Rice cereal - yum!

Levi has started getting interested in our food. He stares at it with curiousity, although he hasn't learned to reach out and grab it yet. We thought it'd be fun to start him on solids, which is really more entertaining than anything.

This was quite a family affair, and the boys were all so excited to help feed him.

Levi liked it okay. He was all eager to get it in his mouth, but he didn't know what to do with it after that. So he pushed most of it back out.He was definitely more interested in the spoon.

Brennan loved feeding Levi. Then the next day he came up to me and said, "Mom, I fed Levi!" Uh-oh. I ran to check on him, and he was trying to navigate a huge pear chunk. I got most of it out with a finger sweep, but then he choked on a tiny piece of the peel and spit up all over. We had a little talk with Brennan after that.

Whew! That was exhausting. Time for a nap.

Sweet Valentine's Day

We've had a lovely Valentine's Day weekend. The boys insisted on making their valentines for school, so we started making them a week early, knowing it could take awhile. Sometimes I'm really on top of it, which is good because when I wait until the last minute (which is more common) I get totally stressed out. It's a good thing we did them early because I was extremely sick on Thursday. Anyway, we made these fun little dog valentines with Airhead tongues and the words "I'm mutts about you" on the back. We got the idea from Family Fun a few years ago.

Spencer's class had a Valentine's mailbox contest, and he came up with this robot idea and made it all by himself. His teacher especially wanted them to used recycled objects from around the house. He won first place!

I decided I wanted to get together with the cousins Friday for our own little Valentine's party, since all the big boys had theirs that day. It was simple but fun. First they decorated their bags with heart stickers and crayons. Here is Luke eating the crayons.

Then they exchanged Valentines. Brennan got a cut above his eye from running into the piano a couple days ago. If this kid can get through childhood with his eyes intact, we'll be in good shape. He still has that huge purple blood blister on his eyelid from an encounter with a pencil 2 years ago.

Then they decorated heart-shaped sugar cookies.

And ate them, of course. Friday night Dave and I went out to dinner at our favorite French restaurant. It's pricey, so we don't go there often; but we love it. We decided to get 4 appetizers and a dessert instead of meals, which was a great way to sample lots of different things.

Saturday morning I made heart-shaped pancakes. First I made regular pancakes; then I used my heart-shaped cookie cutter. Aren't they just adorable? The kids loved them.

Holidays are all about the food, so here is the scrumptious Valentine's dinner we had tonight: grilled steak and asparagus with onions and mushrooms, roasted potatoes and fried apples. Not the healthiest meal, but oh-so-good!

After dinner we exchanged cards, chocolates and gifts.

Then for dessert I made Chocolate Lava Cakes. I have always wanted to make these, and this particular recipe looked nice and simple.

Yum!!! Oh my goodness, these were amazing. I suggest you don't wait until next Valentine's Day to try them out.

BBQ and Plum Sauce

I should invite people over for dinner more often - perhaps once a week. It's the best motivator for me to clean my house, including those things I never seem to get to, like windows and cluttered counters. Last night we invited a super nice family over for a BBQ. They have 3 kids and just moved here from Arizona. The youngest is a boy Dallin's age, which I'm so glad about because there aren't any other boys his age at church. We made BBQ chicken, grilled potato skins, corn on the cob and tomato cucumber salad (recipes to follow). Spencer, always the gracious host, made plum sauce with their other 2 kids (ages 9 and 7), who were totally excited to cook. We have a plum tree out front with a ton of tiny sour plums. A few weeks ago he cut up some plums and added a ton of sugar. But I told him it would probably be better to cook it over the stove to release the juices, and he has wanted to do that ever since. So last night as the adults were sitting around visiting after dinner, we noticed that the kids were all standing around the stove mixing plum pieces and sugar in a sauce pan. It was actually quite good - it tasted a lot like jam. And no one got burned, so that's good.

Tofu tip

I made a lovely tofu stir-fry for dinner tonight, and Dave made his yummy egg drop soup. For those of you out there who turn your noses up at tofu, hear me out. Since Dave started working for his current employer, we have greatly reduced the amount of meat we consume. His doctor is very big into preventative medicine, especially vascular health. He teaches his patients that meat should be eaten very sparingly (hmm, where have we heard that before??), not only because of the cholesterol, but also because of the animal protein, which isn't healthy in high amounts. I think it's wonderful! I like meat and all, but not all the time. And Dave used to think dinner wasn't dinner unless it contained meat. But he has totally changed his perspective. As a family, we eat a ton more fresh fruits and vegetables and whole grains, and we are always looking for good meatless meals. And this is my favorite way to eat tofu: first, get the firm kind. Then cut it into strips, coat it with corn starch, and fry it in oil until crispy. Don't add it to the stir fry or else the sauce makes it soggy. Just drain on paper towels and put on the side or on top of each serving. My kids absolutely love it. Seriously.

Adventurous Cooking

Ever since we ate at that fabulous French crepe cafe for my birthday, I've been itching to create my own crepe masterpiece. So I found a wonderful recipe for vegetable crepes in my Meals For a Month Cookbook that I tweaked for dinner tonight. It was a perfect Fast Sunday dinner because I was able to make it all before church and just heat it up when we got home. Plus as hungry as I get for dinner, I never want anything too heavy after fasting. I sauteed onions, carrots and mushrooms, then I added spinach, frozen potatoes and cheese. I rolled them up in the crepes, put them in a 9x13 pan and poured cream of mushroom soup mixed with milk on top. It was so light and yummy - everyone ate it up. Then for dessert I made hot fudge sauce to put over ice cream. Next I want to make dessert crepes - strawberries with Nutella and ice cream. So simple and yet so delicious.

I LOVE junior primary! For those of you who don't know, they are the 3-7 year olds at church. The senior primary (ages 8-11) are fine, but they start to get a bit smart-alicky by then. I think we have a particularly active junior primary, but I feel like I'm able to get them under control with stories, and their little faces are just fixed on me like, "What's going to happen next??" I just love them! Today for sharing time I put up eight pictures of families from the scriptures (Adam & Eve, Abraham and Isaac, Lehi and his family, etc.) I would give them clues and they would have to guess which family I was describing and tell one way we can learn to strengthen our families from them. It went great. Senior primary didn't go quite so great. We played 20 questions, but they didn't always know what question to ask. I just haven't figured out how to prepare for them as well yet.

Arrrg!

Tyler has just about the most expressive face I've ever seen. It's a small face, but it's all features.

My life is being consumed with choosing a new van. This week I have spent countless hours searching for titles, perusing the internet, and test driving vans with Brennan while everyone was at school/work. It's all very exciting, but a bit exhausting. It doesn't help that I'm still catching up from our trip to Utah last week (unfortunately no house cleaning fairies came while we were gone), and on top of it all I've had a terrible cold that is just about over now except for a nagging cough that keeps me up all night. Last night I slept on the couch so that I could sleep sitting up a bit plus not keep Dave up all night, as I had been doing the previous couple of nights.

We went on a fabulous date last night. (Are all the married couples out there going on weekly dates?? We've been doing much better since Kristen moved here with 2 babysitters we can call last minute). We had dinner at an old inn downtown we've been wanting to go to for awhile. We shared a rib eye steak, which was delicious, and as usual, there was plenty of food for both of us. Dave said it was the best steak he's had in this town, and there was no wait, which is amazing for a Friday night. The upstairs was the lounge, which sounded quite crowded. But downstairs was the more formal restaurant with live music. We could watch the busy downtown on one side of windows and beautiful gardens on the other - it's actually where we took our family Christmas picture last year. We got the Bananas Foster for dessert, which my friend has been bugging me to try forever. She'll be happy when she hears we ordered it and loved it. They saute butter and brown sugar right in front of you, then add bananas and pecans and top it off with some kind of alcohol, which makes quite a display as it all burns off - we're talking lots of flames that make all the other diners turn and ask, "What's that?!" Then they pour it all over vanilla ice cream. It was quite delicious. When we got home we watched a very funny French movie called The Dinner Game. I find all kinds of fun things on Netflix.

Have a wonderful Sabath day tomorrow. I have everyone's shirts ironed and boys bathed, so I'm in good shape.