TUTENESS

  As promised, I took more pics of the kids today than food.   You’ll see that my shuttercal for today was an easy one – green monster!  Done and done!  I soooo didn’t cook today and we coasted on leftovers.  I love days like this!  Anyway, here are the pics of the kids from today:

Dylan doing a paint by numbers.  He does, um, okay?  LOL!  Staying in the lines is for suckers anyway!Avery, showing off her hair being done.  I asked her if I could take a picture of her pretty hair and she immediately assumed the position.  

She and I match with our little baby hairs coming in.  Moms will know what I mean.

Hammin’ it up for me.

Just love her little hands!  So TUTE! I suggested a mini photo shoot and you know Dylan was all over it.  Anytime he can get his hands on the remote, he’s all for it.  Again, I mentioned a picture and Avery got into place all cute (or TUTE)-like.  

I am admiring her tuteness.

Ahh, they make me happy!  

Uh oh – but I don’t like this!  Who made Avos mad?! Ahhh yes, she is mad because Dylan can fold washcloths and she can’t.  Seriously.  That’s why she was mad.

 

He folded that WHOLE stack there!  He’s totally hired. Finally she calmed down enough to listen to a little tutorial.  I don’t think I’m going to hire her yet.  

Well, I’m gonna go watch tv  ahem, work on the 2009 picture book project. Later!

Chile Verde

Good morning!  Check out what we had for din din last night.  Chile Verde.  It was pretty darn good, I must say.  This is from the Williams-Sonoma Slow Cooker: Food Made Fast cookbook that my mom gave me for Christmas.  It was pretty easy to make.  Only bad part is cutting up the meat.  I HATE cutting up meat.  But oh well.  This time, it was worth it (nothing worse than cutting up a bunch of meat and having it turn out just so-so).  Here’s the recipe (and I’m typing this out out of the goodness of my heart, so you better be trying it, peeps!):

Chile Verde

William Sonoma Slow Cooker : Food Made Fast

8 oz canned roasted whole green chiles
3 lb boneless pork shoulder, cut into 1 inch pieces

2 cups chicken broth (make sure you do low sodium – I think it would be much too salty if you did regular chicken broth)
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp dried oregano
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp white pepper
Steamed white rice (brown rice is better for you, Williams Sonoma! Clearly, we did brown rice.)
Sour cream

Cilantro
Whatever else you want to put on top – avocado, tomato, etc.

1. Put the chiles and their liquid in the slow cooker, tearing the chiles into coarse strips with your fingers (I just did chopped green chiles – much easier!).  Stir in the pork, chicken broth, garlic, oregano, 1 1/2 tsp salt, and 1/2 tsp white pepper.  Cover and cook on the high heat setting for 4 hours OR on the low heat setting for 8 hours (we did the low setting for 8 hours – meat was fabulously tender!). 

2. Ladle the stew over steamed rice and serve.  Top with sour cream, cilantro, etc. 
That’s all for now!  I need some pics of the kids today.  Avery FINALLY is letting me pull the hair out of her eyes and into a ponytail so I should probably document it.  I’ve just been so consumed with figuring out what will be my Shuttercal pic of the day.  I’ve forgotten how hard it is!  At least doing this project will remind me that I still have to finish my 2009 book documenting my 2009 Shuttercal project.  I better get on that!  Maybe I’ll do it tonight!  Yes!  Way to set goals, Trishy!

Later!

Happy New Year!

Hey!  It’s the new year! And I’m only getting around to posting a new post

on the 3rd!  I hope this is not an indication of things to come!   I honestly had nothing to tell you the last few days.  We were in Fargo until yesterday afternoon and then I was dead tired last night.  And like I said – nothing to say!

So it’s good to be home!  And what is even better is knowing that we are going to be home for a nice long stretch!  Ahhhhhh.  I’m a homebody, so I enjoy big blocks of home time.  While I love December and the holidays and family gatherings – I love nothing more than just being at home with my people.  And sleeping in my own bed.  Ahhhh, my bed.  We slept until 7:45am this morning!   This is UNHEARD of.  I don’t KNOW the last time I slept in that late.  I wasn’t up at my normal 5 am workout time because I planned on just working out at the gym today instead.  So the kids were the alarm clock and that alarm didn’t go off until then!  Crazy!  But needed, I guess.  I think we were all pretty tired.  It was a school day today though, so we had to scramble to get out the door in time.  Eric didn’t work today, so that helped.  Then when we got back from town, I started taking down Christmas.    I already miss the decor!  And I think the kids do too.  Especially Avery who is still calling out for “Tanta” on a regular basis.  While I did that though, I had bread baking in the bread machine!  Woot woot!  Today’s selection was "Burrito Bread” from the Better Homes and Garden Bread Machine book that Lingy lent me before they left for Mexico (Hi Lingy!  How’s the weather?!).  It smelled freaking awesome in here!  It called for cheese, onion, and refried beans to be put into the dough…which is what made me want to make it.  Can’t go wrong with those three ingredients.  Also made the super awesome Black Bean and Pumpkin Soup to pair it with so between the two – it smelled pretty spectacular in here today. 
   Buuuurrrrrritttoooo bread!  It didn’t have as much flavor as I’d hoped it would.  Still good though.  And tasted awesome dipped in the soup.  Clearly.   Before I hit the couch for a little Bachelor viewing (don’t pretend like you aren’t watching it) – please remember to check out my Shuttercal page.  I don’t know…might need some serious support to keep this thing going this time.  365 days of food?!  Can I really do this?!