Archive | Lena

Dutch babies + pigtail buns

January 15, 2013 at 3:24 pm

Saturday morning usually means piping hot whole wheat pancakes (< they're so good that I'm proud of them even though they're not from scratch!). Every now and then, though, it's fun to try something new. I had seen a recipe for Dutch babies on one of my favorite blogs and decided to give it a try. I went to work with a very cheerful assistant.

Moments later we sat down to Dutch babies dusted with powdered sugar and sprinkled with lemon. Although I did like them, I’m not sure I’d repeat the topping combination, because the flavor of egg was too strong for me. I might prefer them with pure maple syrup, like we eat on our pancakes, or… Nutella and bananas?

Because everything is better with Nutella. Can I get an amen?

Dutch Babies

serves two
adapted from Elephantine

Ingredients

2 room-temperature eggs
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup sifted all-purpose flour
a pinch of ground nutmeg
a pinch of salt
2 Tbsp butter
Toppings

lemon slices
powdered sugar for dusting
jam
maple syrup
Nutella!

Directions

Place an oven-proof skillet (mine is 10″) into your oven and heat to 425˚F.
In a medium bowl, beat eggs with a whisk until light and frothy. Add milk and stir. Gradually whisk in flour, nutmeg and salt.
Remove skillet from oven. Melt butter in the hot skillet, rotating to coat. Pour the batter into the skillet and return skillet to oven.
Bake until puffed and lightly browned, about 12 minutes.
Remove promptly, slice into quarters and squeeze lemon slices over the pieces, then sprinkle with powdered sugar.

7 :: in eat this, Lena

life lately

January 14, 2013 at 2:58 pm

I haven’t shared bits and pieces of our life for awhile as captured on Instagram. It’s always so much fun to go back through the images and remember all those random memories I captured spur-of-the-moment! Here some snapshots of the ordinary and the lovely in our home:

Enjoying her beautiful alphabet magnets from her grandparents.

I love the ferns and cyclamen in the window boxes in this beautiful house

& post-bath tickles

Everyone in this house loves our new blocks (thank you, Anthony and Laura!)

& goofy girl

Modeling a sweater knit by her Aunt Eden and a bonnet knit by me

& lovely afternoon light over our town

Hours of fun with this reusable sticker pad

& admiring our finished Advent calendar: a tree full of birds

at a restaurant in town, the chef working the stone pizza oven always lets kids make their own pizza

& tired wreath on a worn door in our town

our neighborhood (Vecchia Matrice) wishes you happy holidays

& putting baby Jesus in his manger from our nativity set

I’m trying to use this purse as much as possible before I need to go back to a diaper bag in a few weeks…

& got a little growing to do into the apron her Aunt Jess gave her

my big girl on a playground on base one morning after we took Daddy to work

stories and baby bumps in bed before naptime

& not sure what she thinks of Siena helping her color

first pair of big girl undies!

& her new favorite breakfast: Greek yogurt and Charlottesville Farmer’s Market granola from Aunt Jess

sleepy kitty

& isn’t she pretty when she smiles!

11 :: in family, Instagram, Lena, life lately

practicing what I preach :: toy library

December 28, 2012 at 11:43 am

Old-time readers of my blog will know that I love the book Simplicity Parenting; I wrote a book review about it for the blog almost a year ago. In one section of the book the author suggests starting a toy library. Try putting out only a few toys at at time for your child to play with and then switching up the available toys every few weeks or so.

Well, I’ve been trying to incorporate this idea into my parenting for awhile now, and anyone will tell you that I’ve been less than faithful. However, on Christmas Eve night, as I crawled around the floor on my hands and knees tidying up Lena’s toys (as I do every evening… and after every nap… and after we leave one room for another…), my husband shook his head and said, “What about that toy library, honey?”

I looked at the present Lena had just opened and the pile of presents to be opened ~~tomorrow~~ over the next several days and agreed with him. I dumped out her toy basket and removed everything except a relatively new alphabet puzzle and the gift she had just opened. Everything else went into her toy library bin. Many of the smaller items had to be organized into Ziploc bags.

(Do you see that white garbage bag under all these toys? That is full of infant toys, which I’ll be breaking out at the end of January for our new baby! And so the toy multiplication continues….)

The blue bin went back up on her closet, to be taken down again in a couple weeks, when Christmas toys will be put away and old favorites will be pulled out again.

By the time I was finished (not even 15 minutes later), all that remained in her toy basket was the puzzle, a few balls, and her new baby doll and accessories. Oh, and the box the baby came in, which I think makes a nice little cradle. Simplicity parenting, right?!

Have you ever done something like this for your kids? Or would you like to when you have some? :-)

6 :: in good reads, holidays, Lena, motherhood

Christmas morning!

December 27, 2012 at 2:25 pm

Puuuuuullll off that wrapping paper!

Oh Christmas morning in Sicily, I hope you are the start of our family Christmas tradition! It was a quiet, peaceful morning for the three of us as we opened a few gifts at a time (still haven’t opened all of them!) and ate a big Christmas breakfast together. Although we kept our gift-giving very simple for each other, our family showered us with many thoughtful presents from afar, and their evident love for us made them seem not so far away. While we loved our Christmas as a little family here in Sicily, we would have given it up in a heartbeat to share our Christmas morning with them!

Later that day we changed out of our pajamas for a Christmas party with friends at Emily and Patrick’s… and then of course as soon as we got home the pajamas went right back on and Elliott started a fire in the hearth. We finished the evening with Skype chats with our family.

One thing I couldn’t forget all day: last year my family was here for Christmas. I tried to hold Christmas Past (which included my sister Julia) hand-in-hand with Christmas Present, carrying with me the blessings as well as the aches. There is so much to be thankful for this year, truly, and even more to look forward to both in this coming year and into the future.

Did you come up with any new rituals or celebrations this year that you hope become traditions? I’m not sure what I think of spreading out the gift opening over four days…! Have you ever done that?

9 :: in family, holidays, home sweet home, husband, Lena

IKEA thru Instagram

December 20, 2012 at 12:05 pm

Around here it seems like people make their IKEA shopping lists over the course of a month or two before braving the store to stock up. My friend Becca and I were in that boat, needing storage bins, holiday wrapping paper, potted ivy plants, plastic kids’ dishes, etc. Earlier this week we joined forces and took off for the endless, winding halls of IKEA, kids in tow.