Zucchini Lasagna

Gabe's friend gave us 3 HUGE zucchinis (I'm talking the largest I've ever seen!) a few days ago. I'm not a huge zucchini fan, as in I won't buy it myself so I had no idea what to do with them.

One of them we sliced and then we breaded the slices and baked them until crisp-they turned out pretty good!

Yesterday since I had off I decided to try a zucchini lasagna. I've never made it before and don't have a recipe. I basically just made regular lasagna, but instead of noodles I used zucchini. Here's my "recipe"....

Zucchini Lasagna
1-2 zucchini (depending on size) sliced lengthwise so you get long slices
16oz ricotta cheese (I used part skim)
1 egg
1 clove garlic, minced
parsley
salt and pepper
1 jar pasta sauce (or make your own if you want!)
1 lb ground beef, browned, drained, and crumbled
1lb shredded mozzarella cheese

Combine ricotta, egg, garlic, parsley, salt and pepper in a bowl and mix well (I didn't measure the parsley, salt and pepper-just added a little of each). Pour a thin layer of sauce on the bottom of a 9x13" pan and spread. Add a layer of zucchini slices. Spread a thin layer of ricotta mixture over zucchini. Spread another thin layer of sauce. Add a layer of ground beef and mozzarella. Repeat layers until you reach close to the top of the pan (I had 3 layers). Top with one more layer of zucchini, sauce and a lot of mozzarella. Bake at 350 for an hour.

We really liked the way this turned out. I would definitely make this again! For the zucchini slices, I used my v-slicer and set it to 1/8" for the thickness and it worked out pretty well. Our zucchini was shaped oddly so I had to cut and piece them together a bit, but it worked out just fine. I also broiled the lasagna for a few minutes to brown the cheese and make it a little crispy. Definitely try this if you have a chance-it's really good! And since I'm not a huge zucchini fan, you know it must be good!

Down To One...

We are officially down to one nursing session a day!

Since around Avery's birthday, we've been doing 2 a day-once first thing in the morning and once at bedtime. Last week, I had to work Mon-Thurs and on days I work, I don't nurse her in the morning. Instead, I pump and Gabe would give her a bottle/sippy cup of milk when she woke up. Since I had to work 4 days in a row (then had 4 days off), I figured she'd be in the routine of not nursing. So when Friday (my first day off) came, I didn't nurse her. If she had asked for it, I would have. To my surprise, she didn't ask for it!

And that continued all weekend! So since Friday, we've only been nursing at bedtime. And the best part? No more pumping on my work days in the morning!

So today.....today I got to sleep in an extra 20 minutes! It was nice!

I'm not sure how I'll work the night time feeding. I know it'll be the hardest one to break. Part of me wants to let her self-wean, but that could seriously take forever. I might wait a few weeks and see what happens and I'll have to figure out a new bedtime routine if I decide to cut out the last session.

So, we'll see how it goes! It's hard to believe I'm only down to once a day though!

Three Down, One To Go

My work schedule in August is all over the place! I typically work M, T, Th each week, but pretty much the entire month of August my schedule is different. Last week I worked M-Th then got "rewarded" with a 4 day weekend (I swapped W last week for M this coming week). So, it's Sunday night-I'm usually in bed by now gearing up for work tomorrow, but tonight.....tonight I'm gearing up for another day home with my baby!

We had a very busy weekend this weekend as well.

Friday Avery and I went for a walk in the morning. After lunch we went to the library and she played in the playroom for a little bit, then we went on the playground for awhile. After her second nap, we made a trip to Barnes and Noble. While I was getting dinner ready, she decided to rearrange our shoes (yes, all of those shoes are for 2 of us-and that's not even all of them we have in that area-how crazy is that?!). She liked my flip flops the best!

Yesterday Gabe went running in the morning, then I went to the gym. After we both showered and Avery napped, we went to the public market with Gabe's Dad. Even though we went late, it was still very crowded! But we got a lot of great deals as usual! In the early evening, we went to our cousins' newly built house for a housewarming party. We didn't stay too long because we had Avery and she needed to get to bed. It was nice seeing everyone and their house was very nice!

This morning I met an old coworker of mine for breakfast. We tried a new place called James Brown's. It was very yummy! If you go there, just a warning that there is no AC inside-it was pretty toasty in there! After Avery's nap, we went to the Park Ave fest and walked around for awhile. Just as we got back to the car it started pouring so we timed it just right! From there, we met Gabe's parents and his sister (and family) at Pier 45 for dinner. We have never been there and it was very nice. It's right on the water and we sat outside on their very large (and covered!) patio. We ordered a bunch of different tapas and shared them. They were all very good! We'll have to go back again sometime and try some of their entrees.

So I'm off tomorrow as well and really have no plans besides going grocery shopping. I haven't taken Avery in awhile so that'll be interesting! We'll see how the weather is before planning the rest of our day!

The other day, Gabe's friend brought us some very large zucchinis and today Avery was trying to carry them around! It was pretty funny because they are really big for her to try and pick up!

I tried taking a video of Avery dancing the other day. She is so funny when she dances standing up! She didn't do it very long, but I decided to post it anyway because I haven't posted a good video of her walking yet. So at least you'll get to see that!

Avery's Eye Exam

Today Avery had an appointment with a pediatric ophthalmologist.

When she was born, her tear ducts in both eyes were clogged. This caused her eyes to tear a lot and then the tears would dry up and get crusty. The duct in her right eye opened up on its own, but the left eye is still clogged up. When she had her 12month doctors appointment, they said it was time to get it looked at by a specialist.

So, today we had the appointment. The doctor came in and talked to us a bit and took a look at Avery. Then he put some fluorescein (bright yellow drops) in her eyes to see if the eyes drained at all. Of course the right one drained fine, but the left one did not. Avery did well until they started putting stuff in her eyes...after that anytime someone walked in the room, she screamed her head off!

They also dilated her eyes. When they did the drops, they missed getting it in her right eye, so they had to do another round of dilation drops on her. You can imagine how happy Avery was about that! Once she was dilated, they checked out the back of her eye to make sure things were draining properly back there (which they were).

So we got the news that she has to have surgery done on her left eye. They put a probe in the tear duct then insert a tube to keep the duct open and stretch it. The tube is left in place for about a year, then it gets removed. Hopefully that does the trick...if not, she'll have to have a different procedure done.

I'm a little anxious about the procedure because she has to get knocked out to have it done. The good thing is that it only takes 5-10 minutes to do, so it won't be long, but still. I worry about her having the anesthesia. At least they give her a gas mask first, then insert the IV...I was having nightmares of them strapping her down to put an IV in her. I know she needs to have it done and it's a very routine and minor procedure. And it'll be nice for her eye to be normal and not leaky, goopy, and crusty all of the time. So right now we're just waiting for the office to call us and set up the surgery day. They said it'll probably be in September sometime. More news to come on that!

Welcome Baby Brayden!

Yesterday our friends Julie and Richie welcomed their second child into the world! It just happened that I had to work today (my usual day off) so my Mom came in last night to watch Avery. Since she was here, we had her watch Avery for a little bit so we could sneak up to the hospital to see the new addition!

Brayden Alan was born August 3rd at 7:16am. He weighed in around 7 1/2 lbs. He seemed so tiny to me-it's hard to remember Avery being that little....you just forget so fast how small they really are!

Big sister Carly was so excited about her brother. She kept walking around pointing to him and saying "my baby brother". It was so cute!

Here's Carly holding him:

Of course I had to hold the peanut!

Gabe even decided to hold him!

First family photo:

Congratulations Julie, Richie, and Carly! Happy Birthday Brayden!!

Another Sunday Night

Here we are...another Sunday night. The weekend is over (boo!) and the work week about to begin again. We had a nice, long weekend together. Gabe took off Thursday and Friday and I had my usual Friday off so it was nice having a few extra days together.

Friday Gabe and I took Avery to story hour at the library. I try to take her there as much as I can-she really enjoys it. We went out for dinner that night since we don't get to very often these days.

Gabe always says he can't wait for the day that Avery will lay down with us and cuddle in bed. Well, on Friday before her nap, she got comfy on the couch with Gabe while he read her some stories. It was so cute! She just loves her books these days which is great! I hope she stays that way! Look at her studying the book!

Yesterday we took a trip to Buffalo for the day. We started out by stopping at my Uncle Joe's house to see them. My Dad also came by so we got to visit with everyone which was nice. We had pizza for lunch and Avery loved exploring a new house (and the cats!).

Then it was off to my Mom's house to hang out and have dinner. Avery showed off her walking skills: And played with her car:

Today we went to my in-laws house for a bit. My sister-in-law, neice and nephew were there so we all got together to visit. Then Avery and I went with one of her daycare friends to a nearby playground which was fun! Avery tried out the slides and swings and had a lot of fun! Now she's in bed, I just got back from grocery shopping and it's off to work tomorrow.

By the way, did you notice it's August 1st? Seriously?! August?! Where is this year going?! I hate to admit that I went to two stores in the past three weeks that had out Halloween stuff...just insane!

Health Scare

We got a call Wednesday night that my Dad was admitted into the hospital for some chest pain. He had been having it on and off for a few days and when he called his doctor, he wanted him to do to the ER. So, he did and they decided to admit him.

Wednesday night he had several rounds of blood work done and a chest x-ray. They said the x-ray looked abnormal but weren't sure if it had always been that way (since they had nothing to compare it to).

Thursday they did a stress test on him...he had some dye injected in him then had to walk the treadmill. Immediately after they did some photos of his heart to see how the blood was circulating. After a few hours of rest, they repeated the photos to compare them. Apparently they didn't like what they saw. So he stayed overnight again to be able to see the doctor this morning and find out more.

This morning, they transferred him via ambulance to another hospital to do an angiogram on him to take a closer look at what was going on. I guess during the procedure, my Dad's heart went into v-fib and they had to shock him to get him back! He said he was watching the procedure one second and the next he felt like he was asleep and dreaming-said it was very calm and peaceful...then he felt like he got kicked by a donkey and heard them say "he's back!" Talk about scary! Anyways, they didn't find anything during the angiogram-so he got the "all clear" and is being discharged this afternoon. So that's good news, although they really don't have an explanation for the chest pain. Hopefully it'll just go away....