A Storm's a Brewin!

After the sun began to set on Saturday evening, a storm began to move in.



You can see the rain coming down along the left side of the sky.



It was the perfect weather to relax with family & order in some delicious Chicago-style cheese & sausage pizza! So that's just what we did!

Breakfast Cookies

Yesterday I tried a new recipe for healthy breakfast cookies for Cam. Like I mentioned in this post, mornings are very hectic in our house, so the ideal breakfast is something we can grab as we run out the door. Then Cam can eat his breakfast in the car on the way to daycare.



The recipe included toasted walnuts, oats, raisins, bran flakes, carrot puree, whole wheat flour & some tasty, fall-like spices. Click here for the recipe. I made a triple batch & froze the majority of them since they only take a few minutes to thaw.















I think it's safe to say that Cam enjoyed his cookies!

Oui, Oui!

We took the past two days off work to head to my parent's condo for a little R&R. We've been wanting to try this French bakery we pass every now & then & today seemed like a good day to go.



I ordered a French bread called brioche & mine had chocolate chips mixed in.



Yum! I washed it down with some piping hot cappuccino.



Mike had an almond-filled croissant which was utterly delicious.



Cameron devoured his croissant. Hopefully this will inspire him to treat us to a trip to Paris when he's older & rich!



The guy behind the counter was so charmed by Cameron that he gave him a cookie on the house. And that made Cam a very happy boy.



So happy in fact that he literally got up & danced! It was the perfect way to start a Friday morning!

Easy, Tasty Pasta Salad

I was trying to come up with a quick, summer side dish to go along with the burgers we were having with dinner tonight when I decided to make pasta salad. I went with a Mediterranean theme & added sliced grape tomatoes, pepperoncinis, kalamata olives, feta cheese, marinated artichoke hearts & creamy Italian dressing.

And let me tell you, it was quite delicious! This would be the perfect side to bring along to a summer BBQ; your hosts would be very pleased with you!

Night on the Town!

Saturday afternoon we headed to Orlando for my cousin Ed's wedding. Our friends Matt & Kelly were not only nice enough to watch Cam for the night but also take in our goofy dogs. Aren't we so lucky to have such awesome friends?!



Both the ceremony & the reception took place at Maggiano's & it was so nice! The food was utterly amazing & we had an absolute blast.



The shuttle picked us up at the hotel which was nice so we didn't have to worry about driving.



Mike has known my sister since she was twelve; basically she's grown up knowing him. So, he loves to make her "uncomfortable" by rubbing or kissing her arm. May sound dysfunctional but it's all in good fun.



It was so much fun to get dressed up & mingle with the adults for a change!



And to catch up with family.





I'm very lucky to have such a wonderful brother-in-law!



My mom & her boys.





My brother & sister-in-law weren't able to make it so the family wasn't quite complete.



My dad & his two girls!



The whole goofy clan.



My grandma & her three boys.





It was a lot of fun to catch up with my Uncle Keith who flew in from Chicago to be the Best Man in the wedding.



And we enjoyed some insanely delicious grub, including the fried cheese Mike happened to be gnawing on in this picture.



And there was dancing, dancing, dancing and even more dancing.



I'm still feeling sore today from all of that moving & grooving but it was well worth it! Thank you again, Matt & Kelly for taking such great care of Cam! We're very lucky to have you!

Man Overboard!

Well, couple new things going on this week... First of all, Cam got himself a new beanbag chair & he's loving just kicking back & relaxing after a long day at school.



He's back to being obsessed with Cars & has given up Nemo for the time being. As we arrive home, he yells, "Lightning, Lightning!" as he grabs the DVD case & hands it to me. We may have ourselves a TV drone if we aren't careful.



And last, but absolutely, positively not least, Cam is officially able to climb out of his crib. Yesterday morning as I got my coffee ready, I could hear him stirring over the baby monitor as he woke up. He did his usual talking & just hanging out so I continued to get things ready & poured his milk. Then I heard him saying, Oh no, oh no! Oh no, oh no!

There was no urgency to his words, nothing was out of the ordinary & I heard no thuds or scuffles over the monitor. But as I headed to his room to get him from his crib, I found him sitting on the floor outside his crib rather than in his crib. I was extremely surprised to say the least.

After talking it over with Mike & consulting a few parenting websites, we've decided to keep him in his crib for now. We removed the padded bumper from inside his crib to prevent him from having any additional leverage. Seeing that he's never tried to get out of bed before, the bumper had just been there since he was born.



And as of last night we've got this little guy keeping an eye on Cam. I borrowed this video monitor from Lauren yesterday since we had met up to see Eat, Pray, Love.

Last night Cam made no attempts to jump ship as he fell asleep & Mike had to wake him up this morning so again, no attempts of getting out. He usually sleeps till 7:30 or so & we're already up at that time so we'll continue to keep a close eye & convert his bed as we see necessary. By no means do we want him falling out & hurting himself but we also don't want to convert him until he's truly ready. I guess only time will tell! He sure does keep us on our toes though!

On-The-Go Toddler Breakfast

As a Registered Dietitian who also happens to be the mom of a toddler, I feel that it's my responsibility to try & make sure that Cameron gets a well-balanced diet. But unfortunately, that doesn't always happen. It may be a particularly rushed morning or a really hectic night or Cam might be cranky & not wanting anything to do with food.

So, during my lunch break at work today, I started to think of some on-the-go breakfast ideas since we let Cam sleep until the last minute before it's time to fly out the door. We don't want to wake him up earlier than he needs to be up, so I tried to come up with something that he could eat in the car on the way to daycare.



I wanted something that wasn't messy & that was well-balanced with a good amount of total calories, protein & fiber. Cam drinks about 8oz of whole milk right when he wakes up, so he's getting plenty of calcium & fat from that. Children ages 1-3 need 500mg of calcium daily & one cup of milk contains about 290mg, so it's not all that difficult for a little one to meet their calcium needs. Click here to see the calcium content of other foods if your child isn't a big fan of milk. It's pretty amazing to know that Cameron needs 1200-1300 calories/day; that's close to what I need each day & I weigh about 90# more than him!

Mike picked up a whole wheat pancake mix with about 3g of fiber per serving, but I wanted to up that amount so I added All Bran buds to the food processor & threw in some almonds for some healthy fat.





I mashed some bananas with honey so the pancakes would have sweetness baked right in to avoid the mess of syrup.



I found that on our electric stove, the heat only needed to be at low-medium to cook them through without getting too brown since they were really dense. I made the first couple of batches a little too big; because they are so dense, a little goes a long way.



And viola, fifteen minutes later I had about fifteen pancakes that I threw into a Ziplock bag & put in the freezer so we can nuke them as needed when it's time to bolt out the door with our little guy in tow!