Ready for just the right amount of fall flavor in your pasta?

Try Aldi's Specially Selected Pumpkin Butternut Squash pasta sauce and their  liveGfree Organic Gluten Free Brown Rice & Quinoa pasta and use it to make Ragu's No-Boil Baked Ziti (a favorite family recipe).  Sweet, smooth, hints of squash, can't really taste the pumpkin.  A fun, seasonal variation that was just enough different to be enjoyable.

Longing

Longing for home.  For parents and sisters and all things warm and familiar but long missed and much changed, and yet the same.

Longing for friends still loved but long separated not by distance, but by time and sickness and the complications of life.

Longing for places beautiful and full of meaning that I may never see again.

Longing for the love of people dead and lost to me.

Longing for the love of people that should be walking through life with me, but are not any longer.

Sometimes all my hopes for heaven are simply for a place where longing is answered. For this burning in my throat to go away.

Sparrow vs.Human

This song, just about did me in today.  Wanted to make me egg heaven.  I'm sure that it's encouraging someone about their upcoming geometry test, but it seems way to bouncy for real world problems like ISIS kidnapping your daughters and selling them into slavery, a Chinese prisoner, beaten and terrorized, a child dying of cancer.  What does this song say to them?  How can they relate to this?  All I can think after hearing this is, "forget the sparrow and help the people!"

 

Ethan says it's because it's ripped out of it's greater context.  I just can't with the "la-la-las".  I remember when my biggest worries were "la-la-la" level. Not anymore.

This one hits a lot closer to where I live these days. 

Chicken and Vegetables

Made an easy chicken, veggie, and rice dish tonight that turned out to be so delicious! In pan, saute onion and minced garlic in olive. Microwave jasmine rice in covered dish. Add large cubes of chicken with salt and pepper to pan and cook until almost done. Add balsamic vinaigrette, cover, and simmer until done. Add butter to cooked rice and microwave one more minute to melt and stir it in. Remove chicken to rice dish and save pan sauce in a heat proof dish. Add stir fry veggies to pan with more balsamic vinaigrette and stir fry, then cover to steam until done. Serve chicken and veggies over rice with sauce (on side, if desired). Yum. And since almost everyone here is sick, it's also healthy and easy on the stomach.

Lemon Curd

I love lemon.  I have known about lemon curd for over fifteen years.  I discovered it making Simply Lemon cheesecake. I've used it on fresh gingerbread.  But that's it.  I failed to discover the infinite possibilities before me.  

Until I bought this English Provender Co. Lemon Curd at my super favorite discount grocery for $1. (Actually. I think I bought four.)  I'm not even sure that they make it anymore.  I'm not sure.  But what changed my life, and will, I believe continue to change it for the better, is what they wrote on the lid:

"Delicious spread on warm toast, pancakes,& muffins. Spoon onto sponge cake or fill pastry shells & top with fruit and cream."

That, my friends, is life-changing.  How did I never think of this??  Lemon on toast ?  Yes!  Lemon on blueberry muffins?  YES!  Lemon on ricotta pancakes??? YES!!!

I had simple toast with my lemon curd today.  It was simply yummy.  I just had to share.

And while you're enjoying lemon curd with me, don't forget to squeeze in Sonic's Lemon Ice Cream Slush and Chik-Fil-A's frosted lemonade.  So good.

Lost

Sometimes I am surprised again by loss.  That what once was is almost inexplicably forever gone.  I see their faces, smell their skin, feel the warmth of their smiles.  I see myself again as a child, exploring a town and people that are altered and gone.  That that girl is me, and yet part of the past, sometimes it pulls at me.  Sometimes it tries to draw me home to that place, to try to hold on to the pieces that remain, and sometimes it just breaks me against the knowing that there are some things you can never come home to again.

Toddlers

Lily is 16 months old now.  I love this age.  I have tried to soak in and enjoy every moment with her, but it still flies by.

But back to toddlers.  Aren't they the best?  I like a lot of ages and stages.  All of them, really.  Crawling might not be a favorite for me; it's messy and kind of dirty and hard, but otherwise... Back to toddlers.

Lily loves stop signs.  She sees them and puts out her hand and says, "top!"  She's been doing this for a few months.  She gets great joy from it.  It so happened that one of the first times that she did it, a truck came up and stopped right on cue.  So she probably thinks that she can do magic.  Or that stop signs are magic.  Or both.

Lily loves trains.  Today on her walk with daddy, she was a train.  She chugged and explored and tooted.

Lily loves her one special dolly.  She doesn't sleep without it,

Lily's smile can only be described as impish.  She knows she is going to be a tease and play games with you.  We all love to play her games.

I love everything about toddlers.  I was trying to think of things that I don't like, but I'm really coming up short.

 I use Honest diapers.  Not only are they good for the environment and healthier for my baby, but they are so cute.  I mean, like so cute that I actually am kind of obsessed with them.  They have seasonal designs.  They sent her birthday diapers to wear on her birthday.  New spring diapers are coming in the mail, friends.  Diapers with bees and butterflies and tulips and rainbows and little sheep.

 And we sing songs at changing time.  She's kind of crazy about "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star."  We actually sing that all day long.  But at diaper changes, we also sing "Eensy, Weensy Spider," "The Wheels on the Bus," "My God Is So Big," "God Made Me, " and another homemade favorite, "Mommy has Eyes" (maybe I'll make a video of that one sometime.)  

What I'm saying is, I even love toddler diaper changes.

Toddlers are so exuberant about their world.  What would it be like if we smiled as often as they did?  Found joy in the little things?  Loved our favorite animal as much as Lily loves owls?  Got excited about every train we see?  And books.  Well, I actually may still get that excited about books. :)