Peekaboo Partridge Hat

Today I finished up a summer hat for Adam using the Peekaboo Partridge and Happy Scrolls fabric I ordered waaay back in my third trimester.  I had planned to use those fabrics for his chenille blanket but in the end thought the design was a bit too busy for so large a piece.  They work perfectly for something small like a hat though!

The idea for a summer hat came to me when we were at the cottage in Manitoulin and I put on a hat that a friend had handed down to us. It fit Adam pretty well around the head but the straps were too short to encircle his chubby cheeks.  Simple fix, right? Just extend the straps...but wait!  Why not make a whole new hat for him?  Ok yes, I was just looking for an excuse to make him something new.  I haven't found the time yet to make him proper articles of clothing like onesies, shirts, or shorts yet. Instead I've been in a sewing marathon for accessories like bibs and drool pads for the teething monster. But hats are pretty simple and heck, why not?

So one night while watching an episode of House of Cards after Adam went to bed, I threw together my own hat pattern based on the sunhat our friend gave us.  I made it a teensy bit larger but otherwise it was more or less the same.  Ta-dah - three parts!

Altogether there were 12 pieces to assemble (not including straps):

• Top circle - 2x side A + 2x side B
• Side wall - 2x side A + 2x side B
• Brim - 4x side A + 2x heavy interface/brim stiffener

Obviously you can vary the side A / side B combinations to your liking.  I chose to use the same fabric on both sides of the brim but you could choose to use different fabrics so that the hat is reversible. I was tempted to make this one reversible, only I wanted to add straps and didn't know how to make that work on both sides!

The brim was the trickiest part. I didn't have heavy-weight interfacing on me so I sandwiched a piece of the thicker herringbone from his newsboy cap between the Happy Scrolls fabric.  Then I sewed somewhat equidistant lines around the brim to make it look more "professional".

My mistake was connecting the two herringbone brim halves together by putting right sides together (what you would normally do) because that made for an extra thick seam.  The sewing foot had a really difficult time getting over that section of the brim and ended up squishing the outer fabric into a weird wrinkle.  You can see it in the above photo (yuck).  Also it was a challenge lining up the brim seam with the side wall seam of the hat because of all that extra fabric so they are offset.  Oh well.  I ended up positioning the straps so that these seams end up on the sides of his head rather than front and back.

Honestly though, the only thing this little guy cares about is gnawing on every possible surface.

These Life-Saver looking things are so delicious

Checking the fit before adding the straps

To finish, I cut out two long strips of fabric to turn into straps. Pretty straightforward.  I added velcro to the tips and slid the other ends between the inner lining and brim.

And yes, that's a custom-made bib too.  Maybe I'll write about the bib marathon some other time but basically I've had to sew a bunch of bibs myself to ensure they are thick and absorbent enough to keep his drool rash at bay.  Yaaay teething!

Thai One On

Here's another recipe from the Looneyspoons cookbook that I tried out last week from the "Ladle Gaga" section.  I know I know, the puns are kinda corny but that's part of the charm of this book!

The great thing about this Thai-inspired soup is that it has tonnes of flavour and is simple to make.  A wonderful savoury soup with some sweetness and spice - mmmm :)

Here is the list of ingredients that went into this delicious soup:

1 tbsp            butter or olive oil
1 cup             each chopped onions and chopped red bell pepper
3/4 cup          chopped celery
2 tsp              minced garlic
4 cups            peeled, cubed sweet potatoes
1 tbsp            grated gingerroot
3/4 tsp          each ground cumin, ground coriander and curry powder

1/4 tsp          ground cinnamon

2 cups           reduced-sodium chicken or vegetable broth

1 can (14 oz / 398 mL) light coconut milk

1/2 tsp          salt

1/4 tsp          freshly ground black pepper

3 tbsp           each minced fresh cilantro and minced fresh basil leaves

2 tbsp           light peanut butter

1 tbsp           brown sugar

1 tbsp           freshly squeezed lime juice

1 lb (454 g)   cooked medium shrimp, tails removed (thaw first if using frozen)

sweet potatoes, gingerroot, cumin, curry powder, and cinnamon

I'm a big fan of sweet potatoes - great for pureed soups and pureed solids for babies. I'd opt for sweet potato fries over regular fries any day.

peanut butter, brown sugar, lime juice

Unsweetened peanut butter works just as well as regular peanut butter.  I could definitely taste the nuttiness in the soup - definitely a common part of Thai cuisine.

And shrimp...what more can I say?  Shrimp is like the Chicken McNugget of the sea.  I know many people who "hate seafood" but will still eat shrimp.  Of course, I also know a few who insist that they won't eat shrimp either but that's crazy talk.  

Anyway, enough about the ingredients, here are the steps for you eager readers who are already squeezing limes and yanking basil from your gardens.  Guess what, there are only three of them!

1.  Heat butter in a large pot over medium heat. Add onions, red pepper, celery and garlic.  Cook and stir until vegetables begin to soften, about 4 minutes.

2.  Stir in sweet potatoes, gingerroot, cumin, coriander, curry powder and cinnamon.  Cook and stir for 30 more seconds.  Add broth, coconut milk, salt and pepper.  Bring soup to a boil.  Reduce heat to low, cover and simmer for 10 minutes, just until sweet potatoes are tender.

3.  Carefully transfer half the soup to a blender and puree until smooth.  Return pureed soup to pot and remaining soup.  Stir in cilangro, basil, peanut butter, brown sugar and lime juice.  Mix well.  Add shrimp and heat for about 2 more minutes, just until shrimp is hot.

Holy ArtsCow!

Yay my custom board book arrived in the mail yesterday and Holy ArtsCow, the printing quality is exceptional!  

While I was pregnant with Adam my mother-in-law showed me some poems that she had written for Mike when he was a baby.  She had always meant to create a book with them but had never gotten around to it.  The poems were terrific and a seed was planted in my mind to eventually create that book for both her and Adam.  Well I finally sat down and spent two afternoons putting together the illustrations and pages to create this wonderful book of Poems from Nana to Daddy to Adam.

Now I want to state upfront that I did not draw the pictures in this book as I did in the Christmas book for Anna.  I thought about it.  But I still don't have a tablet and when I drew those pictures with just a mouse (or even my index finger on my laptop touch pad) it took a very long time.  

The challenge with finding clipart online is that most of them have poor resolution or a huge annoying watermark across them or are inconsistent in drawing style (i.e. one is cartoonish, one is a sketch, one is a line drawing, etc).  Fortunately I'm pretty handy with Gimp and Photoshop so I could increase the pixel resolution, eliminate watermarks pretty easily, add background and details, and even alter the images to better suit the poem.  For example it didn't take long to transform that little girl with blond hair and pigtails, freckles, and long eyelashes into a little boy pilot!

However finding consistent drawing styles online was just something I had to invest time doing.  Eventually I was able to find all the pictures I wanted and then it was a matter of finding a good printing house.  I half convinced myself of turning it into a cloth book like the one for Caleb but then talked myself out of it again.  There are several websites I came across for making custom board books.  One of the most popular ones I kept reading about is pint size productions, but when I asked for a quote, not only were they pricey but their standard number of pages wasn't enough for what I needed.  

I also considered buying chunky blank board books and then printing the pages on full-page labels and creating the book that way.  Again, just didn't really do it for me.  

Finally I decided to go with a deluxe 6"x6" photo book from ArtsCow and I couldn't be happier.  The biggest challenge with actual board books was finding ones that could accommodate the number of pages for  these poems.  With ArtsCow I was actually creating a photo book with lay-flat pages (4x the thickness of regular pages) as a way to mimic a board book.  There were still some conditions to the number of pages (e.g. multiples of 4) due to how the book is constructed but it happened to work out just right for me.  I also took advantage of a free shipping promo so the total was $23.  That's not bad considering some regular board books are $8.99 + tax. There's also a 4"x 4" option which is cheaper.

Anyway for anyone considering making a custom board book, I would suggest giving ArtsCow a try if other board book companies can't meet your needs. However if anyone does find a good printing site I would love to hear about it!  

Half A Year Gone By Already...

Yesterday Adam turned six months old.  Now wait a minute, where's the rush??

I'm definitely one of those annoying parents who thinks their child is the cutest one out there but at least I try to tone it down around other people.  Every month I think "Ok, now he's the cutest he'll ever possibly be" but he keeps proving me wrong.  Adam is at an adorably fun stage right now and I just want to hang onto every wonderful moments for as long as possible.  It feels like in a blink of an eye he went from this -

1 week old

- to this!

It's embarrassing how many photos I take of Adam but when my maternity leave is over and I can't spend my whole days with him, at least I'll get to sit down to a warm cup of tea and look over these snapshots of his first year of life:  how he practically doubled in weight at month two; how he lost most of hair in month three; how he simultaneously punched, kicked, and laughed for a photo at month six.  I won't regret having this huge collection of photos at all - nope, not one bit.

Oatmeal: My First Taste of Solid Food

Well, calling it "solid" would be pretty misleading.  It was more like watery mush with specks of slightly-less-watery mush.  Sounds yummy, doesn't it?

On Sunday we gave Adam his first taste of something other than breastmilk.  Actually that's not true, in his first month he pounded back the formula to get over his jaundice but since then it's been nothin' but mama-milk.  I thought I was going to put off solids for as long as possible now that breasfeeding is finally easy but I was actually excited to give him his first bite.  His close eyeing of me eating my meals over the past two weeks and his desire to grab things off the plate made me think he was ready for solids, even though the pediatrician said I could wait until he was 6 months.  Close enough, right?

I was pretty exhausted in the morning after Saturday's BBQ and the thought of running out to the grocery store just to pick up some rice cereal didn't appeal to me.  I had already used up all the bananas for the last banana-walnut loaf, and the avocados had gone into the salad from Saturday.  Oh well, what else could we try?  I Googled a few sites and read good things about starting babies off with oatmeal so that's what we did.

I read that steel cut or regular oatmeal would be good, just not the instant kind. Luckily we have the regular rolled oats on hand (10-15 min on stovetop or 4-5 min in microwave) so I ground up 1/4 cup in the Magic Bullet to create a powder and then cooked that in a small pot with 3/4 cups of water.  The result was pretty similar to oatmeal that I would eat, and a bit lumpier than I had expected after grinding down the oats.

While I was preparing the oatmeal Adam woke up and wanted to see what was going on. Mike didn't even get a shirt on him yet!

"Whatcha makin' mama?"

I added a few teaspoons of breastmilk to thin out the oatmeal and then we sat Adam in the Bumbo for his first meal.  Mike held his hands out of the way since he kept wanting to grab the spoon and ram it down his throat - yikes!  I took a bit of video from his first few bites but it was a bit tricky with the camera in one hand and spoon in the other. I couldn't even manage to get much oatmeal onto the spoon with just the one hand but I did manage to get some pretty cute footage of the little guy.  

Yesterday was Day Two of solids and I heated up some of the extra oatmeal left over in the fridge from Sunday.  This time after I added the breastmilk I blended the whole thing in the Magic Bullet once more and the consistency was much better. No lumps!  I think that's the way to go, although I will experiment with a few different ways to cook/store the oatmeal in larger batches for convenience's sake. 

What's going to be next - avocados, bananas, sweet potatoes?  Tune in to find out :)

Rhubarb Pistachio Ginger Crisp

Doesn't reading the title just make your mouth water?  I love this dessert that my mother-in-law introduced us to about two months ago. It's de-licious!  Plus it's easy to make - a definitely plus for a newbie baker like me.

You start off with chopped rhubarb.  I bought almost the entire stock at Loblaws in order to bake these two crisps for the barbecue we had on Saturday. Little did I know people were bringing other desserts and one would have been enough! Oh well, having one in the freezer for another date is fine by me :)

After chopping the rhubarb add some flour, granulated sugar, and chopped crystalized ginger.  Lookin' good already.

Next you make the topping which is comprised of flour, brown sugar, rolled oats, ground ginger, salt, pistachios, and BUTTER.  I know, I said the "B" word.  And once you start baking you are acutely aware of all the naughty ingredients that make desserts as tasty as they are.  I cut the butter into small cubes so it would be easier for me to mix  together by hand since I currently lack some essential baking tools.

It's not quite as bad as it looks! Okay, maybe it is...but so tasty!

I wasn't able to find shelled pistachios at the store so guess what fun task Mike "volunteered" for?

I wanted the pistachios partly crushed so I threw them into a heavy-duty Ziploc bag and got our little hammer from the basement.  It had never occurred to me to take out the Magic Bullet we received as a gift from my mother-in-law! I guess it's because I only used that for the first time this weekend when I made sauces and dips for the bbq (extremely handy, by the way).

Ummm...every baker uses a hammer, right guys?

Finally you assemble the topping over the rhubarb and Voila!

Ready for the oven :)

Here's the full recipe for all those salivating readers who are already half-way to the grocery store for rhubarb and pistachios:

Rhubarb Pistachio Ginger Crisp

750 g rhubarb, cut in 1-inch lengths (this is roughly 6 cups chopped up)
¾ cup granulated sugar
2 tbsp all-purpose flour
1 tsp chopped crystallized ginger (I used more!)
2 tbsp butter

Topping
1 cup all-purpose flour  (I replaced half with whole-wheat flour)
½ cup rolled oats
½ cup brown sugar
¼ tsp ground ginger
½ shelled pistachios, halved
¾ cup butter, cubed  (eek! I used a bit less)
pinch of salt

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350degF.
2. Combine rhubarb, granulated sugar, flour, and crystallized ginger in a 10 x 8 inch baking dish. Dot with   butter.
3. Prepare topping by combining flour, oats, brown sugar, ground ginger, pistachios, and salt in a bowl. Cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse meal. Sprinkle over rhubarb.
4. Bake for 40 min or until juices are bubbling and crumble is golden.

Hello Summer, Farewell Penners (for now)

This past Saturday we hosted a barbecue to welcome in the summer (hooray!) and also get together with our dear friends one last time before they moved back to Ottawa (*tear).  Last month we had new patio stones put in and planted some nice flowers in the garden that have since begun to blossom so it was a good time to have friends over.  The forecast, however, was threatening stormy weather and we did not want to have our bbq derailed.  

During the morning and early afternoon it rained, then turned sunny, then thunderstormed (wait, the forecast was correct??)  I was starting to get bummed out about the weather but luck ended up on our side and the evening was just perfect. Ok, a bit on the humid side but it was dry enough to sit outside and overcast enough so that no one got a sunburn :)  

Whoops, did we forget the chairs? Luckily we got some from our neighbours :)

The guests of honour

Caleb enjoying his birthday cake

Adam was pretty mellow in the evening

Another outfit?? What a drooly baby.

I love this photo of Brigitte and Delia

Good food and good friends...the best way to start off the summer.  Brigitte, I wish you guys weren't leaving  so soon but I'm grateful we got to spend the past six months together on maternity leave.  Enjoy PEI this summer, and enjoy Ottawa as your home.  See you soon and miss you dearly until then!

Feed a Cold and Starve a Fever? Or Vice Versa?

Who knows.  All I know is that in the past ten days Adam and I have gotten both and it didn't stop me from cooking up a storm.  In my last post I wrote that Adam picked up some sort of viral thing which derailed my plans of attending a fancy party two Fridays ago.  Well just when he was getting over his fever last weekend, that was when my throat started to hurt.  On top of that Mike was leaving for Portland for 5 days on business so I had to suck it up.  I decided then to prepare various comfort foods that could be easily heated up for dinner during the week while Mike was away.  I spent most of the afternoon and evening last Sunday in the kitchen making lasagna, Hunter Chicken Stew, and banana-walnut-chocolate chip muffins. Mmm.

beef lasagna with spinach and ricotta cheese

Hunter Chicken Stew

Banana-walnut-chocolate chip muffins

Then on Wednesday Adam and I had a play-date sleepover at Brigitte's house and it was so much fun.  The babies, despite both being sick with separate ailments, were actually really cheerful and had a few awesome naps giving Brigitte and I time to try out a few new recipes. We made a "Contilentil Soup" from her Looneyspoons cookbook and a rhubarb pistachio ginger crisp from a recipe my mother-in-law gave me.  

Even grocery shopping was fun since we had both babies in the same shopping cart and they were happy to just look at everything around them in the aisles.  All the other women at the store were cooing and smiling at our babies and part of me wondered whether they thought we were lesbian parents out with our blond and mixed babies.  

The sleepover definitely helped the week pass by quickly and before we knew it Mike was back from Portland.  If Mike had just gotten home an hour earlier he would have seen Adam roll over for the first time from his back to his tummy.  I was so excited I started clapping and Adam had no clue what had just happened.  I was of course less than excited when he woke us up several times last night screaming because he had rolled half-way onto his tummy, got stuck in face-plant position, and panicked.  Silly baby.  It was happening so often we eventually brought him into bed with us to keep him from rolling.  The middle of the night is no time to practice new skills, sweet pea.  Let's see how tonight goes. Both Adam and I now have colds and probably the best remedy to bet on is rest.