The last of the Snow days?

We have had snow for 3 weekends in a row. About 3-5 inches each time. This is the last snow day's remnants as it melted two days later. Charmie made a snowman, his first one ever by himself.

I'm making bread again!!!!

With some money from this year's tax return Rocky and I decided to buy some kitchen appliances to replace ones that had started to fail. We selected a Le'Quip Nutramill Grain mill.

And a Bosch Universal Plus Kitchen Machine with an additional Stainless Steel bowl, Blender, and the cookie paddles with the metal whip drive.

I cannot say how much I am in love with my new kitchen tools. They are so much more efficient and better than what I had and make what I am trying to do, that much easier!
Today for the first time I made bread again. This time I was able to make 4 loaves at once. I milled 15 cups of hard wheat berries and then followed the recipe in my Bosch book, substituting organic Agave syrup for honey.
After the dough separated from the edges of the bowl I stopped the mixer and divided the dough into my 4 pans. I didnt' get them as even as I was hoping for.

After a while they had doubled in size and then they went into the oven for 41 minutes to bake.

After baking I took them out and let them cool for a few minutes.

Then removed them from their pans to cool on the baking rack.

Lastly we sliced up the one loaf that didn't separate perfectly and had a small bit missing from it's underside. Got out the salted sweet cream butter and the kids enjoyed theirs with a few dallops of honey!

My whole house smells like yummy bread. Today was such a lovely baking day.
Special thanks to my Mommy who happened to be over here and gave some general advice as well as assisted me when my hands were too dirty.
and www.sandybosch.com where I purchased my equiptment. They have wonderful customer service, are helpful with answering and researching questions and willing to even contact Bosch Germany to find out if any of the blender and splash cover components contained BPA for me. Obviously they don't, or I wouldn't have purchased! ;)
After having owned a Kitchen Aid that was used when I got it, and a grain mill for it. I can hands down say a few things. The grain mill attachment for your KA will mill grain (pretty coarse, but fine enough to make bread) however, it shortens the life of the mixer. My mixer had started to strain over simple loads and you could smell the motor burning a bit too. For someone interested in seriously taking on milling grain to make their own bread at home, purchase a dedicated mill! You will be thankful when you don't have to replace your mixer!
Because of my cleaning kick, I'm happy to report that even though my kitchen was thoroughly used all around for making this bread, it's back clean in it's original state before we started.

My Feetz B Happy

This past Sunday a store in town was having a special sale and advertized in the local paper. I saw the flyer/coupon and asked if we coudl stop by on the way home from church.
When I went in I saw these shoes.

They had to come home with me.
I think there may even be a linkie on www.BarkingDogShoes.com, because I got a request for the pic for their blog.
These are an early Happy Birthday Pressie!

The Clean

A buddy of mine, Dibba we shall call her, has been running a clearing the clutter group that she invited me to join. I joined, but the clutter wasn't getting cleared until a week ago. I cleaned off my counter (the major dumping ground) and so far a week later it still looks like this.

Cleaning has spilled over into other areas such as the computer desk, and my dresser (other dumping grounds). My sewing/crafting area will be next for intensive cleaning. It does feel good though to make some headway and see a change from the messyness we've been living in for a while.

10 minutes to meatloaf

I'm experimenting with pressure cookers. I've never used them before and I wanted to try so enter the Deni 5qt. Electric Pressure Cooker.
I found a recipe on www.cooks.com for meatloaf in a pressure cooker. I substituted ground turkey for ground beef.
Here are the loafs in the cooker.

timer set for 10 minutes once high pressure is reached.

Releasing the pressure.

Our 10 minute meatloaf along with veggie rice and rolls.
The kids liked this meal and it was super fast and easy!

kys swap from Huggy Bear

Thank You Janette! I LOVE all of my package :)

Happy Birthday Z!!!!

zuri on strider (trimmed)
Originally uploaded by mom2rays

Two years has flown by. It's so hard to believe that it's been two years since our baby girl came into this world. She's getting to be a big girl quick, so we decided to get her a bike for her special day. This is her first time riding it outside, of course C and M are on their bikes as well riding along. She says "helmet" because Mardie at the beginning of the video needs to get his helmet on.
There will be more videos to come as she gains more skills.

Merry CHRISTMAS everyone!!!

Luke 2:6-7

⁶While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, ⁷and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

What happens when Mommy and Daddy have to both do church stuff at the same time.

Thankfully it was washable marker and not permanent, and thankfully she didn't get the bright idea to "cod'er" anything else other than herself.

Merry Christmas Party

We had so much fun today at Happy's Farm. I definitely want to go back there in the future!

Little Z rides a horse solo!

The boys played cowboys almost non stop when we weren't trying to teach them something!

super secret angel traveling scarf

just posting a pic here so that the people who need to can see a pic, and the people who don't need to, won't find it.

Definitely not bags

Well after scouring my house for a suitable pattern/project to sew for the co-op mommies, I gave up because it was hopeless. I wasn't going to find an appropiate pattern for the amount of yardage I had for said bags. I am disapointed because I really wanted to sew them, but it wasn't meant to be.
Instead I decided to bead them a keychain with one bead in their child's birth month for each year of the child's life. You won't see 18 strands here because I didn't need to make a keychain for me. ;-)
I hope they like them. And each time they look at them they remember this time of our homeschooling together.

Merry Christmas kids in our hs co-op!

We are winding downt this semester. It has flown by. We are going to have a little Christmas party for the kids and wanted to give them somethign special. I sewed litte gift bags and embroidered each one with a nativity motif and the child's name. 18 bags!!!! I've been sewing since a little after 4 yesterday.

I'm exhausted, but the last bag is done! Whew! I also want to make bags for the other mommies, but we'll see if I can get motivated for another sewathon. . .
Each bag took between 19 and 24 minutes just to stitch out the design. Cutting and sewing took an additional 15 -20 minutes each bag. This was definitely a labor of love, but these kids deserve it! They have been working so hard this semester!

It's amazing what accessories can do.

4



tiny

elastics.

In my eyes, she looks like a completely different little girl. I can't believe in just a few monhts she will be 2!

Happy 90th birthday Grandma!!!

Here's the news story. We love you, and I am so glad that we were able to be there for your birthday party!

z's first panties

z's first panties
Originally uploaded by mom2rays

We are entering into more formal stages of potty learning. Z has been telling us for a long time when she needs to go on and off because we practice elimination communication and she is very aware of her body's function.
I decided it was time to get a little more serious about it and got her some panties. She LOVES to wear them, but has to stay dry to keep them on! Any accidents and it's back to the dipes.

You want an update?

homeschool
Originally uploaded by mom2rays

Things have been busy for us here lately. With school kicking off, and the new routines and activities associated with it. Zuri is loving school too. We do preschool activites and she is learning matching colors, her ABC's, and how to put various manipulatives into order.
We are now also a part of a homeschool co-op for Charmie's curriculum, but Mardie and Zuri benefit from having children their age as well.
No updates on the lake property, it sits, unvisited, no time.
No updates on our home other than redoing the living room to accomodate the homeschool. I like how the kids each have their own desk/area to work.
Other than that, I am crafting as usual, but nothing major to speak of.

Sisters (edited)

Sisters (edited)
Originally uploaded by zzwhitejd

pic taken on Sunday at Janet's 40th party and also Janet and Colin's going away party. . . I miss them already. They just arrived in Seattle today.

Update

I guess it has been a while since I posted. So many things have happened.
We just returned from a week at http://www.carolinacamp.com. It was a blast. The kids were mini campers, made new friends, had some fun experiences and learned some new things.
We stayed the week in our Avion for the first time camping as a family. I absolutely LOVED it and was happy to finally park it on our Lake and spend the night in it. It was a bit sad to leave, and I am looking forward to going back!
The kids are all growing and learning so much. Both Charmie and Mardie are now readers! They are learning new sound combinations each week, and doing well. They both have made it through several of their beginning reader books. They are also loving some of the science experiments that we have been doing lately.
Zuri now has many teeth, though not all of her baby teeth yet, and is quite the talker. She says new words daily, and has started to combine words into mini sentences. She is very active, and emulates her brothers in most that they do. We often find her walking around with a Darth Vader Mask, or weilding a Nerf blaster like they do.
My sister and her family are moving away to Seattle :( We found out in May. By the 12th of August they will have moved away. The time has flown. It went away too quickly, as I feel they have. It is a good move for their family as it has been obvious that God is blessing their move, yet, it still is sad. I have never known a period in my adult life with out my sister close by.
It's hard to believe that in a few short weeks another summer will have passed and we will be quickly approaching the fall and holiday season.

Crepes! mmmmm, mmmm, good

My sister recently took me for a treat to a new eats place at our local mall. They make crepes. Saturday night I took Rocky, and it was yummy goodness all over again.
So today I decided to follow my sister's footsteps and try to recreate the crepes at home.
Here's my finished product.

I made apple and cinnamon filling. Thanks mommy for peeling and cutting up the apples for me earlier!

Here's the crepes cooking!

Here's the batter and hot pan

Overall this wasn't too much more labor intensive over pancakes, but they tasted more like a treat. I want a gridle now and I need to get a long skinny spatula!