Noah loves his kitchen, and he loves cooking when I am cooking. I moved the little kitchen into my kitchen a few weeks ago and it has been a big hit. I love watching him work so hard to be like mommy. It’s so cute and really makes spending time in the kitchen more fun.
Here’s a short video of him filling up his pot.
MVI 8112 from Stephanie Adams on Vimeo.
I heard about this deal over at Tot School and thought I would share with you. I was also in the midst of setting up affiliate links with amazon for another project I am working on (more on that later) and thought I would give them a test spin here. I promise I will not be bombarding you with links to buy stuff through me to make money! You can get the Scotch Laminator
The boys recently had a little health scare. Basically they had super high alkaline phosphatase levels (and some other numbers but that was the main one worrying the doctor) and have had on every test we’ve run since we have been home. The doctor wanted to run a few test to rule out things like leukemia (momma never wants to hear that one again!), heavy metal contamination, and some bone diseases. He made us do blood draws, urine testing, and x-rays. (It was a ton of fun!) Two toddlers getting tortured really. Luckily SuperDad was available to do all of the holding. It was a long couple of weeks, but in the end everything turned out normal. The doctor said he was happy with all of the results and in his opinion the high levels could be do to the fact that they could be making up for lost nutrition in Ethiopia and are growing like crazy now. He also told us that Africans have stronger bones than caucasians and that could also contribute to some of the numbers we’ve seen. It was not fun going through all the testing, but I am glad we did it and now know everything is okay. Had they not had previously high numbers I might have waited on all the test to see what a future test said.
I just wanted to put this out there for any parents who have seen high levels in their kids. Don’t worry it could be totally normal!
Happy Father’s Day to my amazing husband. You are one awesome daddy. Always willing to change a disgusting diaper or clean-up a little spit-up. You get up in the middle of the night to tend to your babies never complaining. You are teaching our boys to be wonderful men of God, respectful of women, and kind to all. You play, you read, you laugh with our boys and they love it. Their faces light up every day when you come home. I think it is the best part of their day. (it is mine :D) We all love you and so glad you are in our lives. Happy Father’s Day!
Here’s a short video of Ez being silly then singing the two songs he sort of knows. Old McDonald and If You’re Happy and You Know it (happy, happy, happy in Ez terms). Also a brief appearance by his brother who was feeling left out.
MVI 8068 from Stephanie Adams on Vimeo.
I love sweet corn, love, love it! It is one of my favorite things about summer. I had the opportunity on Friday to go pick organic, sweet corn for a ridiculously low price. I was allowed to pick three dozen so I did. I read up on how to freeze it here, and learned a terrific way to cut it of the cob here.
I spent a little time yesterday afternoon preserving some of it.
Then de-cobbed. Everything I read said not to freeze it on the cob. Cutting it off was much easier than I anticipated and the upside down bowl in a larger bowl trick was very helpful.
Ez woke up from nap right as I was starting the process, turns out the boy loves corn on the cob.
Daddy showing him proper technique.
Wouldn’t put it down to color.
Noah did not share his brother’s love for corn on the cob, but he did eat plenty that I had cut off the cob. I think Ezra ate three ears of corn all by himself.
I love cooking, I love it more now than I ever thought I would. Yes there are nights I don’t want to cook dinner, but once I start the process my mood usually improves. I had never had Ethiopian food before we decided to adopt from Ethiopia. I quickly found out I love it. It is now tied with Mexican as my favorite food. I had put off learning to cook Ethiopian food for far too long. I had built it up in my head as an impossible task, yes injera is not so simple and I need work in that area, but other than that it is like cooking any other food, just different spices.
I am so glad I finally started trying to cook the food. The other night I made two dishes one was bland and I probably won’t ever make it again, just wasn’t really my taste, and the other was SUPER spicy. Like so spicy I was sweating from every pore in my body, but it was also very, very YUMMY. Matt went back for seconds even though he is not a SUPER spicy food eater. The next night I made another half recipe without the berbere so I could combine what was left from the first night with it. The result was the perfect amount of spice for us.
Yemisir Kik We’t
Ingredients:
2 cups split lentils (there are 4 cups in the picture, I was making two different recipes with lentils)
6 cups water (boiled)
2 cups red onions (chopped)
1.5 cups oil (I later learned this was a spiced oil that I should have made ahead of time, I just used olive)
1 Tbsp. ginger
1 tsp. garlic (I just used a clove)
1 cup berbere (I thought I was smart and only used 3/4, haha still too spicy)
1/4 tsp. cumin
The ingredients for both of my dishes
Preparation
Wash lentils and boil for 5 minutes (until the lentils are tender). Cook onions adding oil and stirring gently until golden brown adding a little water as needed (I didn’t see a need with all that oil!) to prevent sticking. Remove lentils from heat, drain and reserve water for later use. Add the lentils to the onions. Add reserved water stirring to prevent mixture from sticking to the bottom of the pan. (the second night I was lazy and skipped draining the lentils and just added it all at once) Add everything else. Simmer for 20 minutes. 6 or more servings.
Helpers being silly
Uh-oh the helpers are done!
Noah on the second night decided he was just join in on the fine, he was so mad when I wouldn’t let him stick his spoon in my pot.
Today is our Family Day. Exactly one year ago today, we became a family. It has been a wonderful year, challenging, life changing, but absolutely amazing. I cannot believe it has already been an entire year, it flew by so quickly.
We celebrated with Ethiopian food tonight, my first try at cooking it. One dish was super spicy and the other was a little bland. We then played outside, pretty much a normal evening as a family of 4.
Utensils:
large pancake pan or large frying pan
large pot
deep mixing bowl
Ingredients:
1.5 pounds teff flour
6 cups of water
2 pkt. yeast
Preparation:
Clean teff thoroughly by removing all foreign materials , grind to a fine powder (mine was flour already, so I skipped.) Sift into a deep mixing bowl. Adding water gradually and rubbing with the fingers to avoid lumps, make the flour into a dough.
In a large pot dissolve yeast in warm water and add the flour mixture and mix. Leave covered for 2-3 days until fermentation begins and water rises to the top. (I waited until the whole top layer was water, only took 2 days) Carefully discard the water. Boil 2 cups of water. Take 1 cup of the mixture, put in the boiling water (Abseet’). Place on a warm stove and stir continuously until it becomes thick (maybe 5 minutes). Cool and pour back into the original pot. Add more water (??? how much, I had no clue so I added a little at a time until it became more like runny pancake batter), cover and let stand till the mixture rises (doesn’t ‘rise’ like you expect bread dough to rise, mine just started to get all bubbly again).
Preheat pancake pan at 420° (I borrowed my neighbor’s electric skillet, and we ended up folding it closed and heating from both sides). Take 3/4 of the mixture and pour into the pan slowly, starting at the edge, going clockwise, in circles and coming to the center. Cover pan 2-4 minutes. When ready, the rim of the injera will rise from the pan. Remove immediately and place on a clean cloth to cool. Injera can be covered and stored in a cool place or refrigerated for about 2-3 days. Makes 6-8 servings.
From Exotic Ethiopian Cooking.
