A Needed Break

I have to take some time off because I am buried under here

image from here

Not really of course, but it sure does feel that way.  My second Montessori assignment is due soon.  I'll be back once I hand it in.  Have a great week.

This Moment . . .

Inspired by Amanda

Studying my Montessori manuals - Preparing for my second assignment

It's tough work but I am enjoying it

Drawing for Peace (and Quiet)

Remember this post?  Remember I said I'd be back with some of the details of the happening around here the week after Christmas?  Well I guess I got lost in all the other things I wanted to post about and kinda, sorta forgot to show you the drawings the kids made when I took this picture.  Oops.

Using an inspiration piece (a free calendar of birds that came in the mail) the children drew their own versions of a Blue Jay and an Eastern Blue Bird.

made by J

made by J

made by A

J used colored pencils only and A used colored pencils and paint markers.  I was so impressed, but of course I would be I am their mother!  They are pretty good though, wouldn't you agree?  

I hope to keep them interested in drawing and using their sketchbooks (not pictured) which Santa brought for them.   I like to pull out the books and pencils when things start to get a little, shall we say out of control.  It's a perfect activity to help calm the body and mind.  I find it helps to bring some peace and tranquility when the "goings get tough". 

See you tomorrow with my knitting project I promised to show you in the same post mentioned above.   Yikes!  I have to step it up on the promises.

Baking Bread

This is the best bread I have made to date (if I do say so myself).  Not that I have made many loaves of bread in my life, usually reverting to my lazy self and using the bread machine or making a no-knead bread, but this bread was made all by me.  It is light and airy and tasty as can be.  I know this not just because I ate it, and wanted to believe it, but because the children ate an entire loaf of it at dinner with our homemade chicken noodle soup.  The soup by the way was also delicious but I can not take credit for that (The Husband made it).  


Back to the bread, there is something so cathartic about making bread.  The rhythmic kneading, watching it rise, smelling its goodness as it bakes.   It brings a quiet warmth to your soul.  It's hard to explain but it feels like home to me.  The coziness and warmth of being home on a cold winter's day while baking bread and preparing a hearty meal.  Each of us keeping busy with our own interests but knowing we will eventually gather at the table to be together as a family.  


These are the day's full gratitude.

Meatless Mondays

Spaghetti with Artichoke Hearts and Tomatoes

from the Pioneer Woman

I do not have photos for you today. You see, nothing I take can compare to the photos you will see when you click on the link and see The Pioneer Woman's photos of this very, very tasty dish.

So tasty the kids liked it!  

Now that's saying something!!

Thanks to those of you who always  stop by each week to take a look at our adventures with Meatless Mondays.  Many thanks indeed.

Sunday Sweets and A Sweet Snowman

Yesterday we made:

Italian Cookies 

from Allrecipes.com

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 3 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 3 teaspoons baking powder
• 
  

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease cookie sheets.
2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until smooth. Mix in the egg and vanilla. Combine the flour and baking powder; stir into the creamed mixture until blended. Divide dough into walnut sized portions. Roll each piece into a rope and then shape into a loop. Place cookies 2 inches apart on the prepared cookie sheets. (we just make them into a ball and flatten a bit)
3. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheat oven, until firm and golden at the edges

Frost with any frosting you like.  I prefer a powder sugar glaze but I didn't have enough so we opened a store bought container of pink frosting.  Not my favorite but the  kids sure do love it!

And here is the Snowman the kids made this weekend:

Pretty Sweet, don't you think?

This Moment . . .

This Moment inspired by Amanda

Playing with balloons and making muscles.  

There was some boob making too but The Husband did not find it funny.  

I however laughed my butt off!

Holy Snow!

The swings are buried.

The deck and everything on it is buried.

This little house can only be entered through a window!

Holy Snow!

Sunday Sweets a Bit Late

I've had the sickies so I haven't had a chance to post, hence the  late posting of Sunday Sweets.  As for Meatless Monday, it didn't happen for The Husband did not think about it, the kids must have forgot and I was dying on the couch.  I'll be back next Monday with a meatless meal to share.

This past Sunday we made:

Chewy Apple Fruit Bars

Ingredients


2/3 cup whole-wheat flour
2/3 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg 
5 tablespoons butter
2/3 cup packed brown sugar
1 large egg
1/4 cup 2% milk
1 medium apple, peeled and diced
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1/2 cup dried apricots, finely chopped


1.  Preheat oven to 350 F.  Butter and flour a 9 x 9 square pan.  In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and spices. Set aside.
2.  In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter and brown sugar on medium-high until fluffy and light.  Add egg and milk, mixing thoroughly.
3.  Add flour mixture and mix until just combined.  Stir in apple, cranberries, and apricots.
4.  Spread batter into prepared pan and bake 23-30 minutes.
5.  Cool before cutting into squares.  

Makes 25ish

Delicious with tea and healthier than your average fruit bar.

Russian Orthodox Christmas

**Warning this is a long post**




Last Wednesday night my family and I enjoyed Christmas Eve Dinner (celebrated January 6th, Christmas Day January 7th by the Orthodox people) at Grandpa's house.  This is a traditional dinner full of symbolism for the Russian Orthodox faith.  Below I have copied word for word the description from the Church cookbook.   

-----------------------------------------------------------------

From Pani(The Priests Wife)

Cookbook

Christmas

One of the most joyous holidays of the Carpatho-Russian people is Christmas.  It is preceded by forty day fast called 'Avent'.

On Christmas Eve, the last day of advent, a Holy Nite Supper, consisting of twelve Lenten dishes, is served.  These preparations symbolize the 12 Apostles chosen by Christ to preach His Gospel.  The Holy Nite Supper is a traditional family meal.  The old traditions have been retained in many homes, but more often parts of the ceremony are observed.  Our parents and grandparents came form different villages in Czechoslovakia and thus, the foods served vary because of geographical locations.  Foods to be eaten are prepared without dairy products.

The family gathers around the dining table which is covered with a white table cloth.  A blessed decorated lighted  candle is in the center of the table.  This represents the Star of Bethlehem and symbolizes Christ as the Light of the World.  Prayers are said and the meal begins with the head of the household breaking a Lenten Fats Bread and giving everyone at the table a portion of it.  Often a glass of wine is served.  This symbolizes Christ at the last supper.  Once the meal has begun, no one may leave the table.  most American families serve the Lenten Bread, wine, garlic, honey, mushroom gray (machanka), potatoes,baby limas, green peas, sauerkraut, pirohi filled with prunes, potatoes, or sauerkraut, fish, fruit compote of prunes or apricots, bobal'ki (or foochki, depending upon which village once came from).  Nuts, coffee or tea are served at the end of the meal.  Christmas Carols are sung and the the family prepares to leave for church for Christmas Matins.

With Christmas Day, the birth of the Christ Child, comes Divine Liturgy, and Christmas Caroling in the afternoon.  We greet other with - - 

"Christos Razdajetsja"

"Christ is Bron!"

------------------------------------------------------------------

Christmas Holy Nite Supper

The 12 courses served Christmas Eve vary in many households.  However, since it is a day of Strict Fast, all foods to be eaten are prepared without the use of dairy products.

Prayer

Wine, Lenten Bread, Garlic and Honey, Salt

Split Peas with Zapraska (salad oil and flour to thicken)

baby Lima Bean with Zaprachka

Mushroom Soup with Zaprachka

Sauerkraut with Zaprachka

Mashed Potatoes

Lenten Pirohi

Fish

Bobal'ki

Fruit Compote

Stewed Prunes

Stewed Apricots

Nuts

Tea and Coffee

Prayer

Christmas Carols

-----------------------------------------------------------------

As you can see there is a lot of food to be eaten during a traditional meal.  However, as time has gone by my husband's family eats only a few of the courses.  As you can imagine it is a lot of work to prepare twelve courses as well as way too much food to eat!


Our meal consist of the Lenten Bread which we tear chunks off and then dip in honey and garlic.  It does not explain in Pani's cookbook that the honey symbolises the sweetness of life and the garlic symbolises the bitterness of life.  This may sound strange to you and maybe a wee bit gross, but believe me it is so delicious.  It's my favorite part of the meal!  Truly.

Then we eat a bowl of pea soup.  Once everyone has finished their soup we eat peirogi and the fruit compote.  This year The Husband and his sister made the peirogi from scratch.   

The filling was potato and cheese.

Delicious!

In years past we have had potato and cheese, prune, and just cheese filled pierogi.  (made by a group of older women at the church who have been making homemade pierogis their entire lives!)


This is one of those days during the year we all look forward to.  Although I was not brought up Russian Orthodox, I have always enjoyed the symbolism and tradition of the meal.  It means a lot to my husband and his family and we hope to instill the joy of this day in our children.




Don't you want to eat a pierogi right now????

Journal Jars and Notebooks

Last week my Brownie Girl Scout troop made journal jars and decorated composition notebooks to receive a Try-It patch called The Write Way.  Each meeting we work on a Try -It patch.  If you are not familiar with Girl Scouts, Try- It patches are something the girls earn for learning a new skill, contributing positively to society, etc.  

My Co-Leaders and I plan most of our meetings around earning Try-Its.  We asked each girls parent (mom or dad) to sign up to do a project and/or lesson to do with the girls.   

We also decided to plan a meeting around a Try-It that interests us, the leaders.  I chose to do The Write Away Try-it (Why the writing Try-It, you ask?  Well because I LOVE notebooks and pens and writing in journals!!) and planned two meeting to do some creative activities, including writing using prompts, decorating a journal jar and a notebook. 

Below are the journal jars.  The girls decorated the jars using white glue and tissue paper. The effect is a beautiful colored jar that has texture.  The jars are recycled from my kitchen.  I put the empty jars in the dishwasher and viola, a nice clean jar to be reused for something creative.

The journal jars house writing prompts ( a piece of paper with one prompt on it folded up). The girls can pull one out each time they feel like writing but feel stuck or unsure of what they feel like writing about. 

Some of the prompts I included are:

• My Favorite color is ______________ because . . . . 
• Write about your least favorite day of the week . . . . 
• If you were an animal, what kind would you be and why?
• My favorite holiday is __________ because . . . . 

I truly enjoyed working with the girls on this project and hope that I may have influenced  them in a positive way and maybe, just maybe, created some new writers out of this group.

This Moment . . .

inspired by Amanda

Last night we went to Grandpa's for our traditional Russian Orthodox 

Christmas Eve dinner.  

I'll be back in a day or two with the details.

My Dreams Have Been Crushed

Not really, but I am a bit frustrated.  As some of you may have read several days ago, I wanted to add some new pages to my blog and have posts automatically connect to those pages once they were published, for example, all the posts I do for Sunday Sweets and Meatless Mondays.  


My hope was once they were published they would be one click away and you would be able to see all post related to SS and MM and not have to search for them.  Well after many days of trying everything I could think of as well as searching all over the world wide web for help, I have come to find you can not do this with Blogger.  Ugh!  I really wanted this to work but oh well, what can I do?  


I chose blogger because it was free and I do like it, but it doesn't do as many wonderfully cool things that other blog hosts do. So for now I will eliminate the pages for Sunday Sweets and Meatless Mondays.  Maybe in the future blogger will add this feature.  Fingers crossed.

Meatless Mondays

*pages still under construction

Macaroni and Cheese!

Grandma's recipe (or Ronzoni if you want to get technical)

Grandma (The Husbands Mom) always made this mac and cheese and we just would die to eat it, it's so good.  We always thought it was her recipe.  One day I had asked her to write it down for me and a few days later she gave me a photo copy of the side panel of a Ronzoni pasta box with the mac and cheese recipe on it.  I was surprised, believe me!

Anyway, whether she made it herself or Ronzoni, it's really, really good!

Prep Time!  I like getting everything ready before even beginning to cook.  Measuring and cutting etc. the ingredients before hand is a huge time saver.

All done. 

 Tasty, tasty buttered bread crumbs on top.

YUM.

I know it probably looks gross to you, but please know that it is because of my photography skills or lack there of, and not the food.  

The mac and cheese is a creamy, cheesy and delicious goodness.

I promise.

Macaroni & Cheese 

Ingredients:

1 package (16 oz) Elbow Macaroni

1 onion, minced

1/2 cup butter

6 tablespoons all-purpose flour

4 cups milk

4 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese

1 teaspoon dry mustard

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1-1/2 cups fresh bread crumbs

Prepare pasta as directed, cooking only 6 minutes; drain.  Cook and stir onion in 6 tablespoons of butter until tender.  Stir in flour.  Gradually stir in milk.  Cook and stir until mixture thickens and comes to a boil.  Stir in cheese, mustard, salt and pepper.  Mix pasta and sauce in a very large bowl.  Pour into a 9x13 inch baking pan. 

Melt the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter.  Stir in bread crumbs and toast; sprinkle over the pasta.

Bake at 350 for 35 minutes or until lightly browned.

My mother-in-law wrote that it serves 7 but it serves more like 8 to 10.

Our Holiday 2010

Christmas Eve. So magical, don't you think?

Christmas morning.

Some knitting.  Finally I'm back in the groove.

I'll be back to show you what I've made.  

A snow storm.  Yeah!

Some sewing.  

A draw sting bag to house C's bento box and drink for preschool.

(I am so in love with the vintage inspired fabrics)

Drawing with our new paint pens and colored pencils.  

I'll soon be back to show you what they drew.

I had the kids make napkin rings for our Christmas Day dinner.  

We used paper tubes cut to about one inch.

 We then stuck Christmas and winter themed foam stickers all around them.

I thought they were lovely and inexpensive!  We had everything we needed right here at home.

And sadly we had some sickies.

J is better, thank goodness!  However C is now sick and so is The Husband.

So far it looks like the girls are doing OK.