FOOD, my favorite topic

I need one of those chef hats. I bet if I had one, I'd look as psyched as this girl when I cook:

I just know that if I get one, my kitchen will magically triple in size and everything will taste heavenly. I'll be known across the land as CHEF CREEL. People will come from miles and miles to marvel at my creations and "ooh" and "ahh" about how talented I am. How do you raise 1 1/2 year old twins, teach, keep the house, maintain friendships, find time for yourself and your husband and still have time to turn out delectable meals?

Yeah right.

If I had the time....if only I had the time....I would experiemnt, create and serve delicious, healthy, innovative meals.

Since I don't, we eat mostly sandwiches or on really bad days, cereal for dinner.

In the process of hunting down tasty meals and snacks for the kids (and let's be honest, Steve and I too) I've stumbled across several blogs/websites devoted to this and other mommy things. To make our lifestyle (specifically meals) less stressful and more budget friendly, I have started to create a meal plan for each week. For the most part, the kids eat what we eat, (recent visit to our faviorite Chinese restaurant with them was so fun!) but as I'm running out of ideas, I figured this would be a sensible place to start.

For tonight, I'll be trying Pancake Crepes with banana, peanut butter, and honey (as seen here) with yogurt and watermelon for the babies. Steve and I will have leftover Beef Strognanoff with steamed brocolli and I'll put the French Dip Sandwich ingredients in the crockpot for tomorrow.

Yes, it's a lot of work to put this together, but I have to believe that this gets easier as I create a reseviour of menus and get the hang of planning, grocery shopping, and cooking without spending all my time cleaning the kitchen- seriously, any volunteers for that job?

The other evening as I was preparing veggie, chicken and cheese quesadillas (with guacamole dip) for the kids, Josiah was pulling on one leg screaming and Lilly on the other. I wanted to yell at them, "Don't you see I'm making you a delicious meal? Can't you appreciate that this isn't from a can or the freezer? I haven't eaten since 10:30 and I'm not whining!"

Geez.

Instead, I chopped, diced and shredded my way through the meal preparation knowing that, many years from now, they were sure to rise up and call me blessed...or whatever it is kids do once they realize their parents are awesome. They will realize that at some point, right?

My little helper:

Cute video of them. Excuse my awful singing :)