A thing of beauty

I've been looking for a giant mixing bowl ever since the first time I made my mother's Thanksgiving rolls. The dough rose right out of my bowl. Made a huge mess. After years of searching, I found it today at Target. Isn't it beautiful?

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It's a little unsettling

We have a new super Walmart opening soon. It's very big news in this semi-small town. Rumors are rampant that Hobby Lobby is coming to fill the soon to be empty Walmart. It would be awesome to have a real craft store in town. I really miss Joanns and Michaels. Anyway, the new super Walmart opens on Wednesday. The old Walmart closes on Tuesday. They stopped stocking the old Walmart about two weeks ago. The shelves are bare. I think I understand a little of how Old Mother Hubbard must have felt.

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My sourdough bread

I was impatient. I only let it rise 10 hours instead of the recommended 20. I still think it's beautiful. And no yeast, and no overwhelming sour taste. Actually, no sour taste at all. Yummy. Ok, yes I cheated, a little, at first, then I had a sandwich. Just couldn't resist.

On a sidenote, I figured out how to rotate pictures uploaded by my phone. :-)

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It's ready

This is what my sourdough stater is supposed to look like, I think. I'm making bread today. :-)

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Cultured foods excite me.

While blog surfing the other night I came across this little gem of a blog. It's a blog all about crockpot cooking. How cool is that. But wait, it gets better. She had a post all about how to make yogurt in your crockpot. So easy!! I tried it out last night and it worked fabulously. Let's do a little math, shall we? I typically buy yogurt in the half gallon tub because that's the only brand that sells a plain whole milk yogurt. Costs me $4.99 per tub. Milk costs on average $2 per gallon. Making my own yogurt will cost $2 per gallon plus buying starter for the first batch (after the first batch you keep using your homemade yogurt as starter). I'm saving $8 per gallon of yogurt. Now when my kids ask if they can have yogurt, there is no hesitation on my part.

This blog looks awesome too. I found it tonight while looking for a way to make my own cultured buttermilk. I like to use buttermilk in a lot of my cooking.

I also found lots of websites telling how to make cultured sour cream or creme fraiche. According to FoodNetwork TV show hosts, creme fraiche is far superior to sour cream. According to all the websites I found, they're exactly the same thing. I don't really care what it's called so long as it's tangy and creamy and thick. Here's what I did, I put 1 cup of heavy cream into a pint jar. Added two tablespoons yogurt (most websites called for buttermilk - I'll try that next time and compare). Put on the lid and shook well to mix. Let it sit out for about 8 hours. It was all thick and looked like sour cream to me. So excited. I don't like sour cream with additives.

Now all I need is a cow...

Of course I couldn't taste any of my creations. I'm in the middle of an hCG round, hopefully my last round. I've lost just over 40 pounds so far. Yes, thank you, I'm rather excited about my much smaller backside. I have about three more weeks to go before I can taste any of these things - oh well. My kids are really enjoying them so they must not be that bad.

One more project of mine lately - sourdough bread. A friend of mine makes the most divine whole wheat sourdough bread. It's so yummy. She shared some of her starter with me today. I'm so excited to make bread without yeast. :-) I will keep you all posted on how the bread turns out.

This might work

So I think I found an app that lets me post to the blog from my phone.

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Wow, how time does fly

You know I never mean to let this much time go by without a blog post. Several times I have gotten on here in the last month fully intending to post something profound. Ok, I'm never profound, but at least a chatty post about our lives. I finally sit down to post something and I've got nothing in my head. What's really weird about it is usually, three or four times a day, something significant happens or the kids say something adorable and I think, "I should blog that." And then by the time the kids are all in bed and I've relaxed and let my brain stop thinking about everything I need to do, my brilliant, half-written blog posts that existed in my head have vanished. I need to figure out a way to blog from my cell phone.

Anyways, today was the primary program in our ward. The kids were so cute and not just my kids either. There was this one little girl in Emma's class who was singing really loud. Seriously, her little five year old voice was drowning out the rest of the primary. Poor Emma was standing right next to her. Emma had her hands covering her ears. What was really cute about it was that the girl didn't exactly know all the words. She knew most of them, but sometimes she got it wrong. She still sang her little heart out. Derrick chickened out and wouldn't go to the microphone to say his line, which he had memorized. I was really looking forward to hearing him say "There is safety(mispronounced) in following(mispronounced) the prophet(mispronounced)." Emma's line had Joseph Smith in it, she pronounced Smith as "Smif." Maybe it was the blue color of her dress combined with "Smif" but I couldn't get the image of smurfs out of my head for quite a while.

All the kids have been working hard this week to get caught up on lessons. In the beginning of October we took the kids to science camp. It was so much fun. But it was also three days of scheduled lessons that didn't get done. I figured we'd do the lessons the following week during fall break. I was weak and didn't make them do their lessons. We did get some done but I didn't push them to get completely caught up. So then this week we really were committed to getting caught up, until Tuesday when we had to go to park. And then on Friday we had a field trip. So next week we will be fully committed instead of just really committed to getting caught up.

What makes it really hard to catch up is that all of the kids had portfolio assignments due. A portfolio assignment is basically an essay/report that needs to be turned into the teacher. They typically count for a high percentage of the grade so they need to be done right. I check all of them before the kids turn them in to make sure the kids understood the assignment. I also typically help them redo/format so that it meets the assignment criteria. We had so many overdue lessons that each of the kids had at least one portfolio they needed my help on. One of the kids had four portfolios. I also help them study for their tests and quizzes. Which were backed up as well. I finally had to tell the kids to go ahead and turn some things in without checking them. We'll see how that plays out for their grades.

Science camp was a lot of fun to do together as a family. In most traditional schools, only one grade will go to science camp. This was a family event. Derrick was the only one who wasn't able to go because he was too young. He got to stay with his aunt though and he had a blast. The camp was three day and there were really cool activities for us. Everyone had so much fun. I'm looking forward to next year already. Maybe next year we'll actually take the camera out of it's case and snap a few photos. Maybe.

The field trip we went on last Friday was to Apple Annies. It's an orchard/farm around here. They had a corn maze that was really rather cool. Again it was a whole family event. I've never really been able to go on any field trips with the kids because chaperones are not allowed to take extra kids with them. I've always had so many doctor appointments that I was asking people to watch the kids for that I didn't feel right about asking them to watch the kids so I could go on a field trip, so I never went. It's really fun to be able to go on field trips as a family. As a HUGE bonus, Chris was able to come home from his business trip a day early and join us at the farm. Love it when that happens.

They had a market set up with pumpkins and squash and other vegetables were on sale. While we were walking through it, one of the big boxes had knobby squash in it. Derrick looked in and said, "Dad, those are freaky pumpkins." I love it when the kids start using words that I just don't expect from them, like freaky.

Mom, school is important too...

We moved + homeschooling + Chris out of town = disastrously messy house.

Disastrously messy house + visiting teachers coming over = frenzied cleaning morning.

Frenzied cleaning morning = kids doing chores instead of school work = following conversation...

Me: Dana, have you finished putting away the clothes yet?

Dana: No, not yet.

Me: Please hurry and get that done.

Dana: Mom, am I going to do school today?

Me: Yes, but later, right now we need to get chores done.

Dana: Mom, school is really important.

Me: Yes it is. So is keeping your room clean. Get to work.

Apparently Dana doesn't think I'm prioritizing properly.

First Football Games

Bradley and Dana both had their first football games yesterday. The games were scheduled four hours apart so it wasn't a problem to make it to both even though Chris was unavailable. Dana, Emma, and Derrick came to watch Bradley's game. Calvin wanted to stay home. We dropped Bradley off for his game and then went to Walmart and bought huge umbrellas. We would have baked under the sun without them and they made the whole ordeal tolerable. Sorry, I'm just not much of a football fan. Bradley won his game and then we hurried home, Dana and I changed (I can't go to a Dana's game wearing Bradley's team shirt), and we hurried off to her game. Luckily a friend of mine watched Emma and Derrick for me. Again, Calvin wanted to stay home and I left Bradley home to get some school work done. So I was at Dana's game all by my lonesome. Rather nice. We were the away team for that game and it was late afternoon which put the sun right in my eyes. But I had the giant umbrella so I just positioned it down to block the sun. It also blocked the game that way. Like I said, not much of a football fan. I read a new cookbook I bought recently. I also fell asleep briefly. Aside from the sweltering heat (ok it was only about 88 degrees) it was a rather pleasant afternoon.

I think I'm rambling...

Today was a great day. The kids were all well fed with rather nutritious food. No one was seriously injured. All required bathing took place. We made it to most of our scheduled events. The events that were missed were not really necessary anyway. Two of the kids are completely up to date with school. One of the children is only a day behind in school. And the other child is a week and a half ahead in one subject, a day behind in the rest. How exactly do you classify that? I even took the kids to the park and had a picnic dinner. Have I done any cleaning? No. Are there piles of paperwork that are waiting to be attended/filed/paid? Yes. Are my expectations for a successful day are too low? Quite possibly. Oh well. I still feel quite accomplished for the day.

Random thought - it is amazing how little motivation I have to load the dishwasher when it doesn't do a very good job. I have less motivation to have the kids load the dishes because if they're not loaded just right, they come out terrible.

I have managed to sort out most of the toys. I have a rather large donation box and have thrown away a full garbage bag. Did that two days ago. I still have yet to figure out where to put the toys that made the cut. Perhaps I need to sort again and cut deeper. Goal for tomorrow, find a place for the toys. Spread out in boxes and bins on the living room floor is unacceptable.

Another goal for tomorrow, hang the pictures. And then if there's time sort out the books and knickknacks.

He's a traveling man

We are so blessed. In a time when so many people are losing their jobs, Chris has a job. He has a great job. He loves his job. He gets to do something he's really good at and enjoys doing. He also gets to take clients out to lunch. There's one tiny aspect of his job that I don't care for much. He has to travel from time to time. It's usually not very often. Lately it's been a lot. Very inconvenient for me with the move and all. He left this morning for Germany. (sigh) I wish I could've gone with him. That would have been so much fun. But, lots of reasons why I can't go, this time.

Calvin is doing a great job keeping up with his school work. He's a little overeager at times and submits his work before having it checked by me. His teachers are really nice about it and let him redo them.

Bradley has been playing football. He seems to be really enjoying it. He also seems to have inherited his athletic abilities from me. Poor kid. But what's important is that he is having fun.

Dana is really enjoying cheer leading. She's full of spirit.

Emma is really loving school. She loves everything about school. She's learning about rhyming words and her letters and numbers.

Derrick is bouncing around, knocking everything out of sync. His attention span only allows him to participate with about half of Emma's school work. But in that amount of time he catches almost as much as she does. He's a smart, bouncy disruption to our day. Lucky for him he's so darn cute. He has also been taking long naps every afternoon. Downright peaceful around here in the afternoon.

With Bradley and Dana both doing sports in the evenings and Calvin and Bradley in scouts, I find myself really juggling how to get the kids where they need to be. Every evening has something happening. There are so many things pulling me in different directions. I don't know how single parents do it. It's hard enough when Chris is in town and nearly impossible to make it everywhere when he's gone.

Well, Emma and Derrick need me to help them with an art project. Today is not a school day, but we have some art projects to get caught up on. Sounds like a good holiday activity to me.

Busy busy busy

So we did really well with keeping up with school for about four days. Then, not so much. Chris found out the middle of last week that he was going to be out of town for this whole week and then the following week too (coming home weekends only). So much for planning a slow move over the whole month. We fast tracked our move to get as much done last weekend before Chris was out of town. (You may remember that he went out of town right after our last move too). Chris had to work long days the whole week before he went out of town as well, so there was no a lot we could do during the week. We ended up getting most of it done, but to do that I had to spend all day last Friday moving, completely neglecting my learning coach duties. Friday Emma did no school. The three older kids got most of their stuff done.

Not a big deal to get a little behind. However, Monday Calvin had a doctor appointment in Phoenix. So I tried to plan ahead and printed off all of their lessons and brought all their books so they could get school done in the car. Didn't really work out. I couldn't help them since I was driving. So that hour or so that I spent trying to find all their books and print off all their lessons - wasted. If you're keeping track, Emma is now two full days behind and everybody is one full day behind. Emma still isn't completely caught up and neither is Dana. Calvin and Bradley managed to get all caught up today.

So I've been working really hard to get the kids all caught up on school. I've done next to nothing on unpacking/organizing. The chaos in the house is slowly spreading. I have no idea where to put things. I think I'm a perfectionist and it's getting in the way of my ability to put things away. I have to analyze each item and think of the best place for each item. Where will this item be used? Store it near where it's used. Where will the kids be able to put it away? Where will the kids not be able to reach this item? Where will this item fit? etc. All really good things to consider. But if I'm considering all that about the can opener or the silverware or the everything... you get the picture. Nothing is getting put away and everything is in the way. Really I need to just put things where they are not in the way for now. I spend a good portion of my day finding items the kids need to accomplish their lessons for school. You're probably thinking, why are you blogging about this when you should be organizing something? You have a very valid point. I'm too tired. Why am I not sleeping? I'm not tired enough to fall asleep without Chris. Remember, he's on a business trip.

Moving again

Yes, that's right, we're moving again. We weren't planning on moving again so soon but it just worked out that way. We found a house that is considerably cheaper and yet still big enough to easily accommodate us. We felt bad telling our landlord. They are our next door neighbors and we love living next door to them, but as it turns out, they kinda needed us to move so they could move into this house. They found someone to buy the house they were living in and didn't want to ask us to move out. They were exploring other options because they felt bad asking us to move out only six months after we moved in. So it all works out really well for everyone, except for the small detail of actually having to move. That part sucks.

Contest announcement

If you live in the SV area, you can enter to win a free photoshoot from this website.

So tired

We sent him to bed, he didn't make it.

Shopping in my own closet...

Such an exciting morning. I was able to put on jeans that I haven't been able to wear in over a year. Chris confirmed - they look good. YEAH!!!

Total loss so far - 23 pounds.

Contacts and cheerleading

Our day started out with a trip to the optometrist. Bradley and Dana both failed the vision screening portion of their sports physicals. I was expecting Bradley to need a new prescription soon but I wasn't expecting Dana to need glasses. While we were at the optometrist, he recommended Bradley try out contacts. I thought Bradley might be too young but he said he has patients with contacts at that age. So we gave it a try. For about two hours we gave it a try. Bradley was so close to being able to put them in and take them out by himself, but he just couldn't quite bring himself to touch his eye. He finally wanted to stop and try again next year. I think we'll try again in a month or so. The exam is good for six months they said, after that he will need a new exam to get contacts.

Dana got to go meet her cheerleading coach and get sized for uniforms. I think they're going to be really cute. The skirts are a lot longer than I was expecting too - thank goodness. Her coach seems to be really nice and seems to be good working with children. She said she would see what she could do about making sure Bradley is on the team that Dana cheers for. It would really simplify my life to have them on the same team for games.

I have now lost 20 pounds. :-)

He did a bad, bad thing.

My sweet husband has been out of town for a few days. Every time he goes on a business trip he always keeps his eyes open for a See's chocolate store. He knows they are my favorite and there isn't one in town here. Well, he found one at the airport last night. He even remembered that dark chocolate is my favorite.

... HELLO!?!?! ...  Diet????

He starts to get it out of the truck and immediately apologizes. He saw the candy store and knew I'd love it, bought it, and then remembered about the diet. Oops. I was going to put them on top of the fridge and not touch them for two months. Ya right. That didn't happen. Five minutes after I had that thought I ripped open the box and ate more than a few. In my utterly weak defense, I did let the kids have way more than I would have shared before the diet. I know - totally weak defense. But come on, not just dark chocolate, but See's dark chocolate. I'm not that strong.

Is this a prank?

Calvin had a doctor appointment in Tucson recently. By the time we were done with the appointment it was lunchtime. There are only a couple of fast food places in Tucson that I trust. I've had too many bad experiences to try many new places so we pretty much always go to the Carl's Jr next to Costco. Calvin only likes his cheeseburgers one way, lettuce and mayo. He never varies. Most fast food places do not get it right. With multiple children in the drive-thru I don't always allow them to make special requests but make them eat it the way it comes. It's too confusing to figure out five special orders. This particular day I order Calvin's special for him. I ask for a cheeseburger with just lettuce and mayo. He opens it up and asks, "Is this a prank?" There was no bun. I start laughing and say, "Nope, that's exactly what I ordered." Sorry, I thought the bun was understood, not at Carl's Jr. They are really accommodating to the low-carb crowd. In this case, a little too accommodating.

Is he big? or is he little?

Me: Derrick, go downstairs and brush your teeth.

Derrick: I don't want to go downstairs, that's not my bathroom.

Me: Yes it is, it's the kids bathroom. Go brush your teeth.

Derrick: I'm not a kid.

Me: (Pause) What are you?

Derrick: I'm a little boy.

Me: Go ask Dad if you're a kid.

Derrick then asks Chris if he's a kid and Chris (having not heard my conversation with Derrick) says, "No, you're a monkey." Now tell me that's not confusing for a little guy.

Emma is now old enough to not need a car seat. She and Derrick are almost the same size. Derrick has started telling me that he's big and he doesn't need a car seat either. He's not buying my reasoning that he's still younger than her. He's about half an inch shorter and weighs the same. To him, they're the same size and if she's big enough to not need a car seat, so is he.

We took the kids to Kartchner Caverns today. It's a really neat tour and the kids always enjoy it. During the tour Derrick tells me he's too little for something and I ask him, "You're little? I thought you were a big boy." He replies, "I'm a little bit little."