Bread Baking - New Recipe!

Mike's mom, Jeanette, passed this recipe on to me a few weeks back and I finally had time this Friday to test it out.  She said she was given the recipe when she attended a cooking class in Skagway way back when they lived there!

My Kitchen Aid bowl was almost not big enough, do they make larger bowls?  I think I need one!

Dissolve 2 TBS (2 pkgs) yeast with 1/2 cup warm water.
Set aside.

Blend 8 TBS Honey

3 1/2 cup warm water

4 cup wheat flour

Add yeast to blended mixture and Beat with mixer for 3-5 minutes.
This is called sponging.

Let this set for 1 hour.

Add 2/3 cup oil

3 tsp salt

6 cup wheat flour gradually

 

knead out with white flour. Let rest for 5-10 minutes.

 

shape into loaves and let raise until double

bake in 375-400 degree oven for approx. 20-30 minutes.

makes 4 loaves

These turned out awesome!  They weren't as dense as my other wheat bread recipes, nice and moist and not at all doughy.  VERY good.  I will make this again next week!  Thank you Jeanette!

Food Waste Friday - Peanut Butter Muffins

I'm participating in Food Waste Fridays hosted by the Frugal Girl.

Well, not too much to report here!  Only had some Peanut Butter Muffins that were sitting in the back of the fridge for at least 3 weeks, could have gone out with last Friday's toss.  I suppose we could have eaten them, but not sure how long these really last.

Anyone care to tell me how long bread / muffins might last in the fridge?

Not Me Monday - Not Much, Just Poop

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

This week has not been all that extraordinary at my house, just the usual going ons.

My hubby certainly did not help me with washing the diapers, and did not forget to check the diapers before putting them in the washer to make sure there weren't any 'paper towel wipes' in them.  And we most definately didn't have little bits of paper towel all over the inside of the washer and all over the diapers when I took them out to dry them!  And I did not proceed to shake out all the diapers and cause the floor to look like it had snowed inside!


I most definately have not done a good job at training my children to recycle, because I did not throw some paper into the wrong recycle bin and my oldest son did not come to me and say "Mom, you can't put paper with the plastic!"

There's never a time when I'm sitting down nursing the twins and I can't get up to get something for my older boys.  So they certainly did not get up to get water for themselves and Michael Jr. most definately did not pour water all over Connor.  So, I did not have a naked boy running rampant around the house for 20 minutes.

AND...Connor most definately did not go to the bathroom by himself, because, he's not potty training, nope.  He did not come out of the bathroom and tell me he pooped on the floor and when I went back to investigate I most certainly did not see chunks of poop on the walls and floor and a nice smear on the toilet seat. 

Nope, none of this happened at my house this week!

On Good Behavior - Resources & Articles

Above all I believe in Child Training thru God's Word. God is specific in that we are to 'train' our children. That means consequences for unacceptable behavior. This has been on my mind a lot; when you have four kids under 4 years of age, there's a lot of training going on! And they're all at different stages and levels of comprehension. These verses help me focus on today for the future and the articles below are also great resources...

Proverbs 22:6

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

Ephesians 6:4

And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord.

No Greater Joy.org has some great resources in their magazine that you can read online or you can subscribe to via the mail. They also have many child training books and videos (several of which we own, have read and viewed!).

From the Total Transformation Program there are two great articles, one on how to give consequences that work and the other 0n motivating the child, these are quick reads and actually give some specific examples that made me think 'duh' that's what I should be doing!

Other resources you can find out there on the web, and I most recently found a really good series of articles written on the Raising Olives blog called Your Child's Heart which I highly recommend!

Food Waste Friday - this n' that

I'm participating in Food Waste Fridays hosted by The Frugal Girl.

This week I found some old moldy apple butter, pbj sandwich, broccoli & baby food! I seriously need to clean the fridge, it's starting to smell even though there's no expired food in there!

Giveaway - Medela Breast Pump

Hi there Ladies! Thought I'd post a 'giveaway' today...

I have a (used) Medela Breast Pump in good working order with all kinds of accessories that I'd like to give away!

My twins won't take a bottle and aren't too keen on sippy cups either, so I thought I'd give it to someone who might get better use of it!

Check it out and then make a comment below about how breastfeeding is important to you!

I'll review all posts and then post a winner on February 1, 2010.

here's a picture of everything: bag, pump, accessories

this is a manual pump

it also has attachments for larger boosoms!

Save $300 with No Garbage Pick Up & Recycling

Well, we did it, we canceled our garbage service. That was a few months back, and I have to say that it was rather successful. Good bye $75 quarterly garbage bills! (We now save $300 / year).

How do you do it you may be asking?

It's rather simple, REALLY simple.

We recycle almost all of our garbage, and I try hard not to have much food waste, and our wonderful dog, Bella, enjoys most of the boy's scraps from the table. I also wash and reuse baggies, tin foil & plastic wrap.

Usually once or twice a week - depending upon how full our recycle bin is, Mike will take the recycling to the dump on his way home from work. At the recycle center he gets a 'punch' on his 'punch card.' This punch card, when full, is good for one free dump run!

A FREE DUMP RUN?

YES!

So that's how we do it! Recycle, get a punch, take our garbage to the dump when we get a full punch card. It saves the environment and your budget! Reduce, Reuse, Recycle!

Here's some information listed on juneau.org's website:

Gives a list of what is accepted for recycling:

http://www.juneau.org/pubworks/recycling.php

Other recycling resources (a list including: styrofoam, cell phones, six pack rings, toner, etc.):

http://www.juneau.org/pubworks/r-rec.php

Wordless Wednesday

Not Me Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created byMckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

This is my first post to “Not Me Monday” at Mck Mamma’s blog. I have enjoyed reading others posts, and with this past week having plenty of those moments, I’ll now start to share them with you.

No, not me, I certainly did not feed my children cereal and toast for dinner twice this week.

I absolutely did not pop one, but two, of my children’s balloons because they did not listen.

I most definitely did not ignore the gigantic pile of clothes on my couch so I could bake bread.

I really should share that I did not leave a dirty diaper sit all night on the top of the toilet tank because I was exhausted.

You just wouldn’t believe that I did not use baby food for other than feeding the babies – this week I certainly did not run out of regular apple sauce and give baby apple sauce to my older kiddos. And I most definitely did not substitute a few jars of baby food (carrots and sweet potatoes) because I didn’t have enough tomato sauce to put in my chili. (And I swear no one noticed.)

No, my kid did not pee his pants at my hubby’s office because I forgot to put him in a pull up and forgot to get him to take a potty break. And he certainly did not leave the building only wearing one of his little brother’s cloth diapers and a pair of rubber boots.

My kid certainly did not take off his underwear to put on his sister's head so she could wear them as a hat.

Happy Birthday Mike!

My fabulous hubby of 8 years turned 33 today, it's hard to believe that we've actually been together almost 12 years, so I've known Mike since he's been 21. Wow! How time flys!

Mike's sister Amber (and family) and his brother Timm (and family) came over to celebrate... I should also mention that this year Mike's mom, Jeanette, was in town this weekend, so she also was able to share this day with us!

Mike is so AWESOME! I made dinner for his birthday, or maybe I should say... I prepared the ingredients and Mike made his own dinner, as I was stuck on the recliner nursing the twins. He's such a good sport, and has come a long way since I first met him. What a catch! He even helped clean up the kitchen tonight after his siblings and mother left.

I do have to say that of course I made rolls on Wednesday and made Mike's cake yesterday (using his grandmother Dorothy's recipie - This is my favorite cake by far, and oh, so easy to make! I'll post more photos of how and the recipie later).

One Small Change

1 Corinthians 10:26

"for the earth is the Lord's, and everything in it."

I have become more aware in the past few years while I have been conciously working on being green, eco friendly and frugal that we are stewards of God's earth and should do our part to create less waste and be more aware of our actions on the environment.

So, having come accross Hip Mountain Mama and it's 'One Small Change' challenge, I thought it would be a perfect match for me and to add to my already growing list of things I am trying to do to be more aware and concious of my actions.

In their own words...



"Our vision with Hip Mountain Mama is much larger than selling environmentally friendly products. We are passionate about educating others about sustainability and passionate about building community. Our desire to create a community of individuals who want to make a positive change has led to the creation of our One Small Change project.


We want to challenge each of you to make 1 change each month leading up to Earth Day (April 22, 2010). It can be small or it can be huge, but all we ask is that you decide on something you will do to make a positive green impact and follow through with it. If everyone makes 4 changes between January and April, this can have a huge effect."



This month, although already half over, I have decided to still participate. I already think that I am somewhat green and eco friendly. But feel like I can continue working on this earth friendly path. As being green is often synonymous with being frugal, I feel like it is something that I need to do, to show my kids how to live responsibly.



This month I have decided to hang dry at least one load of laundry per day. Now, some of you who don't live in our area might think, "what's so difficult about that?" But those of you who do live here (or who have lived here before or visited) are asking, "are you crazy?"



We live in a 'Rain Forest' and here it seems like it rains just about every other day!



So, my only option that I have, unless I want to hang my laundry in the rain, is to hang it in my bathroom and above my washer and dryer! I have a closet rod above my washer and dryer in the hallway and an extra shower rod above the tub in the bathroom (See Photo of Diapers Below).

Baking Bread

We go thru A LOT of bread!

It seems like my kiddos really prefer to only eat bread and fruit these days, although, I make them try other things at dinner time, and then use dinner rolls as my leverage to get them to eat 'that other stuff' they're not too keen on.

Wednesday was my 'baking bread day,' nothing else really got done around here, it was a sort of crazy day, bread baking, laundry piling up, etc. At least I made some pizza for dinner, but I had to run to the store to pick up sauce and cheese - on the sauce note - I'm going to attempt in the future to make and can my own spaghetti/pizza sauce and will post later.

What you'll see is that not every loaf is the same, as I have so many distractions, some loaves of bread have risen more than others, and I have two different loaf pan sizes: 9x5 and 8x4.

I hate to waste anything - so after I sliced all my bread, I kept the bread crumbs and put them in an old Adams Peanut Butter Jar.

mmm... Pizza for dinner!

Food Waste Friday - Sour Cream Gone Bad!

I hate throwing out food, it's money down the drain! I'm starting to participate in 'Food Waste Friday' - hosted by The Frugal Girl.

Last night I made soft tacos for dinner and went for my sour cream and it looked like this:

The thought actually went through my mind "hmm, I wonder if I can salvage some of this, not all of it has mold growing on it" - but I was worried that I would make us sick. Has anyone actually done what I was only thinking?