Watermelon Cake and Movie in the Yard (Year 2)

To see my first post on movies in the yard and watermelon cake, go here.

For my aunt's annual movie in the yard night, I was asked to make another watermelon cake. My first one was such fun, I was absolutely ready to do another one. Watermelon cakes have exploded in popularity and it's such fun to see how simple fruits turn into beautiful creations.

I ran into a serious setback this year. I cut open my watermelon, which I had spent entirely too long selecting, and found this.

Rotten. Ick. It was nothing but mush inside. When I went to shift it, half the insides went splat on the floor. I'm sure I said a word or two my daughters hopefully didn't hear.

After a quick phone call and a replacement watermelon, I got the rest of the fruit ready since I'd assemble the cake at my auntie's house. 

I can't remember where I got these cookie cutters, but I use them all the time to cut sandwiches and fruit into cute shapes. They're a hard plastic that takes the abuse of thick food. I figured out that if I sliced the cantaloupe from the outside headed inwards, I got slices that were big enough to do several shapes at a time.

As I was putting the cake together people started arriving so it was kind of fun to answer questions. I threw a bit of this and that wherever looked good while I was chatting. For this cake I used a little over half a watermelon and we still had leftover slices.

Sage Muffin was determined to get some of the fruit as I was putting it together. She'd wiggle in between my legs and the counter to push me away and then try to climb up to get to the cake. Lily was off and running as usual and I don't think I got a single picture of that girl the whole night. 

So there you have it. Watermelon cake version 2.0. It was delicious and the younger kids loved the skewers of fruit. Sage ate berries and watermelon and cheetos until I thought she'd be sick. Lily spent the entire movie whispering and eating candy with her cousins. There was tubs of popcorn and pickled cucumbers and fresh garden veggies and.. and...too much food. Too much delicious, tasty food.

Due to nasty weather, the movie was not actually on the yard. Instead we all loaded into the garage. It was kind of cozy. 

It doesn't look like it in this picture, but there was quite a few of us! (You can see my rainbow bag on the floor next to my chair! It fit two blankets, diapers, some yarn, and a couple other things!) We watched Wreck-It-Ralph. There is one line that just makes me snicker every time. "All right ladies! The kitten whispers and tickle fights stop now!" Hee hee hee. If that doesn't make you at least snort, I don't know what to do with you. 

Much fun, much food, and late nights. It was the perfect end to summer. I start school on Monday....

I have linked this post to Craft-o-Maniac Monday Inspiration Gallery Look What I made Wednesday!

Random Roundup: what I've been up to.

Those of you bloggers out there who do this regularly in the summer have my deepest respect! It's tough to fit in. I have five million things to blog about, but no time. So, I'm doing a roundup of things I have been wanting to blog about.

#1: My dreadlocks are now 4 years old! Happy dreadiversary!



I'm kind of to the point where I want to cut them. I have to do so in 6 months anyway, and I'm really loving on short hairstyles right now. Dreads are hot, yo. I'm waffling. I would keep them forever if I knew I could, but teaching with dreadlocks in my area is probably as possible as Lily eating broccoli. So now that I know I have to cut them, I want to cut them when I want to, not when I have to. And yes, I'm listening to how much sense I'm not making. I think it's time to break out some funky dye and do something wild. When in doubt, add a rainbow. That's my motto.

#2: Colored. Ice cubes.



I randomly saw this on pinterest and can't remember who had the original idea to credit. I threw some neon food dye in a batch of star shaped ice cubes and let the kids play with them in the pool. They were so entertained I was able to read a whole chapter in my book. That's rare during the monsters being awake portion of the day. You should probably put kiddos in older swimsuits in case of staining.

#3: The coolest mushroom in existence.



It's called a lionhead mushroom. It's furry. And delicious with a bunch of other mushrooms in mushroom risotto.

#4: ANT INFESTATION.



I feel like a mass murderer lately. They just won't. stop. coming. out. of my front porch. Normally I'm a let live type, but it's gross and Sage sits there and tries to eat them. Ugg. I have kids and dogs and can't use chemicals.  Tried a gazillion non-chemical remedies. Verdict? Soapy dishwater and cornmeal. Worked amazingly. My walkway is covered with the little ant bodies. (Note to self: spray off the walkway.)

#5: Lily left us last week. So Sage decided to practice for when she gets her Hogwarts letter.



She crawled into one of Dad's shirts and grabbed my wand off the bookshelf. Much hilarity ensued.

#6: Sage also had her first painting session! She painted almost as much as she ate the paint.



I simply put food dye into corn syrup. Once her masterpiece dried, I sprayed it with some top coat and I'm going to frame it for our wall. Clean up was not easy, but the rainbow colored water did look pretty.

#7: I made another baby shower gift. This time it was an owl lovey. Turned out super cute. It even rattled! Working on writing the pattern for it, possibly to share later.



#8: I wore makeup. Haha. I nearly made it to 60 days makeup free! Oh well. It was date night and the Hubster got all fancy, so I did too. I forgot how much fun makeup is when it's not a daily chore!!



So there you go. What we've been up to lately, if you leave out about half the stuff we're doing. Hehe. Who agrees with me that there needs to be at least two more hours added to the day?

Anyone?

Anyone?

Foodie Tutorial Tryout: Chicken Broccoli Bread Braid

Have you seen all of the braided stuffed bread deliciousness happening on Pinterest lately?? I'm not quite sure why, but I'm loving this idea. Delicious carb goodness, no? It's just cool to me that people came up with the idea to shove whatever they want to eat inside bread and then bake it all together. Plus, the braids are pretty!

I keep finding new ideas to try out.

 (Links are to original websites with recipes!)

There's the Ham Breakfast Braid... no longer must I shovel my omlette on my toast and have my husband look at me like I'm crazy!

The Taco Bread Braid... which uses cream cheese. Could be fabulous.

 There's Braided Spaghetti... no need for extra garlic bread! NOM!

And finally, the one that looked really good to me.

 The Broccoli Cheddar Chicken Braid. Because when you put cheese and brocolli together, magic happens. 

So I had to try that one first. Verdict? DELICIOUS. I must now try ALL THE BRAIDS.

I did fiddle the above recipe a bit. I made it even better. Ha. Instead of mayo (blech!) I used ranch. I also used an Italian herb mix instead of just rosemary and put fresh Parmesan cheese and minced garlic in my egg wash. 

So you'll notice I didn't braid my bread. Two reasons.

 1) I had a toddler who was beating my leg with her plastic spoon. It's her way of saying "Feed me!!!" Even though she had just eaten blueberries, string cheese, and some pasta noodles. When there is food about, Sage Muffin will sniff it out and demand a bite. Apparently, I was starving her by making her wait 30 minutes between meals.

2) Whoever said that doing these braids with crescent roll dough was easy must have been entirely too optimistic. The perforations in the doll did not simply "press together." Also, it took two rolls of that stuff. I don't know how anyone could have enough dough using one roll to lay ingredients on and then braid. In the future, I'll use a bread dough.

One other thing I did and you should too. Buy pre-cooked, shredded chicken in the deli section of your grocery store. Because seriously, who has time to cook chicken, shred it, and THEN make dinner!? Not me.

It made a huge loaf and it was soooooo good. Braided (sort of) Breaded Chickeny Cheesy Broccoli goodness. I've also made the Spaghetti Braid, but gave it away as a meal for a family, so I haven't taste tested that one yet. Maybe for next week. I've also heard that if wrapped in foil and plastic wrap correctly, these freeze very well. 

I'm participating in my first freezer food exchange next month and I think this will be one of the three dishes I use. Is it weird I'm excited to do a food exchange? School is only a month away, so I need to start stocking pre-made, easy food now so that my kids don't end up eating hot dogs every night for dinner. 

Let me know if you come across any other braided recipes! I'm obsessed! 

Not Your Mama's Stroganoff Recipe.

I have actually have some time to play with recipes again!! Woot!

This was a huge hit with three out of four of us in the house... (keep in mind Lily's a bird eater.) We love mushroom stroganoff, but it was time to try something new. This recipe also has the distinction of being my first gluten-free recipe! 

Now one of my ingredients comes from Mom's Place at www.momsplaceglutenfree.com. I'm not shamelessly plugging them or anything, but if you have gluten intolerance, they're a good place to find flours, bread mixes, and in this case, cream of whatever soups. Also, the lemon bars rock. I have a family member who has celiac disease, so it's fun to try and use new ingredients to make recipes that are safe for her to eat.

Anyhoo. This is great for getting veggies into your family's tummy. It has 3 types of veggies. Well, four if you count onions. It doesn't look very pretty... but it tastes SO good. I promise. On to the recipe!!

Not Your Mama's Stroganoff

Ingredients:

1 pound hamburger (I use 97/3% lean so there's no need to drain grease)

1 onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

1/2 head cauliflower, chopped (about 2 cups)

1 red pepper, chopped

1 small can sliced mushrooms (or chopped fresh button mushrooms)

1 package Mom's Place gluten-free cream of mushroom soup mix (or equivalent)

1 small 8 oz. container sour cream

salt and pepper to taste

steamed rice (if desired)

Saute the onion, garlic, peppers, and cauliflower until onions are translucent. Add the hamburger to brown. Season with salt and pepper. Add mushrooms. 

Once hamburger is browned, add cream of mushroom soup mix. I also added the water called for on the package. 

Once you've got things heated to bubbling, turn heat down to a simmer or off if you plan to serve right away. Add the sour cream. It's going to get soup-like, but that's what you want for serving over the rice. If you want to reduce any liquid, let it heat through a bit more before turning the temp down. 

You're ready to serve this yummy stuff over rice or eat as is! We were out of rice so we just threw it on a plate and went to down. It was really tasty and pretty quick. Only took about 20 minutes to make. Some options for changing this up could be different soup mix flavors, different veggies, or perhaps a ground turkey rather than hamburger. This is really easy to personalize to what you need!

I hope you enjoy it! If you try my recipe, I would love to hear your experiences in the comments! 

Happy eating!

Solid Food Sage Monster, Volume 2

To read Solid Food Sage Monster Volume 1, click here.

So the Saga of Solid Food continues. :) Now if you've met my baby girl, you know she's an eater. It's her favorite thing in the world to do. Since we've started doing solid foods, she's grumpy if people are eating around her and she's not getting any. She's also messy. We gave up trying to feed her in clothes after one shot. I do more loads of bibs than any other laundry. Ha. 

So, in SFSM V.1, I mentioned that we had tried rice cereal. We have since stopped using rice cereal and switched to oatmeal. She was having potty issues, tummy problems, and general crankiness. In searching for the answer, I found info that stated that some pediatricians think that rice cereal is BAD for babies. Apparently, "it's not that different from giving babies a spoonful of sugar." (You can read the article here.) So we waited a few days and tried oatmeal and she loves it. Oatmeal might not be a good idea if there's a history of gluten intolerance in your family, but we're fine there. All of the problems have been alleviated. If you're interested in more info on the rice cereal issue, read this or this or this.

The list of accepted foods is growing. Sage still chomps on sweet potatoes like they're candy. We've also added apples, bananas, avocado, carrots, watermelon, and pears. She wasn't so sure about the avocado alone, but with pears, she loves it. Carrots didn't go over well the first time, but it was an organic jar of food because we were out to Grandma's house. They tasted nasty and bitter. If I wouldn't eat it, I'm not making my baby eat it. 

Luckily, I got my first Bountiful Basket this week and it had carrots so I can make Sagey Poo some yummy fresh food. As a side note, if you don't get bountiful baskets, I require you to immediately click on the link I've kindly provided and participate. 

See this lovely array of fruits and veggies? $15 dollars for all. It's all amazing quality and fresh. It filled up a laundry basket. Bountiful Baskets is a food co-op. You participate by contributing a weekly fee on a Monday and then pick up your produce the following Saturday. Every couple of times, you volunteer and help them sort and what not. Easy peasy. Seriously, go to the website. Learn. Enjoy. You're welcome.

Okay, winding back on topic now....

I've been making baby food like a mad woman this past week. It all started, as good stories often do, when my husband brought me home 9 baked sweet potatoes from his work. I had asked him to bring a "few" home since they throw them out anyway because I wanted to try my hand at making baby food. He brought 9. NINE! So I got out my blender/food processor Bullet thingy, peeled some sweets, and away I went. 

It's a bit of a messy process, but quick enough that in 20 minutes I had two ice cube trays full of pureed sweet potato goodness ready to pop in the freezer. If you're looking for a great set of instructions and pretty pictures, head to Rust & Sunshine's post about it. The picture below is from her blog and gives you an idea of what you'll end up with.

Photo from Rust & Sunshine

Besides sweet potatoes, I have made plums, apples, apples and prunes (dried plums) mixed, peaches, and more sweet potatoes. Tomorrow, I'm all set up to make carrots and peas. I have also spent more hours than I care to admit looking at baby food recipes on Wholesome Baby Food. Since Sage likes her new high chair and will happily watch me while playing with her toys, I can whip up a batch or two pretty quickly.

All together, I have 112 one ounce cubes of baby food prepared. That is over a month of meals for Sage as she usually eats two cubes, twice a day. Overall cost? About 10 dollars. Since the organic jars of baby food run about $.80, I have saved $35.00. Can't beat it. Word to the wise though, use a good sharpie marker to label your bags of food. I had a DUH moment and used a water based marker. Haha. Luckily, I remembered what was what. 

I still had SIX sweet potatoes left to deal with. Honestly, what was the man thinking? I had sweet potato for lunch two days in a row and made a pie. I finally had to admit defeat and throw out the last three. You win sweets, you win.

One last thing, if you don't have one of these nifty food keepers for your baby, get one. Now. I'll wait.

Did you get one? Good.

Sage LOVES when I put one of the frozen cubes of baby food in this. She'll happily gnaw on it until there is nothing left. It's also how we fed her watermelon. Boy howdy, did she like that. She hasn't quite figured out the hand coordination required to hold and eat at the same time, but luckily, she has a patient mama who will hold it for her if need be.

Whew. What a novel. If you made it this far, thanks for reading!!!

Watermelon cake and movies in the yard.

When I saw the all fruit cake over at See My Footprints, I fell in love. What an amazing alternative to sugar and frosting. It's been pinned so many times, but I couldn't really find anyone else who had tried it!

When my aunt asked me to bring a treat for her Movie in the Yard night, I knew what I was going to make.

Movie in the Yard night is a winner of an idea for some summer evening fun. It's like the drive-in, only on lawn chairs and blankets. They had a projector and screen set up complete with popcorn, candy, and other yummy snacks. We watched Despicable Me, a movie I will never get tired of.

"It's so fluffy, I'm gonna DIE!!!"

*snicker*

Anyway, so here's my cake made of watermelon and other assorted fruity magic.

The cake done at See My Footprints had the rind removed, but because there was going to be lots of kids and dark, I decided to leave the rind on. I also wanted it all sliced for ease of snacking. So I sliced a whole seedless watermelon and then rearranged the slices in staggered tiers just to make it look pretty. I used strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, cantaloupe, and kiwi to decorate my cake.

As you can see, it was a little lopsided. I messed with it forever and just finally gave up. So the advice from me would be to make sure you cut your slices really, really straight. Doing the decorating was seriously the best. I think I ate as much fruit as I put on  the cake because it was all so fresh and tasty.

Lily helped me cut out the cantaloupe shapes. I found some plastic flower and heart cookie cutters in two sizes that I had bought to fancy up her peanut butter sandwiches. (Side note: has anyone else noticed that a simple PB&J with a bag of chips is not a cool enough lunch anymore? I should have never shown Lily the lunches over at Meet the Dubiens.)  As long as the melon wasn't more than about 3/4 inches thick, they handled it just fine and Lily could help. I would love to find some smaller cookie cutters that would work for the kiwis. 

I had absolutely no plan when it came down to a "design" for the cake. I am, and always will be, a woman who works better just winging it. The key here, is lots and lots of toothpicks. Which was handy because people re-used them as they were picking off fruit. I probably went a bit overboard with the toothpicks, but only because I had to transport the cake in the car and I did NOT want anything falling apart. 

It was a total hit. I was told it was adorable, a wonderful option for those on diets, and that I was very talented. Seriously, all the compliments were making my head swell. See My Footprints did her cake for her child's 1st birthday as an alternative to real cake, which I think is so very smart. Although, I do love a good messy toddler playing in cake at a party. There are several other versions of cakes that she has done as well. Check them out!

And there you have it. Watermelon "cake" that tastes delicious. I love finding new recipes and foodie projects for big group get togethers. With a huge family, it's good to have these things in your back pocket! ;) If you ever need a summer party idea, I'm telling you, try the movie outside idea. All you need is a projector and something to use as a screen. Oh, but watch out for ditches. Haha. Some of the boys were catching frogs and I suddenly had a very muddy, very wet Lily on my hands shortly before the movie started.   I was lucky to have an aunt who was nice enough to run home and grab a change of clothes so Lily didn't freeze. It wouldn't be a night out if Lily didn't do something crazy!

I have linked this post to...

   

Solid Food Sage Monster

So we have started the Solid Food Adventure in my house. Miss Sagey Poo is taking to solid food like her sister takes to chocolate bars. It's a pure love.

I knew we were good to go with rice cereal, because we tried it a month or two back. Her tummy got upset so we held off on trying anything else, but there were no allergy issues. So this week, we've tried applesauce and sweet potatoes so far. It's kind of hard to wait 3 days between each food! It's so exciting, we want to just barrel ahead. Sage is now under the impression that a food utensil going towards a mouth should be heading in the direction of her mouth, so I think it's excitement all around.

I did buy some canned baby food, the organic Albertson's brand. The more and more I think about this new foodie journey though, the more I'm leaning towards making Sage's baby food. Have you tasted baby food? It's nasty. It's bland. I want Sage to like carrots, not something that once upon a time tasted like carrots. Not to mention, even with organic food, do we REALLY know what goes into those jars of baby food? (Now I sound like my paranoid hubster.)

This article has some pretty interesting info on baby food. Namely, that bland, gross canned food may not be the way to go. I love the idea of spicing baby food. On the off chance that it helps to make her less of a picky eater, I will dive right in. We all know how I would love to have a child who isn't a picky eater.

The underlying reason behind me making my own baby food? I want to be more involved as a mama. I made a promise to myself that when Sage was born, it would be different than the mess I found myself in when Lily was a peanut. I was young and had no idea what I was doing! While I realize that's true of all first time parents, my views on parenting from then to now have completely done a 180. I've promised myself to be more educated and less go with the flow because it's popular or EASY type of parent. I'm implementing more art and less TV with Lily as a way to connect with her. Making Sage her morning and evening snacks gives me that same type of connection. It also provides some serious satisfaction that as a mama, I've taken the time to care more and hurry less.

I'll let you know more as I get into this food making journey and we'll see if the costs outweigh the benefits. It could be that I end up scrapping it because it takes time away from both my girls. It could end up actually being more expensive. Who knows?

Here's some more info on homemade baby food:

Rust & Sunshine has a lovely post with easy instructions and pictures regarding her homemade baby food.
Weelicious has every baby food recipe you could ever want.
Wholesome Baby Food has some fantastic tips and techniques.

"Mom, that's gross!" And other things I hear at meal times...

My picky eater Lily has struck again. A half hour long fight led to her eating corn dogs and jello for dinner AGAIN.

I worry about this eating problem of hers like a dog gnawing on a bone. Her doctor says that she's fine as long as she is on a vitamin supplement. She's not underweight, or undernourished, but man I would love for her to eat a fresh damn orange or a salad.Attempts to coax her to try new things end up in fights, tears, and her just not eating. That whole "this is dinner and if you don't eat you go hungry" idea doesn't work in my house because she literally will go hungry. It's been suggested that if we are that concerned about her, we should start thinking about an occupational therapist for food, which I didn't even know was an option. Who knew?

 I keep telling myself that age old parental advice: "She'll grow out of it." Some days I think that is true and she surprises me by eating something. The other day I went to Jamba Juice and she loved the smell of the place. I got a smoothie and she ended up sharing it with me. I am now buying stock in that company. She wouldn't drink smoothies last time we tried them. Another new development is that she'll eat cheese pizza now. Before it was just breadsticks - as long as there was no seasoning on them.

Other days, I feel like she's getting worse. And let me tell you, it is exhausting trying to figure out Lily dinner and make a meal for Nic and me. She won't eat any vegetables. None. I can try and hide them, call them something different, give her ultimatums, still nothing.

Her list of acceptable food items goes something like this:
chicken nuggets or cooked chicken breasts as long as there is nothing but salt seasoning them.
Steak, but only if it's Grandma's.
French fries.
Hot dogs or corn dogs
Applesauce, pears, sometimes mandarin oranges.
Apples (with peanut butter), bananas, maybe a few grapes, but no other fresh fruit.
Cereal, but only if it's Lucky Charms.
Peanut butter: this she eats by the spoonfuls. PB sandwiches with no jam, honey, or anything else. If peanut butter ever becomes illegal, my daughter is going to starve.
Cheese, but only string cheese. No grilled cheese sandwiches for my girl.
Bacon. Scramble eggs. Pancakes.

I may be forgetting one or two things, but that's about it. I offer and offer and offer new choices, but most of the time all I get is, "EW! That's disGUSTing!"

She'll grow out of it...


Do you have a picky eater? Any advice?