Lemon, Sage & Ginger Soap

This past weekend, I was able to set some time aside especially for more soap making. YYAAYY My dear hubby actually volunteered to "watch" the girls so I can make soap. We are down to our last bar and he is "desperate". He loves my soap. aaawww.. :) This batch is made with coconut oil, olive oil, and palm oil. I added a blend of Lemon, Sage and Ginger essential oils. It makes a great combination. I also added calendula petals, not only for the visual affect but for their healing properties they hold within. The first picture is the soap inside the mold just before cutting. It has been in this mold since Saturday evening. After adding all ingredients together and stirring to "trace" I poured in this mold and let it set underneath a blanket to keep as warm as possible for 24 hours. I then uncovered it and let it sit for another 3 days. Then came the cutting part. As you can see, I still need practice at making that "straight" cut. It will be around 4 weeks before we can start using this soap. Until then, it will make my laundry room smell "lemony" fresh, and will continue to harden as it is still quite soft. My next batch, I hope to make a "shampoo bar". I plan on adding Nettle leaf and Rosemary, as they are very good for the hair. I can't wait until the sun gets warm enough to where I can make infused oils with different herbs before making them into soaps. Now, that will be "as good as it gets"! :)

FINALLY - some good results

Wow - I took Sharon's suggestion on letting my "bread machine do the work" and it worked like a charm! My bread actually didn't go flat! It always tasted good, just didn't look as good. *grin But now I can have both! :) Always feels more rewarding when something looks as good as it taste. I added a cup of soft wheat as I ran out of the hard wheat - and didn't want to add white flour. My hard wheat is in a bucket out in my sunroom, and I would have had to wait til tomorrow to bring it down to room temperture. It's FREEZING out there. bbrrrrr I am not sure if the "soft" wheat had anything to do with it not going flat or not. I will have to wait and see the next time, which just may be in a couple of days. My girls eat this wheat bread like there is no tomorrow. :)

Daddy made a mess!

WOW - it's Monday again already! Even though Jonathan and I had a lazy relaxing weekend, (something we don't get too often) time still went by way too fast. Yesterday was a very COLD, snowy, & BLUSTERY day outside. It was so nice to watch it all from the inside. :)

Abigail has now increased her vocabulary to some 5 and 6 word sentences. For example: Our bathroom sink was rather clogged, so this weekend Jonathan decided to take care of it once and for all. He got underneath the sink, took the piping apart, (thankfully he didn't need my help or I would have lost it *MAJOR GAG*)and made quite a mess. Abigail was in there only for a few seconds to observe what he was doing and came running to me:

Abbi: Ohh nooo.. Mommy! (hands go up in the air) Daddy made a mess!!

Mommy: he did??

Abbi: YESSSHHH

Her favorite sentence lately is- "no, I don't like it" - as in.. when I give her something to eat, have cloths in my hand to change her into.. and so on. She has figured out how to "disagree" with me, and is implementing it a bit too often for my taste. :) Her vocabulary is increasing by leaps and bounds on a daily bases. She has become quite the little parrot and repeats everything. My baby is growing up. *sniff

I made Wheat Bread today and so far it is rising rather quickly. YYAAYYY My sister Doina tipped my off by telling me I should knead my bread for about 15 minutes. ( vs. the 5 to 7 minutes I have been doing) It got pretty tiresome, so I let my Kicthen aid mixture share the chore. And wow.. the results seem WONDERFUL! The bread has been rising for less than an hour and it has nearly doubled, if not doubled. So - now I must do some baking.

A penny saved..

These days, with gas prices so high every penny saved is truly a penny earned! Here is a link that my sister Daniela shared with me... you enter your zipcode and it shows you all the gas stations within a so many mile radius of your zipcode, with live gas prices!

Arrowroot saves the day!

I went to the grocery store last week and quickly picked up what I thought was "canned pumpkin" to make pumpkin bread for my dear hubby. So today, I get all my ingredients out and ready -- was going to surprise him as he LOVES Pumpkin Bread. I open the can and in doing so I got some pumpkin on my finger and when I licked it off I noticed it was sweet. HUH?!?! I took a closer look at the can and it was READY MADE PIE FILLING! NOT just Canned Pumpkin .. OH NO!! For a moment I went into panic mode .. then I thought, "wait a minute.. I will just make him Pumpkin Pie! After all he has been asking me to make him some for quite sometime now. I checked the back of the can and for my convenience they had a simple Pumpkin Pie recipe, which only required the Pie Filling, Evaporated Milk, and a couple of eggs. As I went for the pantry I prayed I had an evaporated milk in there somewhere. Low and behold he was sitting nice and sweet in the corner, just waiting on me. :) Shew.. I was off the hook and on my way to making a pie for my sweetheart. All will go smooth for hench forth ... OR so I thought. I gathered my little troop (Emma; Abbi was still napping or she would of had her little fingers in it too) and we start making the pie crust. As she was stirring the flour and salt for me she goes "Mommy.. this is going to make a goooodd pie!!" I said.. that's right sweetie! *kiss - so after getting the crust mixed, and into the pie plate, edges all nice and neat, I left to "poking with the fork" part to Emma and I moved on to throwing the filling together.

I read:

Pumpkin Pie

1 Can Pumpkin Pie Filling

1 Can Evaporated Milk

2 Eggs (beaten)

Mix all together and pour into a 9 in. pie plate.. ect.

Little did I realize, until it was too late, that it only asked for 5 of the 12 ozs. of evaporated milk - ONLY 5 oz. and NOT ALL 12. But anyhow.. I poured it all in before realizing what I was doing. When I seen it was too "runny" I realized I just made a BIG OOOPPSSS! I thought it was JUST meant to be ONE BIG FLOP! But, I didn't give up THAT easy. :) So I reached for my arrowroot powder, threw in a couple of heaping tablespoons stirred it up and into the oven it went. I wasn't sure how it would turn out... but after baking it an extra 20 minutes, it was screaming at me to let it out the oven already! My hubby said it was EXCELLENT!! He loved it! As you can see from the picture that he and the girls already feasted! :)

So I can safely say that "Arrowroot saved the day"!!!! *SMILE*

** I also made gravy using arrowroot powder... and it was YUMMY! A wonderful alternative to the highly processed cornstarch or flour, plus it adds nutrition to your food.

Congratulations to Bob & Monica!

A BIG DOUBLE congratulations to my sister Monica and bro-in-law Bob! They are the proud parents of Kailey Hope and Zoie Faith, born this morning about 7:00 EST time! God has truly blessed them with 2 beautiful healthy girls! I haven't seen them yet, but I take thier word for it and hope to get pictures SOON! :) My arms ache to hold them, but unfortunately I am 10 hours way. I can't wait to get more "details". :) I talked to Bob.. but you know how guys are. hehe J/K ... he did a pretty good job but I am sure Monica will have LOTS more details. :)

And oh yes... congratulations to me TOO! I am an auntie AGAIN! :) I think these two little bundles have made number 22 and 23? :)

*********SPECIAL UPDATE*************

Sharon has pictures of the cuties on her blog! THANKS SHARON!

Five Little Snowmen

Yesterday and today I have been teaching the girls "Five Little Snowmen", which goes like this:

Five little snowmen fat
each with a funny hat
out came the sun and melt one
what a sad thing was that!
boo hooo --

Four little snowmen fat... ect ect.. you count down til you get to 1.

In the picture the girls are acting out the words - they had so much fun! It is the cutest little song. :)

****NEWS FLASH: Bird watcher in the making!

Today, the girls and I also did some bird watching thru our binoculars. I managed to take a few pictures of Abbi. She said she seen a "bue bird" (blue) and a "bak bird" (black) :)

Spring Fever

Well.. today is ONLY January 23 - and I have Spring fever so bad it's making me sick. BBAAHHH It was a rather cold day today which the girls and I spent indoors for the most part. Our day started off with taking Emma to school, which I surely would have rather stayed home. I crawled out of bed anyways, peeked out the window only to see snow covered grounds. Trust me, it didn't look very inviting. After bringing Emma home from school we stayed indoors for the rest of the day. All I could do was look out the window and stare at the snow covering the ground where my herb garden will be and invisioning the big healthy herbs in the nice warm summer sunlight... which was rather hard to do .. but some way, some how - I managed. One of the herbs I would like to grow is the Pineapple Sage. I am not quite sure what I would use this particular herb for, but I mainly want it to attract more hummingbirds. Of course my dear hubby would say "what do you need more hummingbirds for? You already attract enough." But in my eyes.. I can never attract enough. :) Someone on ebay had the seeds at a very fair price and I "put off" buying them, only to be kicking myself now, because they ran out. *sigh Now, I am having trouble locating more seeds; at a reasonable price that is.

Sometime next month I will start growing my seeds insoors. Until then, I will keep taking Emma to school, babysitting and endulging myself in bird/gardening books/magazines. :) AND watching the birds that are currently visiting my feeders, which are the American Gold Finch, Black Caped Chickadee, Dark Eyed Junco, White Breasted Nuthatch, Downy Woodpecker, Blue Jay, Northern Cardinals, Carolina Wren, House Finches and a few others. :)

MORE Snow!

Wow - it is finally starting to look and feel like Winter. This morning Emma came into our room excitedly shouting "mommy! it's snowing outside.. come and see". Since I was too tired to get up I pretended to be asleep (hehe) and she went over to Jonathan's side of the bed "daddy! it's snowing outside.. come and see! Come on Daddy!" Jonathan said "we will come see later.. not now" Emma: "But daddy.. it's snowing.. come see!" When she realized she wasn't getting either one of us out of bed she went over and pulled up the blind in our room.. and WOW - it was snowing hard! So I had to get up.. get them breakfast and then out they went to play in the snow.. something Emma and Abbi have BOTH been waiting for. :) Above you see some of the many pictures I took and I have more on our Picasa Photo Site.

Abigail and Cody

Abigail LOVES this baby! I can always count on her to comfort him when he is crying, give him his pacifier when he doesn't need it and feed him when he is hungry. :)

Baby Cody & Girls

Most of you know I babysit, during the week. I occasionally take pictures of all the kids as they are having fun. Last week I had the baby laying on the floor and all the girls came to join him. I thought this picture turned out SWEET and here it is! Clockwise starting with Emma (3) Cody
(4 mons) Bri aka Abrianna (4) Hailey (2) and Abigail Hope (2)

Recent picture of the girls

YAYY - my picasa is working again... Here is a recent picture of the girls, doing what they love best.. painting~! :)

A lil' bit of white stuff

This morning, the girls and I awoke to some white stuff falling out of the sky. Oh my! Could it be?!?!?! Could it possibly be??? ..... SNOW? YES! YES! It was SNOW!

This Winter has been very unsual for us. We have had only 2 snowfalls where we actually had a bit of accumilation on the ground. Only once did Emma and Abbi get to go play in it. They have been waiting for more snow all Winter. They were both so excited to see the snow this morning. Abbi had to drag a chair to stand on so she could see the snow and Emma was standing on her tip toes. They were both shouting ... YYYAAYYY.... snow!! Emma said... Mommy.. can I go play in it .. and of course since Abbi is such a parrot she said... "pay in it mommy?" :)

Last night after supper- Abbi said.. "mommy... potty!" I was thinking.. she is just saying that..and then she said, louder... "mmooommmmyyy... potty!" "Do you really have to go potty?" I asked. Abbi said "YESSH!" So..I rush her to the big potty and she went teeetteee! I am so proud of her. No need for potty training.. looks like she is doing it herself. :) I just need to remember to start encouraging her more!

I will be posting some updated pictures soon.... once I figure out how to post them. I used to upload them thru picasa, but for some odd reason that's not working anymore.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year to everyone, even though it is 3 days late. :) Things have been very busy here as usual. We all had a wonderful Christmas. My brother Dorel, and Jonathan's sister Kathy, which is my brothers wife and their 4 children came up to spend Christmas with us. We had much tasteful food, played games, sang Carols and just sat around and talked! I went overboard on buying the kids gifts again - but they got what they wanted. :) It was so much fun watching them open their gifts and gasp in excitement with each little gift they opened. I can't believe Christmas has come and gone.... same with the New Year. 2007 ; WOW! Emma is already talking about "next" Christmas.

Today, Emma said:

Emma: Mommy.. I want a baby like that. (pointing to 3 month old Cody; a baby I watch)

Mommy: You do?

Emma: Yes.... where do we find one like that.. hhummm mommy?

LOL

I am babysitting at the moment so I will have to blog more later. :)