The Never Ending Questions + Some Easy Recipes

For those of you who haven't had a child yet, be prepared for a vast amount of random (& somewhat intrusive) questions that occur LOOONNNGGG after you bring home that sweet bundle of joy. Like, my child is 15 months old, and I still get them from people all. of. the. time.

Here are some prime examples:

"Sooo, like, does he sleep through the night? Do you sleep?" 

Note, this question occurs 1234890382 times from the time they are born until...? Oh wait, I still get it on a regular basis. 
So, let me disprove the myth regarding getting no sleep being a 1st time parent:
  I actually get more sleep now than I ever have.  Brooks slept through the night at 6-7 weeks, and has slept great ever since. 
(Yes, we followed the Babywise schedule. I know people have differing opinions about Babywise, and it def. doesn't work for everyone, but it did work for us. 

"What can he do right now?"

Lets see... he's become fluent in French, earned his Black Belt in Karate, and dunk the basketball like Demarcus Cousins.  
Bahahahaha, yeah, right. 
 Ummm, honestly, its pretty anticlimactic until they hit around 6 months, so if people try to claim their child is some rockstar before then- Newsflash: they are LYING to you. After 6 months, the milestones come at you 90000 miles per hour.
And by milestones, I mean, crawling, saying their first words, walking, etc. 
Refer to the picture below to gauge their talent level at 15 months.

I mean, the child is clearly gifted, right? Just look at those mad crafting skills. 
Bahahahahaha. 

So, here's question that I have gotten repeatedly and I honestly didn't anticipate getting asked this at all...

"I bet you don't cook anymore, do you?"

Seriously, people ask me this all the time (along with how long it took me to get off the baby weight, but thats a post for another time), and I find the question so incredibly weird.
I'm unsure if people assume that when you have a child, you just have absolutely no time to do anything but tend to them, or what? Or maybe they think that you stop cooking normal food & replace it with baby/kid food?

 Those are the only things I can piece together, because otherwise, I'm not sure how being a new Mother & not cooking on a regular basis correlate?
Maybe I'm missing something :)

But to answer that question,

YES, I do still cook 4-5 nights per week. 

Honestly, I find it just as therapeutic as I always have. For me, working out & cooking are the two things that make me feel like I have some control in my life.
Now, I know not everyone feels that way, which is absolutely fine. I don't judge.
I'm a firm believer that people have to do what works for them.
*Side note: I will say that it has absolutely blown my mind when people get an attitude and/or get defensive about eating out, AFTER they ask me how often I cook for my family. 
Listen peaches, if you don't want to know the answer, then don't ask the question :)*

Believe you me, I'm not trying to be Martha Stewart over here. 
I just really like to eat :)

My happiness in this picture is a perfect example about why I will never be a size zero again, and why I have to work out on a super regular basis :) 

To break it down even more, I honestly just find solace in the kitchen.  I've said this before in another post, but I actually cook in complete silence.  No tv shows, no radio, no podcasts, etc.
I neeeeeed  that time to unwind every day after work.

Also, nothing delights me more than creating a fabulous meal to share with my little family of 3. 

So, if you do enjoy cooking, here are a few simple recipes that my family can't get enough of lately......

Kentucky Hot Brown

INGREDIENTS

-2 cups milk

-2-3 tablespoons of butter

-1/4 cup flour

-1/4 cup diced onion

-1/2 tsp. salt & pepper

-1/2 tsp. Worcestershire

-1/2 cup cheddar cheese

-1/4 cup parmesan cheese + Extra for topping

-Dash of Paprika

-Cayenne Pepper to taste

-2 Pieces of toasted Bread per plate

-3-4 pieces of sliced turkey per plate

-3-5 pieces of cooked bacon

-1 sliced tomato

INSTRUCTIONS

Cheese Sauce:

-In skillet, Melt butter on medium heat, whisk in 1/4 cup of flour.

-Quickly add in milk & continue to whisk & cook on medium heat until it becomes thick/bubbly.

-Add cheeses, onion, salt & pepper, worcestershire, & paprika.

-Whisk until mixed thoroughly. Keep warm on low.

-For each individual plate: Layer toasted bread, then turkey slices, then cheese sauce. Top with tomato, bacon pieces, parmesan, and paprika.

-BROIL on HIGH until cheese is bubbly--> Should take 3-6 mins.

-Serve on hot pads & enjoy :)

CHICKEN TORTILLA SOUP

INGREDIENTS
-1.5 lbs of cooked chicken, shredded
-2 tablespoons butter

-1 onion, chopped fine
-1 can rotel
-1 can of black beans
-1 can of mexican corn
-1 large box of Chicken Broth
-2-3 tablespoons of Taco Seasoning
-1 package of low-fat cream cheese
-(optional:Tortilla chips, sour cream, cheddar cheese)

INSTRUCTIONS
-Sautee onion in butter in large stock pot, until onion becomes clear in color
-Then mix in the rotel, black beans, corn, chicken broth.
-Add in taco seasoning.
-Stir in cream cheese.
-Serve when cream cheese is completely melted.
-Top with fav taco toppings, if desired :)

Both of those little numbers take less than 30 mins to prepare, and they are both delish!

  So if you work full time, like me, those types of meals are ideal on week nights :)

I'll be sure to share some more of our favs soon- I'd actually planned on putting some more in this post, but if I don't get my tail in gear,  my family won't have their dinner until 9pm tonight :)

Hope yall are having a great week!

Back in the Saddle

Guess who's back? 

.........

Back again :)

(Please say you just sang those 2 sentences in your head, Eminem-style. Nothing would delight me more.)

Yeah, soooo its only taken me well over a year to feel like I have enough time to blog again, but who's really counting? 

Between coping with the first year of parenthood, having numerous changes occur within my job that required a ton of learning, time, & attention, I constantly feel like I'm running around like a chicken with my head cut off.  I kept thinking I'd come back to blogging as soon as life slowed down for a hot minute.  But, that has never seemed to happen. 

However, I realize something recently....

THIS IS MY NORMAL NOW

And I'm 110% okay with that because I am one #blessed girl.

I should probably throw a disclaimer out about how incredibly deceiving that picture is...

It looks like Kevin and I have it pretty together, right?

Uhhhh. We totally do! About 25% of the time.

The other 75% of the time, we have no idea what we're doing with little man and are just trying to keep our heads above water.

But we get through it together, utilizing equal parts humor and wine. 

 

(Yes, we did take a child-free vacation to Sonoma when Brooks was 8 months old. Don't judge me :) It was worth every penny to have uninterrupted adult time for 5 straight days. Some call it selfish to take vacations without your kids... I call it "a reclaim on your personal sanity.")

I couldn't ask for a better guy to be doing this whole parenting thing with. Seriously. He knows how to keep me calm (no easy task), and help me find the humor in these crazy situations when I have problems seeing it.

Sorry, I completely got off topic.

Let me reiterate... these first few pics are incredibly deceiving. 

Our life is more accurate depicted by the situations/pictures below... 

For example, what in the hell do you do when you find your child drinking out of the dog bowls and/our playing in them on a consistent basis? 

Ummmm. You have no choice, but to laugh after it occurs 12390523 times.

I'm sure people are gonna get all Judge Judy on me and question my child's hygiene, but I can guarantee those are the people that don't have kids.

Don't worry, your time is coming. Get all your parenting opinions out now while you don't have any bc I love hearing them. They're all so credible :) 

Heres another example of our normal.... 

What about when your child starts stealing food off of other kids' plates at school, while trying to make it look like hes just nonchalantly walking around the lunch tables?

(Nevermind the fact he's already dominated his own lunch & snack. #fatsyhead)

Devious much?

While its absolutely hilarious, I'm also kind of like... holy embarrassing. 

I mean, do I send even more food? Do I send something to help ensure that his little tail stays in his seat? If so, what on earth does that look like? Should I start to be concerned about how much he seems to genuinely enjoy food? 

This is seriously what my first thought was when I was told about his food stealing ways...

Yes, I was worried that if my 1 year old continues with his eating habits throughout his childhood that he might wind up with Diabetes.

Totally normal.

Welcome to parenting, yall. 

Worrying about insane things is also I something I now do on the reg. 

Okay, heres something else I have concerns about..... 

So, this looks super sweet, right? 

And it honestly really is.

However, homeboy is super obsessed with animals. 

Like, he gets more excited to see his dogs than me when he gets home from school.

And he also prefers to stalk other people's dogs when visiting friends' homes vs. playing with his friends' toys.

No joke, he also called our dogs, "Mommas" for a solid 2 months. 

Can't lie, that one kind of hurt. Thank God he grew out of that phase. 

Now he just constantly follows our dogs around, making barking & panting sounds. 

Hmmmm. New revelation. Maybe he is confused & thinks that he IS a dog?

That would explain the dog bowl fascination :)

I'm just gonna continue to tell myself that his love of animals means that he's gonna be a super compassionate guy and will make a great father some day. 

Whatever helps me sleep at night, right? :)

Speaking of sleep, that sounds rather fabulous right now. 

But before I go, just know that yall have a lot of solid parenting/marriage/life stories & astute observations headed your way.  I've got 15 months of pint-up writing to get out :) 

Consider yourself warned.