Back again!

Hello all, I'm back again, and apologize deeply for such a long absence.  I've put the time to good use, though, I promise!

As you know, I decided back at the end of January to knit dresses and sweaters for the four younger girls for Easter.  As my deadline drew closer, I came to realize that if I spent time at the computer, that was time away from my knitting needles, and I needed every minute I could get.  So, while I was away from you, every spare minute, and I mean Every Single Spare Minute, was spent on the dresses.  But YAY, I finished, on time, and without pulling a single all- nighter!

Here are Emma's and Abby's dresses:

And here are Madison's and Katie's:

Here are the girls on Easter morning:

They were quite happy with these dresses, which was a huge relief to me, after the months spent working on them.  While at church that morning, several people complimented them on their outfits.  Without fail, (well, except for Maddie), each girl said, "Thank you, my mom made it.", which made me quite happy.  It was nice to feel that they were proud of me!

And that is nearly the sum total of my knitting projects for March and April.  I did manage this knitted, beaded necklace, which was meant for Easter, but wound up not matching the dress I bought.  I did wear it on another occasion though, and got several comments about it.  I can't wait to try another one!

And I spent quite a bit of time on a cross stitch picture for Don, which was meant to be an anniversary present.  Our anniversary fell on Easter as well, and his present wasn't finished quite on time.  As I didn't actually finish it until May, and as it isn't in a frame yet, I will post pictures of that sometime later.

Here is a picture of Don with his carrot harvest.  I have to say, initially, I thought the garden was my garden, but it turns out, it is actually Don's!  He takes great pride in the vegetables that he grows, and I, after all, get to do the fun parts, which consist of helping to choose what we are going to grown, and then doing something with them after harvest!

Don, however, prepared this harvest for the freezzer.  He cleaned all of these, then sliced them, blanched them, and put them in the freezer.  We wound up with 3 1/2 pounds of sliced carrots...not too shabby!  Added to the cauliflower and broccoli, we had quite a nice little winter garden.  That's gone now though, and the spring/summer veggies are in, and already doing quite well!

This post was meant to be short and sweet, just to let you know that I've not forgotten about you!  I'll be back soon to catch you up on some of our other doings.  See you soon!

My soup day

As you no doubt know, my husband has built a fabulous garden for us in the backyard.  I like to refer to it as "my garden", but the realtiy is that it is his, and he takes great pride in it.  He designed it, built it from the ground up, hauled the dirt, installed the irrigation system, and does most of the planting.  The only part that is truly mine is making yummy things from the produce that results.

Last fall, we planted broccoli, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, cabbage, carrots, and romaine lettuce.  While everything did pretty well, we are particularly pleased with the cauliflower.  Two weeks ago, Don picked the last 3 heads.  Don cut 2 of them into florets, blanched them, and left them for me to freeze.  We got 4 one pound packs to put in the freezer.  With the last one, I decided to make Cream of Cauliflower Cheese soup.

Katie, holding one of the "smaller" cauliflowers. 

Here is my recipe for Cream of Cauliflower-Cheese Soup:
4 cups fresh Cauliflower florets
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon flour
1/2 teaspoon celery seeds
1/4 teaspoon salt
black pepper to taste
1 cup milk or half-and-half
1/2 cup shredded American cheese

I cut up the last cauliflower and came up with 16 cups of florets, so I made a quadruple batch.

Step one:  In a large saucepan, cook vegetables, covered, in a large amount of boiling water for 8 to 10 minutes.  Set aside 1 cup of cooked vegetables. (I skipped this part.)

Step 2:  In a food processor combine the remaining cooked vegetables with 3/4 cup of broth.  Cover and process until smooth, about 1 minute.  Set aside.  (I pureed the whole amount of vegetables.)

Step 3:  In the same saucepan, melt butter.  Stir in flour and seasong.  Add milk all at once.  Cook and stir until slightly thickened and bubbly.  Cook and stir 1 minute more.

Step 4:  Stir in blended vegetables, remaining broth, and cheese.  Cook and stir until heated through, adding additional milk if necessary, to reach desired consistency.  If desired, season with additional salt and pepper.  (Here, I added a little bit of fresh ground nutmeg.)

I didn't have shredded American, so I cubed a pack of slices.

Of course, being me, I packaged most of this soup in single sized portions, and put it in the freezer.

Many packages of yummy goodness!  I hope you try this recipe, it's great for rainy days!

(Up next, the recipe for Pioneer Woman Sherried Tomato soup, pictured above!)

Short and Sweet (but better than nothing!)

This post is not only long overdue, it's going to just be a teaser, in the hopes that once I've got a promise of more info out there, I will be able to follow through rather quickly!

As I have 2 girls waiting to play Monopoly Jr. with me, I will keep this brief, and summarize what's been keeping me away for so long!

First, we had 2 whirlwind, back to back trips to Southern California.  More on those later.

Random picture of the 3 girls.  Emma is wearing a t-shirt that Don's niece made.

Next, school.  I had forgotten how busy kindergarten keeps parents!  Take that, and multiply it by two....yeah, any wonder why I haven't posted lately?  The girls are doing VERY well, though, and genuinely love school!  Both Abby and Emma were chosen for September's Student of the Month for their class.  Yes, both of them at the same time...their teacher said they were both worthy, and she was trying to make it easy on our family.  As their prize, they each received a free personal pizza from the local restaurant, and were very proud of themselves!  Aside from that, in the 1 1/2 months of school, we've had 1 back to school luau, 3 fundraisers (with one more tonight, and one starting next week!), 2 parent/teacher conferences (1 each), and plenty of homework.  Oh yeah, and I volunteer in their class on Tuesday mornings.  For that, I am truly glad that they are in the same class!  More on school to come!

Also, the garden has gone CRAZY!  I've been canning like mad to try to keep up with how much produce we're getting! I've canned jalapenos, chiles, catsup, pasta sauce (2 kinds), marmalade, taco sauce, BBQ sauce, pickles (multiple kinds!), corn, pinto beans, relish, salsa...the list goes on, and will be touched on again later!


Abby, Emma, and Katie, at our backyard campout.

I went "backyard camping" with the girls one night, and they had a really good time.  I'm not sure any of us slept very well, but it was fun!

My new Ugly Purse and accessories.

A brief sampling of the bag mania that has gripped me for the last 2 or so months!  This was knit and felted from leftover balls of wool yarn, and as I used every color I had, the girls dubbed it the Ugly Purse.  I don't care, I love it!  I've knit several other purses lately, no two alike.  Why?  I don't know why either.  Because I wanted to see if I could, I guess!

My mother-in-law's auction basket, all finished!

Of course, I've had many other knitting projects in the works.  And cross stitch.  And baking.  And other crafting.  Lots more to follow on this!

And to round out my weeks, I babysit a 7 month old on Wednesday mornings, so his mom can volunteer in her daughter's kindergarten class, have Bible study on Wednesday nights, and MOPS has started again, as well as the accompanying book club meetings.  Is it any wonder that when I stop moving for a minute, my kids take pictures like this:

Although I want it noted that this is RARE!

But, at least I'm in good company:

Maddie, taking after her dad...puts on a tv show and falls asleep on the couch!

Take care, and I promise to come back soon with more details!











A Birthday Girl, a Summer Garden, and a Finished Project

First off, today is my oldest daughter's birthday.  Sixteen years ago, I became a mom.  And yet, I find myself thinking occasionally, "I wonder when I will start feeling like a grownup."  Please, somebody out there, tell me that I'm not alone.  Even though I've been an adult now for longer than I was a kid, I sometimes still don't feel like it!  Not that I'm stuck in my youth, or keeping up with the teens, and I definitely wake up sore sometimes, and can't do the things that I used to do, but I'm waiting to "feel" my age.

Here are some pictures of the birthday girl.  We actually celebrated on Saturday, with a big Mexican feast and birthday cake.  Today, we are having dinner together, and she requested her favorite dessert:  rice pudding souffle with raspberry sauce.
Here is Brianna (with Abby, Katie, and Emma) opening presents.

Her favorite cake:  chocolate cake, filled with bananas and whipped cream, and topped with more whipped cream!

Getting ready to blow out candles (with a little help from Maddie!)

And here she goes!  (Looks like she is making a wish, but she said later that she forgot!  She did get all the candles out, though!)










The weekend before last, Don finished the garden.  So, we went to the nursery and bought our vegetable plants.  While Don was finishing the sprinkler system, I was clearing out the rest of the winter vegetables.  We had a couple of heads of cabbage left, (which I put in the compost bin, darn it!) and a lot of chard.  When I say a lot, I mean a LOT.  This is what it looked like when we carried it into the kitchen:

Doesn't look like so much here, does it?  But, keep in mind, there are 2 full size bath towels under it.  Not to mention, we had already had a few dinners of it and given quite a bit to my dad.  All this from 6 plants.

This is what it looked like after I washed and chopped it all:

It filled my 6 largest bowls!

The next step was to blanch it all, and then shock it, in order to put it in the freezer.  This is how it looked after that step:

That's right, it all fit in one bowl, after a 30 second bath in boiling water.

I got out my vacuum sealer, and we now have:




Eight one pound packages in the freezer.  And, the knowledge that next year, 6 plants is probably too many!






For the most part, the garden has been replanted.  We have a total of 22 various tomato plants, 8 green bean plants, 2 summer squash plants, 2 crookneck squash plants, 1 zucchini plant (still have some of last year's in the freezer!), 2 jalapeno plants, 2 banana pepper plants, 3 Anaheim chili plants, 3 bell pepper plants, 3 cuke plants, basil, cilantro, oregano, thyme, sage, mint, rosemary, parsley, chives, and leeks.  I also have seedlings on my window sill:  tomatillos, pickling cukes, and watermelon.  Plus, I left a spot for eggplant.  I'm hopeful for a lot of fresh produce this year!

And now, for the finished project I mentioned.  Today, I finished the 40 squares project.  I last showed you square 34, so here is

Square 35:

Chocolate.  All kinds.  'Cause I don't discriminate.  Enough said??

Square 36:

One of my 2 favorite holidays.

Square 37:

My other favorite holiday.

Square 38:

One possible perfect end to a long day:
a book, a cold drink, and a tub full of bubbles!

Square 39:

Representing my fairy tale life!

Square 40:

My greatest hope:

I also added a banner to the bottom.  Here is the detail of that:

And I put a simple outline around the whole thing, to unify it.  Here is the completed picture:
















I'm going to frame it as soon as I can.  And this project was so fun, I will be starting another one soon.  Right after I finish the baby shower gift I'm working on.  I'll keep you posted!

A very productive weekend, and 5 new squares!

So, it's been a few days since I posted, and last time I mentioned that my husband has started reading my blog.  I also mentioned that I needed a bigger garden.  Put those two sentences together, and you will know what my husband did this weekend!  I think I'm on to something...a high tech, low nag way of getting things done!  Let's here it for progress!!

Anyway, here is a picture of our garden as it existed Saturday morning:

It was my present last year, after the baby was born.  You can see the remains of our winter garden:  some chard, some cabbage, leeks, and herbs.  We also had lettuces and broccoli.

On Saturday, Don more than doubled the size.  Here is a picture of the extension:

As you can see, there is no dirt in it yet.  It rained all day Sunday, and it is raining again today.  The hope is to fill it with dirt next Saturday, while there is a break in the weather.  Until then, my seedlings are still living in our downstairs shower!

Now, for the next 5 squares in the 40 squares project.  For square 25, I had originally planned just a simple cottage type house.  However, Don was teasing me about how tiny that house looked for our size family.  I took him up on the challenge, and this is the result:

This is my rendition, in DMC floss, of our house, bought 3 years ago.

Here is the picture I took of our actual house, so I had something to work from:

All things considered, I don't think I'm too far off!

Square 26:

This is a time card.  The circle/slash (is that redundant???) signifies that I don't fill these out any more.  Thus, this square represents my stay-at-home mom-ness.  (I've had to explain that several times!)

Square 27:

This is our garden, as it was last year.  I asked the 3 little girls what I should put in this square, and they decided on eggplant, tomatoes, and broccoli.  So, here they are.

Square 28:

Cooking, another thing I like to do!

Square 29:

Between our garden, and the orchards we are surrounded by, I spend a lot of time canning and preserving.  (We have LOTS of jelly in our garage!)  I decided to try stitching in script for a change, and am VERY happy with how it came out.

Originally, I sketched pictures in each of the boxes to follow.  Now, my squares are 100% freehand, so I've a little more room to improvise.  That, and the needle is feeling more familiar in my hand now.  Only eleven more squares to go, and then I'm done.  I think I'm going to do a border around the whole thing, to unify it a little bit more.  I'm also going to type a sheet for the back of the frame, describing the significance of each square, as well as the origin of the project. 

I am going to a baby shower for one of the pastors of our church and his wife this Saturday.  True to form, I hadn't started knitting their baby gifts yet, as of 2 days ago.  Also true to form, as soon as the kids saw me sit down with my knitting, they wanted a project to do.  So, I went out to the "craft room" (garage) and dug around until I found this:

I can remember playing with this as a kid, only mine was plastic, and this one is metal. 

Over the years, my mom and I have found 4 of them at various thrift stores.  I don't know how old it is, but one of the looms came in the original box, with all of the accessories, including the instruction book.  Look at the girls in this picture:

How fun is that?

Anyway, I thought it might be a little beyond the girls, but decided to give it a try.

Abby and Emma did fairly well with it, and only needed a little help.

"Come on, Mom, let me work on my project, please!"

"Katie's" project, abandoned on the couch. (She needed quite a bit of help.)

Emma and Katie's finished potholders, and Abby's work in progress.  (She restarted hers 3 times, or she'd be done too.)

They really enjoyed it, but now I have to try to find more of the loops, as I think we are almost out.  Hopefully I can find a source online.  Coming soon, more squares, pics of the baby gifts, and, hopefully, a progress shot of the sampler.  Until then, take care!