In Which We Breathe

Making things is very calming to me, I really need to make more time to do it.  Today I realized that Savannah Lynn doesn't own anything orange....and tomorrow is orange day at preschool! I took the opportunity to make her an outfit by stitch-witchery-ing (yeah, because that's a word) on a square of fabric with a picture and then making a tulle and ribbon skirt and matching hair bow.  I might still put the bow onto a headband, we'll see.

I think it's pretty cute for about an hour and $16 in fabric!! (We already had the white t-shirt, which was a free hand-me-down from a friend!)

This leads me for a moment to Halloween.  We celebrate Halloween.  In fact, we have a huge party for our kids' friends, too.  We don't really do the whole "ooooh, scary death" thing, it's more fun dress-up, candy.  I've never felt a conviction to not do Halloween. I have many Christian friends that do, and many in our CC group find it offensive (although many of them love it and also enjoy celebrating).  For me, it's no different than people who celebrate Christmas and aren't Christian.  For them, the day may have started out as a (pagan festival the church wanted to compete with, ahem) celebration of Christ, but they're ignoring that and doing Santa, presents, and a day off work.   For me, Halloween may have started out as Samahein or be important to various cultish sects, but for us, it's not about Satan or evil or the "thin veil between the living and the dead".  It's about little kids dressing up and having fun.  I don't think the people celebrating secular Christmas are being "deceived into celebrating Christ" nor do I feel us having fun with Halloween makes us "deceived into the devil's holiday".  So that's what it is.  If at some point God convicts me otherwise, we'll change that.  Just an aside.

I've been very stressed lately- there's a lot up in the air about our lives right now and I've struggled with anxiety and depression for a few years and it's particularly bad right now.  Austin's work schedule (constant) and the kids' sports and activities (many) along with the house being a mess during construction actually landed me in the closet crying a few days this past week.  It's been a tough few days.

Making something tonight made me feel so much more relaxed.....

This post made no sense at all, did it? I guess there's something to be said for a picture and some rambling, right?

While I'm here writing, this week's menu:
Monday- Vegetarian Lasagne with salad and garlic bread (scouts)
Tuesday- Tofu, Cauliflower, and Bell Pepper Tikka Masala with naan (CC craft day)
Wednesday- Split pea soup with carrots, beer batter bread (art class, football)
Thursday- leftovers (CC day)
Friday- Party! (Football)
Saturday- Party! (At someone else's house!!) (Hockey, Church)
Sunday- Baked potatoes with broccoli and cheese, baked chicken (hockey, football)

In Which We Share the Caramel Recipe With Jamie :)

• 1 cup butter 
• 2 cups packed brown sugar
• 1 cup light corn syrup
• 1 (14 ounce) can sweetened condensed milk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• Pinch of Salt

In a heavy saucepan, combine the butter, brown sugar, corn syrup, salt and milk; bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Cook and stir until a candy thermometer reads 248 degrees (firm ball stage) about 30-40 minutes and for a softer caramel cook just to a few less degrees. Remove from heat; stir in vanilla. 

Notes- don't double in a larger pan, make 2 pans.  When I say Butter I mean Butter.  Don't try margarine or soy substitute, because it will fail miserably.  Very Salty peanuts make a great addition to the outside of the apples, and will make sure the apples don't stick to your (very well buttered) wax paper.

In Which I Tell You What's Cookin'

In the spirit of feeding my family better, I've been cutting back on the couponing and cooking more.

This week:
-Roasted turkey tenderloins with stuffing, peas, and baked acorn squash.  Apple Cranberry Crisp
-Fatteh with chickpeas and onions, yogurt garlic sauce, roasted eggplant, tabbouleh
-Turkey Pot Pie (homemade with biscuit topping), applesauce (homemade!)
-Leftovers
-Hawaiian Pizza

Next week:
-Eggplant noodle-less lasagne, garlic bread, salad
-Ham steaks with sweet potatoes and green beans
-Split Pea Soup with Carrots and beer bread
-Macaroni-less Mac and Cheese (using spaghetti squash) with broccoli
-Vegetable Pad Thai with Green Papaya salad

This week we've also processed more of the apples we picked making apple muffins, apple oatmeal cookies, applesauce, apple crisp and (today, hopefully) caramel apples with homemade caramel.  I found a recipe that uses sweetened condensed milk as a base, which I'm hoping will work out better than other caramels I have tried :) We picked a bunch of 2-3 inch apples that were fully ripe, thinking they'd be the perfect apple-caramel ratio since most kids only eat the bites that touch the sweet stuff anyway :)

In Which We Give Up On The Kitchen

Oh Kitchen.  I have such plans for you.  Plans to turn you from yellow and blue into tuscan oranges and browns and blues...plans for a backsplash...plans to sew seat cushions for the chairs....

But let's be honest....you're not really a kitchen anymore.

It's CC Week 7, which our community takes off.  We'll be on Week 7 work next week, but it'll be Week 8 of homeschooling.  That means we review.  I finally bought our giant white board and mounted it on the other side of the window-

We're doing fairly well on our memory work- we're erasing lines as we all know them perfectly.  Riley struggles with generating the years for history sentences and getting the route memorization of other subjects in the correct order.  Logan struggles with focusing when I'm testing his knowledge straight through.  Savannah is a rockstar for a 3 year old. :)

I finally organized my Baker's Rack in a way that makes some form of sense as far as usage.  If you ever come to my house and open the bottom cabinets, though, I will cut you.  As my friend Gaby would say, I know Mexican Judo.

And since I was spending money today.....I also bought a magnetic white board for Riley's All About Spelling components.  I am so happy I won't have to dig these out of bags anymore for every lesson!! Happy Day :)

Tonight we're having soup and French Orchard sandwiches (which I am totally stealing from a local sandwich shop!) They're nice white bread (no Wonder, please) with ham, brie, green apple, apricot jam, and some greens.  Yum! I was giving my mom ideas and mentioned this one and then promptly decided I had to run to the store, too.

I love my children- but I know better than to run to the store before dinner.  So embarassing when they're running around like crazy and I can't contain them because I didn't get a cart since "We're just getting ONE thing!"

Sigh.  One day I'll be good at being a mom. Probably when I have great-great-great-grandchildren.