Coming Home

I had a great day today. I got to hang out with one of my best friends and work on a sewing project. The project went well, and we had a great time. Then I got to make a couple of t-shirt dresses for Hosanna & her cousin. And they went well too. It all came together, my machine behaved, it was all good.

Sitting at my sewing machine felt like coming home after a long absence. I haven't done much sewing since Christmas and it felt great to sew again. Putting fabric to machine is such a relaxing activity. I need to do it more often.

Homemade Mayonnaise: FAIL

Just so you all don't think everything I touch in the kitchen turns to gold (so to speak), I wanted to share today's disaster.

I was trying to make bacon mayonnaise because well, I like bacon and I like mayo and the two combined sounded mighty tasty. (Read the recipe. It will make the rest of this post make sense.) I had bacon grease left from making baked beans on Monday that I had saved for just this purpose. I got out my blender and set to work.

Problem 1: When I started the blender, the egg & stuff that was in there splashed immediately up onto the sides, making it impossible to see what was actually going on in there (other than splashing).

Problem 2: I wasn't watching the clock. Since I couldn't see whether of not my egg and little bit of bacon grease was emulsifying, I just sort of guessed that it had been about 2 minutes, and started pouring in the rest of the bacon grease.

Problem 3: It hadn't emulsified yet. So adding the rest of the bacon grease just assured my doom. It will not now emulsify and turn into mayo.

I tried another method. I put the mess into a wide mouth jar and tried this method with my stick blender. My hand was numb by the time I gave up. It will not emulsify. So no bacon mayo for me.

Bacon Mayo: FAIL

I Could Be a Vegetarian

For the record, I am not a vegetarian. I never have been. I never will be. I like cheeseburgers too much.

But there are days that I contemplate becoming a vegetarian and making my whole family suffer with my veggie ways.

Like yesterday.

I was ill-possessed of mind or something, and I decided to cook a whole chicken. I don't know what I was thinking. I don't like cooking meat at all, really. Not because of any misguided love of animals or anything, I just think it's kind of icky. The cooking part. Not the eating part. Because I love a good roast any day of the week.

So here I am, with a whole chicken. I took it out of the freezer Monday, with intent to cook it Tuesday. Tuesday morning comes along, I pull out my chicken, and it was pretty firm for a thawed chicken. I guess I should have gotten it out on Sunday. It was still awfully frosty. I knew I had to take the giblets out of the middle, but which end were they on??? The whole thing was frozen shut anyhow.

Henny Penny took a warm bath while I made a few calls to try and determine a course of action. 2 mothers later, I had enough information to continue. Lots of prying, wiggling, dunking in water, wretching noises, and hand-washing ensued and I finally got the bird in the cooker.

The good news is... we had delicious juicy chicken for dinner. My carnivores were happy. I was happy. The bad news... I'm too frugal to pitch what's left, so I have to spend today picking the carcass and making chicken stock.

I could be a vegetarian. I really could.

Fingers in the Dirt

IT'S FINALLY SPRING!!!

(Can you tell I'm excited? Because I really really am!)

Spring has finally sprung here in the great white north of Wisconsin. The snow is melted and gone and little green things are finding their way through the dirt. And my fingers are finding their way into the dirt!

I spent yesterday raking out the flower beds in front of the house and raking along the edge of the fence. Ruby helped me load up the leaves in the wagon and take them to the compost pile. Then I started raking around the edge of the rock garden. But I couldn't finish that because the pile of wood chips we took to the garden last year was still spilling out into the yard. They had never gotten raked into the garden like we wanted. So Teagan raked them out over the garden. A few of the rocks on one side had gotten moved last year (to dump out the wood chips) and never got put back in place. Well, we started moving rocks, and pretty soon we had almost doubled the size of our little garden! It's amazing, but when we rearranged the rocks, we had enough for a much bigger circle! We raked up the piles of leaves from last year's raking (which were mostly decomposed) and put that in the new garden area. Then we spread out the wood chips over that. We will add some more something to the new area of the garden, but we've got a good start so far!

Today I went out to re-consider some lilies that grew around the edge of the garden. They were beautiful, sure, but I got tired of pulling lilies out of the eggplants. I dug up all I could, about 40 little lily shoots, plus as much of the root system as I could get. Those things are tenacious! We worked up a little dirt on the edge of the woods and threw them in there. I didn't go through a lot of trouble for them. From what I've heard they will grow anywhere. I lightly spread dirt over them and threw leaves on top. If they grow great, if not, oh well.

All in all, I am growing to love my yard & garden. I love going out there and digging around in the dirt. It's very satisfying.

We Be Jammin'

Remember the strawberries I got last week? They became jam yesterday!

5 pints, and 4 half-pints, plus a bit more

In my quest to improve the nutrition of the food we eat, I chose not to use white sugar to make my jam. I used raw honey instead. I had tried to make peach jam with honey last fall, but it never jelled. I wanted to try again.

Tanna gave me some Pomona's Pectin that she had bought but never used. Pomona's is a different kind of pectin which can be used with low-sugar, no-sugar, honey, any sweetener or none at all! It's a great product for those of us who want to ditch the white sugar. This was my first time using it, and I was very pleased with my results! All of the jam jelled perfectly as it cooled.

Another great thing about Pomona's pectin over traditional pectins... you can double or triple the batch! I used 12 cups of mashed berries and 2 1/2 cups of honey to make my jam. And I did it all at one time.

It tastes wonderful on hot pancakes!

So, how does it taste? In a word: Fresh! Instead of being overly sweet, it tastes like fresh delicious strawberries. We ate it on our pancakes this morning and it was delicious! Without all that sugar, you could actually taste the pancakes, the butter, and the strawberries. The flavors swirled around each other, doing a little dance on my taste buds. Mmmm...

Bottom line: I will be using Pomona's again. It worked great. I plan on making more jam this year with honey or other alternative sweeteners. I have some Bing cherries in the freezer that would be delightful and Teagan has requested that I try raspberry jam this summer. We'll be jammin' again soon!

Our Easter

Happy Easter! He is Risen!

I hope you all had a wonderful time celebrating the Resurrection with your families. We were able to attend church on Sunday - everyone was mostly healthy- and then we spent the rest of the day with Teagan's parents & brothers and their families. It was a very nice day.

Here are a few pictures from the day...

All dressed up for church

My poor children had to pose for pictures outside in 32 degree temps with no coats and the early morning sun blazing into their eyeballs. Because I'm mean like that.

This is my favorite. The 3 older kids were all looking down at Hosanna telling her to stand still and look at Mommy...



While we were at Noni's, Hosanna got her first real haircut. Mostly to attempt to blend in Ruby's haircutting job. It kinda worked.

Would you believe I forgot to save a lock of her hair?? What kind of mom am I anyway?? Oh yeah, the busy distracted kind...

And in case you're wondering what happened to Hosanna's nose...

She fought the sidewalk. And the sidewalk won.

My Presentation

I didn't talk much about it here, or anywhere really, but I gave a presentation yesterday. It was kind of a big deal. To me anyway.

Our parent's support group asked me to give a presentation on Jade's diet. We invited people from all over the area. I baked and bought food and researched. I'm a little obsessed with food (if you haven't noticed) so it was pretty fun for me.

Last night was the night. We had 17 people in attendance, not including me. 3 parents of kids with autism, and 14 therapists and staff from local schools. I talked for a little over an hour, covering the basics of how the diet works and talking a whole lot about food.

I baked peanut butter cookies, spice cake (with sprinkles!), strawberry-banana muffins, and brownies! I made a lot. There were leftovers....

Jade spent the whole weekend eyeing up my tote full of treats. I promised her that on Wednesday she could eat her treats. She's been snacking all day. Breakfast, lunch, and 2 snacks worth of treats so far....

I think I may have gotten a bit carried away with the food part of it. But I really wanted to give people a feel for what the diet is really about. Going into the natural foods aisle for the first time is daunting, and I wanted people to be armed with information. I also sent everyone home with a list of resources and some recipes.

It went very well. I was a little nervous going in, but this really is a topic I know well. Once I got going, it was all good. Those in attendance said they learned a lot, and I was able to encourage one mom to keep trying... the rewards are worth it. My whole intention was to inform and encourage, so mission accomplished.

Strep & Strawberries

Yesterday was interesting. I woke up with a familiar feeling...

A visit to the doctor confirmed my suspicions. I have strep throat again! For the third time this year! And Ruby has it too, for the second time. What in the world?! Craziness.

On our way home from the doctor, we picked up 16 lbs. of fresh strawberries. My fruit co-op friend called Sunday night with a great deal on berries. I didn't know I would have strep throat the next day, so I ordered 2 flats! They were really gorgeous, and a really super deal. But they needed to be done up right away. If I were to wait until after my presentation and do them on Wednesday, I would have had a lot more go south. As it was, I only had about 4 berries that I couldn't use.

Look at those beautiful berries!

I ended up just capping them and running them through the food processor. I put half of them in a big bowl in the refrigerator. They will become jam on Wednesday. The rest I measured in 1 cup increments and put in baggies to freeze. The plastic boxes that the berries came in worked perfectly to hold the baggies of puree. These will be perfect for smoothies, strawberry bread & muffins, and who knows what else!

I was super-duper excited about the strawberries, because I just last week used up the last of my berries from last year. I was expecting to wait until the end of June for good fresh strawberries, but the Lord blessed us with these right after we had run out. What a good God!

Popcorn for Breakfast

The kids & I had a new taste sensation for breakfast today.

Popcorn Cereal.

I popped up some popcorn, put it into bowls and poured milk on it, just like cereal. We topped it off with sucanat & cinnamon. It was SO tasty!! It tasted like Corn Pops, but not quite as sweet. I wonder if that's how Corn Pops started? Hmmm...

Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised with how good this was. Cheap & easy. And more nutritious than any box of cereal (especially Corn Pops).

Look Closely...

Something's different about Hosanna. I didn't notice at first. Look closely...

If you click on these you can get a closer look...

The second picture is pretty telling...

See that bare patch in the middle?

Unbeknowst to me, Hosanna got her first haircut. Courtesy of Ruby. And I didn't notice until the next day.

We met Noni in town and went to lunch. As we were waiting for our food, Noni looks at Hosanna and says, "She looks different. Did you cut her hair?" No, I say, it just looks different because it's laying down. After her bath last night it hasn't been sticking up anymore. No, she insists, the hair is shorter on top. I look again. Sure enough.

Suddenly, I have a flashback to Monday afternoon. I had picked up a pair of scissors from the kitchen table and put them in my pocket. I didn't know where they had come from. I figured Ruby got them out of Kordell's room.

I turn to look at Ruby. Ruby, I say, did you cut Hosanna's hair? Ah, the mischievous smile told all. She did indeed cut Hosanna's hair. Thankfully, she didn't cut it quite to the scalp. It's still a whole half inch long. Noni said to just leave it and we'll gradually blend it in as she gets haircuts.

No more fountains for awhile. I'm sure glad I took pictures of it while I had the chance.

Ruby's Angeled Eggs

Ruby did such a good job helping make the "angeled" eggs yesterday that I wanted to share a picture! She was so proud of herself. She peeled the eggs, mixed the filling, and filled the eggs. Mama put on the "sprinkles".

What a big helper! I think I'm working myself out of a job. At least I hope I am...

PS... If you look really closely at her left hand, you can see the scar from her bagel-cutting incident a few weeks ago. It's looking pretty good now.

Suzy Homemaker Hard at Work

We're all finally feeling better, so it's back to the normal routine around here.

Having been sick myself or taking care of sick little ones for the last two weeks, I haven't done much more than the bare minimum required to keep us all from starving. But today I plowed into my kitchen with renewed vigor!

For breakfast, I made strawberry bread with chilled strawberry soup. (Because yesterday I was looking longingly through my Simply in Season cookbook longing for spring vegetables and decided to splurge and use my last bag of strawberries from the freezer to make something springy!) I also made spaghetti for Jade to take in her lunch.

For lunch, Ruby & I whipped up some "angeled" eggs and served them with cheese and leftover strawberry bread from breakfast. (Because while I was surfing the internet this morning, reading about Laura's Angeled Eggs, Ruby came in and said they looked yummy and we should make some, so we did!)

After lunch, I decided to make bread. We'd been out for a few days. I'm not sure what I changed or what I'm doing wrong, but the last few rounds of bread-making have been a bit dangerous! During the kneading (which my mixer does for me) big hunks of dough are coming to life and flying out of the mixer and across the kitchen!! It's a little scary! Plus, my dough consistency just hasn't been right the last 3 times or so. Hmmm. I'm still learning all the science of bread making. I'll keep tinkering with it. Anyway, I made 3 loaves of bread and a pan of cinnamon rolls.

While I was making the bread, a pot of black beans simmered on the stove. I cooked up 2 pounds of beans with intentions of freezing them for future use. From the 2 pounds, I got 6 cans worth of beans (6 2-cup portions) and 3 cups of bean broth. So easy... the beans don't need much babysitting. The hardest part was bagging them up for the freezer.

On the menu tonight... Black beans & rice, of course!

11 years ago...

Who are those kids!? Man, we're getting old...

Eleven years ago today, I married my sweetheart. We were just babies, at 18 & 19 years old, having no idea what lay ahead. "For richer or poorer, in sickness and in health" - though we mostly assumed that meant richer and in health. Because the world is full of optimism when you are young and in love.

The last 11 years have held a lot of excitement. We have moved 6 times. We've welcomed 4 children into the world and let one go on to heaven. Gone through 2 surgeries, and more doctor visits than I can count. Endured disability and bankruptcy. Yet the Lord has always provided for us. He has kept us close to each other and close to Him through all of it.

I love Teagan more now than the day we married. I have seen him grow into a mighty man of God, an amazing Daddy and a wonderful husband. I can't wait to see what the next 11 years hold.

Quiet, but not in a Good Way

Well, we never did get to go out on Saturday night. Kordell took a turn for the worse, as did a few other children, and we called it off. The night wasn't a total loss though. We tucked the kiddos in early and watched a DVD at home. All the entertainment, none of the driving.

Over the next couple of days, it was one sick kid after another. One would get better while another got worse, and they just went round and round. I was sick again on Monday. Thankfully, it was short lived. Yesterday we finally decided to take Ruby & Hosanna in to the doctor. They both have this junky sounding cough and a fever that won't let up. Ruby's strep test was negative, and she has no bacterial infections, just a nasty virus. Hosanna has another ear infection, and likely the same virus as Ruby - a double whammy. Teagan & I have been up with them two nights in a row.

On the positive side, sick children are quiet children. It has been a nice reprieve for a couple days. We've spent a lot of time snuggling and reading books. It's been nice. But I am ready for everyone to be healthy again. We've had our fair share of this germy stuff and I'd rather have healthy kids than quiet ones.

His Compassions Never Fail

Sometimes God is just sweet to us. (If you're in my Bible study, I totally stole that line from Beth, but it's so good!)

It's true! I know, cerebrally, that God is good and faithful and mighty and all that, but sometimes He's just sweet to me. He knows that's what I need Him to be sometimes. I might be able to ignore or take for granted His goodness, but His sweetness just touches me and lifts my face up to His.

A few days ago, I was really mad at God. Really mad. Like whiny kid whose plans got spoiled mad. Pouting and whining and I told Him so. God, this is not fair. What kind of cruel joke is it to perfectly arrange 2 date nights in a row (which are desperately needed) and then have the kids & I get sick?? I am so mad! This stinks! Part of me wondered if it was even okay to be mad at God. But I figured telling Him I was mad was better than just stewing in it.

Over the next day and a half, the Lord just poured out sweetness on me. He used Ruby and our family memory verse to soothe my aching heart. Just try to stay mad at God with your 3 year old telling you this at each meal (and in between):

Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:
Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
- Lamentations 3:21-23

I finally accepted the fact that we just weren't going to get to go on our dates. But, can you guess what happened? Yesterday morning, we got up and Jade wasn't coughing. Hosanna wasn't throwing up. I was feeling better. We were able to take the older kids to our friend's house and go to the concert last night, like we'd planned! And today, things are okay. Kordell was a little under the weather, but already feeling better this afternoon. We might just get to go out again.

And not only did we get to go last night, but we were really blessed by the concert. Andrew Peterson's music and storytelling just have a way of getting right into your heart and touching those hurt places with the soothing balm of Jesus. I wanted to share with you a song that really touched my heart last night, courtesy of youtube.



Thank you Lord for being so sweet to me! I pray that all of you reading this will be blessed by the sweetness of our faithful, compassionate God this week.

Sick Again

AGAIN!

We all took turns a few weeks ago, and Teagan was the last one still fighting it. Not anymore! I came down with strep throat yesterday (again!), Jade has been coughing non-stop, and Hosanna has a tummy bug of some kind.

The worst part...

Teagan & I were going to go out on a date not one night, but 2 nights in a row! The babysitters all fell into place and we were so excited. But unless we have a miraculous touch from God overnight tonight, we aren't going anywhere.

I'm so bummed.

It's Almost Spring!

Spring is so close I can almost taste it.

We've had gorgeous weather here the last few days. Well, for March in Wisconsin anyway. All you southern people, I don't want to hear about how it's 75 and sunny!! It's been 50-60 here and sunny and the snow is melting away! There's grass in my yard! Brown grass, but grass nonetheless.

I'm so excited!!!

The little Green Project: Cheesy Broccoli Penne

For today's installment of The little Green Project, I wanted to share a recipe.

Lately I've had a hankering for macaroni & cheese. I used to love that blue box stuff, but the more I know about food, the more unappetizing it is. I started making my own macaroni & cheese, using real, good for you ingredients. Yesterday I decided to take it up a notch and add a green vegetable. So "Cheesy Broccoli Penne" was born.


Cheesy Broccoli Penne

8 oz. whole wheat penne pasta
1/4 cup or so chopped onion
1 T. butter
1 T. flour (soft white wheat works well)
sprinkle of pepper
1 cup milk
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1-2 cups frozen broccoli, thawed or fresh broccoli, steamed

Cook the penne in a large pot. While it is cooking, in a 2 qt. saucepan, saute the onion in the butter. Add flour & pepper. Mix well. Add milk all at once. Cook, stirring constantly, until thickened. Add cheese and stir until melted. Add broccoli and cook, stirring often, until broccoli is warmed. By this time, the penne should be all cooked & drained. Add the broccoli cheese sauce to the penne in the larger pot. Stir to combine. Serves 4.

I was actually surprised at how fast this was to put together. It didn't take much longer than boxed mac & cheese and it is so much better for you!

For more green ideas, check out Heavenly Homemakers little Green Project!

Good Clean Fun

Hosanna got to take a bath in the sink a few weeks ago. Every kid has to have a sink bath at least one time in their life, right? Well, she loved it. It was super cute and she had a blast. (Sorry no pics of the actual bath.)

Well, Little Miss I-Can-Climb-on-Anything decided she wanted to do that again. Upon hearing strange noises from the kitchen, I walked out of the office to see this:


Cute! But naughty!! Now we can't keep her out of the sink!! Every time I turn my back she is trying to get in there. She's going to keep me on my toes, that's for sure.

Bad Mom Award

I get the Bad Mom Award for today.

It's just been a bad day all around.

I was awakened by my husband saying, "I'm sorry I let you oversleep and Jade is wet." Which means the whole bed is wet. And all her clothes that she had picked out the night before to wear today. And she was even more unhappy about it than I was. After a harrowing 40 minutes, we got her safely on the bus. Whew.

Teagan left to go to a friend's house for coffee like he does every Tuesday. I was in the office catching up with Facebook and my blog reader, printing out Kordell's school work for the morning, and shopping for the best price for coconut flour. Ruby came into the office crying and holding her hand... which was bleeding.

She had tried to cut a bagel with the big (sharp) bread knife. It had slipped and sunk deep into the top of her left hand. I applied pressure and called Teagan. He came blazing home to rescue us. He bandaged it the best he could, but we decided that she really should go get it looked at. I was really thinking she needed stitches. I called Noni and she headed right over.

At that point, I started to feel a little woozy. I tried to relax, take some deep breaths, but it wasn't working. I said, "I think I'm going to faint". And sure enough, I did! Let me just say that the only superhero in this house today is Teagan. He did a great job getting Ruby finished up and out of the way so he could take care of me. I don't know how long I was out, but I had no idea what was going on, and I felt really terrible for a long time after I came to. Noni arrived, and Teagan left with Ruby, and I was too out of it to go with them.

As it turns out, she didn't need stitches. But the doctor said it was close. She almost cut her tendon. And if Teagan hadn't bandaged it as well as he had to start with, she would have needed stitches. Praise the Lord! She has to wear a splint to keep her pointer finger straight so the top of the hand will heal properly. But otherwise, she is okay.

I am also okay. I didn't break my glasses or bang my head or otherwise hurt myself when I fainted. And that is good. However, I feel like a really bad mom. I should have been in the kitchen instead of the office. It's a laptop, for pete's sake, I didn't have to be in the office. I'm in the kitchen now and they are still getting into trouble! That's kids for you though. I will be more conscious of things in the future.