Simple meals....stuffed pretzel recipe found here; absolutely delicious and everything could be found in leftovers or the pantry
Simple projects....watercolor painted wooden Easter eggs
And simple play....who knew a $1 bag of plastic eggs would provide such hours of amusement?
We're keeping it simple as we head into the last 7 weeks of waiting for this new baby!
We have a fun and busy day planned here! Some green painting, a little storytelling, and a traditional corned beef and cabbage dinner with Daddy.
We are trying to teach our children more about the lives of Christian saints. It is not something I grew up with, but we think it's a valuable way to teach the history of our faith, and about the heroes of the faith. To that end, I made a little playset of St. Patrick's life, inspired by this article. Mine is not nearly as detailed or lovely (I may have to revamp my St. Patrick along these lines), but it does the job, and my little guy loves to see the story in action. We are using the Tomie De Paola, Patrick: Patron Saint of Ireland, along with the playset, and I find the illustrations particularly luminous. I would like to own this book eventually, and it may be sooner than later as the little girl has just ripped one of the pages of the library copy:)
I'm trying something new this year and making my own "fake" corned beef from the most recent issue of Martha Stewart Living. The spice rub (above) that it marinates in is aromatic, and I have high hopes for tonight. The veggies cook with it, and, with a little potato/apple mash on the side, we have our meal. I hope the kids like it:)
Our Irish soda bread was made earlier in the week for a baking activity, and my little one was fascinated with the measuring cups and flour. Extremely cute; extremely messy!
Much to look forward to today; best be getting on with it!
It's amazing what a few hours of solitude and quiet can do! Yesterday was the most peaceful, nourishing day I've had in many a week. Some time spent alone in my kitchen, with some tea, slow sewing, and slow cooking was just what I needed (read: thank goodness the children are still young enough to nap!). I really enjoy the slow cooking process (minus the slow cooker), but this is a luxury that few days afford. This recipe, that I have been making often this winter, is just the ticket. You start with great ingredients, cook, and simmer, chop, and add, and end up with a healthful, yummy, warm, one-dish meal.
The homemade bread experiment continues after a little break. I've got a batch of four loaves in my bucket in the fridge, ready to pull out at an afternoon's notice. Yesterday, something new was required, so with my basic dough, and a fresh red pepper to hand, we enjoyed Roasted Red Pepper Stuffed Fougasse (from Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day). Sounds quite fancy I think, and Husband was duly impressed, but it was really very simple because the dough was already made.
Looked and tasted good! I was pleased. My bread making is reliably hit-or-miss:)
But don't let all this homemade-ness fool you. Tonight's menu is pizza, with grocery store mix, grocery store sauce, and canned pineapple. While yesterday was a respite, today is teaching me not to expect such bounty everyday!
Yogurt, made from our milk share...
And, my exciting find of the weekend: pincushions in the form of a mini sewing kit. How clever! Each pincushion is surrounded by little colorful spools of thread, with a thimble, sewing needles and pins attached. They are handmade and they were $2.50 each! Wouldn't this make the cutest present for a budding seamstress?
What are your favorite finds from the farmer's market or thrift store?
I seem to be a little out of season with my cooking lately. Many blueberry cakes have been in the works with last summer's frozen blueberry harvest.
And did you know this great trick for cheater's buttermilk? You just squeeze a few tablespoons per cup of milk into a bowl, let it sit for a few minutes, and voila, thick, creamy buttermilk.
Summery Tomato-Basil Soup was also made to celebrate the little boy's birthday, and it was very refreshing with grilled cheese and a green salad. Here's the super-easy recipe for you to try:
Tomato-Basil Soup
2 T. butter
2 T. olive oil
1 medium onion chopped
3 garlic cloves minced
1 cup celery chopped
4 cans good quality diced tomatoes (you could use your own canned tomatoes, or use fresh that have been diced in the food processor)
3 cups chicken stock
1 t. oregano, 1 t. salt and fresh pepper
2 cups basil chopped
Saute the onion, garlic, and celery in the oil and butter until softened. Add the stock, tomatoes, and spices, and bring to a boil. Simmer for 20 minutes. Stir in the fresh basil to taste, and serve with parmesan cheese.
Yum, yum. I'm blaming all the extra time in the kitchen on this....
Plus a new kitchen! We love the kitchen in our new house, for its storage, counter space, and pretty French Blue cupboards. I grew up dreaming of a blue kitchen, and now I've got one!
With all the indoor time that January brings, we've been using this space to the max, and incorporating some new routines into our cooking.
I've been making homemade bread now for a few weeks using the method in Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day. I would recommend it highly; it teaches you how to produce artisan-quality bread with very minimal effort and investment. We only had to purchase a few new tools, like a pizza peel and a large food storage bin. You do also need a baking stone, but we were able to unearth one in our pile of yet-unused wedding presents.
The basic dough recipe calls for all white flour, and this is how DH prefers it, but I've been slowly experimenting with adding whole wheat flour. I prefer the more complex taste that the whole wheat flour gives, plus the added healthiness. I've gotten to a ratio of about 55% whole wheat flour, 45% white flour, and I like it. It still rises and bakes well, it's delicious with soups or stews in the evening, and great for toast the next morning. If you've been interested in making your own bread for a while without a bread machine, I would encourage you to try this book.
The results you can get with so little time or effort still amaze me. Little people like it too. Bread-making has become part of our weekly routine, and we love it.
Husband has decided he wants to make our own yogurt, so he took off with it this weekend, using some words of wisdom from a friend and these general guidelines. It turned out great, we're almost through our 1/2 gallon in just three days, and I love being able to give this super-healthy stuff to the little girl since she is loving food these days.
This too was incredibly easy and I see it being a weekly routine that we can sustain. There's very little hands-on time, which for us is key:) We didn't have to buy any equipment for this either, other than a food thermometer which we've sorely needed for a while now. To keep the yogurt at a steady 110 degrees for its 8 hour "incubation," we submerged the jar of cooked yogurt in a pot of water at 110, then placed that whole set-up in our large cooler. Worked like a charm.
I'm excited that we've found some practical (and frugal) ways to improve the health of our diets. What kinds of food routines do you enjoy with your family?
Not a lot of big things, just small happenings around here. We had a great visit with Grammy, with spoiling for all. Now, it's back to cooking and keeping babies happy, with a little craft therapy for mom in between.
I made a double batch of pesto, the first of the season, and was thrilled to later discover a volunteer basil plant in the middle of my flower garden. So there will be more pesto to come...
Our zucchini plants are out of control, so I'm testing various zucchini bread recipes in hopes of freezing a bunch of loaves for Christmas-neighbor-gifts.
And some knitting has been finished, and some begun....more later....
My Little Guy is up to some new tricks, including walking, and the discovery of dirt, rocks sticks.... A lethal combination! I am working hard to remember he is a boy, and should be allowed to get dirty (as of course girls should too:).
Our days are pretty simple, and much the same caring for two very little ones, but I try to do something un-baby related every day. Yesterday I got in two things! A batch of my favorite scone recipe, and some new knitting. If vague recipes drive you crazy, ignore the next bit. But, if you are feeling like something bready, a little sweet, and not too bad for you, this is it.
Take 1 1/3 cups white whole wheat flour, 1 2/3 cups all purpose flour, a bit of baking soda and a bit of salt. Mix. Now, cut in one cold stick of butter until the mixture looks crumbly. Then add about 1/2 cup sugar and some craisins, or currants, or chocolate chips; whatever you have on hand, or whatever suits your fancy. Toss lightly to combine. Then, beat one egg into 3/4 cup milk, and add this to the flour mixture, stirring with a fork until just combined. Turn onto a floured surface, and knead until combined. Then shape into a ball and flatten, and using a sharp knife cut into 8 wedges. Onto the cookie sheet and into the 350 degree oven for about 25 minutes.
Eat and enjoy!
The new knitting is a good-y, the tea leaves cardigan, which I've seen several recommendations for, with some stash Rowan Felted Tweed. And it's for me, in the prettiest pink color. And maybe since I've started now it will be finished for fall!? Thank goodness for naps and hands-free baby carriers!
What have you been working on in your days?
Little Miss E. in some handknit goodness for snuggle time. Thankfully, wool can be washed, because she is kind of a spit-up-y baby. And I've forgotten how much newborns sleep! Wow-sers, I don't think we have more than one or two pictures of her with her eyes open.
She is such a sweet baby, and is going very easy on us. We are all settling in together and figuring each other out, and Daddy is home with us for some days this week so that is extra fun! DH and I had to laugh this morning when both babies were crying at the same time, and, as it happens, for the same reason: they didn't want to get dressed for the day. But I got mine quiet first:) What an adventure, I am so thankful we are on it!
I was working on this post about bread making the evening that I went into labor, and the title was going to be "bread, but no baby." It must have ticked my girl off, because she started to signal her imminent appearance a few hours later! I thought it would be appropriate to share now, as we continue to enjoy this batch of homemade bread.
Good bread is one of my weaknesses, but it can get so expensive, especially as my tastes run to the artisan kinds, so I've wanted to try making our own bread for a while. At $4-$5 a loaf, and a not very big loaf at that, my bread consumption has to be limited. Plus, the white flours just aren't that healthy, and I'm trying to incorporate more whole grains in our diet as we try to eliminate refined flours and sugars.
So, a bread-making experiment: homemade soaked whole grain bread. You can read more here about the nutritional benefits of soaking whole grains, and you can find the recipe I followed here. A word of warning before you dive in: soaking your grains like this takes a really big bowl, and enough refrigerator space to store it for 24 hours. Fortunately, my fridge was nearly empty when I was doing this, so no problems there:)
Some good looking dough, huh? My Kitchenaid mixer (just the standard model, nothing special) was not big enough to mix this dough, so DH and I mixed/kneaded it by hand on our kitchen table. We found that working small sections made it more manageable, and then incorporated them together so that we had one big hunk of dough at the end:) With a couple risings and some bake time, we had four nice loaves of healthy bread.
I think he likes it!
The loaves themselves aren't the most attractive, and my loaf pans were a little too wide so the bread came out flatter than it should, but the texture is great, the taste is yummy, and it is so much lighter than any other whole wheat bread I've had.
With a little Amish butter, it is really delicious!
I hope to be back in this space soon with some new projects; I'm thinking of pillows to make out living room a little more comfy as we lounge around together.
Wife, Mommy, Artist. Inspired by all things vintage, I design nostalgic paper and home goods with watercolor illustration to bring the warmth of the past to modern life.
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