Muffin Tin Monday: Part Deux!

Okay. So it's really my third one, not the second. But when I was coming up with titles for my last one, I thought up this title, but the theme than was alphabet. THIS week's theme was Numbers/123. At first I thought "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish"!! But then I realized it wasn't really a counting book, other than that one line. Nuts. It would have been neat to stick with a Seuss theme. I thought of Sesame Street's The Count and thought of making a sandwich that looked like his head, then I could put 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 things in each of the other holes. Then my sanity returned. So I went with

"One, Two. Buckle My shoe. Three, Four. Shut the door. Five, Six. Pick up sticks. Seven, Eight. Lay them straight. Nine, Ten. A big fat hen!"

Or in this case: One, Two, a Cheesy Shoe. Three, Four, a Sandwich Door. Five, Six, Pretzel Stix. Seven Eight, Green Peppers Cut Straight. Nine, Ten, a Big Fat chick-hastily-altered-to-look-more-like-a-Hen!" :)

One, Two: I don't have a shoe cookie cutter (I'm kicking myself for not getting the Fairy Tale set. Nothing in it looked awesome, and I was like "Pfft. It's not like I'll ever need to make a SHOE!" D'oh!) So I hacked it out by hand. I cut off a little corner of fruit leather into a square, then jabbed out a hole in the middle, to make it look like a buckle. I could have opted for ties and changed the rhyme to "One, Two. Tie my shoe." but I couldn't think of anything other than licorice lace to use as ties, and I don't have any! I glued it on with peanut butter. (Too lazy to get out the cream cheese!)

Three, Four: The door was the easiest part (of the stuff I made.) PB & Nutella (I liked the brown colors. Like wood. For a door) sandwich, and I used a steak knife to crisply slice off the edges. Sliced olive doorknob didn't look quite right, and I couldn't think of anything else to use, so I ook a section of a slice and laid it across the middle.

Five, Six: Pretzel Stix. Left over from my first MTM. I'm liking these lazy elements!

Seven, Eight: I was going to use some kind of straight item, like celery or carrots. Only she doesn't like celery and lately just nibbles and spits out carrots into a little masticated carrot-bit pile. So I decided to use the green bell pepper that we had bought at our recent trip to the store. I try and let her pick out a fruit or veggie to try, since feeling involved and making choices increases her chances of eating it! Notice that I made 8 slices to 'lay straight!'

Nine, Ten: Ugh. I don't HAVE a chicken cutter. I thought about doing a hard-boiled egg, only I don't know how to do that, and the raw one I tried for my first pictures looked stupid. Stared unbelievingly at my regular and mini Easter cutter sets at the lack of chickenage. Where do they think all those eggs come from? The DUCK?! So I used my Farm set chick. It looked too chick-like. I racked my brain trying to remember what the difference is in the silhouette, so I could try and modify it. Comb. Wattle. Wing? Oh. Tail. I used part of a small flower cutter on the edge of the fruit leather to make a comb, then the head part of the chick cutter to make it fit. Used a petal of the flower cutter to make the wattle, and it looked fine as it was. Glued them on with PB. (See above!) Raided my cutter stash to find something wing-like and found the pig, saw the tail, and something in my brain went "Ah-HA!" Cut a partial piggy butt out, then shaped it to fit with the chickie-cutter's behind. More PB glue. Sprinkle for the eye. Voila!  [Note to self: Use free Amazon gift cards you just earned with your SwagBucks to buy chicken and shoe cookie cutters!]

My attempt with a raw egg to see if I wanted to bother lying about it boiling one. Note the 6 pretzel stix. I added more after and forgot to take them out for the 'official' pictures. We'll just pretend there's 11 in there (5 + 6.)

We ate outside, since we're frantically prepping our garage for a huge hobby-gamer-blowout-garage sale (no, not THAT kind of blowout! The "get rid of all my crap" kind... Ooo still a double meaning!) The fruit leather  (we call it "chewy fruit") on the chicken got hucked off the porch first thing, but she saved the 'buckle' for me. *Sniffle* She used to LOVE chewy fruit. I bought a whole box of 48 strips at Costco. Actually, she'll still eat it plain. But she throws it away when I use it to decorate her other foods. She just eats the scraps later!

"Oh no! His bah-mum came off!" (his bottom) "An olive? Special just for me!"

"Two cheeses! I made a match!" (She loves the AniMatch memory game app on my iPhone!)

I hate peppers. Anything with the word 'pepper' in it's name. Black pepper. White pepper. Bell pepper. Sweet pepper. Red Hot Chili Peppers. Anything except Dr. Pepper. MMMmmmm! I hate the smell of bell peppers. I hate how they ruin the taste of the rest of my food by just being cooked with it. I hate the taste of them cooked. 

But apparently, I don't hate the green ones raw! She made me try it first, to show her it was really not terrible. And being the brave, loving and supportive mommy I am, I was willing to make that sacrifice for my kid. Huh. Not terrible. I wouldn't choose it over another food, or eat it like an apple (like my hubby does) or anything. But if there were a veggie tray at a party, I would eat a slice or two. Dipped in Ranch. I feel almost like a grown-up now! Next thing you know, I'll be going to bed at a decent hour, or remembering to feed the baby myself once in a while or something!