Bake something Special : Week 3 of the challenge

21 Oct

“People who love to eat are always the best people”  – Julia Child

A new week has started already! Can you believe it? The sunshine we have had here is so great – I actually got to get out and enjoy it on saturday with some of my family going to the pumpkin patch! so much fun – 5 adults to 7 kids, not too bad of ratio! ha. 

But on to the challenge, I have to say, that since I WAS sick all last week ( and am actually fighting a cough still) I am counting my challenge of having a family fun night as accomplished as it could have been. We had some friends ( who are like another set of parents to us) over for dinner, cribbage and watching the Ducks play against Washington State. (Go Ducks!). It was a lot of fun and I wasn’t sick til the next day! ha. so, how did you guys do with your challenge of a family fun night? Please share!!!!!

As for this week, well, I like this one. Make something special for your family this week – for no reason at all! If you have kids, get them involved! If not, grab your hubby or a friend and make it more fun in the kitchen! I am wondering what I’ll make since my OH and I are off all processed sugar now. . . Hmmm, this will take some thinking. But I did buy a cute owlet pan that I want to use , whatever I end up making! =) 

Here is the link to the actual challenge : http://womenlivingwell.org/2013/10/making-your-home-a-haven-week-3-plus-a-kitchen-aid-mixer-giveaway/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+WomenLivingWell+%28Women+Living+Well+%29&utm_content=Yahoo%21+Mail  and don’t forget to sign up to win a kitchenaid mixer! how cool is THAT prize?? (If I could find a place on my counters for mine, I’d commandeer mine back from my mom’s house!) 

Happy cooking/baking and don’t forget to keep that candle burning! 

God bless! 

~Laura

Tags: ,

Blogs I Love

18 Oct

Happy Friday everybody! 

This has been a gorgeous week here in the High Desert. Sadly, I’ve only been able to enjoy it through windows. I had so much planned for this week! spending time with friends, cleaning out the pantry (!), trying out  a new challah recipe, grooming the dog, etc etc! I was going to be productive this week!

And then I got sick. I’ve been on this couch since Tuesday morning. I used to love it. Now I’m not so sure. Thank goodness for the wonderful mom that i have that came and brought me soup from Chans (yum!) and cleaned the house up. As my OH said last night, ‘you can always tell when Laura is sick because she  isn’t able to do anything about her OCD’.  Hehe. It’s true. Dishes stacked on the counter just bothers me. . . . It might have something to do with the fact that our house is teeny tiny and if you’re sitting on the couch, you are only steps away from the kitchen, aaand the dirty dishes. There’s no escaping them. 

I have gotten distracted though, I thought I would give you a lineup of my favorite blogs. Some I’ve been following for quite a while, some I have only recently found. I hope you enjoy going through these and finding some gold nuggets. =) 

  • http://glutenfreehomemaker.com/ – she has information on being gluten free, and dairy free! Plus great recipes and she does a ‘gluten free wednesday’ series that is fantastic. 
  • http://www.creativejewishmom.com/ – now I admit that i haven’t done any of the crafts that she has shared, yet. But I have saved them on Pinterest and have plans to. I love the information on Jewish holidays that she shares. 
  • http://empoweredsustenance.com/ – this is a relatively new blog for me but I love it. I could spend hours going through her past posts. She has so much information! I especially liked her article about Healthy Air Travel. Very good stuff in there. 
  • http://womenlivingwell.org/ – now some of you have already been to this blog, because we are doing her ‘make your home a haven’ challenge! (reminder : plan a family fun night!). not only does she have homemaking advice, there’s also parenting, marriage, ministry etc on there! A great blog for the Christian wife. =)
  • http://unveiledwife.com/ – another great Christian blog. Now, I admit that I don’t make it to her actual blog very often but she sends out daily prayers to your email, or if you’re on facebook and ‘like’ her page, you get them on your timeline. I am going through her devotional that was recently published and it is good. A 30 day devo that covers, well… check  it out on her page! I actually met Jennifer when she was in town and held a ‘book discussion’ or whatever we all called it! I t was a great time of meeting with other Christian women and discussing the joys and difficulties of marriage and life. 
  • http://laughingtreephotography.com/ – this last one is a friend of mine’s blog. She is a great photographer but I also love her style of writing. 

 

Well, I could add about a dozen more to the list but I’ll stop there! I hope you enjoy checking some of these out. And hopefully I’ll be up and about again soon so I can get on to what all I actually want to post about!  If you want to check out my pinterest page for recipes, health ideas, fashion, etc  here is a link ! – http://www.pinterest.com/lauramichael/boards/

And please, if there’s something you have been wondering how to make – gf, df, ef, or whatever, please let me know, I’m willing to experiment for/with you! 

Tags: , ,

A Fun and Gentle Home – week 2 of the challenge

14 Oct

It’s week 2 for the Home Challenge. =) I hope you all remembered to light your candles – and pray each day this past week. I found that I spent more time praying for my OH and I  and extended family than I normally would. SO good! This weeks’ challenge will be harder for me, but  I’m sitting on some ideas on making it work. I love Courtney’s whole article today, so I’m going to just go ahead and send you over to her site to read it. I love the steps to pursuing gentleness in your home. So good! And don’t forget to sign up to win the pack of games! =) 

 

http://womenlivingwell.org/2013/10/making-your-home-a-haven-week-2-plus-a-10-pack-of-games-giveaway/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+WomenLivingWell+%28Women+Living+Well+%29&utm_content=Yahoo%21+Mail

 

I wanted to share that OH and I had our 6 month anniversary yesterday! I know, it’s not an official anniversary, but I decided it was exciting enough to celebrate with a special meal. I marinated some lamb, made stuffed mushrooms (yum!), couscous and fresh green beans. He then made us white pumpkin cheesecake brownies. I now am looking forward to our year celebration! Who knows what we will do =) 

I hope you enjoy the last day of this three day weekend and remember to let Christ shine through you each day to your spouse, children, friends and strangers. God bless!

( I just might get to cleaning out my pantry since OH is in the other room studying…)Image

Tags: , ,

Image

Fall means Soup

12 Oct

Fall means Soup

Now, i realize that i’m not exactly sticking to the challenge (the next step is the pantry!) but i wanted to share this delicious recipe that i tried this past week with you. I had some lentils in my fridge from a previous stew. So I went on to Pinterest (!) and searched for soups that I had most of the ingredients to already. I found some yummy soups but I decided this one looked delicious and worth trying. It’s Spicy Root & Lentil Soup from Wallflower Girl (a new blog that I can’t wait to spend some time reading through!)
It’s a delightful soup of parsnip, carrot, sweet potato and lentils. YUM. need i say more?
here is the link to her recipe of the soup : http://wallflowergirl.co.uk/spicy-root-lentil-soup/

But i will say that i only used 3 carrots. 1 parsnip. and didn’t have any vegetable stock so I used water. I also didn’t have any coriander – somehow, when I wrote down the ingredients I needed to buy, I didn’t even see those two! oy vay. and of course, I didn’t top it off with yogurt. But I can see that it would absolutely make it that much more delicous. My soup ended up much thicker than her photos of it – I think that’s because I let it simmer a mite too long which boiled the water right down. shrug. It was still super good. I’m not sure my OH was too fond of it – doesn’t bother me though! I’ll eat the whole batch. I’m fine with that.
Sorry I’m not putting the recipe directly on here, but I don’t want to take from the original blogger. Trying to be respectful, and since I didn’t really change the recipe all that much…. You get my drift.

Tags: , ,

A little bit of Venting and Upholstery

10 Oct

 Do you know what I really don’t like? What keeps me squirming and moving and mentally sighing?

 

Metal Chairs.

 

You know the ones I’m talking about. Those horrid folding metal torture devices that they insist you sit on for an indefinite period of time. There is no back support. For anyone over 5 foot 3 inches (sorry mom) there is no leg support. and they are seriously cold. freezing torture devices. 

Image

 

(just in case you weren’t sure…. see above photo) 

 

A crime against humanity. 

Now, if you think i’m overreacting to something so slight. I could normally  agree with you. After all, aren’t I glad that we at least have chairs? Most of the time, I would readily say ‘yes!’. But considering these chairs are the equivalent to sitting on the floor –  but somehow worse –  I can’t. 

Take this evening for instance. I sat in one for 1 1/2 hours – and had to force my back to straighten. I am now having shoots of pain straight down my legs. Not only does my…uhmm, derriere hurt, my hips ache.  And, honey, when my hips ache, I’m not a happy person.

 I’m not even 30 yet, how are these women in their 50s and up handling this? 

I want to know who invented such a thing. 

REally, how hard IS it to staple some cushion and fabric on a wood chair? Not that hard, I’ve done it before. Hmmm, maybe that’s what I should do – go ‘upcycle’ their chairs. . . . . 

Image 

Tags: ,

Link

Make your home a Warm Hug

7 Oct

Make your home a Warm Hug

 http://womenlivingwell.org/2013/09/making-your-home-a-haven-fall-challenge-is-back-with-an-ipad-mini-giveaway/

I love reading the posts on http://womenlivingwell.org/  – but i was so excited when i read that she is doing a monthly challenge on ‘making your home a haven’. i love this idea. So, although this will be hard with my OH only being home on weekends or random weekday nights, i aim to do this. Each weekly challenge seems to be easy and worth doing! i invite you all to follow the link and do this challenge with countless other women!

( and if anyone can tell me how to do an image as a link to a site, that’d be fantastic!)

Saving Money Feels Fantastic : On To the Freezer (Again)

7 Oct

Hello! I really hope you all are clicking the links and reading her full article on squawkfox. I love her sense of humor that she throws in. Take this next one – Freezer Tactics.

http://www.squawkfox.com/2012/06/20/zombies/

I enjoyed reading this, although my freezer doesn’t need organized – I did that when I defrosted it!! (pat on the back for me inserted here) But I had never heard of OAMC – Once A Month Cooking. Interesting. I can  see how one could want to do this with working full time and whatever else fills up your schedule (a little one, like she says). But, for me, I prefer to have a few backups in the freezer for those random times. Not as a  regular thing. But, I am also blessed with the fact that I am home often enough to make dinner for my OH and I . She also has links for freezing  items from your garden – yay! 

Next on the list was freezer inventory – with templates for a freezer map and inventory list. I can see the super organized type A types, liking both of those. Sadly, i’m not either. So, i won’t be using those (check back when we have kids and i’ll probably sheepishly admit to using both). 

http://www.squawkfox.com/2012/07/05/freezer-organization/

Next up is the Organized Pantry, which i really, really need to go through anyway. I’ll describe our pantry situation to you in the next post. =) 

Thank you for joining me on this journey – let me know if you’re enjoying my blog posts 

Happy Fall,

Laura

Tags:

Saving Money Feels Fantastic: Apologies and Food or Fluff

4 Oct

Hellooo again!! 

First off, i want to apologize for not posting when i said i would. I had a ‘whopper’ of a migraine on Tuesday and have been recuperating.  Thank goodness for wonderful people in my life who, at the drop of a hat, came and took care of me all day. I’m blessed despite my health issues.

So, back to the Challenge! The next one is Meal Planning. Now, this just so happens to be one of those things that i would absolutely love to do each week – but it’s also one of those things that don’t happen (like grooming my dog each week).  Reading through her article :  http://www.squawkfox.com/2012/05/25/meal-planner/ inspires me to try. But with my lack of energy and everything, i’m going to skip it and go on to the next item on the LIST : What’s your fluff factor? but i like the phrase – Food or Fluff??

Now, we all know what Fluff is, but for those of you who want to pretend you don’t know. I’ll enlighten you : cheetos – nut clusters – that chocolate peanut butter spread (what is that called??) – tater tots (these are up there on the list with french fries. i love them but know i shouldn’t eat them) – ice cream ….. notice any common factors with these items? They are all processed. I.E. – not fresh. not real. But get this percentage  – we throw away about 25% of our grocery ‘haul’ each year. TWENTY-FIVE PERCENT. Ouch. That’s a lot of waste . And i love what she says (paraphrasing here) – ‘fluff doesn’t bring happiness. It costs you money’. 

You have got to read her article on this, she has a great mathematical problem on how to calculate your ‘fluff factor’. And after that, she gets me for skipping the meal planning part. For how do you keep from buying ‘fluff’? Have a meal plan – make a grocery list  – calculate fluff factor. Well, I might have to start trying to plan meals weekly. I will say this, with my diet, it’s harder to buy such ‘fluff’ and with my bank account (which is painful to look at) it makes it easier to buy essentials and essentials only. 

They do know how to market those items though. Sadly. We are fed information that we neeeed it, we just won’t be as happy as we could be if we bought it. And sure, it’s true. For a few minutes. And then it’s gone. 

Oops, sorry. I’ll get back on track here: Honestly, there isn’t much fluff in my basket when i go shopping. How about you? How do you avoid grabbing that tantalizing item? Share!

And next up is Freezer Tactics. 

On other topics. I am currently trying a new Challah bread recipe. I will share with you how it goes. It’s looking a little iffy right now =( Plus i’m going to throw together a spicy root and lentil soup for dinner. YUM! 

Tags: , ,

Saving Money Feels Fantastic: Defrosting the Freezer

30 Sep

Hello again hello again!

Today was defrosting the freezer day. I remembered to read through her whole article this time before i started. 

http://www.squawkfox.com/2012/05/19/defrost-freezer/ – now, my freezer wasn’t filled with ice like the one in her article! It was actually completely clear of any ice which made me happy! Go freezer! Save money! so, I pulled everything out and got to scrubbing. 

scrub scrub scrub- my arms are now sore. 

It wasn’t that dirty but any dirt in a food storage area is too much in my book! I didn’t unplug it like she suggested – since that would be unplugging my fridge too. Undoes the smarts of it all. So i cleaned fast. Organized everything back in the freezer. Then, I pulled the fridge/freezer out from against the wall to clean from behind and under. whew. Now, we have a golden retriever (read: lots of hair) and tile (read: no carpet). So when you put those two together it means that we have dog hair skittering around the floor of our house, no matter how often i sweep, it is there 10 minutes later (Thanks Lady!) . So, as you can imagine, there was dog hair under the fridge. yuck. I refrained from taking any pictures of that! I’m so nice, aren’t I?

 I wiped the wall behind, back of the fridge and anywhere else that looked dusty. Then i started scrubbing the sides of the fridge and freezer. And, I got clever. I grabbed the Scrubbing Bubbles can and used it on the whole outside! It worked like a charm. The fridge is now sparkling clean. And that makes me happy.

And I’m happy to say, the only food I threw out was some old bread, got a little freezer burnt. Sad. But that’s the first food we’ve thrown out since Saturday’s fridge cleaning! I am rather proud of us. 

Until next time – Meal Planning (yipes!) – start scrubbing those freezers!

~Laura

Tags: ,

Saving Money Feels Fantastic : Fridge Raid

28 Sep

hello again, dear friends! 

Well, today i cleaned out the refrigerator – day 3 of the Food Waste Challenge that i’m doing on http://www.squawkfox.com/2012/05/07/organized-fridge/ . I started out feeling pretty good. I have been keeping up on what all is in my fridge. Or so I thought. I found more than I thought I would. Food gone bad and a fridge that wasn’t near as clean as I thought it was. =( So, out came every single item and scrubby-dub-dub. (enter a bit of a cinderella song).

I found 1 eggplant, a bit of green salad, 1/2 tomato, 1 avocado and 1/4 jar of tahini all gone bad. sigh. So, I have added that to the fairly empty diary for today. And now the refrigerator  is sparkling clean ( and finally figured out why nothing stands up right on a shelf in the door, it’s all bulgy-weird! haha, it’s not ME!) which is a very good feeling. 

You have got to check out the link above, she has step by step of cleaning out the fridge and putting it back together. Go ahead and read the whole thing, some of it you will shake your head and say ‘of course, i know this’ but who doesn’t need a nice reminder sometimes? One thing i don’t do, (and will go do if i can claw my way off this comfy bed  that i’m currently reclining on) is the vegetables in the ziploc bags. Hmm, might have to give it a shot. Now, we have a nice, friendly old fridge. Which means our crisper drawers are now ,well,  just drawers.  At least it doesn’t freeze our milk anymore. 

One thing i did not do with the fridge cleaning adventure, was pull it out and vacuum the back of it, but that is on my list for next week, when i’m in my cleaning clothes and my OH is at work. 

So, all in all, it is a very good endeavor, this emptying out the fridge. For intstance, who knew we had two partially empty jars of salsa? or 3 different hot sauces ( not mine!) ? Not only do you get out that which is nasty and organize that which isn’t, but you find items you didn’t know you had =)

Until next time – (cleaning the freezer!) – have a great weekend. 

~Laura

 

Tags: ,

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →