Happy Birthday, Virginia!

The artiste!

Today is my beautiful toddler's second birthday, and I find it hard to believe. How is it possible that she can be 2 already? Time has really started flying since I gave birth to her. My life has changed quite a bit. I am a better person because of her. And to add another cliche to the mix, I can't imagine my life without her. Since it is her birthday, I want it to be a fabulous day for her.

The canvas is ready to go! Notice the little hand reaching for it.

I baked a cake first thing today. It is cooling and waiting for icing, which I intend to put on during Ginny's nap. Then, this morning, after breakfast, Ginny and I worked on an art project for her birthday. We have done a variation of this before. We basically did some finger painting. She has finger painted a few times and seems to enjoy it.

Ginny was eating her breakfast when I started bringing the art supplies into the kitchen to work on. She pointed to the paint and said "colors." I had a heck of a time getting her to finish eating because she was so focused on the colors. She knew we were going to finger paint. Because it is her birthday and I want her to have a more permanent reminder, I planned to have her finger paint on canvas. As she finished her breakfast, I wrote the word "two" in blue tape on the canvas. The plan is to pull off the tape once the painting is dry and see the result.

Ginny happily begins to paint.

Once she was done eating, I put a paint smock on her (basically one of her daddy's old shirts), and prepped the table with newspaper. It was time to paint! Ginny lit up. She couldn't wait. She had so much fun. She was even humming to herself as she painted. Luckily, I got that video taped. Of course, the biggest problem was ending the project. She didn't want to stop. However, we needed to stop at some point. So, we did. She wasn't thrilled.

The birthday girl's reaction to painting time ending.

Now, she is happily watching Little Einsteins, and has forgotten how mean mommy was to stop her painting. Hopefully the rest of her day is enjoyable! I want her to have a fabulous, happy 2nd birthday!

Roly Poly

Just laid down on the  blanket.

Like a dutiful mother should be, I always lay my baby down on a blanket for tummy time. Well, always maybe stretching it. Instead I lay her down for tummy time most of the time or maybe it would be more accurate to say fairly often. Anyhow, despite my short-comings in this area, my lovely Grace has learned how to roll over.

The first time she rolled over was when she was four months old, a mere 10 days from turning five months. Of course I was thrilled as I watched her roll from her tummy to her back. I pulled out the video camera and hoped I could get her to do it again on film. I could not. However, I did take a picture and texted it to her father and grandparents. Naturally the next step was to express my pride on Facebook. What good mother wouldn't do that? (Please note that I am being sarcastic.)

Within a minute, she has rolled onto her tummy.

The next day, Grace topped herself by rolling from her back to her tummy.  This small little roll stunned me. I didn't expect her to do that move so quickly, but she did. From that day forward, she kept practicing her rolls. At first she mainly rolled from tummy to back, but eventually started rolling more from the back to the belly. She has even woken me up a few times because she has rolled onto her belly while asleep. She wakes uncertain as to what happened and gets frustrated.

Now, we have quite the roly poly baby girl! A couple of days ago, she did her first 360 and I actually caught it on video! Stunning. She will now roll herself from one end of the room to the other. She doesn't roll back because as of right now she only rolls to her right. I'm sure left rolling will happen at some point. One amusing thing about her new discovery is watching her get frustrated. There are times that she will be laying on her belly all frustrated because she wants to be on her back. Yet, she rolled herself onto her belly. It is like she doesn't know how she is getting there. I'm sure she will figure it out, eventually. 

After nearly 10 minutes (or less), she has rolled almost the length of the room

I guess this means she may be crawling soon. Oh boy!

Shredded Beef Tacos: Crock Pot Delight

I love Mexican food. Anytime I see a recipe for Mexican food, I am likely to pin it, especially if it looks easy.

Yesterday, I decided to try a brand new pin (I usually go with older pins first), slow cooker shredded beef tacos. My type of recipe, Mexican and slow cooker. It ended up tasting good, but there are a few things I will tweak in the future.

The first thing you need to do is create a rub out of 2 tsp. chili powder, 1 tsp cumin, and 1/2 tsp smoked paprika. I subbed regular paprika for the smoked version because that was all I had on hand. Then you are supposed to rub the spice mixture all over 2 lbs of beef, in my case a chuck roast. 

Notice the large jar of garlic? Yep. That is my shortcut.

Maybe I'm doing something wrong, but I didn't feel that the rub was enough to get over all the meat. If there is a technique I'm missing, please let me know. The rub I had made was only enough to go on one side...barely. So, I mixed up some more rub. The next time I do this recipe I plan on tripling the rub so that I have plenty of rub to cover the meat. I'd much rather end up with a bit extra than scrambling to make more. (If you triple, you would need 2 Tbsp chili powder, 1 Tbsp cumin, and 1 1/2 tsp paprika.)

Once the rub is applied, heat up 2 Tbsp of olive oil in a skillet and sear the meat on each side. Searing should only take 1-2 minutes per side. Put the meat in the bottom of you slow cooker. Add your minced onion (1 small) and minced garlic (4 cloves) on top of the meat.

The food in the crock pot ready to go.

You will then add 1 cup of beef broth or stock to the skillet, deglazing the pan. Add 2 Tbsp of tomato paste to help thicken the broth and 1 tsp of chipolte powder. The pinned recipe says to add a chopped chipolte pepper into the recipe. I did not do that and instead went with her substituted suggestion of the powder. However, the 1/2 tsp did not give the beef much flavor or kick so if going with the powder, I would add the full teaspoon.

The beef all shredded and ready to serve.

Once the sauce has thickened, after 3-5 minutes, pour it on top of the meat in the crock pot. Cover the crock pot and cook on low for 6-8 hours. After it is done cooking, take out the meat with a slotted spoon. Shred the meat and serve with flour tortillas (or if you prefer, corn) and all the fixings. Another thing you can do is use the meat to make beef quesadillas.

We really did like this dish. I just want to add a bit more kick and flavor to it in the future. One thought was that I might add cayenne pepper to the rub or even include the chipolte powder in the rub. 

Ready to eat! (The quesadilla was made for my toddler.)

Shredded beef tacos with all the fixings!

Another successful pin!