My new kitchen, or “the awesomeness of my parents”

OK, let’s get this out of the way right up front – my parents are pretty awesome.  It totally sucks that we have to live so far apart, but they try and come visit every six months to a year, and every time they do, they bring their work clothes.

This time as we planned for their visit, they knew that Inara would be in school most days and Chris would also be at work, so they asked if there was a bigger project we could work on since there wouldn’t be small child disruption.  At first, we had planned to overhaul the front yard and begin (what I’m sure will be a long process) turning it into garden.  As the time came closer though, I decided I wanted to go a different route.  Chris and I are both great project starters, but horrible at actually finishing stuff – so I looked around at all the half finished projects, or supplies we had bought for things that had never gotten done, and decided to try and cross off a bunch of little things rather than one BIG thing.

I sat down and made a list, room by room, of all the things in the house I’d love to accomplish while they were here.  I came away with an average of two to three things in each room of the house.  I knew it wouldn’t all happen, so on the first afternoon of their visit we sat down and talked about the list, made a plan and decided what to work on.

However, mom and dad had a mini pow-wow while I went to pick up Chris and they had a whole new plan when we sat down to dinner.  The plane tickets they had bought to come here had, by in large, been paid for by frequent flier miles.  SO, mom decided to spend the amount she had budgeted on their tickets but hadn’t spent on upgrading some of the projects.

That is how my kitchen ended up looking like this:

 

 

 

OK, so let’s start with a very brief and very crude representation of the common areas of our house:

 

This is the gist of the floor plan.  When we moved in almost seven years ago, and up until VERY recently (within the last few months) our dining table was in the breakfast nook, and the dining room served as this large random area I wasn’t sure what to do with.  It’s been our homschool room, a catch all area, an animal area, and all sorts of stuff.  however, I was fed up with the timy galley style kitchen I had, and always feeling like the dining table was CRAMMED into that breakfast nook.  So, I moved it over to the dining room.  This opened up lots of extra space in the kitchen.  The first step was that I wanted to put in a coffee bar area under the bay window so that I could free up some counter space and organize our keurig and electric kettle and everything that went with those.  I moved a cabinet that had been the stand to Chris’ snake tank over there and it fit PERFECTly.  Only one problem, it had no top.  So I scrounged in the garage and found a skinny piece of wood that worked but wasn’t attached, and was too large. Then some friends gave us that book shelf and after thinking for a few days, I decided to put it in the corner as a place to put all my cookbooks, small appliances, and for a bit of a decorative touch.

However, I needed more counter space, so I found this old and poorly constructed shelf/counter/thing that Chris had built years ago (and I couldn’t tell you what for now – maybe to put hedgehog cages on??).  It was 5 feet long, just taller than counter hight and despite not being even close to level or even, worked well to put my microwave, bread maker, kitchenaid mixer and other items on.  Only problem, it was ugly, uneven, not level and ugly.  But it worked so it stayed there.

So, on  my list for the kitchen was to put a real top on the coffee bar and to put a new top (that was at least even, if we couldn’t fix the level part too) on the ugly counter extender.  Well, that’s the part my parents changed.  My mom offered to buy us two new large cabinets and a counter top to replace the ugly wood thing and the one small one foot counter/cabinet that was next to the stove.  It turned out to be exactly six feet so two large 36″ cabinets and a six foot expanse of uninterrupted counter space – I had died and gone to tiny kitchen heaven.  I’m not even joking when I say adding these two cabinets almost doubles our storage space and the counter is the largest counter in my kitchen.

 

We went back and fourth on a few different cabinet set ups (two 18″ cabinets and a 36; a set of 18 in drawers, an 18 inch cabinet and a 35 inch cabinet; a tall 18 inch pantry cabinet, a standard 18 inch cabinet and a 36 – etc.) Finally we decided on the simplest of two 36 inch cabinets and after choosing what we wanted at Lowes, mom made me go over to Home Depot just to make sure I didn’t like what was there better.  Oh am I so glad she made me do that. The cabinets at Lowe’s looked basically the same, except they had two smaller drawers and when you opened the doors there was a small support/divider that ran between the cupboard doors in the front.  The cabinets at home depot have one large drawer and an uninterrupted cabinet space.  OH MY HEAVEN!  I also ended up choosing a different counter top than we had originally picked at Lowes, and in the end I’m very happy with that switch as well.

 

So, with a fair amount of hard work, Chris and my dad spent three days installing the cabinets – which also included moving an electrical outlet (which they switched from a two outlet receptor to a four outlet one!), and then the counter.  Dad also cut and installed a new top on the coffee bar, and cut me SEVERAL new shelves for the bookcases in the dining room.

 

It’s not a total kitchen remodel (none of us could afford that, nor was there anywhere near enough time) but it’s a FANTASTIC kitchen addition.  Mom and I also talked about several of the next steps for continuing the betterment of my tiny kitchen and it’s horrid organization issues.

 

While the guys were working on that, my mom and I had our own project – but that’s another blog post.

 

Until then, I’m going to go drool some more over my new kitchen.  I have already rearranged half my small appliances and drawers twice – I’m sure it’ll be a couple months before I finally figure out the right combination.  just in time to add new things to it for my birthday and Christmas.

Thursday and Sunday

Thursday is my hubbies birthday.  I am so grateful for Chris, and so grateful for God putting us together.  I’m excited to celebrate him, and love on him.  But, there is one deeply hidden thing that I am thankful for year after year after year – his Birthday is always days away from Mothers Day.

 

We are not big celebrators in this house.  We don’t make a big deal out of Valentines Day, St. Patrick’s Day, our Anniversary, our own Birthday’s, or many of the “minor” holidays.  We celebrate big for Christmas, Thanksgiving, Inara’s birthday, and for her on Valentines Day, but that’s about it.  And even those “big” celebrations tend to be small affairs compared to many other people we know.

 

We weren’t always like that though – so why the shift over the years.  Well, I wont lie some if it is simply budget, we cannot afford big to-dos on the budget God has given to us.  But the other side of it, with almost every holiday, somehow there is a hurt attached.  There are a lot of days with hurts attached when you’ve lost three babies.  There are a lot of moments with hurt, awkwardness, and random tears after the path we’ve walked the last seven years.

 

Mother’s day is hard for me, not only because it reminds me of all the babies I will never get to see or hold or watch, or giggle with this side of Heaven, but it reminds me that three years ago on Mother’s day I peed on a stick and it told me I was pregnant for the third time.  Which reminds me that a month later I had a miscarriage, and six months after that I almost died due to complications from my fourth pregnancy, and second still-birth.  All of which reminds me how many statistics I now represent and embody – non of which are good, or happy.

 

This, this is why I am happy that Thursday is Chris’ birthday, because this one day, allows me to focus on him and my love for him all weekend and push the hurt and tears and pain and awkwardness to the side at least for the most part, and celebrate him.

 

So, to my Mother in law who went into labor early 31 years ago – thank you for the amazing son you raised and that very special mother’s day you had that year.  And to God, who had the whole plan in His hands even then – thank you for bringing Chris to the world almost two months early – just so that almost 30 years later his birthday could be a comfort to me through all the hardships we’ve faced.

 

And to all my other friends and family out there with less than “normal” motherhood emotions headed into this weekend, please know that you are not alone, and you are loved.

 

An open letter to pastors {A non-mom speaks about Mother’s Day}

Summer Prep

Only five weeks left of school!  I am both excited and completely dreading summer vacation.  I am SUPER happy about not having to set that 5:30 am alarm any more, but on the other hand weeks and weeks of Inara home all day every day!  So in my head I’m already working on our Summer List and trying to find activities to get us out of the house.  The first and easiest choice was Kingdom Rock VBS at church in June.  This will be our third year doing VBS, and I find myself feeling a bit more comfortable with the routine it will provide us that week.

One down side to the school year wrapping up though, is no more AWANA for the year.  Last week was our last regular meeting of the year and this week is their annual award cerimony.  Inara really loved doing AWANA this year, and we are already looking forward to next year.  The down side is that without the structure of AWANA we don’t have a plan in place for Bible memorization over the summer – which is something I want to continue with Inara both to keep her in the habit as well as to keep brain function going.

So with VBS in mind, I made a new short set of bible verse cards to get us started.  This set includes the five bible verses from GROUP’s Kingdom Rock VBS (which is the theme our church is doing this year).  The verses are NLT version and some are truncated – both of which are done to match the verse being used in the VBS daily Bible Point.  Just for fun (and to differentiate from our “normal” cards) I added the Kingdom Rock logo to the bottom corner of each card.

 

Here’s a preview:

 

Just as before the cards are formatted to print four to a page in a 3×5 size.  Feel free to download the PDF below and use them for your kids as well.

bible_verse_cards_VBS_Kingdom_Rock

An Ode To Breakfast

The experts all say that “Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.”, or so we are told at least.  I’m not here to debate that point one way or another, I really could care less.  What I am here to say is that I LOVE breakfast, or at least breakfast foods.  There is a strong possibility that I could eat “breakfast” three times a day and be totally happy.

Rip’s Big Bowl

So, in honor of that meal that is nothing but awesome in my book, I decided to share with you some of my favorite breakfasts, recipes, and other “morning” goodness.

At the start of February, Chris and I embarked upon an Engine 2 Diet 28 day challenge, which basically means that for the month of February we are whole food eating vegans.  The biggest challenge with that has been, of course, the food.  What do we eat?  Well, I am so thankful that the E2 book, comes with a mini cookbook of sorts right inside.  One of the first things we tried, was Rip’s Big Bowl, which is a mixture of various breakfast cereals, fruits, and a plant based milk.  I LOVE it!  We use a combination (1/4 cup each) of Grape Nuts, Shredded Spoon Size Wheat’n Bran, Barbara’s High Fiber Original, and Old Fashioned Rolled Oats.  The recipes suggests walnuts, raisins, and flax meal.  I’ve included all of these, or just some in different amounts.  As for fruit, pile it on whatever you want.  So far my favorites are banana slices, strawberries, and orange segments.  A bit of unsweetened vanilla almond milk on top and you are golden.  This is something I see myself eating for years to come, so glad I found it!

Rip’s Big Bowl

Pretty pretty eggs

Eggs, beautiful eggs! Around these parts we are big fans of eggs.  Inara likes hers scrambled with cheese on top, Chris likes his in breakfast tacos or quesaillas (as do I) and my favorite way is soft cooked with toast all cut up and mixed together in a bowl.  We also make them as casseroles, use them in french toast, and so much more.  We love our eggs, and our chickens.

Breakfast casserole

But, personally, my favorite by leaps and bounds – OATMEAL!

Growing up, I loved the super sugared instant oatmeal (bananas and cream as well as strawberries and cream are favorites) but over the last few years, I have finally learned how to cook, and come to love “real” cooked oatmeal, particularly steel cut oats.  If you’ve never made cooked oats before, there are GREAT instructions on how to cook basic oats of all kinds on wikihow!  That is a link worth keeping, in case you find yourself buying oats in bulk and tossing the instructions (I do it all the time!) and then can’t remember cook times or water requirements, or maybe that’s just me lol.

However, once you’ve mastered how to cook the oats all by their beautiful selves, it’s time to add flavors, find different ways of cooking, and truly exploring oats to their fullest.  I’ve made oatmeal in so many different ways, from following the instructions (see link above), cooking them overnight in the slow-cooker, making steal cut oats in my rice cooker, and just cooking them overnight in jars on the counter.  If you want to experiment with steal cut oats are are looking for the simplest ways to cook them, I really do recommend either the rice maker method, or by cooking it in jars (instructions on thekitchn.com), then you can top your cooked oats any way you want.

If you’re simply looking for different flavors, varieties, or ways to prepare your basic oatmeal, check out the many many many different recipes on Kath Eats Real Food.  That girl LOVES her some oatmeal.  I highly recommend her classic whipped banana oatmeal – it’s really good with steal cut oats, but it’s fantastic whatever oatmeal you chose to use.

There are also lots of recipes over on Family Fresh Cooking, I took the Essential Travel Oatmeal with us on a trip last weekend, it was pretty darn good.

 

OOORRR, if you want something fast, easy, but still wholesome and unprocessed on a busy school day morning, check out the instructions on how to make your own flavored instant oatmeal, again on thekitchn.com.

 

If you are like me, and you can’t get enough oatmeal in any form, check out these two recipes for my favorite baked oatmeal, and homemade granola as well.  Once you are familiar with the recipes, both are highly adaptable and fun to try new variations of.

 

I hope this gives you lots of food for thought, and new ideas for your breakfast (or brinner if thats your preference) or both!

Natural and awesome cleaning with vinegar.

TLIf you have spent time on Pinterest odds are you have seen pins on making natural citrus vinegar soaks. Well, after a while I decided to give it a try myself. For the last month I’ve been playing around with various combinations of not only citrus peels (including one now with orange and cinnamon sticks similar to the link above) but also with herbs after reading a post over at Fresh Eggs Daily about her lavender mint spray.

I just decanted my first pint of the herb vinegar this morning and I LOVE the way it smells, I’m excited to start using it around the house as well as around the animals.

I got these nice spray bottles at Container Store I kinda love how they show off the pretty colors of the different vinegars.

I wasn’t sure at first if I’d like the herbs so I didn’t start a second soak, but I do have the citrus soak set up so that I’m getting a new batch every two weeks, and I’m now working on an herb soak so it will be ready every two weeks as well.

If you are interested in different combinations and the benefits of various herbs there is a nice (although hardly comprehensive) list here on Fresh Eggs Daily. In the batch of lavender mint I started this morning I also added some camomile to add some antibacterial properties to the mix as well.

I hope you give it a try. I will say I have found that letting the batches soak for a month at a time does seem to offer better results than a shorter two week soak.

Canning 101: supply update

I promise I have posts coming in the canning series, they just take a while to compile because of all the pictures. In the meantime: I want to introduce you to a new canning supply I discovered this summer and have found to be REALLY helpful!

Ball reusable plastic storage caps. These are NEVER to be used when heat sealing jars while you are canning, however they do have lots of other great applications. Back in the very first posts about canning, you’ll remember that I talked about some mistrust in reusing the metal seals in jars more than once. Also, if you’ve used mason jars for any kind of storage on a frequent basis, you may have had the same frustrations I have in using the two part lids. Well, these plastic tops can help with some of that.

If you use your jars for other storage methods other than heat sealing, you can use these. They work GREAT for dry storage, and also for freezing, cold storage (anything in the fridge, I love these with wide mouth jars when making overnight refrigerator oatmeal) or room temperature storage as seen in my picture above with my orange peel vinegar soak.

They come in both wide mouth and regular mouth, but I’ve only been able to find them online (got mine from amazon) not in stores. I highly recommend you give them a try, however be warned – you’ll end up using them for more than you thought you would. I already wish I’d ordered at least 4 boxes of regular moth lids instead of just two.

Now, I’m off to work of filling up my canned goods storage again. It’s looking MIGHTY sad and empty theses days.

Happiness and Peace

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.  John 14:27

I woke up this morning just as I would any other morning, which in itself is a small miracle.  I got Inara ready for school and walked her out to the bus.  I sat quietly in the backyard and I watched the chickens forage, determine pecking order, and explore as only chickens do.  I read today’s reading in Jesus Calling and only then did I realize the date.  I knew it was coming, but to not realize that was here is totally different.

 

I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry,whether living in plenty or in want.  Philippians 4:12

 

I sat and reflected.  I enjoyed the cool morning, the quiet start to the day.  I learned that hummingbirds make a chirping noise.  I was amazed to see how much change can happen in such a short time.

 

plans to give you hope and a future.  Jeremiah 29:11

 

I finally feel hope and peace, and not just an empty dull ache.  It’s still not, nor do I ever expect or want it to be, all butterflies and rainbows, but for now, there is peace and there is hope, and I know the Lord has plans for me.

 

 

Happy 6th Birthday Toby.  Mommy loves and misses you every day.

 

New and News

Yesterday was a holiday here in the US making today Monday.  I (and all of us really) spent the day hanging out in my PJs, doing a whole lot of nothing, playing computer games, and relaxing before getting back to routine today.

Over the weekend I started working on a few changes to the blog, first I gave it a minor facelift, slightly different colors, easier to read (I hope), but biggest is that all the stuff from the sidebar that was over there >>> is now at the bottom of the page vvv so you can look toward the bottom if you want to search, look at specific categories/tags, subscribe to the blog etc.

Also, I am slowly in the process of adding some new sections to the top bar ^^^, as you can see I’ve already got the “printables” section there.  In that you can find links to posts that have included any type of free printable, including but not limited to the bible verse cards I posted the other day, menu planning printables linked over to my other blog FireflySkys, and more.  I’m also working on a section with links to any and all recipes, as well as one for all my canning/preserving/homesteading posts so be on the look out for those.

Speaking of canning, we are in the preservation season (if there is such a thing?) so I’m readying some more posts there too.  I have a salsa post ready to go and I’ll also be working on pasta sauce (both pressure canning procedures).  I’m also planning on starting to share some other types of preservation and homesteading like freezing, cooking, dry mixes and similar items.

Today though, I need to make some new easy jelly since I finally used my last jar of jellies and jam from last season.  I’m also considering some canning and similar giveaways – we’ll see on that.

Well, I’m off to be all domestical and make some jelly, do some laundry, clean a bit and other non-exciting things.

Hi

So, uh, two months later…

I guess I took a bloging break for the summer.

Well, this week we did it, we started the next adventure – Kindergarten!  Inara has been loving school, she comes home happy and excited every afternoon, so far her favorite parts are Gym, Recess, and riding the bus.  She says she is meeting friends, but can’t remember any of their names lol.

Also new this week, Awana.  Thursday was Inara’s first night at Sparks, and she seemed to have fun, but for her the jury is still out.  We’ll give it a couple weeks and see how she feels after going a few times.  In the mean time though, we’ve been working on her scripture memorization.

Over the summer I have been working on just this thing.  We started trying to memorize scripture with her last year durring homeschool and it didn’t work out so well, so I started doing some research and (re)discovered the Scripture Memory System from Charlotte Mason.  I remember looking into this (or something very similar) a couple years back, but then never did anything with it.  The way this works, is that it’s self guided and builds over time.  There are several different “categories” for your scriptures to go into that build over time, but essentially you start with one scripture, and you work with it daily until you’ve got it down, then it moves back a category so you are working on it every other day and you add a new passage to work on daily.  When you’ve got the new one down, you move it into the opposite every other day category and add a new one to daily, then you work towards adding scriptures till you have one daily, every other day, and once per week, then again daily, every other day, weekly and once per month.  There is a video on the Charlotte Mason site (linked above) that explains it all much more clearly.

Confession, I love the idea of stuff like this, but then the actual implementation is halted because I’m too lazy to make all the cards and dividers you need.  Bonus – the Charlotte Mason had a set of printable PDFs for all the dividers – All I had to do was print them out!  I also then chose to laminate them prior to cutting, just to make them a bit more sturdy!

The next step was to figure out what versus we/I wanted Inara to learn over time.  I did A LOT of googling, looked at lists on the Charlotte Mason site, The Navigators, compared lists from our homeschool curriculums, and from random internet searches, and ended up with a HUGE list of old and new testament versus, and some full chapters for memorization.

Next step: make the cards.

1) I have not so awesome handwriting

2) I had a BIG list (that’s not even all of it in the picture^^)

3) I wanted them all to look the same

4) I’m a bit OCD/Anal Retentive when it comes to #3

So, I went the next obvious choice.  I typed them all.  I set up a template for 3×5 “cards” in Word, and set to work.  I made three different sets, Old Testament, New Testament, and Long Passages.  I chose NIV for the default translation and set to work – it took a while between formatting and the fact that there were just so many, but eventually I got them all done.  Next step, print and again laminate for longevity.  I  chose to print them all on white card stock and took my HUGE pile (including the dividing cards at the same time) to the teacher store and laminated my heart out.  Then I had to cut them all apart.  I also chose not to include the long passages at the time, I figured as it was there was PLENTY there.

I was excited to jump in.  I got them all organized, picked out which verse to start with, and set them in their box on the table.  I don’t think it was two days total before Inara “reorganized” them and they were a mess.  I was so frustrated that my work was all messed up I just walked away from it.  What took me at least two weeks, just sat in it’s box and went untouched for at least a month and a half.

Well, a big part of Awana is scripture memorization, so I jumped back in.  I sat down the other night, and reorganized my dividers, took out the old cards which we had done NOTHING with and stored them away.  Next I went back to the computer, I’ve spent the last 48 hours looking up the scriptures for memorization for the Awana program and putting them into word.  Yesterday I went back to the teacher store with a new pile, laminated and spent last night cutting them all apart, and getting them into our storage box.

I also included in the Awana sets a list of which versus were included on a 3×5 card so we could know how close Inara was getting to completing the goals of each workbook.  I highlighted any versus that were included in multiple Awana sets as well.

Also included in these sets are listings of the books of the Bible for memorization or review.  Now we are all set to tackle Awana’s scripture memorization.

The best part, you can benefit from all my handwork!  I linked to the PDF copies of my scripture sets.  I haven’t finished all the Awana sets (I intend to include all three Sparks, the Cubbies, and possibly those from higher levels as well) but what I’ve got done is yours to take.  For the Awana sets all versus are in NIV (I know you can also chose NKJV and KJV for Awana, but we picked NIV) and in the original sets, they are NIV unless otherwise marked.  All versus were copied from BibleGateway.com for version and referances.

Original sets:

Old Testament Verse Cards

New Testament Verse Cards

Full Chapter Bible Cards

Awana sets:

Awana Sparks HangGlider NIV

Awana Sparks WingRunner NIV

June Foodie Penpal

This month I had a fun box from my foodie Penpal.

I’m excited to try out the pound cake mix for sure, I love pound cake. I’m thinking something fun with it for the 4th oh July would be about perfect.

Fun story with the candy. The company my husband works for has a “sister” company called Musketball Tech. I just thought it was super neat to see candy like that!!

Also, this hardly made it through the photo shoot. It was yummy!

Thanks again to my foodie Penpal this month for a great package!

If your interested in participating in Foodie Penpals head over to The Lean Green Bean for more info, or to fill out the participation form and read the terms and conditions to join in the fun in July.

You must submit your information by July 4th as pairings will be emailed on July 5th!