Just because

Ethan turns 8

Ethan just turned 8 a couple weeks ago, so I headed to the park with my boy and my camera on a nice cloudy day. It was a welcome change from our normal blazing hot sun. We had plenty of beautiful light, lots of green grass, and sweat dripping from both us of from all the humidity in the air. These are our favorite images from his birthday session.

And from those images, he chose these to go on his baptism invitation. They were different from the ones that I would have chosen, but he assured me these are the ones that he wanted. Because of that, I think his invitation turned out perfect!

Happy birthday Ethan!

Totally worth it

Earlier this month, we had the "joy" of taking family portraits. Our session was full of exciting moments of grass cuts on fingers, bored kids, moody girls, dancers too tired of looking at a camera's flashing red lights, close calls with PILES of dog poo, closed eyes, smile fatigue....

Yep, even some user errors like over/under exposing, and improper focus. :-)

 And finally, we were able to get one like this, only after replacing a head in photoshop. It was the absolute best we could get, as bad as it is. I must say that paying a professional photographer to take our family portraits would have been worth every penny after all we went through to get ONE mediocre portrait using a tripod. Lesson learned.

 

White Coat Ceremony

First, I have to apologize for the horrible pictures in this post. They are some of the worst I've ever taken, thank goodness. The room was dark, the lens too small, the subjects too far away, and the heads-in-my-way too many. Despite the horrible pictures, it was a fantastic day. 
Ryan had just finished his first day of dental school. He was excited, the kids were excited, and I was quite proud of my hunny. For those of you that have never been to a white coat ceremony, it is like a graduation, except it is at the beginning of school rather than at the end. It still comes with all the excitement, tears, speeches, and "fluff" that comes with a graduation. 
When all the students came in, they were divided between the two opposite aisles of the auditorium. We were so lucky to have Ryan come down the aisle right next to us. I was looking for him but did not see him until someone else called out that they saw him. 

 Here is Ryan waving to the kids as he walked by.

 Ryan is patting one of the boys on the head.

After the students found their seats, all the formalities started: people on stage introduced, speeches, pep talks, etc., all the fun stuff that goes with ceremonies of this type. 
Finally, the students were ready to go on stage, have their name read, get a white coat in the wrong size, shake hands, hug, find their seat on stage, and wait. 
If they were lucky, they had cute 3 year olds pointing and exclaiming, "There's Dad! That's my Dad!" Cutest thing ever. She was so proud of her daddy. 

If they were even luckier, they had two cute kids (Jayke then Aimee) yell out, "I love you, Dad" when their name was read. And everyone in the audience around those cute kids say, "Awe" at those two adorable children.

Ryan trying to fit in the too-small-coat.

The handshake.

The hug.

The proud parents and grandparents.

The picture with Mom and Dad after the ceremony, showing off his new white coat and name badge.

The picture with proud wife and kids after the ceremony.  Finally getting a decent picture after 4 tries to make the 3 year old not grumpy. I might be wrong, but I think the smile had something to do with a bribe.

I don't remember much else of anything that happened that day. I was just so excited and proud of Ryan for finally making it to this point in his life. I'm sure I was bawling for joy most of the day, mostly because I was so happy and partly because the pregnancy hormones would not let me control the flow of water from my eyes. This day could possibly have been one of the best days of our lives.

Banana Bread

 

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups sugar
1 cup butter, softened
3 1/8 cups mashed bananas (about 6 medium)
1-2 cups buttermilk
2 tsp vanilla
5 cups flour
2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda mixed with 2 tsp water (I usually use a small cup to mix them.)
Variation: May substitute plain yogurt for the buttermilk. If doing this, add 2 TBSP vinegar with the yogurt. 

Directions

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease bottoms only of four 8 or 9 inch loaf pans with shortening.
In a large bowl, stir sugar and butter until well mixed. Stir in bananas, buttermilk, and vanilla. Beat until well mixed and smooth.
Stir in flour and salt, until completely moistened. Add baking soda and water mixture until thoroughly mixed throughout. Divide batter evenly between pans. Smooth out top of batter, if needed.
Bake for 50-60 minutes, or until tops are browned and toothpick comes out clean. Cool completely on wire racks. Once cooled, you may wrap in plastic wrap and freeze for up to 1 month.
Note on buttermilk: If your buttermilk is on the thinner side, use 1 cup. If your buttermilk is quite thick, use 2 cups. The resulting batter should be thin enough to mix easily, but not too thin as to be runny. If you find that your batter is too thick after adding the flour, you can always add a little more buttermilk until the batter looks nice.

Funeral Potatoes

When we were going on a wheat-free diet, I thought our days of Cheesy Potatoes, Funeral Potatoes, or Church Potatoes (whatever you call it) were over. I was completely wrong. We can still have them and they actually taste better without all the preservatives and added ingredients that come in the can of cream of chicken soup.

1 1/2 cups of milk (reserve 1/4 cup)
1 chicken or veggie bouillon cube (I used Rapunzel Vegan Vegetable Bouillon from Sprouts)
1 1/2 Tbsp cornstarch
Salt to taste
1 cup sour cream
1/2-1 cup grated cheddar cheese (depends on how cheesy you like it)
1 stick melted butter
12 oz shredded potatoes (or 1 box dehydrated potatoes, rehydrated)
1/8 cup dried chopped onions
1 cup crushed cereal (corn flakes, chex, and crispix all work fine)
1 Tbsp melted butter

Preheat oven to 350F. Heat milk and bouillon cube in saucepan until almost boiling.  In small cup mix reserved 1/4 cup milk and cornstarch until smooth. Whisk cornstarch mix into hot milk mixture until smooth. It should thicken as it comes to a full boil. Salt to taste. Add sour cream, cheese, butter, potatoes, and onions. Mix well. Pour mixture into 8x8 casserole dish. In small container, mix crushed cereal and 1 Tbsp melted butter. Sprinkle over potato mixture in casserole dish. Bake at 350F for 30 minutes.

Cream of Chicken Soup

It had been so long since my last post that I had actually forgot my blog address and had to look through all my old facebook posts to figure out what it was. :-(  E is now on a wheat-free diet to see if that helps clear up his Eosinophilic Esophagitis. One of the (many) things that we can't have anymore is cream of (fill in the blank) soup. Until tonight. I had found a recipe online on how to make the soup with bean flour. Ummm, no thank you. Ryan had the idea to just use cornstarch instead. Brilliant! (And delicious to boot!) Here's the recipe:

Cream of Chicken Soup

3 cups of milk (reserve 1/4 cup)
2 chicken or veggie bouillon cubes (I used Rapunzel Vegan Vegetable Bouillon from Sprouts)
3 Tbsp cornstarch
1 can chicken chunks (or just precooked is fine)
Salt to taste

Heat milk, bouillon cubes, and chicken in saucepan until almost boiling.  In small cup mix reserved 1/4 cup milk and cornstarch until smooth. Whisk cornstarch mix into hot milk mixture until smooth. It should thicken as it comes to a full boil. Salt to taste.

If you are trying to use this in place of the cream of chicken soup in a can, this recipe equals 2 cans, un-reconstituted.

What I loved most about this recipe is that it uses basic ingredients (that are easily substituted) and took less than 10 minutes to prepare. I would say that it was just as good, if not better, than any canned soup I've tasted. Best of all, I can feel happy knowing that I didn't put a bunch of artificial chemicals into our bodies.