If you like risotto, you must try this recipe

I think maybe I could just eat this every night for the rest of my life and be happy--especially with local leeks, tomatoes and basil all available in abundance at the farmers' market. Enjoy!

Here's a link to the recipe if you'd like a printer-friendly version.

Risotto with fresh mozzarella, tomatoes and basil

Yield
6 servings (serving size: about 1 cup)

Ingredients
3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
4 1/2 cups fat-free, less-sodium chicken broth
2 tablespoons extravirgin olive oil, divided
2 cups chopped leek
1 1/2 cups Arborio rice or other medium-grain rice
1/3 cup dry white wine
1/4 cup half-and-half
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 cup halved grape tomatoes
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
5 ounces fresh mozzarella cheese, finely diced

Preparation
Place vinegar in a small, heavy saucepan; bring to a boil over medium heat. Cook until slightly syrupy and reduced to 1 tablespoon (about 4 minutes). Set aside.

Bring the broth to a simmer in a medium saucepan (do not boil). Keep warm.

Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add leek; sauté 3 minutes or until tender. Add rice; cook 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Stir in wine, and cook 1 minute or until the liquid is nearly absorbed, stirring constantly. Stir in 1 cup broth; cook 5 minutes or until the liquid is nearly absorbed, stirring constantly. Reduce heat to medium. Add the remaining broth, 1/2 cup at a time, stirring constantly until each portion of broth is absorbed before adding the next (about 25 minutes total). Stir in half-and-half, salt, and pepper; cook 2 minutes. Remove from heat; stir in tomatoes, basil, and cheese. Place about 1 cup risotto evenly into 6 shallow serving bowls, and drizzle each with 1/2 teaspoon balsamic syrup and 1/2 teaspoon olive oil.

2nd Referral Anniversary

In honor of the two-year anniversary of Lauren's referral, here are some pictures of Lauren holding baby Lauren's referral photo, taken this morning. (Click here to see last year's.) To celebrate the occasion, she wore panties to school for this first time! (And no accidents!) Big girl!

Kindergarten Kid

We now have two days of morning kindergarten under our belts! Check out the cuteness from his first official day, which was yesterday. The highlight of the whole thing, for Aidan, is taking the bus home. He gets to take a small bus with a few of the other kindergartners, and it drops him off right in front of our house. What a big kid!

Last Day of Preschool & Watermelon Girl

Hope everyone is having a great long weekend and enjoying the last few weeks of summer. It has definitely been feeling more like fall here. It rained this afternoon and I made vegetable soup for dinner. I'm not feeling ready for the return of the rain yet!

Aidan's last day of preschool was Friday. We gave his teacher a jar of homemade granola (label and card by Aidan):




Here are two more pictures from the last day of preschool:



I think he is ready for kindergarten. We're talking about it daily and have purchased all of our required supplies. We have our parent-student interview with his teacher on Wednesday, and he goes to school with half the class on Friday. He starts his regular schedule on 9/9. I also teach my first Jazzercise class this Wednesday. Wish me luck!

We got Lauren's bangs trimmed today. Here she is, mid-watermelon feast:





And finally, here is a little video of our darling girl eating watermelon, talking and laughing. Enjoy!

Old Friends

Our wonderful college friends Leslie and Sam, along with their two girls (Ella, 5, and Maren, 1 1/2) visited from California last weekend and we had so much fun with them. They were in town for a family reunion but we got to see them when they weren't occupied with family events. Sunday night, we all went out to a local winery to see a concert put on by Sam's uncle, blues guitarist Roy Rogers from San Francisco. Our friends Megan and Juan and their kids came too, and we all had a blast dancing and running around and enjoying the great music and cooler weather. (We had temperatures over 100 on Saturday and then probably a good 30 degrees cooler on Sunday!)

Ella and Aidan (their birthdays are one day apart) just loved each other. They are both energetic goofballs and just hit it off immediately. It had been a few years since they'd seen each other, and I am now feeling committed to try and get together with them here or there once a year at least! Maren is a sweetie and really liked both Ryan and me. She kept putting up her arms so we would pick her up and carry her around!




Aidan and Ella at the fountains downtown on Saturday.
Maren and me at the fountains.
Lauren takes a break from the fountains to show a dog her stuffed doggie.
Goofykins 1 and 2 at the concert Sunday night.

Blurry picture but I like it anyway...Lauren and Andrew are good buddies. He just turned 3 so he likes it that she is littler than him...he once told his mom that he wanted to be in charge of Lauren. :-)

I did it!

For those who might be checking in, just wanted to let you know that I passed my Jazzercise audition! I'll be in Portland for the weekend now learning a bunch of stuff. More later!

And He's Off...

Aidan learned to ride his bike with no training wheels! We are so impressed (we both think we were at least 6 before we took off our training wheels), and he is so proud of himself. He took to it really fast, maybe because his bike is pretty small--he's had it since before he turned 3. We think maybe he feels more comfortable being closer to the ground. When he's ready, we'll buy him a bigger bike. What a big boy he is these days. He even gives me looks sometimes like he thinks I am a total dork. A preview of what's to come, I guess.

Here are a couple of pictures from the county fair, too. Aidan loved the rides! Maybe next year Lauren will be big enough to go on more of them.

Da Vinci Days!

Da Vinci Days (a local celebration of art, science and technology with music, food, a parade, kinetic sculpture races and all kinds of things to do for kids) was last weekend, and, as usual, we had a blast. Ryan's parents, niece (age 12) and her friend (age 13) arrived Wednesday and stayed until Sunday morning. Jess and the girls arrived Friday afternoon and stayed until after dinner Sunday. We had a super-busy, action-packed time and a really fun visit with everyone. We weren't ready for anyone to leave when the time came!

The 5-year-olds watching the electric car race. Aidan and Hannah are so adorable together--they've been best buddies since they were 1 1/2. They sometimes have a brother-sister type of relationship (good and bad) but they seem to get along better every time we get together. We'll be heading to southern Oregon to visit them next month.

For Aidan, da Vinci Days equals ice cream days. He had a waffle cone all three days of the event.

Little angel Lauren. She wasn't feeling well the first night, but made a quick recovery.

Lauren and Daddy doing their crazy acrobatics in the park.
Kinetic sculpture parade on Saturday. This one is the Calistoga dragon--and it breathed fire!
Our beautiful niece Elise and Lauren at the Frisbee dog competition on Saturday. Elise has three younger brothers and is great with kids! She is really sweet and we enjoyed her company very much.
Aidan in the medical helicopter that landed in the field on Saturday.

Aidan and Lauren playing soccer in the children's village.

Aidan checks out a race car.

Aidan attempting to learn some Irish dancing moves. He was actually really good at it!

Cuties in their PJs

My Jazzercise audition is less than three weeks away now, and I've been practicing quite a bit. When uploading pictures recently, I found several that Ryan had taken one evening before bed, while I was at class. Enjoy the cuteness!

Two-year-old girlie!

Lauren turned 2 two weeks ago! She got to eat ice cream in the nude--I don't think it gets much better than that for her (the girl LOVES to be "nakey," as she calls it). We didn't have a party but had a couple of friends over for fresh cherry pie, ice cream and cupcakes. Our 2-year-old is as cute, smart and fiesty as can be, and impresses us every day with her amazing vocabulary. She is so much fun! My mom got her one of those tricycles with no wheels, and she has gotten so fast on it...she just zips along behind Aidan on the sidewalk. They have been playing together pretty nicely, still with at least one major squabble daily. I guess that will probably last for a while. :-)

By the way, the baby she's feeding ice cream to in the picture below had never had ice cream or cupcakes before--first time for everything, right?