Ducks

I made a to do list on Saturday.  Not Saturday like two days ago.  Saturday like a week and two days ago.  If I actually finish writing this and get it posted I will finish my list.  All except get Carter's hair cut.  Whatever.  He's bringing sexy mullets back.  It was supposed to be a to do list for the day, not the next 10.  Whoops.

Which brings me to New Year's Resolutions.  I didn't make one.  Instead I invented "Operation Ducks in a Row."  Oh wait, I decided to rename it to "Straighten the Ducks."  Getting them all in a row seemed a bit ambitious.  I'm going to aim for less crooked.  Basically it goes down like this....  I want another baby pretty soon.  But my house and my brain and my life look like this.

I don't like it one bit. 

Carter keeps asking me adorable things like, "Mama wanna play trains?"  And I say, "Yes in just one minute but first I have to ________."  Only there are so many things I need to do before I can play trains that he's gonna be 45 before I fill in all the blanks. 

I'm working at a feverish pace to knock out as many projects as I can in the first part of the year.  Which I figure is the perfect New Year's Resolution because people normally do really well at the first part of the year and then they suck.  And that's my plan.  To do really well at the start and then suck.  And by suck I mean play trains and watch VeggieTales and ride bikes and fingerpaint.

baby food soup

And my final soup is....baby food!

I had such high hopes for this recipe I found in Parents Magazine.  I'm posting it with the hopes that some one out there can make some adjustment that can save it.

In a big pot heat 1 tablespoon olive oil on medium.
Add 1/2 cup chopped carrot
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/3 cup chopped onion
Stir occasionally
Cook 8-10 minutes until tender and starting to brown.

(I tasted a carrot at this point and it was delectable.)

Add 3 1/2 cups chopped butternut squash
2 medium apples, chopped
4 cups chicken broth

Bring to a boil
Reduce heat
Simmer uncovered 20 minutes until squash is tender
Cool slightly

Puree in blender or food processor.

Add black pepper and croutons

Easy and disgusting.  Li wouldn't even eat the leftovers and that's saying something.
I thought the croutons were mainly for garnish but if you omit them, you've got yourself a BIG pot of baby food.  I was this close to feeding it to Megan.

My mom suggested leaving out the apples.  Anyone else have an idea?

Macaroni and Cheese

I know, I know it's not soup.  But this recipe uses soup so I think it counts.  I am cheating though because Thursday was the night I clenched the world's worst mother trophy so you can bet your boots I didn't make dinner.

It's ridiculously easy to make.  You can probably pull it off, even on your bad nights.

I'm even going to type it out, it's that easy....
Over medium heat boil 1 can Campbell's cheese soup --- I use the fiesta kind, it's spicy
with 2 cups of water.

Add 2 cups uncooked elbow noodles --- I use whole wheat because I like to pretend this is better for you than the box.

Cover and cook for 10 minutes or until your noodles are soft.
Stir it every now and then.
Remove from heat and stir in 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese --- I used pepperjack once, and it was a bit much for me.  But maybe you like that kinda thing.

Let stand covered 10 minutes before serving --- we usually don't make it.

We all love this and I like to pretend Carter is eating veggies because the fiesta soup has red and green chunks it in.  I'm sure they don't really count, but maybe they'll prep him to eat the real thing some day. 

I don't even like cauliflower

Wednesday was Cauliflower Soup.  I feel special every time I type cauliflower and the red squiggly line doesn't come up.  It's a tricky word, right?

Here is the link to my cauliflower soup recipe.  I made this a few weeks ago.  It's incredibly easy and really yummy.  And Carter and I even ate vegetables without complaining.  It's pretty rich and creamy, so I did get a little bit of a bellyache after.

This time around I thought I'd get clever and make it with broccoli.  Which was a bad idea.  And then I got carried away with my vegetables.  I love a party and I always say the more the merrier.  But then I didn't want to add too many of those salty chicken cubes things so I didn't.  I just put in more water. 

It wasn't a horrible catastrophe. We ended up having to add more seasonings after it was cooked.  (I say we because I always call in Li to fix my kitchen blunders, I'm no good at anything but following a recipe.)  And the broccoli just made the texture yucky.  Next time  I'll stick to cauliflower and not invite extra veggies to the party unless I'm willing to add extra of everything else.  i.e. double the recipe, like a normal person.


Oh, and I followed the advice of one of the commenters and used a slotted spoon to put the veggies in the blender and then only added some of the broth back in.  Also, I don't have Worcestershire sauce (nor can I spell it without a squiggly line) I used some soy sauce and Tabasco instead. 

Try it.  You'll like it.

I was meant to be a Mexican

On Tuesday we had Tortilla Soup.

Yum.

Think of the yummiest thing ever.
And then think harder.

It's so good.

Out with peanut butter and chocolate.
Lime, avocado and cilantro is the new best combo.

(Okay, I guess PB and chocolate is still be the best couple.)


The only thing that would make this soup experience more wonderful for me would be some of these.

Does anybody want to buy me some?



I apologize for the lack of photos, I just doesn't usually occur to me to take pictures of my food.

Please don't read my blog

I've had mucho inner turmoil about blogging.  It seems the less time I spend reading blogs the happier I get.  But writing a blog makes me happy.  I feel a little like a drug dealer.  But I finally decided that I can't be responsible if ya'll wanna do crack.  I hope the real drug dealers don't see it like that.

Seriously though.  If my blog makes you unhappy, please don't read it.

If you're still reading I promised soup recipes this week so here goes...

Last Monday we had coconut chicken curry.  I didn't mean to make soup on Monday.  I had sweet potatoes that I wanted to do something with.  While searching for recipes to use them I found this recipe, which didn't even call for sweet potatoes, but I made it anyway and used my potatoes instead of regular ones.  It was yummy!!


I'd repost the recipe, but that's a lot of typing or copy/pasting.  I suppose if you really want to try it, you can click the link, right?  Here it is again, in case you didn't find it. 

I made a few changes....
Like I said I used sweet potatoes instead of regular.
I don't like peas so I used some carrots and put them in with the potatoes.
I didn't add the optional toasted coconut because I don't know how to toast coconut.
My coconut milk was about a month expired.  (I'm sure this is key to getting it to taste great.)

I did that whole step where you brown the chicken before you put it in the crock pot but I'm sure that next time, I'll just throw it in.  I didn't notice much of a difference.  And I spent way more than the suggested 15 minutes on prep and 10 minutes is usually my limit, so the browning step has got to go.

Also they recommend cooking on low 6-8 hours.  Maybe my pot cooks hot, but it was way done by 5.

We will make this again.

If I can find some more coconut milk that's not expired.

Now I understand why my parents put me in the garage

I had the sugary sweetest post planned for today.  

All about smoothies and matching clothes and kitty-cats and rainbows.  

Well, some of that anyway. 

Maybe another day.  

If you're good.

(I just realized I typed god instead of good.  Do you think God reads blogs?)

So maybe it was because I've been playing nurse to 2 sick kids for the past 6 days.  

Or maybe the fact that my baby isn't yet 5 months old, and hasn't started solids but I still started my period this morning.  

Or maybe the gravitational pull of the moon in line with jupiter.....whatever.  

I woke up from my 7 solid hours of sleep feeling like there was no way I could function without 7 more.

But I yanked myself out of bed and Netflix and I did our best to raise these children.

(Megan likes to watch Carter while he watches TV.)

I remember wishing that Li had a sick day so that he could come home and I could have a sick day.
In retrospect, that should've been a red flag.

Megan finally fell asleep so I stuck Carter in his bed and fell asleep.  

Carter did not go to sleep and got into...well, I don't want to get arrested....so, something he shouldn't have.   

I was still desperate for sleep so I locked him in his room and he started yelling.  

Of course. 

Then my tender little Megan started crying in her sleep because Carter was crying.  

Ugh.  

As if I hadn't already blown the competition for world's worst mother out of the water.  

But yelling and door slamming and stomping around were soon to follow.  

Putting him in the garage to keep him quiet would've been much kinder.

(How could I get mad at a face like that?)

How much would I love a phone call like, "Please take my kids for an hour I'm desperate for a nap."?  So much. 

I know for a fact that if I had posted something similar on facebook I would have had multiple offers of help in minutes.

I watched Carter yank on a hose tonight for several minutes crying his brains out because he couldn't move it any further.  (I really am a mean mom, huh?)  When I finally convinced him he needed help it took me all of 30 seconds to fix his problem.

"I wanna do it myself."

Well I can't. 

And neither can you.

Or maybe you can.

But you don't have to.

And speaking of food, which we aren't, but my original post idea was going to... everything I wanted to make for dinner this week was soup.  So we ate nothing but soup all week.  And next week I'm going to post a recipe a day.  It should be yummy.