momstown Oakville

Thursday, July 19, 2012

Delicious Orzo with Roasted Veggies Recipe

I discovered this  orzo recipe a few years ago while watching the Food Network.  I have made a few changes based on my family's preferences, the original recipe comes from the cookbook Barefoot Contessa Parties.  This recipe is colourful and keeps well over several days, in fact it only gets tastier!  I have served this both as a main dish or a side dish.  It's great at potlucks too.

It's a perfect summer dish and you can even just use leftover grilled veggies from the BBQ if you have that on hand.  Feel free to swap out the veggies I've suggested and add your families favourites instead.

What you need:

1 small eggplant, peeled and 3/4 inch diced (I just guess the right size!)
1 red pepper, 1 inch diced
1 yellow pepper, 1 inch diced
1 red onion, peeled and 1 inch diced
2 garlic cloves minced
1/4 cup olive oil
1 1/2 tsp sea salt (you can use regular salt)
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 pound of orzo pasta (about a cup)

Dressing:
1/3 lemon juice (2 lemons squeezed)
1/8 to 1/4 cup olive oil
1 tsp pepper

Toppings:
4 scallions, minced
Diced feta cheese (not crumbled) - as much as you'd like!
8 basil leaves, cut into strips


What you do:

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

Toss the eggplant, peppers, onion and garlic with the olive oil, salt and pepper on a large sheet pan.  Roast for 30 minutes, until browned, turning vegetables once at the halfway point with a spatula.

Meanwhile, cook the orzo for 7 to 9 minutes, until tender.  Drain and transfer to a large serving bowl.  Add the roasted vegetables to the pasta, scraping all the liquid and seasonings from the roasting pan into the bowl.

For the dressing, combine the ingredients and pour on the pasta and veggies.  Let cool to room temperature then add the toppings.  Serve at room temperature.

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

How to eat sand the right way!

Yesterday momstown Oakville's Junior Chef's gathered at Coronation Park to make edible sea and sand.  A big thank you to Miss Sherri from Circle Time Parties for leading the kids through this activity.

So how do you make sand and sea taste good?

You'll need a small, clear plastic cup to create your scene.  First you take some chocolate cake (or chocolate cookies) and crumble it up to make the bottom of the sea. Then you add the 'sea' (blue jello) and some fish of course!  We also added some cut up fruit such as strawberries and grapes to mimic other things you may find in the sea.



Next comes the sand.  The kids had a great time smashing graham crackers to make their sand.


Once the 'beach' was ready, we finished off our creative snack by adding some animal crackers on top and an umbrella to keep them protected from the sun!



All of our Junior Chef's did a really great job and had lots of fun!  Our Junior Chef program runs once a month. Next month we will be doing something birthday themed since we are so excited to be celebrating our 5th birthday with a big party on August 14th.  


Do you think your little ones would like to be Junior Chef's?  Join us for a 4 week FREE trial to learn more about our Junior Chef program and all the other 40+ events and programs we run each month.

Monday, July 16, 2012

Friday, July 13, 2012

Cheers! To A Big Glass Of Water! Tips For Keeping Kids Hydrated

Keeping kids hydrated and healthy during these hot summer days is so important. While we are so busy jumping in pools, lakes and running through splash pads, it's often easy to forget to stop the kids for a quick drink of water and a break to rehydrate. Keeping kids (and mom) hydrated during these busy and hot summer months is key to keeping the family healthy.

Children can become dehydrated easily.  Some of the early signs to watch for are irritability and fatigue.  Late stages of dehydration can result in symptoms like heat cramps, exhaustion and heat stroke.  It's important to keep kids hydrated starting first thing in the morning (and throughout the day) to avoid any of these symptoms.

The best thing to prevent dehydration is water!  So, always have water on hand for your kids.  During the hot summer months kids should be drinking water at least 6 times a day.  For active kids who are running around outside, and sweating, try for small sips of water every 15-20 minutes. 

Momstown meals also has some great refreshing snack ideas to offer a tasty alternative to water!  Try these Fruity Frozen Yogurt snacks as a great way to stay cool.

Have fun and stay safe this summer!

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Travelling with kids?

*This post is written by momstown Oakville's Community Manager, Sarah M*

We try to travel often as a family and the most popular question I get from other moms isn't "where are you going?" but "how do you do it?" with three young kids.  We may make it look easy in the pictures of smiling faces on the beach or kids jumping in the hot tub for "apres ski", but there is an stressful and sometimes unpleasant side to travelling with little ones! We've learned along the way and have been able to really make things easier on ourselves.  We are able to enjoy more and stress less!


With summer vacation upon us, so many families are taking off on vacations together.  I thought I'd share a few things we learned along the way:

1. We've learned that our kids are really the happiest with the simple things!  Yes, a bucket and a shovel on the beach, or a popsicle pool side.  It doesn't have to be days filled with adventure (although we like those too).  We learned to put many relaxing days into our vacation, and just enjoy spending uninterrupted time with our kids.



2. We also don't put stress on the kids (or our wallets) with too many restaurant meals! We try to always stay somewhere with a full kitchen and cook most meals in.  A place with a washer and dryer sure can lighten the luggage load too!

3. We travel with as little as possible as far as "baby gear" goes!  We have managed (thanks to google) to find baby gear rental places.  We rent extra strollers, cribs, we even rented an exersaucer and bouncy swing.  These are all things that make you feel like you have the comforts of home, without dragging too much with you!

4. We focus on making memories with our children, and enjoy seeing the excitement in their eyes!  We've certainly given up on the idea of coming home from a vacation feeling rested and relaxed!  We often come home more exhausted than when we left.  We do however have the memories that are priceless.  Our kids are only young once - and we figure we'll catch up on sleep when they are older.

Safe travels this summer:)

Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Tales for Tots: Clifford at the Circus!

This month momstown Oakville is all about the circus!  Our books, crafts and programs are all based around this exciting theme that has the kids eager to learn and participate!

Today, momstown Oakville hosted Tales for Tots where we made some great circus crafts (Clifford on a tight rope), and we shared a book from Scholastic Canada "Clifford at the Circus".  The kids loved the book, and really enjoyed hearing about Clifford getting into trouble as well as helping out at the circus. Many of our momstown kids are BIG Clifford fans!


Thanks to Scholastic Canada, we are able to give away a copy of this book!


We are also really excited about Clifford this month because he will be joining us for our momstown Oakville 5th Birthday Party!  This is a FREE community event in Oakville, you won't want to miss.  For details about the party, click here.

To join us for our monthly Tales for Tots event, register for a FREE 4 week trial.

Sunday, July 8, 2012

Milestone: Baby's First Haircut

This morning I took my 16 month old daughter for her first haircut.  We went to Little Sprouts Cuts for Kids as they do a really cute first haircut certificate, before and after pictures and give you a lock of hair in a little keepsake bag as well.  My poor second child has not had nearly the same amount of pictures taken and milestones documented as my first child, so I wanted to make sure I captured this milestone.

Cutting a little girls hair for the first time is different then cutting a little boys hair for the first time.  As our main  momstown mama has said, hair drama starts early!  When I took my son in, I knew he would come out with shorter hair looking like a little boy with a standard little boy haircut.  I didn't want my daughter's hair cut too short and she's got cute curls in the back and on the sides and I didn't want to loose those completely.  But cut it short in the front and keep in long in the back??  That's called a mullet and not really the look I was going for!

Our hairdresser at Little Sprouts Cuts for Kids did a great job at cleaning up her hair and making sure it was no longer in her face but still leaving some length at the back.  She looks very cute if I do say so myself.

The before picture:

Lots of flyaways!
The cut begins
What is going on?
All done with a  little clip and everything!
For the baby book :)

No tears for this little girl, in fact I think she quite enjoyed herself.  Give it a few years and I may be throwing a spa themed birthday party!