1 year?! Where did that go!?

Exactly one year ago today i was probably at one of the most miserable times.  I was 38 weeks pregnant, I was struggling with SVT, It was 95 degrees every day, i was still working part time, and I was about the size of a narwhal...which is 3500 lbs for those who aren't narwhal specialists.  Aren't narwhals fascinating creatures?!  I've never seen one at Seaworld or a zoo or anything, so i thought they were extremely endangered, but no....no they are not.  In fact they aren't even threatened.  Barely even a concern!  So why don't we hear more about them!?  The wikipedia page on them is tiny!  It's like nobody cares!  I care narwhals....i care.
So anyways....my baby will be one year old in four days.  That's crazy!  We had a family get together tonight to celebrate and let him open his gifts in the comforts of home.  We couldn't all get together until around 6:30pm and bedtime is USUALLY 7 so we stayed home.  This little man had the best day and behaved SO well.  We had taken him to the zoo earlier so he had a blast looking at the animals and wandering the zoo...and then he got to open presents, and eat CAKE!  The best pictures of the boy came from cake eating....which was HILARIOUS with this hambone!

we will DEFINITELY be giving this another go with a better photo shoot in the future.  The boy loves his cake!! :)

zucchini cheddar biscuits!

do yourself a favor....and make these today.  I came across the recipe through thepioneerwoman.com, which led me to tastykitchen.com, which led me to acozykitchen.com.  They looked yummy and I was in an odd mood to bake, and had 2 zucchinis to do something with.  So if you like Red Lobster's biscuits, and who doesn't...so if you are a true blooded American, make these today :)

first you'll need to shred/grate up about 1 cup of zucchini, which is basically one larger sized zucchini.
Zucchini is a glorious food, it can be sauteed, fried, grilled, baked, mashed, shredded, stripped, sliced...ANYTHING!
anyways...back to this....

after you shred the zucchini place it into a cheesecloth and squeeze the juices out of it.  There is a lot of juice in those babies!  Place them aside and sprinkle 1/2 tsp of salt and a dash of flour over them.  Make sure they are dry or the world will indeed end.
Next you'll want to realize that your infant son smells ripe and change his diaper.  It's nasty so you'll need to wash your hands too.  Then get totally pre-occupied in following this recipe and watching your baby, and waking up your toddler because if she sleeps too long she'll never go to bed tonight, and take no more pictures of the mixing process like you had planned on doing because WAHLAH!  They are done!

easiest recipe EVER right?!
 ok but no really the whole recipe is taken from this site...
I made some slight changes shown below...
http://acozykitchen.com/

Makes 15 biscuits

1 cup zucchini, shredded (about 1 large zucchini)
2 teaspoons salt, divided
1 cup grated cheddar
2 1/2 cups of flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 stick butter, warm and cubed
1 cup milk
Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C).

Shred the zucchini. Using a cheese cloth, add the zucchini to the center and squeeze all of the excess water out. Transfer to a small bowl and add 1/2 teaspoon salt and a dash of flour. Mix and let stand for 10 minutes.
In a large bowl, sift flour, baking powder and salt. Working quickly, add the cubed butter and break up with your hands until they’re the size of small peas.
Add the milk, zucchini and cheddar until moistened. Drop batter, using two tablespoons, on a baking sheet lined with parchment.
Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until edges are golden brown. Serve warm with pat of butter.

I made 2 pans worth at one time and i think it took closer to 20 mins for mine to bake up....so just watch 'em!

sneak peak behind the camera

alright here is a peak behind my lens.  The picture of Kenzie that i got yesterday wasn't exactly one that I had time to focus on and compose correctly since Xander was about to walk into our neighbors yard and Kenzie only looks at me for about .126937309 seconds.  I snapped the photo right as she looked at me and it captured her eyes in their gorgeousness well enough, but it just wasn't quite what i wanted.  So here is a before and after edits.

I cropped to the rule of thirds to focus on her eyes.  Then I upped the exposure a little.  I tinted the grass behind her with some slight orange and brightened it up so it sorta faded into the background.  After that I exposed the entire photo slightly more and brought up Kenzie's skin tone so that her skin wasn't washed out.  Then I tinted everything with a light red to give it the ethereal feel.  Once that was done i fixed the focus onto her face and blurred everything else ever so slightly.  So hopefully the pic doesn't look over editted, but there is definitely some work behind the scenes. I normally try to do more of this before I even take the photo but with these two movers and scooters, who has time!?