my oldest is his daddy

I'll definitely post more photos tomorrow but in the meantime, check out this photo of my Robert from this past weekend at the river house...

yes, it's from behind BUT when did he get to be such a little boy...no shoes, shorts with the long sleeve shirt, the new haircut, and a soccer ball...he is his father....am I alone in this thought?

another week of yummy

Here we go...another week of yummy food that my TODDLER ACTUALLY ATE.

Sunday: leftovers, nothing exciting

Monday: Fish Sticks and roasted potatoes
There are tons of recipes out there for fish sticks, I used tilapia and after dipping in the egg wash, covered in breadcrumbs with Parmesan and old by before baking them alongside the potatoes. I semi followed this recipe for potatoes
I just made the potatoes the way I always roast them (400 degrees for 40 minutes, coated in olive oil first and then butter halfway thru), then tossed them with the Parmesan and bacon afterwards...AMAZING.

Tuesday: Pork and pineapple fried rice
I used some leftover pork and just made this fried rice recipe, adding in pineapple..so so easy and yummy.

Wednesday: chick fil-a because I played at Crump Park too long with my amazing friend Holly and her two sweet daughters..she snapped some pretty amazing photos of our two oldest little ones, just waiting to snag them from her.

Thursday: Dinner at the Szy household, tilapia (again...so healthy this week) and asparagus risotto...my mom's a good cook.

Friday: leftover pizza because my Robert was out of town with his grandparents and when the toddlers away his parents get lots of house work done instead of going out to dinner like normal kid-free parents.

Saturday: to be honest, I'm not sure we ate dinner...can't even remember since we were so engrossed in painting and building.

Here are a few photos for my mother in law:

this is the scene most of the time at our home these days...Joshua staring at Robert, wanting to be doing whatever his brother is doing:

or this...who knows what was going on really
here's my big 8 month old too:)

bean burgers explained

This is for my sweet friend Jill, and hopefully at least one other person:)


After reading lots and lots of recipes for comparison and suggestion, here's what I did:
1 C peas and carrots
1/2 C butternut squash
2 Tbs of pesto (pre-portioned from the freezer)
1 Tbs Worcestershire
1 Tbs Dijon Mustard
3Tbs yogurt
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp paprika
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup oats
1/4 cup breadcrumbs
1/4 cup flaxseed
1 can black beans (I happen to use pre-portioned frozen but it was about one can's worth), mashed

1. Heated the frozen vegetables in the microwave and then threw them in my vitamix.

2. Added pesto, yogurt, onion powder, paprika, chili powder, cinnamon then had my sous chef turn the vitamix on:)

3. Once it was good and liquid form, I started adding in the oats, breadcrumbs and flaxseed until it was a good consistency, then I poured some of it into a bowl along with the black beans

You want to be able to form patties with the mix, if it's too runny, add more oats, too thick more liquid.

Then it goes in the refrigerator for a bit until you're ready to cook...that was about a half hour for me while I played puzzles with Robert and fed Joshua.

Last, form patties and cook on stovetop (I used our grill pan to make it more hamburger like..hoping to fool Robert completely),then they go in the oven to firm up at 350 for about 10 minutes.

I served ours on toasted ciabatta with cheddar cheese and bacon...so good, AND I had two for lunch the next day.

Yes, there should be photos, but at this point in my life, we're focusing on getting the meal on the table without too much yelling (by me) and whining of hunger (that would be all three of my boys)

if you make them, let me know!

pizza and bean burgers

I haven't been posting weekly meals recently because no one wants to read that we ate three planned meals, plus leftovers and then food while traveling for the last couple of weeks...i'm feeling a bit more normal (and frugal) after this past week...and as a result of wednesdays meal, a little bit shocked:)

Sunday: leftovers

Monday: Salmon with mustard brown sugar glaze, broccoli and orzo.
This is the easiest salmon ever and my husband loves it, I used to follow this recipe religiously, but now I just bake the salmon with salt and pepper and some white wine at 350 until it's opaque and then glaze on a mix of brown sugar and dijon mustard...it's yummy, and, perhaps most importantly for this mustard hater, doesn't taste of mustard (surprisingly enough)

Tuesday: Balsamic pork tenderloin with green bean casserole
We had friends over for dinner and the sweet little girl initially told me she didn't like pork, but changed her mind after tasting this..it's just so freakin' good. I made it once before this time I tried out PW's green bean casserole, because my husband LOVES old fashioned green bean casserole and I do not...at all...cream of mushroom soup is yuck to me and my northern roots, thank goodness my mother in law makes the regular casserole for thanksgiving so my husband can look forward to it every year (thanks sandra, he loves your cooking)
side note: I didn't have/don't care for pimentos so I used red peppers and threw them in with the onions, yummy and pretty:)

Wednesday: wait for it...black bean burgers with sweet potato hashbrowns (frozen from a bag, nothing special)
I just about died when my husband announced that A. he actually liked them and B. I should make them again...now granted, I put bacon and cheese on top of his BUT STILL...if you know my husband, this is a big deal.
I'll devote a whole post to it sometime soon because well, it's that big.

Thursday: homemade pizzas
Took out three bags of frozen pizza dough that I had made about a week ago from this recipe, rolled them out and Robert helped me make individual pizzas for himself (cheese only), mommy (chicken, spinach and pineapple) and daddy (chicken and pineapple).
Baked them in the oven for about a half hour at 400 degrees. We baked on cookie sheets because we didn't have parchment paper, but in the future, the parchment works MUCH better!

Friday: my parents were in town so we ordered take out from outback, the hubby's choice.

Saturday: we visited my brother in law and his awesome family in charlottesville so we naturally ordered mellow mushroom:)
Even though the pizza was amazing, it was so wonderful to watch our older kids play together and great for me to get some time with Braden, their youngest.

Toddler consensus...this was a great week for us! He obviously didn't attempt the salmon but DID eat the pork, bean burgers (he loved it actually), pizzas and outback/pizza, because, who wouldn't

travel and new things

We've been traveling a bunch, which means my food planning hit survival mode/eat whatever needed to be consumed before going bad mode before and after we headed out of town.

We spent several days down in Hilton Head visiting Robert's grandparents, enjoying the beautiful south carolina weather and completely missing the minute snowstorm that apparently hit richmond...although we were sad to deprive our Robert of a snow experience, we were both secretly glad to have spent it down south. Joshua took a liking to his great grandparents right away and Robert loved playing the player piano and being spoiled by his grandmother. We took a bit of family time and headed down to the beach a couple of afternoons, I just love the beach at that time of year, not hot yet but definitely not too cold to wander and dig in the sand.

here are a few pics from our time there:


(notice the awesome black eye that he got from running smack into his tricycle handle bars...he's all healed but it was a scary sight to see)
our littlest is just getting so big!