trains

#SundaySupper: Recipes with Coffee

~ lk529 ~ 17 Comments

Over Labor Day weekend we traveled to Northern California, Santa Cruz to be exact, to celebrate my cousin’s wedding.

The wedding was one we will never forget. They got married standing underneath exquisite Redwoods with the sun peaking through the massive trees.

To reach the ceremony site, we hopped aboard a narrow gauge train and traveled uphill for about 25 minutes. Following the beautiful exchange of vows we climbed back on the train to return to the reception location. The entire experience was simply breathtaking.

To say my train obsessed toddler was in heaven is an understatement!

felton-wedding

We spent the long weekend in Santa Cruz with my parents and uncle at a vacation rental home on the water. We enjoyed exploring the area and discovering the differences between that beach city and the one we’re living in now.

Chocolate Chip Mocha Smoothie for #SundaySupper from Sew You Think You Can Cook (1)Because we staying in a “hotel house,” as we described it to my toddler, I had the luxury of being able to cook! I made Chicken Chorizo Meatballs (a variation of this recipe) for the rehearsal party at my aunt’s “hotel house,” a beautiful cheese platter for dinner one night, and coffee smoothies to accompany some local pastries for breakfast one morning!

I was counting on making my recipe for this week’s Sunday Supper over the wedding weekend so I packed my chocolate chips and chocolate sauce. Doesn’t everyone travel with chocolate chips in tow?!

Thankfully the vacation home had a blender! I hadn’t considered that I may not have one before hitting the grocery store to pick up yogurt and whipped cream.

This smoothie was met with mixed reviews. My dad was not a fan, but sweet coffee drinks are not his thing. My uncle and I enjoyed our glasses, though. That being said, I have some suggestions for changes I’d make next time:

  • The tang from Greek yogurt was a little too much to pair with the coffee, so I’d switch to regular yogurt (or you know, ice cream but then we can’t call it breakfast can we?)
  • To balance out the sweetness level, I’d add a touch of vanilla extract

Chocolate Chip Mocha Smoothie

Ingredients:

  • 1 1/2 C ice
  • 3/4 C vanilla Greek yogurt
  • 3/4 C cooled coffee
  • 1/4 C chocolate chips
  • 1/4 C chocolate syrup

Steps:

  1. Place all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth. Garnish, if desired, with whipped cream and extra chocolate syrup.

*This recipe is adapted from Jacqui at http://www.dishingdelish.com/chocolate-chip-mocha-breakfast-smoothie/*

Chocolate Chip Mocha Smoothie for #SundaySupper from Sew You Think You Can Cook (2)

Beverages

Breakfast

Main

Sides

Dessert

Sunday Supper MovementJoin the #SundaySupper conversation on twitter on Sunday! We tweet throughout the day and share recipes from all over the world. Our weekly chat starts at 7:00 pm ET. Follow the #SundaySupper hashtag and remember to include it in your tweets to join in the chat. To get more great Sunday Supper Recipes, visit our website or check out ourPinterest board.

Would you like to join the Sunday Supper Movement? It’s easy. You can sign up by clicking here: Sunday Supper Movement.

Tuesday Tattles #17

~ lk529 ~ 2 Comments

It’s come to my realization that I haven’t actually shared our favorite kids books! I know I’ve sprinkled them into some of Firecracker’s monthly favorites – a series that’s gone the wayside as he approached and passed 2.

As I started to list all of the books that we love I gawked at how long it was and yet how much I was leaving out. So, I’m going to do a few book series during Tuesday Tattles over the next couple of months.

I’m going to start with the best bedtime books. These are books that have helped lull my kids into naps or have become cemented into the bedtime routine.

our-top-8-books-for-bed-time-sew-you-think-you-can-cook

Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss

This title might seem like a strange one to include on a bedtime book list, but between 19-22 months I had this book engraved into my memory. Our bedtime routine always concluded with my son falling asleep in my lap while I rocked him and read Green Eggs and Ham. Not only is it a book to encourage trying new foods, its very rhythmic and repetitive script transforms into the perfect “lullaby.”

The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss

The Cat in the Hat isn’t quite as repetitive as Green Eggs and Ham but I did develop a rhythm in reading it that turned out to be just the ticket I needed for nap time. (Back when Firecracker took naps.) It’s a long book for an active boy to sit through and we’d often only make it halfway though, never venturing into the part of the story with Thing 1 and Thing 2, before he’d drift off to sleep in my lap in the rocking chair.

img_0497Danny and the Dinosaur by Syd Hoff

Danny and the Dinosaur was one of my husband’s favorite books as a kid and my in-laws gave us the Danny and the Dinosaur 50th Anniversary Box Set before our cross-country move. I remember it being the first book I read in our new home. Just like The Cat in the Hat, Danny and the Dinosaur quickly became associated with pre-nap reading.

Steam Train, Dream Train Colors by Sherri Duskey Rinker

My mom found this book and Steam Train, Dream Train 1-2-3 for my boys for Easter. I used to keep them both in the car (the books, not the boys) and Firecracker would happily “read” through them, often finally falling asleep. I’m not sure when it happened, but the colors book found its way inside and is now mandatory bedtime reading. He even has the first page memorized. He doesn’t fall asleep reading this book, though. We often read it 2-3 times. Graduating from color recognition, he states all of the letters in the words at each turn of the page. I can recite this book for memory and can “read” it in the pitch black of night.

img_3044
img_2950Where Do Steam Trains Sleep at Night? by Brianna Caplan Sayres

Here’s another gem given to Firecracker by my mom. It’s a book that he was immediately drawn to. It’s a great book for little train lovers. The book describes different bed time routines for each style of train in two line poems about parent and child engines. My son loves finding the mouse “hidden” on each page.

The Goodnight Train by June Sobel

There had to be a unique train book that didn’t come from my mom, right?! We found this one in a cute children’s boutique nearby. I love the illustrations and whimsical feel. The Goodnight Train gets rotated with Where Do Steam Train Sleep at Night? at night. As a result, neither of them are memorized making it difficult to read when bedtime procrastination has left me not even a glow of sunlight.

img_3005Goodnight, Dragons by Judith Roth

Not every book can be about trains! I do have a second child after all. While we’ve had this book long before Treat came along, it didn’t get quite the attention or love until fairly recently. Goodnight, Dragons is, hands down, Treat’s favorite book. It’s the only one he’ll actually sit still (ish) for! What I love most about this book is its message: “Everybody needs a cuddle; maybe dragons more than most.”

If Animals Kissed Good Night by Ann Whitford Paul

The last book on my list is my personal favorite. It has cute little rhymes for multiple parent-child animal pairings as the day turns into night. But I think this book holds a special place in my heart because of the memories I have reading it to Firecracker when he was 12-18 months old: he was just learning how to kiss (a skill he is now way too aggressive with) and with every couplet read he’d turn and give me a kiss.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. 

Tuesday Tattles: 2nd Birthday

~ lk529 ~ 18 Comments

Tuesday Tattles

It’s finally time to share my Firecracker’s second birthday party, with you!

When we moved to California and became regulars at the playground I quickly realized it’d be a great place to have the kids’ birthday parties. I scoped out the venue for months to determine when would be the best time of day to throw a party at a public park, to figure out if it’d be allowed, and to decide which picnic table to claim. I then had to start asking around about how big the 4th of July got around here. The answer was a resounding “crazy!” So I knew that we simply wouldn’t be able to celebrate on THE day. (Good thing it wasn’t his 1st birthday!)

We celebrated on a Sunday at 10:30 am. Firecracker is only two weeks older than our friends’ son and so we did a dual birthday bash for the 2 year olds. Our guest lists would have been identical anyway. The party was attended by other families who moved out to California from Ohio the same time we did. And by happy coincidence, my dad had meetings in Los Angeles the following week so my parents came out for the party and my mom stayed out here to play and help with the kids while my dad was in his meetings!

IMG_9583I had originally planned (aka – when he was born I picked out his first four birthday themes) on having an Auburn themed birthday party. It was hard for me to change my mind, but I knew that my train obsessed toddler would much prefer a train themed party. So, I let go of my planning and switched gears.

This party was much smaller than his 1st birthday, so instead of ordering a cake, I decided to simply make cupcakes. I made 4 dozen cupcakes – way more than I needed. About half of them ended up in my freezer unfrosted. I displayed the cupcakes on Twizzler train tracks on our dining table. I made Busy Day Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting and Vegan Vanilla Cupcakes, my friend made the frosting for the vanilla cupcakes.

Cupcakes for a Train Themed 2nd Birthday Party

 

Down at the playground we set up a table with snacks. I cut out black circles and taped them to disposable aluminum loaf pans to create train cars. My friend had popsicle sticks which we used to create a track for the food.

A fruit train of pineapple, cherries, and red and green grapes was led by Orange Cream Dip and Chocolate Hummus. A veggie train of cherry tomatoes, broccoli and cauliflower, and carrots was led by Sour Cream and Onion Dip and Ranch. We also had a container of hummus. Salty snacks of pretzel sticks, potato chips, and “pigs” in a blanket joined the party, too. I traced a train cookie cutter to cut out the labels for the respective dips.

A train themed 2nd Birthday Party

After a couple of hours at the playground we moved the party to our place for grilling and cupcakes.

Decorations were fairly minimal too. I used the major Thomas and Friends character colors as my inspiration, blue, red, and green for Thomas, James, and Percy, respectively. I wrapped streamers around the banister for the stairs and tied some balloons on each end of the staircase. Balloons were attached to chairs at either end of the table were the cupcakes were displayed. Two sets (1 balloon of each color) of balloons were placed on Thomas the Tank Engine balloon weights and taken down to the playground to bookend our picnic table.

The biggest decorating endeavor was the Happy Birthday Banner. The banner was placed above our awesome 80’s style mirrored fireplace. I didn’t have a single hole puncher (I do now!) and couldn’t fit the train shapes in our stand 3 hole puncher, so my mom strung the banners together with a needle and thin yarn.

I found templates for a train engine, train car, and caboose through Google searching. I printed those out on colored card stock. I had two blue trains for the birthday boys’ names, a red train, and a green train. 4 red cabooses, and 19 grey train cars!  For the letters, I used the font Ariel. Three letters at a time were typed in WordArt at font size 96, then I sized the WordArt graphic to be 3.48″ x 8.81″, making sure the letters would fit inside the train cars, and then selected Rotate Flip Horizontal so that the text would be backwards. The words “2nd” and “and” followed the same method except that the WordArt graphic was sized at 1.52″ x 3″. The letters were arranged to look like railroad crossing signs and put on two 5″ yellow circles. Everything was cut out using a craft knife and adhered to the train cars using small glue dots.

IMG_9567

My attempt at getting a photo of the birthday boys with their cupcakes was a slight fail.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links.

Thursday Thoughts #15

~ lk529 ~ 1 Comment

Thursday Thoughts

As some of you may know, we have left Ohio for California! We spent a year and a half in the Dayton area while my husband earned his Masters degree.

Here are some of our favorite {kid-friendly} things to do in SW Ohio.

Next week, I’ll share some of our favorite food destinations.

EnterTRAINmentJunction

If you have any kids who love trains, or you’re an adult who loves model trains, this attraction is a must-see. With more than 2 miles of track in a 25,000 sqft space, this display is the largest model train display in the world! And it’s impressive. The path takes you through the history of train usage beginning with pre-Civil War and going all the way to modern times. There’s even a second floor loft area displaying Coney Island and providing an overhead view of the exhibit. They have scavenger hunts set up throughout the displays, too. Supposedly 10 dinosaurs are placed amongst the scenery, but in two trips we’ve only spotted 7. There’s also a large indoor play area which makes the trip ideal when the weather is cold and rainy. Two outdoor rides that are available Memorial Day thru Labor Day which we didn’t get a chance to experience. Another attraction we didn’t explore is the A-Maze-N Funhouse geared toward older kids.

EnterTRAINment Junction is located halfway between Dayton and Cincinnati on I-675 in West Chester, OH.

National Museum of the USAF

A great, free family destination is the National Museum of the Air Force. The meuseum is located in Dayton, OH. You should note that this museum is massive and it would be near impossible to see everything. If you have a longer trip to the Dayton area I’d suggest only one or two exhibits at a time. It’s a good place to “get your steps” on a cold day, too. During the week it’s not very busy and easier to let the little ones walk around a little more freely.

Young’s Jersey Dairy

Young’s Dairy in Yellow Springs, OH is a fun place to go on beautiful days. They have seasonal activities all year round. In the Winter you can cut your own Christmas trees, there’s an annual Easter Egg Hunt in the Spring, a vintage car show in the Summer, and pumpkin picking in the Fall. We’ve only ever gone to the Dairy in the Fall. There’s a miniature golf course on the property, too! In the evenings you can watch them milking the cows, an event I regret not seeing. During the day though you can pet and feed the goats, and whatever cows are around.

The food at Young’s is good, too. The buffalo cheddar cheese curds are quite delicious and their ice cream alone is worth a trip to the dairy.

Fruit Picking

At the end of the summer, we went berry picking at the Homestead Berry Farm. Firecracker was only 25 months old at the time and he loved running down the aisles of berry bushes and picking raspberries right off the bush! He’d not tried raspberries prior to that outing, despite my trying; now, they’re still one of his favorites! (Though, I don’t think anything will top blueberries.) We filled up a pint of fresh picked raspberries and one pint of fresh picked blackberries. My husband did the blackberry picking while I kept Firecracker away from those prickly bushes, he said it was fun searching for the treasure of the blackberries which grew hidden among the leaves. We also bought a jar of blackberry jam which was delicious on toast.

In the fall, my mom and I went apple picking at Monnin’s Fruit Farm. Once again, my son voluntarily took a bite of an apple that he himself plucked. It’s too bad apples didn’t have the same staying power as the raspberries did. We picked a half-bushel and split the bounty. So many apples! I used some of them in my favorite waffle recipe to date – Apple Pie Waffles.

Zoos

The zoo is always a winner with little ones and we were located right in the middle of two great options: The Cincinatti Zoo and The Columbus Zoo. Both are about an hour drive from Dayton. We explored both zoos while in the Dayton area. While our personal favorite was the Columbus Zoo, I don’t have any bad things to say regarding the Cincinatti Zoo. The Columbus Zoo has a small aquarium on premises and a water park (which we didn’t get to explore, to my husband’s disappointment). General Admission to the Cincinatti Zoo runs at $16, for the Columbus Zoo $19.99. Parking at both attractions is $10. My suggestion for any zoo trip is to go on a less than perfect weather day. Our best animal viewing occurred on a slightly cool, cloudy day with a threat of rain. When it’s not hot the animals are active and the crowds aren’t overpowering either!