I’ll start by announcing the winner of the Alice in Wonderland Playset! The winner is… via Instagram @DAMEWOOD_DAYS!
Now, on to our new playset and giveaway! For the Moby Dick Playset, Gigi requested a “pirate party”. This little party was decidedly simpler than our somewhat-elaborate Alice in Wonderland Tea Party due to the fact that the kids were a bit under the weather, and while a mini-tea party menu is easy to come up with, a pirate party was a little trickier. I bought a bag of Pirate’s Booty, cut up an orange (to fight scurvy, obviously), and handed each of the girls a little apple to nibble. Gigi’s Grandma had made her a fabulous pirate costume which G happily pulled on before opening her new Moby Dick Playset. She loved discovering and repeating the characters names, and “shooting” the harpoon at the people and seagulls, somehow the whale was spared. Maybe, unlike the sailors at the center of Moby Dick, she understood that a tiny harpoon may not be the best way to hook her whale.
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To enter the giveaway and win a Moby Dick Playset leave a comment! I’ll announce the winner when I share our Jungle Book Picnic next week! You can also enter on Instagram! Good luck!
GIVEAWAY CLOSED.
You know someone really loves you when they are willing to put their life on the line, day after day, for you. Every morning this week at 5:45am Kyle has been risking life and limb for me. He gets up at 5:30am, gets the coffee steeping, and no doubt steels himself for potential battle, before he walks softly back into our bedroom and wakes me up.
The terror of waking me from deep sleep is not a new one. When I was younger, my sister used to wake me up by flinging pillows at me from a safe distance, presumably with a safe exit strategy in mind, so I didn’t hit her. I don’t remember any of this, of course. And I recently heard a family legend that my Aunt Sue, my mom’s youngest sister, was awakened by their mother who would throw breakfast items at her sleeping form to avoid physical injury.
What, you might be thinking, could be so important that my wonderful husband would risk his life to wake me up at such a wretched hour? I have been exercising in the mornings. Before coffee, before my eyes are even properly open, I have been exercising. I am a fairly consistent exerciser. As consistent as a mom of two young kids with no childcare can be. Meaning I have the goal of getting a work out in every day during their naps. However, sometimes I have to prioritize: eating lunch, tidying up, prepping dinner, taking a shower, or eating Hot Dates with Olive Oil and Salt while watching an episode of Gilmore Girls. Then, of course there are the times when one of the girls skips a nap. When it’s all added up, I end up getting a workout in once, maybe twice a week.
Between my temperamental back, and my temperamental anxiety, I really need daily exercise. I recently had the realization that the only way I’m going to get more hours in the day is if I add one myself. And the only place to add one? In the morning. But, knowing how much I loathe alarms, Kyle bravely volunteered to wake me up each morning. He gamely puts up with my grumbles and glares and lets me steal nips of his coffee between lunges. He doesn’t know it yet, but soon he’s good man.
To reward his goodness, I’ve been cooking up wonderful food and snacks for our family this week. With all the exercise going on, and the excitement of getting the garden planned out and the new raised beds in place, I’ve been making quick, healthy snacks in the afternoons inspired by the vegetables that will soon be creeping up through our soil. One of my favorite, simplest recipes is for Kale Chips with Lemon Zest and Flake Salt. There are many, many recipes “out there” for Kale Chips, and mine is pretty basic. Except for the sprinkling of fragrant lemon zest and the squeeze of bright lemon juice, there’s nothing extraordinary about them. That being said, I can easily devour a bowlful of them by myself, not that my kids let that happen.
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Kale Chips are quick and easy to make, simply tossed with glossy olive oil, they are roasted until the kale crisps up and the edges of the torn leaves begin to brown and contract. Once pulled from the oven they are quickly showered with lemon, flake salt, and a few turns of freshly ground black pepper, and equally as quickly, they are devoured. They melt in your mouth. They are crisp and salty and vegetal and bright. They inspire me to over-plant kale in our freshly turned garden beds.
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KALE CHIPS WITH LEMON ZEST AND FLAKE SALT
Ingredients.
1 bunch of kale
extra virgin olive oil
flake salt
freshly ground black pepper
squeeze of fresh lemon juice
zest of 1/2 lemon zest
Directions.
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Wash and thoroughly dry the kale. Strip it from the stalk into large pieces. Spread into a single layer on a baking sheet. Drizzle with olive oil and toss until each piece is lightly coated. Sprinkle with a tiny bit of salt, and a few turns of fresh pepper. Bake, tossing every few minutes, until kale has crisped up and the edges are a bit brown, about 15-20 minutes.
Remove from oven and transfer to a platter. Sprinkle with lemon zest, a bit more flake salt, and a little squeeze of lemon juice. Enjoy immediately.
PRINTABLE RECIPE.
KALE CHIPS WITH LEMON ZEST AND FLAKE SALT
We have worked with Jennifer Adams, the author of the wildly popular BabyLit Board Books in the past, and we were thrilled to have the opportunity to work with her again. We are big fans of her BabyLit Board Books which include Jungle Book, The Wizard of Oz, Moby-Dick, Sense and Sensibility, Anna Karenina, Don Quixote, Frankenstein, A Christmas Carol, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Sherlock Holmes, Jabberwocky, Dracula, The Secret Garden, Wuthering Heights, Romeo and Juliet, and my personal favorite, Pride and Prejudice. We’ve collected most of them and I give them as gifts all the time.
Any book that helps bring the classics to kids and gets them started early on a love of reading is a really incredible thing! The illustrations, by Alison Oliver, are vibrant and layered and both of the girls keep going back to these books. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for a Les Misérables Board Book since Gigi is completely obsessed… it would be lighter for her to carry around than her 1,232 page copy! Along with the amazing board books, BabyLit also makes four wonderful playsets: Moby-Dick, Alice in Wonderland, Pride and Prejudice, and Jungle Book (each playset also includes a copy of the book)!
Over the coming weeks I’ll be sharing the fun ways we’ve introduced these playsets into our home preschool “program”, and along with each post I’ll be giving away a matching playset!
We started off with Alice in Wonderland because Gigi has been all about tea parties lately, and you know I love any opportunity to bake a cake! I took a lot of time to set up a sweet little tea party while she napped, I even got out real china! We had spent the morning making a letter E cake since that was the letter we were focusing on that week, and I pulled down my own annotated copy of Alice in Wonderland, and this wonderful book called The Other Alice, Gigi had a fabulous handed-down Alice costume, so once she woke up she slipped it on, and we had tea and cake and worked together to set up her new playset. Then, while she played with it, I read to her from my copy of Alice in Wonderland. She was only half-listneing as she played and ate, which was the whole point. It was so fun to watch her use her rich imagination to bring the characters to life while she listened to Lewis Carroll’s wonderful story.PINPINPINPINPINPINPINPINPINPINPINTo enter the giveaway and win an Alice in Wonderland playset leave a comment! I’ll announce the winner when I share our Moby Dick Playset “Pirate Party” next week! You can also enter on Instagram! Good luck!
GIVEAWAY CLOSED.
We are slowly puttering about our days: trips to the library, getting the garden prepped for planting, setting out plans for a big road trip, cooking simple meals, welcoming company into town over the weekends, reading books, fighting colds, and sipping wine with friends.
All of our little activities have somehow added up to make life feel busy and full, not to mention that Lulu has a high fever again and is teething up a storm. Basically, what I’m saying is, please forgive me if my writing is a bit muddled and sleepy-sounding. It is a direct reflection of my thought process these days.
We spend hours each day at parks and have lunch picnics in the backyard, and at night we fall asleep listening to the spring rain on our windows. The garden weeds are going wild and I am itching to grab the trowel and my gloves and work in the dirt. Kyle has been busy building two new raised beds, one of which will host a cold frame that he built. I’ll post a tutorial for the raised beds soon! The girls are fully appreciating extra time in the garden. They’re favorite task is watering things: weeds, the patio, rocks, each other. We are fully embracing the transition from winter to spring; it is one of my favorite times of the year.
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As spring settles in, and I prepare to welcome asparagus, garlic scapes, and rhubarb back into the kitchen, I am also preparing to kiss my favorite winter citrus fruits goodbye. There’s still a bit of time to find them at the grocery store and as long as they are there I will be picking them up and putting them into our cart… or rather handing them to Lulu so she can bite through the peels before spitting it out and throwing them into the back of the cart.
A little while back I shared a recipe for Candied Meyer Lemons and Blood Oranges and I thought I’d share a quick cocktail recipe I worked up using the lemons! I opted to use vodka from a local distillery for this spin on a French 75, but you could use gin if you prefer. I love the slight tangerine flavor that Meyer lemons give this drink, but if you can’t find them you could use regular lemons in their place. This cocktail is really simple and was a big hit with our friends.
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CANDIED MEYER LEMON FRENCH 75
Ingredients.
1 slice candied Meyer lemon
1 tsp Meyer lemon juice
6 oz chilled champagne
1/2 oz chilled vodka
1 tsp Meyer lemon juice
Directions.
Drop lemon slice into a champagne flute, add lemon juice, vodka, and top with champagne! Stir gently and enjoy immediately.
PRINTABLE RECIPE
CANDIED MEYER LEMON FRENCH 75
I am an amazing one-handed cook. Seriously, you should see me in the kitchen. Lulu’s favorite place to be is perched on my left hip; especially between the hours of 4-6pm. So, I’ve adapted to one handed cooking. The kids have been fighting the flu/terrible virus/croup/bubonic plague so I’ve had lots of time to work on my set of one-handed skills; I’m getting pretty good at one-handed typing.
I’ve learned a couple of things this past week: Popsicles in the bath can be a great distraction for grumpy, feverish kids; you won’t turn into a vampire if you don’t leave the house for 10 days (and counting); you will let sick kids get away with atrocious table manners if it means they are consuming calories; it’s possible to watch three Disney movies a day for 10 days straight and not lose your mind (completely); when your baby loses their voice from coughing it’s both sad and cute.
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With all of the mental and physical demands of caring for sick kids over the past week, I found myself gravitating towards, and thinking a lot about, comfort food. The moment the kids’ temperatures spiked I called Kyle to pick up the ingredients for chicken noodle soup, crackers, and popsicles. I also made a quick run to the library to pick up a copy of my favorite comfort book. I’ve read Animal Dreams by Barbara Kingsolver a dozen times and for some reason I had to have it this past week. I gave my well-loved copy away a couple of years ago but thankfully the library had it’s own well-loved copy for me to borrow.
The comfort food I turn to most is toast. I’ve been making a lot of toast. Cinnamon sugar toast for snacks, which is what my mom used to make for my siblings and myself and something I crave almost immediately when I’m feeling under the weather. I ate cinnamon sugar toast almost every single day when I was pregnant with Gigi. That, and warm milk with honey. So that’s what I make for the girls when they aren’t feeling good.
I also love to make avocado toast. I use Kyle’s freshly baked sourdough bread, smear it with a bit of mayonnaise or Vegenaise, smash some avocado on top, and hit it with sprinkles of Togarashi, also sometimes called Shichimi Togarashi (a mix of Japanese chili peppers), flaky salt, and a squeeze of fresh lemon juice. I could eat that every day… and often do.
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I think (hope) that we are on the upswing from this illness. We are planning to spend the next few days getting more rest, sipping water spiked with Elderberry Syrup, reading favorite books, little walks around the neighborhood for fresh air, and nibbling lots more toast.
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AVOCADO TOASTS WITH TOGARASHI
Ingredients.
1 ripe avocado, cut in half, pit discarded
4 slices of rustic French bread
flake salt
1-2 slices of lemon
Togarashi – Japanese chili pepper blend
mayonnaise or Vegenaise
extra virgin olive oil
Directions.
Place the slices of bread on a baking sheet and drizzle with olive oil. Pop them under the broiler until golden and crisp.
Allow the toast to cool for a moment. In a small bowl smash up the avocado flesh with a fork.
Smear the toast with a bit of mayonnaise or Vegenaise. Scoop the avocado onto the toast and spread it with a fork until it covers the surface of the toast.
Sprinkle a bit of flake salt and Togarashi onto top, finish with a squeeze of lemon juice and a little drizzle of olive oil. Enjoy immediately.
Serves 2.
PRINTABLE RECIPE.
AVOCADO TOASTS WITH TOGARASHI
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Katie - Each one is cuter than the next!
kayleigh larkins - This is so cute! I had no idea they made these too!
Lauren - what fun! Owen loves to read and what better way to introduce him to the classic tale of the sea!
Stacey F - This would be great for my Peter Pan watching toddler. In the car today: “swallow my eyes, it is Pan!”
Rachel - Such fun!! My pirate-loving 4-year-old would be over the moon to play with this set.
darla - thiis is great for boys
Rachele W. - I love these playsets!!! How cool to really get into the story…and honestly, our daughter is obsessed with blue…and this is a lot of blue! She’d LOVE it!!! IG – chelewhite