Here Comes Peter Cottontail

Well another Easter has come and gone, and I'm actually a little sad about it.  The warm weather, all the bright and cheery colors of the season, and seeing the smiles on our children's faces as they run around in search for all their eggs and then watch as confetti flies all over, is such a wonderful feeling.

We were pretty busy last week prepping for an Easter party, assembling mini Easter baskets, and painting egg shells.  Here's a look at our life last week in pictures - enjoy :)

Goldfish carrots for the mini Easter baskets

Bunny Bait treats I made for an Easter party
Nicholas was invited to - it was delicious!

This picture makes me laugh every timeI see it! It looks like he's
holding on fordear life!

Working on his little egg decorating project

Score! Nicholas came out with a Rice Krispie Treat!  He kept going back for those...
I think he was mesmerized by the shiny, blue wrapper.

As kids, we always colored Easter eggs with food coloring and vinegar, but I always remember hating the smell.  So now, on Pinterest of course, I learned you can color egg shells with Kool-Aid.  So here's Nick's first attempt at it.  Not too bad for a 15-month old :)

Here are the colors we used for his "Kool-Eggs"

I was pretty surprised to see that we didn't make a huge mess!
Nicholas would just color one egg at a time and then
 let me take it out so it could dry.  I was loving how into it he was!

Now we moved up to coloring 3 colors at one time!

And here is his masterpiece

Saturday afternoon, Nicholas went over to his cousin's house for another Easter party and he had a blast.  Another piñata and another egg hunt!! I was a little disappointed that I couldn't make it to the party (my husband and I had bought tickets months before for a concert out of town. At the time of the purchase, I hadn't realized it was on Easter weekend.  But I knew our son was in good hands with my Mom and sister).  

Nicholas waving "hey" with his cousins Kayla & Claire

Piñata time!!

LOL! He's very happy to have found another Easter basket

Confetti in his curls

On Easter Sunday, we were able to get a great picture of Nicholas with his Easter baskets.  I love his madras pants!

And last but not least, here are a few of my favorite shots of Nick all dressed up for his Easter pictures.  Thank you to All Good Productions for these great photos!

I hope everyone had a blessed and memorable Easter! 

Dinner for Three

I have never been much of a cook, not even during my post-college years and I was living on my own.  I think I somehow managed to get by on just cereal and sandwiches.  The Food Network always caught my attention and whatever Giada or The Barefoot Contessa were making always looked delicious, but I never really felt the need to try it for myself.  

Today, I'm blessed to have married someone who could care less if all I made him to eat were pancakes or grilled cheese sandwiches.  My husband is usually the one who cooks in our house if we all want to have a great meal.  But lately, his work schedule has been all kinds of crazy so I've had to get more comfortable in the kitchen - for the sake of our son.  Nine months ago, providing food for our little guy was no problem.  All he needed was pureed first foods, that was such a breeze! I made him applesauce, pears, plums, peaches, mango, pineapple, beets, spinach, carrots, asparagus, sweet potato, peas, avocado - you name it!  If it could be steamed and pureed, our son ate it.  

Our little guy enjoying his pureed peas (July 2011)

But then, he graduated to more textured food and needed meats incorporated into his diet.  This is where it got tricky.  Pureeing beef was just gross - it would come out chalky, smelled funny, and just didn't have a good flavor and then the chicken was just too dry.  I ended up buying stage 3 meals from Plum Organics and now Sprout and that just made life so much easier.  And now, since he mainly eats table food, we have become more mindful of what we eat because he wants to eat what we eat.  We've only fed our son organic fruits, veggies, meats, and dairy since he was 6 months old so we've now incorporated that into our own diets. 

Now let me tell you, if you haven't hopped on the Pinterest band wagon, you must! Pinterest has saved my family! I find such great tasting and easy recipes all the time.  I love that the ingredient list is short and is mostly stuff that you already have in your pantry.  Last Friday, in observation of Lent, I made Shrimp Sandwiches with Chipotle Avocado Mayonnaise.  These sandwiches were amazing! The avocado mayonnaise really added flavor to the meal.  The only downside here, not enough for seconds...boo :(

Then on Sunday, because I didn't want the leftover avocado mayonnaise to go to waste, we made these Slow Cooker Chicken Caesar Sandwiches.  Again, another great lunch!  It's such a great feeling to know my husband and son are well fed and love the food they're eating.   

Last night was another seafood special night.  This time, I made Crab Cake Stuffed Shrimp along with Baked Tilapia with Spinach, Tomatoes, and Herbs and a side of asparagus.  Both were great recipes for all of us to enjoy.

Slowly but surely I'm liking this whole idea of cooking, sometimes it's not so bad but then other times I get discouraged when what I make doesn't come out looking like the picture from the recipe.  Oh well, at least I have the encouragement from my husband and even if it tastes bad, he'll say it's delicious with a big smile on his face.