A little someone got a bubble machine for her birthday!
pop, pop, pop
Lauren picking a red one this time. A single strawberry has not made it in our house this summer!
our garden up close. i am pretty pleased with the crop since it is my first year having a garden. the first plot is strawberries and peppers (banana, yellow, green, and red) and the second plot is tomatoes and onions right now
I love food (good food, that is)! After I eat breakfast, I am immediately thinking about what I am going to have for lunch, and then supper. When we are on vacation, I wonder what delicious food we are going to partake in along the way. Food...yum! Here are some of our favorites we have tried lately!
Sunny Millet topped with strawberries and blueberries
Tempeh Tacos with Black Beans adapted from "Feeding the Whole Family". This is by far my favorite cook book! We have made a multitude of recipes from it: the millet above, falafel, scones, and pizza dough to name a few.
More Tempeh Tacos. Tempeh is soybeans that are pressed together into a brick. Think of tofu but soybeans and not so dense and mushy.
More of the raw granola topped with bananas, blueberries, and almond milk. Best cereal ever!
Our new favorite snack: equal parts yogurt and peanut butter with some cinnamon and things to dip in it.
This is my favorite lunch meal! I use a harvest blend of grains/beans from Trader Joe's (quinoa, cous cous, dried garbanzo beans, and pasta) and then added corn, edamame, raisins, and red onion although you can add whatever you have on hand.
"Vegan Mac and Cheese". We used a mixture of random noodles we had left and added zucchini and hamburger crumbles (gasp!)
We had our first crop of the season ready for eating...strawberries. I have a feeling these little buggers will never make it into the house. Lauren has already picked her fair share of 'yellow' ones...still working on explaining that they need to be red before picking. She has a mouthful here!
Against the garage we have green and yellow zucchini and acorn squash. It will be awhile before we see anything from these plants.
Our finished plots. Plot #1: strawberries, spinach, and peppers (yellow, red, green, and banana). Plot #2: tomatoes (better boy and yellow cherry), onions, and one tiny head of lettuce that Lauren planted.
We got the majority of our plants from a local greenhouse called Adventurous Roots. I really LOVE them and could go out there everyday! We loaded up on herbs and I am so glad. We have a collection of stevia, purple basil, Italian basil, spearmint, chocolate mint, oregano, parsley, rosemary, and cilantro. All I really need now is chives. The chocolate mint was absolutely divine on our smores and Stevia you can easily just pick off and eat for dessert alone!
We decided to use raised beds instead of plots for several reasons: they are easier to maintain, you don't have to step on the dirt to reach the plants which compacts it and inhibits growth, and it protects against some insects and bugs. Plus, it is easier to set up and maintain without having to prepare your soil in the ground. For our set-up, we placed a layer of leaves down, a layer of compost, and our garden blend topsoil which is a mixture of sand, mushroom compost, and soil.
We had the dirt delivered to our house in a massive pile and had to take care of it fast before it killed the grass. Don't you love Lauren's 80's gardening bibs?
Lauren loves juicing in the morning! When she sees me pull the juicer out from the wall, she starts yelling 'jew'. Now she has to help too!Saying 'jew'
I found this little cup with a straw for under $2 and figured it would be a good 'jew' cup.
Looking for a fun, safe, and clean science project??
I am always researching ways to reduce the amount of cleaners that we use in our home. We cut out all toxic chemicals before moving into our house and slowly are incorporating home-made solutions into our cleaning regime versus a store bought plant-based cleaner.
The next stop on our list, toilet bowl cleaner! The goal of cleaning our toilets is mainly for them to sparkle and not stink. All that can be accomplished with the following supplies... Castile soap, baking soda, vinegar, and essential oils. You can easily skip the castile soap and oils if you do not have them on hand. The recipe I got was from "Easy Green Living" by Loux.
1 tbsp. castile soap or other liquid soap 1/3 cup baking soda 1/3 cup distilled white vinegar 8 drops essential oil of lavender, rosemary, or both (I used a lavender and tea tree oil blend)
Add the soap into the toilet bowl, sprinkle baking soda in, then pour in vinegar and oils. Let it fizz and sizzle for 2-3 minutes then scrub with your toilet brush.
It is that easy and cheap!! So why should you decide to change your cleaning routine and opt for a natural approach? If I was using a traditional toxic, chemical-based, toilet bowl cleaner, there is no way I would let Lauren near it, let alone touch it...so why would I keep it in the house?
The other downside to using chemical-based cleaners is that the fumes can be toxic when combined. For example, if you scrub your toilet with a cleaner that contains chlorine bleach and then clean your sink/tub with an ammonia based cleaner, you can create deadly fumes or cause severe lung damage!
And at the request of my sister, here is a better picture of the date pits that Lauren ate compared to a penny...remember, she ate 3. Opps!
A post all about food! We have been eating some of our favorites this week and I thought that I would share them with all of you. Lauren absolutely LOVES dates. If she could, she would eat them all day. Unfortunately, like all fruit, they have a lot of natural sugars in them and we don't like hyper Lauren so we have to restrict her 'date intake'. The other day I was so proud of her in the grocery store when we were walking through the produce section and she was yelling and pointing, 'apple, banana, grapes, booberries'; glad she knows her fruits instead of candy bars. Evidence here...
This is how she responded when she knew she was put on a strict date diet
Now comes the horrible part of the story. I usually get our dates from the bulk section at Whole Foods but haven't made a trip there in quite some time. Jewel had a nice deal on some good-looking, plump, dates and Lauren spotted them in the grocery store and started screaming 'yum'. Anyways, I gave her one and Kyle gave her three. It wasn't until the last one that Kyle gave her that she spit a little something in his hand...a pit!! That means that she ate three of these suckers...
Now onto the next treat. I really love a good grilled cheese and am looking for fun variations often. My internship supervisor told me about this and I had to try. Here is a fig (similar but not the same as a date)
Put it through the mini-food processor until it was chunky
Put a few slices of brie on my bread (with butter)
Topped the brie with some thin apple slices
Put the fig chunks on top of that
Grilled it up and yummo!
Lauren kept saying 'more please' in sign language. Here she is mid 'more'.
and mid-'please'
Now onto dessert. I am big ice cream lover. I usually have to eat a heaping bowl every night before I go to bed. Since I have been slowly cutting processed foods out of my diet and eating less sugary things, ice cream just hasn't tasted quite the same. So...I made my own! Take about 1 1/2 frozen bananas and plop them into a food processor.
Keep on low and occasionally scrape down the bowl. If you want a 'dippin dot' texture, you can stop here. Otherwise it is a good time to add anything you might like in it.
I added a few carob chips and spoonful of almond maple butter. Cold Stone has a banana ice cream so think about what you would add to that.
Mix it all up on low again until the desired consistency is reached
Because there are no preservatives, you really need to eat it that night otherwise the banana will start to brown up. A yummy, healthy treat that you don't have to worry about your kiddos eating.
Of course, Lauren! My friend, Ashley, is having a baby real soon and has been talking about making a wrap for little Miss #2. Because I LOVED my Moby so much, I knew that she needed one compared to making her own. I searched online for a great deal and eventually found this beauty at 50% off because the store was going out of business. Because Ashley isn't a recycling cloth diaper freak like me, I decided to keep it for myself and send her my old one (she was okay with that). I didn't think that Lauren would fit in it anymore because she is SO SQUIRMY. The weight limit is 35 lbs (Lauren is about 21 lbs) but since it is jersey knit, it has some stretch to it and Lauren tends to weasel her way out of it. The minute I pulled it out of the bag though, she was flapping her arms and so excited to get in. I could barely wrap it fast enough!
In other Lauren news...she has been a little difficult to live with lately. I really hate to use that word but those darn molars are going to kill me. Testing Mommy and Daddy have been her favorite things to do and she is definitely trying to figure out what she can and can not get away with. Sleep has been horrible, thanks again to the lovely molars! Last night I got a 5 hour stretch of sleep...my first 5-hr. stretch in ages! I went to work today so refreshed and actually felt competent and enjoyed my job. I guess I forgot how important sleep is to parenting and working competently. I could really get used to that!
For example...here is little Miss climbing on top of the table as she is yelling, "no, no, down, sit!" The chair pulled out is how she got up.
I will take a brief moment to share about my latest joy and to show my dad how it is done! This is my new favorite breakfast: fresh juice, 1-2 bananas, a heaping spoonful of peanut or almond butter, and a large bunch of spinach all blended together.
It looks like this when done. You can barely taste the spinach but it definitely aids to the smoothie and makes it divine. Lauren is quite a fan as well hence the alternative of almond butter. If you do not have a power juicer, you can easily use milk or yogurt. This morning I added coconut milk instead of fresh juice as my time was limited.
Potty training has been moving along well. We are in no rush to make things happen and are moving at her pace. She loves sitting on the potty, especially in the morning, and reading books. I now have to set my alarm clock earlier in order to sit with her and read about 5 books while she 'takes care of business'.
She now loves her 'pretty' and is begging to look through her basket of bows, headbands, and hats. If you didn't notice, Dad decided to put her headband on funny in this picture and she kept it there for quite some time squishing the rest of her face.
The other morning I had MOPS at our local church. Lauren's babysitter, Heather, and I go every other week. Usually we bring the kids along and they go to the nursery during our two hour group. This week, however, Kyle had off from work so he decided to stay back with both of them and play instead of exposing them to the nasty germs that they always seem to bring home after MOPS. We came back to two happy babies playing and about 70 pictures on the camera.
Lauren trying to balance a toy tuna can on her head.
Showing Jax the snow outside
This is a typical Lauren face. I can only imagine her being a bossy little lady one of these days, sorry Jax.
Jax in all his smiley glory. Kyle said several times he forgot that Jax was there because he was so quiet and not as "high-maintenance" as Lauren. He was so impressed that Jax ate his meal in its entirety quickly, played quietly, was easily entertained, and could fall asleep on his own. My response to him...maybe baby #2 will be like that.
They both wanted to play in Lauren's bed. It may look different than what I posted a few posts back. Her mattress is now off the floor and she is in her crib, minus one side rail. We put a bolster under the fitted sheet so she can't roll off but can easily climb out when done sleeping.
She seems to like it and the nice thing is that I can nurse her while she is laying in it by kneeling next to the bed. Before her molars decided to make an appearance she was staying in there until about midnight-2 am so hopefully we can increase that time each night. We are following Jay Gordon's night weaning method between 11pm-6am but had to stop momentarily to get through the molars. Hopefully we can start back up again soon. I was completely shocked when I told her that the na-na's were 'all-gone' in the middle of the night and she rolled back over and fell asleep.
Saying 'jew'
I found this little cup with a straw for under $2 and figured it would be a good 'jew' cup.
Castile soap, baking soda, vinegar, and essential oils. You can easily skip the castile soap and oils if you do not have them on hand. The recipe I got was from "Easy Green Living" by Loux.
This is how she responded when she knew she was put on a strict date diet
Now comes the horrible part of the story. I usually get our dates from the bulk section at Whole Foods but haven't made a trip there in quite some time. Jewel had a nice deal on some good-looking, plump, dates and Lauren spotted them in the grocery store and started screaming 'yum'. Anyways, I gave her one and Kyle gave her three. It wasn't until the last one that Kyle gave her that she spit a little something in his hand...a pit!! That means that she ate three of these suckers...
Put it through the mini-food processor until it was chunky
Put a few slices of brie on my bread (with butter)
Topped the brie with some thin apple slices
Put the fig chunks on top of that
Grilled it up and yummo!
and mid-'please'
Keep on low and occasionally scrape down the bowl. If you want a 'dippin dot' texture, you can stop here. Otherwise it is a good time to add anything you might like in it.
I added a few carob chips and spoonful of almond maple butter. Cold Stone has a banana ice cream so think about what you would add to that.
Mix it all up on low again until the desired consistency is reached
Because there are no preservatives, you really need to eat it that night otherwise the banana will start to brown up. A yummy, healthy treat that you don't have to worry about your kiddos eating.
Of course, Lauren! My friend, Ashley, is having a baby real soon and has been talking about making a wrap for little Miss #2. Because I LOVED my Moby so much, I knew that she needed one compared to making her own. I searched online for a great deal and eventually found this beauty at 50% off because the store was going out of business. Because Ashley isn't a recycling cloth diaper freak like me, I decided to keep it for myself and send her my old one (she was okay with that). I didn't think that Lauren would fit in it anymore because she is SO SQUIRMY. The weight limit is 35 lbs (Lauren is about 21 lbs) but since it is jersey knit, it has some stretch to it and Lauren tends to weasel her way out of it. The minute I pulled it out of the bag though, she was flapping her arms and so excited to get in. I could barely wrap it fast enough!
I will take a brief moment to share about my latest joy and to show my dad how it is done! This is my new favorite breakfast: fresh juice, 1-2 bananas, a heaping spoonful of peanut or almond butter, and a large bunch of spinach all blended together.
It looks like this when done. You can barely taste the spinach but it definitely aids to the smoothie and makes it divine. Lauren is quite a fan as well hence the alternative of almond butter. If you do not have a 
Potty training has been moving along well. We are in no rush to make things happen and are moving at her pace. She loves sitting on the potty, especially in the morning, and reading books. I now have to set my alarm clock earlier in order to sit with her and read about 5 books while she 'takes care of business'.
She now loves her 'pretty' and is begging to look through her basket of bows, headbands, and hats. If you didn't notice, Dad decided to put her headband on funny in this picture and she kept it there for quite some time squishing the rest of her face.
Showing Jax the snow outside
This is a typical Lauren face. I can only imagine her being a bossy little lady one of these days, sorry Jax.
Jax in all his smiley glory. Kyle said several times he forgot that Jax was there because he was so quiet and not as "high-maintenance" as Lauren. He was so impressed that Jax ate his meal in its entirety quickly, played quietly, was easily entertained, and could fall asleep on his own. My response to him...maybe baby #2 will be like that.
They both wanted to play in Lauren's bed. It may look different than what I posted a few posts back. Her mattress is now off the floor and she is in her crib, minus one side rail. We put a bolster under the fitted sheet so she can't roll off but can easily climb out when done sleeping.
She seems to like it and the nice thing is that I can nurse her while she is laying in it by kneeling next to the bed. Before her molars decided to make an appearance she was staying in there until about midnight-2 am so hopefully we can increase that time each night. We are following Jay Gordon's night weaning method between 11pm-6am but had to stop momentarily to get through the molars. Hopefully we can start back up again soon. I was completely shocked when I told her that the na-na's were 'all-gone' in the middle of the night and she rolled back over and fell asleep.
