re going all out!!!!
We’re giving you what [lots of] you have been asking for: OPEN BOOK 2010!
&
We’re asking you for something in return: Our Readers’ Favorite Posts From Our FOURTH Year of Blogging!
This is how it works: Ask us anything (anything!) you want to know, and we’ll try our best to answer every question. Leave your question here in the comments. In return, along with your question, please answer our question to you: What was your favorite J-M blog post from this past year? Any post from November 2009 – today qualifies.
So, 1) leave your question, and 2) leave your favorite post!
Deadline = Sunday, November 21, 12:00 noon EST
Please join in on this! I have to admit that I’m nervous nobody will play along this time around. We see our site stats, so we know that hundreds of people are reading everyday, but we have lots of readers who rarely-or-never comment. Please chime in??!!
{P.S. re: Open Book~~ We’ve done this twice before: first, in August of 2007, then again in August of 2008 (browse the archives on the right sidebar if you want to check those out). Re: Readers’ Favorite Posts~~ We’ve done this every year of our blogging (click here).}
This week was a no swap week for Shalinee and I. It is Kavya’s 5th birthday week– with her school birthday Thursday, and her big at-home dinosaur party (none of us in either family can wait!!!) on Sunday, there was just too much to do this week… swap just couldn’t fit in. And that is totally o.k. because sometimes it just can’t happen, and that is just real life. I did a Food post this week instead (see below). And now… phew!… onto the weekend (it has been quite a week here in J-M-land… lots of movin’ and shakin’ goin’ on… hopefully will be able to post about all that sometime soon…).
This post has been a long time coming. Over the past few years of blogging I’ve had lots and lots of people ask me, “How on earth do you get your kids to eat all those fruits and vegetables?” I hate the thought of sounding like a preachy-know-it-all-Mommy-Blogger, so I’ve put off posting my answer to that. But, at the risk of sounding like a preachy-know-it-all-Mommy-Blogger, here goes—My attempt at a Top 10 List of Our Secrets for Getting Young Kids to Eat Lots of Fruits and Veggies.
- Start them young. We were letting all three of our kids gnaw on fresh fruit and veggies at very young ages. People worry about choking hazards, and rightfully so, but –whenever safely humanly possible— we have tried to let our bambinos eat the real deal as early as it can possibly be introduced. We are big believers in the baby fruit net (here is the one we always used, but there are tons on the market), and we used it early and often for all sorts of fruits and vegetables.
- Raw & fresh. We have always conscientiously worked hard to provide fruits and veggies raw and fresh. That means a lot of time spent cutting and chopping (major hassle), and it also means very high weekly grocery bills (seriously painful!), but it is worth it if it is at all possible (so sadly, and unfortunately, definitely not possible for many families to shell out the required cash; we are grateful that we can prioritize healthy food in this way).
- Eat fruits & veggies in their presence. Young kids mimic us, so we need to model for them. Braydon and I are big on fresh, raw fruits and veggies ourselves, and our kids see us eating it. This is hugely important because they want to do what we’re doing and eat what we’re eating. Fruits and veggies need to be a family affair!
- Make it finger-food/bite-sized. Chop it and slice it and dice it to make it easy to pop in the mouth. This is key as key can be. It is amazing how quickly platters of fruit and veggies will disappear around here if it is “cut” instead of “big” (as K, O, and M call it).
- Make it look good. If we handed them a pear, a banana, and a bunch of blueberries, it just wouldn’t be the same as presenting them with a platter that looks like the picture above (top of post). Braydon and I try to have some fun with this when we can make the time to do it (the photo is a platter that Braydon created one day). I think kids know when we’ve put some heart and soul into things. They appreciate it at some level. And they like it. We’ve been doing beautiful fruit and veggie platters for our kids since they were tiny toddlers. They love it. And don’t we (as adults) too? If it is pretty and colorful it seems a lot more appealing than it otherwise might be.
- Dips. We are big into dips, especially for veggies. And by “dips” around here, we’re generally referring to store-bought salad dressings. Ranch and Thousand Island are favorites for our three. Vinaigrettes too. They also love yogurt for dipping with fruit. And then, of course there is…
- Hummus. And other extras. Such as cheese, crackers, chips & salsa, nuts, etc. to go with a nice spread of fruits and veggies. These things mix it up, make fruits and veggies more fun, and add some breadth and depth and texture… and some good old fashioned protein. A bunch of baby carrots is one thing. A bunch of baby carrots with a nice little bowl of hummus to dip them in is another.
- Fruits & Veggies as “Appetizers.” We are big on the fruit and/or veggie platter as an “hors d’oeuvres.” While I’m making dinner we’ll often put a platter on the counter and the bambinos will go to town! They are hungry, they’re waiting for supper, and before you know it, the fruits and veggies are devoured. This does a couple of things: for one, it gets them to eat fruits and veggies right up front, and it also means that I don’t need to worry as much about serving a salad or vegetable with the meal.
- Buy it in bulk. I know this might sound crazy, but I’ve found that the best produce is at our bulk-club-store (you know… BJ’s, Costco, Sam’s, etc.). Seriously, believe it or not, that’s where I consistently find the best-quality, freshest, best-priced fruits and veggies. And when you’re eating as much of it as we are, buying it in bulk is a great way to go.
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Be as calm, cool, and collected about it as possible. I don’t think I’ve ever put fruits and veggies in front of my kids and said, “EAT IT!” I just act very laid-back about it from beginning to end. I put it out, without saying much about it, and then when it disappears I don’t say much about it either. There’s no big fanfare when they eat it, or when they don’t. I swear, this –playing it cool— is the most important trick in the book. Our approach has been sort of the polar opposite of the “sneak it in”-“hide-it-in-something-they’ll-eat” approach; rather than sneak fruits and veggies in to other things, we’ve been right up front about it from the start. We don’t make a big thing over how “healthy” or “good” fruits and veggies are; rather, we simply give it to them, without batting an eye, as if it were perfectly normal for a 2-year-old to eat raw broccoli and celery sticks. They don’t know otherwise… so they don’t know that, for example, kids are “supposed” to hate peas. And by the time they realize that… it is too late (because they already like peas).
What are your tips and tricks?
Yes, we’re suckers for this sweet little one named Meera Grace. At the end of this month she’ll officially be two and a half. And yes, for better or for worse, we’re still letting her drink bottles. She loves bottles of milk more than anything else (except her bunny; Bunny is her #1). We all know that we’re going to have to cut her off at some point (we’re trying to get the guts up to do it sometime soon), but all four of us are such push-over’s when it comes to our girl, that we dread the day that we eventually go cold turkey even more than she does. In the meantime, she has us wrapped around her little finger… and she knows it.
To be noted! To be recorded in the annals of the J-M Family History! One small step in the grand scheme of their lives, but one giant leap in their twinship! Last week I took K & O shoe shopping for fall shoes… and… drum roll please… THEY EACH CHOSE A DIFFERENT PAIR OF SHOES!!!!!!! This is huge. Huge I tell you! They each independently and self-confidently chose shoes that were different from one another. They each liked their own choice based on what they looked like, and felt like, to their self and their self alone. And they did it happily, together. It was a big first for K & O!
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