Muffin Tin Monday: Birthday Hangover

This weekend was birthday weekend (see below)! My husband and daughter have back-to-back birthdays, so there was a lot of bad eating this past week. For MTM I decided to do a healthy "hangover" meal. Fiber One Cereal, Applesauce, and an Egg.

Menu for this week!

This week I'm going to be using meals from Eating Well's Website. I started playing around and looking at the meal plans and thought we could use a week of healthier eating after birthday week (both my husband and daughter!). Here is the plan.

Monday:
Roasted Vegetable Pasta

Tuesday:
Winter Squash Risotto With Spinach Salad

Wednesday: Chicken and Sweet Potato Fries (I'll be out late so I'll eat leftovers and fries when I get home).

Thursday: Tabbouleh with Grilled Vegetables
Quick-cooking barley, Steamed Cauliflower (3/4 cup)

Friday: Shrimp Caesar Salad

Saturday: Smoky Corn and Black Bean Pizza
Butternut Squash Soup


Sunday: Hot Chile Grilled Cheese Sandwich and Homemade Tomato Soup

For Breakfast (at least a couple of days this week) my daughter and I will be having these Banana Berry Smoothies!

For Lunch I'll be making this Chickpea Stew to eat throughout the week.

Third Birthday

My older daughter Ginny turned three today and we had a Breakfast Birthday Party today. It was perfect. Everyone came over around 10, they played (and ate) like crazy, and everyone was gone (and ready for naps) by 12:30. We did a "These are a few of my favorite things" theme: Here are some pictures!

Here is the invite!


The Party Table:


Food Close Ups!




Monkey Bread (Instead of Cake):


Here are the recipes I used!

Donut Muffins: The most liked recipe


Blueberry Muffins: Very cupcake like, and quite good.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins: Also, very good, a bit dense.

Monkey Bread for the Cake! No cream cheese glaze, I drizzled vanilla baking chips (melted) over the cake for visual impact.

Hash brown Casserole: I don't use the soup, instead make a roux and add a little extra milk. Also, I mixed in 2 eggs.

Meal Plan Monday

Monday: Clean out the fridge soup
Tuesday: Chicken Tenders
Wednesday: ???????
Thursday: No idea, suggestions?
Friday: Lentil Soup and Biscuits
Saturday: Tilapa w/ couscous
Sunday: Homemade Pasta

MTM: A day at the Movies

Today we have a video MTM because my husband has the camera! We didn't focus on a single movie, more a day at the movies and our favorite movie snacks!

Recipes from this week!

Here are some of the things we made this week!

Blueberry Cinnamon Rolls!
http://annies-eats.com/2010/07/14/blueberry-cinnamon-rolls/
These were great. But instead of milk in the icing, I used lemonade because I LOVE the blueberry-lemon flavor combination!

Blueberry Pancakes!
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Blueberry-Flax-Pancakes/Detail.aspx
This is my new go-to pancake recipe. It is delicious and pretty healthy. I used Quaker pancake mix which is great because it is whole grain, but works really well in this recipe.

Homemade Falafel!
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Seans-Falafel-and-Cucumber-Sauce/Detail.aspx
So good, I made it with homemade pitas from this months Vegetarian Times.

Pictures of the Pitas!


Peach Jam and Butter:
The large jars are jam the short are butter!


Peach-Blueberry Upside Down Cake!
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Plum-Blueberry-Upside-Down-Cake/Detail.aspx
Subbed peaches for plums!


Mountain Mix (we went for a hike at a local mountain, so we made this as a snack!)


Most of it made it to the mountain!


And this Garlic Summer Squash, which was amazing!
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Garlicky-Summer-Squash-and-Fresh-Corn/Detail.aspx

Meal Plan Monday

Here is our plan for the week, I will post recipes and pictures throughout the week!

Monday: Chicken Pot Pie, Homemade Applesauce
Tuesday: Pizza on the Grill, Fruit
Wednesday: Homemade Falafel and Homemade Pita Bread, Salad, Fruit
Thursday: Salmon, Quiona, Steamed Vegetables
Friday: Festival
Saturday: Veggie Quiche, Applesauce
Sunday: Fajita Burritos

Back from baby break

So, towards the end of my pregnancy I quit posting, and as of today our new daughter is 10 weeks old. I've been cooking quite a bit, but it is hard to get a moment to blog. So, here are a few things I've made.

MTM: Eating a Rainbow

For Muffin Tin Monday this week I made a "Rainbow Soup." We had so much great produce in all different colors, and I just really wanted some Vegetable soup in the house. We then played "I spy" with the colors and talked about the different vegetables. They are red, green and yellow peppers, corn, celery, asparagus (which the tips have blue/purple tint but it fades to the solid green with cooking) and zucchini. Oh, and of course, my daughter's favorite CARROTS! On the side I served crackers (boring white!) and half a pear, the other half was eaten by me and enjoyed by my unborn little one who is now wiggling all around.

Here are the pictures.

Muffin Tin(?) Monday: No theme

So, this idea took almost no effort and delighted the two year old SO much! I took 6 of her plastic eggs and filled them with food. 4 with Cheerios and 2 with special treats (chocolate covered cranberries and a gummy worm). Then placed the eggs in an egg carton. She caught me when I pulled out the camera and instantly dove into the meal. Here are some pictures.

MTM: A Day at the Beach

For MTM there was no theme so we did a beach/ocean theme. Why? Because we are planning a little vacation this week and are really excited. No one is more excited than the two-year old, which has caused a bit of a problem. Every so often, she grabs her sand bucket and says, "time to go to the beach," and we have to say, "not for a little while honey." In the past 24 hours (since we bought the beach bucket) we've had this conversation no less than 20 times.

Our meal was more of a snack time thing as well. Here are fish swimming in the ocean Jello (blue Jello with Swedish Fish). Fishing poles and bait (pretzel sticks and a gummy worm). And Sand dollar crackers (Ritz with peanut butter and then a crushed ritz sprinkled on top. Lines cut to look like sand dollar.)







And today an added bonus of an art project. S is for Seashell.

Muffin Tin Monday, Green!

So, St. Partick's Day is this week and MTM's theme is GREEN! As a bonus we actually used a muffin tin this week.

Here is our meal!

Peanut Butter, Pickles, Green Popcorn
Green Apples, Broccoli, and Green Powerade (watered down)



The only thing I really made was this green popcorn!


Recipe:
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
1/2 Tbs butter
Green Food Coloring

1 Bag Microwave Popcorn

Heat oven to 200 degrees
Pop the popping corn according to package instructions.
Heat the other ingredients to a boil and boil for three minutes.
Pour hot mixture over the popcorn on a baking pan and mix.
Cook for about 10 minutes until popcorn hardens a bit.

Yellow Themed Breakfast

Took the theme for MTM, but didn't use a muffin tin...again. I think the issue is that either a muffin tin OR a theme is plenty for my daughter, so I usually don't mix them together. Here is our very yellow breakfast!

Good Morning Sunshine Eggs:


Cheese with eggs on top.

Yummy Yellow Smoothie:


Now we're really going through a smoothie kick so here's what I do. I take a yogurt (in this case Horizon Organics Banana Sweet Potato Little Blends) and add about 1/3 packet of No Sugar Added Vanilla Instant Breakfast and fill the glass (or sippy cup) up with milk. Today I added some yellow food coloring to get the color and a yellow straw for kicks. We often use the Horizon strawberry carrot yogurt to make Pink Ink Yink Drink!

Overall, very healthy and filling meal!!

Dr. Seuss Day!

For Dr. Seuss Day we decided to have Pink Ink Yink Drink for breakfast, but I've already posted about that, so I thought we'd try something new as well. I came up with this idea a little too late the last time we did a Dr. Seuss theme, but knew his birthday was coming up so I held on to it. But, I forgot, luckily the husband is a teacher and mentioned borrowing some books from our little one so I did get to do this on the right day!

Here is our Dr. Seuss pizza.

We had a ton of fun. First I made a crust (mommy job) and then I made it into a hat. I threw it in the oven for about 10 minutes, and then we put on the toppings. The little one made a huge mess spreading on the sauce, but had a lot of fun. Then she sprinkled on the cheese which she LOVED! After that I put down some red bell pepper strips to outline the stripes and then let my little one fill in the red areas with peppers and the white areas with onions. Then we popped it in the oven and waited for our perfect pizza! YUMMY!!

Slideshow above!

MTM: No Theme...Tea Party!

Because there was no theme for MTM, we choose to have a tea party. I planned to use tins, but they just didn't fit with the party.

So here is our table set up.


The Food, muffins, banana scones and cantaloupe on a stick!


Oh, and here is a picture of the one heart scone I made just to try it out. I think it is pretty cute!


We did have actual tea because my daughter is weird and LOVES tea...but apple juice is a nice replacement if your kid isn't a tea drinker.

MTM: Orange

My daughter read the book Yoko by Rosemary Wells and became OBSESSED with sushi. So, we were doing sushi for awhile. I really wanted to get some chopsticks but couldn't find them except on-line with a crazy shipping fee. Well, we found them!! And fitting today's theme, my kiddo happened to choose orange octopus chopsticks. Here is our orange menu.

We had noodles and carrots with "special (soy) sauce." We also had some cheese and water in our new water bottle.



Here you can see the chopsticks!



Oh, and this little gem was only orange on the inside. What a special surprise!

Ice Cream for Breakfast!

Last week my daughter was sick. When she was sick as a baby all she'd do is eat, eat, EAT! Now, it is almost impossible to get her to eat when she is sick. So, I made her an ice cream sundae for breakfast. The best thing is I didn't feel at all guilty about giving this to her. The ice cream was just a frozen banana and some milk mixed in the food processor until smooth. I threw in some strawberries, one of her favorites. I did add a little chocolate syrup and whipped cream, but it wasn't much and she ate it up. This "ice cream" does melt fast though, so be prepared!

MTM: Red Theme

So, we went off the theme a bit today, but for very good reason. Today was the last day that Clifford (and his exhibit) was at the Children's Museum and daddy was off work for President's Day. So, we went to the museum to say good bye and play a lot. When we got home, I remembered MTM but didn't have much time. So, I improvised. Daddy and Baby Girl loved what I came up with, I thought it could have been better, but am learning that my audience is pretty easy to impress.

Here is my Clifford Quesadilla. A small (used a biscuit sized cutter to cut the tortilla) cheese quesadilla (colored red with edible marker), with marshmallow eyes and nose (colored in with edible marker), drawn on face and Red Pepper ears. Oh, and on a plate, no muffin tin.



Then, it was time for nap, but after nap we had this little gem of a recipe. I made strawberry sorbet (Clifford Ice Cream, of course!) by putting frozen strawberries, yogurt and a bit of sugar into my food processor. And processing until smooth! YUMMY!

Valentine's Week

This week has been all about Valentine's Day. I'm planning to wrap up Valentine's Week on Saturday for the boo, so that it doesn't feel like we're leaving her on a special day when we go out on Sunday. Although Grandma is coming over which means she'll probably bring something special for the special day.

Yesterday we made Valentine Monster cookies. I made the dough and she mixed in the M&Ms and Chocolate Chips. A job I normal don't share because the mouth to bowl ratio almost always becomes one-to-one. But, it happened, and it was fine because it was special.

Here she is dumping/eating the M&Ms.


Stirring


And then she put them on the pan which took too much help for me to take pictures. But, here is the finished project...don't they just look extra cute because they look like a 2-year old made them!


For lunch today we had Jam-Filled French Toast and Heart-Shaped Strawberries.

Happy Birthday Kitty!

My daughter is currently obsessed with the concept of Birthdays. So, it wasn't all that surprising when she decided last week that Kitty (her stuffed Kitty and security item) needed a birthday party. We decided to go with it and invited over her cousin and grandma. We served Tuna Melts, cheesy potatoes, blueberries, goldfish crackers and goldfish graham crackers. It was so fun and cute and she ate everything because there was an air of excitement that it was a party. Oh, and because the kitty needed some cake, we made cake balls (from bakerella.com) that looked like kitties. I always get critical when they don't turn out like I want them to, but then I remember my audience (in this case a 1 year old, a two year old and a stuffed cat) and that usually gets me to relax.

Above is a slideshow of our PARTY!

MTM "No me want watch sports. Me want eat football food"

Ah, the things kids say! Yesterday, my daughter looked and me and said, "No me want watch sports. Me want eat football food." So, at least she was interested in the important part of the game. Me, I blame my husband. I love sports and so does she. But, she enjoys playing, and not so much watching. So, here is her Muffin Tin Monday, which we did Sunday with a Football Food theme.

Yellow Peppers, Tortillas, Green Peppers, and mini-hotdogs. I only have action shots because my husband doesn't understand the whole, taking pictures thing, so he gave the tin to her while I was grabbing the camera.