Did You Know?

On Monday April 9, 2012, the First Family will host the 134th annual White House Easter Egg Roll.  Click here to find out more.

Connor the Climber

Connor started to pull himself to a stand by holding on to the couch, bench and the toy box.  Now a week later, he can climb up stairs.  I can’t believe it!  Yesterday my husband was behind Connor as he climbed up about 5 stairs in 1 minute.  He is not even 9 months old yet and he is climbing up stairs.  Boy am I in trouble!  (we have 3 sets of stairs)

Construction Paper Eggs

Happy First Day of spring!  Today to kick off the start of spring I wanted Allison to use a glue stick 100% by herself.  I cut out eggs out of paper and cut out some shapes and glues the shapes on to the eggs.  She had so much fun!  She was able to be creative and she loved that they were shapes she was glueing on.  Simple, easy to prepare, she felt like she was doing a craft and she had a blast!

Did You Know?

The first day of spring is March 20th!

Crock-pot Vegetable beef soup

I use my 6Qt Crock-pot.  

For me it is much easier to cook, bake, and do things around the house in the morning than in the late afternoon or evening.  On this particular day we had 4” of snow and I told Pinky Pie we could go play in it when she woke up from her nap.  After we played out in the snow we came in the house and there in the kitchen was our hot soup waiting for us. Great example of a good day to use my crock-pot! 

Ingredients:

1 1/2 lb. Stew Beef

1 1/2 C. Carrots (chopped, or whole baby carrots)

1 1/2 C. Celery (chopped)

1 1/2 C. Zucchini (2 zucchinis)

2 C. Broccoli (bit size pieces)

6-7 Red Potatoes (about 2 1/2 C.)

1 Yellow Onion (chopped)

12 Garlic Cloves (minced)

64oz. of Vegetable Broth

1 Can Diced Tomatoes 

2 tsp. Italian Seasoning

Salt & pepper to taste

Take Action:

1. Chop all your veggies

2. Brown the beef by dredging the beef flower, salt and pepper.

3. Put them in a pan with a little oil, just long enough to brown each side. Working in batches if necessary.

4. (Optional) Add all the onion to the pan and saute for 3 minutes then add the garlic for one more minute.

5. Put everything into the crock-pot with the lid on.  High for 3-4 hours or on low for 6-7 hours.

6. Enjoy! 

Browning the Beef

Sautéed onions 

All ready to start cooking!

Other Options:

1. Just add everything to the crock-pot and the beef will be shredded.

2. Don't add beef and you will have yourself a delicious veggie soup.

It is so cool to watch how babies learn!

Recently Little Bubs has been very interested in his hands.  Yesterday he was watching one hand move and I thought it was so cute.  I soon saw his other hand slowly move over and softly grab the hand that he was watching.  So cute!  

Tonight in the bath Bubs found some bubbles and thought they would be fun to play with.  He tried to pick them up but they wouldn’t stay in his hand.  With his hand open he was putting his hand in the water and lifting his hand slowly up, when his hand was out of the water he would slowly close his little hand.  I wonder what he was thinking!

It is so cool how babies learn about their bodies and new things!