A Tale of Two Gifts

I celebrated my third Mother's Day this year with two babies. A handsome, funny, wily three year old and a snuggly, cuddly, happy 4 month old.  What a great day!

Andrew had been working hard for a few weeks to come up with something appropriate for the occasion. I hadn't made any formal requests since there wasn't anything that I had to absolutely.have.now.  My techie husband shows his love through gadgets.  I treasure that about him. In fact, the very first present he ever gave me were a pair of ear phones for my annual trip to San Francisco.  I had lost mine and hated the Apple ones that came with my, then, iPod Mini (gads!  Look how huge that thing is! It's practically the Zach Morris phone of MP3 players.) 

I've grown to love gadgetry and all its glory, and more than that I completely appreciate how excited my husband gets when I ask him, "Can you tell me about [insert name of something techy here]?"  The Saturday before Mother's Day, we had date night and I was presented with this fabulous toy, the iPhone 4 (by the way, that Speck case is turquoise and hot pink and MY husband picked it out!) It's a toy and a tool all wrapped in one and I love it.

*Yes, that's him holding the sandwich. Isn't he adorable!?*

 

The second part of this story is how much I love being a mother and what that means around Mother's Day.  It means handmade gifts from my children.  

Growing up, my sister and I were the princesses of craft and handmade gifts (what a surprise, huh?)  We made picture frames, hand print butterflies, coupon books for my mom, which usually had offers for "Good for ONE free hug & kiss"  or "Good for ONE emptying of the dishwasher without complaint."  My mother loves these presents. She cherished them and until Ben started going to preschool and making gifts for me, I didn't really understand.

I do now.  Last year, I received a lovely card with his hand print in the middle of a paper heart. Along with the card came a laminated book mark with an original Jackson Pollack-esque drawing on bright white copy paper with the finest Crayola markers (tee hee!)  I love, love, love that book mark. I love it so much that when I accidentally let it slip between my seat and the bulk head on a flight back from Toronto, I was frantic.  I waited anxiously until we landed so I good squeeze my zaftig self between my seat and the one in front of me and rescue my precious bookmark.  At that moment is when I got how my mother felt all those years.

This year, Ben presented me with a bird house.  He chose lovely shades of red-orange, blue, and green. He layered the paint on thickly so that it wouldn't ever come off, he said. He gave it to me at a little reception called "Morning Muffins with Mommy."  As soon as we got home, he made me put it in the try right away.  And here it is.  My lovely bird house, hanging in our back yard on a rainy morning. 

I can't say if I love one gift more than that other, but I think that if something were to happen to my birdhouse, I might actually cry a little.

To all the mothers who read this blog, I hope it was a wonderful day for you and every day you spend with your children you remember how loved you are by those wonderful little people.

Experiencing technically difficulties. Please do not adjust your television set.

*sigh*  As you can see, my once cute, colorful, cherry-ful blog is no more. It seems to be going through a Minimalist period.   Actually, what happened was that I thought I could monkey with the code for a fun new font. I followed the directions, made sure to check for typos, and bam!  It didn't work.

I'm going to try to get it back up to its former loveliness soon.  Anyway, here's what's coming soon:

1) Molly's 4 Month letter

2) A new craft blog!

Green Chili Chicken Casserole

I don't think I've posted this recipe here. It's one I created a while back that my hubby love, love, loves.  It's really easy to make and freezes very well, so if you do OAMC, then this recipe would fit nicely into your repertoire.

Here are the ingredients:

Shredded Monterrey jack cheese, cream of jalapeno soup, Green Chile Tomatillo salsa, chicken breast, white corn tortillas

Ingredients:
1lb. cooked, shredded chicken breast*
1 to 1 1/4 cups shredded Monterrey Jack cheese (you can grate your own instead of buying the already shredded stuff. I'm just lazy.)
1 10oz can of Cream of Jalapeno soup (This might be regional. It's available in Texas along with a lot of other traditional Mexican soups.  If you can't find it, you can sub Cream of Chicken)
2/3 cup Green Chile Tomatillo salsa (Again, this is a variety found in my local grocery store. You can sub any kind of green chile or tomatillo salsa. Heat intensity is personal preference.)
15-20 White tortillas, cut in half or quarters

Directions:
1) If preparing to eat immediately, preheat oven to 350 degrees.  If preparing for the freezer, skip this step.
2) Spray a 9X13" baking pan with non-stick spray. Set aside.
3) In a bowl, combine shredded chicken, soup, 1/3 cup salsa and mix until the chicken has been thoroughly coated with the wet ingredients.  Set aside.
4) Spread 1/3 cup of salsa on the bottom of baking pan and build your first tortilla layer. Spread about 1/4 of the chicken mixture over the tortillas and then sprinkle with 1/4 cup of the shredded cheese.
5) Repeat the layering process for two to three more layers (of until you run out of the chicken mixture.)
6) Loosely top the casserole with the remaining tortillas and spread the last 1/3 cup of salsa over the top. Sprinkle with the remaining cheese.
7) Bake in a 350 degree oven, loosely covered with foil for about 25-30 minutes. Uncover and bake an additional 5-10 minutes until the cheese on top browns.  Or if you have a broiler safe baking dish, brown the top for about 5 minutes under the broiler.

To bake from frozen - Allow casserole to thaw completely in refrigerator. Preheat oven to 375 and bake for 35-40 minutes until completely heated through. 

Green Chile Chicken Casserole - Ready for freezing or to pop in the oven.

*A note about cooking the chicken -
The best way I've found to cook chicken for these kinds of recipes is in a slow cooker.  The chicken will be extremely tender and moist and it's an easy way to infuse flavor.  The the casserole in the photo in this post, I cooked thawed chicken on high for about 4.5 hours. I flavored it with one small can of hot green chilies, 2T of olive oil, 1 peeled whole garlic clove, and about 2 tsps of salt.  The resulting juice and chilies from the slow cooker were incorporated into the sauce for this recipe (as was about 1/3 c of left over Creamy Jalapeno dip from Chuy's!). 

Another option for the chicken is to make up a big batch of KA's Chicken Tacos chicken. The flavors would be perfect in this recipe! If you really wanted to coordinate ingredients, I would use a tomato based salsa and a sharp cheddar cheese (in lieu of tomatillo salsa and Monterrey Jack cheese.)

Conversations with Ben - April 22, 2011

This morning, waking up, getting changed, and dressed for the day.

Ben: "...and then Mommy take me and Molly to the liberry and she will get me a movie to watch and it will be a great day!"
Daddy: "Oh yeah?  That sounds like fun."
Ben: "Uh huh. And I get to go to the liberry."
Daddy: "It's library."
Ben: "Liberry."
Daddy: "Library. Lye-BRAR-ee"
Ben: "No, Daddy. Liberry. LYE-BERRY."

Conversations with Ben - April 10, 2011

Riding in the car on the way to the grocery store.

Ben: "Mommy, what those birds doing?"
Me: "Where, honey? What birds?"
Ben: "Thoooossseeee birds there. See?"
Me: "Oh right.  They're digging in the dirt. Probably looking for something to eat."
Ben: "What do the birdies eat?"
Me: "Hhm.  Bugs and worms, I suppose."
Ben: "Oh."
Ben: "I don't like to eat bugs.  They're too pointy."

"Cheese" for the camera! Looks exactly like his "I smell something" face.

Molly - Three Months Old

Good golly, Miss Molly!
You're three months old.  Slow down, there tiger.  If you're not careful, you'll be all grown up and I'll be looking around, wondering where my baby went.

What a month!  Not long after you turned two months, I thought it was about time you started trying out your new room. You had been taking naps there for a couple of weeks and seemed to love it just fine. One late evening you were "napping" and I thought that maybe we should try leaving you there for the night.  Best decision (and 8 hours of sleep), EVER!  You're a happy camper in your cozy abode.

I don't think it's the decor, though.  Poor baby! Your mama has just not gotten it together enough to actually decorate. I keep meaning to. There is a boat load of adorable tchotckes and flotsam at the "crapt" store (Ha! When you're older, you'll have to ask your brother about that one) that would be perfect for a girly-girl's haven.  Some day. I promise. It will be properly girlified.

What else did you do this month? Oh yes! You started talking.  Well, ok, not with actual words that I understand, but you are definitely making sounds with the intent to communicate. It's just wonderful to hear.  You'll stop and smile and then say things like, "Cooo gaaahhh aggooo," which I can only assume means, "Oh mommy! You are so pretty and funny. I think you're the smartest woman in the whole wide world! I can't imagine that some day you'll be as funny as a heart attack and as smart as a box of rocks."  Obviously, that's exactly what you are saying.

On the other hand, every time you see your boyfriend, The Fan In Your Room, you also say, "Cooo gaaahhh aggooo." The best I can hope for is that it means you're happy. 

You are such a love!  I snuggle you every day and give you kisses and tell you how wonderful you are. I'm beyond happy to be your mommy.

Love, hugs, and kisses!
Mama

Molly - Two Months Old

Dear Molly-wolly,
You turned two months old yesterday. Hooray!  You're a big girl, my love.  Today we went to see your pediatrician to get the official stats.  You weigh 10 pounds, 10 ounces. Your noggin is 37 centimeters around and you're about 21" long (but your pedi things because you love to sit all yogi style, that your nurse Sarah didn't did measure your gams quite right. But that's okay.)

So where does that put you on the classic growth chart?  All over the place!  You're 50% for weight, 10% for head size and 5% for length (but we know that's probably wrong anyway.)  You're 100% perfect! It said so right on the chart. I promise. *wink, wink*

The worst part though were the shots. Oh my sweet drama queen! You did not like them one bit. I don't blame you. Those suckers hurt!  You stopped crying shortly after the shots were given but then when I picked you up and you looked at my face, you just whimpered and sobbed on my shoulder.  Break my heart, little girl!

So other than the recent trauma of exams and inoculations, this month has been just lovely.  You have started to smile and coo and gurgle at us.  You've gotten accustomed to sleeping for more than two hours.  You love to eat and even though I quit breastfeeding you exactly 1,832 times, I also restarted 1,833 times.  You love boob, kiddo (your dad is slightly jealous. Yes, I did write that because I know he reads this blog. Hi, honey!)

The love between you and your Ben-Ben is growing so much.  Molly, your brother is smitten with you.  I am so excited for the day when you and he can play together (and inevitably argue with, pick on, and bicker with each other.)  

You're starting to stir so I'm going to go for now.  I love you, darling princess.  My sweet love!
LHK,
Mommy

P.S. I promise to edit this post with your two month picture soon!