Cooking Supper

Siri at Nine Months

Yep, the girl is still huge.  While most babies start to even out in the second half of their first year, our darling daughter continues to be the heavyweight champ of the playpen.  Her pediatrician predicts that she will be 5'10" as an adult.  Here are the stats:

Height: 29 3/4 inches - 96th percentile

Weight: 22 lbs 5 ounces - 95th percentile

Head: 17 7/8 inches - 85th percentile

6 teeth

She is also working very hard on learning to crawl and talk, but has yet to figure either out. 

Go, Siri, go!

Hanging Out

February

Top 5 Baby Injustices

(In order of grievousness)

1. Face Washing

2. The Booger Sucker

3. Socks

4. The Putting on of Jammies

5. The Rectal Thermometer

Chicken Thigh and Orzo Soup

2 tbls olive oil

1 tbls butter

1 medium yellow onion, diced

2 large carrots cut in ¼ inch rounds

2 stalks celery, diced

3 tbls unbleached all purpose flour

4 cups chicken stock or broth

2 cups cooked chicken, cut into bite size chunks*

1 tbls fresh thyme, stripped from stems and roughly chopped or 1 tsp dried thyme

½ cup Orzo

2 to 4 tbls ½ & ½ or cream, depending on how naughty you're feeling

fresh parsley, minced

kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Heat olive oil and butter in large pot, add onion, carrot, celery, ½ tsp kosher salt and ¼ tsp pepper and cook until onions are soft, about 5 minutes.  Add flour and cook for at least a minute or until the flour begins to smell nutty.  Add the chicken stock and simmer gently, stirring occasionally for 20 minutes.  It should thicken and reduce slightly.  Add cooked chicken and thyme.  Crank up the heat to a boil and add the Orzo.  Boil for 9 minutes or until the pasta is al dente.  Turn off the heat, stir in the cream and add more salt and pepper to suit your tastes.  Sprinkle with a bit of parsley and serve with a giant chunk of freshly baked bread with real butter and a glass of chardonnay. Eat it up, yum.  The bread, by the way, is the Deli-style rye recipe from the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day book.  I make it all the time because it rocks.

*This is great for leftover chicken, but I didn’t have any so I poached some thighs in chicken stock (you could use water) until they were just barely cooked through, removed them from the poaching liquid and cut them up.  This cooks off the fat from the thighs.  You can skim the fat from the poaching liquid and use it in the soup if you want or discard.  You could also just use cut up raw breasts in the soup and just simmer until they’re cooked through.  You know, whatever you have around.

Stuff to look forward to in 2011

Siri will crawl, then walk, then talk.  She'll go from being a six month old baby, just learning to sit up, to an eighteen month old big girl.

Henry will likely potty train and move from his crib into a big boy bed.  He'll start preschool and continue to learn, learn, learn and astound us every day.  Most recently, he's started recalling lyrics and singing songs on his own!

Nathan and Cari will celebrate their fourth anniversary!

We will have a second operational toilet in the house.

Nathan will make some good dough playing music, including playing the historic Surf Ballroom in Iowa - site of Ritchie Valens, Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper's last gig.

Cari will get back into a regular yoga class and, hopefully, spend some quality time on Cupcake (her bike) this summer along with Nathan and, possibly, the kids in the Burley.

We will go camping as much as possible as well as spend time at the Houkum cabin.

We hope to laugh and love and play every day and be thankful for it.