Cooking? Me?

Well, yes and no.

Sunday night we were supposed to have leftovers, but we ended up "celebrating" the 2nd night of Clay going to bed at 7:30 by getting a Whataburger. That is only the 2nd time in the month of February that we have eaten anything out for dinner! So I am happy about that.

Monday night we had the broccoli/cheese/rice mix that I make. I didn't do any chicken sandwiches with it this time though.

Tuesday night we went to my Mom's house, and she made homemade hamburgers. So we had hamburgers, and chips, and then a small green salad on the side.

Tonight I am making hamburger helper. I always keep 1 or 2 boxes in my pantry of this for those nights that I don't feel like cooking, but I don't really feel like having a cold sandwich either. So simple and for the most part, good. So the cheeseburger macaroni Hamburger Helper with whole kernal corn on the side. Tomorrow I will be getting back to my more complicated recipes.

I know that I was supposed to make meatloaf Monday night, but Robbie was just hell bent on me NOT making it. He doesn't like "regular" meatloaf, and he just didn't want me to even try the cajun meatloaf. Hopefully I can talk him into it one day. Or just make it and not tell him. Whichever comes first.

.....I'd be dead!

So this little guy to the left now has 2 teeth on the bottom! I can't believe that they finally cut through, but thank you Lord that they did!

So the other night while I was nursing him, he decided to try his new teeth out and bite down on my nipple. Once he did, I unlatched him, and I said  very firmly "No sir! We do NOT bite!"

Once I said this, Robbie looked at me and told me to not get onto him. He said "He doesn't know what he is doing, and that he isn't supposed to be doing that." I said "Well he will learn really fast because everytime that he does it, he is going to be unlatched from me with me telling him no." Then Robbie proceeded to tell me that I was being mean to him.

So fast forward to the end of the night. Clay is in bed. Colt is in bed. And Robbie and I are headed to bed. We get all settled in, and I lean over to give him a kiss. As soon as he leans in, I go lower and bite HIS nipple.

If looks could kill........

What started out as a date night....

.....ended up turning into something that will probably be a routine from now on. I put Clay down the other night at 7:15. He was asleep by 8:00 pm, and he slept all night until 8:30 the next morning (yesterday). So yesterday he refused to take a nap again, so I just fed him dinner a little early, got him cleaned up, bathed him, brushed his teeth, put his pjs on, read him a bedtime story, and let him watch a little bit of cartoons. Then we put him to bed at 7:15. And again, by 8 pm, he was asleep. And he slept until 8:15 this morning.

I have a feeling that this is going to be an every night thing now. Usually when he has a nap, he won't go down until about 2:30, and then he sleeps until almost 4:30 or 5 pm. Then he gets up, we eat dinner about 7 or 7:30, and then he goes down to bed at 9 pm. But he doesn't go to sleep until about 10:30 or 11. And then he is up at 8:00 am the next morning. So he is actually getting better sleep when he goes to bed early. So I think this is going to be our new nightime routine!

Now if I can just get Colt to sleeping through the night again, I will be 1 happy Mom with 1 happy husband!

Those much needed nights

You know those days where you just don't think you can go much more without running away? Or those days that you wish your kids couldn't talk yet? Or those days where if you have to change one more poopy diaper, you might just go insane? Well that is how I was yesterday. And Robbie has been that way for more than a few days now. It has been insane around this house lately.

Robbie works 12 hour shifts, and when he comes home, he comes home to me trying to cook dinner (almost always it is almost ready though), trying to keep Clay away from the stove/oven (and out of everything else), trying to keep Colt entertained since he is going through a stage where he has to see me or he isn't happy, and me trying to keep from pulling my hair out. And for the next 2 hours after he gets home and before Clay goes to bed, it is us eating dinner, cleaning up from dinner, me bathing Colt, him bathing Clay, and then teeth getting brushed, bedtime stories being read, and then fighting with both kids to go to sleep. By the time that they are both asleep, Robbie and I are ready to fall over dead. And if Robbie is going to work the next day, he is really in for it. Since Colt can sense when Robbie needs a good night of sleep, those are usually the days that he doesn't want to sleep all night. Or he wants to fight until midnight to go to sleep.

On top of the normal routine, Colt has been teething. The first 2 teeth (on bottom) finally cut through 2 nights ago, so he hasn't been as fussy. But we also think that he may have an ear infection, so he is going to the doctor tomorrow. So he has definitely been more fussy than usual. And it can wear anyone down to hear a baby cry and fuss all day long.

So I knew that we needed a break. We have not had more than a 4 hour break since August 5th. Do you realize how long that has been? Now we have had a break from Clay lots of times. Breaks that last overnight. But from Colt, not more than 4 hours. And we definitely appreciate those times for sure. But we can't have an overnighter from both boys yet because Colt is exclusively breastfed. He has had a bottle ONE TIME since he was born August 27th. ONE TIME! Do you hear me? ONE TIME! Anyone who knows how many times a baby eats (from the bottle or breast) knows that that is a lot of time to have a baby attached to your boob. And with him not being on anything but rice cereal once a day yet, he still nurses a lot. I plan on exclusively breastfeeding him until he is 10 1/2 months old. Then I will start weaning him off of me, and hopefully have him on whole milk by 11 months old. Clay was 10 1/2 months old when we started switching him over to whole milk (for tummy issues, and approved by the doctor), so I am going to do the same with Colt. So until then, we won't be getting an overnight break from Colt. And as soon as he is weaned from me, I plan on having a whole weekend overnighter! :-)

Anyway. So yesterday it just so happened to work out for me to plan an in-home date night. The last in-home date night that we had planned, Clay went to my Mom's, and we kept Colt. And Colt cried from about 8:30 pm until 2:30 am. Just cried and cried and cried. And for no apparant reason. It was horrible! So last night I really wasn't looking for it to really work out for us. But it did!!! Clay didn't have a nap yesterday because he absolutely refused to lay down, and so I knew that he would go to bed early. And Colt had been up most of the day, and he was due to eat cereal and nurse around 6:30. I had planned on putting dinner in the oven at 6:30, and that would give me 30 minutes to feed and nurse him. Since I wanted Clay going to bed between 7 and 7:30, I ended up making him a grilled cheese for dinner with chips. I started that at 5:50, and he started eating at 6 pm. Since I had to make pasta, I started the water to boil, and I fed Colt his cereal while I was waiting for that and while Clay ate his dinner. Then once Clay finished dinner, I cleaned him and his dishes up, and then I put him on the couch and turned his Barney movie on.

Once Colt was done with his cereal, I prepared the rest of dinner and put it in the oven at 6:30. Then I nursed Colt. Then Robbie got home and took a shower. After I finished nursing Colt, I changed his diaper, put his pjs on, and then I put him in bed. After Robbie got out of the shower, I asked him to brush Clay's teeth while I finished getting dinner ready. Robbie didn't know that I was doing this, so he was a bit surprised to hear me asking him to brush Clay's teeth BEFORE dinner. I told him that Clay had already eaten, and he was going to bed once Barney was over. When Barney was over, I popped the bread in the oven, and we went to his room, changed his diaper and put his pjs on. Then off to bed he went. And then all was quiet in the Girman house!

Robbie and I have become huge fans of The Office. We had never watched it when it came on during the week, but we had caught a few of the late night episodes on TV and fell in love with it. So I bought Robbie the first 3 seasons on DVD for Christmas, and we just recently bought Season 4 and 5. So after putting the kids to bed, we happily filled our plates, popped the first DVD of Season 4 in the DVD player, and sat on the couch together. Other than the few times that I had to get up and tell Clay to go to bed with the last time threatening his life to take his toys away the next day if he didn't hush and go to bed, it was a pretty quiet night. And just what we needed to re-energize. We would have been in bed at 10 pm, but as soon as we laid down, Colt got up to eat again. So we went back in the living room and talked while I nursed Colt, and then we were in bed by 11:30. It was SOO nice! Colt did wake up again at 2:15, but it was because he was uncovered and couldn't find his paci. So I popped that sucker back in his mouth, pulled the blanket up, and turned back over and went to sleep.

Clay is again refusing to take a nap, and I am completely fine with that! Another early night for the boys, and a nice quiet night for the parents! Works for me! Robbie is off tomorrow anyway, so he can spend much needed time with them then!

I made Destiny's Baked Ziti last night, and it was amazing! Robbie said that he would prefer it over regular spaghetti! There was 1 change that I made, and there is another change that I will make the next time that I make it.

It doesn't have ground beef in the recipe. Robbie is a huge fan of having meat in spaghetti (as long as it isn't meatballs), so I mixed ground beef in with the sauce before mixing it in with the cheeses. That was the 1 change that I made this time.

Next time...I did NOT like the way that the parm cheese "melted" on top. It is like it doesn't melt. It gets hard and forms a shell on top of the dish. I am also not a huge fan of bagged cheeses. I prefer grating the cheese myself. So next time I will buy a block of mozzarella cheese, grate the whole thing, put 3/4 of it in the mix with the ricotta cheese, and then put the other 1/4 on the top and bake it. I also grated fresh parm cheese last night to put on top of individual portions. Sometimes Robbie does, sometimes he won't. I love fresh parm cheese though. So next time I will just do fresh parm cheese on the side and do the fresh mozzarella on top to bake with. But other than that, a simple, easy, and delicious dish!

Here it is fresh out of the oven!

I was planning on putting a salad on the side with it, but I decided to do something different instead. I had 2 kaiser rolls leftover from the hamburgers the night before, so I cut them in 1/2. Then I buttered each 1/2. Then I put garlic powder on them, freshly grated sharp cheddar cheese, and then Italian seasoning. And Robbie and I both loved it! Something that I would definitely do again! Next time since I will be using mozzarella cheese, I will grate a little for the bread too and mix the cheeses. So good.

Robbie's plate

This dish made so much that we have over 3/4 of the pan left. Therefore, we will be having this again tonight. Tonight Clay will be eating it with us, and I will be doing salad on the side instead of the garlic cheese bread.

Tomorrow I plan on doing PW's (courtesy of Pastor Ryan) Cajun Meatloaf with mashed potatoes and some sort of veggie or salad. The meatloaf serves 8 people (with 3 lbs of meat), so I am going to cut that down to 1 lb of beef and cut the ingredients to match that. Should be good! I love meatloaf with onions and bell peppers, but Robbie can't even stand the sight of meatloaf. I am hoping to change his mind with this one.

No bueno!

Last night we tried PW's Most Favorite Burger Ever, and I have to say that it is NOT our most favorite burger. At all. There were parts of it that I liked, but I just couldn't get past the blue cheese. And I would probably make it again, but it would have to be minus the blue cheese. Robbie and I both ended up taking about 2 bites of it and then trashing it. And then I made some velveeta shells and cheese instead. And we had that with our salad. Like I said though, there were parts that I liked. I loved the spicy mayo/tobasco mixture. I loved the onions. OMG, I loved the onions. And then the actual burger was really good. But that damn blue cheese was just too much for me. But hey, at least I tried it!

Here are the onions caramelizing in the butter and brown sugar.

And my kaiser rolls heating up in the skillet to get them toasted.

And here is the finished product. I made 3 of the burgers because I thought if they turned out good, Robbie would most likely eat 2. And for the 4th burger, I made Clay a regular cheeseburger. I put a slice of cheese on it while it was in the pan so it could melt, and then I put mustard on it.

It is actually a pretty burger.

And our plates after we got the salads on them. I bought some of that Wishbone Salad Spritzer (Ranch), and that is what is on my lettuce on the right. And that is some watery stuff. I think I will stick with my regular ranch dressing.

And Robbie's reaction to the burger.

So this one didn't make it into my recipe book. I still am having trouble deciding what I want to cook tonight. I have a few options and ideas, but I just can't decide.

Outside In Pizza Review

When I first started staying home in May 2008 with Clay, I was a faithful watcher of the Rachael Ray talk show. I loved to watch the cooking segment at the end. And that is where I found the recipe for what I made for dinner last night. I had planned on making the blue cheese hamburgers, but Robbie wasn't up for hamburgers last night, so it got changed at the last minute. Tonight is the hamburgers though. Excited to give those a try. The outside in pizza is a very easy recipe.

Ingredients:

Focaccia Bread (I used a garlic one last night...not sure if I would again though)

Pepperoni

Mozzarella Cheese

Pizza Sauce

Now you could use any pizza toppings that you wanted. Rachael Ray did a pepperoni one and she also did a veggie one. But Robbie won't eat veggie pizza, so pepperoni it was.

Directions:

Cut the focaccia bread in 1/2 (to open up the bread like a sandwich). Then spread however much pizza sauce you want on the bread, put the cheese on top, and then pepperoni. I have done it several ways as far as cooking. RR showed it where she put it in a skillet and cooked it that way. Kind of like you would a grilled cheese. But I have always had to microwave it a bit after that to get the insides of it hot enough to eat (and to melt the cheese more). I have tried just microwaving it, but the bread doesn't get crispy enough like a pizza crust for me. And then last night, I put it under the broiler without closing the bread up into a sandwich. I kept it open so the cheese would melt and the toppings would be hot. The bread started burning a bit on the edges, so I took it out. But because I left it open, the top part of the bread was soggy. And once I started cutting into it, the inside of the cheese was still cold (if that makes sense).

So really I can't figure out a good way to cook this sandwich without burning it in the skillet to get the insides hot enough, without having to eat mushy bread from just microwaving it, or without getting a burnt crust/toppings on the inside and mushy bread on the outside by broiling it. If I could figure out a way to do that, it would be an excellent sandwich! It has a great taste to it, but I can't stand the mushiness of the bread. Or to have a cold "pizza".

Here is a picture of it coming out from under the broiler before I closed it up to a sandwich and cut it up. I used fresh mozzarella cheese, and I probably wouldn't do that again. I would prefer the shredded for this just because it is more evenly distributed throughout every bite, and not just a glob of cheese in 1 area.

Confession

Yesterday we had one of those days. You know those days. The ones that there is a constant roadblock everywhere that you look. One that has you taking tylenol every 4 hours just to keep the headache at bay. The one that leaves you with a sleepless night. Not the sleepless night where you are waken up every 4 hours to nurse. But the one that has so many things on your mind that you can't catch a wink of sleep.

The day started out really well yesterday. We got up and got the boys ready. My Grandma had stayed the past two nights, and she had decided to go home yesterday. We were all hungry, so instead of eating leftover beans, we decided to go out for a nice lunch. So we load up the car and drive to Panera Bread. We have a great lunch, and then we stop in over at Michael's. We wanted to get some fresh, spring flowers for my Grandpa's grave. The snow had pretty much left the poinsettas that were on his grave flat. After getting the flowers, we drove out to the cemetery. Then we headed to my Grandma's house. Colt was asleep and Clay was almost there, so we left them both with my Grandma, and Robbie and I went birthday shopping for Clay. Since we have a little bit of extra money right now, we wanted to go ahead and get his birthday party supplies out of the way and get his big gift. It isn't until May, but still.

We leave my Grandma's house and enjoy a few hours away from the kids, and then head back over there. After we got there, we had planned on leaving and going grocery shopping. But Clay was still asleep, and Colt was ready to nurse. We ended up staying til 11:15 last night and decided to go grocery shopping today. My cousin (who lives with my Grandma) was off last night, and we all watched a movie and ordered a pizza. So not only did we eat out for lunch, we ate out for dinner. I didn't cook at all yesterday. And I didn't workout. And I drank a dr.pepper. After we ate dinner, we started talking about some things that Robbie and I are going through (more on that later), and it pretty much went downhill from there. I had to take tylenol to get (somewhat) rid of my stress headache. Clay was acting like a complete terror. And then Colt has (we think) an ear infection. So he didn't want to be put down. And when you did hold him, you had to be standing up and he had to be up on your shoulder. Not laying down. So yesterday just ended up being a horrible day.

This morning Robbie had to go and get some stuff taken care of for work, and then he had to stop and get his oil changed. Once he gets home and we eat lunch, we plan on going grocery shopping. This is what I have in mind for tonight. I am not a blue cheese fan, but I am definitely willing to give it a try!