In a slump....

Not just the markets, but we are too:) Add in the fact we are looking at needing to make a major lifestyle change in how I cook, snacks we eat, etc.....I really need to work to combat it.


So I'm wondering just how I can stock my pantry to our best advantage. I've never been a big menu planner, but I think that has to change now. For the girl who up until 3 or 4 years ago thought the perfect mac n cheese came out of a box..... Hamburger helper used to be a mainstay in our diet.... - this has to be an attitude adjustment. A good one, I think.....

So I have a question a couple of questions for everyone:

• What are some items in your pantry that you consider essential to cooking from scratch????
• What do your kids eat for snack foods? I need low sugar, healthy snacks now....
• Is there any value to a freezer inventory? I pretty much have an idea what is in there right now...but don't know quantities.....with 2 big chest freezers and 2 refrigerator/freezer combos....we've got lots of storage space.
• What in the HECK do I do with dried mixed beans and dried kidney beans (other than bean soup, chilli and baked beans?)
• Any good down home cooking cookbook ideas......
• And most importantly (to me) give me some good, quick, easy recipes for dinner. We are SICK of the same old stuff.......keeping in mind that Todd is really and meat and potatoes kind of guy.....and my cooking style could best be described as the lazy cooking from scratch style...

I know....these aren't difficult questions at all.....right?? haha

Kris

Science Fair

Jessie had science fair yesterday. For 3rd graders in our school, it's voluntary and counts towards extra credit in science. She decided to grow a coal garden - which has been a lot of fun for both kids to do time and time again. Todd & I both wondered why the kid who has a 103.89% in science would want to voluntarily do extra credit work. But we are so glad she did.

Sunday she spent about 3 hours working on the board. Drawing it out on paper, planning it out on the board in pencil, using the markers and gluing all the pictures down. Not to mention the hour and a half it took her to write and type her report.

Last night we went up to the school to see just how she did - she got a "superior". And her "grade" would have been a 98 out of 100. Which earned her an extra 20 points of extra credit.

And some of the other interesting projects that were up there:

In 4th grade doing the science fair is mandatory. She already knows what she is doing - "how a baby calf is born." So I guess her and I will be out there checking on the cows regularly in a few weeks to get some interesting pictures.

Have a great day!
Kris

Simple Weekends...

I had a fantastic weekend.

The baby quilt for our friends on the fire department - is on the frame ready to be quilted:

I worked on spring table runners for my Mom and I, but am going to put these on hold until I buy a yard of fabric from this fabric line for the center stripe (which is discontinued so I have to wait for an auction to end on Ebay). For this pattern, I'm thinking the cherries are too busy......

I cooked a terrific dinner for Saturday night - ham loaf (brought ready to bake from our butcher), green beans frozen from last year's garden, homemade egg noodles, and artisian bread in 5 min. a day.

Fortunately for me, everyone loved the egg noodles. I had my doubts they would turn out, but they did. I cannot wait to eat the few that are left for lunch.

Today I baked a yellow cake to frost with the leftover blueberry frosting from the Angel Food Cake. And we had beef stroganoff w/ homemade egg noodles (again) for dinner.

And I finished pillows for Jessie's bed. Last night we ran to Lowe's to get the pieces to attach the headboard and footboard to her bed. I'm pleased with how it came out:

Now I'm off to watch the rest of the race - have a great Sunday evening!

Kris

Where did the week go????

Seems like I turn around, and it's Friday. It didn't help that I had Monday off, Jessie had an orthodontist appt. on Tuesday (which she doesn't need braces yet), then there was girl scouts and tutoring Tuesday night, Jessie had a doctor's appt on Thursday, tutoring Thursday night, we had calling hours to go to Thursday night for a good friend's Grandma who passed away, and then last night I had to go get the stuff for Todd to make steer feed. UGH.

I did find buttons for Jessie's flower power pillow:

This afternoon I have to get some sewing done. One of the guys on the fire department had a baby Thursday morning (well, his wife did - you know what I mean:)) and Todd asked me last night if I had a baby quilt made that we could give them as a present. So I have to get one done in time for Todd to take it to fire practice Tuesday night. Nothing like waiting until the last minute to tell me, right??

But first, I need to do some cleaning, some laundry and some blog reading. I am soooooo far behind on everything!

Have a great Saturday!
Kris

Heaven

I was in the mood to bake when I finally made it home from work and errands.....

I had seen a recipe on-line for Angel Food Cake. Which was yummy enough - until I read a comment that had the frosting (which consists of cool whip, blueberry yogurt and powdered sugar). I thought this would be a change from our normal chocolate filled deserts....

So I set to work baking 1 from scratch.

Just a couple rules to follow:

Rule #1 - when you think it is done, leave it in a little bit longer. My oven tends to run hot but not in this case.

Rule #2 - DON'T slam the oven door.

Rule #3 - make sure you hide the frosting. Or the little boy in the house will think it's fine to sneak into the fridge and scoop it up with his fingers!

Rule #4 - even when the top falls in because either you took it out of the oven too soon or you slammed the oven door - it will still taste yummy. So yummy that the entire cake will be gone in 1 evening.....

If you can survive making this - it is Oh so Yummy. This just might become a favorite desert....

Thankfully we couldn't eat all the frosting, so I just may have to bake another one tomorrow night.

Kris

Wonky style

I got productive last night.....well......sort of:)

While Jessie worked on cleaning her room I started on a pillow for her bed:

I'm thinking for the centers of the flowers, I need to find some big funky buttons......

Inspired to create these after seeing this one and these. I think they will look good in Jessie's room, being the pink girly girl room that it is. I'm now wondering how hard would it be to make her new curtains and a new dust ruffle along the same lines.....I think that will be a next winter's project though. Although....maybe I could find a plain white valance and dustruffle and just add the applique?

I was so happy with how the flower power pillow is turning out, I decided to do a wonky log cabin block. Also, I joined Jacquie's Project Improv. And thought I had better practice improvisational piecing. So this log cabin block which will turn pillow was born. Not very wonky, but I'm happy with it:

Todd's dad showed up and hauled away most of this wood (which is good as I don't have to stack the icky stuff - it has bugs in it. And we don't have to push it into the burn pile to get rid of it):

We are getting seriously low on wood - to the point I tend to freak out. Until I remember that Todd has about 30 logs cut to bring home to be split into firewood. Which he says he is doing this weekend - as farmers will be planting before too long, and he won't be able to drive across the fields to get the logs once they all start working ground. Never mind that he should be getting busy at work here within the next month.....

Kris

Ice

This weekend past was the ice festival in Medina. So we decided Sunday afternoon to go up there with my parents to walk around.

I had every good intention of getting some sewing done on Sunday evening, but this was much more fun:

Really, really cool. And ......really, really cold! Mom should be putting a couple of really good shots of the kids up on her blog at some point.

Yesterday, I had off because the kids' babysitter needed a day off. And what did I do? Sort of cleaned the house, did laundry - but didn't fold it, and read a book. And that was about it.

Come to think of it, I think Midnight used the sewing room more than I did yesterday.....

I would have sewn last night, but "24" was on and I had to watch it. Tonight my FIL is coming to pick up some firewood that we don't want. It's punky (Todd's word, not mine) and we don't want to bring it in our house. As he has an outdoor woodburning furnace - he can use it.

Kris