I'll be back. . . .

. . . . it's 5.55am and I'm sitting with my laptop on the sofa! The coffee pot is gurgling away and I just got up for our final school day this week. I didn't post yesterday and I know if I didn't jot something down now some of you will be wondering where I am ;-)

So, just wanted to say "I'll be back later, with a longer post, and of course some pictures". I'll be taking Boo to the groomers for 9am so I will try to post once I get back from Petsmart.

TGIF!

Swamp Weed Anyone?

Still on the subject of food (I hope I'm not boring you!) This is the book Kristen and I bought at the book store on Sunday :-) It has some really fun recipes in it, and in my quest to have Kristen keep trying new things (I'm convinced one day she'll discover something she just loves) I thought it would be fun for her if she helped me cook more. Not just baking cookies, which honestly she doesn't really help me with much, she just always wants to eat the chocolate chips or 'lick the spoon or bowl'!!

So, yesterday we decided we'd make Swamp Weed! If you enlarge the picture below you will see that is actually guacamole :-) We didn't have ingredients to make fly larvae so we might try that next time. I cut the avocados in half and took out the stone then I gave them to Kristen and showed her how to scoop out the flesh. While she was doing that and then chopping it in to bits in a bowl, I chopped the tomatoes and onion and cilantro etc. Then Kristen mixed it all together. She kept saying she didn't like the smell and she didn't like avocados. Honestly, I don't even think she's ever tried avocado? Why do kids say they don't like something when they haven't even tried it?

So, here's the first taste test. Did she like it?

Well she gave it two thumbs up. SO, she doesn't like guacamole but she does like Swamp Weed!

Actually that was short lived, I put it out on the table an hour later with dinner and when she scooped up a bigger bit with her pita bread (I baked triangles in the oven to make them crispy) she announced that she didn't like it after all?!! Oh well, more for me cos I LOVE guacamole, urm, I mean swamp weed ;-)

Yesterday being Earth Day , I tried to do my bit when I called in to the grocery store for a few things. I bought 5 of their reusable green bags. I have to admit I've been pretty naughty for a while and just let them use plastic when packing my groceries - but no more! I will make a concerted effort to cut down on plastic bags, in fact I won't need to use them any more. I have these bags (which actually were filled with my groceries in this picture, but you just can't see them) already back in the car ready for my next trip to the store. Anything I can't fit in these 5 bags I will ask to put in paper bags :-)

It's overcast today and a chance of a thunder storm looms.

A Not So Smooth Smoothie!

I've been really impressed with Kristen's eating lately and my quest to get her to eat more healthy things is going well. I'm sure I'm not the only mom who struggles to get healthy food down their kids. Kristen wrinkles her nose at ALL veggies except broccoli and she even complains if I cut up an apple and make her eat slices of it (which I don't do as often as I should!). The only fruit she says she likes is watermelon! I blame myself for not being consistent when she was younger. If she told me she didn't like something I believed her and never really offered her that food again! Even before she could talk, if she made a face when I fed her something I assumed she didn't like it and moved on to something else for her to try, never thinking to offer her that same veggie or piece of fruit again.

But this past weekend after I'd made the pancakes (and yay, she's been eating them for breakfast ever since) she's somehow been more willing to try other things. I'm always talking to Kristen about good food and eating healthy and I mentioned to her that we should try smoothies so she can eat some fresh fruit in a way she might like it. She was eager to try this. On Saturday we got the makings of a banana and strawberry smoothie. Some bananas, frozen strawberries (I like using the frozen ones so it makes the smoothie cold and you don't have to use ice), Horizons Organic vanilla yogurt - we added milk to the blender and voila, a yummy smoothie. Kristen loved it :-)

On Sunday, she announced that she wanted for breakfast "some pancakes and a tropical smoothie"! I'd bought frozen tropical fruit also so this time I blended the mixed fruit with a yogurt and instead of milk I used orange juice. This is the tropical smoothie you see in the pictures, and as you can see Kristen quite liked this one too. She got 3/4's of this drank then told me next time I make it I shouldn't use orange juice because it was a bit too 'tangy'. I have to mention Kristen doesn't like orange juice on it's own.

Well to cut a long story short, we went out Sunday morning to the book store and then headed to a place to have lunch. We had to wait about 10 minutes for a table but all of a sudden Kristen said she didn't feel well? Before we even got a table we decided to leave and just go home. Two minutes later Kristen throws up in the car (thankfully we had a plastic bag near by)!!!!!! We get home a few minutes after that and she just lays down on the sofa. I instantly knew that the orange juice in the smoothie had not agreed with her. I'm assuming it must have been too acidic for her stomach? She ate some toast and drank some water and about 15 minutes after that she was right as rain again!

So, we may skip the smoothies for a little while! She ate a banana all by itself yesterday (which I packed in her 'disposable' lunch to take on her field trip) so I think we can say we are still making progress :-)

And, I'm happy to report that she had a great time on her trip and thoroughly enjoyed seeing The Wizard of Oz. She couldn't stop talking about it when she got home!

A Determined Soul!

It's Monday again! I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. We've had a fun time. Not all relaxing, but most certainly all good. We (or mainly Jason) were busy in the yard again on Saturday.

The soil saga continues! The plants don't seem to have done much since Jason added the 'bone meal', which puts nitrogen in to the soil, so he made the decision to pull up one of the beds, get rid of the organic soil that was in it and just try planting something directly in to the soil underneath. He's not one to give up easily! In fact he very rarely gives up on anything. So, to do all this he needed a new 'toy'! Here is is using it. . . ..


It's a Rototiller! This churned up the garden soil really good, he then put the wooden beams back on each side but leaving them only about 2 inches high. He wanted to do this so the grass wouldn't invade the garden bed. We bought a few more tomato plants and peppers and after Jason had tilled the soil, I planted them in it. Now we wait again! In the mean time I also took out some of the herbs I'd planted in the organic soil and put them in terracotta pots. For now I will just have a little herb garden on the patio, until we see how well things do in our own soil.


I bought an outdoor area rug one day last week and put it under our new patio furniture. It really finishes off the space out there. I also bought more 'butterfly lights' from Target and put them up. Jason and I sat out there for a little bit on Saturday night after we'd watched a movie (Feast of Love, starring Morgan Freeman). It was a little cool by 10pm, but I took a throw out with me and snuggled under it. There was a big bright moon shining too - it was lovely. We were out there first thing Sunday morning too with our coffee :-) I placed a lavender candle on the table and I light it every time I go out there. There's also a couple of little lavender plants (not real) on there that I got from Michael's last week for $2 each! You may be able to click on the picture to see better?


It's Kristen's 'Field Trip' today at school. They are going to a theater in Austin to see Wizard of Oz. Only one parent can accompany each class teacher so I can't go! Some mom's opted to not send their kids cos they said they didn't want them to ride the school bus!!!! OK, each to their own, I guess! I personally don't want to 'wrap my child in cotton wool', so much so that she can't experience things like field trips! That's not to say I won't be a little worried until I pick her up at 3pm! I'll be praying for a safe trip for them all.

I'm happy to report she did like my 'wholewheat healthy pancakes' and we've been trying out smoothies too - more on that tomorrow!

Have a lovely day, I'll be around to read blogs and catch up with everyone that 'took the weekend off' :-)

Yay, it's the weekend!

I really do look forward to the weekends these days. Getting up at 6am all week is no fun for me, and it's still so dark then too! The past couple of days has been very cloudy but still warm, getting up to 78 degrees yesterday!. It's just strange having such high temps but not seeing sunshine. We have no plans for the weekend but I need to get productive and do something, I'm just not sure what yet? I have some stuff to finish off in the yard, or I could buy paint and start our bedroom? I haven't decided on a color yet so that might have to wait another week or so until I'm really 'inspired'.

Yesterday, my Paula Deen magazine finally arrived. This was a replacement issue that I had to request weeks ago when I'd seen the new issue in stores but hadn't received it in the mail .

I got a subscription to this for my birthday back in October and I look forward to every issue. This one was worth waiting for. I really do like Paula Deen and the magazine is not only filled with yummy recipes but has great articles in too. A lot of times they are about her sons and her family which I think adds a great personal touch. Anyway, I had a lovely time reading it yesterday and I discovered that they have set up a new website where you can get recipes from previous issues. It's called CookingwithPaulaDeen.com I had a browse through that yesterday too. I especially liked the 'steak tacos' they mentioned in the magazine. They said the recipe was on the site so I looked it up. You can CLICK HERE if you'd like to see it too. I think I might try these one day soon. The corn relish sounds very fresh and yummy. If you want the recipe for the corn relish, go to the home page and search recipes, it brings it up seperately!

Healthy Options!

On Tuesday I picked up this magazine in Walmart. It's a new one from 'Taste of Home', called Healthy Cooking. Of course I'm all in to healthy cooking right now and trying to get us all to eat more veggies etc so I was all over this :-)

Yesterday I did a little baking in the kitchen. The magazine has a recipe in for some healthy pancakes. I made those first, and sampled a couple myself. These are primarily for Kristen because she usually has Pilsbury Pancakes for breakfast! And I want her to try a more healthy option.

These are made with wholewheat flour and are obviously 'different' to the pancake taste Kristen is so used to (why or why didn't I just make healthy ones from the get go!). I thought they were ok, but not very sweet, but I could get used to eating them, if I actually ate pancakes for breakfast - but I don't! I'll let you know what Kristen's verdict is when she's tasted them.

After making the pancakes I did some 'healthy' cookies. I've decided not to buy any more cookies from the store (for now!), but instead I'll try to make some healthy versions once every week or two. I don't mind Kristen having a cookie each day if it's full of 'good stuff' like whole wheat and oats. So I found the Sun-Maid recipe that I'd tried before and made those again. I did try these a few months ago but not sure if I ever blogged about it because I didn't have enough oats and they didn't turn out quite the way they should - still tasty, but a little flat.

These ones turned out pretty yummy though :-) Kristen isn't very keen on raisins (big surprise - not) so I split the mixture and tried half with some chocolate chips for her and did the other half with raisins. Oatmeal and raisin cookies are one of my favorites, so I shall be indulging in one or two myself ;-)

I don't have to do library duty today. Jean, the director has found another girl who will share Thursday mornings with me. So this week I don't need to be there, but I'll cover next week. After that we are only going to open one more month on those days and then probably close during the Summer. Hardly anyone is calling in during the week, so I think Jean just plans to open it up on Sundays when there are a lot more people around.

It's book club tonight, I always look forward to that :-) We read Beach Road by James Patterson this month. It's the first book of his I've ever read, and I can say with certainty that it will probably be the last! I just wasn't that impressed with his writing style, or his story line for that matter!

My New Little Corner!

As promised, here's pictures of our new patio/deck furniture. My plan was to replace the lounger I was sitting on last weekend with this set, but it's actually a little too large to fit in that corner. We tried all ways to put it there, from L-shape to angles. . . but it just didn't look right. Jason suggested we try the other corner of the deck (something I wouldn't think of because I get so set in my ways I thought it just HAD to go where I'd pictured it). So what do you think? Cozy huh? I LOVE it, and it's my new favorite place to be. Especially as the days are warming up nicely now, and most mornings are sunny like this.

Believe it or not, this set actually came in pieces and Jason had to assemble the arms and backs of the chairs and sofa, and screw the legs together on the coffee table. After we'd got it all set up we sat out on Saturday afternoon and enjoyed the fruits of our labor ;-)

The first picture is taken from the right side of the chair, and the picture below as you can see, is facing the set and looking out in to the cul-de-sac. It was hard to get a good picture because the sun is out front in the mornings, making the picture look a little dark. If you click on it, you may be able to see a little better. I should also try to take pictures in the afternoon when the sun is at the back of the house.

Right behind me. . . .is this mess! I have plans for this little alcove - I'm going to add a little bistro table and chairs and add candle sconces to the wall. So next time Jason and I have our 'date night' at home I'm going to make a special dinner and we'll dine 'Al Fresco'

The patio set actually came with two chairs, but I haven't put both of them on the deck. The bakers rack out there makes it a bit of a squeeze to have the other chair there. Until I decide where I shall put the bakers rack I have kept the second chair in our bedroom.

I still haven't painted our master bedroom yet. . . I'm starting to feel the urge to do so!