Growing Up Savvy Posts
What date is today? March 3rd? Are you sure? 
This is what our back yard looked like today. The snow was heavy enough that we both worked from home and tag-teamed childcare. Thankfully, Sophia is pretty good at occupying herself now-a-days. We started the morning with some dancing…
and transitioned to calmer activities like painting.
The end of our workday called for something comforting, something with chocolate — naturally. And so, I whipped up a batch of chocolate muffins. Seems luxurious, right? Well it was. At first, I was worried whether or not the batter would fit into my muffin tins, and then I was worried whether or not the muffins would come out of the tins. First world problems, no?
Turns out, I didn’t have to worry about the muffins coming out of the tins, or their taste for that matter. See for yourself.
Continuing with our streak of visitors, we spent time with my parents this weekend. They visited hands full of my mom’s famous sous and we provided Sophia for entertainment and some of our very own culinary creations to round out all the family fun. I can never shake off my parents generosity and desire to ease our kitchen burdens — they will always want to delight us with something delicious. I can’t complain either because as I said before, my mom is an amazing cook. Besides it being delicious, it is nice to know that someone cared enough to make something for you or at least offer. As much as we love to cook, someone else’s culinary offerings are always a treat. Try as I may, I will need years to match my mom’s kitchen expertise especially in Russian/Azeri dishes. But try we do and in our own way, we manage it.
Now that the end of winter is near, I am somewhat sad about its imminent departure. Before it really goes away and snow is no longer likely, I decided to make Pelmeni which are hand-made dumplings with savory fillings. I opted to fill mine with veal for flavor, pork for texture and sautéed onion and garlic for that extra little something. Shaping and filling the little dumplings turned out to be quite an undertaking. I probably spent three hours at the task but the result was well received by even the youngest of critics. They are typically served with sour cream and plenty of freshly cracked pepper or sautéed with butter and onions.
As you can see, we prefer ours with sour cream and cracked pepper. Even Sophia, who admittedly was skeptical when I first placed her plate in front of her, ended up completely smitten with these. These are absolutely a labor of love. I’d make them again, but only once in a blue moon and for someone I truly love. Thankfully, three hours of these have yielded two more dinner-sized portions in my freezer.
Cheese and dairy seemed to play an accidentally integral part of our weekend as we also made blintzes, ricotta gnocchi and that farmer’s cheese cake my sister shared with me last weekend. The blintzes I just had to show off to my mom as she makes them so well and I’ve recently freed her of said responsibility for us. The ricotta was burning a hole through my culinary to-do list and I’d missed making home-made tomato sauce. The gnocchi were super easy and the tomato sauce is fail-proof.
The gnocchi, finished off with basil were part of Sunday lunch which I finished off with the cheese cake… I changed the recipe my sister shared with me and it needs a bit more tuning before I will share my version of it with the world. That said, I think I’ve made mild improvement but have more changes I’d like to incorporate.
All this would not be possible without two extra pairs of hands to help with Sophia.
What’s more, I took advantage of a few free moments to treat my mom and me to an excursion to the shoppes. Mother-daughter time is something that I don’t get often, cherish and thoroughly enjoy. Great fun was had by all. This weekend was originally supposed to be just the three of us, but I am glad my parents visited. We are officially declaring next weekend time for just-the-three-of-us.
“Sophia, say I promise…” is something I find myself asking of Sophia quite often these days. She is at the point where we can talk to her and explain ourselves knowing she understands. She is also at the point where unruly behavior is no longer acceptable and we have introduced rules, promises and incentives to help her transition from a baby into a little girl.
But if Sophia is to follow rules and make promises, we ought to do the same and we do. For example, I often promise her dessert if she finishes her dinner or an outing if she plays nicely. In reality, our rules, promises and incentives are nothing out of the ordinary and are very typical in all
our every day lives; We promise to show up to work day in and day out, we promise to love, cherish and honor our spouses and we promise to respect those around us. In this case, we are expecting a not-yet-two-and-a-half-year-old to follow our suit.
At first we thought that perhaps this is expecting too much from a child her age, however we quickly learned that Sophia understands that if she follows through with her promises, we will follow through with ours. This has in effect become a matter of trust and in order to maintain hers, we have keep our end of the deal.
Mother nature was just kidding about springtime weather. It has been snowing two days in a row and we decided that some culinary cheering up was needed in order to make it through the week without a serious case of cabin fever or winter blues. There is no better way to cheer up than with Evan’s famous beef stew followed by my spring-time blueberry muffins.
The muffins are topped with lemon scented sugar which produces a delightfully crispy top. They’re based on an old Cooks Illustrated recipe, a version of which I found here. In other news, we also recently purchased this game for Sophia and she has been learning how to take turns and follow basic board game rules.
Springtime weather. I am almost afraid to say it for it may not happen again for a very long time. Mother nature was somehow compensating for the snow storms and frigid temperatures we’ve been subjected to recently. Whatever the reason, we were happy to be out and about this weekend — worried mother nature would change its mind. First things first, we went to the National Zoo. Rather, we took our own little wild animal child to see all the exciting creatures that exist in the wild.
Early bird gets the worm so to speak… The zoo pavilions open at 10 am, but the grounds are open at 8. We arrived at 9:15 and that was clearly this panda’s breakfast time!
Of course no day at the zoo would be complete without a carousel ride. This was Sophia’s first ever ride and though she was a little timid at first, the music won her over.
My sister, brother-in-law and nephew visited with us after the zoo. Seeing the kids play together was just out of this world especially because he is ten and she is not even two and a half.
Sunday fun-day was a continuation of our Saturday with more visitors. This time, Grammie and Pop and Clowdie (the dog) visited us for the day. As usual, my in-laws know how to wow Sophia. They arrived just after 10 am equipped with finger paints and watercolors. Painting is quite a stretch for us around these parts. We like to think that crayons and markers suffice, but were happy to see painting as well.
Pop and Sophia put a playdoh rolling pin to some imaginative use with playdoh.
You must be wondering by now what culinary delights we cooked this weekend or if we cooked at all. We did indeed cook because we had visitors to feed and the workweek to fend with. First and foremost, my sister brought a care package from my mom with her famous strudel and apple pirogies. I recently relieved my mother of blintz-making duties, but have now retained her to make apple pirogies.
Additionally, and because russians never ever visit without bringing something delicious as an offering, my sister baked one of my all-time favorites — a cottage cheese cake with a meringue topping. My mom used to make this when we were children and it is the perfect afternoon tea accompaniment. My sister put her special touch on the dish by adding apples between the cottage cheese and meringue topping. Evan and Sophia liked it too. Little Sophia thrust herself off her chair quite fast at the site of this sublime confection demanding a piece.
If you look at the cake picture carefully, you’ll see a new batch of the Boston creme cupcakes from last week in the background. We just had to share them with our family this weekend. The cupcakes were clearly a dessert item and despite my better judgement, I couldn’t rationalize having one for breakfast on Sunday. So what to do, what to do? Obviously, the answer was churros — Spanish donuts. Besides, I try to make something that I know my in-laws would enjoy. We need to make sure they will be back 🙂
Here they are taking a dip in the hot oil.
Rolled in cinnamon sugar they were pretty irresistible.
A bit about parenting. As a parent, I sometimes feel like I am blindfolded, feeling my way around for a doorway in a sparsely outfitted, dark room. I just wish I could take my blindfold off and turn the lights on. Theodore Roosevelt was certainly right when he noted that, “Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty …”
One of my biggest surprises in parenthood is that no two kids are alike and there are very few textbook children. Most parents cannot open a Dr. Sears book and read about what a child should be doing at age X and see that their X-month old is doing just that. At first, I was in denial about this and thought that maybe I am at fault for Sophia’s horrid sleep or her dependence on her bottle well beyond the age of two. However, I quickly realized that children are all different and they, just like us adults, have their own personalities, needs and develop at a different pace. As such, it is simply unfair to expect your child to adhere to a set of guidelines that are outlined by experts who have never met you or your child.
Our own parenting style is also one where we are flexible and focus on Sophia’s needs and comfort, expanding great effort to avoid any undue stress or cognitive taxation on her. This style has precipitated, or perhaps the style itself was precipitated by, Sophia’s personality and needs. As a result, we are faced with a 28-month old who co-sleeps with us at least part of the night and still drinks drank a bottle in the evening and in the early morning. That’s right, I am with this post, celebrating the end of my bottle prepping and washing days where Sophia is concerned.
How did we finally do it? Well, one day, we offered her milk out of a cup with a straw, a cookie to go with it and made the entire thing that much more appealing with her very favorite cartoon. We’ve not looked back since. There were no tears, no cold turkey, no spilled milk and no days without it. I could have followed the textbook that said that I just had to remove the bottle from Sophia at age one, but I know that would have meant tears, spilled milk, going cold turkey and bending Sophia’s will to mine or actually, the experts’ will. Why? Instead, we waited until she was ready and found the transition to be fairly easy.
This was a great lesson for me as a parent: I should, and always will, trust my gut when it comes to my child. I will not let society and its arbitrary norms dictate my child’s transitions and adjustments and rather, enjoy and embrace her needs first and foremost.
I hope this post does not impart an impression of some sort of a hippie parenting where we have an anything goes attitude. While lax on some things, we are incredibly strict and have expectations in others such raising a child who is a willing and agile traveler, a child who is willing to try new foods, new activities and experience and a child who above all is empathic.
It has been a while since I’ve talked about what Sophia is up-to now-a-days. Her activity, toy choices and even playmates change based on her interests which have grown over the past few months. My mother-in-law, who is a childhood education expert, tells me that I should expect to see an even bigger jump in play-skills, personality and interests in the coming 6 months. Since Sophia’s our first child and I am the youngest, I have no idea what to expect and find every day to be the equivalent of unwrapping a present.
Generally, I have seen a broadening of Sophia’s exploratory behavior and she has moved from solely tactual exploration to attempting to fit the object into her world and her play schemes. I see an increased attention span where arts and crafts are concerned with crayons and now finally, markers dominating her craft table activities. She always has in me, a willing companion for coloring. For whatever reason, I find the activity to be incredibly relaxing after a workday and always find myself asking her to color with me.
Sophia loves stickers, but not just any stickers, the squishy sticker puzzles are her absolute favorite. She got a set from Evan’s uncle, aunt and cousins and I have since purchased another one with a different theme.
An increase in attention span has translated in greater advances with unit blocks that my mother-in-law praised for the last 12 months. I was skeptical at first, but must admit, that unit blocks are pretty wonderful. Not only does Sophia enjoy playing with hers, but we enjoy them too. She has not yet fully transitioned to 3-D building but we are not in a rush. We build with her and sometimes for her, letting her explore the creations and more importantly topple/destroy them so that we can start over again.
She does well with non-connecting puzzles, but lacks the attention span and spatial reasoning skills necessary for connecting ones. This is something we’ll need to work on.
Lastly, there are of course legos and our joint appreciation of them. Evan and I love legos and could still occupy ourselves with them for hours. It turns out that Sophia has either inherited this trait from us, or perhaps legos are just universally loved. Either way, she loves building towers and arranging little lego people and flowers in her lego play schemes.
Current favorite books (all images courtesy of Amazon.com):
