That'll do boys... that'll do!
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Good Sam Dogs!
Sunday morning I bathed little dogs. I clipped and pedi-pawed their toenails. I slicked down the Nigelito and brushed Sir Roddy and they were HANDSOME! Why did I take all the time to groom and primp two little pipsqueak dogs on a damp Sunday morning? They had a job to do! The boys and I volunteered to help out a Girl Scout who is near and dear to us who is working toward her Silver Award. She and two other girls organized a Pet Expo where Girl Scouts from three different levels were able to obtain their Pet Care badges. As it turns out there were close to 70 girls that participated!!! I don't think these dogs have ever been petted so much in their entire lives! Other than Roddy barking his face off at the first group of girls (I think he was a little intimidated by 20 something pre-teens) the dogs did GREAT! Nigel was calm and patient and Roddy was just excited and wanted to lick everyone in the face! I think one or both dogs would be great candidates for the Canine Good Citizen Training so we could visit Senior centers and such! It was a great day and the dogs and I were happy to support one of our favorite Girl Scouts! Here is a quick shot of the boys, waiting patiently for their next group of admirers! ;) 
That'll do boys... that'll do!
That'll do boys... that'll do!
Monday, September 13, 2010
Operation Sun-Dried Tomato
Too many tomatoes, too many tomatoes!!! And not to sound selfish, because I have been giving away tomatoes to neighbors and friends all summer, but I can tell the cherry tomato vine is on it's last leg and I just somehow wanted to preserve these little beauties so I could enjoy them. I have worked hard this summer and deserve to now hoard the bounty! I froze a bunch last year, but they immediately turned to mush once added to a recipe and no one likes mushy tomatoes. So I thought, hmmmmm. What about sun-dried tomatoes? Is it even possible to do this at home without a dehydrator or a desert? Because even though Austin is hot, it's MUGGY and I'm sure anything left outside would turn into a moldy mess within hours! But sure enough, the clever people that post things on the internet came to my rescue! Sun-dried tomatoes in the oven!!!
First I washed and dried luscious, little jewels of tomatoes!
Then I sliced them all in half and sprinkled them lightly with sea salt.
Next I popped them into the oven on 200*F and forgot about them!
About 4 hours into it, a most intoxicating aroma came wafting from my oven, I decided to check them and stir them around a bit to ensure even drying.
I returned them to the oven and began checking on them periodically and about 2-1/2 hours later I was rewarded with my first sun-dried tomatoes!! Just like tart little tomato raisins with such a burst of flavor! Awesome! I started picking out the ones that were done and returning the others to the oven. All in all, to get the entire batch done, it was about 8-ish hours. But they turned out perfectly dried and insanely yummy! And being that every website I perused stated that setting them in oil at home is a BAD idea due to high possibility of food poisoning, I decided to be satisfied with my little tomato raisins and call it a day! Here is a look at the finished product, ready for use in pasta or pizza and can be stored in the pantry for at least a year (not that they'll even last that long)!
First I washed and dried luscious, little jewels of tomatoes!
Then I sliced them all in half and sprinkled them lightly with sea salt.
Next I popped them into the oven on 200*F and forgot about them!
About 4 hours into it, a most intoxicating aroma came wafting from my oven, I decided to check them and stir them around a bit to ensure even drying.
I returned them to the oven and began checking on them periodically and about 2-1/2 hours later I was rewarded with my first sun-dried tomatoes!! Just like tart little tomato raisins with such a burst of flavor! Awesome! I started picking out the ones that were done and returning the others to the oven. All in all, to get the entire batch done, it was about 8-ish hours. But they turned out perfectly dried and insanely yummy! And being that every website I perused stated that setting them in oil at home is a BAD idea due to high possibility of food poisoning, I decided to be satisfied with my little tomato raisins and call it a day! Here is a look at the finished product, ready for use in pasta or pizza and can be stored in the pantry for at least a year (not that they'll even last that long)!
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Hurricane Piglet
Yesterday Hurricane Piglet rolled through town leaving a trail of devastation and destruction in her wake.
Eventually the storm made landfall and thankfully lost all intensity!
The entirety of Saturday was spent clearing the wreckage.
Eventually the storm made landfall and thankfully lost all intensity!
The entirety of Saturday was spent clearing the wreckage.
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Home Economics-Dog Biscuits
After giving the kids a month off, it was time to get our little homeschool academy up and running again! The kids put in a concerted effort Tuesday morning, so we decided to take a well-deserved break from bookwork and delve into what I like to call "practical chemistry and home economics"! The fact is, the dogs were out of treats and we don't put the dogs in kennels without treats. We also need the treats for training purposes. And sadly, dog biscuits were NOT in my grocery budget this go around. So what do you do when you need the dog biscuits but your budget doesn't allow it? You pull up a recipe online and make them with your kids! After all, dog biscuits are made with things normally found in your pantry like flour, oats, and in our case peanut butter!
First you preheat your oven and mix all the ingredients. I allowed the kids to measure everything out (taking the opportunity to discuss fractions of course!). Once mixed, we rolled out the dough and the kids started cutting out the individual biscuits.
And yes, in case you were wondering, we do occasionally cook in our underwear here!
As you can see, we made quite a lot of biscuits! Thank goodness we only made a 1/2 batch!
We popped them in the oven and waited.
While in the oven we discussed mixtures and chemical changes due to heat. Once done, we shook them off the pan and let them cool on a wire rack and observed how they had changed. And yes, those are squirrel-shaped biscuits because the kids thought it would be really funny since the dogs are always trying to get at that pesky squirrel who taunts them from the fence!
We also took some time after it was all said and done to determine the cost effectiveness of making our own biscuits vs. buying pre-made ones. We made approximately 200 dog biscuits for $0.86 vs. $3.99 for a comparable sized bag of regular flavor Petsmart Grreat Choice biscuits or $11.99 for peanut butter flavored Mother Hubbard Biscuits. So not too bad! And the recipients of said treats didn't complain a bit!
First you preheat your oven and mix all the ingredients. I allowed the kids to measure everything out (taking the opportunity to discuss fractions of course!). Once mixed, we rolled out the dough and the kids started cutting out the individual biscuits.
And yes, in case you were wondering, we do occasionally cook in our underwear here! As you can see, we made quite a lot of biscuits! Thank goodness we only made a 1/2 batch!
We popped them in the oven and waited.
While in the oven we discussed mixtures and chemical changes due to heat. Once done, we shook them off the pan and let them cool on a wire rack and observed how they had changed. And yes, those are squirrel-shaped biscuits because the kids thought it would be really funny since the dogs are always trying to get at that pesky squirrel who taunts them from the fence!
We also took some time after it was all said and done to determine the cost effectiveness of making our own biscuits vs. buying pre-made ones. We made approximately 200 dog biscuits for $0.86 vs. $3.99 for a comparable sized bag of regular flavor Petsmart Grreat Choice biscuits or $11.99 for peanut butter flavored Mother Hubbard Biscuits. So not too bad! And the recipients of said treats didn't complain a bit!
Friday, September 3, 2010
What's on the menu? Chocolate mini muffins
I have been such a good girl, sticking to my planned menu and I have to admit, it's kind of nice knowing exactly what you'll be cooking and what you'll need to do beforehand to prep for the meal instead of flying by the seat of your pants! However, this morning came and I was UNIMPRESSED, to say the least, with the prospect of toast or oatmeal. I have been sick for two days, eating bland crap and the last thing I wanted was more bland crap! So. Doo-do-do-TOOOOOOO!
Chocolate chip mini muffins (Oh yeah!)
1-1/2 c flour
1-1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 c sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 c milk (I use powdered milk to save real milk, 1/3 c powder into 1 c water = 1 c milk)
1 egg
1/3 c melted butter
chocolate chips
Grease your muffin tins and preheat the oven to 350*. Combine all of the dry ingredients then add the milk, egg, butter, mix well. Add chocolate chips to your liking. I like mine fairly sparse, so the chips aren't just one big blob in the muffin. Pour batter into greased mini muffin pans, bake 15-20ish minutes until they are golden brown and a toothpick comes out clean.
These are so easy to make, the kids LOVE them and it makes enough to have for snacks later!! Enjoy!
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
OH the irony!
September 1st people, day one of "Re-vamp My Life 2010" and I woke up with a sore throat. Hmph. Did I school two children today? Nope. Did I go to my physical therapy appointment or even do the exercises? Nope. Did I follow the planned menu? OK, sort of, instead of chicken salad I made chicken soup, so I get a few points there! So what did I do today? I let the kids play Wii and watch movies until they turned into little hyped-up, cross-eyed, brain-dead zombies!
Sigh.
And people wonder why I never make New Year's resolutions!
Sigh.
And people wonder why I never make New Year's resolutions!
Monday, August 30, 2010
Gearing up... BIG changes ahead
Do you ever have those times in your life when you just NEED a change?!? A change of address, a change of style, a new haircut, a new job? Yeah, well, I'm having one of those times! I need a change of lifestyle! I'm tired of being TIRED. I'm tired of being POOR. I'm tired of BAD HABITS. And mostly I'm tired of feeling completely over-whelmed on any given day with my life! But you know what? I'm not gonna bitch about it, I'm gonna do something. In fact, I'm gonna do a lot and what better time to start than September 1, 2010.
1. After about a month of down time, I will start the kids up with school. This will be the Piggy's first year with "real" school, and the Monkey Man will be cruising into his 5th year of homeschooling (since I started him at 4). He's an old pro now! And lucky for me, he has the ability to be self-directed, doing some independent study while I work with the Little Miss. I'm sure it's going to be a bit of a learning curve for all of us, but especially me. Time management is key and I'm not the best at it!
2. The kids will start all of their activities! Last year I was pretty lax with things, but they are craving more activity and interaction with their core group of friends. So... they will both be participating in a homeschool sport and skate class, Campfire, bowling, and Nature Nights at the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center! The Monkey Man will have a monthly science class through the Austin Nature and Science Center as well as weekly science experiments at our local library! The Piggy will take a few of the Nature Center classes as well as a weekly arts and crafts class at the local library! And can I just give a big shout out to my library for offering cool things for my kids FOR FREE! Hooray! We love free! We will definitely be a busy bunch of beavers over the next few months, but that is exactly what they need!
3. I am starting a new menu program to hopefully cut down on our grocery bills!! I admit it, I shop for what sounds good to me at the time, I make sure I have all the staples and I wing it almost every day for every meal! I have a couple of things in mind when I shop, but end up having to go back to the store for little things like cilantro or broccoli or mozzarella cheese! It never fails and it adds up! We have also spent entirely too much $$$ eating out. We are pretty good about eating evening meals at home, but I have planned poorly for outings and errands and have had to grab food on the fly, and there are times I don't plan well for leftovers for Big Daddy to take to work for lunch. It's a huge problem. So not only am I planning for dinners, but lunches and breakfasts as well to hopefully cut back on that unnecessary spending! This is going to take A LOT of planning, and I'm going to have to FOLLOW THROUGH!! It's crunch time and I need to get our monthly budget under control! Mostly since we now have two kids participating in activities that require money and a home business we're trying to launch. Every single dime counts now.
4. This will be the first month implementing our cash only program. From now on, I will budget a certain amount of cash for groceries, kid activities and family entertainment. It is SO much easier to go out and just throw it on the card and deal with it later, which is what bites me in the ass EVERY time! I will now pull cash out every two weeks to deal with the various activities and the groceries. Bills of course, still have to be paid online, but I have those budgeted at this point and know exactly when things will be coming out. One tank of gas per paycheck, unless there is a specific scheduled outing that takes us out of town (like a camping trip or a tour of the Bluebell Ice Cream Factory). So this household is on lock-down for spending for at least the next 6 months to a year! We will have to get a headstart on XMAS shopping this year and get pretty creative with how we pull it off! Fun, fun!
5. Health is a top priority! I will be continuing with my physical therapy as my knees have been feeling SO much better. They're not perfect, but I feel as though I'm not compensating as much and I can climb stairs now with minimal issue!! I NEED to keep this going! My kids deserve to have healthy active parents! I am instituting the evening walk at least 5 nights a week! Big Daddy and I are both on portion control at meals and I'm trying very hard to cut back on the country-cookin' and focus more on healthy choices. I have never fed my family a lot processed, packaged crap, BUT I do have a tendency to fall back on the old stand-by meals that I ate as a kid as they are cheap to prepare and make enough to have leftovers the next day! Maybe it's just time to get creative and re-vamp those meals! I am hoping at some point to purchase bicycles for the entire family. It would be nice to get out and ride the trails! I mean seriously, with Lance Armstrong here, you KNOW Austin has some cool biking trails! Obviously healthcare is expensive so now is the time to get pro-active. The old saying "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" makes SO much sense to me, because honestly, I don't have the time or $$$ to be sick!
6. Burn the TV! Haha! I say this as on the same day I sign up for a free trial membership with Netflix! But we are seriously cutting back on screen time in this house. Obviously a large part of my homeschooling involves the computer and educational programming, but it's the junk TV and games I'm worried about. The kids will each be allowed one hour of screen time a day (they can choose for it to be a movie, the Wii or some non-school related computer time). Once a week we will have a family movie night and Big Daddy and I are going to implement the hell out of the DVR and record the 2-3 shows we love like "Modern Family" and "House" so we can watch late-night TV after the kids are in bed! I'm not saying there can't be exceptions, but night time needs to be family time, not sit-on-our-asses-and-watch-the-boob-toob time! I have a feeling this is going to be the hardest goal of all. My kids are TV watching, Wii playing, computer junkies! And I'll be the first to admit that sometimes all I want to do in the evening is veg on the couch and watch HGTV until I'm damn near comatose, but really? I can't find anything better to do, like read a book or play a game with my kids? We're definitely gonna figure this one out!
Now that I'm reading through this post, these goals seem SO lofty! Is it even remotely possible for me to pull this crap off? I don't know, but the only way we'll find out is if I jump in and try! And since September is the kick-off of our school season, it seems like the perfect time to kick off some smarter, healthier practices in our home. Wish me luck and I'll keep you posted, that is if I don't keel over in the process!!
1. After about a month of down time, I will start the kids up with school. This will be the Piggy's first year with "real" school, and the Monkey Man will be cruising into his 5th year of homeschooling (since I started him at 4). He's an old pro now! And lucky for me, he has the ability to be self-directed, doing some independent study while I work with the Little Miss. I'm sure it's going to be a bit of a learning curve for all of us, but especially me. Time management is key and I'm not the best at it!
2. The kids will start all of their activities! Last year I was pretty lax with things, but they are craving more activity and interaction with their core group of friends. So... they will both be participating in a homeschool sport and skate class, Campfire, bowling, and Nature Nights at the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center! The Monkey Man will have a monthly science class through the Austin Nature and Science Center as well as weekly science experiments at our local library! The Piggy will take a few of the Nature Center classes as well as a weekly arts and crafts class at the local library! And can I just give a big shout out to my library for offering cool things for my kids FOR FREE! Hooray! We love free! We will definitely be a busy bunch of beavers over the next few months, but that is exactly what they need!
3. I am starting a new menu program to hopefully cut down on our grocery bills!! I admit it, I shop for what sounds good to me at the time, I make sure I have all the staples and I wing it almost every day for every meal! I have a couple of things in mind when I shop, but end up having to go back to the store for little things like cilantro or broccoli or mozzarella cheese! It never fails and it adds up! We have also spent entirely too much $$$ eating out. We are pretty good about eating evening meals at home, but I have planned poorly for outings and errands and have had to grab food on the fly, and there are times I don't plan well for leftovers for Big Daddy to take to work for lunch. It's a huge problem. So not only am I planning for dinners, but lunches and breakfasts as well to hopefully cut back on that unnecessary spending! This is going to take A LOT of planning, and I'm going to have to FOLLOW THROUGH!! It's crunch time and I need to get our monthly budget under control! Mostly since we now have two kids participating in activities that require money and a home business we're trying to launch. Every single dime counts now.
4. This will be the first month implementing our cash only program. From now on, I will budget a certain amount of cash for groceries, kid activities and family entertainment. It is SO much easier to go out and just throw it on the card and deal with it later, which is what bites me in the ass EVERY time! I will now pull cash out every two weeks to deal with the various activities and the groceries. Bills of course, still have to be paid online, but I have those budgeted at this point and know exactly when things will be coming out. One tank of gas per paycheck, unless there is a specific scheduled outing that takes us out of town (like a camping trip or a tour of the Bluebell Ice Cream Factory). So this household is on lock-down for spending for at least the next 6 months to a year! We will have to get a headstart on XMAS shopping this year and get pretty creative with how we pull it off! Fun, fun!
5. Health is a top priority! I will be continuing with my physical therapy as my knees have been feeling SO much better. They're not perfect, but I feel as though I'm not compensating as much and I can climb stairs now with minimal issue!! I NEED to keep this going! My kids deserve to have healthy active parents! I am instituting the evening walk at least 5 nights a week! Big Daddy and I are both on portion control at meals and I'm trying very hard to cut back on the country-cookin' and focus more on healthy choices. I have never fed my family a lot processed, packaged crap, BUT I do have a tendency to fall back on the old stand-by meals that I ate as a kid as they are cheap to prepare and make enough to have leftovers the next day! Maybe it's just time to get creative and re-vamp those meals! I am hoping at some point to purchase bicycles for the entire family. It would be nice to get out and ride the trails! I mean seriously, with Lance Armstrong here, you KNOW Austin has some cool biking trails! Obviously healthcare is expensive so now is the time to get pro-active. The old saying "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" makes SO much sense to me, because honestly, I don't have the time or $$$ to be sick!
6. Burn the TV! Haha! I say this as on the same day I sign up for a free trial membership with Netflix! But we are seriously cutting back on screen time in this house. Obviously a large part of my homeschooling involves the computer and educational programming, but it's the junk TV and games I'm worried about. The kids will each be allowed one hour of screen time a day (they can choose for it to be a movie, the Wii or some non-school related computer time). Once a week we will have a family movie night and Big Daddy and I are going to implement the hell out of the DVR and record the 2-3 shows we love like "Modern Family" and "House" so we can watch late-night TV after the kids are in bed! I'm not saying there can't be exceptions, but night time needs to be family time, not sit-on-our-asses-and-watch-the-boob-toob time! I have a feeling this is going to be the hardest goal of all. My kids are TV watching, Wii playing, computer junkies! And I'll be the first to admit that sometimes all I want to do in the evening is veg on the couch and watch HGTV until I'm damn near comatose, but really? I can't find anything better to do, like read a book or play a game with my kids? We're definitely gonna figure this one out!
Now that I'm reading through this post, these goals seem SO lofty! Is it even remotely possible for me to pull this crap off? I don't know, but the only way we'll find out is if I jump in and try! And since September is the kick-off of our school season, it seems like the perfect time to kick off some smarter, healthier practices in our home. Wish me luck and I'll keep you posted, that is if I don't keel over in the process!!
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