Eat your greens: pesto pasta

My kids have never been the best raw veggie eaters.  We're working on it.  Until they start eating their salad, broccoli and green beans (I'm not giving up!), I have to be more creative with how I prepare and serve veggies, especially green ones, because those are scary.  Pesto pasta is one place we have succeeded.

I have found that it doesn't matter what kind of green I use for the base... I've used basil (in the summer when we have a lot), cilantro, parsley, spinach, even a spring greens mix.  Every batch I make is a little different, I just use whatever we have on hand.  I don't normally measure things out, but here's the basic recipe, you can change it to suit your taste:

Pesto Pasta

Ingredients

1 lb favorite pasta

4-8 cups greens (basil, cilantro, parsley, spinach or other greens)

1 cup nuts (pine nuts, cashews, peanuts, almonds, sunflower seeds, pecans, etc. or a combination)

1/3+ cup olive oil

1 cup shredded parmesan cheese

1 tsp. salt

Directions

Cook pasta until al dente.  While pasta is cooking, place remaining ingredients in a food processor.

I normally fill the food processor almost to the top with greens.  I was just running low.

Pulse until smooth.  Add more olive oil if needed.

When pasta has finished cooking, save a couple cups of the water and drain the rest.

Toss the pasta, pesto sauce and about 1 cup pasta water (plus or minus... add more water if the pesto isn't mixing well.)  Then serve!  I hope your kids (and you) like it as much as we do.

Saying thank you

With each of the kids birthdays comes many gifts and well wishes from family and friends.  So I try to spend some time in the days (or weeks) after each one helping the kids thank those who remembered them.  I'm certainly not perfect at it, sometimes we forget, and sometimes a simple phone call or text is all I can squeeze in.  But there is something about a handwritten note that I love.

I took this picture of Will the day before his birthday and thought it would make a cute thank you card.  After printing it, I glued it to some cardstock so I could write a little note on the back.

I also love to have a stash of homemade cards on hand to use for birthdays and thank you's so we don't have to be scrambling at the last second.

Scribble drawings 

Water color