Photoshoot with Janine

 

My good friend and talented photographer, Janine, took a whole bunch of impromptu pictures of Lucia last weekend with her big fancy camera. 

Thanks Janine! Here are a sampling of some of our favorites 

(brace yourself, there are a lot of faves)...

 Ha, love that face!

And saved the best for last! Janine captured that spit-up at the exact right moment...check out that stream!

Avocado and Arugula Pesto Pasta

 I took a little break from cooking/baking when Lucia was born but we that didn't mean we took a break from home cooked meals because I froze a bunch of good food when I was still pregnant. I have since started cooking again but this was one of those frozen meals that was very good and super easy to make.

I used a recipe from foodnetwork.com and made a few changes. 

You can find the original here.

The Recipe:

• 1 pound pasta
• 2 medium avocados, halved, peeled, and seeded
• 3 cups baby arugula leaves (3 ounces)
• 1 packed cup fresh basil leaves
• 3 tablespoons fresh lime juice, about 2 large limes
• 2 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1 cup grated Parmesan
• 1/2 cup pine nuts, toasted (toast in dry saute pan for a few minutes)

The Method:

1. Cook pasta, save about 1 cup of the pasta water before draining. Place in a serving bowl.
2. Place avocados, arugula, basil, lime juice, garlic, half of the pine nuts, salt, and pepper in a food processor and blend until smooth.
3. Pour the pesto over the pasta and toss together (I actually only used half of this recipe with 1 lb of pasta). Add the cheese and toss together until coated, adding a little of the reserved pasta water if the sauce is too thick. 
4. Top with a little more cheese and the rest of the pine nuts. I also added baked chicken pieces and bacon to make it an even heartier dish.  

If you want to freeze for later use, just transfer desired serving sizes of pesto into freezer friendly containers and place in freezer. Just thaw in the fridge the day before you want to use it then follow directions 3 and 4.

Lucia at One Month

Here is a picture of Lucia today at four weeks old! It has been a good month and has gone by fast. Lucia has been a great baby so far, her temperament has been mild (knock on wood, I know this can still change). We have had some phases of good sleep and others with not so much sleep which is all you can ask for with a newborn.


This is not to say that there are not explosive diapers, spitting up on clothes when you least expect it and random loud bouts of crying but we love her anyway! I've come to realize that if you want to learn how to enjoy the simple things in life (aka, a shower! having 10 minutes to do what you want! sleeping for 3 more minutes while your husband changes the diaper!) then just have a baby.


Going back in time a bit, here are some pictures from these past few weeks...

I have been taking advantage of her pretty regular afternoon nap to go for walks and to the grocery store using my moby wrap. Works great!

This seems to be her favorite position as of late.

Grandpa Mark and grandma Debbie were in town this week and got to spend lots of time with Lucia. It was great to have them here!

This is one of our favorite faces of hers, when she crosses her eyes and makes an "o"...always makes us laugh.

Lucia loves to look at her black and white art cards (thanks Emilie and Steve!). And I like them because I like how black and white looks in her crib rather than a neon colored mobile (for the record, I was feeling bad that we didn't have a mobile for her mostly because I didn't like the way it looked, but there have to be some compromises when we are sharing a room, right?)

And lastly, here is a picture of Lucia's cousins, Naomi, Sonja and Gwen looking at her together. And this moment really happened, I didn't stage it.