December 28, 2009

Trent got out of work early so I could go to the hospital to visit Maryann. She's been in the hospital since December 20th and has had a rough road. It was a good visit because she was showing some signs of improvement. Once I got home I made oven roasted tilapia with a horseradish lemon sauce (Gordon Ramsy recipe). I also roasted some broccoli and califlower and tossed it with some orecchiette pasta, garlic, and parsley. My plan was the girls would eat the pasta and 'accidentally' eat some veggies in it too....who am I kidding...

December 27, 2009

This was one of those days when I woke up I knew there was alot to fit into one day...and I didn't even know about the overnight snow accumulation, so add snow shoveling and slower driving conditions back to St. Louis. But come dinner everything that needed to be done got done AND we had an assortment of leftovers for dinner from all the christmas celebrating....I just have to pry Lauren off her new Leapster and get her to the table.

December 26, 2009

Christmas in Kansas City with Trent's family! We arrived, despite snowy roads, and started exchanging gifts for the afternoon/evening. We took a break for cocktails and appetizers, did more gifts, then ate a lasagna dinner at 7:00. Dinner was good, but not to be outdone by the chocolate fondue...I almost had to put dish soap in it to stop myself from thirds (and by thirds, I mean fourths).

December 25, 2009

Julie's Cookie Tray

Talking to Santa!

Trent and I started hosting Christmas at our house 5 years ago. One of Trent's favorite things about Christmas in his childhood was that his grandma, Nammie, made the same menu every year (and she was one incredible cook). So Trent wanted to come up with a menu we would serve every year on Christmas too. Here we go...

Brunch

Cinnamon Rolls

Assorted Fruit Tray

Hummus topped with Feta and Olives, served with Pita Chips

Cherry and Chocolate Biscotti dipped in white chocolate

Dinner

Braciole with pruscuitto, provolone, and egg

mixed green salad

Baked Mostacciole

Bread

Dessert

TBD

It's a fairly mellow day with gift opening, kids playing, and lots of eating.

December 24, 2009

I like Fridays better than Saturdays and I like Christmas Eve better than Christmas. I have no idea why, I think it must be I like the anticipation of something more than the actual thing? Anyway, I love Christmas Eve. This year we went to Christmas Eve mass at 4:30, Macaroni Grill for dinner, then to our annual Cherry Pie Party with my dad's family. Two things about Cherry Pie Party...there is no Cherry Pie present and it was our 75th year to have the Cherry Pie(less) Party. The girls had a fantasic time at dinner and the party. Mass? Not so much, but that's why god invented the Cry Room.

December 21, 2009

The afternoon was dedicated to making the meat sauce for Christmas. After prepping and stirring meat sauce all afternoon, I kinda get into the mood to have the absolute opposite thing for dinner. I'm the same way when I make Christmas cookies, the last thing I want to eat is a cookie after looking at them for hours. So dinner was an asparagus, proscuitto, and spinach tossed salad with lemon vinagrette topped with a fried egg. It's from Cooking Light and it's one of my go to recipes because you can make it in minutes. Of course it's pretty curious to Trent when he walks into a house that smells like spaghetti sauce and gets a salad put in front of him. ;)

December 20th, 2009

I love Christmas traditions, both new and old. This year I think we started a new one. Erin, Markham, and I normally get together for a dinner over the holidays and exchange gifts. Then once Markham and I had kids we kinda tweaked the plan each year depending on who had a newborn at the time or could get out of the house for a couple hours. This year we decided to embrace the kids and men and have everyone over to our house for a fancy dinner and an ornament exchange. It was lots of fun. Erin made a cream cheese and artichoke pesto torte appetizer, Markham brought over twice baked potatoes and a spinach gratin, and I grilled beef filets and served them with blue cheese butter. Of course with all the cheesy goodness being served, I had to serve a salad to balance it all out and bring our heart rates back down. For dessert I made a cookies and cream cake that looked like a big hot mess, but delivered on taste. Hopefully a new tradition has been born and it will survive the years to become an old tradition.

December 19th, 2009

I had a huge amount of savoy cabbage looking at me in the frig for a week. I love cabbage, but this amount was a little scary. I went with a stir fry and even got out the wok...which I don't think has seen the light of day since 2003. I stir fried the cabbage, spinach, carrots, mushrooms, chives, and steak slices. Then I made brown rice and a sweet brown sauce. It turned out good, but my god were there alot of leftovers. Did I mention it was a big amount of cabbage?

December 14th, 2009

One of my favorite perks of the holiday season is all the good movies are being released in anticipation of award show season. I love Oscar movie time! Both Trent and I wanted to see "Up in the Air" and decided to get a babysitter for the evening. We went to 54th Street Bar and Grill, which is next to neighborhood movie theater, Ronnies. It was Trent's first time at 54th Street and he became a fan at $4.99 martini's. We split sliders and boneless buffalo wings and then walked over to Ronnie's. Highly recommend the movie, 54th street, and date nights.

December 13th, 2009

Sunday night family dinner at Julie and Ben's house! Trent, Ben, and I took the kids around the block to look at some of the neighbors christmas lights. Julie made pasta with a meat sauce, salad, and homemade bread. For dessert I made almond chocoroons (pretty much a cookie that tastes like an almond joy) and eggnog poundcake. After dinner all the kids took a bath together, which was the cutest thing. It shows great restraint on my part I'm not posting the bath pictures...

December 9th, 2009

I'm the kind of girl that if I get sick after eating a certain food, I'm crossing that food off my list for an indefinite period of time. Blueberry pancakes (and really pancakes in general) have been on my list since I was 5 years old. Those little "cocktail weinies" in the crock pot have lived on the list since 2nd grade. Monte Cristo sandwiches have been on my list since my freshman year in college and an unfortunate incident with peach schnapps. A couple month ago when I had the stomach flu I added black bean soup to the list, and also most mexican food. Mexican food is Lauren's favorite, tacos and quesadillas specifically. I knew I had to get back on that horse like a big girl and get over it. I made veggie chili and cornbread. I went in like a trooper and had a bowl of it with chives and sour cream on top and made it out alive. My stomach wasn't overly happy about it, but I think it'll get better if I keep with my no mini hot dogsl, blueberry pancake, and monte cristo pledge.

December 7th, 2009

We invited Markham, Dennis, Kaleb, and Kinsley over for dinner to celebrate Markham's birthday. All of us love Chinese food and we have a great place that delivers by our house. It was a fun evening. Too fun because when they left Kaleb and Lauren were both crying because they didn't want the playing to end.

December 4th, 2009

Tonight was Lauren's school's annual "Winter Wonderland" party from 5-7 pm. It's a fun night and the girls really enjoy it. Trent normally doesn't get home from work until after 6 pm, but he was going to leave early so we could get to the party around 5:30. I made a big pot of split pea soup in the afternoon. Then I gave the girls a bath, fed them, and got them dressed so we could all leave once Trent got home. After the party we drove around our neighborhood looking at christmas lights. Once we got the girls to bed, Trent and I had our soup in front of the TV, which is a treasured rarity.

November 29th, 2009

Christmas Tree Day! Every year we go to Sappington Nursery to get our tree, it's right up the street and my nursery of choice for plants and flowers. It just so happened they had Santa there too, the girls loved it. We decided to get a second, smaller tree for our playroom so we can enjoy one on the main level and then put the big one in the basement where we host Christmas. We put all the girls' special ornaments on the tree in the playroom and it's been quite the hit. For dinner I was pretty worn out and made open face bagels with pastrami, dijon mustard cream cheese, and spinach. It's a recipe from Gordon Ramsey's cookbook that I tried last year and end up making every month or so. I also made some sweet potato fries. I'm bummed Thanksgiving break is over, but excited the Holiday Season commences!

November 28th, 2009

Whew! We drove home from KC, put Sydney down for her nap, and went to town putting up Christmas Decorations. The house definitely feels like Christmas. The added benefit of Thanksgiving and having a generous Mother in Law - leftovers! They taste just as good as they did on Thanksgiving.

November 27th, 2009

Black Friday! Although Trent and I didn't get out of the door early enough to take advantage of the door busters, we did have a great morning/afternoon shopping for Lauren and Sydney. Kirk and Sally took the girls to The Plaza and had a great time as well. That evening was a "Soup-a-thon" at Michelle and Jon's house. They are near the end of some huge home renovations, so we were excited to see the updates (and holy cow are they some updates!). Michelle made three soups. Lauren and I had the Italian Wedding Soup and Sydney and Trent had the white chicken chili, both delicious. Then Sally bought some fancy cupcakes to sing Happy Birthday to Sydney, which Sydney loved (and was excited for an encore of Happy Birthday, then blowing out candles). My hope is Michelle and Jon continue making many improvements on their house so they have to host many more parties to show it off. Although Michelle despises home improvement projects, so I doubt she'll go for this. I'll have to say 'pretty please with a cherry on top."

November 26th, 2009

Thanksgiving is hands down my favorite holiday of the year. My favorite memories of Thanksgiving is making our italian turkey stuffing with my Grandma Coco. I love all the thanksgiving food, except the sweet potato with marshmellows, which I highly doubt Pilgrims had in their pantry. Trent and I go to Kansas City and celebrate Thanksgiving with his family. We cook all day, get the tables ready, and eat Thanksgiving around 6:30 pm. It's all family and all food and I love it.

November 25th, 2009

Twas the night before Thanksgiving and outsourcing dinner was on my mind. I was on The Hill for a hair appointment and had to take advantage of stellar cuisine offerings. After a couple of texting conversations with Trent, we decided Anthoninos, which is a great greek place. Lauren was with me and we phoned our order from Julie and Ben's house and went to pick it up 20 minutes later to bring home. It was delicious and very un-Thanksgiving-ish fare, so we could be ready for the big meal tomorrow. God bless the inventor of spanikopita.

November 24th, 2009

I'm that girl at parties who keeps gum in her mouth so I don't OD at the buffet table. The problem is really the warm dips, I can't stop and would make a spectacle of myself. I think one of my top favorite is spinach artichoke dip. The saltier and creamier the better. I found a recipe in Cooking Light for a spinach and artichoke quesadilla. They were yummy and the bonus was Sydney liked it too. I served it with a corn and bean salad and was able to be around spinach and artichokes gum free.

November 22nd, 2009

We had a big bottle of red wine leftover from Sydney's party and Trent and I are white wine people (more specifically, chardonnay). I didn't want it to go bad since we were leaving for KC for Thanksgiving on Thursday. Enter scene: drunken risotto. Instead of cooking the rice in chicken broth, you cook it in red wine (with a little chicken broth). I made it with sausage, spinach, and mushrooms. It was a Rachel Ray recipe and it turned out really good. Exit scene: big bottle of red wine on frig.

November 21st, 2009

Sydney's 2nd birthday party!!! For her birthday we decided to have a big family pasta dinner. Sydney loves pasta and her three favorites are macaroni and cheese, tortellini with pesto, and pasta with a meat sauce. Lauren's favorite is spaghetti and meatballs, so I did pasta with a meat sauce and meatballs to make both girls happy. My dad did a cheese and salami platter for an appetizer and my mom went to MacArthurs Bakery in Kirkwood and bought mini ricotta cannolis, cookies, and an Elmo dollar cake for Sydney. Michelle, Jon, Caleb, and Elizabeth came from Kansas City to the party and the girls had fun doing a sleepover with their cousins. Menu high was the macaroni and cheese, I did it with asiago, cheddar, and provolone, then baked it with herbed breadcrumbs. It was pretty tasty, but I think I made it too adult-ish because the kids weren't too impressed. Menu low was the tortellini with pesto, I ran out of my pesto I keep in the freezer and bought a jarred one. I think it tasted more like comet cleaner than pesto, not good. Most importantly, Sydney had a great evening and loved blowing out not one, but two candles.