I haven't blogged in a few days because Brent has actually been home! For the past three or so weeks he's been working a ton. He's had to be there at 6:00 in the morning and usually works until the middle of the night (3 a.m. or later) or the next afternoon. Of course he comes home completely exhausted, but only sleeps for a few hours so he can spend time with us on his "day" off. Since he started this schedule at the beginning of the month, the kids are in bed by their regular bed time and Brent's asleep half an hour (at most) later. The class he's been following is finished for the most part so we've seen him TWO DAYS IN A ROW and at a decent time both days! I think we should get to see him regularly until early next week then we'll start all over on this less than ideal schedule.
The kids have been keeping me busy. I think that Blake is starting to enter the "terrible two's" which scares me because, with Ava, the three's were much harder than the two's and she wasn't nearly as rambunctious as Blake is! Yesterday morning after breakfast I started the shower, left the bathroom while the water was warming up and came back to find Blake sitting down with his clothes on and two blankets completely soaked.
As always, he took half of my shower with me then got out, soaking wet, and started doing what he could to destroy my bathroom. Usually this includes pulling all of the dirty clothes and dirty towels out of their hampers and redecorating the bathroom with them, getting back in the shower just when he is about dry so he can get back out and make sure the floor is really slippery when I get out. Lately he's been climbing up on the counter and experimenting with my tooth paste, deodorant, lotion and the other day, MY TOOTHBRUSH! Don't worry, I got a new one... a two pack actually!
Blake has decided that he no longer likes milk. (Side note: He's allergic to cow's milk so he drinks almond milk, always has.) We'll put him down for a nap or down for the night with milk and before we even get out the door, he starts yelling, "WANT JUUUUUICE. DADDDY! MOMMMY! WANT JUUUUUICE!" I don't know what caused the change in preference, but I cannot get him to drink milk! We've been giving him a tad bit of juice and a lot of water and he seems happy with it. It's so funny to me that he's already starting to have preferences and can tell us about them. He's getting too big too fast!
Yesterday, Ava got dressed for school all by herself. This isn't anything new, but on most days I'll add some input and make a suggestion or two. Yesterday I wanted to, but she was SO proud of her outfit, I didn't have the heart to say anything. She wore a red dress with white polka dots, red boots (not exactly the same color red as the dress) and her sparkly "belt." She has a purse that HAD a sparkly belt on it until she cut it off so she could wear it! We were walking out the door and she freaked out because she forgot it. "MOM! MY BELT! I FORGOT MY BELT! WE CAN'T GO YET!" We were almost late for school because of this belt! I tired to attach a picture, but it's in my yahoo account and for some reason, it's not loading. I'll add it later!
Since Brent was home yesterday, he took Ava to dance so Blake could finish up his nap and I could start dinner. It was so nice to have him around to help. Normally on Mondays I take Ava to school, immediately go to the grocery store where I get Blake a free cookie (not Paleo, I know, but it allows me to shop for a few minutes) then I stop and get him something to eat for lunch from the deli.. usually chicken. He'll eat his lunch while I grocery shop. It's PERFECT because I can do what I need to do and he just sits still and eats. Then we'll come home, I'll bring him in and put him down for a nap then unload the groceries. I'll make myself lunch then pick up the house a little bit and by that time it's usually 2:20 and I have to pick Ava up for dance. So I wake Blake up way before he's ready, go get Ava and head to dance. She slowly (the only way she operates lol) changes from her school clothes to her leotard and we go in. Usually Blake wants to be ON the dance floor so for an hour, I try to be creative and keep him entertained. It's amazing how much easier he is when he gets a FULL nap. On Thursday's, dance is an hour and a half later and Blake is GREAT!
While Brent and Ava were at dance, I made some DELICIOUS cinnamon apple cookies.
I was worried about how they'd turn out because there's no flour in them to form a dough, but everything worked together perfectly. Brent requested that I make a bunch for him when he starts working overnight again and Ava asked if she could take them as her snack for school today! That screams successful recipe to me! I got the recipe here and followed it almost exactly, but I added about three times as much vanilla as it calls for and doubled the cinnamon. I know cookies aren't normally a breakfast food, but Ava and I had one for breakfast today. With these cookies, there's no reason why they can't be a breakfast food!
For dinner I made Everyday Paleo's Curried Meatballs and "No Potato Salad."
The "No Potato Salad" was time consuming and I made several adjustments, but it turned out so good! Even Ava, my biggest critic, said she loved them "besides the salt." Hahaha, I almost guarantee that she couldn't pick out the salt taste in this dish, I know I couldn't because there was very little. I can't remember all of the changes that I made, but I do remember that I added more onion and pickles after I had already mixed everything and I added curry powder to coordinate them with the meatballs. This is one of those things that you taste and make adjustments as you go. I think we all have our idea of what potato salad is supposed to taste like so change it up until you get it to the taste you want. The cauliflower was very tasty in it! I was pleasantly surprised!
Ava also loved the curried meatballs. When I was making them, I worried what she would think about them and in my mind I was trying to think of adjustments I could make next time to make them more sweet instead of spicy, but she absolutely loved them. She said they were her favorite part of the meal! I asked if she wanted a cookie after dinner, but because she napped right through dinner and woke up to eat after the sun was already sleeping, she said that she would have to wait until tomorrow. I taught her when she was much younger that it's not okay to eat anything sweet or drink anything besides water after it gets dark and she refuses to break that rule. Makes me proud!
For the meatballs, I followed the recipe for the actual meatballs exactly, but I made a lot more sauce than it calls for. We ended up with 30-something meatballs and nowhere near enough sauce. If you use three pounds of ground beef like suggested, I recommend making triple the amount of sauce called for.
For dinner tonight, I'm making something with chicken and pesto. I'll blog about it tomorrow!
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