Toddler pizzas and ginger snaps

This weekend I made pizza and garlic fingers from scratch for Josh and I. We always make our own sauce and we make our own dough as well. The pizza crust tends to be thick, and while I enjoy a thick crust, Josh isn't the biggest fan. So I decided to pinch some of the dough off and make mini versions for Jacob. I made two mini pizzas and two mini garlic fingers. I was careful to go easy on the sauce and the cheese, using just enough to flavour the crusts. They turned out really well.

How cute are these tiny little pizzas? Jacob just loved them.

Today I baked some ginger spice cookies from a recipe that appeared in Chatelaine years ago. While I was visiting a friend this weekend, he offered us a cookie from a batch that his neighbour baked. They were delicious: the perfect ginger flavor, great snap, and just the right crunch. I couldn't get them out of my mind. So when I got home from our visit, I called my friend's mother and asked her where he might have gotten these cookies. She said their neighbour Carrie made them so I asked her to locate the recipe for me. That evening she emailed it to me and today I had the time to try it out.

They're the perfect ginger snap.

Just look at that texture.

They made a perfect afternoon snack with some milk.

One year of maternity leave

As my maternity leave comes to a close, I am feeling a lot of different emotions, the most palpable of which is sorrow. I can't believe my baby boy is going to be one year old soon, and we will have to be apart for nine hours each weekday. I'm really, really struggling with this. How can anyone expect me to be away from him in that capacity? I am all he has known for the last ten months and it breaks my heart to know that he will have to spend five whole days a week without me.

I'm struggling so much with this idea of being away from my baby that I am having a very hard time enjoying the rest of my maternity leave. Looking back on this time, I don't want to think I wasted my last two months by being sad. So in an effort to make the most of our time, I am going to try to do the following things.

- enjoy waking up in the morning knowing I get to spend the entire day with my little boy.

- enjoy waking up as late as 8:00 am and know that I can take my time getting out of bed, getting a glass of water and a snack, and really take the time to gently wake up while Jacob plays in his crib. When I go back to work I will have to wake by alarm (even earlier), and race around trying to get myself and my baby ready to leave the house on time. I'm so lucky to have a child who is content to play in his crib in the mornings and doesn't cry out.

- savour all the moments I get to be in my own home all day long - I can spend time in the morning in bed with my baby, lounge on the couch in my pjs while he plays, workout whenever I want to, make lunch or bake whenever I want in my own kitchen, listen to CBC radio in the middle of the afternoon.

- get groceries in the middle of the day.

- know that whenever baby naps is pretty much a good time for me to nap too.

- know that this day with Jacob can be spent cocooned in our warm house, never having to leave, in our pajamas if we want. We can nurse and cuddle and hug and dance and babywear and play toys together, as much as we want. I don't need to shower, or style my hair, or put on makeup.

- enjoy the little things like when he smiles at me, or reaches for me, or leans his head on my chest. Really take the time to enjoy these things.

- savour all of the sweet breastfeeding moments - when he rests his little hands on my chest, when he makes satisfied noises during a feed, when he interlaces his hands, when he closes his eyes and focuses on what he is doing.

- watch him crawl. Watch him see something he wants, and go for it. And enjoy the smile that usually accompanies this moment.

-enjoy the weekends, knowing that right now I don't need to use them as "my only two days off to get things done". I can enjoy family time on the weekend without having to take care of other things that I neglected during the week.

I have really enjoyed this past year and getting to know my baby. And I want to really enjoy the next five weeks, too.

Cloud dough and lemon squares from a clumsy mom.

We've had some lemons sitting in our fruit bowl for a couple of weeks now and instead of letting them go bad, today I decided to use them up in a batch of coconut lemon crumble bars. The recipe was labour intensive for squares (the filling includes whipping egg yolks and tempering them with a cooked cornstarch/sugar mixture) and incorporated a lot of whisking. One thing I found odd about this recipe was that the base did not require any pre-cooking before the filling was poured in.

The squares turned out nicely with a smooth texture but I was a bit disappointed in the recipe overall. The filling was more akin to a lemon pudding. I had been expecting a light, tart and bright filling similar to most lemon square recipes I've made before. The topping had coconut in it which was also different but I enjoyed the crunch it lent to the crumble.

This afternoon I wanted to do something fun with Jacob so I decided to make cloud dough for us to play with together. I had heard of it before and thought it would be something that would be relatively easy to whip up for us to enjoy. I put the ingredients into my KitchenAid mixer and once the dough came together I put it into a ceramic baking dish for him to play with. I figured a heavy dish would be harder for him to tip over. I laid out a large sheet of plastic on his play mat and stripped him down to a diaper. I set him down on the mat in front of the dish and showed him the dough.

He wasn't interested.

At all.

In fact, he wanted away from the cloud dough as fast as possible and was not willing to touch it. I tried placing his feet into the dish so he could step on it and feel it squish between his toes, hoping that would entice him. That didn't work either. So after a few minutes I put the dough away and gave him a bath. I had to change my clothes too - that stuff can become a floury mess very quickly!

The dough can be stored in an airtight container for one week.

Wouldn't you just love to squish this between your hands?

I'll be heading to bed early tonight as I've been trying to get ample sleep the past few nights. I think my body needs it after the tumble I took Friday. I had set out to do some grocery shopping and no sooner had I wiped my boots off on the grocery store entry mat than I slipped and fell forward, instantly landing facedown. My sunglasses went flying off my head and I was completely mortified. I jumped up quickly and assured the bakery worker who had asked me if I was alright that yes, I was just fine. I scurried away and finished my shopping and errands. On the drive home I began to realize that I had landed a lot harder on my knee and elbow than I thought and by the time I was home I could no longer bend my arm. I debated going to the ER to be checked out but ultimately decided to see how I felt in the morning. I've been feeling better with each passing day and am hoping it's just muscle tenderness now. 

I think my little accident is a sign that I need to slow down and be more present - there's no need to rush around the way I do. I think we can all benefit from slowing down a little each day.

Ribbon sensory toy

Recently a friend told me about a toy she made for her little boy (who is the same age as Jacob) out of ribbon and a yogurt container. It sounded like something Jacob might like, so last weekend when I finished up the yogurt to make an Orange Creamsicle Smoothie, I washed the container and set it aside. 

Today I decided to make the toy. I took various colours, textures, and widths of ribbon and cut them into pieces. I cut slits into the yogurt container with a very sharp knife and inserted the ribbon through the slits. I tied large knots on the end of the ribbon that had just been inserted into the container and then pulled them through until they were tight, so that the length of the ribbon was on the outside of the container. I then taped the lid onto the container with strong packing tape.

Here is the finished product.

It looks silly, but it will certainly be something my little guy will enjoy!

Recycling an old container into a bright and tactile toy is a fun activity to do on this wintery day.

Snowstorm Tuesday

Two winters ago, whenever we got a significant amount of snow, it seemed to arrive on a Wednesday. It became the running joke in our area that year that if a storm was coming, it would most certainly be arriving on Wednesday of any given week. I'm thinking this year the new Wednesday will be Tuesday. 

It started snowing last night. This morning, we woke up to a lot of snow. This combined with the snow we got last Tuesday amounted to a very high volume. It took Josh over an hour to clear our driveway and walkways this morning.

This is our front porch.

There used to be stairs there.

Remember the bistro set on our back deck that I posted a picture of last week in the snow? Yeah, it's quickly disappearing.

Not much room for two

Emma loves the snow. It makes her turn into a crazy dog. She leaps and bounds from snow drift to snow drift. She comes in with snowballs stuck to her fur and has to spend some quality time licking them out of her paws.

I am very tempted to do some storm day baking but the sun is out now and the snow is cleared so it just doesn't have that same feel as it would if were I burrowed in as the snow quietly fell. I would consult with Jacob as to what he thinks we should do, but he is having a blast playing with his toys right now. I'm thinking he's also inclined to skip the baking for today.

If you're snowed in today, I hope you're enjoying it!