Bath Time!

A few days ago, Kyle was giving Jane a bath and thought it would be funny to give her a soap hat.

At first, she hated it.





Then she didn't mind so much.



Every time I look at these pictures I laugh. That face is just too much.

Beef Noodles

This past Saturday, we had what we like to call adult hamburger helper for dinner. I grew up eating a lot of hamburger helper and have always liked it but this has so much more flavor. Kyle even likes it and he is soooo not a helper fan.

Beef Noodles
Slightly adapted from Homemade By Holman (one of my favorite blogs for recipes)

Serves 4

1 lb ground beef
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 pkg wide egg noodles
1 can cream of mushroom soup
4 oz velveeta
1/2 cup milk (I use whole milk, but any kind will do)
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese (I just kind of toss in however much I want)
1 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp paprika
Salt and pepper, to taste
Green onions (optional)
mushrooms (optional)
Minced onion (optional)

Brown ground beef with garlic and drain liquid. Cook noodles. After beef is browned, add soup, velveeta and milk. After cheese melts, add onion powder, paprika, salt and pepper, and noodles. Add shredded cheese and stir until it melts. Serve with chopped green onions on the side so people can add how much they want. We didn't this time, but sometimes we like to sauté some chopped onions with the beef and add in some mushrooms, canned or fresh.

We served this with spicy corn (a can of corn heated with butter and Tony Chacheres) and garlic bread, which I burned. Oh well. It was still good.

Once again, I didn't think to take a picture so here's one from Homemade By Holman.

2 Month Appointment

Jane had her 2 month appointment today for a checkup and vaccinations. She weighs 11 pounds and is 22 inches long! We found out last week that she has reflux, so it was nice to see that she's gaining weight well since I can't be sure how much she's eating with breastfeeding.

She did really well with the vaccines. The first was an oral one for rotavirus and the nurse said it was a sweet, syrupy liquid. Halfway through giving it to her she stopped to let Jane swallow and Jane cried out because she wanted more. It was super cute. The shots were not quite as easy though. One in each thigh. It took about two seconds after the first shot for her to start crying. Once I fed her and gave her some good snuggles she calmed down and fell asleep in the car.

The rotavirus vaccine has live cultures in it that made her belly hurt and when we got home she threw up (a ton) all over both of us. After a bath and some comfy pajamas she seems to be doing better, but she clearly doesn't feel well. I have a feeling she'll be sleeping in my arms tonight. I don't think I'll have too much of a problem with that though :)

Blueberry crumb cake

My parents came up to our place this weekend to visit and spend time with Jane (she's growing so fast!). While they were here I made a few different dishes that were a big hit and they asked for the recipes. I decided to post them here so they would be easy to find, rather than searching for a piece of paper or trying to remember a website, and thought other people might like to have them.

The first one I will post is a blueberry crumb cake I made for breakfast Saturday morning. We shop at Aldi a lot and they had pints of blueberries for 99 cents each. For that price I couldn't pass them up and after trying this recipe I'm glad I didn't.

Blueberry Crumb Cake
Slightly modified from Simply Scratch

For the cake:
5 tbsp unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla
2 cups flour
2 1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
3/4 cup milk
1 pint blueberries

For the crumb topping:
3/4 stick butter
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup flour

To make the cake: preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter an 8x11 glass baking dish. Mix together butter, sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg. Add vanilla and egg, then flour and milk. Fold in blueberries then pour in pan.

To make the crumble topping: blend butter, sugar and flour until large crumbles form. I don't have a pastry blender and I hate doing the two knives thing, so I just smush it all together using a fork. A food processor would probably work well too. Sprinkle the crumbles over the cake and bake for 45-50 minutes. Take it out and eat it! We like to slather it with butter :)

I didn't think about taking a picture, so here is one from Simply Scratch.




Also, I would love for anyone who has been reading my posts to "follow" the blog. All you need is a gmail account. Just go here and log in or set up an account, then add The Early Bloomers to your blog roll!

1 month pictures...oops

I guess tomorrow turned in to almost a month. I really need to get better at this thing called blogging...

I thought it would be fun to take a picture of Jane with the same stuffed animal every month to show how she's grown. My parents gave us a big stuffed elephant that I thought would be perfect. Jane didn't really care for her photoshoot though.







"Do you hear me Mr. Elephant? I hate this!"



She was trying to nurse from the elephant. Needless to say, we took a food break after this picture.



She looks so scared lol











I think I had more fun than she did, but I got some pretty good pictures. Next week she'll be two months and maybe I'll get the pictures up here before she turns one ;)