Baby It's Cold Inside

On Groundhog's Day, Mr. Groundhog dismally predicted six more weeks of winter. Although I shouldn't complain since this winter has been pretty mellow, I was very disappointed. Maybe it's because I've had some of those winter blues, or maybe I'm just antsy to get outside again, but I'm tired of being cold! And I'm tired of the sicknesses that float around in the colder months.

Unfortunately, Mr. Groundhog did is his job expertly and it's been cold and snowy this last week. And my kids finally got sick. We've been doing great this winter, scraping by with good health, but they succumbed to the nasty coughs, runny noses, and we're currently weaning Lydia through a strange fever.

Being in the basement with the snow and the cold, it tends to be chillier than the average household. One evening, poor, sick Ammon couldn't seem to stop shivering during dinner. So I did what any good mom would and bundled the kid up so he could eat in peace.

Sporting a jacket, hat, and bib, we continued on. I would have put gloves on too but they would have been covered in oranges.

I knew he was doing better when his smiles returned and his resumed eating with gusto. That's my boy.

He may have looked silly eating all bundled up, but it did the trick and soon he threw his hat on the floor in victory over the cold - well, actually because he throws everything on the floor, but I knew it meant he was warm and that was a victory for me. Curse you cold - we will win!

My Three Valentines

I seriously love Valentines Day. I mean flowers, chocolate, romance, and love all celebrated in one day - amazing! This year I was especially lucky because my Valentines keep multiplying and now I have three! To kick off the day I made two of them homemade, whole-wheat, heart-shaped pancakes. Good for the body and the soul :)

We slathered them in strawberry jam and enjoyed. Aren't my two Valentine's cute?

I didn't leave out my third Valentine; I sent him a cute, heart-covered mug full of hot chocolate mixes for him to enjoy at work. Plus, we had our own hot date planned for that evening.

Brigham made reservations at a steakhouse called Madelines and we enjoyed a fancy dinner after dropping the kids off at the grandparents. We exchanged gifts and I got a beautiful necklace with matching earrings and Brigham got the third book in the Hunger Games trilogy, Mockingjay. 

At first I was hesitant about the necklace because a bit earlier I told Brigham I didn't want jewelry and I just wanted chocolate for Valentines Day. In fact, my exact words were, "It's Valentine's Day. Every girl deserves to get chocolate on Valentine's Day. I won't be happy unless you get me chocolate and all I want is chocolate. Well, you can get me something else too and I'll be happy...as long as there's chocolate with it." Obviously I was having a moment, but I was trying to get the point across loud and clear. I don't know how much clearer it can get.   

So when Brigham pulled out the necklace, I kept waiting for something to accompany the gift and when nothing did...it took me a moment to overcome that fact. However, I will say it melted my heart when Brigham told me he picked out this necklace because it's made out of the same type of shell that we were given during our sealing at our wedding. So sweet!

As for Brigham, I was happy to surprise him with Mockingjay. We have the first two Hunger Games books and Brigham had read both, but he needed the last one. For the last week, he had been trying to convince me to let his friend at work borrow one of my books so that Brigham could borrow Mockingjay in return. I kept saying I didn't want to talk about it and pretended like I didn't trust his friend borrowing our book. Really, it was all a ruse to hold out until Valentine's Day so my present wouldn't be ruined. Let me tell you it was hard work getting two men off my back about those dang books, but it made for a pretty good laugh in the end when everything was revealed.

After our dinner and gift exchange, we made a fast pit-stop to get me a small bit of chocolate I'll pretend I'm ok with, and then went to the movies and saw This Means War. It was hilarious, although a little sketchy in spots, and an enjoyable time together.

After the movie, we picked up our little Valentines and headed home. It was a lovely day. Especially since I'm now blessed with three different Valentines to share it with. I hope your day was full of those you love and Happy Valentines Day!

First it was There, And Then it was Not

Remember Ammon's hair?

Besides that memory and this picture, that's all that left of it.

He needed a haircut AGAIN (that's like three haircuts in three months) and I was sick of how it hung on his forehead and my bad chop job in the back, so I went a little crazy with the scissors...

And now he looks like this:

It ended up being shorter than I intended (what haircut isn't?) because I still have a lot of learning to do (poor Ammon having to be my guinea pig) but I actually love it. I think it makes him look grown up and more dignified. It also shows off the roundness of his pinch-able cheeks and his blue eyes. Brigham says he looks more like my side of the family now, but I think that he still looks like his daddy's clone - with a Nelson haircut.

I have to thank two Dum-Dum suckers, the Baby Einstein movie, and my endurance of screaming for making it through the cutting torture. Too bad we don't have working clippers, because, since it ended up being so short, buzzing would have been a lot easier than hacking it all off with scissors.

At least I shouldn't have to cut it for a REALLY long time now.

Butternut Squash Mac & Cheese

My Grandma and Grandpa Nelson gave us a huge butternut squash so I've been coming up with different ways to use it.

I made a double batch of winter-squash rolls and made the seeds into one of my favorite snacks, sweet and spicy seeds. This really is the best recipe for pumpkin seeds, or any kind of squash seeds. I always eat half the batch myself and have a really hard time sharing.

But I digress. After some research, I decided to try a new way to use the butternut squash in Macaroni and Cheese. It sounded like a good way to add something of nutritional value to a, generally, unhealthy dish.

So I first cooked the squash in the oven and it was so big I had to use two different pans.

Basically you cut the squash in half, scoop out the seeds and strings like a pumpkin, rub a little oil on it,  add some water to the dish, and bake for an hour or so.

After it's baked, the squash is soft so I scooped it all out, set some aside for my rolls, and pureed the rest.

It made so much that I actually had double what I needed and so I poured the extra into a ziploc that's now in the freezer ready for another recipe in the future.

Now for the actual mac & cheese. Cook your noodles according to package directions - drain and set aside in a pan. Then combine milk and the pureed squash in a pan on the stove and stir over the heat to combine.

Then add some mustard, salt, and pepper.

After you add the spices and let it simmer for a couple of minutes, you get to add the best part: CHEESE!

I added lots of cheese.

Once the cheese is melted and the mixture is nice and creamy, you pour it over your noodles and spread it around until all the noodles are covered completely.

Because I combined two different recipes, I also added an extra layer of toppings that consisted of seasoned bread crumbs, parmesan cheese, and an extra handful of cheddar cheese.

Then it all goes in the oven to bake. When it comes out it looks like this:

We served it up with some peas.

I will have to say that butternut squash made it very creamy. I loved how creamy it was. It also made it a sweeter macaroni and cheese that threw me for a loop at first. You don't really taste the squash flavor but it is sweeter. I got used to it that night and decided it was pretty good. No one else was bothered by extra sweetness. However, when I heated up the left-overs the next day I didn't taste any sweetness at all, only cheesy, creamy goodness - it was AMAZING!

So it's one of those recipes that's better on day two but still good on day one. I'm definitely going to make this recipe again.

If you want to try it out, I actually combined two different recipes you can find here and here. You don't actually have to cook a butternut squash because you can also buy it packaged in frozen cubes. However, it's easy to cook a squash and do whatever you want with it afterwards. Eat it, mash or puree it, freeze it, or set it aside for whenever you want to use it.

The recipe made so much that I froze the other half of the dish for a different night. So now I have frozen pureed butternut squash and and frozen butternut squash macaroni and cheese. Butternut squash all around.  Not a bad thing, considering how healthy it is for you.