Monthly Archives: October 2014

Crazy how life can be all comfy and set one day and then completely turned upside down in a matter of weeks!!  Well as you know, we have been praying for direction concerning this move out of state…well God has opened doors and answered prayers so we are doing it.

We got the okay concerning a home and we are set to move down in less than 2 weeks. As of right now, my life is consisting of doubling up on school so that we can finish out October this week and have next week to visit and socialize before we go.  I have doctor appointments this entire week to get in all of our appointments before we go.  Plus I need to do some shopping before we go and get some last minute things.

I have been actively cleaning out, selling, and giving away items that we are not taking.  I THINK in my head that all of our stuff will fit but in reality, I measured it out and I KNOW it won’t all fit.  So I am reducing even more.  This will be good for me, helps me realize that I don’t actually need all of the stuff I think I need.

We are excited, it is getting awful chilly here in Michigan and I look forward to some warmer weather in North Carolina.  I know it will still be cool but warmer than our polar vortex winter we had last year.  YIKES!!!  I am happily giving away my shovels, snow pants, skates, sleds, and winter boots.  I think I will keep the gloves and coats.  It will still be cold just not freezing.

I say this to let you know if I don’t get on here, you know what I am doing….packing….cleaning…..running last minute errands and doctors…visiting with friends to make good memories and probably having a few meltdowns.

I will keep you posted as to how it is going.  Maybe do some large family moving on a cross country scale….blog post topic….hmmmm  we will see.

Have a blessed day.

“Faith, mighty faith, the promise sees, And looks to God alone; Laughs at impossibilities, And cries it shall be done.” ~ Charles Wesley

Okay, you have all heard the songs……Let it go……….let it go……..and of course Do you want to build a snowman?…..I am not an advocate of the Frozen movie as it has some things that I am prone to wanting to deter my children from but my children still know what it is.

My children and I like to watch all the youtube videos of people that have done parodies to the different songs. The princess is one that my daughter likes to dress up as.  She is just like any normal little girl who likes to play dress up with frilly capes and crowns.

We decided to do a Frozen themed birthday party and we did it rather inexpensively.

For the birthday girl, we let her help make cupcakes and then decorate all by herself.  

This was the highlight of her day.  Ooey, gooey frosting and sprinkles yes definitely made a mess…..but she loved every moment of it.

For her birthday lunch we kept it light.  We were going to be enjoying a big dinner later on and I didn’t want to fill them up too full.

Pinterest had tons of ideas for Frozen foods, we took one of the ideas and made the snowman on string cheese. I served whole wheat pretzel sticks, apple slices, and homemade peanut butter.  Easy but nutritious.

Then of course, what birthday lunch wouldn’t be complete without letting your children eat in the living room!! A forbidden thing in our home. Just make sure to put the messiest child on the floor.  Here he was sitting on some party decorations.   We had simple decorations.  I bought a pack of coffee filters and made them into snowflakes.  We hung them with fishing line.  We decorated with Christmas lights and pink balloons.  It was a request from the birthday girl.

For the menu, we went with the Swedish theme as that is where the movie is taken from. –or so I think?!?!We made Sven’s Swedish Meatballs–he is a character in the movie.

We also had an Olaf cheeseball.  This has been one of our favorite snacks to make for parties.  Again, a character in the movie.

We served Olaf’s nose—carrots and Elsa’s snow dipping sauce—ranch dressing.For the Swedish theme–I thought of sauerkraut and sausage.  I think I can link Swedish and German foods together??!?!  Maybe not, but I was dying to try out my new homemade sauerkraut and this was a perfect time.  It was DELICIOUS!!  We put mini sausages inside, making this a new favorite.

We also served macaroni and cheese.  It didn’t have any correlation to the movie, but it was the #1 requested food by the birthday girl.

I haven’t made any play dough since last winter, so this was a treat for my children.  I made white “snow” play dough and the children enjoyed making snowmen with googly eyes and sequin pieces that I got from the Dollar store.

    I also made a new recipe with coconut oil instead of vegetable oil–much healthier results.       We made a pin the nose on Olaf.  

Of course, it is REQUIRED that all family members participate.  Here is our oldest daughter.And our eldest son.

We also played simple games like throw the snowball (cotton balls) into the bucket.  We played Elsa, Elsa, Olaf—her version of Duck, duck, goose.

Simple games, the little ones focuses are not long.  We keep them short, and don’t focus on the winning or losing aspect.  Just a fun time.

Gifts:

I made these wooden people based on the movie characters.

Next, I wanted to make her some sort of princess item.  I am not big on sewing but came across this DIY no sew cape from makeit-loveit.

Here is what my pattern looked like when I cut it out.

I then took and “burned” the edges so that they wouldn’t fray.  This was neat and left them with a wavy edge.  Looks neat.

I then painted snowflakes on the cape.  I put paper plates underneath while it was drying.  I used acrylic paint.

For the enclosure to the neck, I used velcro with sticky backs.  No sewing needed just stick it on.

This cost me about $5 to make.  Very simple.  I actually had some satin material that I have since made capes for the other girls and one Larry Boy cape for my son.Her nickname is “Posie”  so Lauren our birthday decorator made the sign on the wall with the help of other sisters.  It is a tradition that when the little ones wake up the house is decorated with streamers, balloons, and a sign.  It has been done by Lauren every since they were little.  When I had so many little ones, it was just enough to get through my days, who had time to blow up balloons and decorate?  Not me, so thankfully my daughter enjoys doing that as a surprise.  Each child puts in their request for decoration colors or themes and then Lauren decorates.

For her cake, she wanted Superman ice cream.  I realized that this is something that you can ONLY get in Michigan.  Or so I was told.  We decided to make a “frozen” birthday cake.  I made a funfetti cake mix and baked it as usual then froze it.  I  topped it with partially thawed superman ice cream.  Froze that and then topped with whipped topping and added blue sprinkles. 

It was yummy.  I wanted to make another kind in case not everyone liked superman ice cream, so we went with the chocolate theme.

I did the same thing as the superman frozen cake.  I made everything in layers and froze it in between steps.  It had:

• chocolate cake
• chocolate ice cream
• chocolate syrup drizzled
• chocolate covered toffee bits
• whipped topping
• chocolate syrup drizzled

To top off the night we had some homemade hot chocolate to go with our frozen theme.  This is one recipe that we like to make many times during the winter months.

It was a happy day, full of fun, laughter, and memories.  It didn’t cost us an arm and a leg, but we were still able to do something special.

Happy Birthday Autumn!

I remember back in the day when I had only 4 children, I did crafts almost every day with my children.  We made many messes with markers, finger paints, play dough, glue, you name it we made it!!! I had a close friend who was staying with us while her husband was on deployment and she couldn’t believe that I would “allow”  my children to make such messes.  It stressed her out because she had little ones and mine were older and not as prone to making such a huge mess.  I laughed and thought it was funny, then my time came.

I slowly started having little ones and my craft cupboard got leaner and leaner as I had more children.  Today I still don’t “allow” markers, finger paints, and all those individual Oriental Trading crafts with sticker backs, aghhhh!!!  It grew out of a need because my little ones would mysteriously appear with a mural on my walls from markers.  Or I would find lovely stickers stuck to my wood floors in the bedrooms.  I decided to just get rid of anything that was too messy.

We do keep crayons, scissors, and glue but that is all.  I try and keep it up high on the shelf and we don’t have too many problems with crayon marks appearing on the walls all of a sudden.

One thing that we do make for the winter months is play dough.  Basically I just know that it is going to require a complete clean up of my dining room and I expect that.  I let them play and then we just clean everything up.

I usually make it with canola oil that we used to use.  Well I don’t buy that anymore and I didn’t want to waste the money buying something that I didn’t have, I wanted to try a recipe with coconut oil.

The results were excellent.  I noticed no difference in this kind from the canola oil I used to make.  I love the fact that my children are getting a healthy dose of coconut oil naturally rubbed into their skin, which is much better than vegetable oil.

Here is what we mixed up in a large pot:

• 2 T coconut oil
• 2 cups water
• 1 cup salt
• 2 cups flour
• 4 tsp cream of tartar

I put it in the order above and turned the burner on low.  I stirred until it mixed up—in my opinion it mixed up better than my old recipe with vegetable oil.  I then kneaded it on my counter until it was smooth and pliable.

Sorry for the “glare” from the window. Here the children were having fun playing with it.  I bought some googly eyes and sequins from the Dollar store for them to make snowmen.  I know—messy!!  But they are having fun.

My table has a fluted table top and that can get annoying when your children are playing with play dough.  It likes to get stuck in the creases.  I just let it harden and then take a small screwdriver and scrape out the flutes.

Messy??? Yes, but fun memories for my children.  As  a mom, I like order but I also have to let my children enjoy things.  I like to call it organized chaos!! We can’t be so “stuck in the mud” and never let our children do anything because they might get messy or it takes too long to clean up.  It is better to have to clean up your little boy who has been crawling, yes you read that correctly, around in Daddy’s shop playing with wrenches and tools and his clothing covered in grease then to be the complaining, overbearing wife who likes to “control” things.  I don’t let my children run free and create messes always, but I do allow them lots of fun, free time, exploring and creating things that make a mess.  It helps foster creativity in your child and can be a little fun for mom too.

When is the last time you sat down and created a cupcake out of  play dough with your child?  Or have you sat and enjoyed dirt cakes with grass and flowers for tea?  How about playing with popcorn seeds in a small area for your little guy to scoop up in his mini front loaders and dump trucks?

All those creative, messy things can be fun memories for your child.  My children still like the feed corn pool that we had in our basement.  What a mess it could be!!!  But it was okay, it was out of sight in the basement and was a fun treat to go play in when it was cold.

It’s good to be the “free-living” individual every once in a while. Make up a batch of this “good for your skin” play dough.   Let down your guard and “allow” some mess!!

If you need a great dish to bring for a potluck or if you just want to WOW your family with your culinary skills, then this is one to consider!!  Swedish meatballs homemade are amazingly simple and taste wonderful.  I normally do not make them with ground pork but opted to for this recipe and the results were delicious.

You can serve these plain right out of your serving bowl or cook up some egg noodles to serve them over.  Either way, they are delicious.

For this recipe you will need:

• 1 onion diced
• 1 lb ground beef
• 1 lb ground pork
• 1/2 cup bread crumbs
• 2 large eggs
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp salt and pepper

For the sauce:

• 4 cups beef broth
• 1-16 ounce container of sour cream
• thickening agent– choose what is in your pantry
  • 1/2 cup potato flakes
  • 1 can cream of mushroom soup
  • 2 T cornstarch mixed with 1/4 cup water
  • 2 T flour mixed with 1/4 cup water

Place all your ingredients into your mixing bowl.  I just love my purple plastic bowls from the Dollar store, thank goodness for fall colors.

Mix all of your ingredients together and shape them into balls.  I used a cookie scooper to get the same shape.  I then put them in my glass baking dish and froze them.  I wasn’t going to make them that day and wanted them to stay firm.  The next day, I took them out of the freezer and put them into my oven uncovered at 400 for 30 minutes until browned.

I poured my beef broth in the baking pan and let that cook for another 20 minutes. I checked my meatballs to be sure they were cooked and then finished off the sauce.

I whisked in sour cream and potato flakes.  Covered it with tin foil and let it cook at 325 to blend all the flavors for 15 minutes and then served it.  Delicious!!

Serve plain or over top of egg noodles.  Make this ahead of time and freeze the meatballs in plastic baggies.  Then when you want to make them, just pour it into your baking dish and cook.  Takes less time.  Enjoy!!