Midnight Crafters

Recipe Card - Jello pie

2012-01-11T13:27:00.000-05:00

This is a true anchor from weight watchers over 10 years ago. Jello pie. This thing is really 4 points. I seen where it said 3 points in a couple of places, but when I calculate it, its 4. This is great to take to parties or have when you might be tempted. You can make it in all kinds of variations. This time I had strawberry, next time I think I am using upside down pineapple cake yogurt and lime jello, to have a pina colada pie. I might by pass the crumbs crust too. So enjoy!

Thanksgiving -WW recipes

2011-11-18T15:14:00.000-05:00

As I finish my first week on plan, I am in epic failure mode. Hmm, a small trip has turned my efforts into drive thru madness. as thanksgiving is fastly approaching, I am building my arsenal to be prepared with low point options at the dinner table. I have held onto these recipes for some time and they can be a true lifesaver for just knowing what I can eat and how much versus adventuring into the unknown.

My first is the Weight Watcher Bread Stuffing. Please be aware that this will not look, smell or taste like diet food. It is very probable that it may be consumed by all guest and not just the dieting ones.

Now I do enjoy the Weight watcher Cranberry Walnut Relish. Besides just being pretty, it makes me feel as though I have a since of culinary gourmet affluence. Hmm, which I do not, but it is fun to pretend.

My ultimate comfort food, has got to be the mashed potatoes. No reason to skimp on taste with this dish. Adding the garlic and thyme brings a well deserved pop of flavor to every bite.

Weight watchers has always been wonderful at making the meal more than just a diet, but a lifestyle and an occasion. Always adding to your menu fresh foods and staying to natural and less processed foods, makes every meal healthy and delicious. Most of all, almost every weight watcher recipe I have found to add to my life is usually straight forward and easy. But most of all, do able without a special cooking class.

Have a great thanksgiving.

~trish

WW Week 1: hearty breakfast

2011-11-11T07:25:00.000-05:00

For me, breakfast is the make or break me meal of the day. If I am not satisfied, the day is going to go down hill for making good decisions on what to eat. This is my go to meal in the morning. It is 1 cup of steamed potatoes and 2 eggs for a total of 6 points.

The potatoes are not fried. Today I am using left over potatoes from dinner. I have a tupperware steaming container, i.e., sealed container with a vent. I dice the potatoes and season with my favorite all spice. Then I microwave them for about 8 minutes, depending on how much I have in there. On mornings I do not have left overs, I dice up 1 small red potato (only 1 point), microwave for about 5. Then spray some cooking spray and brown. ta da. Now this is when I will add chopped green onions, like today. Or chopped tomatoes, green peppers, or any other zero point veggie.

One thing to be aware of. I love salsa. I added 2 Tbsp of salsa for zero points and then was in horror when I figured out that those little spoonfuls had 1/6 my daily sodium intake. This is why I use salsa type veggies in my potatoes and not salsa. That sodium will mess with your head and scale. Too much and you are retaining water like a camel and the scale will show it. One gallon of water is 8 lbs on the scale. Besides it is horrible for your body in so many other ways. So stick with fresh.

For me, I feel satisfied and like I am not on a diet. Besides, when the diet is over, this is a lifestyle choice I would still enjoy to have every morning. Thus, helping me to keep the weight off. And for me, losing the weight isn't the problem, it's keeping it off.
~trish

Week 1: Cassoulet

2011-11-10T15:05:00.000-05:00

Another great favorite of mine is Cassoulet. I love this, to me this recipe is excellent for comfort in the fall, but also gives me the grown up version of beans and weenies. This is really a great recipe for any bean, even cranberry beans. This recipe is a version of the original put out by the WW recipe mill.

To keep your points low, use the low-fat turkey smoked sausage. If you do, this recipe will serve 4 with 6 points per serving. Also, if you are not using canned beans then portion out 4 servings from dry beans and prepare them to use. If you want a quick way to prepare them, go here.

Also check this out for some more great recipes for using beans! http://www.pulsecanada.com/uploads/4f/3c/4f3c70cc5efe8ead7b1f1c1f052ae932/Cooking-with-Beans-Peas--Lentils-2010.pdf

I hope this helps you, if you are looking for ways to add more fiber to your life with a yummy flavor. For us, beans are a favorite in my house.
~trish

Week 1: Beef Stroganoff

2011-11-09T14:19:00.001-05:00

See the WW, hmm, after all my success I am back onto weight watchers. The new points plus made me lose it quick, but it came right back on. So after a week kicking the idea that I needed to start again, last night I made the commitment.

So in search of a refresher I found Debra at Losing it! Who is sharing day by day her efforts to be on plan. She was a bunch of inspiration for me and I do suggest you check her out. For the love of good food, I wanted to share this recipe for stroganoff. When I first started weight watchers almost ten years ago, this recipe was my go to for comfort.

My recipe card is a 5by7. I love printing them at the photo lab and laminating them. I use storybook creator and this layout is made from Creative Memories Rugged Outdoors Digital Addition.

This recipe comes from one of the best weight watcher, original points plan, cookbooks. I hope you enjoy.
~trish

Simplicity 2388 Review

2011-03-18T10:55:00.001-04:00

So I had a horrible time yesterday to get this uploaded! So it is finally here. Remember, check the sale at JoAnns coming up on Simplicity Patterns for 99cents.

I used Simplicity 2388.

See yah!

~trish

Flogging my home sewn purses

2011-03-03T15:34:00.001-05:00

Here is my first ever flog! I decided to start flogging, since I do not have much time. Of course, my 1st one is about 12 minutes. hopefully, you will still love me.

Homespun threads for the diaper bag: http://myhomespunthreads.blogspot.com/. All of her patterns are free. She has an awesome bible cover pattern.

Kat at Kaydeebunz that is a notorious inspiration to me! http://craftymomma2.blogspot.com/

sew Mama, sew has the free Amy Butler pattern: http://sewmamasew.com/blog2/?p=11705. Sew mama, sew has a nice collection of tutorials and patterns for FREE.

I think that is everything I said I would link. If you are local and wanted to know about me working at the cow, head over to www.craftincow.blogspot.com to see what all that is about.

Please let me know if you liked my unedited, basic flog. And if I should continue.

Have a great day!

`trish

Freezing beans!

2011-01-08T08:18:00.001-05:00

So after a few lessons from http://everydayfoodstorage.net/f/legumes, I got about 4 pounds of beans and got them ready to freeze today. I bought navy, red, and northern beans. These are beans that we typically eat a lot of. I did get the navy, because everyday food storage

http://missvickie.com/howto/beans/howtobeantypes.html

When I froze them, I put them into 1 cup portions in sandwich bags. I then put the sandwich bags in a 1 gallon freezer bag. This way, they are all together and I can be cheap and not have to waste a freezer bag on each portion.

Now that I am posting this, I am making my second batch. We already ran through this one.

~trish

Inspired to be recover

2011-01-01T22:15:00.001-05:00

Here is my best highchair ever. It was about $50 at Target a couple of years ago. After a few kids later, the cover had gotten a bit yucky! SO I had to get a bit of stitchin done. I hope you like it. I absolutely love it.

Now I did manage to lose the latch part of the buckle, so I picked up a buckle from Walmart for $2. It was originally a 3 point buckle. The bottom strap I subbed for a 2 point, making the bottom strap a loop for the top to thread through.

We are loving it! I think I might make a few bibs to match.

~trish

My class Schedule for the Beginning of January at The Cow!

2010-12-31T13:02:00.001-05:00

Now that I am teaching at the Craftin’ Cow, I wanted to share my class schedule, if you can make it.

This coming week, I am hosting:

Monday January 3 10am – 2pm	Operation Write Home – Be my Valentine Card Bash Make cards from a kit or create you own. All cards will go to our American Heroes who are currently serving for them to send home to their loved ones. Find out more about this organization at www.operationwritehome.org	$5 donation to Operation Write Home


Friday January 7 11am-2pm	Digi – Lunch Box with Trish H. Getting into digital, but need some help. Pack your lunch and come on in to get some digi done.	Punch on the punch card or day pass

Next week:

Friday

January 14

8pm - Midnight

Midnight PJ Party with Trish H.

Let the party start! Bringing Trish’s notorious PJ party to the COW! Bring your stuff to work on, there will be some great FREE make and takes for valentines. Valentine’s ideas will be shared. Bring a little finger food to share. RSVP please!

Punch on the punch card or day pass

Saturday

January 15

10am – 2pm

Sew a purse with Trish H.

A great beginners class. You will need a yard of fabric for both the outer shell and the lining, plus a 1 ½ yards of interfacing. Plus a large button to match. Be sure to bring you sewing machine and basic kit.

$25

Head over to the cow to see the schedule for the entire month of January.

~trish

Christmas card template from the Craftin Cow

2010-12-22T10:57:00.001-05:00

The Craftin’ Cow has a great free template for making cards. Just print the card template on cardstock, cut and past.

Here is my version!

All of it is paper, printed on my printer. I used glossy effects to give it an apoxy finish.

~trish

Another apron I made.

2010-12-22T10:53:00.001-05:00

I made this one for a good friend of mine. I can’t believe she made me soil myself with SU fabric.

GO GATORS!

Great getting started Couponing.

2010-12-21T11:31:00.001-05:00

I love jenny at Southern Savers. In fact, she is the only reason I currently coupon, because she makes it simple and easy for me. I am always recommending her site to anyone and everyone. This is a great video. She breaks it down on how to coupon without being overwhelming.

In fact, I am buying the file system today at dollar tree today, and making a commitment to go full throttle couponing with Jenny.

Here website is:

www.southernsavers.com

~trish

Winter Bookmarks!

2010-12-09T21:01:00.001-05:00

I love the bookmarks done by Controlling my chaos! so I am making a point to make my own. The ones I am making this month, I will give away in a goodie bag at a crop this weekend and I will use them as bookmarks for my daughters class. So here it is. Print it out on 4 by 6, I will send mine to the photo lab. Cut the photo to 2 by 6, fold it in half to be 2 by 3. Place magnets at the bottom to close.

Enjoy!

~trish

Christmas Apron

2010-12-07T21:37:00.001-05:00

I feel bad that I haven’t really been able to share great things with you. Mostly it is because, I have no time to spare. I am still doing some great things here and there, but mostly I am driving aimlessly around, unsure where my next direction is. This school thing is making my head foggy!

I drive them here and there and then turn around to be right back to where I left them. I can’t even get a grocery list finished, much less a meal plan. At this point, I just grab the sales and coupons from www.southernsavers.com and make due with what I have.

I did start making Christmas gifts early November, so I have a huge lead on that. But I am also helping my mom out with a new craft studio that my cause a bit of distraction with www.craftincow.blogspot.com. I really need to be posting stuff on craigslist. See, here I am again rambling. Let me show you what I made this last time.

This is a little apron I made out of a pair of jeans for the Christmas. I grabbed the 3D flower from Make it and Love it blog. The stamping is done with Stazon Ink, it showed up the best. I did get the bedazzler out for the gem stones.

Of course, I got this great idea from mimi at Paper Rose studio! I added tulle thanks to the bright ideas of Barb from dinner in a pinch!

I love how cute it comes together. I have so many more to make as gifts and also a baseball snuggi. I can’t wait to show you that.

I did find a great new cooking/frugal/pantry resource: http://everydayfoodstorage.net/

I feel a bit lost with out keeping you in the loop of my creations. It gives me some steadiness to know that I am able to share the little things I figure out each day!

Keep warm!

~trish

craft rooms to inspire me

2010-11-30T12:37:00.001-05:00

I am sorry to be away for so long. I am amidst so many projects right now and I can not believe that the days can fly by so quickly. I have been working on this post alone for about a week or 2. So I am gathering up inspiration because I am getting very close to chipping out a new space for crafting.

I am excited that my mom is creating a craft studio, so I get to move more of my once in a while tools over there. Woot! Woot. So I am moving my Sizzix stash, stamps, and punches. I plan to use my personal space so I can function on digital, cricut cutting, and sewing. So I need to create a space for that and plus doing a little work for my husband.

So here is my inventory of ideas I collected. Enjoy!

allsorts.typepad.com

urbandebris.typepad.com

whipstitchfabrics.com

twiddlelee.com

blogstoknow.blogspot.com

wholelottalovely.wordpress.com

sarahyoude.com

thehouseofislablog.blogspot.com

curbly.com

houeida.posterous.com

threadbanger.com

Make 5 Dinners in ONE hour: 10 School Lunches in 15 Minutes

2010-10-23T13:37:00.000-04:00

I really wanted to share this with you. I bento, because for me it is easy. But I just came across this and realized for many of you THIS would be a perfect solution.

Make 5 Dinners in ONE hour: 10 School Lunches in 15 Minutes: "Two of my kids take their lunch to school every day and EVERY morning I make them. Well now that does not make much sense does it? I make ..."

Digi – Tic Tac TOe!

2010-10-18T21:02:00.001-04:00

So I am still testing myself to think outside the scrapbook pages for my digi work. I seen some cool printables and decided to make my own. So I made a tic tac toe board for this month.

Just print it on regular letter size paper, cut out the pieces and play. I think I am going to put mine on the fridge for the kids to play and do magnets for the pieces. I again used Cheerful Halloween Digital Kit. I hope you like it, because it is here for you to have.

Enjoy!

~trish

Digital Hybrid – Christmas Planner

2010-10-18T00:51:00.001-04:00

Alright, I am trying to challenge myself to think outside the box with my digital program! So I was sifting through the web and cam across a lot of sites gearing up for an organized Christmas. Now in years past, I had promised myself I would make one for me, well after the house went hushed last night. I designed one on my digital storybook creator and then this morning I put it all together.

It is so nice being able to lay it out in the storybook creator and then print, cut and glue! And I get to easily share it with you! So here is my planner!

So I am using a brand new creative memories digital kit. It is the Very Merry Digital Kit and is only $8.95 to download. The kit comes with all this!

So In the first 2 pockets I have my to do list for each month and then lined paper to track my gifts.

Next pockets is for any cooking and then another to keep track of cards sent and received.

When I put the planner together, I had to use 2 pieces of 12 by 12 aqnd I ended up with a pocket at the back. Then I realized how perfect. I sealed an envelope and trimmed it to fit and added a tab and it became my receipt holder!

See it is sturdy enough to stand up on its own!

So to make this all wonderful for you! I have the files here for you to be able to make your own! If you love the content! Buy the digital package. I got the calendar and the lined portion of the paper from the freebie blog by Creative Memories. Have fun! If you are part of my midnight PJ party crew. Print these out and bring 2 12 by 12 cardstock, you cuter, and adhesive and we will make these Friday night.

Now click on them to enlarge them, then save them as a picture. Print out on standard letter. Make sure your printer ink is filled, I printed mine out the first time at the end of my color ink cartridge. If you make yours, send me links so I can take a look!

Enjoy!

~trish

Party time! #1 is turning 6

2010-10-15T13:15:00.001-04:00

So what do I love most about being mom! Birthdays! They were a miserably difficult experience to birth these wonderful children. I never thought I could ever go through that much pain and live through it, much less be so happy. I must say, God has a great since of humor. It is horrible to go through it once, but then to repeat the process. Hmm, must be a bit crazy. So I love each birthday, because I am having another year with my child and I can celebrate that I went through the worst pain I can imagine and survived! Wow! My body is amazing for its strength!

So this week is #1’s storybook character parade and it works perfect with our costumes anyways. So here is my little pig (1 of 3).

I still have 2 more pigs to make. The overalls were a pair I had made for #2. I added pink to the straps and the cuffs and was so thankful they fit here. My husband and I had it out trying to put the snaps on them (this goes back to having 2 engineers that live and breath together). I made the ears and tail out of felt and I used a good gauged wire left over from my wedding stuff. I did pick up the nose at the party store.

So to celebrate at school, we brought in cupcakes. To help make it special they had to be cute.

Here cake for her party is just finished.

and my kitchen looks about like this.

Plenty of candy, another cake for just the family tonight. What a mess! I am so thankful for the Dollar Tree when it is birthday time! I got her a balloon for each year!

I made custom bag toppers for her goodie bags.

I am really trying to challenge myself to do more everyday stuff with my digital program. I look forward to sharing some more of my ideas!

~trish

Digital Paint cans

2010-10-14T16:21:00.001-04:00

I just came across Jill at www.controllingmychaos.com she has amazing ideas on using the digital storybook creator in different ways. She has the entire layout for making these sweet candy filled treat cans at her blog! You will love crawling through her blog of creativeness. She has some amazing ideas that I am already trying out myself!

Digital Recipe Cards – Cheerful Halloween Digital additions Preview

2010-10-13T22:28:00.001-04:00

I am so excited that I got to preview one of the new digital additions from my Creative Memories Consultant, Tracy Croy! She has really managed to get me hooked on making recipe cards. They are relatively easy and then you can print them out via a 4x6 printing service or at home. So I was able to play with the new Cheerful Halloween Digital Addition. This picture shows you everything you get in the kit. I have to say this is amazing! Since the digital file is only $5.95!

So I decided the best thing for some good recipes to add to my recipe collection would be to look in www.familyfun.go.com.

So I came up with these 3 recipe cards.

You can click and save these jpegs and then either print to your local printer or send it to a photo lab.

Enjoy!

~trish

Decorating for fall

2010-10-11T22:12:00.001-04:00

http://www.familycorner.com/homegarden/crafts/pumpkin_candle_holders.shtml

So I used to love to get in the spirit of the season and go crazy decorating. Well, with 4 kids so young, I find it hard to get the energy to cook dinner, much less decorating for a party or holiday. So my house is the one that looks the same day after day inside and out, except for a Christmas tree in December and the grass continually growing and getting cut.

My inner self that constantly thinks and wishes for an altered life as I move constantly through this one, invisions a home decorated for the seasons with cool decor that is not found in a store. I imagine all the cool ways to make these things. And when I get the moment to sneak away to make something, I am clueless on what to do. Well let me tell you! These are so cool, and then I realized they are wine glasses! Ahh, I can probably buy them for less than a dollar a piece. If I get a chance, I am picking some up to make.

~trish

Cooking with dried beans

2010-10-04T20:29:00.001-04:00

Cooking Dried Beans in the Slow Cooker

Day 292.
It's day 292. And I finally have cracked the cooking-with-dried vs. cooking-with-canned-beans code.
Why did it take me 292 days?
Sheer laziness. I have no other reason.
1 bag of dried black beans costs $1.89 at the fancy-pants grocery store, and it costs $0.89 at our local produce stand.
1 can of organic black beans at Trader Joe's costs $0.99.
1 dried bag of black beans (16 oz) = 3 cans (15 oz each).
Which means even if you buy over-priced dried black beans you will save some money making them at home yourself.
The Ingredients.

--bag of black beans (or other beans. but remember that kidney beans have that freaky toxin.)
--water
--crockpot (4 quarts and up)
The Directions.
Pour the entire bag of dried beans into a colander and rinse under cold water. If you see any beans that have broken in half, or skin that floats to the surface, get rid of it. Also pick out any beans that look shriveled and gross.
Dump all the beans into your crockpot. Add enough water to cover all the beans and an additional 2 inches.
Cover. Do not turn on. Let the beans soak for at least 6 hours, or overnight. If you live in a very warm area, and the crockpot won't be in a room that is climate-controlled, put the stoneware in the fridge. You don't want bacteria to have the opportunity to grow.
In the morning, dump the water, and rinse your beans. The water will be bean-colored.
Put the beans back into your crockpot and cover with enough fresh water to completely cover the beans with an extra 2-3 inches.
Cover and cook on low for 8 hours.
The beans are done when they are bite-tender. Don't worry if the water hasn't all absorbed. You're going to dump it, anyway.
Drain the beans.
When cool, put 1 2/3 cups of beans into storage containers or freezer bags (you're adding this amount because you aren't adding filler-liquid like the cans have). The beans will store nicely in the refrigerator for 1 week, or in the freezer for 6 months.
Use as you would canned beans in your favorite recipe.
The Verdict.
I like knowing what is in my food. I like the idea that we can save money and reduce consumption by using dried beans.
This takes a while. When I do this again, I'm going to get quite a few bags of beans and do them all at once in a few crockpots. The kids liked picking through the beans to weed out the undesirables, and they will munch on black beans (and garbanzo and pinto and kidney) for a snack, which makes me happy.
I've found a chart that breaks down the energy consumption of kitchen appliances:
(First Energy Corp., Ohio--scroll to page 5)
it states that a crockpot costs 2 cents an hour to run. Which means that even with adding the cooking time/cost to the beans, it's cost-effective to cook your own.

Make It Fast, Cook It Slow

by Stephanie O’Dea

Posted by Stephanie O'Dea at 7:02 AM

I am featuring post from another blog. My husband found it, in his effectiveness to prove to me, why my chili is a failure. So here it is.

Ketchup!

2010-09-23T11:08:00.001-04:00

I really hate that I need to give you a ketchup post! Or catch up! I can not figure out where the days go! They fly by and I am whooped after wards and the day is not even over!

So the kids! Kids are good!

#1 is loving school! She is learning her sight words and loves the social of school. I make her lunch every bento style. I have taken a few pictures. But not like I was. I am still picking up cool containers, between the dollar Tree and Marshalls.

#2 is speaking a lot better with his speech class 2 times a week. He seems to have really calmed down and his tantrums have almost ceased. I am almost astonished by it. He gets to be in a class with mostly boys. Since he is surrounded by girls at home, this is great!

#3 is showing her true 2 yr old colors. I am realizing there is a lot she does just to aggravate the other 2. She is quiet, until they are in the car, and then she will sing and chatter nonsense just to talk over them. Trouble! She is calmer though.

#4 is growing!

This is #3 and #4!

Me. Hmm, the dreaded 4 letter word, BUSY! I run all day long and drop of exhaustion. I started selling stamps again and love the fact that I am getting out and about because of it. I am also cooking at church for Awanas. I am barely sewing. I am planning a birthday party. I am planning a scrapbook crop to benefit the children camp this summer. I am raising money for another youth group this weekend and then a relay for life and Susan G Anthony. So I am busy. Yuk! I feel like all I do is drive around and hardly have a moment to sit.

I am a bit bewildered by it all. I knew that this would happen, if they went to school. I do not want to rush the days by, but I look forward to only making a trip to one school instead of 2.

I am also studying to get licensed for my professional engineering license. Yuk!

I am ready for fall! Fall will be beautiful and fast. It will be filled with a party! A Festival! Costumes! The Woods! Hunting! Mud! A Turkey to cook! And the breeze that makes everything calm. A Garden! Oh I love Fall!

I know it is right at the door and we will be in the thick of fall! I have so much to do before then, so I can really enjoy it!

Costumes: I am thinkin the 3 little pigs and the big bad wolf! You guess who the wolf will be! The BOY of course!

See you soon!
~trish

Cakes for 100 and More! Strawberry Shortcake!

2010-09-23T10:41:00.001-04:00

As finding my best way to serve God in Our Awanas church program, I figured out, I should make desert. So each week I make desert that will need to serve 100 or more people (kids and adults). Now the thing to realize is there is a budget. Ready! Here it is! I have got about $20 to let God do miracles with! So I am going to share my recipes with you on how I get it done!

So I just served strawberry cake last night and I thought we were going to have to roll the adults out of the room. Everyone was getting their cake to their seats and then going for their dinner. Wow! It really gave me the sense that, yep, God is using me and this is what it is for! So this cake is a hit! This is a picture of a test version I did before I made the big pans of it!

RECIPE! for 100!

4 boxes of Yellow Cake mix ($4)

1 jar apple sauce ($2)

1 dozen eggs ($1.50)

4 boxes Strawberry Jello ($4)

4 tubs of white icing ($5)

1 Large bag of frozen strawberries from walmart ($6)

1 cup sugar (on hand)

So you make the cake via the directions, except substitute the oil with applesauce. When the toothpick comes out clean, pull it out and poke holes all over the cake. Make Jello as directed and immediately pour over hot cake. Let cake cool to room temperature (you can skip this, if you are in a time crunch, just becareful not to crumble the cake when you spread icing.)

Spread icing all over the top. Defrost strawberries and smash them up, so they are crushed. Add sugar to the strawberries to make a sauce with a juice. Spoon strawberries all over the top. Put in fridge until you serve it.

When I make this, I am using 2 13 by 24 inch pans. I am also an industrial oven.

I hope you enjoy. I am going to put the other recipes I come up with. But you can see, I can make that $20 go far. I have a mud cake and a pineapple upside down cake recipe. If you have any box cake recipes to share, please send them my way. I need 2 more recipes.

~trish

Blog Jump!!

2010-09-06T00:23:00.001-04:00

I am not sure how it happens, but it does. I have had a change of direction and have been spending time elsewhere. So I was sewing like a mad woman and now I have abruptly stopped. I took the sewing machine off the desk and replaced it with the cricut. I took up card making again and then re-opened an old blog.

So my activities have been at

www.puntagordastamps.blogspot.com

~trish

DCWV Freebie and Challenge

2010-09-01T16:20:00.001-04:00

http://www.300dpi.com/design-challenge

get this kit free and join in the challenge for freebies.

here are the rules:

Create a Scrapbook Page for your Back to School Photos!

You could win $25.00 in FREE product in the challenge that starts now!

The product we used for this months Design Example is the Hit the Books 2 Digital Kit.

Rules:

Use the Back to School Digital Kits (as shown) to make a scrapbook page. Scan or photograph your designs (up close) and send in a jpg (500 pixels wide, 72 dpi resolution) to Gallery submissions below.

Download the Hit the Books 2 Digital Kit

Deadline:

September 30th, 2010 (midnight, MST) Our WINNER will be featured on our Blog for October and will win Free products worth $25.00!

Selected entries will be featured in our Virtual Scrapbook Gallery. By submitting your project you are giving 300dpi.com permission to include your entry into our Online Virtual Gallery.

~trish

Wearing a baby sling.

2010-08-31T22:50:00.001-04:00

I get a few questions on the baby sling, so I figured I would take some pictures.

#1 here is the sling

#2 Reach into the sling, to fold in half.

Here it is in half.

#3 Bring it over one arm and your head and let it rest on your shoulder.

almost, like you are wearing a sash.

#4 At the seam, you want to open the “pocket”. this is the 2 edges.

#5 Slip the baby in, for demonstration purposes I used a bunny,

Not to worry my friends, no bunnies were hurt in the making of this how to post.

~trish

Summer giveaway #3

2010-08-23T23:16:00.001-04:00

This is another set from the Pine Cone Press of Not your ordinary Book Club. This is a really cool technique book using ink. The packet gives you the tools to duplicate one of their page layouts.

So you can win all of this, like Jackie did for the last 2 give-aways, by doing the following!

1. Make sure you are a follower. To do so, you need to hit the subscribe button on the right. Once you subscribe, a little picture box will show up under followers. I love this. I can begin to see what you look like and the other blogs you read, thanks to Google.

2. Post a comment to this post. Make sure you are a follower, so it will show up as your follower name. You have to post to this posting, not to facebook.

***So the big thing here is that, at the end of the week, I am going to look at the comments and then check it against the followers list. If the names match, I put you in the drawling tub.

Want a second chance, facebook this post.

Hit the “f” button under the post to link it to your facebook page. If you do this, please leave a comment at the posting that you did it. Not my facebook page, because I won’t be looking all over to find if you did.

To be my friend on facebook, send me your email!

That’s the rules, if you don’t like them, then just complain about it. I won’t care.

I will pick the names out on Sunday. Really, I will try to make it this Sunday!

~trish

The last 2 weeks of blur!

2010-08-23T22:55:00.001-04:00

Well friends, the last 2 weeks have been rough in so many ways. As a mom that wants to succeed at the task, I had to take inventory or my strengths and weaknesses and had to come to reality about my personal limits. Like I said, it has been rough, a few personal meltdowns and finally coming to grips with the decisions we made.

I can imagine the “dun, dun, dun” loud eerie music playing.

Okay, no one died! But, my husband has been working some crazy hours with his second job. I feel so blessed that he is willing to work so hard. These crazy hours are about15-17 hours each day on the weekend and 2-3 nights during the week, him working until 9 pm. I had no idea how fragile our home is without him. Let’s just say in no way, can this momma go it alone. We were getting the kids fed, educated, and dressed, but this momma wasn’t getting to be the momma I want to be.

Now this side job will last like this for about 2 months. I know we could put our school aside for that time and just focus on being mom, but then there is always another side job that will put the same schedule on him. On top of this, I have a little test I have to study for that is a major deal. (This goes back to that professional degree I have.)

So momma is off having day in and out with all 4, with pure exhaustion making me just want to cry when the voices are echoing off the walls to sound like I have an entire herd of hyenas in here. So I was getting snappy with my precious babies and losing all joy in every moment and realized something needed to change.

I heard a while back on a podcast, that it is the attributes of the stay at home mom that will change the world. It lingered in my mind as I was facing the stresses in my life at the moment. What echoed is that it was not the homeschool mom that is changing the world, it is the stay at home mom. SO it shook me that it is more important for me to be mom, than it is for me to school teacher. I never thought that I would have to choose between the 2, but this is where my world is fragile without my husband being readily available in my day.

So I made the decision painfully and heartbreakingly. And once I mourned at the loss this year of being able to school my own children, I put my big girl panties on and got to the business of enrolling my kids. I made the decision Tuesday, enrolled them on Wednesday, and they started on Thursday!

Here they are on their first day. Now #1 started kindergarten. #2 is going to VPK. #3 just wants to go to school, so she totes a backpack with her all day long. Every time we stop somewhere, she ask if this is her school. I am using this opportunity to tell her she needs to go pee pee in a potty, so she can go to school one day.

Now we are on day 3 of them going to school and wow! I feel like I am coming back to my old self again. So I am embracing the change. I am also changing things with the baby!

She has been evicted from my bed. She is thrashing around through the night and I am not getting any sleep. I am almost dried up and have lost all desire to nurse. SO now I am trying to get her on a schedule to take her bottle and sleep through the night. I had to get on the phone today and find a crib that would fit in our bedroom, because she has outgrown the bassinet. Thankfully a friend came through with the coolest port-a-crib.

It is low to the grown, so it is not overwhelming in a small room. Against better judgement, I will show you what my room looks like. We do not have anything fancy, it is just the nuts and bolts of real life.

And I didn’t clean up from my sewing project. I even sew in my little bedroom. Here is my $20 Janome machine I picked up at Goodwill.

I dream of grander things, but today is not the day for them and that is that. I will make due with what I have got, because I know one day I WILL have them the way I want, so I will practice patience. None the less, I get a lot of sewing done at this spot.

So all this craziness and meltdowns is the reason I have been lacking any real thought to my postings and why I was late on my give-away.

I do want to share my excitement for the plans to my new family order. I am giving myself this week to catch back up on my house. But hopefully next week, we will start back up on the unit study side of the MFW kindergarten program. I want to continue to show them God in everything around us and the one week unit studies are perfect for that. The nice part is, the unit studies have so many activities, I doubt they will feel like “work”.

I am also excited to have more time to devote to making my home more stream lined. Yeah! I hope that by the end of the school year, I will be more at a maintenance level than a purge and organize level. SO I plan to keep FLYING with the flylady!

I better post my next giveaway, toodles!

~trish

Giveaway #2 – winner!

2010-08-23T12:54:00.001-04:00

Welp, Sky2cu4 is a winner again! she is taking advantage of double entries. Want to be my friend on facebook, just ask and I will give you my info to friend me or send me your log in email.

I will post giveaway #3 tonight.

~trish

See, I told you I would come back to talk on MONDAY! I can’t wait to gush about all that is going on in the Howard House.

High Chair makeover!

2010-08-20T17:47:00.001-04:00

I am feeling back to normal, now that I have enrolled my kids into the public school system. I can melt away telling you how my heart broke and the reasons we came to this decision, but I will leave it to another time. I really want to share with you something I have been wanting to do and today, I did it. I made over a highchair that was given to me.

AFTER

BEFORE

I do want to say, by Monday, I plan to start back where I left off in conversation, as if the last 2 weeks we were on pause. So, Saturday night I will be pulling the name for the #2 giveaway. So you still have a chance to win. I will show giveaway #3 on Monday.

~trish

The dads’ life.

2010-08-14T11:32:00.001-04:00

Had to share. Just smile.

The best digital scrapbook site yet.

2010-08-14T11:21:00.001-04:00

This past weekend I was at a scrapbook retreat and was introduced to this site. It is amazing. It has a ton of free stuff for the Creative Memories Storybook Creator. It has video tutorials, free page templates and books, and free images. They do a wonderful job training you to be more productive in the program. Also, they have 2 great blueprint books that motivate you to complete a themed book in just about 3 hours, with or without pictures.

Please, if you scrapbook digitally or ever thought about it, please check it out. It is a wonderful site.

~trish

I will get to that drawing and the next giveaway soon.

alphabet flashcards

2010-08-13T13:46:00.001-04:00

I want to give you a link to Homemade by Jill who made these awesome flashcards. You can get the entire set for free at her blog!

I am still here

2010-08-09T22:28:00.001-04:00

Alright, maybe just have 4 small children makes you too busy! Or it could be coming off the most amazing scrapbook weekend ever. I have lots to share with you, but I am not ready to do it.

I still have my give-away winner to announce, but I will do that tomorrow.

I have a summary to finish about last week’s home school lesson.

And about a few other thoughts. And my next give away.

But until then, I will leave you with this little parody that I wrote and sang about scrapbooking. I will warn you, I am not the best singer, but I make up for it with wit.

I hope you love it. I promise, this is at a scrapbook weekend. It was a 48 hour party really, under the cover of scrapbooking. As a mom, this is the best kind of get away. This is my first away from home scrapbook event. I am thankful to be able to get the much needed adult time with other moms. And this scrapbook weekend, happened to have a DJ playing old school MTV videos and did Karaoke in the evening. How cool is that?

~trish

The Once A Month MOM Cooking website and podcast

2010-08-04T14:17:00.001-04:00

I stumbled across the podcast and then found her site. AMAZING! This is another source for doing your once a month cooking. She has it all very professional with printable recipe cards!

She puts out a monthly podcast about the meals. You can get all the information you need at her site.

I am excited about the pop-tart recipe. My kids love pop-tarts and so does my husband. So I look forward to making these. I am going to plan to use her plan for my next cooking session. find her here!

~trish

Summer Give-away #2

2010-08-03T14:45:00.001-04:00

Here is the next give away! Yes, all of these awesome give-away items are coming from my scrapbook treasures.

This is a set from the Pine Cone Press of Not your ordinary Book Club. There is a supplement packet that goes with the book that teaches you how to create with blanks. The other packet was going to be part of another giveaway, but the book got ruined, so now I need to find another thing to give-away for week #4.

So you can win all of this, like Jackie did with last weeks give-away, by doing the following!

2. Post a comment to this post. Make sure you are a follower, so it will show up as your follower name. You have to post to this posting, not to facebook.

***So the big thing here is that, at the end of the week, I am going to look at the comments and then check it against the followers list. If the names match, I put you in the drawling tub.

Want a second chance, facebook this post.

That’s the rules, if you don’t like them, then just complain about it. I won’t care.

I will pick the names out on Sunday.

Suepe’s Big Bag – Pink Tropical

2010-08-03T14:31:00.001-04:00

I want to start sharing my mom’s amazing bags! I can’t wait to describe them. These bags are heavy duty bags, with some sturdiness. The front side has 2 pockets, one with a zipper.

The other side has one large pocket perfect for papers and file folders.

On each end she put these amazing drink pockets. She used string doo-dads to keep your drink secure.

Check out the inside! I love the stripes inside. One side has a dual pockets and a strap for your keys!

On the other side has 3 pockets. The middle one has a Velcro closure.

The top zips close, so you can keep things secure.

The bag is 18” wide by 15” tall by 5” deep

This bag is available for purchase. There is only this one. There is not a bunch of bags that are from this fabric combination, that is waiting to be purchased. SO if you love it, jump on it, or it will be gone.

Suepe’s Big Bag – Pink Tropical $120 plus tax and S&H-- BUY NOW

Give away #1 – Winner!

2010-08-03T13:30:00.001-04:00

HUGE, I am Sorry! I was suppose to post this yesterday. I hope I didn’t keep someone on the edge of her internet modem.

Yesterday just ran right by me. I was up by 6 am and I was kicked out of the house by my darling husband, so that I can have a quiet breakfast out by myself! Huge love to my husband. I am one of those bazaar people that love to eat by myself. It is not because I want no one to chronicle the amount I eat (which that isn’t a bad reason), I just love the peacefulness. I really developed this love when I was in college and always eating by myself, before then I wouldn’t think to eat by myself, unless I was a loser!

Back on pace! My day literally went like this: Up, breakfast, dentist – fillings, home school, lunch, podcast searching, treadmill, clean kitchen, dinner, clean up, shower somewhere in there, and then in bed. I can’t wait to tell you all about my new love of podcasting. I think I can see that in my future.

Back to the give away! I think we had a few problems with the criteria!

A recap!

1. Make sure you are a subscriber/follower. Just push the little button to the right.

2. Then comment on the post. This way I can connect the follower to the commenter. If you do this backwards, come back and comment again so I know.

3. Now you are entered in to win.

4. If you then link it to facebook (with that little “f” at the bottom of the post). Come back to the post and comment that you facebooked the post. Not comment me on facebook. Because really, when it is time to pick the winner, I am only looking on the post. I am a mom of 4, so I am not going all over to find out.

the winner is: Skycu4

Stayed tune for the next giveaway!

DCWV August Design Challenge

2010-08-02T13:20:00.001-04:00

Each month DCWV at www.300dpi.com has a challenge that you can win prizes with. I have won a previous challenge. The best part about DCWV is that they usually have a free kit to download!

This month, you can download for FREE!

Let’s get digital!

~trish

NEW LOOK 6805

2010-07-29T07:28:00.002-04:00

Ever see a dress and go WOW? Best yet you notice it is made with some of your favorite fabric that you have stashed away. Well I did and then I had to chase here down for details on the pattern. No Shame Trish, here. Here she is! Isn’t here dress amazing, even better is how she dressed it up, honestly I am in envy because I would have never have thought to add the sweater and the necklaces.

She said
“It’s a great pattern, easy to use and goes together well. It’s a little short waisted.”
Short waisted is an easy fix. You can typically find the pattern at Jo-Ann's. I have noticed that they are no longer at our Wal-Mart.

Hopefully, my post baby body will be its more normal shape so that I can make one of these for my wardrobe.
~trish

Baby Shower Gifts

2010-07-28T21:24:00.001-04:00

This is what I am doing on our week off, plus a dr appointment, and doing speech class!

I have a baby shower coming up this weekend and wanted to make some little things for the new mom. All of these items I have seen on other blogs and got some great directions and measurements from www.makeit-loveit.com under her baby label.

I used the printed fabric and a light green flannel for all the pieces.

First is the 2 bibs.

Then the huggies wipe covered and the diaper pouch.

Then I made a baby carrier cover with a padded handle to keep the noisies away from the baby.

I had plenty of fabric, because I bought it with the intention of making a dress for me. I think I like it surrounding a baby better. These items took me about 5-6hours to make, including time to change dirty diapers, nurse a screaming baby, and break up the typical sibling rivalry. I am hoping the mom to be will love it. I really should have made one for myself.

DON’T FORGET I HAVE A GIVE-AWAY GOING ON THIS WEEK. YOU MUST COMMENT (on this blog, facebook comments do not count) AND BECOME A FOLLOWER!

Homes-cool tidbits

2010-07-27T00:06:00.001-04:00

I am really enjoying the My Father’s World curriculum. I have read about a few moms that are adding this or that to strengthen the study for their youngster. At this point, I have no desire to add to it. It is a good strong program that is not consumed in busy-ness.

The one thing I do think it lacks for our situation is writing. Mostly because I have a soon to be 6 year old doing kindergarten, because of where her birthday fell. So I really want to have her active in writing daily. So I got a great writing table from Staples. And I have her write the day of the week, the date, her name, her phone number, and the letter we are learning that week. I am also doing this as a way to teach her the days of the week and her phone number. When she masters her phone number, we will move to the address.

Now I do not want it to be overbearing, SO I write everything with a highlighter and then she just traces it. Sometimes I put dots at where to start for each letter.

Next, we keep all the library books in a basket. This helps us from loosing them and accruing big bills at the library.

We have a lot going on this week. One is that #2’s speech therapy will start again 2 times a week and we have a doctors appointment on a different day. SO I decided that we would take the week off and resume next week. So do not be surprised when you do not see a summary just yet.

2010 Summer Giveaway #1

2010-07-26T14:23:00.001-04:00

We are finishing up the summer and I am de-cluttering. To celebrate! I am going to have 4 weeks of give-aways.

My giveaway item will be announced on Mondays and selected after Saturday at Midnight.

How to play!

You must do 2 things!

1. Comment on this post.

2. Become a follower!

Want to add your name in for another chance, Facebook this post and leave me a comment that you did it!

So, there you go, 2 chances to win.

So I am super excited with this give-away! This is an 8.5 x 8.5 album for your school memories and in addition, a set of alpha stamps! This is to celebrate our start of school and yours!

~trish

MFW –week2 Moon

2010-07-24T23:52:00.001-04:00

we have finished the second week of homes-cool! I love this curriculum! I have just as much joy doing the work as they do, so yes I sometimes photo copy a worksheet, so that I can color with them. I am mostly amazed at how much they are retaining, even my 4 year old son. So here is what we did!

Biblically: We will reflect Jesus’s light, like the moon does the sun.

we studied the different shapes.

We measured the distance of the Earth from the Sun. You can barely see the chalked sun behind #1, I thought the chalk would have shown up, but it was a hard see. #1 is holding a black piece of paper with a green dot for Earth (left side) and a white dot for the moon (right side). As the “adult” I was shocked to see the actual size difference close up, talk about feeling finite, especially when you consider yourself the moon and Jesus the Sun. I am tiny and insignificant, but like the moon, I can bring significant brightness to the world if I let my light shine! WOW! Who is getting the bible concepts here, them or me? Well this might be a great curriculum for the whole family.

we also got perspective on how far away we are from the sun and 4 kids and 461 feet later. I had had enough perspective. So we joyfully ate Moon Pies on our neighbors front porch. (Just helping the Mmmmmmm sound out.)

Now what really showed me the power of reading aloud was when the kids and I talked about making a spaceship the next day. Well my son was elated about this and talked all about how we needed space suits that the astronauts wear because he was going on the moon and there is no air up there. Wow. I think he was somewhere between the ceiling fan and the wall bouncing when I was doing the reading out loud. That cardboard box is still giving them hours of entertainment. They have brought me moon rocks back from their adventures.

These are the books we checked out.

The first set is the non-fiction books and the second is our story books for Friday. I am including a dvd for each theme. It takes a bit of searching but it is well worth it. I figure it is another way to reinforce of content and give me a chance to nurse the baby and still be schooling. I also check out different dvds for sign language or Spanish. I check out phonics prepping movies. I know there are moms out there that might gasp at the thought that the tv came on during a school day, but with the littles all being so little and the littlest being really little, I need the help that I get from the tv and I feel as though it is good use of it.

Printables I considered

http://files.homeschoolshare.com/docs54478/alphabet_notebook/m/m_book_primary.pdf

http://files.homeschoolshare.com/docs54478/alphabet_notebook/m/moon_prayer.pdf

Now I started a little bit of tot school. I got the ideas from 1 +1 +1! I was shocked at how well it worked. I started with just motor skills on using tongs and moving tiny pom poms into an ice tray. Then later in the week we did matching the pom poms. Even the other kids wanted to play with the tray. The pom poms and the ice tray came from the Dollar Tree. The rest I had.

I can’t wait to do the exciting things for this next week. I am loving the homes-cooling gig!

~trish

Anniversary gift

2010-07-24T23:14:00.001-04:00

This beautiful dishcloth was crocheted by my mother in law. I love it. It is hard to express all the things it makes me feel and think, especially since it is such a least thought about item in our homes. I want to say for such a simple item and tool that we use, it feels lavish and warm and comforting, like the days I would hold my great grandmother’s warm soft wrinkly hands. [That would be a whole other topic about being a child and craving those soft dish worn hands to touch my childish face. And how I am in shock that so many women are more concerned with the youthful appearance of their hands than the tenderness and wisdom that their hands can bring to comfort a child. another day].

A beautiful dishcloth can go unnoticed among a sink and counter full of dishes. Even worst, a beautiful dishcloth can be kept up for safe keeping away from the stale food that sits on those plates from the previous nights dinner. A beautiful set of dishcloths that were made with tenderness and love can be hidden away and forgotten about by a clutter hound. A beautiful dishcloth like this can shine like a ruby at the top of a crown when it is left on a cleaned counter, next to a polished sink.

You see, I love yarned dishcloths, but I found them greatly impractical because I never wanted them to be dirty after all that time was spent on making them. Well, I have finished about 3 weeks of Fly Lady training. I am far from mastering a routine and a beautiful kept house! But I have the most beautiful sink and never knew it. My sink is a double white cast iron sink that was filled with stains from onion peels and such. Well, working slowly to create a routine, I have managed to keep a base point of my kitchen sink cleaned and pretty much the surrounding counter top. Well, my mother in law blessed me with this beautiful dishcloth and for once, I was excited to have it at my sink like a badge of honor.

Then the dishcloth started to linger in my heart. Have you ever read The five Love Languages by Dr. Gary Chapman? Well this book was given to me a couple months after our honey moon ended. As a side note, two head strong personalities can quite literally end the honeymoon period of their marriage on the way home from the honeymoon AND we did.

So back to the 5 love languages. My husband’s love language is acts of service, mine quality time. Well, in the beginning of our courtship or something like that. In retrospect I would like to think of it as courtship, in reality it was not. Alright, I was a little too well know for my huge DISLIKE of dishes. When I lived alone in college, I would let them pile for days and then scornfully do them, when the last dish was gone. I just know grasped the concept that I do not have to have the dishwasher bulging and it has a button that allows it to run more than once a day, hmm! So one day I come home and I get a strange feeling something was wrong/different. Not a comforting notion when you live alone. SO I look around and realize after walking from room to room, there WAS something missing, MY DISHES! They were gone and the sink was clean?!

Wow! It was like the tooth fairy had shown up with the money truck. My darling husband had stopped by to find that I was not home and decided to let himself in (I believe at this time we were not dating but just friends and he was there to gain access to my fridge.) Well with the lack of anything to do, he did my dishes. Wow! Should have know then that he was the one I was going to marry, NO MORE DISHES! Well, I married him anyways and during the first ~~few~~ year he did the dishes often.

{{5 Love languages comes in here}} Well during a typical heated argument for my need for love, still didn’t get the whole love thing, I was a new Christian and well, new to marriage.

I demanded that I wanted time with him because that is what people who were in love do.

Well, he argued that he did love me, because look he did the dishes. ((enter weird scooby doo sound)).

My ignorant response was, why do I care about that, I can hire someone for that, but I can not hire someone to LOVE ME!

Yes folks, I was that naive. So we read the book, the light bulb turns on and my mouth makes the sound “OOooooooooo. Wow? Really???” Who would have thought that one?

So this next month will be my 8th wedding anniversary to my wonderful strong headed husband. In the last 8 years, I have learned a lot about him, but mostly me. In fact, there are days that I realize he could have chained into an entirely different person and it really does not matter. Now I choose to love him. And honestly, since I am being too honest, I sometime love him, while I am on the phone telling him about why I find it ridiculous that I have to love him in “that way” (insert whatever task I am doing at the moment) and can’t he just put his socks in the basket, instead of me stumbling onto his secret stash of dirty socks.

In the past 3 weeks as I am taking the beginning steps to become a better ~~person,~~ no not really, just a better help mate to my husband, a better mother, and the tick-tock of our home’s rhythm, I am embracing my role at the sink. I know I am working on a deep change that is unlacing every bit of my internal fiber, to be woven new by only God’s hands and I am letting him. I will be an orderly person, I will keep my home kept, and I will not live among clutter. The eternal chant that reminds me of God’s truth, is that He is not a God of chaos. (I am an engineer, so please realize that even spell check does not work for me, when I use caios, I really mean chaos, I spell it like it sounds not by the American language change of rules policy)

oh, back to my thought, so I am using flylady to become a person of order and it is going to take everything I got to surrender to God’s will for this to happen. But that little dishcloth and the comfort of my great grandmother’s hands reminds me that I have an ultimate love given to me and I can simply keep my home kept, to give that love to others. To celebrate this and surround myself with this knowledge of surrender to love my husband as he needs to be loved, I plan to have about 8-10 dishcloths made by my anniversary so I have one daily (with a few backups) to keep me in constant acknowledgement.

So I made my first 2 here

And I am working on my next one here:

Then just last night I was reminded by God’s Power and how he gives to us through the love of other people that He surrounds us with. Because last night, I was given these 2 dishcloths out of the blue. WOW! I was so excited! She had no idea how such a simple and often overlooked tool in the kitchen that she took the time and love to make, could mean so much to me.

What I love about them the most is that each one is different. Some are crocheted and some are knitted. They have different stitches and different yarn. They are different sizes. Together, they remind me that each season of marriage is different and will feel and look different from the others. Enjoy the beauty of the good seasons and the survival of the hard seasons and no matter what, this too shall pass, like it or not. And most of all, I CHOOSE to love, I do not feel love. Love is not a feeling or emotion, it is a job. Which means, I will not ever worry about falling out of it, I either choose to love or I don’t. Now falling in and out of lust, is a given. I just hope the Good Lord doesn’t mess with that until we can both no longer………

Well, good night you all! :)

~trish

The hooks I love!

2010-07-20T23:42:00.001-04:00

I love these hooks! I love how easy it is to put them up and be able to hang things out of the way so easily. One of the

reasons I love them, is that my walls within my house are concrete. I am not just talking concrete blocks, I am also talking concrete coated. So to hang ANYTHING! I need a hammer drill and a 20 page commitment contract with my husband that I really want a hole there and that I will keep something hanging. Because those holes are not easily patched. But having these hooks makes a huge difference. A double pack of hooks this size cost me about $4. I also get smaller ones for hanging garland in the house. I have even thought to use them for clothes line affect with the kids master pieces.

I am really impressed that they can hold a lot of weight. My purse typically has a wallet, calendar, and camera; along with all the other stuff that attracts in it. I have no fear that it will stay up.

So this is an option, especially if you do not want to wait on the hubby to hang something. (Mine has intentionally hid the hammer drill on me)

~trish

Skim or Whole Milk

2010-07-18T21:41:00.001-04:00

I thought this was going to be a post on hind milk and fore milk, but instead it is turning into my personal milking it pity party. I have nursed all of my children. I amazed myself with the first one and with my husbands constant support, I nursed her for 6 months. I had the same success with the next. Well, #2 came along with such dissatisfaction that I could no longer take the heartbreak and aggravation of it all and we ended at 4 months. It took 1 week to figure out that there was no way my body could have kept up with her appetite. Still to this day, she out eats the first 2.

So sweet #4 is now 10 weeks old and I AM TIRED. I mean completely exhausted. My poor child is gassy since day 1. (I have tried changing our diet, but man, we eat a lot of onions, garlic, beans, and greens.) SO I am really not eating good enough for her. I feel like I am being tugged in several directions with the other children and emotionally I am not keeping up, because I am so wiped out with exhaustion.

So I chinned up and bought some formula today. I will tell you, I feel like a quitter! I am not a good quitter. I have stuck through more things than I ever wanted to because I did not want to be a quitter. I am having a bad mom moment. But in my heart I know I need to do this for her and the rest of family and for myself too. for me, because it takes a lot of energy to play fair and when I am wiped out, my snappy aggravated side comes out for everyone to play with, not very pretty.

What has me most heart broken is that I know that I am “just” supplementing to take some pressure of my body to produce. But it is a slippery slope for me. My supplementing usually only last me 2 weeks and then I am done nursing. I am hoping to nurse from after dinner to morning and then supplement during the day. If I can grab a nap, I will probably nurse her again. I hope this plan helps me from completely stopping. We will see!

I think this is in my make things easier category of life right now.

~trish

A New Blog

2010-07-16T20:45:00.001-04:00

Well, I am starting my next blog. I am not sure if it is crazy to operate more than one blog, but I am hoping to meet a specific need with this particular blog. There are a lot of moms in this town and there are a lot of things to do and opportunities to do, but there is not one place to find it. So I am hoping to bring the connection between the parents in the area and the cool things to do.

hmmm, lets see how this goes. I have no plan to slow these blogs down, just focused. If you are not aware, this blog is my daily musings that go on in my head. Diapers and backpacks is more impersonal and more informative of the local opportunities.

www.diapersandbackpacks.blogspot.com

~trish

Goodbye clutter, HELLO functional!

2010-07-16T16:46:00.001-04:00

This post is to celebrate less! Less stuff that is. Background, please! I really have a big house with lots of little rooms that is filled with lots of littles and according to my friend and lots of furniture. So I have in my house a couch and a futon, because my darling husband won’t let me get rid of the futon, in case, we have company. Well, I agree with said friend, too much stuff is really hard to live with. So I am slowly replacing things. Like remember the once loved ashtray chair that was in hopes to replace, but couldn’t due to obnoxious smell.

Well, I am saying good bye to these two items.

I am picking up this tomorrow:

because it does this:

(side note: new sofa is 4 inches shorter than the old one because of the lack of huge arms)

And the most awesome thing about it, is I am using this to help pay for it!

Do not stress, I have already purchased its replacement a couple weeks ago for $20 at Goodwill, right here.

Look familiar, yep, a pretty version of the ashtray and probably more comfortable since I don’t have to hold my breath.

Confetti going everywhere!

~trish

MFW-K Lesson 1 – Sun

2010-07-16T16:06:00.002-04:00

Jesus is the light of the world.
We are off and running on our Kindergarten program. The week long unit study proved to be a hit. We kicked it off with the library to collect our material.
We did 2 of our lessons late at night because we spent the day at the theater or mimi’s.
Books we used:

Field trip:
Cinderella Play

Crafts we did:

Projects:
Raisin
This is after 3 days. We have been having some cloudy days. The kids have been noting that they are getting soft, smaller, and changing color. I have been keeping a fresh grape to compare.

Sundial
we did 2 different sundials to see which is better, strictly for mommy’s curiosity. Instead of using a pencil and clay as the instructions said, I used a skewer stick and a hole on cardstock paper. You can see the shadow on the paper, this is at 2 pm. I made my paper 6 in by 6 in and was able to cover it with a 5 gallon bucker.

I did this style from the instructions on eHow.com The shadow was not as defined as the stick. Plus it was 12 in by 12 in and not easy to cover. As you can see, it was no longer affective after the rain.

Noodle art

Printables I used/considered:
http://0.tqn.com/d/homeschooling/1/0/e/d/colors2.png
http://www.coloringcastle.com/sun_coloring_pages.html
http://www.starfall.com/ni/download/level-k-bl/bl-s.pdf
http://homeschooling.about.com/od/langearlyread/ss/letterscolor_5.htm

Handling the other littles:
#2 (age 4) did the first 2 days and the today’s, but sat out the rest of the week. Mostly because of being too tired. When he is joining us, he is loving it.
#3 (age 2) For this first week, I made sure she was sleeping. Sometimes she was up to allowable craziness.

#4 (9weeks) fussed here and there. On day 1, while we were going through information about the sun, she started a screaming fit that lasted an hour. I had only been through 1 book, but I had a VHS from the library about the sun, so I popped that in and excused myself.
Summary
I am grateful for this week and that we did get started. We are not entirely prepared with being organized yet but we will get there. I had several defining moments of ohh, yes, this is why we are homeschooling and a meltdown by mommy when I found the mud on the side of the house.
I was terrified that my children would be uneager or even unwilling. I think the change up on activities and not doing the same phonics montra day after day was a success. The phonics is about 10-15 different activities that only have you doing about 5 each day and they change on the day. I like that we will have a routine with the phonics with our activities and after a while it should feel like an old hat for me.
I am really happy to finish the week positively. I am extremely tired and fussy with trying to implement a cleaning routine, homeschooling, and nursing the baby. I am even considering to start supplementing just to have more energy. She is not keeping me up at night, but I keep waking up more exhausted everyday.
Wheewhooo!
~trish

TV ruins a good education

2010-07-16T10:55:00.001-04:00

I am in the beginning of reading The Educated Child by William Bennett, et al. and he states that TV ruins a good education. He list all the background to which he determined that statement. all made sense to me, so I am emplimenting no TV from Sunday to Friday.

Here is the result, some good fashion playing is taking place.

MUD! Not shown are the muddy children. Not stated this is what and where I discovered them as we were to be walking out of the house and into the van. Obviously, my morning is going long than expected.

~trish

A new routine for my kitchen.

2010-07-15T00:03:00.001-04:00

So I have been using FlyLAdy to build a new routine to clean with. Who am I kidding. I hate to clean, I am building my first routine of keeping house. I hate to keep house. I work so hard and it feels like I am running in circles and getting nothing accomplished. Well, I decided to try FlyLady. Well, my kitchen is very quickly coming together pretty and clean.

Just to recap, I did clean my sink on the first day, but this was my counters. And there was nothing special about that day, this was my counters everyday.

I promise that I did not move things around the room to make it look good. Here is another day and the entire kitchen.

suddenly, my kitchen is feeling spacious. I take up the whole counter when I make dinner now, because I have the entire counter to use. I am not getting stressed when the kids bring their bowls to the sink, because there is space to put them. So what if food gets on the counter, I am going to clean it off no matter what.

What I am liking about FLY LADY:

First, it is not “go clean your house and then keep it up”. Her way is start a routine a little at a time and before you know it, your house will be sparkling. My attitude has always been to exhaust myself and scream as I would try and deep clean a cluttered house, then be exhausted and never keep it up or get back to it.

Second, you start with manageable accomplishments and somehow I always do a little more.

Third, I have been working hard but the good kind of hard. I put in 100% and got 100% accomplished. Usually, I feel like I put 100% towards my goals and got 10% accomplished because I was moving with no direction and just mostly chasing my tail everyday around this house.

And forth, ~~I like the smell of bleach and never knew it.~~ ~~I can’t believe how good my reflection looks in my sink.~~ ~~I didn’t know a toilet could be pretty.~~ I love the look of shock when my husband comes home.

~trish

Have poop, will travel.

2010-07-14T23:44:00.001-04:00

Me sitting on the bench watching the kids play on our our little trip! I glance up and ponder to myself

“Hmm, I wonder why #3 took her bathsuit off in the park. Oh, no, not here! Are you kidding me! #3 what are you doing?”

#3 says, “pooop, mooommmyy, pooop”

‘ahh, this is why I do not have dogs! Really? I hope I have a garbage bag. I haven’t had to do this since college, when I had my little dog. Aha, the is why I do not have dog! Really? Please, baby, we do not poop on the grass, we go to the potty.”

#3 – “#3, poooop in gasss”

[side note: #3 loves to speak in the third person. She is the only one that has done this. Also, the kids is an amazing squatter when it comes to going potty outside. When I was her age, my dad would have us sit on a log with our butts over the side or make us lean against a try. The later once resulted with me getting redbugs all over my butt and my underwear sapped to my _ss, oh sorry it just kind off rhymed.]

“Well, I guess it wouldn’t feel right, if there wasn’t any crap to my day” (I say this with my hand in the air with defeat)

Adding to my pissy vacation. My children managed to whiz their way through the state of Florida, quit literally. In fact, as we stopped to eat at a Cracker Barrel, my son hoped out of the van to pee on the first tree he could see. Unfortunately, to me it was the one directly in front of the porch about 20 feet away. There was a chorus of chuckling and pointing as I walked up. I looked to discover, OF COURSE MY SON IS SHOWING OFF AGAIN WITH THE DISTANCE HE CAN PROJECT.

Next trip, I am logging all of our pit stops. My husband had a deflecting moment, when my son chose to stand in the van and take aim at a guardrail. To my poor husbands dismay was that he standing outside the van as the pee splash off the guard rail and showering him. See, I need to have that camera ready!

~trish

Bulk Produce

2010-07-14T23:28:00.001-04:00

I might be guilty of having a love for buying in bulk. There is just something about buying 100 tomatoes that gets me giddy!

So the other day I went to the farmers market. It is like a whole other world there. You can buy from market stands.

Out of the back of trucks

you can buy in quantities of one thing or 1 box. So I got excited and went shopping. A little too much. Thankfully, I only had one kid, I had to rearrange the seating.

I bought 2 boxes of corn, 5 boxes of tomatoes, 1 box of peppers and 5 watermelons for about $60. Let me say! WHAT WAS I THINKING! Way too much to put away. I ended up putting up the corn and 1 box of tomatoes. The rest was handed out and I did buy 2 boxes of it for my MIL and mom and split the peppers. BUT still, I got 4 kids and one on a ninni! How did I think that I could put food up.

Oh but I loved the smell of those peppers and tomatoes. YUM! But at the end of the week, it made me realize that I needed to keep things simpler. SO no clothe diapers, no homemade wipes, no bulk preparation. I am going as easy as possible and maintaining health. So SAM’s Club here I come.

~trish

PS I think I am going back, I love the freshness. Maybe neck week.

Family bento style

2010-07-14T01:03:00.001-04:00

I found this little bad boy in Target being clearance off. It is a cute bento box and it is big enough for the family to have an outing. So I had to try it out. the blue bowls are open and the green bowls are separated into 3 compartments.

I served tropical fruit cocktail, ritz crackers with cream cheese and a salmon spread. Cookies, raisins, and fruit snack. I included the fork picks to eat the fruit with and a spoon for the spreads. I also had a towelette for each of us.

The kids loved it. I had a few impressed onlookers. I packed the container in a insulated grocery cooler with a jug of cold water and container of lemon aid with the towels packed around it (we went to the fountains). The water and lemonaid kept the food cold while we did our errands in the morning.

~trish

Sunrise to a daydreaming weekend.

2010-07-14T00:53:00.001-04:00

This is just before 7 am going over the bridge leaving home for the weekend, almost alone. Almost, because my shadow #4 goes with me everywhere. Got food in the boob and will travel. so I loaded up for a 3 hour drive to attend a bridal shower and came back the following afternoon.

It was so amazing and refreshing to be on the move so early in the morning and to drive in almost silence that i had to take a picture of the sun coming up to share. The part I loved the most about this adventure was the quietness of driving. And I mean quiet. Even with the radio blaring, it was still quiet in comparison with the ciaos I live.

The time was a saturation of my thoughts that allowed them to move and grow without interruption. My thoughts slowly covered and engulfed my dreams and desires for my family, children, and husband. My goals were noted for the long term and the short term needs were viewed in a more critical light, versus just in the motion. For once in a longtime, I was not having to go through the motions. I could think about the motions I do everyday and consider what I could change for the better.

I spent the next 48 hours moving slow and with a smile. Grueling was the realization that I am so caught up in the task and effort that my day takes, I often forget to smile, (note to self is to start smiling). I evaluated me as mom, wife, daughter, and child of God. Took inventory on what needed to changes and smiled at what I was getting right. Took the time to emotionally let go of any recent baggage I have emotionally acquired and dusted off the trunks in long term storage. Emptied a few bags and smiled.

I thought and dreamed about this coming year and the next 10, then the 5 years after that and then the lifetime that I will have when my children will be adults. I prayed. Prayed for their success, their love, their spouse, their children.

I talked to God. I called a friend. Had a chat with me. I had no idea how a long quiet car ride can set the soul at ease. I hope not to wait to long for the next.

~trish

Kicking off the homes-cool year

2010-07-14T00:38:00.001-04:00

So today was the first day of school in our area. So today would have been the huge time honored mom and child ~~bonding~~ crying your eyes out event of leaving your sweet child at some desk with their name on it and trying to figure out what to do for the next 5-6 hours.

Well not for this family, we went to a play. Not just any play, a dinner theater show. How nice a buffet lunch and a desert bar all before the show. All of the kids went, even #4 sat in for the show. The children loved it.

I am glad that we went though. I always knew I wanted to homeschool, even before having children. I might have started selling it to my husband once we got home from the honeymoon. even still, I get nervous. No one in my family has ever homeschooled before. SO I am walking on new ground for me. Thankfully my mom, which is funny because it was never a consideration for her, is 100% behind me. I think she is loving the lack schedule and the ability to talk me into an adventure with the kids. (She is already planning a weekend “fieldtrip” to a huge museum)

so apart of me was sad not to have the whole shopping and consuming adventure of clothes, lunchboxes, school supplies. Or the nerves and the excitement of somewhere new. The pretty desk with the name at the top. The colorful room. And yet I am thankful not to have those experiences too. I know being home with my kids and getting the blessing of homeschooling them is gift. I know if I was working, my heart would be mourning over the missed opportunity to be homeschooling them. If I had them in school, I would be wishing I could be teaching them my way, and would probably be a teachers worst nightmare of a parent. I love being involved with their learning and given half the chance I will end up engrossed in someone else's’ kid’s learning. So I know I am on the right path, but it doesn’t mean I am not nervous.

So we skipped the first day jitters and went to a play. What is cool, is that I will scrapbook this as a fieldtrip! Eat your heart out! This family does supercool stuff and calls it schooling!

~trish

Organizing the MFW-K day

2010-07-14T00:15:00.001-04:00

We are into our official homeschool year. We started somewhere in May, right after #4 birth and took until the end of June to finish the first week. Oh, I was feeling some fear that maybe I was in over my head. My thought was that even though I have this great passion and desire to homeschool my children, what happens if I never get to it in our day. well, we are getting better and of course, we still have no real set routine yet. I hope by Christmas, we will find it or maybe Santa will bring me one.

As we are moving forth in the lessons, I am excited that I am coming together mentally with the planning and physically with keeping it together. I will say, right now we are homeschooling either on the living room floor or at the coffee table. I do not have some awesome cool, eat your heart out classroom. I am going to make a makeshift display area over our tiny dinner table to help us review and gloat over our hard work. I had hoped to use the bulletin board squares that you tape up, BUT the darn things keep falling down. SO I am patiently waiting for my husband to make a board to put them on.

Here is our stuff!

Calendar. Part of our morning routine is to put the date on the calendar. I originally bought a calendar set from the Dollar Tree and had it all together on a poster board. Having only a few places to hang it and having guest knocking it down, I opted to get rid of it. I found this little gem at Staples for $3.

A small hiccup it that #3 likes to erase the numbers when no one is looking.

I don’t actually mind, because now #1 is getting a lot of practice writing the numbers. Bad mommy?

I took the example by Melanie at www.treasuresunseen.blogspot.com and set up all my unit lessons like she did.

I love being part of the My Fathers World Kindergarten – Yahoo group. Group members share files and ideas and help with keeping the mommy’s chin up. In that group, there is a weekly summary of each unit study. So I print mine and put the week we are working on attached to a clipboard. I also clip the pages we will work on behind the summary.

The generous mom who made this, created a somewhat standardized form that she added weekly details. One thing to note about MFW-K is that it operates like a letter of a week program that is combined into a unit study and submerged into the bible. For that, I am in bliss to teach my children this program.

Now I never meant to do this but my daily workbox just came to be and is working fine for now. In it I have:

tactile numbers
teacher manual
bible
box of crayons
box with scissors, glue, pencils
letter box (this is the envelope box, plan to make it pretty later)
3-hole punch
paper items for the next craft project
books from the library that go along with the study
a game (cooties mini version from wal-mart) to celebrate the end of our lesson for the day. [I am finding that ending with a game helps motivate us to stay on task and helps me to remember to have fun]

Now I can not forget that I have to keep a portfolio of #1 work. So here is a 3-ring binder from one of my college courses.

We are moving along. And I am already amazed at what I am seeing. #1 is very good at knowing the sounds of letters, so we should be moving into blends rather soon. #2 is really pleasing me. We are using this year as his Pre-k, so I plan for him to do a lot of just sitting in. Well he is very determined to do things perfect. He is more than happy to do what ever #1 is doing and I believe he would try to take over her work. I think the most important task for him right now is to just sit back and listen and mimic her. I hope #1 gets just as excited. She is doing it to please me, she is a pleaser. But I also know given the chance, she would much rather be doing something else. I hope as the routine gets more in place, she will come around.

~trish

wearing a baby!

2010-07-07T22:43:00.001-04:00

#3 was wanting to be a little mommy. She was “wearing” her babies by throwing them into a pillowcase and throwing them over her shoulder. At first, I thought she was wanting to be a hobo. But after watching her for a little bit, I realized she was wanting to wear them. So I grabbed some fabric and put together a little baby sling for her.

she is so cute, but not to be confused, oh my, this child here is a rascal! She will earn me every white hair I have.

~trish

nursing cover

2010-07-07T22:38:00.001-04:00

A recent friend I met was sporting one of these nursing covers. Now being on my 4th child and had nursed all the others, I never used a nursing cover before. I have seen them, but I really did not have an interest in them for several reasons. First, all the ones I had seen were very bulks and it was almost like putting on another garment. Second, I did not feel in need of one, because I am really good at maintaining cover and wearing my clothes and positioning the baby so nothing was in view.

I am not sure if it is now that I am older or that I have too much whirl-winding around me with the younger ones, but I wanted a cover. I guess, I am just too tired to put up with the effort of trying to conceal myself from the public and it is easier to just cover. The nice part about the cover, is that you do not need all those fancy tops to wear.

I was really excited to hop on the tutorial, here:

http://blisstree.com/live/free-pattern-to-sew-your-own-nursing-cover/?utm_source=blisstree&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=b5hubs_migration

The nice addition that makes this easy to use is the boning at the top, that gives the cover a tent like shape. Thus, allowing you to peak in with out lifting the cover, also, helps air flow. BECAUSE NURSING MAKES YOU HOT!

Now the young lady in the pictures is my very young sister in law. I had to take advantage of her holding #4 and I went a head and used her as my model. I am getting a little bit reluctant to allow my darling husband to take any more horrible pictures of me. I truly believe he does it intentionally.

~trish

Should there be instructions for glue?

2010-07-07T03:00:00.001-04:00

I thought, hmm, I bet my kids would love to do a craft. How about some foam pirates and hula dancers, this should be easy enough. I can help out in the beginning and get some stuff done in the kitchen. I will be mom of the year!

Well, reality hit about an hour later with the glue bottle now empty. My sweet, but almost always misunderstood 4 year old son took this project on, ambitiously! My always initial reaction is why did you have the intent on destroying everything? But I just sent him in to clean up. As I surveyed the damage and tried not to cry at the obvious misery I would have to work at to clean, I soon started seeing little people.?

If you look carefully, you can see a few of them on the table. A since of relief hit me, that he was really trying here, I just had to be willing to look beyond the glue. As the head house maid in the family, it is hard to look past the glue.

I did get it all cleaned up, relatively easily. I put the people aside to dry and scraped all the extra foam pieces. From there I left it alone for a few hours. My wonderful husband came home to tell me “You didn’t want to clean that up before the table got ruined?” Ahh, men! Well, that evening I just pealed the dried glue off the table and the table was fine.

I do have to say, having now 3 girls and 1 boy, my attitude and demeanor is often frustrated with the wild ways of a boy. sometimes it feels like it is smooth sailing running through the day with the girls and the entire time I am fighting with my son to stop making waves. ( My best analogy would be a day with girls is like a yoga class and the day with a boy is like hip hop aerobics, one relaxed and one high energy) Add on this being insanely tired from having a newborn that I am nursing, it is easy to say I can get snappy at the wave maker.

I was so thankful, that I sent him inside initially when I was shocked at seeing the mess. Having him in another room allowed me to completely take in the picture with out him continuing to make more wakes. This allowed me to see his accomplishment and praise him for it. I wish I had a stop button for time, so I can do more taking in the whole picture during all the ciaos, so I could easily see and praise the effort , instead of reacting to the mess.

~trish

Urge to Purge is BACK!

2010-07-07T02:29:00.001-04:00

SO to be a way! I went unplugged for just over a week, totally unintentionally. I would never want to unplug from you, but I snuck away to see family and had no telephone service or internet. So I had almost a week of no phone calls or keeping up with anything. I was even unplugged from my sewing machine, now that was the most daunting part.

While I was staying at my uncluttered, simply arranged sisters house, I found a nice book by Better Homes and Gardens. I really liked this book. I only got to get about an inch deep into it, but found it heavy in wonderful information about keeping a home.

Now I know this sounds funny of an idea, a book to help you keep home, but I quickly realized keeping a house a home, takes art. The art that you must learned and let me say, I have not and did not learn it. It had a ton of details about everything, even making a bed. So being in a clean home with an inspiring book, I got the urge to have the same at home.

So I spent the 8 hour drive home making my initial game plan, hmm, boy is this sounding familiar to one of the many post I have done on the overwhelming clutter I have. I will say, over the past few years and months, I have drastically decreased my clutter.

My problem at the moment is,

Yes, there is still stuff to get rid of and removed from the house.
Some things really will not have a home until some remodeling is done (and of course, my darling husband refuses to start until everything is moved out of his way, YUCK!)
It is time to find a reasonable home for the rest of it.

To help motivate my I am calling upon the knowledge of FlyLady!

Our FlyLady system is all about establishing little habits that string together into simple routines to help your day run on automatic pilot. You can do this! – Essentially it is an outside source that reminds you to work on your chores. I did this when I had my first child and would get emails telling me to clean this and that – as funny as it sounds- it was the boost I needed to get it done.

I am coming back to Fly Lady to help me maintain a routine outside of myself as to controller to make it work. I am not sure if I am going to sign up for the emails or have a reminder on my calendar to do things each day.

Fly Lady’s initial push is all about the kitchen sink! Clean, sparkle and polish. There is even instructions to do it. Well I got started tonight.

The funniest thing happened, I decided I should wipe the window ledge above and then I noticed how dirty the screen was. Next thing I know, I am on a chair taking down the screen and washing them. These are good wire screan, so I was able to scrub it good. I was shocked at the dirt.

At this point I want to add a little condition statement. This is still what you see when you look right and left of the sink.

Ah, oh well, my sink is pretty. And besides, baby steps. Maybe tomorrow my counters will be cleaned.

Fly lady, fly!

~trish

Baby Wearing

2010-06-28T15:28:00.001-04:00

I have had several baby slings and carriers, but these are still my favorite. And even better is that I made it. I have tried the style, were you wrap them in different positions using the same piece of clothe. But I found that I like these best, with a little up front work, it keeps it easy for me to use. Here is a picture of me and my cousin wearing our babies. Our babies are about a month apart.

You can have easy access to the babies from the side if they are tiny and as they grow, from the top.

The pattern is a good pattern, but the directions are misleading, to say it best. You will need some experience in sewing, not because the techniques are challenging. It is because the directions will not direct you to the desired finished product. I have bought this pattern twice, most recently,because I could not find the other pattern. The second pattern had an extra pattern piece to cut. With that said, once you build it once, it is minimal effort to create again and again.

McCalls Pattern 5678

I have also made the sling. I actually prefer this sling verses any I have owned. I like that it sits the baby more at your abdomen, verses your chest.

I hope you enjoy!

~trish

Reading cushions.

2010-06-22T22:27:00.001-04:00

On one of my late night blog crawling, I seen a cute version of making a cushion. I believe Pottery Barn was the inspiration. So I took off to make one and try my hand at piping. Oh must say, I love piping, especially since I do have a piping foot for my sewing machine.

I made the cushion 20 inches wide and 5 inches high.

I interfaced all sides of it and also put a handle on the cushion. I used about a pound of poly-fil to stuff it. The cushion went together quickly. I like the idea of the circles because I am going to make 2 more and they should easily stack. My daughters love it.

Individual Cups

2010-06-22T22:20:00.001-04:00

A friend read my facebook post about monogramming cups for each kids. Well, she did it better.

What you see are Tervis Tumblers that are made in the USA!! I am so excited about my cup and I have been drinking a lot of water since.

Here is what I love about Tervis!

1. I can leave a drink with ice in the car for over an hour in 97 degree summer day and still have ice left.

2. It has my name on it!

3. Freezer, microwave, and dishwasher safe.

4. It has a lid.

5. It has a lifetime guarantee and it will be replaced if it breaks.

6. Made in the USA, BABY!

You can order them online at www.tervis.com and the prices are extremely reasonable. I am now embarrassed to say, this is my first tervis and because of the guarantee, it can be my only one, well unless I lose it.

I am loving too that each kids has their own cup. Thank you Heather, totally awesome baby gift for the entire family.

~trish

I want a new dress.

2010-06-19T01:07:00.001-04:00

I love the old navy beach dress, but I have made a commitment to myself that I would not buy new clothes that are made outside the USA. It is my little pro-american, keep the jobs and money in our country attack against the world. So I love this dress, I imagine that it is soft and comfy.\

I also like

My only way around my shopping dilemma is to either buy it thrift or sew it. Since it is the current fashion, I doubt I will buy it thrift. SO I am checking out patterns.

sadly, both of these patterns only go to size 16 and my after baby pattern size is still about a size 20. I am not sure why pattern sizes are so unforgiving. So I am out of luck on these patterns.

I might have luck with this one:

I am really not sure how I am going to do on making a dress. I figure, I am going to hit Goodwill and a few garage sales in the morning. And then hit walmart for the pattern. New Look 6774. I will give it a try tomorrow night. I read a few reviews on it and I hope it will be a good fit for me. It is hard at the in between stage that I am at. I have a big butt from the pregnancy but worst is my belly. I know that it will go away on its own, but I am at the point that nothing fits.

I did try to copy a dress I already owned and it was a maternity one. It turned out cute but a complete flop on fitting. Try try again. I need to go through my entire wardrobe and clean house. I have so much that I do not care for.

~trish

Potty Chair on the go.

2010-06-15T12:37:00.001-04:00

This is our beloved potty chair. I got it for under $5 at ikea. I thought when putting a potty chair in my van that it is a common thing to ride with. I was shocked that, no, not very many mommys are riding around with a potty chair.

I put our potty chair in a couple of years ago. A small inconvenience about potty trained children is their tiny bladders at the most inconvenient times. So I put a chair in the van and away we went. I keep wipes in the van and water to give it a good clean after each use. I can not tell you how many times and where it has been used.

My favorite it my son. He does not like the auto flushing toilets at walmart. One time, he refused. So once we got to the van, he pulled the potty chair out, set it in the parking lot on the yellow parking line and relaxed for his 15 minute movement. Ahh, I realized this is just mommy-hood. I sat at the edge of the van with the door open watching my son on the potty having a movement and watching people coming and going. Thankfully, we had a car parked next to us, so noone really could see him. UNTIL! A car pulled in to park across from us. I thought she was going to need the chair, she almost peed herself, laughing so hard.

So our green potty is always in the van. And I am excited to have #3 using it on our trips to the lake. She is still wearing a diaper, but her daddy invited her to use it after her sister was done with it. Of course, sitting under a nice oak, is a nice place to relax.

~trish

Finishing up on the Smokers Chair

2010-06-15T12:17:00.001-04:00

Remember my post that one of the things I wanted to get done this summer was to finish my ashtray chair. Well, I got started on it!

So I just took a knife and started cutting at the seams. I realized very quickly that I had no idea what I was doing.

Then I realized that this thing has had water damage. And then I knew what I needed to do to make this chair right.

So I took the hardware off at the bottom and took it to the curb.

~trish

Winn-Dixie sale

2010-06-11T16:13:00.001-04:00

When the day just doesn’t start off right.

2010-06-09T12:33:00.001-04:00

Enough said!

Yah right, like that is all I would say. Well, I just might be a little hormonal. Not too bad, pretty mild for me, but I am FREAKING OUT HERE PEOPLE! Well, no not that bad. Lets see, I have already public apologized for being me, see earlier post on Miss Bossy pants. I have thrown myself to the Homeschool moms forum that I might be inadequate, because I can’t get myself into a routine with my children, even though I have a 4 week old attached. Miss Type A is trying to take over again, I must STOP her!

Well, the blessing in homeschooling year round is that you can take time off. So seeing that I have a newborn, I am attempting no curriculum progress for another 2 months. So I believe that would make our unit study start date august 10th. Hmm, that is my wedding anniversary. Well, I better keep the poppa happy, no rice dinner for him, we might start the following week. I do want to keep them learning, almost unconstructively, so here is what I plan to mildly work with them on:

Monthly Calendar (got all the pieces from the Dollar Tree)
Numbers
Alphabet
Weather
Lots of reading (We will be exceeding our limit at the Library this summer)

I plan to do all this with games and nothing too structured. I might even throw in some file folder games that I already have made up. I did find a neat blog Confessions of a homeschooler, she has a ton of ideas that I might have to copy from. I love the use of her workboxes and it makes me want to try them. But then again it goes into me trying to do too much. For this summer, I am trying to keep it simple.

Oh, so what better way to keep it simple than to make a few goals for the summer. I am trying to keep it to a minimum here folks, but I am a task master and if I do not have a list I will never get it done, the traits of a reformed/rehabilitated procrastinator. So here are my plans/goals.

Potty Train #3 (I really should say, coheirs my darling husband into training her, like he did for the last one)
rebuild my wardrobe by making, thrift, or refashioning.
Recover my nasty ashtray chair, so it will be useable.
Take the kids to see my sisters
See a play with the kids
Take the kids to a Museum
Start making my Christmas gifts (also meaning I have a list made on the who and what)
Work on building a routine (maybe that we just play school between 10-noon), engrain the rules, distribute chores.

I think 8 items for the next 2-3 months is reasonable. I am so excited, I will have to make a list on sidebar to show them and cross them off as I go. Sounds like a reasonable, I am not letting the “Type A missy have a mile, but I will give her an inch” thing to do. I will even try not to add to it, but I can not make any promises.

I am excited, I wrote this last night. I just found out that you can go to www.kidsbowlfree.com and sign up to 6 kids to bowl 2 free games this summer until the end of August. For $25 you sign up 4 adults to join in on those free games. How awesome is that! So I am happy to be adding a little fun to our summer at little cost to us.

~trish

House Rules

2010-06-07T17:49:00.001-04:00

I finally got motivated to post the rules in our home. Now, I feel a bit bad as a parent to finally post them, but well, if you can’t read what does it matter? Well, I am realizing that I need them to keep me consistent. This is not really my great idea for the saying our rules or a cute way to post them. A while back I seen something similar and saved the pic for later. Now I have no idea where I found it, but I loved it enough to copy it. I hope this will keep us on the right track and being able to follow through.

I posted a couple of copies around the house. My colorful one, I used scrapbook paper to jazz it up. I hope to get a piece of wood to modge podge it to and make it something cute for my house. here is the original that I wish I could give credit to its creator.

If you know who created, let me know, so I can give them credit.

~trish

Baby Bonnet – Simplicity 3840

2010-06-07T17:33:00.001-04:00

Years ago, I was at a moms meeting and a new mom showed up with a very similar hat on her baby. I instantly loved it, but I guess we did not click, because I think I chased her badgering her for more information on the bonnet so I could make one too. I did fudge one and made a pattern for #3. Well, I found this pattern at a simplicity pattern sale. Now I bought this after I swore off any more children, so my mom scratched her head on why I would still buy it. But I had to have it.

I used all the scraps I could find to make this one. It came together quick. There are 2 pieces to cut, first you cut 2 layers of fabric and 1 of interfacing. The second, is the overlay. I almost skipped the overlay, but decided to try it any how. I love it, it makes it so cute. Now the nice part about this pattern is this specific pattern gives you the pattern for each size. How nice that I did not have to be stuck making a copy of the pattern. I will say, I did not bother reading the instructions. I just threw it together.

I cannot wait for her tiny head to get bigger and for her to be able to hold it up on her own. She will be the cutest. Yes, I did put this on her to model while she was sleeping. That is what proud mommas do.

~trish

Bean bag numbers!

2010-06-07T17:10:00.001-04:00

Traveling through a new blog last night, I found the coolest little project. So I had to make it.

I found Sarah at Create Studio where she has a ton of great ideas. She made similar bean bag numbers, using rice. She has the templates for you to print off to make your own.

Now I found her somewhere after midnight, between all night blog crawling and a nursing session. I had to quietly search the porch for extra scraps of fabric. I had that cut before I went to sleep and spent a little time here and there to stitch them. They are raveled edges, which made them very easy to put together. Now, as I filled them with rice, I knew why you need to use rice. Beans will not fit.

So hopefully, my children will enjoy them and learn their numbers. Just in case you ever wondered how I get things done. Well, this is what my computer sees when I am blogging. I took this picture using my webcam.

~trish

A bossy know it all!

2010-06-06T01:11:00.001-04:00

Get me out of my routine and the worst of me comes out. This is terribly hard for me to write. For those who know me well, like my mother or even my mother in law, this post would only confirm what they know to be true.

I might, who am I kidding, I am really bossy with my OPINIONS. Ouch, they are just opinions. See I ~~might be~~ am a know-it-all, as my father in law calls these wonderful people, KIAs. Get it, Know It All, KIA. Well, see this bit of a KIA problem might have a little bit to do with that train I want to drive. As a want to be train driver, the engineer in me sees things so blue and white gridded lines with a ruler and pencil.

I am so bad, I will walk in my mother in laws house and tell her what needs to be moved to make a better flow and efficiency to her home. I must have some mother in law, because anyone else will tell me where to go and how to get there. My mouth will literally spout off exactly what I am thinking before my good sense had enough time to stop it. Get me a perfect stranger that might want to be a good friend and I will run them down in 3 weeks top by telling them how to be “better”. What a jerk I am.

I think this might be a pride thing. And if I am noticing that I am bossing everyone around and telling them how to be better (shamefully, like me), then God has a huge slice of humble pie for me to swim in just around the corner. I will eat the last bit of it embarrassed and ashamed of my sin and ugliness. I will ask forgiveness of my pompous air from people, wonderful people, who had finally had enough of me.

This is how it goes for me. I spend a bunch of time alone (adult alone), me and the kids doing our thing. During these days, I seek advise from others (Christians) to be a steward of my blessings (i.e., children, order, home, etc.). So I spend my time in a relative isolation sharpening my skills with satisfaction. I am blessed with wonderful friends who limitedly enter my home by God’s hand to help refine me. I get so comfortable with my blessings and work my craft efficiently.

In my excitement at how wonderful things come together, I cannot help but share the knowledge I gain. When I say share, I am talking about anyone who is not walking fast enough away from me and I somehow have managed to sit on them. You want to talk to me, it will be about my favorite topics:frugal, kids, birth, raising mindful kids, homeschooling, sewing, or being efficient. Go outside that, I won’t have time for it and I will justify it. See, what a jerk.

Now after a while, I will find people interested and then you get this “WOW” factor from them. This is my problem, at this point my head inflates and my heart is deflated in comparison. My head is so busy being great that I forget to put my heart into the conversation. I begin to act and treat people as if the only way to be good enough is to be like me. Ahh, this is when my heart breaks because this is not how I want to treat someone or anyone.

With my pencil and ruler I will draft out a better way for them, for their home, budget, children, kitchen, or anything else in the homemaking craft. My straight forth demeanor will seem as though I am throwing sledge hammers into a glass shop. Unfortunately (told to me by many a boss) , I call it like I see it and lack the tack to gently present it. Either you will love me or you will hate me and you will know soon enough.

Sadly, I am doing this because my heart wants to best for you and want everything you are and have to be better for you. I have no ugliness desired about it or sense of I am better than this. But it doesn’t matter, the devil will help inflate my head so much and I will get so busy fixing everything and everyone that my heart won’t even be part of it anymore. In fact, I will go back to my unsaved dumpster mentality that I am busy fixing, because nothing is good enough or anyone, most of all, me.

So the Miss Bossy Pants who happens to Know-it-all has surfaced and I must squash her out. But I know there is no way to do that without His help. And you know, that Miss Bossy pants can‘t figure out what to pray for forgiveness for! How could I be a sinner when I know it all. AHHH! When my pray life is lacking it is because SHE showed up with her big headed pride.

If I follow the typical routine. I will aggravate and alienate most everyone. I will go back to solitude and seek council to be better. Sharpen my skills with success. Tell everyone in sight and get ugly all over again.

SO the best thing I can do is stop it all before it continues along. Trash my pride and give it to the Lord. Ask for forgiveness from everyone I have been around for any length of time at one sitting. Shut my trap and open my ears. And if someone wants to know, then tell them. But what works for me, doesn’t mean it works for everyone.

Did I also tell you, that I feel led that my job from God is to share with others how God has blessed me to be a good steward of my blessings. And that sharing in this blessing, I need to teach others. Hmm, I am walking a fine line. Is it that when you are doing God’s most profound work, the devil will work hard to distort it anyway he can.

So I pray I am on God’s path and I will work at sharing my experience as God has given me and to keep my mouth shut more than it is moving and my ears open, before my mouth gets to yapping. I better get busy apologizing.

(Thank you Lord for letting me smell humble pie and giving me the choice in eating it or not, amen.)

~trish (had to give a picture of my favorite Miss Bossy pants that fills up my heart with goodness.)

Menu planning for a healthy marriage

2010-06-05T23:57:00.001-04:00

This is my first time, but I am so impressed with this post that I need to send you there. Maybe it is a cop-out for writing my own post with the new baby, but i agree with it and I couldn’t have delivered it better.

Husband on Wife-Imposed Rice Diet

I had to laugh as I read this article thinking of of a true diet of Rice and vegetables, I considered the wife very self-centered and almost intentionally pushing him away, without ever considering the sense of intimacy connected. Hmm.

Well That is all I really want to say. Please enjoy reading it and comment back to me. Then I will put my 2 cents in.

~trish

Keeping the grocery bill LOW?

2010-06-03T23:02:00.001-04:00

Scratch, Scratch, Scratch. No I do not have an itch! The easiest way to keep the bills low is to only buy the staples and make things from scratch. This is a picture of my chicken pot pie. The biscuits are another round I made from scratch. I froze the rest, so that they will be convenient later, for biscuits and honey.

Now I love couponing, but after a couple of months I remember, all I am really buying is a bunch of processed food. Remember those packages of short bread cookies I got for $1 a package, still have half of them. I do not really even like eating them, but I am in major calorie intake mood with nursing. So couponing is a luxury, since I spend more and on things I do not NEED.

So I have 2 major fundamentals when it comes to shopping for food: 1. Cook from Scratch and 2. Buy in bulk on the big items.

I am always encouraged when I check out other families who are keeping their grocery bill down. I read 2 articles this evening that made me want to share this with you, the first at life in a shoe and the second at frugalhacks.com

I realize there are a lot of other things I do that help.

Soda is a luxury item. When I buy it, it is for the sole enjoyment of my husband and me. So it is generic root beer and a diet soda. The children will have a treat of root beer, once in a while (like once a month). Why? Soda is yummy! You can drink and drink and never be satisfied. I can gulp water and be satisfied, I can go through 4 cans of soda and still not have my thirst quenched.
Buy excessive amounts of meat when it is on sale at an unbelievable price. Stock up!
Control on the snacks. Now our one outlet on snacks is the little snack cakes and the powder donut bags. Why? because I can get them on the super cheap at the day old bread store. Just the other day, our store had buy 10 bags of donuts for $3. That is unheard of as a price, so I bought 10 and froze them. I will buy the boxed snack packs for less than a dollar. (I do buy generic oreos, this is my husbands weakness. And he only eats 3-4 cookies each night with his glass of milk)
Milk is costly, never waste great fresh milk to cook with, use dry.
Use what you buy!

Now one thing that was listed that I have not given much thought about was buying in bulk produce in season. I buy in bulk to can, but did not think to buy in bulk for fresh consumption. Mostly because I am wishy washy on what I feel like eating fresh. Now we are blessed in this part of Florida, because we have a lot of large volume farmers markets. I mean where they have nothing but a box truck full of green peppers only. I like the idea of eating what is in season and cheap. My fear is, it is a 1 1/2 to 2 hour drive to get there and would my small children be able to keep up with the amount of food I would get from a box of each and only having 2 things.

One way I could work around this, would be to get a couple of families to get in as a co-op and make food boxes every 2-3 weeks. Or instead can/ freeze my left-overs. So I will think about this a bit more and figure out how to incorporate it into my life.

Good luck saving. I keep thinking about this couple I met, while I was still fresh in college doing an internship. Denny and Pat, senior volunteers, who lived by and constantly chatted the same slogan every day, “Waste not, Want not”. Ten plus years later, this slogan resonates in every part of my life. And grows to take over other parts. Funny is that this seed was planted for ten years before it ever took root.

~trish

OAMC June Cooking Event

2010-05-30T17:41:00.001-04:00

Monday

Prepped Tuna casserole, minus noodles and froze.
Bought ingredients at Walmart
Made myself crazy by showing up at Sams 3 minutes after they closed
Had pitty party in parking lot, went to Joanns to make list of patterns I want for the big sale on friday as a since of therapy.

Tuesday

Buy the remaining ingredients at Sam’s.
Found the source of the mysterious smell in the Van.
Pre-warned the Manager of JoAnns that I will be there when the doors open on friday with all 4 kids. (He is the new manager, I figured the least I can do is prepare him.)
Cut onions
Cook ground beef.
Slice beef roast (I bought stew meat instead, Sams stew meat is all the cut offs from the steaks and is high quality) and brown.

Wednesday

Boil chicken, cool, debone, bag meat up. Save broth.

Thursday

Make pasta sauce.
Chop celery and slice mushrooms.
Make and freeze beef stroganoff
Make Beef tips and Freeze.

Friday

Soak beans
Hit the Memorial Sale at JoAnns for $1/yd fabric, follow with library,
Undercook the beans.
Make and freeze Creamy Chicken
Make and Freeze Jambalaya
Make and freeze Red beans and Rice

By the end of the weekend everything was finished. I had some distractions that kept me off task, I provided you with them to show you that it really isn’t a daunting task. I may have some attention problems right now.

I ended up with 29 meals in the freezer. I skipped the tuna patties, because I took too long to get to the rest of the tuna. I feared for the safety of it. Every night that I prepped the meals, I pulled a bit a side for dinner that night, so I really got 45 extra meals on top of the ones in the freezer.

I skipped all the pasta and rice. I am going to make the rice and pasta the day of, to save time prepping them and to save room in the freezer. Some things I did not mix well. Like the bean recipes, I divided the beans out the day before and had them in the zip lock bags and then the next day I mixed the remaining ingredients and added them in after the fact.

Things to consider on the lazy lasagna and cheeseburger pasta. Do not make your arms hurt, cut the the velveeda and cream cheese up and put them at the bottom of the ziplock. Then mix remaining ingredients and pour on top. My arms are killing me. And add the shredded cheese last when mixing. It is very difficult to mix shredded cheese when you multiplied the recipe by 4.

Another Note about my recipes. The creamy Chicken can use a little something. I figured it would be a meal requiring sides, I think it needs vegetables in it. Over the next few times I make it, I will figure out what to add.

Now my future bulk cooking will not be this intense. I just had to get caught up from not bulking for a while. After next week (when I get paid again), I plan to bulk cook 1-2 meals each week. My thought is if I am putting in 6-7 meals into the freezer each week than I should always have 30 meals in the freezer. Than I will not have another hard wallet hit, like this week. I think I am going to have to get a payday loan from my husband, I might be short by about $10, $45 if I have to get diapers. (On that side note, I better get my laundry caught up, to clothe diaper).

Email me with any questions you have. If you bulk cook, link me to your blog. This post took me all week to write. I am excited to be done cooking and start sewing. I got a new skirt pattern and wonderful $1 yard fabric to use.

~trish

Good Morning Breakfast

2010-05-30T14:37:00.001-04:00

Is this not the cutest set of eyes to make breakfast for?

I just wanted to share our morning breakfast table with you. This was breakfast of eggs, grits, and sausage and Orange Juice from the freezer section. My husband makes fun of me for getting them to eat grits, especially since I was a grit hater growing up. I am not sure why my dad never gave them to me with butter and american cheese on a plate with fried catfish? This was all it took to be a grit lover. The simple truth, why my kids are asked to eat them, they are cheap and easy.

I just really wanted to touch base with you because I am not done cooking yet. It is not because it is a long process, I just never want to get started. I start about the time I should be preparing dinner and then I will do 2 different meals in that time and bag them up. I really need to get motivated and finish before my cooked food goes bad.

Alright, I am off to cook.

~trish

Onion dicing, 10 lbs at a time

2010-05-26T14:35:00.001-04:00

My mom swears by this little gadget. See the gallon of onions, they are all uniformly diced and it took me about 45 minutes to do 10 lbs. Of course, this is with the occasional interruptions and nursing a baby and trying to get to tumbling in a rainstorm and just deciding to go back to the onions. With mom out of town and her onion chopper all alone for the weekend and me having all these onions to do, I went over to her house in the silence and snagged it.

This thing is awesome and will be a must have or totally barrowed from. All I did was pealed and quarter the onions and then put them on the grid, push the top down and done!

Clean up on this thing was marginal effort. I checked them out at JCPenny’s are this gadget runs between $20-30.

I just wanted to share the gadget that saved me time and tears. Oh yah, I did no crying in the chopping of these onions.

~trish

Sweetness of 2 sisters

2010-05-26T12:31:00.001-04:00

Isn’t this just adorable. #3 is constantly looking out for #4. If she doesn’t have a blanket, she is dragging one from somewhere through the house to get it for her. #3 is always giving little pecks on the head with a good swap of a pat afterwards.

I am most impressed with #3, for the fact that this girl would not be easily described as gentle. She tumbles, jumps and can make the strongest, roughest water seem like ripples. BUT when it comes to her new sister, she is soft spoken, tender, and loving. Then in 4 split seconds the terror unleashes ciaos and mayhem to the rest of her siblings.

I feel so blessed to have #4, not just for the joys that she has already given me in the past 2 weeks, but also the joy to see other sides of my children that only she will invoke.

Each child I have had is like another window being open to bring light into a different corner of my other children’s being. I feel amazed to learn and see all their wonders that God has made them to be.

~trish

Building a New Routine

2010-05-25T14:12:00.001-04:00

We played school last week on Monday and not one of us had fun. I think pulling teeth would have been met with a better attitude. I think my attitude needed to leave the check it off my list attitude to this is fun and making it messy.

We are using My Fathers World – Kindergarten. The first 2 weeks is an introduction that covers creation and alphabet singing and is very light in requirements. At first, I thought lets get through this section and get into the meat and potatoes of the program, because this is soo me to want to get it checked off my list. Well after last weeks misery, I realized the 2 week introduction is really to get them used to what you are doing and to build a routine.

Well, I have pages and pages of explicit routines that I never follow through with every 15 minutes accounted for. 15 minute increments go back to working days, I had to account for every 15 minutes for billing. Well, I got some inspiration at The Girlies at Mt Hope and her 4 girls.

So for the induction phase of homeschooling with my little ones, I am trying to implement a routine that will corral them in and not be too rigid. I am hoping after 2 weeks we will be, for the most part, adapted to it and following it. Here it is:

7:30 am    Breakfast with a bible story

8:15 am    Get dressed, brush teeth, make beds, put clothes where they belong

8:45 am    Circle Time (Prayer, Pledge, in the furture: calendar & 100 day chart)

9:00 am    Unit Study (#1 and #2; #3 will probably sit along and I will let her do the craft)

9:45 am    Snack then Play (this will be my time to sew and get laundry/household chores done)

11:45 am Start lunch (followed with #1 and #2 clean up play area & living room; #3 goes down for a nap)

12:45 am Activity/Craft for #1 & #2 (this might be finger paint, baking, who knows)

3:15 pm    Quick Pick up (#1 & #2) and put laundry away

3:45 pm    Quiet Time (Movie time) & snack

5:10 pm    Set table for dinner & outside to play

I am not making plans past the time for my husband to come home. I have him to keep a natural order to the evening. Usually we eat like clock work at 6 pm, the moment he is walking in the door, but with the summer days of being light until almost 8:30 pm, I have moved dinner time to 7pm. So the kids are having a later bedtime from 7:15pm to 8:15pm. I wish I could say they make up that sleep in the morning or at nap, but sadly they do not. I think the longer exposure to the sun, gives them an energy boost during the day to keep them going.

I also like that I have not scheduled us to go from one thing to the next. If we get done before our next thing, we just have free time. So I guess I am using it as a schedule versus a routine. The nice part is I know if we are not finished after 45 minutes or the amount of time I had set, then it is too much to do in one day. Yesterday was a great example, I have 5 days worth of laundry to get done. I could have had the kids help me with that for the next 2 weeks, but all we would be doing is making more laundry to do each week and really? Having all the laundry put away, is that the importance of our daily lives? Spoken by a true hater of putting laundry away.

Well, moving through our routine yesterday, I was ready to rush them onto the next activity, until I looked at the clock and realized they 35 minutes before we should start our circle time. See momma was ready to get this show on the move, while they were still coming to grips that it was a beautiful morning and they should investigate the chicks. So I took a step back and realized, I WASN’T EVEN READY TO DO OUR LESSONS FOR THE DAY! Bad MOMMY! Well, that free time was a blessing for me, I was able to make the copies I needed, pull out the paint, and be ready and not rushed.

Let’s see how tomorrow will be! I will be doing my bulk of cooking for my Once A Month Cooking.

~trish

June 2010 Bulk Cooking Menu

2010-05-24T16:22:00.002-04:00

This took me a bit of time to get together. Like I said before, planning is key! First I came up with my meals and the recipes. I have a list below that show what I am making, how many it serves and the total number of meals I am making of it. To make things easier, I linked the recipes for you. Some I had to type out and post, some I changed the recipe from how I would make it to one that was already on the web. For some of you, you may have never thought about cooking in bulk like this before, so I want to make it as easy as possible to follow along.
Menu List

Chicken	Servings	# of Meals
Creamy Chicken Casserole	6	2
Chicken Pot Pie	6	2
Chicken and Sausage cassoulet		2
Jambalaya	8	2

Ground beef
Lazy Lasagna	6	4
Cheeseburger Pasta	6	4

Tuna
Tuna Casserole		3
Tuna Cakes		2

Sausage
Red beans and Rice	6	2

Stuffed Shells	6	2
Beef Tips	6	3
Beef Stroganoff	6	2

Alterations:
Jambalaya: I will be using canned tomatoes (diced) instead of fresh tomatoes. I will be browning the cooked chicken and sausage as it says. I will make the mixture and then freeze and will cook it later in the crock pot.
Tuna Patties: Calls for bisquick in the recipe. I am not buying it. I found a recipe for baking mix here.
Beef Tips: This recipe is for a huge amount, I am cutting the recipe in half and assuming it will suit 3 meals of 6 servings.

Now, sorry I did not type it all out, but it is so much easier to hand write my ingredients for each meal. So I scanned the pages for you. Here they are:

Just click and you should be able to print.
Now from here, I consolidate my list to create my grocery list to shop from.

I then check my pantry for what I have, so I can delete it from my list. From this list, I am using my $0.68/lb whole chickens and the 4 pound can of tuna I already have.
After, I cruise sam’s club (website) to see what I can buy in bulk and mark it on my list. I also check out the weekly ads to see if it can beat the price. I plan to buy first at walmart to price match anything and then go to walmart. My initial approximation is that this will cost me $200 for 30 days. Now if you read about my frugal finances, I get $300 every 2 weeks. So for the next 2 weeks no doubt, we are eating from the freezer. But the following 4 weeks, we will eat about every other night. This way I can make our favorite, fried meat, rice and gravy with green beans.

As for cooking this bulkiness, that will be a later post. The nice part is after all this work, I can always repeat this bulk planning with just the shopping and cooking effort.
If you bulk cook! Please leave me a comment and send us a link to your blog where you post any of your recipes. Coming up with the meals I want to eat is my hardest part.

~trish

Cheeseburger Pasta

2010-05-19T15:04:00.001-04:00

This is my creation based on my husband’s love of those nasty boxed meals that all you need to do is add a pound of beef. I am not naming names of the dinner HELPER. But I don’t like the stuff and I can not figure out how it is healthy with vegetables. So taking inspiration by the flavors available, I created this one. AND I know mine is better, cheaper, and healthier. And it freezes well.

Cheeseburger Pasta

1 pound ground beef, cooked
8 oz pasta, cooked
1 c. chopped onion
8 oz Velveeta cheese
1/2 c. milk
1/2 tsp garlic salt
1 TBSP Gourmet Steak Seasoning
1 c. diced tomato
1/2 c. shredded cheddar

Cook onions within the ground beef in skillet on med/high. Stir in Velveeta, milk, garlic, and steak seasoning, until blended. Stir in pasta and tomatoes. Sprinkle with shredded cheese and heat 2-3 minutes.

Again with the pasta, remember to undercook it, so it does not turn to mush in the freezer and re-heating process. I will replace the fresh tomato with a can of diced tomatoes, when cooking in bulk. I Mix it all together after the beef and onions were cooked and put it into a zip-lock for the freezer.

~trish

Lazy Lasagna

2010-05-19T14:52:00.001-04:00

This is a recipe from a family collection cookbook on my husbands side. I love this recipe, another absolute favorite of mine. I am not a determined woman enough to do all the layering to make traditional lasagna. I enjoy all the cheese that is in it, but I love to be able to add any vegetables I want to change it up. I have froze this meal many times and it turns out marvelous.

Lazy Lasagna

1 lb ground beef, cooked
8 oz pasta (elbow, bowtie, etc.), cooked
8 oz cream cheese
1 egg
16 oz cottage cheese
12 oz shredded mozzarella
Italian seasoning
3 c. spaghetti sauce

Mix cream cheese and egg. Combine all ingredients, except for sauce. Pour into pan, top with sauce. Bake 350F for 30 min.

Important note, cook the pasta just until it is done. You want it to be a bit hard, so that it will freeze well. Not to worry, it will cook all the way when you thaw and heat it. I am sorry for the lack of precise measurement on the ingredients. For the ability to share the recipe, I just approximated the amount. I have swapped the ground beef for spicy Italian sausage, my husband and I loved it, the kids not so much.

~trish

Chicken and Sausage Cassoulet

2010-05-19T12:51:00.001-04:00

I LOVE, {HUGE HEARTS}, Cassoulet! It is a glorified (grown up) version of beans and weenies. I usually make this by a favorite Weight Watches recipe. I love the taste of the Thyme herb and the northern beans. I got this recipe from the Rival Cookbook that came with my crock pot. I am using this recipe, versus my original one, because the use of chicken lowers the cost and I never used the turkey sausage (so it was never the calories it was supposed to be).

Chicken and Sausage Cassoulet

15 oz can navy beans
1 c. tomato juice
1/2 c. diced onions
1 clove garlic, minced
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp. thyme
1 tsp instant chicken bouillon granules
1/2 tsp basil
1/2 tsp oregano
4 chicken drumsticks
4 oz sausage, sliced

Combine all ingredients, except for the meats, in the crock pot. Add the meat on top of the bean mixture. Cook on low for 10-13 hours OR High for 5-6 hours.

Now I will be using dried beans, presoaked. I will skip the chicken boullion for chicken broth. I will be adding the broth in exchange for the liquid from the can of beans. I will add my cooked chicken, instead of the drum sticks.

As for freezing this, I will premix the mixture and put in a ziplock and then add the meat on top. Then I will thaw and dump in a crock pot to cook.

~trish

Chicken Pot Pie

2010-05-19T12:29:00.001-04:00

This is a modified recipe that I occasionally change up. I love to use left over chicken from a rotisserie at the store or left over fried chicken. If I have any left over veggies from the week, I would through that in too. If you have pie crust, top it with that, or go with the biscuits.

Chicken Pot Pie Fillling

3 c. cooked chicken
1 med onion, chopped
1 stalk of celery, chopped
1 1/2 c. mixed vegetables
1 c. chopped potatoes
1 c. chicken broth
1 can cream of mushroom soup

Combine all ingredients. Season to taste. If you find that the base is too thin, add corn starch to thicken. Add pie shell or biscuits to the top. Bake at 400F for about 35 minutes.

When I am making this in bulk, I will have boiled whole chickens to use as my chopped chicken. After I am done cooking the chicken, I cook down the broth in the pot and save it. This is one of my recipes I use it in, besides making soup out of it.

I have not decided if I am going to make the pie filling and freeze in a zip-lock, or if I will make it in its entirety and freeze in an aluminum pan. If I do the filing, I can pull out frozen biscuits to put on the top. So there are many variations, based on what would work best for your family.

~trish

Creamy Chicken Pasta

2010-05-19T10:07:00.001-04:00

This is for my chicken bulk cooking. I have not made this before, but when I looked over all the ingredients and it looks like it will be very good. I also picked this recipe because I can buy most of the ingredients in bulk, like the larger can of Cream of Mushroom soup.

I got this recipe from:

The Ultimate Southern Living Cookbook (1999), p.327

Creamy Chicken Pasta

3 1/4 c. chopped cooked chicken
10 3/4 oz can cream of chicken soup with herbs
10 3/4 oz can of cream of celery soup
8 oz sour cream
1/2 tsp pepper
3 c. crushed ritz crackers (2 sleeves)
1/4 c. melted butter

Combine chicken, both cream of soups, sour cream and pepper; stirring well. Layer half the ritz crackers at the bottom of dish, spoon chicken mixture, layer remaining crackers and drizzle melted butter.

Bake uncovered at 325F for 35 minutes. Serves 6

I am going to change this to make it more suitable for my family. When I make the mixture, I am going to add diced onions, carrots, celery, and whatever good looking vegetable that jumps on my cutting board. also, I will just freeze the chicken mixture, uncooked in a freezer bag.

When I go to make it, I will thaw and cook in the crock pot. I will probably serve it with egg noodles and pass on the ritz, but I can change it up and serve with ritz layered in.

~trish

Power Planning for Bulk Cooking!

2010-05-18T13:23:00.002-04:00

welcome to my appliance counter. I have set up shop to prepare for a bulk cooking session next week. I have my pretty little binder with my tried and true recipes, my box of little cookbooks, and off to the right, my handy Southern Living Cookbook. More like the manual for cooking with all of its little how-to and explanation glossary.
And of course, the thing that makes it all possible, my computer! I am trying to collect recipes from my cookbooks for this round, but I am not making a lot of progress.
My Menu Goals, when planning a bulk cooking session:

15 different meals
Total of 30 meals.
Grocery bill under $200

Now I get this done by breaking up things into categories and collecting recipes for each group. Here are my groups:

Chicken
Ground beef
spaghetti Sauce
Tuna
Pork

Now This round I am using the chicken, ground beef, tuna, and added sausage. I do this so I am cooking several meals in each category, so I get a great bulk buy discount for the meals, and I have less work by cooking everything at once.
Now I usually never have Tuna or sausage as a category. BUT! I bought the huge can of Tuna from Sam’s Club (66 oz Can) and want to get it used. My family is only going to eat so much tuna noodle casserole, so I went looking for other recipes to freeze. I decided on making Tuna cakes, like a crab cake, as a meal. The sausage is because some New Orleans red beans and rice sounds yummy and I can then also make Jambalaya with the chicken. This is feasible when I can buy the sausage in a 3lb bulk buy.
The method of Planning

So as I make my list of meals, under each category. I make another list that has the ingredients and quantities for each meal. (I try to get close to 15 total recipes)
I sit with all my recipes and decide how many times I want to eat that meal in the next month. If I make 4x, then I am eating it each week, 2x, then every other week. (I want a total of 30 meals)
Once I have the total amounts I am going to make, then I go back to my ingredients list and multiply the ingredients by the number of times we will have this meal.
New LIST! Grocery list. Now once the ingredients have been determined for each meal, I start adding up all the ingredients. Now I do this by groups. Like meat, produce, canned, frozen, etc.
Now I go to my bulk store, Sam’s Club, online to figure out what they sell in bulk that will fit my need on the grocery list.

For example, my chicken group of meals I will be using whole chickens. I got them for about $0.68/lb and have plenty in the freezer. I will boil the chickens and cube all the meat up and use it for the recipes, even when it when it calls for chicken breast. I also will have a wonderful stock to use for anything that calls for it and I will use the remaining for a soup base.
Another example is making spaghetti sauce from Tomato Sauce. A #10 Can of sauce is less than $3 a can and you can easily make sauce for plenty meals. So you have your sauce and then can do meatballs, stuffed shells, spaghetti, raviolis, lasagna, etc.
By the end of this week, I will have my planning completed and my list made. I will post them for you. I am going to cook all my meals over several days, because otherwise it takes an entire day. Having a newborn and 3 others running loose, this would be a “put me in the county nuthouse” event. Although, we have one, one county over, I am going to try and use that first free stay for when I really need a break.
back with you soon,
~trish

Homemade Classic White Bread

2010-05-18T12:23:00.001-04:00

Another attempt to get baking was to make 2 loaves of white bread. This is the utmost easiest recipe and it turns out perfect bread. It is made in the oven and not a bread machine. Even though the bread machine is an easy method of making bread, I feel as though it is too much time between little loaves. This one I can be done, start to finish in about 2 hours. It is plenty of bread and the shape makes it easy to cut into thin sandwich slices.

I found this recipe at Favorite Freezer Foods they have wonderful information about bulk cooking and freezing with safety information and recipes.

White Sandwich Bread Recipe
(2 loaves)

5 1/2 - 6 cups flour, all purpose or bread
3 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons yeast
2 teaspoons salt
2 cups water

Optional:

2 Tablespoons butter
1/2 cup powdered milk, or substitute milk for up to half the water.

Combine two cups of flour, sugar, salt, un-dissolved yeast and if your using it the powdered milk. Use water OR regular milk that is warm to the touch and add to dry ingredients.

Beat well, I usually use my Kitchen Aid stand mixer for this part. Mix for about two minutes to get the gluten started, then add in more flour one cup at a time. After four cups of flour I turn the dough out to a floored surface, usually my kitchen table, and knead by hand. My mixer starts to strain if I try to make this double batch with all the flour in it.

After kneading, then let rest for 10 minutes. Punch down the dough and cut in in half. I use a knife to cut the dough. Shape into loaves and let rise until doubled about 45 minutes.

Bake at 400 Fahrenheit for 25-30 minutes. Immediately remove from the pan and let cool.

To Freeze:
How to freeze bread dough after shaping but before rising. Freeze for 2-3 months. A silicone pan is great for this and you can try one free from Easy Bakeware.

How to freeze baked bread after it has cooled completely. Slice before freezing if desired. Wrap well in freezer quality materials. I use a plastic freezer bag or plastic wrap and tin foil. Freeze for up to 6 months if well wrapped.

Now with this last batch, I made a fatal mistake to my bread. I store my yeast and bread flour in the fridge and freezer. The yeast I do not need to, but it makes me feel better. The flour in the freezer is to stop the bugs from growing, because sometimes it is a bit of time before I bake again and when I am in the mood, I want my ingredients in the house. Well, I did not let my dry ingredients come to room temperature. SO when I added my warm water, the yeast never got warm and cozy enough to activate. My bread raised a bit, but I think this had to do with the amount of Kneading I did and the air within the bread, more than the yeast. If I would have made it longer and thinner, I think it would have done well as a pseudo French bread.

So what do you do with un-risen bread, well I made a round of French toast that was good. And then I made bread pudding. Oh, I skipped the raisins and cinnamon, and went for the chocolate chips instead. Yum, Yum!

enjoy

~trish

Biscuit King!

2010-05-18T11:39:00.001-04:00

I have been working hard to get my older 2 children involved in baking with me. I have this delusion that if I get them started now, that in hopefully 2 years they will do the baking without me. The only one with any desire to do the baking is my son, #2. #1 is limitedly interested, based on what else is going on.

Last week, I got my son to help out on making homemade biscuits. No, these are not the Counter Biscuit, you know, you bang the tube against the counter and it pops. This recipe is cheap! and Easy! My favorites for a recipe. The recipe make smore and are just as good, as the biscuit tubes at the store. Plus, the cost of one set of biscuits at the store will keep you in biscuits for probably 2 weeks, every night. Well, depending on how much you like biscuits. My family loves biscuits and honey. I got the recipe from Menus 4 moms.

Buttermilk Biscuits

4 cups self-rising flour
1/2 cup butter
1-1/2 cups buttermilk

Combine flour and butter, cutting with a fork. Stir in buttermilk.

Add more flour if too wet, more buttermilk if too dry. When dough is rolling consistency, knead a few times and turn out onto a floured surface. Roll out and cut with a biscuit cutter or upside down glass.

Bake half of the biscuits on cookie sheet at 475°F until brown.

Place the other half of the biscuits on a cookie sheet or other flat pan and put in the freezer until frozen. Before going to bed or early the next morning, bag the biscuits in a dated freezer bag for later use. If cooking thawed biscuits, follow normal cooking instructions. To cook frozen biscuits, extend cooking time.

Now I did not have any butter, so used plain vegetable shortening. I also did not have buttermilk, so I used regular milk. My biscuits were wonderful and we made all of them and had the left-overs the next day. If you wanted to get really convenient, you could make several batches and freeze them. Then you would have your own freezer stash, like you buy in the store.

Preparing these biscuits with little hands, took about 20 minutes. Good investment of time with my son and warm biscuits. He was so proud at the dinner table talking about his biscuits.

~trish

PS. I am adding a new label called “Survival Cooking” – These are recipes that are inexpensive to make, you can cook them in bulk, uses staples ingredients, and can help you lessen your consumer versus producer status. I will talk later on consumption versus production, later, but it has to do with the fact that our country imports too much and exports not enough. I believe this practice will have a devastating impact on country’s stability in the near future if it continues on this road.

At home with the newest.

2010-05-12T17:07:00.001-04:00

I have a very timely baby! #4 is the first to arrive on her due date. She did get a little help, as I said earlier I was having pre-labor for a couple of weeks. Sunday, I started with contractions off and on at 8:30 in the morning and were irregular for the entire day. Our Mother’s day show was everyone pointing to, “look YOUR contracting”.

Well, went to bed and woke up with stronger contractions every 20 minutes at 12:15 am on Monday. I had had enough. It hurt and I was not going to be able to go to sleep, so I figured it was time to go and see what was going on. So we went. Got there at 3:15 am and found out I was more like 7-8 minutes apart, I just was not feeling them. Well, things got better with 3-7 minutes apart. Then a little nap and everything stopped. Ah, this has been my past 2 weeks. I did progress from 2 cm to 3 cm.

Thankfully, I was scheduled to be induced the following morning. The Doctor decided to just induce me on Monday, since I was already there. I was a bit bummed.

I have been induced for #2 and #3 and HAD to have an epidural with both. And both times, the epidural did not work perfectly. #2 required being punctured twice to get it set. The labor and delivery was enjoyable, but the aftermath was horrible. I had migraines for about 5 days. #3’s epidural only worked for my left side of my body and not the other. So I felt everything! My husband and I both desired for me not to have another epidural for fear of the dangers and it not being a great success yet.

The induction followed much like the last one; quick, fast and amazingly painful! Within 3 hours it was done. I ended up with contractions about 1-2 minutes apart with each contraction opening me another cm. literally, I went 5 cm, contraction, 6 cm, contraction, 7 cm, contraction, 8cm, contraction, 9cm, contraction, 10 cm. All of this 2 minutes apart, with no time to relax from the pain. BECAUSE although I really needed the drugs, I had absolutely no time! I even asked at 4 cm. When I hit 10 cm, she was out in 3 minutes.

WOW! That was painful! I mean, I am glad I can join the women of strength who have done it with out drugs, but man, it kind of scared me mentally. I stand firm that every woman is made as God has intended her to be. Some of us are blessed for birth, some for pregnancy, and some for none of it. Well, I am not blessed with the ability to handle pain. But thankfully, I survived and felt incredibly great within 15-30 minutes.

#4 came out on her due date at 8 lbs and perfect. I am quickly recovering, even though I am getting the full experience of the forceful cramping of my uterus, her previous home, to shrink. But besides that We are doing great! AND HERE SHE IS!

~trish

Good Morning Swedish pancakes!

2010-05-07T17:31:00.001-04:00

I grew up as a little girl loving these pancakes. Unlike my cousins, I had front seat to a pancake fest every morning with my grandpa at the griddle until I was 8 years old. Now unlike my cousins, most of them got to learn the recipe and I never did. My grandpa made an attempt, but the recipe was not to be written. Mix it until it looks like this, add enough of this until it is this consistency. And so on. Not even an idea of how much, he just had no idea. He made it by feel.

Now that he has gotten older, he can not manage the cast iron pan, nor can he get the batter made. Well, missing my favorite comfort food, I went searching for the web for a reasonable recipe. Well, I found one. I had to change it to get the taste to what I am used too, but it works. I am still getting the hang of spreading the batter thin and even on the pan.

Here is the recipe that I got the base from recipezaar.com

Serves 4

3 eggs
1 1/4 c milk
1/4 c sugar

mix

1 1/4 c flour
1/2 t salt

stir until smooth

3 T melted butter
1 1/4 c milk

stir

Now ladle onto med-low preheated skillet. Rotate pan to cover entire griddle with batter. Let cook, flip and then serve. See griddle below.

Hope you enjoy!

~trish

My baby bump!

2010-05-07T11:21:00.001-04:00

What a rough picture! Here I am at 36 weeks. I wish I had a picture of today, I am still prego, with 3 days to go until my due date. I have never been pregnant this long with any of the others. The funny part, is how more and more relaxed I am, as I am getting closer to the end.

You can see my more recent bump in my hen house post. How funny! I do have some appreciation to God that my eyes are in the front of my face than in the back. I was a bit in shock when I seen pictures of my back. What a petty thing to think about, but in this pregnancy my milk fat storage is apparently my back and butt. I like to call it milk fat, since your body stores up fat at the end to have a good burst of milk supply. I also name it this, so I mentally never own and feel as though I must keep it.

Like a crazy woman, I am making plans for a half marathon. I have ran a half marathon a couple of years ago and a 15k a couple months after #3. I have a plan. Previously, I have walked 14 miles a week for the first 14 weeks. I did this by getting out 3-4 times a week, walking about 3-4 miles at a time. By the 14th week, I had all my pregnancy weight gone. So taking this approach, I plan to start running at whatever distance and how often by how it feels. I have enough going on, I am not going to over push myself. SO I hope to get to October and have about 5 miles a week that I am running and a total of 20 miles moved each week.

I am going to have to pull out some favors and get my groggy head up early to get the miles in. I feel that it is worth it though. My time getting the miles in, often releases my stress and clears my head. Which always helps me to deal with my little ones!

Days away from getting started.

~trish

In the hen house.

2010-05-05T23:48:00.001-04:00

So what is the best thing to be doing at 39+ weeks prego, paint a hen house of course. The kids loved it and we even attracted the neighbors to help. I did build this with the help of my husband and neighbor. I got all excited when I seen them on www.backyardchickens.com, I knew I had to build one. The house is a mixture of left over colors from the house. Some of it is from a bedroom, mosre from the kitchen. We just opened old cans and everyone grabbed a brush!

As you can see, everyone painted! Even the 2 year old. Can you see the huge amount of paint on her brush! I was trying to get her to paint the base!

What I love most is great neighbors. Especially the kind that says “I DONT PAINT”, but can’t resist the paint brush. We are always blessed to have them as our neighbors.

So here it is. The lift is again thanks to my neighbor, he figured it was too heavy for me to lift. This is just a simple design made from scraps. Of course, %1 is still painting the underneath.

I have 2 hen boxes for the girls to lay eggs. I still have several months. And the other picture is the opening.

Of course, we had a few other things painted, like noses. I did put #2 and #3 to work cleaning brushes, but then they were off bathing themselves in the paint bucket.

All I could think of, as my husband griped about having to clean the brushes was Amy’s post about the top 10 reasons to have a large family, #1 - THEY SURE ARE FUN.

Yes, we would have had a great time even with 2 or 1 kids in the paint bucket, but having 3 just made it crazier that you could not stop laughing as paint was being slung from brush to house.

I did get said paint off all of them, before sending them to bed. Said brushes, no.

~trish

New purse day!

2010-05-05T08:05:00.001-04:00

Trying to keep it easy, I figured I would sit around my mom’s house for the day. With her huge craft room and amazing stash of fabric, it is always hard to not just sit and make SOMETHING! Well, yesterday I knew I had had enough of my purse and I was ready for a new one.

I had watched the Sewing with Nancy last week on PBS. She was making purses and using a template as a pattern. Well, I decided that doing it her way is a really quick and easy method. It gave a very nice finished product. I also added some hardware for the first time. I added a magnet snap to close it. I added a latch to hold my keys and 2 D-rings for the strap.

How much do you love the flower? Love it! This was shown at the Stampin’ Up Convention that a few demonstators came back to share. This is created with a flower Sizzix die cut.

You cut 4 of each size you want in fabric. Iron the flowers in half and then layer the 4 flowers and hot glue in the middle. Then you layer and glue the different sizes together. Cut more flowers out of toile. (hope that is the right word. No idea how to spell the webbing stuff, sounds like tool but I think it is with a w). Then you tuck it in between the layers. I added a rhinestone. Making the flower took about 5 minutes, it took longer to heat the glue gun.

I am excited to have such a cute purse. This is the best one I have made yet. At first, I was not excited about the fabric, but I am so glad I did. I will be making more in the future for my personal collection.

~trish

Immediate Bulk Cooking!

2010-05-05T07:30:00.001-04:00

I know I have been needing to do some bulk cooking, but I just really have had no energy or motivation. Well, after a wonderful invitation to dinner last night by my mom, we soon discovered her extra fridge on the porch had stopped working and everything in the freezer had thawed. I can’t believe a fridge would stop working after 24 years, what are these things made of! No, I guess it was time.

So as she cooked some fried fish, a beautiful cob salad, rice, and broccoli for dinner, we began cooking. Here she is with the fish.

So 1st, we had the thankfulness that our large cooler was still at my mom’s house. So we immediately unloaded the freezer into either the garbage bag or the cooler. We decided to save the meat, any frozen deserts or process food that was under the meat was tossed. We put the meat into the cooler and was able to take inventory of what we had and how we would cook it.

We decided to cook the meat to be ready for the meal. This way we are not running around to get the required ingredients for each meal. This is a fast and dirty way of doing it. Our meat will be all prepped and then the meal can be made and the meat thawed and included. Most of all the budget and the anguish of loosing a freezer full of BOGOs would not be loss.

So we first made a pork roast in the crock pot. The plan is to crock pot it and then create a gravy from the sauce, split this into 2 bags. So it will be a pork and gravy meal, with only rice and a veggie needed to be made.

I attacked the chicken wings. Marinated and got them ready for the oven. Oh, I am excited about them. I cooked them on a rack to dry them out as they cook. Most times when I bake them, they tend to be greasy by cooking in their own fat. Unintentionally, I made them healthy.

Stroganoff is a favorite of ours. So with 4 London broils, we got them ready. We just seasoned them and baked. Maybe not the most typical way to make them. After they cooked, we were going to let them cool and then slice and freeze. This way, we only need to sauté the onions, garlic and mushrooms, make the rue add the cooked beef and continue as normal.

We had 2 more London broils and another favorite is to make oriental noodles, that my mom learned from a good friend of mine that is Vietnamese. I finally got to sit down and shave the meat to allow it to marinate. Here I am after about 3 hours and over 39 weeks prego, looking a little rough.

YES! Her kitchen is that awesome! We still have more to do. The menu for Mother’s Day has been determine by the 2 honey baked hams we have. Next week, we plan to make cooked scallop potatoes and ham and a ham and potato chowder with the left-overs.

We still have a bit left in the cooler under 2 bags of ice, but it is no longer an overwhelming amount. She will be on her own for cooking that. I am heading to the doctors today, so she will be working with my 3 kids under feet. I will say after this event, I had my first big contraction that lasted about 5-8 minutes and then minor ones every hour. After 4 hours, it stopped and I slept like a rock.

~trish

www.300dpi.com April Challenge

2010-05-01T23:25:00.001-04:00

Now that the submission deadline has passed for the April Challenge, I just wanted to share it with you.

I love being digital!

~trish

Midnight Crafters

Recipe Card - Jello pie

Thanksgiving -WW recipes

WW Week 1: hearty breakfast

Week 1: Cassoulet

Week 1: Beef Stroganoff

Simplicity 2388 Review

Flogging my home sewn purses

Freezing beans!

Inspired to be recover

My class Schedule for the Beginning of January at The Cow!

Digi – Lunch Box with Trish H.

Friday

January 14

Saturday

January 15

Christmas card template from the Craftin Cow

Another apron I made.

Great getting started Couponing.

Winter Bookmarks!

Christmas Apron

craft rooms to inspire me

Make 5 Dinners in ONE hour: 10 School Lunches in 15 Minutes

Digi – Tic Tac TOe!

Digital Hybrid – Christmas Planner

Party time! #1 is turning 6

Digital Paint cans

Digital Recipe Cards – Cheerful Halloween Digital additions Preview

Decorating for fall

Cooking with dried beans

Cooking Dried Beans in the Slow Cooker

Make It Fast, Cook It Slow

Ketchup!

Cakes for 100 and More! Strawberry Shortcake!

Blog Jump!!

DCWV Freebie and Challenge

Create a Scrapbook Page for your Back to School Photos!

Rules:

Deadline:

Wearing a baby sling.

Summer giveaway #3

The last 2 weeks of blur!

Giveaway #2 – winner!

High Chair makeover!

The dads’ life.

The best digital scrapbook site yet.

alphabet flashcards

I am still here

The Once A Month MOM Cooking website and podcast

Summer Give-away #2

Suepe’s Big Bag – Pink Tropical

Give away #1 – Winner!

DCWV August Design Challenge

NEW LOOK 6805

Baby Shower Gifts

Homes-cool tidbits

2010 Summer Giveaway #1

MFW –week2 Moon

Anniversary gift

The hooks I love!

Skim or Whole Milk

A New Blog

Goodbye clutter, HELLO functional!

MFW-K Lesson 1 – Sun

TV ruins a good education

A new routine for my kitchen.

Have poop, will travel.

Bulk Produce

Family bento style

Sunrise to a daydreaming weekend.

Kicking off the homes-cool year

Organizing the MFW-K day

wearing a baby!

nursing cover

Should there be instructions for glue?

Urge to Purge is BACK!

Baby Wearing

Reading cushions.

Individual Cups

I want a new dress.