Duck, Duck, GOOSE!

Here is a cute video of Ellen and her friend Emma playing Duck Duck Goose at the park today. They don't quite have all of the rules of the game grasped, but really enjoy chasing each other!!


I babysit Emma while her mother Melissa works at Sylvan (same place I work!) and then when I work, Melissa watches Ellen. Its a great trade and neither of us has to pay for daycare. Not that we could afford daycare since Sylvan doesn't pay very well and we work there part-time! Sadly (?) this will all be coming to an end this fall as Melissa is having a baby in October, and then I'm having our twinies in November. There is no way that one adult could watch two toddlers and THREE newborns, so we will both probably stop working! In the spring I'd like to go back and work maybe one evening a week tutoring, and let Matt watch the girls.. but we'll see! Right now I'm so tired most of the time I'm just looking forward to being done with work. Not that having twins will make me any less tired, but at least I won't be pregnant tired anymore.

Today I actually got dinner completely ready during Ellen's nap before I went to babysit which was an accomplishment. I made a delicious chicken stir fry with rice and veggies. We are still getting our summer farmshare which has been awesome and very diverse this summer! We've gotten so many fruits and veggies; its made cooking easy! I added some yellow green beans (not sure what these actually were), a zucchini, and an orange bell pepper to the stir fry and it turned out great. Here is a picture of the final result:
(admittedly it doesn't look too appetizing because of the lighting and the white bowl... but it was amazing. Picture it drizzled with toasted cashews!!)


Actually now that I'm looking at it on my computer the picture looks kind of gross. Sorry. It was good, I promise. :)

I actually have a few cute photos of Ellen from the past week:

Today at the park climbing all over this concrete structure:


Cooking with Daddy in the kitchen while I slept! Matt made pancakes (yum!) and Ellen made a floury mess. Totally worth the extra ZZZs. ;)




Last thing - looking at these pictures of her in her pigtails is reminding me of something that happened at 6am on Sunday morning.... admittedly it was not as hilarious then, but looking back at it now its quite funny. So at 6am Sunday morning we are awoken by screams of panic from Ellen's room. Matt goes in to get her and calm her down, but he can't get her to stop crying... she doesn't want him, she doesn't want milk... she just keeps saying something over and over that he can't understand. I finally get up to see what's wrong, and when I walk in the room she's sobbing "Ponies, Ellen wants Ponies." By "Ponies" what she means is that she wants her hair to be put in pony tails. At 6am. SO...I put her hair in pony tails, and then I went back to bed. Unfortunately for Matt she did not so he had to get up with her. This is when they made the pancakes! :):)

** A side story to the pony tails is that on Sunday we went to a women's soccer game with my college friend Erin and her boyfriend Justin. Justin's sister plays for West Virginia and they came to town to see us and watch his sister play soccer! The game we went to on Sunday was West Virginia vs. the #1 team in the nation: Stanford. WV was expected to lose, especially since they had lost their Friday night game. It just so happens that Sunday morning at 6am the pony tail holder colors that Matt picked out were blue and yellow - West Virginia's colors, which she wore to the game! And amazingly West Virginia (and Justin's sister) played an awesome game and actually BEAT Stanford 1-0!! It was a super exciting game and Ellen loved it. Maybe we can take a little credit for her blue and yellow ponies?!?!? :):) At least she was a good luck charm. And apparently now we are West Virginia fans! Go Mountaineers!

Three Awesome Gluten Free Recipes

I realize that I'm going to have to change my blog name since it is clearly no longer a food blog and has morphed almost completely into a baby and pregnancy blog!!

However, we are still doing the fresh 20 (about every other week) and so I have a few awesome recipes from last week to share.

The first is one that I repeated and made again this week because it was so good:

Tomato and Spinach Rice Pitas
**I have changed this recipe based on what I put in it, so its not identical to the fresh 20's recipe**

1 cup rice
2 cups water

2-3 chicken breasts, cooked and cut into small pieces
1 tomato, diced
2 cups of fresh baby spinach, chopped
1 medium cucumber (or zucchini), chopped
1 avocado, chopped
1/2 lemon juiced to make 1 tablespoon of lemon juice
2 tablespoons of olive oil
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper

gluten free pitas (or regular pitas if you are not GF)


1. Cook the rice according to package directions
2. Cook the chicken, add to rice
3. Add tomato, spinach, cucumber, avocado, lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper to rice mixture, stir to combine.
4. Toast pitas, cut in half and fill with spinach/rice mixture, and enjoy!!

Even Ellen LOVED these pitas! She ate almost 3/4 of an entire pita with filling. I was pleasantly surprised, especially since she almost never eats rice or spinach!


The second one is actually two recipes in one:
BBQ Chicken, and BBQ Chicken Pizza
This is probably the best BBQ sauce I've ever had... it was ahmazing.


BBQ Sauce: (for both meals)
1 6oz can of tomato paste
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp paprika
1 tbsp onion powder
1 tbsp garlic powder
1/4 cup molasses
2 tbsp honey
2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
pinch of cayenne pepper
1/4 cup water

1. In a small bowl whisk to combine all ingredients. Add water if too thick, but not too much, the sauce should stay pretty thick. Divide in half, half for BBQ chicken and half for BBQ chicken pizza.


BBQ Chicken:
(Buy enough chicken for both BBQ chicken dinner and BBQ chicken pizza, I used about 2 lbs which I think was enough for both of us plus leftovers.)

Season all of the chicken with a mixture of:

1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tbsp paprika
1 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp onion powder

Line a baking sheet and cook chicken for ~25 minutes or until done. In the last ~5 minutes or so, brush on the BBQ sauce. Be careful the sauce will burn quickly so don't leave it in for too long!

***Save 1/2 of your chicken for the BBQ chicken pizza, you will need 2 cups***


BBQ Chicken Pizza:

4 gluten free pitas or flatbread
BBQ Sauce
1/4 medium red onion
2 cups baby spinach, chopped
2 cups BBQ chicken, shredded
2 cups mozzarella cheese, shredded

1. preheat oven to 425
2. Line a baking sheet and lay out pitas, spread about 1-2 tbsp of BBQ sauce on each pita. Add onions, then spinach, then chicken, and finish with 1/2 of cheese on top of each.
3. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until cheese is melted and bubbly.



And that's it! Three great GF recipes!
Sorry I forgot to take pictures, but they are worth making - easy and delicious!!

24 Weeks!

We had our 24 week appointment on Tuesday, and everything went great... we got our first growth ultrasound where they check to see if the twins are growing appropriately, and so far so good!

Baby A is still head down and on the left, and Baby B is also now head down on the right. Good job babies! Please stay head down!!! We got the cutest picture of their two heads together, both of them looking up at us. See if you can pick out the baby's eyes and noses. There is even a little hand between the two heads.



I *think* we have chosen names. I reserve the right to change them of course, but as of now Baby A will be named Anna, and Baby B will be named Lucy. :) So from now on I will refer to them as Anna and Lucy! Its exciting to actually give them names!!

Here is a picture of Anna (baby A)


And here is a picture of Lucy (baby B)


And here is a picture of me at 24 weeks!


I feel much bigger than this picture looks. I may have to get Matt to start taking my picture since I think that I'm minimizing my bump somehow with this angle. Today my black maternity pants got too tight, and my khakis are too tight around my belly. I'll just have to stop going to work so I can just wear jeans and sweats all of the time. :)

Triple Stroller!

We have been reorganizing our house to get ready for the twins' arrival. Until this weekend we had just been piling all of our baby stuff into our sun-room, including the triple stroller that my parents so generously gave us!! It is an amazing stroller because it is the size and weight of a double stroller, but comes with a toddler seat that you attach to the front. This way I only have to lift 40lbs instead of 60lbs when putting the stroller into our van (and it will actually fit in the van) and I can fit through doorways! :) We decided to set the stroller up so I could put in my new hot pink head-hugger infant seat pads for the twins, and we also gave Ellen a chance to try out her new toddler seat. And she LOVED it. In fact she refused to get down for at least an hour, and sat up there talking to herself, playing with toys she requested, even crayoning for a while. Matt and I weren't even in the same room with her for a while and she was super happy just talking to herself in her seat. Here is a picture of her loving her seat:


And the stroller:


Part of the reorganizing this past weekend included me giving up HALF of my closet to Matt. The HORRORS! I guess I should have some empathy for Matt who is being kicked out of his room where he has kept his clothes and books for the past two years since we will be putting the twins there. And now we are squished into the same closet. It will be fine, I bought an extra shoe rack at target and somehow everything fit. I'll just have to be better about packing up my out of season clothes when I'm not using them. Thankfully we have a HUGE attic that is currently full of bins of clothes. (baby and mine!)

I made a nice gluten free dinner tonight: Lemony chicken with Zuccini white bean salad. It was actually delicious. The chicken I cooked in a marinade of lemon juice, olive oil, and oregano. And the salad was just chopped up raw zuchini, a can of cannelini beans, and shredded parmesan cheese with a dressing of more lemon juice and olive oil. Super healthy and easy! And hopefully not too many calories since after dinner I proceeded to eat a ton of peanut butter m&ms and some ice cream. :)

A few of Ellen's latest sentences / phrases:

"The boys turned the water off, the fountains. Ellen cried. Emma cried too. Just a little bit, not too much."
(this is describing our last trip to the pool where there was thunder and the lifeguards (the boys) turned the fountains off. Both Ellen and her friend Emma were quite upset, but they only cried a little bit.) :)

"Put Nolan in the car, he is going to Grammie's house. Maybe"
(she likes to put her little people in cars and send them to Grammie's house, she has named several of them, Emma, Nolan, and Neighbor Jane. Today I think she named one Ellen, we'll see if it sticks.)

"Maybe NOT!!"
(said in a crying voice, she says this when she is upset and does not want to do something. Its a welcome change from NO! But it is hard not to laugh when she says it so seriously)

"Puff goes poopy in the litter box"
(said to our cat Puff)
"Penny poops a lot"
(talking about my parents' dog Penny)
"Amara poops in the grass"
(our dog Amara)
"Ellen made a poopy, change diaper!"
(I'm hoping all of this talk about poop will eventually lead to potty training, but we are not there yet!)

And here is a picture of me at 23 weeks, I think I popped out from the last picture I posted!

5 Minutes is up!

Ellen (at 22 months) often has trouble with transitions, like when we have to leave the park to go home, or when its time to stop playing and have a bath. It seems to help if I warn her that something is going to change ahead of time, by telling her that she has 5 minutes left of a certain activity, and then we are going to ....
So several times per day she hears she has 5 minutes left from me! :) Yesterday I overheard her as she was playing with her new Little People Dollhouse, she said to a few little people: "5 minutes are up! Time to go inside now!" and then a few moments later: "Time for bed!" I couldn't stop cracking up.

Here is the new and awesome dollhouse I scored on craigslist. (thanks to Mom and Dad for picking it up!!)


This past weekend we were at my parents house in Swarthmore to see family one last time before we hunker down and get ready to have twins. I realize that I'm MONTHS away from this, but I just don't feel like doing lots of travel while pregnant with twins. Part of me is scared something will go wrong, and I know eventually I'll just be too uncomfortable to sit in a car for 4 hours. We picked up TONS of baby stuff that my parents had collected for us from craigslist, including a triple stroller!! We also went to IKEA and bought two matching cribs and a changing table for the twins room! I can't wait to start setting everything up. Here is a picture of our van after we packed it with all of the stuff we got from my parents and Ikea. It is COMPLETELY full - the only seats it has in it are the drivers seat, passenger seat, and Ellen's seat. The rest is full of stuff! (and our poor dog squished next to the cribs and Ellen's toys)



After being gone all weekend and working a full day on Monday, I haven't been able to make any fresh 20 meals this week, but we did have 3 eggplants that I needed to use up from our farm-share, so tonight I made Eggplant Parmesan. It was amazing and so easy. Another better homes and gardens recipe!

First I peeled and cut up the eggplants. Then I dipped them in egg mixed with water, and next in flour. (I used regular flour, but gluten free would also equally work here!) I put them in an ungreased casserole pan, covered them with shredded parmesan cheese, ragu tomato sauce, and more mozarella cheese! There was lots of cheese in this dish! It baked for ~15-20 minutes in a 400 degree oven, and turned out delicious. Even Ellen ate two servings which is rare for her to really like the meals that I make!! :)



And lastly here is me at 21 weeks pregnant! Can you believe there are two babies in there? I'm not sure that I can yet, though I'm getting to know each of them as they are kicking more and more every day! :)

TWIN GIRLS!

We had our 20 week ultrasound today and found out we are having two GIRLS!!



The ultrasound went really well, both girls are healthy and have all of their parts!! They moved and kicked around a lot during the ultrasound which was fun to see. I'm feeling lots of kicks now, mostly from baby B who is on the right side of my stomach.

To explain the A vs. B... Baby A is the baby that is furthest down, and she is head down and on the left side. Baby B is slightly higher up, she is head up, and on the right side. So now when I feel kicks I know which baby is kicking me, its awesome.

Thanks for all of the prayers and well wishes, we couldn't be happier. :)

Maine and Baby Kicks!

Its been forever since I've posted, we've been keeping busy and all is well. :)
We had a wonderful week long trip to Maine to visit Matt's family's camp that they call "Naguibagua." His family names everything, apparently this name has a Native American meaning which I've now forgotten, but Matt says was probably made up anyway. Its a great name though and we got Ellen to start saying it which was awesome. The sad part of our week was on Saturday, we attended a memorial service for Matt's Uncle Arch who died this spring. It was a really sweet, sad service. He had fought a long battle with bone marrow cancer and amazingly had several bone marrow transplants. He was a big strong extremely smart man and he will be missed!! The positive to the funeral being in Maine was that it brought Matt's entire family together, and most of his cousins stayed at camp Naguibagua with us the whole week which was a blast.

There were 6 girls under the age of 6 at camp (including Ellen) and wow was that awesome / crazy. Ellen was inducted into a club by her oldest cousin Jane (6) called the Dragonoses club. I'm not sure how much of this she understood, but she loved saying Dragonoses and then growling and making funny noises. I'm guessing she understood more than I'm giving her credit for! (According to Jane a Dragonoses is a dragon like creature that snorts, growls, and breathes fire)

Ellen loved the time with her cousins and each morning when she woke up the first thing she'd say was: "Cousins? Downstairs!" Most of the time her cousins were still sleeping since Ellen got up every morning at 5:30....not that I blame her - the sunrise was super early in Maine and our room faced east with nothing but windows. So, by 5:30AM, it was essentially as bright as noon in our room. So of course she woke up early! She also went to bed early and took good naps. Thank goodness.

We made an awesome eight layer casserole to share for dinner - gluten free!!
It is essentially a lasagna but without the lasagna noodles. It is a recipe from Better Homes and Gardens which is actually not a gluten free recipe, but I easily converted it by using gluten free rice curly noodles. Here is the recipe:
http://www.bhg.com/recipe/beef/eight-layer-casserole/
(from the better homes and gardens website so I'm not stealing it)

It was an amazing casserole - I think what makes it amazing is that the cheese layer consists of cream cheese and sour cream. YUM. As an added plus the spinach layer gives you some good veggies too - and Ellen actually ate it!

Here is a picture of the final casserole:



**BTW, I am no longer eating gluten free, it just got to be too much with being pregnant and hungry all the time. I still like to cook gluten free and will continue to share my successful dishes, though this blog is probably going to mostly transition to a baby blog :)**

Lastly, the babies have started kicking!!!! This makes me so happy. I have felt them a few times today, especially when I've been sitting still. In fact I've been feeling them kick as I write this post. What a wonderful, reassuring feeling that they are doing OK! And, in 10 days we will find out if we are having girls or boys or one of each! I am excited!!

And here is a picture of Ellen combing her monster's hair (Philly Phanatic)


And I haven't gotten any pictures off my camera from Maine yet, but when I do I'll do a camera dump and share.