Dinners for the week.

I'm behind in my dinners for the week so far due to D being sick on Monday.

Anyways...

Monday - we had KFC and it was YUMMY!

Tuesday - butter pasta (fettucine tossed with butter and Jonny's garlic seasoning. SO GOOD)

Wednesday - we are having baked chicken rolls with spinach, sundried tomatoes, and ricotta cheese. I got the recipe from Cooking Light but with my adaptations, it is anything but "light"

Thursday - personal meatloaves with mashed potatoes (another recipe from Cooking Light but probably not all that "light" anymore)

Friday - Pizza!

I'm always up for a good recipe if someone cares to share.

Teething? Sick? Combo?

Yesterday was not a fun day in our world. D was a little cranky in the morning but went down for a nap. She woke up incredibly upset with a fever of almost 101 and the reddest cheeks I've ever seen on her. I dosed her with tylenol and gave her a cold drink of milk, all of which she promptly threw up. So, we settled into the recliner with a sippy of juice and an afternoon of Dr.90210. She ate some cookies a little later on, and again threw up. As soon as the tylenol started to wear off she would start moaning and crying, so I kept her medicated as much as I could following the tylenol directions.

Finally at about 5 she ate a granola bar and went down for a nap and stayed cool. She got up a bit later when Jeff got home and ate some chicken and had some more cold milk. She spiked another fever later last night and was moaning and pointing to her teeth. Finally she fell asleep in our bed and slept pretty well throughout the night (waking up once for some milk).

This morning she slept in until almost 9:30 and woke up moany but that quickly went away. We had a succesful trip to the grocery store, so I'm hopeful that she is on the mend.

I'm thinking it was probably a combo of teeth and some illness. She has never had that much trouble with temps while teething, except for the time she was getting molars and had roseola at the same time (fun!).

I'm all about food: Sticky Buns!

Sorry, the weekends are always slow with CP/therapy talk. We haven't been up to much either, just getting our land ready to be cleared for the house we are building.

I try to make a "special" breakfast once during the weekend. It always consists of Sticky Buns and bacon or sausage. This sticky bun recipe is the EASIEST recipe ever. You don't have to mix much, you don't have to wait an hour for dough to rise, you just put it together the evening before, pop it in the oven, and when you wake up the next day, turn the oven on.

Sticky Buns

18 Rhodes dinner rolls, frozen
1 stick butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 box jell-o cook 'n serve butterscotch pudding (NOT INSTANT)
1/2 small bag pecan chips (or however and whatever you want)

In a bundt pan or angel food cake pan that has been sprayed with nonstick spray or buttered, put the rhodes frozen dinner rolls in the bottom of the pan. Put the powdered jello mix on top. Add as much nuts to the top as well.

In a microwaveable bowl, melt the butter. Mix in the brown sugar and pour on top of the rolls.

Put the bundt pan in the oven overnight.

The next morning, turn the oven on to 350 degrees for 25 minutes.

I flip the pan over onto a plate when it is still hot and serve warm.

Another Food Post - Mashed Potato Hash Browns

I was scrambling a bit for a breakfast concept this morning, but luckily I had a carton of eggs, cheese, bread, onions, and some leftover mashed potatoes from dinner on Thursday.

I put together an egg and cheese omelet for Jeff (I am not a fan of eggs) and made mashed potato hash browns out of the mashed potatoes and some chopped green onion. I kind of got the idea from watching Rachel Ray and her smashed potato leftover uses, but this is how I did it.

I microwaved the leftover mashed potatoes until they were somewhat warm. I didn't want to risk having hash browns with a cold center. I chopped some green onion and mixed it in to the warmed potatoes.

In a pan on the stove, I melted some butter and olive oil over medium heat (if we had had bacon I would have used the drippings). I made little tiny cakes out of the potatoes and plopped them into the butter/oil mixture and cooked up crisp on both sides, seasoning with salt and pepper as needed. Once they were done, I plated them and sprinkled with parmesan cheese. They took about 4 minutes to crisp on both sides. They didn't really stay together like cakes, but they were DELICIOUS!

So, the moral of the story, save your leftover mashed potatoes for breakfast.

Kinesio Photos

Diane came again today and we are trying a couple of different applications of the kinesio tape. One goes from the elbow and over the thumb to help bring her arm into a neutral position as well as pull the thumb out a bit. Her fingers are always relaxed but she does have thumb abduction going on. Also, since Mr. Larry dumped the orthotic yesterday, Diane did a taping on D's leg which imitates what the orthotic did but without the sensory interruption.

The kinesio tape comes in a wide assortment of colors (today Diane had flesh and purple). We just went with the flesh because it is less noticeable and D didn't pull at it last week. I think the purple would call too much attention to her.

Chicken Parmigiana

As per my earlier-in-the-week post about family dinners, here was last night's choice - Chicken Parmigiania (ala Tyler Florence @ Food Network).

I put only a small handful of kalamata olives because Jeff doesn't care for them. I'm glad I made this choice as they are REALLY salty and the flavor of a chunk of olive is just so different from the rest of the meal. It was good with a decent bite of chicken, but otherwise it was...too opposite.

I loved the hand crushed tomato sauce, just be careful when crushing them. I ended up spraying a wall in the kitchen with the juice. So, I learned to poke my thumb into the tomato before squishing it.

My husband enjoyed it, I enjoyed it, and the dog enjoyed it. I'm pretty sure it will be on a future menu.