I love living in a small town!!!

Good Morning!! TGIF!!!

Today is a busy day and boy is it hot!! When dh left to go to work this morning he opened the door and you could just feel the humidity!! Its like a sauna out there!!

I just came in from watering, gotta give my garden a fighting chance, especially since our chance of rain is an isolated thunderstorm and they are only predicting a 20-30% chance of that happening!!

Speaking of the garden, I gotta tell ya I love love love living in a small town!! Yesterday I went over and borrowed my daddy's truck so that the kids and I could take away our garbage and pick up some straw from the feed mill. Well after running our errands we stopped by the feed store and when I was getting out of the truck a local farmer Billy (whom I've known my entire life) asked me what I was in for, I told him straw and maybe a couple of hot pepper plants, he asked me if I needed any watermelon or cantelope plants and I told him it wouldn't hurt to have a few more and he offered me some extras he had at his place (farm) so I finished my business and went over to the farm and he told me to take all I wanted he had put in all he was gonna and he hated for the rest to go to waste. So I ended up with an entire flat of watermelon, an entire flat of cantelope, almost an entire flat of squash and a flat of misc. plants that I had no idea what they were till I got them home. Turns out they were Thai basil <- not entirely sure what to do with that one, hot peppers, a couple different tomatoes, and I think a strawberry plant!!! I told Billy that I would share all that he had given me and he was just happy that they would be put to use and not die out on the side walk because he might forget to water them! ~smile~

What a blessing!! I shared plants with my mom, kept some for myself and most of the plants went to a good friend of ours who is in the same boat as the rest of us, 1 income, she stays at home only they have 5 kids!!!! We are both trying to grow as much as we can, can and freeze as much as we can and free plants from great farmer neighbors is amazing way to help us get there!!!!

With money not going as far as it once did its good to live in a small town, where the neighbors look out after each other and help each other!!!

I do love living in a small town!!!

Oh and a heads up, when I went to return the truck to my mom, my middle child was playing on her swing set and he was stung 2x within like 5 minutes, my mom took him and sprayed some anti-itch spray on him that she had picked up hoping to take the sting out and keep it from bothering him. Immediately after spraying the anti-itch spray on him his back  where ever the spray touched him was red like koolaid and been poured over him it was scary. My mom took him in the house and washed him off with soapy water and it started to fade slightly, I put the kids in the car and came home as fast as I could because I wanted to get some benedryll in him because it seemed he was allergic to the spray someway. I got him home and by the time I got home (thankfully she only lives about 5 miles away) the redness was almost completely faded. I called to get the active ingredients of the spray so I could look them up on the internet, the active ingredients her benzyl (sp?)alcochol. Zinc acetate, camphor and menthol. Turns out Camphor is not safe for kids in high concentrations and it will cause severely red irritated skin, which is exactly what happened. My mom feels horrible but it was no fault of hers at all and thankfully he is completely fine, I gave him a dose of antihistimine and also put some anti itch cream on his bites (after reading the label, ha) and he is AOK!!! He had me worried but it turned out fine!!!

I told dh that we need to make sure that our vehicles have meds that are safe incase of being away somewhere and the kids get a bug bite I won't have to run home or to the store I'll have the proper stuff with me.

Thats about it for me, got get off here and get busy!!!
Have a wonderful day!!!
Dana

Thursday 6/28/2012

Good Morning!!!

Today looks like another busy day!! But a mostly at home day.

Yesterday turned out to be productive but in a laid back sort of way.
I did dishes 2x
planted herbs plants: dill, sage, basil, thyme
Watered
weeded in the garden some
picked what I think will be the last of the peas- talked to dh about retilling and planting something more in the same space probably this weekend.
weeded one of the flowerbeds
spread 2 bags of mulch
cleaned up the yard
Then in the evening we had a meeting we had to go to

Today my plans are:
Take away all the trash
stop at the feed mill and pick up 3 bales of straw
work more in the yard
probably mow
Maybe some laundry

Dinner tonight is
Chicken fried rice

Hope your day is wonderful!!!
Dana

Wednesday 6/27/2012

Good morning!!!

Today is a day at home YAY!!! I feel like I have been on the run for what seems like FOREVER!!

I have alot that I want to do around here to get things caught up!!!
There's dishes, laundry, get the house picked up, ya know the normal things that need done!!

Then there is the outside work, I have mulch to spread, garden to tend, yard to pick up, the mowing to do although I seriously doubt that the mowing will get done today, maybe tomorrow if everything works out!!!

All in all I am happy to be home, I'll be super busy but extremely happy to have time to get things at least started around here!!!

Dinner tonight is a leftover redo meaning I have some leftover spaghetti sauce that I am going to make into lasagne!!! Super yummy!!

Have a great day !!!
Dana

Menu Plan Monday

Here is our menu for this week:

Monday- Fried chicken salad
Tuesday- Beef and snow pea stir fry, veggie fried rice
Wednesday-Crispy Chicken, Alfredo, spinach
Thursday- Unstuffed peppers, mashed potatoes, corn and lima beans
Friday-Hm pizza
Saturday- Burgers on the grill with all the fixins!!!
Sunday- Beef Roast in Crockpot, creamed potatoes, green beans

Jump Start on the morning...

So one of the things I want to do better about is breakfast. My oldest son usually eats breakfast at school and hubby only has coffee on the way to work. Not sure the Hubs habits will change but I would like to get away from the oldest eating breakfast at school. I have a couple reasons for wanting that to change. The number 1 reason is cost, it costs me 1.30 every morning he eats breakfast at school and breakfast at school in my eyes and my son's stomach is more like a morning snack than a morning meal. I am paying 1.30  for him to eat a  morning snack at school five days a week. In addition and my number 2 reason is that my youngest son will be going to school a full day this fall and well that will add up to 1.30 x 2 x5days a week right now its costing me 6.50 for the oldest and if prices don't increase which well we can't count on that they won't another 6.50 a week for my second son and it adds up to 13.00. I think I can do better than that and they will be more satisfied and full longer. Enter in this recipe:
http://chickensintheroad.com/cooking/overnight-cinnamon-rolls/
I've made this before and they are delicious!! Easy and not real time consuming and well thats a win-win in my book.

Its super simple you mix these goodies up, roll them out, fill them, roll them up, cut them, place them in a greased baking dish, cover with plastic wrap and pop in the fridge, they raise nice and slow overnight and when you get up in the morning you just turn on the oven and pop them in to bake. Easy Peasy!!!

*FYI* I make them up using the recipe for adding the oil and egg, I like the consistancy it gives the dough.

I can mix up the drizzle while I am enjoying my first cup of coffee and voila, warm-gooey-yummy-homemade cinnamon rolls for breakfast!!

I've toyed around with some other quick breakfasts. I really like the hm mcmom sandwiches that freeze and reheat wonderfully, and my kids like them too!!

If you get a chance to try the overnight cinnamon rolls let me know what you think. They're a winner at this house!!!

TGIF!!!

Ok so I promised some pictures, my work isn't the best but hey I'm learning right?? And I am having a great time!! The course is set up in 4 sections, each section has 4 classes. So I numbered the pics according to which class the goodies were made in, hope that helps and doesn't confuse anyone!!!

These are the cupcakes that I decorated from the 1.3 class, during this class we had to learn how to make the blue flowers you see and the pink flowers as well as how to properly ice and fill a cupcake. The one with balloons was a free handed one that we had to pick from a group of pictures and recreate. At the begging of my hubby, I used a copycat recipe for filling which was a Twinkie filling recipe. He loved them so I guess they were good!!!

 This cake is the first cake I decorated in the  1.2 class, we took the image from a piece of paper, learned how to transfer the image without the need of a special printer or edible image and then decorate the image that we chose. Fun and easier than I thought!!! Also its a 1 layer cake that we torted then filled, it's filled with dark chocolate pudding!! It was soooooo goooood!!! Glad I am able to send this stuff to work with the hubs!! I am already overweight and don't need any help gaining any more, lol. I'll do the practicing, his office can do the weight gaining :)

This pic is just for fun, I was getting lunch ready for the kids a bit ago and when I walked out in the livingroom this is what I found!! They created this all on their own with no help or hints or prodding!!!!!Its a breath of fresh air really, as they weren't bickering or fighting over toys etc., which they have been doing more than their fair share of I assure you!!!  And THE VERY BEST PART???? They are actually watching My Little Pony with their little sister, because that is what she wanted to watch!! So how awesome is that?? They built her a fort/tent and then watched a girly show with her because they are just awesome brothers!!  I ♥ MY KIDS!!!!

Ok so there are some pics for ya!! I have some garden pics too, I'll put them in another post later on!!!
Enjoy your day!! If it gets to be 100* today like yesterday, or if those severe thunderstorms they are calling for actually come in, you can find me in the tent with the kids, watching a movie!!! Enjoy your day!!!
Dana

Cake Decorating

Today is lesson 3 of the first part of the cake decorating classes I am taking. Its been fun so far and today we are moving past the basics and starting on making icing flowers, I am super excited.  We are decorating cupcakes today, I'll take some pics and hopefully have something worthwhile to post. Should be a great class.

I'm tired though, we didn't get to bed until 11:00 then baby girl was up at 3:30 getting sick, I know she isn't sick just had an upset stomach and its my fault too, I should have known better. We had tacos for dinner last night and she tore them up as well as a healthy share of red koolaid, I knew it was too rich for her tummy but she was loving it so well I've learned my lesson you can be sure of that. I had to give her a shower at 3:30 this morning. We were up and down on the couch from 3:30 till 5:30 when I just plain gave up and turned on cartoons for her, she hasn't gotten sick since and has even ate some toast so hopefully the worst is behind her, however all the yucky laundry still waits for me.

So that's my day today, cake decorating class and laundry, fun fun fun!!! :)

Have a blessed day!!!
Dana