Let Them Eat Cake . . . and Spinach Puree

With my first two children, I had this dream of making all their baby food from scratch, using fresh (organic) fruit and veggies.  And, of course, I bought the jars and only mashed an occasional banana for them.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not anti-jar-baby-food.  I thought it was awesome that in the depths of winter I could feed Annie stuff like, "Blueberry, mango, raspberry, peach puree."  'Cause not only would it cost me a small fortune to buy that many different kinds of fruit, but half of 'em would've ended up going bad in my fridge.
But this time around, we bought a Blendtec a few months back.  And we were partially able to justify the cost by me making the promise, "I'll make Isaac's baby food in it!"  So this time around, I had a bit more motivation.
We started with avocados about a month ago, and that was a disaster.  His physical reaction was so negative to it, that we'll probably wait until he's a year old or so before we try that one again.  Then bananas.  Again, it didn't seem to agree with his little digestive system.  I was ready to swear off baby food for awhile.  But we tried one last thing.  Squash.  From a jar.  And it worked great.  He never had a problem with it, and I had a renewed commitment to baby food.  So, I took a bag out of the freezer of apricots that we'd picked off the tree this year, and let them thaw and threw them into the blender.  He loved 'em.  Could eat them in 4-6 ounce portions.  He ate them so well I rarely used a bib, because he never spit anything back out.  Then, we had some overly ripe pears, so I threw them (seeds and all) into our blender and we had another hit on our hands.  He couldn't get enough of them.  He loves sweet potatoes too -- but that one's totally from a jar.  I don't even really know how to cook sweet potatoes, to be honest.  This morning I threw a handful of spinach in with a few more pears making the nastiest looking green stuff you've ever seen.  But after a few initial 'icky' faces, he took to it and spent the next 20 minutes just lapping it up . . .

On the less healthy end of the spectrum, I'm taking a cake decorating class.  I'm enjoying it immensely, 'cause I get to leave the house.  Without anyone in tow.  And talk with other adults.  For two whole hours while Greg stays home and gets the kids to bed and cleans the kitchen.  Be still my heart.

I'm no master, but I've been really surprised at how easy it is to put together some pretty cute stuff when you know a few great tips and tricks.  The first picture is the first ever cake I decorated.  (Taken on my phone).  Annie approved of the design, since she's been asking for a butterfly cake for her birthday.

But in just a week's time, I think I came pretty far -- and I found I vastly prefer decorating cupcakes . . .

The random green 'shaggy' cupcake and the green 'all leaves' cupcake pretty much came about because I had a whole bunch of green frosting I hadn't used, and I'm not a big fan of waste.  :-)
I may not be the best cake decorator out there, but I now feel confident enough to do my girls' birthday cakes and cupcakes this year!