Sarah Approved Food

Sarah has put my culinary skills to the test.  She loves something one week and won't even take a bite of it the next week.  I've definitely discovered a few things with her that have held true since the beginning - She hates bell peppers and onions (even when cooked down), she likes chicken and ham the best and calls all meat chicken, you can disguise a lot of healthy things when they're in a smoothie, and when she's hungry she will eat.

I have mom friends whose kids won't eat smoothies, but if your child does like smoothies this is a great way to sneak in vegetables.  A typical smoothie for Sarah has milk, plain yogurt, spinach, pumpkin, a banana and random fruit (strawberries, pineapple, blueberries, fresh squeezed orange juice).

I know it's really great to try new foods when your kids are little, but I also think it's okay to stick to things they like when they are healthy foods.  Sarah loves broccoli and carrots, and it's okay to have those a couple of times a week.  I don't naturally gravitate toward fish, but since Robert loves it, and I know it's really healthy I've been trying to serve it a few times a month.  I recently discovered a real winner that uses broccoli, carrots, and salmon, and then I served it with wild rice.  Sarah approved of all of it and asked for more.  Honey Teriyaki Salmon and Veggies in Foil was a hit with all of us.  We subbed a few things:

• White vinegar instead of rice vinegar
• Ground ginger instead of minced ginger (and used less of it)
• Vegetable oil instead of sesame oil

I've also discovered that Sarah loves soup!  She likes eating from spoons and slurping up the broth at the end.  This is a good way to incorporate meat, beans, and veggies.

All three of us are big fans of Aldi's Never Any line.  They make really delicious breakfast sausage and chicken sausages. These are precooked so they're fast to grill up in a skillet, and there aren't any nasty hormones, fillers, or by-products.

My last random thought - Sarah has been having days where it feels like she's not eating much at all. Her pediatrician told me to look at a week at a time, not just every separate meal. When I do that, I realize she is eating a variety of things. She's also growing and adding inches and ounces, so she must be getting enough food. I think it's hard to transition from the newborn phase where your baby gains 15 pounds in a year to the toddler phase where your child only gains a few pounds a year. It's hard for me to change my mindset at least. 

What are some of your favorite tried and true toddler foods?

Yard Updates, Winter 2017

In the fall we just didn't have the time or money to do much to our yard, so we got around to it in late February/early March.  We had an unusually warm winter here in Missouri, and I think a lot of the country experienced it.  Because of that, our yard never really went dormant all winter.  It was actually kind of a bummer for us because we wanted some weeds to die.  You guys know our yard was in rough shape last winter when we moved in.  In the last year we've learned that rehabbing your lawn is a multi-year process.  There aren't instant results, and you just have to stick with it.  Last winter/spring we took care of raking years' worth of lives, de-thatching, removing a stump, removing gravel and replacing it with mulch, and getting rid of the gravel around our river birch tree in the back yard.  We were pleased with all of the results except for the gravel removal around the tree.

So here's what our yard looked like a year ago:

And here's what our yard looked like at the same time this year.  It's nowhere near perfect, but it really does look better than last year.

So in late February we rented an aerator and a tiller.  This was our first aerator experience, and it was kind of comical.  I had anticipated helping Robert, but after that machine nearly took him down it became obvious that I wouldn't be helping.  It was very powerful!  Robert when through the yard horizontally and vertically.  We hope to aerate again in the fall.

Since grass still wasn't growing around the river birch tree where we dug out gravel we decided that there must still be more gravel there.  Last year Robert dug out as much as he could, but this year he rented a tiller that went down 10", and it got out so much more gravel.  It was still reaching gravel down at 10" so who knows how deep it actually goes.  We're just hoping that going down 10" is enough to grow some grass.  The tiller loosened up the soil and gravel, and then it was time to sift out the gravel from the good soil.  This was another difficult task.  Robert and I agree that we won't be volunteering to sift dirt for anyone any time soon.  Robert built his own soil sifter based on Home Depot's tutorial, and it held up for our project and could be used again.  Basically, we put the sifter over the wheel barrow, shoveled dirt into it, shook it back and forth to sift out the dirt from the gravel, dumped the gravel in a pile, and dumped the wheel barrow when it got full.  When we were finally finished we raked out the soil to level it some.  Robert planted shade-friendly grass and has been watering it every day.  We know the grass won't be perfect since it's under a tree, but if we don't get at least some grass Robert says he will cry, and I say we should just plant ivy or turn it into a concrete slab with a patio or a shed.

After tilling and aerating we wanted to put down a fertilizer and a pre-emergent.  It's kind of frustrating because since we didn't have a cold winter we already had weeds, so I don't know how much the pre-emergent will do.  We've gained most of our knowledge through The Lawn Care Nut and his YouTube videos.  He's entertaining, and he's full of good information, but I also just wanted a spreadsheet that told me what to do and when to do it, so I just made my own.

Like I said, this winter was super warm so we bumped up the tasks that would usually be done in early April to early March, and then we mowed for the first time two weeks later in mid March.  As The Lawn Care Nut suggests, we used Lesco Starter Fertilizer.  We really couldn't find it anywhere locally so we ordered it on Amazon with free shipping.  This fert is kind of expensive, but thankfully our 8,000 square foot yard only needed half a bag, and we will be able to use the other half of the bag in late August.  The LCN wants you to put down the fert with sharp angular sand.  We found a big bag at Home Depot for about $4 which is great, but it was sold outside at Home Depot, and it had rained recently so it was wet and couldn't flick out of the spreader, so I ended up putting it out by hand which was miserable, and I'm not sure how effective it was.  Oh well.  Then we put down a liquid pre-emergent called Prodiamine which is the generic form of Barricade.  Again, we bought this on Amazon because it wasn't sold locally.

Within two weeks our yard was much greener and thicker.  Now, it's still about 50% weeds, but I'm trusting the process and believe that this fall when we spot spray the weeds, aerate, and seed it'll give us great results next spring.  Robert mowed at 2.75" in mid March, and now the rest of the season we will mow at 3.75".  I think this is going to be really hard for me because our yard is going to look really weedy.  To the eye, the yard would look less full of weeds if we cut it shorter, but by cutting it longer the root system will get longer, deeper, and stronger.  The root length is directly proportionate to the grass length, so by cutting the grass longer our roots will get stronger and give us better grass next year.

We got one random day of some flurries over spring break.  Go figure.

Around Easter we will do our next treatment.  That time we will use Prodiamine again, but our fertilizer will be Ringer Lawn Restore.  We aren't going to spot spray for weeds because that would kill half of our yard.  We will spot spray in the fall when things are about to go dormant.

Alabama Visitors

Several months ago Robert was talking to his dad, and we learned that his wife, Terri, would be going to Honduras on a mission trip in March.  We invited Ray up to visit while she was out of town.  Shortly before the trip was to occur, his two sisters, Leah and Tammy, decided they'd like to come, so it became a big sibling trip.  Leah is about to move to Singapore for a few years, so it was an extra special trip before her big move.  This was also Leah and Tammy's first trip back to Missouri since our wedding five years ago.

Sarah was super jazzed the night they arrived and stayed up late to see them.  She got a bedtime story from Papa.

We did a Branson day with them and enjoyed lunch at Hook and Ladder Pizza in Hollister and the Ralph Foster Museum at College of the Ozarks.

It worked out perfectly that they were here over spring break, so Robert got to preach while pastor John was out for a family vacation.

Sarah soaked up all the extra attention, and was so sad when they left!

We spent plenty of time just doing our normal thing around the house, but it's always fun to have company there to make the day more exciting.  We got to eat good food, play Trivial Pursuit, and go shopping.  We enjoyed lots of chatting and time together.  I'm glad we could host them!