phyllo fun

update: here's the recipe as per robyn's request.. have you noticed that most of the recipes i use are from allrecipes.com?

last night we moved our friday night cooking to sunday.. we were making spinach pie and i was worried the spinach wouldnt make it until friday. or that i wouldnt make it until friday. i love spinach pie!

so here is our lovely spinach getting cooked with some onion, green onion and garlic.

and here we're putting layers of phyllo dough in the pan. this stuff is so fun to work with...

our spinach got a good squeezing and met up with some feta, ricotta and egg.

and in it goes

top it off with some more phyllo, cut it up and stick it in the oven.

here's jeremy working on some potatoes to go with the pie.

the potatoes and pie emerge from the oven. ooo... aahhhhh....

while our spinach pie and potatoes were cooking we thought we'd play around with the leftover dough and different fillings.. here i am buttering a "cheese football" at lightening speed. it's got feta, ricotta, monterey jack, parsley and egg

here's what they look like inside

and here we have some pecan footballs for dessert. (we cracked pecans while the dough was thawing out.) they've got pecans, syrup, egg, and vanilla inside.

oscar loved the spinach pie but wasn't crazy about the potatoes. i really liked playing with the phyllo dough, and i'll probably get it again. jeremy and i were already thinking about other stuff we can do with it. i'll definitely be making spinach pie again, though i might buy frozen spinach to save time and $$.

family picnic

this weekend jeremy's mom had a family picnic at her house. despite the mud and puddles all over, we had a great time.

i was in charge of invitations.. it was short notice, so i did postcards.

cheesy cowboy

aaron lost his pants in a mud puddle

aunt janie, lane, aunt mary and rosie enjoying some shade

oscar and lane put some party favors from oscar's bday to good use

jeremy held my hat for me while i took the bike for a ride

aunt janie put her feet up while danielle went to work cutting aunt mary's hair

jeremy started some bottle cap races which were a big hit

oscar declared it snack time, so we marched back to the house for some cookies.

we organized a quick relay race. here are jeremy and his uncle nigel facing off in the bean bag balance. unfortunately (for you, not me) there were no pictures taken of me running with a penny between my knees.

hula hoop fun for everyone

the night ended with a wienie roast around the campfire. this is actually a picture of jeremy and his cousin, david, wringing their socks out by the campfire. (it really was quite wet)

date night

the saturday after our pizza night jeremy and i packed up a picnic and drove to dauphin island. we ate lunch on the beach and then stuck our feet in the bay. it was a perfect picnic - i didnt even eat any sand. we also blew bubbles.. it was windy enough that we just held the wand up and the wind blew the bubbles for us. we drove around dauphin island and jeremy showed me a few houses he had wired.

the bridge that makes me nervous

welcome to dauphin island

houses on stilts - they always look so silly to me...

here we are enjoying some perfect picnic weather

the water is still a bit chilly (notice jeremy's expression)

after our picnic we drove to mobile and looked at a couple more houses that jeremy worked/is working on. we got a motel room and changed for going out. we went to see coraline in 3d.. it was really neato... the 3d is so fun, i wonder what oscar would think about it. the textures look amazing. after that we got a very very late dinner at applebee's because it was next to the theater and we were worried that everything else would be closed by the time we drove anywhere. then back to our room. we left mobile shortly after breakfast because oscar had a stomach bug.

friday night fun

since i had the stomach bug so long, i didnt get a chance to post any of this fun stuff we've been doing, so now i have to catch up!


we've declared friday nights 'family cooking night'. it wasnt something we planned - we just happened to make biscuits together on a friday night and decided it was lots of fun. so we've planned something to make together the past two weeks.

pizza:

on friday the 20th we used this crust recipe and made pizza. we ended up making one supreme, one ham & pineapple, and a small stuffed crust with mushrooms and ham. it turned out so yummy that we called jeremy's mom over to eat some. we had LOTS of leftovers (which were also good.. mmm)

jeremy cutting pizza

supreme pizza (supremely good)

oscar waiting for a slice

me cutting up the ham & pineapple pizza

chocolate chip cookies:

this past friday we made chocolate chip cookies. actually, we forgot to plan something to make for our special night and i was planning on making chocolate chip cookies anyway, so we did it together. they could have used a bit more flour than the recipe called for...

cookies

this is how oscar looks when he says 'cheese!'

potty break

i'm on day 3 of a stomach bug and on day 2 of serious big boy pants wearing potty training with oscar, so i haven't had much time for posting. here is oscar sleeping on his potty:

yesterday he used his potty 31 times. he had one accident the first time i put on his big boy underpants, but none after that. (not that he had a chance with going every 5-25 min). the sleeping picture is from sunday.. he was trying out his new froggy potty and apparently it's comfy.

more special presents

here's a special post for aunt robyn, uncle mike and sammy.

we picked up oscar's birthday package on monday

he's gotten present unwrapping down now.. he's a pro (also a pro at silly faces)

always loves a good book

wow! what a great set of markers!

he tried out the markers right away - they're a big hit! and a whole pack of paper to himself is quite a treat!

last night we played with his tub crayons. they're lots of fun and clean up easy.

thanks you guys! (while i was posting this, oscar came and told me he wanted to color on HIS paper.. i wonder if he saw the pictures..)

special presents

i thought i'd do extra posts for those that sent presents and didn't get to see oscar enjoy them. this is a special post for uncle chris, aunt angie, gavin and abby.

here is oscar trying to open his present. plastic tableclothes may be big enough for large presents, but they're also harder to get into.

with lane's help, oscar managed to get through to the box.

oh the excitement!

oscar was so excited he tried to get the chair out by himself

we got it unloaded and oscar and aaron both tested it out.

later that night oscar was sitting at his table drawing.. so cute!

thank you so much!

the party

party highlights:

oscar chatted with and entertained his party guests.

we ate like a bunch of hungry caterpillars. the punch seemed to be a big hit.. (thank you paula deen and i'm sorry we make fun of your accent..)

aunt janie tried to pin the caterpillar on jeremy while we played games.

then there was some chasing/tickling/laughing.

we skipped right to opening presents.. we figured if oscar sat down to eat cake he'd fall asleep.

oscar and aaron checked out oscar's bat mobile (or batsicle as lane calls it)

we sang to oscar

and he blew out the candles (with a little help from daddy)

cake was served with options. chocolate? yellow? ice cream on cone or on cake? jeremy chose both and on cake.

the birthday boy finished off the party with a lollipop and a nap

later that evening, paw paw came over and oscar opened up a tool set. he immediately went to work on his batmobile.. i guess it came with a faulty gas cap?

dont worry, he got it running again..