Grinch Cookies

There are a few things that just scream "Christmas" to me from my childhood - and without a doubt How the Grinch Stole Christmas is on that list.  I read the book as a kid, I watched the movie laying on my Noni's floor in her den at Christmastime, and I could probably recite the whole thing to you now if I tried.  I love to pass on these memories I have a kid, to my own kids, so Townes and I have watched The Grinch more than a couple of times already since Thanksgiving and the book is in our bedtime rotation.  So when he asked me to bake something today - these seemed like the perfect idea.

Aside from being festive, fun and creative, they are also really, really easy to make and don't require much skill or many ingredients!  They are a version of my shortbread cookies (a recipe from my Noni) that I used on Valentine's Day last year - these are almond flavored instead and obviously these are green!

Grinch Cookies

Makes 2 dozen (depending on cookie size)

For the Cookies:

• 1 cup butter, softened to room temp (very important)
• 3/4 cup sugar (I used granulated, but powdered is okay too)
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 1/4 tsp. almond extract
• 2 1/2 cups flour
• Green food dye (or yellow and blue)
• 1-3 tbs. shortening
• Powdered sugar, for rolling
• Red decorators icing

Preheat your oven to 350° and line two baking sheets with parchment paper or silicon baking mats.  Set aside.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream the butter and sugar.  Really beat it until its super smooth and creamy - its basically the whole cookie.  Beat in the vanilla and almond.  Add the flour a half cup at a time and beat until combined after each addition.  If the dough is too crumbly (it will need to hold together like playdough when squeezed in your hands, but should NOT be sticky) add 1 tbs. of shortening at a time.  After each addition make sure you have given it a solid few minutes to beat in and see if its come together enough.

Once the dough is the right consistency, beat in the food dye.  Once the dough is your desired shade of green, scoop out a small tablespoon of dough and roll into a ball with your hands.  Roll in powdered sugar, then place the ball on your cookie sheet and flatten with your hand to about 1/2 inch or thinner. Repeat with remaining dough.

Bake for 12-18 minutes, until the edges are JUST starting to brown (the time will vary depending on the thickness of your dough and the size of your cookie so just watch carefully).  Let the cookies cool completely on the cookie sheet.

Once the cookies are completely cooled, apply the hearts. I used a "leaf" tip on my tube of red frosting and made the heart in two halves.  You can also just use a small round piping tip and draw a heart with the icing.

Welcome to the family, Elowyn!

Y'all have probably noticed that I haven't written anything in like, a whole year.  I haven't abandoned Broad and Hill - I just had to take a break, but for a good reason!  I was pregnant with baby number three!

While that is super exciting news, the bad part is that I have AWFUL pregnancies.  I am super sick pretty much the whole time, its not the most conducive situation to blogging... or cooking, or eating, or doing much of anything that isn't laying in bed in a dark cool room waiting for 40 weeks to go by.

The good part is that our baby is perfect and wonderful and we all adore her (duh). Here is she is folks, meet our baby girl, Elowyn Elizabeth.  Born September 1st, 2016.  Pretty cute, huh?

Now that we've had some time to settle back in as a family, I've been getting my feet back under me and have some exciting stuff coming for the holiday season to share with you!!

Baby Chalkboard Updates: Round 2

A while ago I wrote a long post about the monthly chalkboard updates I did for our first son, Townes.  When we had our second son, Hayes (who also goes by Hondo), I wanted to continue the tradition, but also changing it up a little to make it his.  I was also much busier, since I had a toddler running around and a newborn to take care of, so doing two per-month for holidays and milestones was a bit much.  This time around I consolidated my holiday themes into the monthly update when I could instead.

However, the main difference with Hayes' is that instead of using a chair, I drew Hayes right into the picture.  I accomplished this by using the same chalkboard "wall" I had made for Townes during the renovation, and instead of leaning it up against a wall, I laid it down on the floor and then put Hayes down right on it.  Then I photographed him from above.

As always, some of the designs came out better than others, and you can tell it took me a couple months to get into a groove of what works. One big thing that changed was the kind of chalk I used, I found the most fantastic, high pigment chalk from Crayola at Michael's and it changed a lot.  The colors were so much brighter, had more depth and I was able to really expand my creative range.

Its hard to choose favorites, because so many of them are just wonderful memories of my little guy at that age, but my top four are certainly seven months (May/Cinco de Mayo), eight months (June/Father's Day), eleven months (September/Where the Wild Things Are) and his birthday.

My final thoughts on this method are to remember that the chalk will smudge, so be ready to snap your photo the second you put your baby down.  Normally for that reason, I had an extra set of hands (Chanel's) around to help.  I would stand on a chair to get the shot from above, and she would place him down and get him to giggle.  But once he rolled over, we were done.  Also, keep in mind that the little one will get chalk on whatever they are wearing - the high pigment chalk can be a bit harder to get out of light colored clothing - so you've been warned.

For more photo tips and editing (remember to adjust your white balance when you edit) - see the original post about Baby Chalkboards!

Broccoli and Cheese Pasta

This pasta dish is a straight indulgence.  I'm not even going to try to pretend otherwise just because there is something green in here, this is thick, dreamy, cheesy indulgence.  If you grew up a fan of Velveeta shells and cheese, this is right up your alley.

I was having a craving the other day for something cheesy and filling and comforting.  It was cold and I was the kind of exhausted that makes you want to get in bed and stay there until spring.  All I could think of was bacon cheeseburgers and Velveeta shells and cheese. So I started thinking maybe I should make the kids broccoli, cheese and rice soup, but I couldn't quite convince myself of it because I wanted something richer, more decadent.  So I decided to make my version of Velveeta, but with some broccoli and chicken thrown in there, all over pasta instead of rice.

This cheese sauce is stick-to-your-ribs thick, but you can thin it out a little more if you want, and the cheese level is easy to adjust to your taste as well.  Once you master a sauce like this, the possibilities are endless. Next up, I am going to make a homemade version of the Annie's White Cheddar sauce.  Stay tuned for that!

Broccoli and Cheese Pasta

Serves 6 - 8

Ingredients:

• 8 - 16 oz of pasta, cooked and rinsed (I made the whole box and then added until it was my desired cheese-pasta ratio)
• 6 chicken tenders
• 1 white onion, minced
• 3 tbs. butter
• 1 tbs. minced garlic
• Salt and Pepper
• 1/4 - 1/2 cup of flour
• 2-3 cups chicken broth
• 1 cup whole milk
• 8 - 12 oz of sharp orange cheddar cheese, freshly shredded
• 4 oz. (half a block) cream cheese
• 2 cups frozen broccoli florets

In a dutch oven, over medium-high heat, melt 1 tbs. of butter.  Season one side of your chicken tenders with salt and pepper, then place seasoned-side down into the dutch oven and brown, about 3-5 minutes.  Season the uncooked side of the chicken and then turn it over, browning the other side.  After the outsides are browned, add enough chicken broth to cover half the depth of the chicken.  Flip the chicken and cover the pot, turn the heat to medium, and let the chicken simmer and steam in the broth until cooked through and tender.  Once the chicken is cooked, remove the chicken from the pot and set aside on a plate. 

Add the minced onion and garlic to the broth, saute and simmer in the broth until onions are soft.  Add the remaining 2 tbs. of butter and let it melt.  Sprinkle 1/4 cup of flour over the broth mix and whisk together.  There should be enough flour to absorb all the liquid, if you need to add more flour, do so a little at a time until all the broth is absorbed. 

Slowly add the milk, whisking until smooth. Turn heat down to medium-low. Add the shredded cheese, a handful at a time, and stir after each addition until cheese had completely melted and incorporated.  Add your desired amount of cheese, I recommend at least 8 oz, but go for more to your taste.  Stir in the cream cheese until incorporated. 

If the cheese sauce is too thick for your liking, slowly add chicken broth until it has thinned to your preference.

Add the pasta, a handful at a time, mixing to coat in the cheese sauce.  Add the broccoli florets and stir to incorporate.  While the broccoli heats through, chop the chicken tenders into bite sized pieces and add to the pot.  Season with salt and pepper, serve immediately.

Photo Flipbook Party Invite

Townes' 3rd birthday is coming up next week and it has me, as most mom's do, thinking back on his first birthday and how much he has grown.  I love throwing parties and so when his first birthday came around I was just tickled to throw my very first kid's party.  I had probably started thinking about it from the day I got him home from the hospital honestly, just casual thoughts about what we could do.

Its hard to pick a theme for a one-year olds party because, let's be real, they don't really have interests.  I mean, sure they are into food and toys and sleeping, but who isn't and anyway, those things don't really make for much of a party theme (though now that I've said that, I'm starting to wonder if I couldn't throw an adorable "nap themed" party for a baby - stay tuned, I'll work on it - I'm thinking some sheep and clouds and cozy blankets....)  Shit, sorry, I digress.

Townes' first birthday wasn't shaping up like I thought it would because first of all, we weren't living in our house.  We were four months into our HUGE remodel and living in a rental so I already felt disjointed.  Also, I hadn't anticipated how bummed I would be at the idea that all of my family probably wouldn't be there since they live in New York, California, Washington and elsewhere that isn't here.

However that is where I got the theme, in missing my NY family, I decided Townes' birthday could still pay homage to them in some way and so we did a NY theme with T, starring as King Kong.  We had Nathan's hot dogs, hot pretzels, and a popcorn bar. There was a King Kong pinata and a custom made cake to look like a skyscraper for King King Townes' to smash (it was the Frost Tower, which is here in Austin, so we had a little Texas sprinkled in).  I even made favors for everyone to take home that were "bagels in a jar" - I filled large mason jars with all the dry fixings to make homemade NY Style Bagels, topped them with a cute label that said I Heart NY and a tag with the recipe and instructions.

The crowning jewel of this party theme though was the invitation.  We had an adorable black gorilla costume for Townes and we decided we wanted to make a video of him walking through towers of cardboard blocks and knocking them down - that idea ended up posing a few problems: 1) he couldn't walk yet, 2) what exactly would we do with said video, and 3) he was having no part in any of it at all, just wanted the damn gorilla hat off.

After some more brainstorming and discussing, Chanel and I decided to scrap the video idea and make a flip book.  At the time the plan was to give them out as favors to people at the party.  So we dressed him back up, set up the blocks and tried again, this time rapid shooting stills with our camera.  No luck again.  He wouldn't cooperate.

Back to the drawing board, one last time.  We went back to something he knew.  Since he had been doing his chalkboard photos for a year we knew he would cooperate that way.  So we drew the skyline of Austin (another subtle nod to his hometown) on the board and tried to get him to walk in front of it.  Nope.  Finally we gave him his chair and a banana (his favorite snack) and went with what made him happy.  SUCCESS!

Then when I started making the flip books I thought, I should mail them to the people who can't come - then it occurred to me to just make them the invitation and send them to everyone!  It was adorable and everyone loved it. I chose black envelopes to go with the theme (from Paper Source, as always) and then chose a vintage NY subway map wrapping paper for the liner.  I printed labels for the front of the envelope that invoked a little film making with the washi tape and they were all set!  My favorite part was the little message on the last page, letting everyone know we loved them and that this was a keepsake if they couldn't come, which lots of people couldn't.

Like the idea?  Here are some tips on how to do it yourself - its not hard I promise!

Shooting the Photos

At this point, you can do this with just about any camera.  Most digital cameras, even basic ones will let you hold down the shutter button and will just keep auto-focusing and shooting. We used my Canon Rebel, but you could get the same effect on your iPhone with the Burst feature.

It doesn't have to be anything super planned.  We happened to have a theme, but the book will capture the equivalent of a 5-10 second video.  That's not a lot.  So if there is something you love about your little one (a funny face, the way the laugh, how they eat, anything) it will be a cute flip book.  They just need to be moving.

Lastly, if you can, use a tripod.  If you aren't moving then the frame of the photos will all remain the same and will look best in a book because the only moving part will be your kiddo, not the angle of the photo.  This will also allow you to apply the same edits and crop to the whole batch of photos instead of doing each one individually and hoping they match up - trust me this saves a lot of time.

The Cover

I made the cover using (gasp!) Microsoft Word.  All my graphic designer friends would be appalled (not even would be, T's godfather is a super talented graphic designer and he repeatedly tells me he is) but its software I am comfortable with, already own, and can intuitively figure out since I've been using it since elementary school.  I just pull up a blank publishing document, adjust the page layout to be the size I need (in this case 2 x 3) and then go to work adding text boxes, clip art, and so on.

Then what you need to do is save the page as an image and you are ready to go!

The Book

There are a two ways you can go about assembling the book depending on your time, budget and patience.

THE DIY WAY

This is not the way I ended up going because I was making so many (I used about 45, we sent them to everyone - first kid overkill if you will).  But what you could do is print each of the photos on photo paper, cut them to size, and fasten them together with glue and some thread. 

What you would do is cut each photo out leaving a 1/4 inch border on the left side.  Add two small pin holes in the top and bottom quarters of the border (in the same spot of each photo, like the edge of binder paper).  Stack up all your photos (NOT THE COVER), and apply a little bit of glue using a glue stick on the border and glue them all together in order. Once they are glued together, thread a needle and go in one hole, out the other side and then in the other hole and out the other side, twice around creating a secondary way to hold the pages together.

Finally, attach the covers.  The front and back covers should be printed as one long strip, with enough space in the middle to wrap around the bound edge of the book. Use glue to secure the cover pages to the binding area and you are done!

This is pretty simple, if you are making just a couple, but its A LOT of work if you are making more than like, five. So I went with the other method.

ORDERING THEM PRINTED

Turns out, iPhoto has a flip book option in their projects!  Yes, you can order a flip book directly from your iPhoto!  This was the method I chose.  All my photos were already in iPhoto so I just added my cover photo to my Library, made a new project and followed the instructions.

At the time, you could order them in a pack of three for $9.  Now this is more expensive than lotsof other types of invitations, but I never said this was an exercise in cost-efficiency.  The iPhoto project also allowed me to add the final page of text and that was my favorite part.  I am sure that also with some digging other photo printing apps and sites would offer a similar project.