Daffodils & Pierogies

I really can't believe how gorgeous the weather has been the last few days. When Matt got home from work today, we decided to take advantage of the sunshine and loaded up the gang for a nice long walk at the park around the corner.

Riker seemed captivated by all the trees.

When we came home, I saw this:

My daffodils are blooming! I think they're a little confused, but that's okay. Naturally the first thing I did after seeing this was change the wallpapers on my phone and laptop...bye-bye falling snow, hellooo spring flowers and flip-flops!

Dinner

I had originally planned to have soup for dinner, but it was way too hot in the house for that. We opted for pierogies and veggies instead. Side note: I used to think pierogies were really unhealthy, but if you stick to the serving size they're only about 250 calories - not bad!

I needed to use up some veggies in our crisper, so I just threw in everything I had - red peppers, onions, cherry tomatoes and broccoli. I sauteed them in a little olive oil with garlic powder, dried basil and crushed red pepper flakes. Just before the veggies were done, I added a half cup of the pasta water and a splash of half & half to make a little sauce. You don't need a lot of cream and butter to moisten things up and make it tasty.

Then I dumped the whole thing over the cooked pierogies and sprinkled it with parmesan cheese.

I loved how the veggies soaked up a lot of flavor but still stayed slightly crisp. Delicious!

After dinner we headed out to attend a cooking class! A friend of our family teaches a weekly healthy eating course, and I've been wanting to take it forever. Our schedule finally allowed it tonight, and it was a lot of fun. After learning about all kinds of healthy things, we stopped off for vanilla soft serve cones (or "creemees" for my VT friends)...the one thing this warm weather is not good for is my ice cream addiction!