Smoked Salmon Composed Salad

I starting making a fantastic salmon nicoise salad in the past year or so and since then I've been inspired to create composed salads out of leftovers.

My iPhone photography skills are way, way behind my cooking skills

Smoked salmon, a local farm-raised product I picked up at the farmer's market. Cherry tomatoes broiled with the last of the basil breadcrumbs. Blanched green beans, sliced almonds, baby greens and the citrus vinaigrette I made for our Valentine's day salad. Delicious! 

Caleb, 1 Month!

I can't believe our baby is an entire month old. (Every parent says this, right?) The days are long but the weeks go by so fast. Caleb's already so much bigger than he was at the hospital and starting to look like a little baby, not a newborn.

He sleeps better at night than during the day. During the day he'll take one, maybe two really good, long naps. If he refuses to nap in his crib I'll hold him for an or hour so that he doesn't completely melt down from a lack of sleep. At night he'll sleep for 3 to 4 hour stretches and that's always been in his crib. He likes to sleep all wrapped up, either in a swaddle blanket or a sleepsack, and he's just grown out of the newborn size sleepsack and we have to bump him up to the 0-3 size.

We're following a "parent-directed feeding" schedule (aka Babywise) and that seems to work really well for us.  I've never felt like I've denied him food when he's really hungry and he always takes a full feeding. With bottle feeding we know exactly how much he's getting, usually 4 ounces 8 times a day. At the moment we're working on going down to 7 feedings a day and I'm trying to figure out how to increase some of his feedings so that he gets the same amount of food over the course of the day. He gets half formula and half milk now.

"Mom, stop trying to get pictures of my cute outfit and change my diaper!!"

He hates tummy time, but can hold his head up and looked around when he's being held sitting up. Sometimes he likes to just lay next to you on the couch or bed and kick his feet and wave his arms in the air and make faces, gurgling and cooing and grunting. He looks like the little drummer boy. He's basically the best baby and we're so, so lucky to be his parents.

Mom and Baby selfie at 1 month old.

Valentine's Day

(With a baby. I feel like all of my posts are how life is different, with baby or life is the same, with a baby.) Valentine's Day was fairly normal for us. We stayed in - I dislike going out on Valentine's because of the high expectations around forced romance. Brian and I worked together to hang out with the babe, make dinner and tidy up the dining room table enough for a meal with candles and flowers.

Valentine's Day 2014 

Green Salad with Citrus and Almonds
Surf & Turf 
   Steak with Blue Cheese Butter & Broiled Scallops Provencale
Green Beans with Almonds 
Chocolate Trio 
   Spiked Hot Cocoa, Chocolate Truffles, Sea Salt Chocolate Covered Caramels 
French-style Apple Cider 

Not to be too self-congratulatory, but it was an incredible meal. I think I've mentioned the steak with blue cheese butter before. It's a recipe from Screen Doors and Sweet Tea, a recipe I waited almost five years to try and we've probably had it five times in the past few months. The scallops was another recipe I waited entirely too long to try. It's from Serious Eats, posted back in 2012, and I've had it saved since then but never found a reason to pull it out. Scallops and cherry tomatoes are buried under a layer of basil breadcrumbs and broiled until just cooked through. I won't wait until two years to make it again and I'm brainstorming what else I can pair with the basil breadcrumbs.

I wrote a couple months ago that I was going to miss leisurely cooking a really good meal once we had a kid. Thankfully, while life has definitely changed, it's not all that different. I still think about what we're going to have for dinner. I get to have a glass of wine while standing at the stove. I'm taking trips to Whole Foods with my mom, trying new recipes and having fun with Caleb. If this is parenthood, I'm in.

My Valentines

Nothing's better than a steak in a cast iron pan.

Found this Door County produced cider at Whole Foods.

"You brought me flowers!"

"Of course I brought you flowers. You're my Valentine."

The scallops topped with basil breadcrumbs.

My birthday and Valentine's gift from Brian- a garnet necklace, Caleb's birthstone.

I Keep Starting Posts in My Head

I start them at 1:30 am, 4am, the middle of the afternoon, in the shower, but I never seem to make it to the computer. Life with a newborn is a series of productive days and lazy days, three hour intervals concerned with bottles and burping, endless laundry trips. We had a fantastic visit from Brian's brother and sister in law over the weekend. We went out for tacos and margaritas on my birthday. (I had a birthday- I spent most of 28 not drinking and now I'll spend 29 learning how to be a mom.) We hit up the farmers market to say hi to my former market colleagues and show off the baby. Brian and I dropped off Uncle J and Aunt M for a brewery tour and went to relax at a cool coffee shop on the east side of town. We should know better than to try to be cool now that we're parents- Caleb had a major blowout and the bathrooms had nothing resembling a changing table- cue me changing him on the bathroom floor. Both of us needed a good scrub down after that experience. Otherwise we've been watching the Olympics and enjoying the fabulous meals that our friends have been dropping off. I spend a lot time staring at this guy and his funny faces.