I'm crazy, baby!

I've thrown four baby showers since August so I thought I'd do a quick post with some pictures from the happy occasions. I love throwing showers for people, organizing meals for when baby comes, and making meals for families with new babies. Lately, I've been doing all three of these things a lot. It's been a busy baby time around here.

Organizing is one thing I'm good at so I am happy to be able to do something helpful for people. I can't take credit for most of what happens at the actual shower; I just send out invitations and then delegate, delegate, delegate. I assign other people to help me make the food and take care of the decorating (I'm terrible at making things look cute and generally dislike doing it). I do always put myself in charge of the games, though, as that is my favorite thing at showers. Maybe someday I'll be able to knit cute handmade sweaters, make beautiful cakes, or make a plain old room beautiful with cute decorations. For now, though, I'll just keep organizing. 

If you ever throw a shower and want some good game ideas, I'm your girl. Some of my favorite shower games are a mad lib about the birth, the blueberry-baby delivery game, the wet diaper game, and a game where everyone tries to guess what features the mom wants the baby to inherit from her or the daddy.

On August 18th, I threw a shower for Emily, one of my awesome co-workers. We had a great time and thanks to Laurie-Anne's amazing decorations and creative theme ("Emily is ready to pop" - complete with giant lollipops, popcorn, and a cute banner) and Marion's two amazing cakes, the shower was a huge success. 

Laurie-Anne's cute decorations. I'm always astounded with her awesome ideas and how she can make the ugly community room look cute, festive, and feminine.

Marion (my co-worker from Germany) made two amazing cakes. I loved them both. This was a snow white cake with cherries and the other was an apple tart. I love German/Swiss baked goods! They use nut flours frequently in baking and I adore the texture and flavor the nut flours add!

And here is Em - ready to pop indeed! I love her sticky-outy belly button. She's done!

Jackie, Laurie-Anne, Marion, and Katie

Jana, Jessica, Em, and Gretchen. This picture makes me happy. Everyone is having such a good time!

On September 15th, I threw a shower for my friend in the ward, Megan. It was such a fun shower and unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures. Jenny did all the decorating and made the cakes and so many other people pitched in to help out. It wouldn't have been nearly as nice had I tried to do it on my own.

On November 10th, I threw a baby shower for my dear friend, Staci. Staci is like a second mom to Sam and she is such a wonderful mom and friend. Stace is having her 3rd boy and was insistent that we not throw her a shower but I pressured her into having a "celebration" since she deserves a lot of love and a lot of diapers and wipes for the new little man. We had a great time.

Staci holding her "blueberry baby" for the blueberry baby game. I freeze a single blueberry in each ice cube and everyone has to estimate the exact delivery time (to the second) that their blueberry baby will be born. They can do anything to get the baby free except put the ice cube in their mouth or stick it in hot water. It is my favorite baby shower game. It cracks me up watching people try to get their baby out in time or keep it in the ice until it's time for it to be delivered. 

Jeannie, Marisa, and Chiyo

Candee, Nan, and Laurie-Anne

Brenna and Kelli

Shauna holding Brenna's munchkin.

Cami and Candee

Staci, Jenny, and Stephanie

On Saturday, November 12th, I threw a shower for Marion, another of my fabulous co-workers. Laurie-Anne, once again, was the mastermind behind the cute decorations. We also had a diaper cake competition and a lot of friends brought wonderful food. 

Marion with the cute diaper cakes and best wishes sign in German.

Laurie-Anne with her fabulous decorations. 

Dorit, Laurie-Anne, Marion, Em, and Jackie. 

The cute diaper cakes.

Maggie, Henry, and Maya. Henry is holding the size 4 Huggies diaper we used for the wet diaper game. It held 29 oz of water before it was completely saturated! Crazy!

So, I've got another shower to throw for a friend in January but after that, I'll have a break for awhile. I love celebrating all these new little people and wonderful mamas I know. Hurray for babies!

CSA Joy and Summer Cooking Adventures

We joined a farm this year and bought a share of the produce grown there (a Community Supported Agriculture or CSA share). I was a little dissatisfied in late Spring when we received about a pound of lettuce over a 5 week period. We paid a fee upfront that worked out to about $10 a week so when I realized I'd paid about $50 for a pound of lettuce, I was pretty upset.

But, the rest of the summer and fall more than made up for the slow start. I know -  I should have anticipated a slow start; only so many things grow in the Spring. I was just worried it would never pick up and we'd continue to get nothing for what we'd paid. Boy was I wrong!

We had vegetables coming out of our ears! It was all I could do to keep up with all the cucumbers, Swiss chard (the bane of my vegetable eating existence - I really hate it), green beans, tomatoes, and squash. The picture below is an average weekly share. We had a basketful like this every week from June through October. My fridge was completely packed to the brim with beautiful vegetables and I hardly bought any groceries all summer. Today, in fact, was the first day I had to buy a normal grocery load of veggies and I found that it had been so long, I couldn't remember what I usually bought. After a summer of eating every kind of veggie imaginable, I can't remember what I used to cook before we had the farm.

Sam loved going to the farm, especially because he got to see horseys and cows. He also loved eating fresh green beans, cucumbers, and peas. 

He would usually shove about five green beans in his mouth and would chew and chew and chew. Finally, after about a half hour, he'd spit out all the roughage he couldn't chew enough to swallow. Eating veggies is tough with only one set of tiny molars. I figure he was getting a lot of vitamins even if he couldn't mulch very efficiently. 

 

We got creative with the wide variety and large amount of veggies, especially with the chard and kale. We stir fried the stuff for the first couple weeks but I literally gagged one night trying to eat the bitter, slimy chard and we decided there was no way we could eat it unless we hid it in everything we ate. We made green pancakes at least once a week (our usual blender wheat, oatmeal, cranberry pancakes with several chard and kale leaves blended in). I also started making chardy cheese, which was our usual homemade mac and cheese baked with chopped up chard and kale in it. Sam actually ate that stuff; it was pretty gross. We also started making smoothies with chard and kale pretty regularly and once, I made a wickedly chardy quiche that we barely managed to gag down. We did a decent job hiding *ahem* I mean, eating, the chard and kale and wasted very little of it.

On top of our farm share, Don and I planted a little 10x10' garden plot in our family housing community garden. We've done this every year but haven't really succeeded until this year. We had a wildly successful bumper crop of pretty much everything we planted. We had beautiful lettuce and spinach all through May and early June, then we had green beans and peas, and once the tomatoes started coming, they just wouldn't stop! We planted 6 plants anticipating they wouldn't grow well. It's amazing how actually watering your garden results in thriving plants - who knew!? In previous years, we'd forget to water our garden or would leave it for a week while we went out of town and it would go unwatered and wither and shrivel... This year, though, we were vigilant and many friends helped us water while we were out and about and the garden blossomed! 

This is two days worth of tomatoes. The tomatoes were a little spotted but they were so juicy and delicious.

Sam loved these funny lemon cucumbers that we'd get from the farm. They looked like lemons on the outside and even a little bit on the inside. Sam ate one or two of these like an apple every day for several days running. I was thrilled. His love for them didn't last but I was happy he liked them for a little while.

This is a random picture of the pesto pasta I made. We got tons of basil each week from the farm so I made several batches of pesto, most of which I froze. I also made homemade mozzarella cheese for this pesto dish, which was delicious. It was a very domestic day for me. 

This is a picture of the homemade mozzarella cheese, which admittedly looks a little weird. It tasted wonderful!

One day's worth of tomatoes and zucchini from the garden. I made a ton of zucchini bread and my friend at the farm gave me the most amazing zesty zucchini quesadilla recipe that I love! 

That huge tomato is called a brandywine. They were great for marinara sauce but always looked a little funky. 

When I had 19 cucumbers sitting in my fridge, I decided it was time to figure out how to make dill pickles. My friend Katie in Family Housing had made refrigerator dill pickles last summer so I got her recipe and she gave me a bunch of dill from her garden and Don and I had a pickling party! We pickled all kinds of cucumbers - marketmore, lemon, pickling... They all turned out so well! Some of them were even on the verge of going bad before I peeled and pared away at them and they still tasted great. We packed the dill, garlic, and black peppercorns in the bottom of the jar, added the cucumber spears, and then poured the hot brine made of salt water and vinegar over the cucumbers. Then, we screwed on the lids and within about 20 minutes, all the jars had self sealed. The next day, we had delicious, crisp, and flavorful pickles! I don't think I'll ever buy pickles again!

 

Filling the jars, prepping the cucs.

Pouring in the brine...

This is what the cucs looked right after we put the brine in...

About an hour later, this is what the cucs looked like. They were already pickles! Amazing! We took some to the farm potluck and people loved them. I think we started a wave of pickling through the CSA members because the pickles were so tasty!

Because of our prolific tomato plants and wild amounts of veggies in the fridge, each week for about a month and half, I'd spent about 2 1/2 hours making a huge batch of fresh tomato marinara. It actually usually ended up as more of a vegetable ghoulash but it was delicious. 

I would chop the tomatoes and set them to simmer. Then, I'd food process onions, tons of garlic, carrots, eggplant, yellow squash, zucchini, and chard and saute all of that until tender. Then, I'd combine it all together with some fresh basil, parsley, and a couple bay leafs and then let the whole thing cook down for a couple hours. We'd cook up some mild Italian pork sausage medallions and some pasta and have ourselves a feast. We'd eat half and freeze half. It was a great way to use our tomatoes and get all our veggies out of the fridge and into our happy bellies. 

I also used our tomatoes to make a huge pot of homemade tomato soup. I had never made tomato soup before and was really pleased with how well it turned out. I added a bunch of pesto for a nice basil flavor and it was delicious! 

I've still got tomato ghoulash and soup in my freezer. It has made for lots of much needed quick, easy meals lately.

One domestic thing that I'm good at is making homemade whole wheat bread. I finally have a good recipe that makes a light, fluffy loaf. Previously, I made a bunch of recipe that were very brick-like and crumbly so I'm in love with this bread and have made it every week for over 3 years now. One week, the loafs looked so pretty, I had to take a picture.

My friend Cami and I were in charge of a YW activity where I taught the girls to make bread and she taught the girls to make freezer jam. We had tons of strawberries left over so I made a bunch of freezer jam (which is so easy and delicious!) and have been enjoying it and giving it away for months and months now. Yum! Who knew jam could be so easy and inexpensive!

Hurray for learning new skills! I really love cooking. Now to learn to love cleaning up after... 

Denver Rescue Mission Service Projects and the Family Housing Welcome Back BBQ

On a random note, Sam likes to build barricades using all his toys. He stacks them on top of each other and completely surrounds himself. Then he tries to get me or Don to squeeze in to the tiny space next to him behind the barricade. It makes us laugh.

In July, I organized a canned food and clothing drive for the Denver Rescue Mission. The youth did a door to door drive in Superior (where most of the youth in our congregation live) which we did on a Wednesday night. Then, I asked other congregation members at church to bring items to the church.  We had an enormous response and had two cars completely packed to overflowing that we took down to the Mission on August 10th. 

I was in charge of the service project for all the youth in July and when I started to look in to what we could do, I got really excited about helping the kids learn about the problem of homelessness. I organized  a series of service projects with the Denver Rescue Mission with the goal of helping them really understand what life is like for these people who live on the street and have an opportunity to get to know and love them. I didn't want it to be something that they saw once and forgot. I was hoping that this would be an experience that would cause a deeper, more permanent change. 

When we arrived at the Mission and began unloading the food, the volunteer coordinator, Lee, and the other workers were amazed at how much we had collected. I had told Lee that we had carfuls of stuff and I think he thought I was exaggerating at first. He told me to have the kids put the food in a small area of the room. It wasn't until that area was completely filled and we were filling a good portion of the room that he realized I was serious. He said it was the biggest collection he had ever seen. 

After we unloaded the food, we sorted it in to the pantry and helped with some of the dinner prep. Then, Lee gave us a tour of the shelter and told us about life for the people who frequent the shelter and the program they offer to help people get off the street, recover from addictions, and develop skills to be able to get a job. After our tour, we walked by the area called "the triangle" where prostitutes sell themselves for nearly nothing to buy drugs and many drug deals and murders happen regularly. We walked to a park where a lot of homeless people hang out and had our dinner. We discussed pan-handling and how to help people we see out on street corners, etc. 

Then, we headed back to the shelter and went to the chapel service. It was a fascinating and eye-opening experience, especially for many of the kids who had never been to any other church besides our own.

It was a great experience and the kids still talk about what they learned. In September, the girls went down and served dinner. They were really excited to go after having been in August and they had a wonderful time. They can't wait to go again. Organizing these service projects took a lot of time but it was well worth it to see how happy the girls were after helping at the Mission. This has been my favorite experience in the three years I've worked with these girls.

The group at the Mission. I wish I'd gotten a picture of all the cans but I didn't. We'd already sorted and put them away at this point.

Dinner prep.

Funny kids. 

Back to Sam. Sam's two obsessions of the summer were watermelon and the moon. One night, we decided to take him outside so he could eat his watermelon and look at the moon at the same time. He was thrilled. He doesn't have a shirt one because at this point, he refused to wear a bib so everytime he ate melon (he also loves cantaloupe), we just took his shirt off. As soon as he saw the melon, he would say, "Shirt off!" 

Each Wednesday, Sam and I go to the library for storytime and we get new books. I took him to the kids' astronomy section to find some books about the moon since he is so in love with it. These books are clearly written for kids writing reports in elementary school about the moon but Sam was fascinated with them. He sat down with a complicated book that had a diagram of the moon in the different phases circling the earth. He pointed to the picture and said, "Moon go around the earff." I was amazed. For the next several weeks, all he wanted to read before nap and bedtime were his moon books. I learned more about the moon than I had ever known before. It is so neat to see Sam's interests and personality come out as his language development skyrockets. Daily, he says new sentences with words I've never heard. It is so exciting!

On Saturday, August 13th, I was in charge of the Family Housing Welcome Back BBQ. We had 700 people show up (we only had about 570 last year!) and I brought in 16 groups from campus and the community to share information about the services they provide. They each had an informational table and we had a raffle for 3 ipod shuffles to get people to visit the tables (which worked much better than the previous year when hardly anyone visited the tables). We also had a DJ and dancing, CHIP - the CU Mascot, the CUPD with their squad cars and motorcycles, and the fire department who brought a fire truck and let the kids spray water out of the fire hose. It was a huge event and everything went really well. We had campus catering take care of the food and I think everyone had a great time.

Sam at the BBQ - eating watermelon, of course.

I just loved all of these Indian grad students with their ice cream cones hanging out with CHIP, the mascot. 

Me and CHIP! Hurray for another successful event.