Friday Night Pizza

So, apparently, we like traditions that revolve around food. We've always enjoyed homemade pizza, usually on Fridays. Since we've moved here it's turned into an Official Family Tradition. The kids set the table fancy, and write up a menu. I make dough, sauce, toppings. It is a nice way to start the weekend.

Here is my kitchen station: onions caramelizing, sauce saucing, dough rising, and basil being chopped.

Here are the kids setting the table fancily. That paper is the menu they hang up every Friday.

Taken by Rebecca. I'm chopping something...

Here's our basil. We got it especially for pizza night.

Here's a sign so that Eric doesn't get lost on his way downstairs to the restaurant from his office :)

Here are the kids' pizzas before going into the oven. Becca likes caramelized onions and basil on hers (and it has to be heart-shaped.) Justin likes olives, basil, and extra mozzarella. He doesn't care what shape as long as there's a lot of it!

And here they are eating it (the best part, of course :)) We also drink juice, and mix it with sparkling water, and the kids call it homemade soda. We usually have water, so it's a big Friday treat to have "soda." Can you see the big orange stain on the tablecloth? That's from the kids filling their juice so high it spilled everywhere.

We usually have chocolate mousse for dessert, but I forgot to take a picture of that. (It's the easiest, yummiest, cheat-iest mousse recipe ever. I discovered you can whip some heavy cream, melt chocolate chips with a bit of butter, and fold them together. It tastes just like fancy chocolate mousse, but is SO easy and quick!) And that's our pizza night. Pretty soon we'll have a food tradition for every day of the week...

But this day reminds me every single week how really simple traditions can become so important and fun for the kids. They (we all) look forward to it every week!