Homemade Cranberry Sauce

One of my very favorite parts of Thanksgiving Dinner is the Cranberry Sauce.  A few years ago we decided to be super-domestic and make our own from scratch.  Little did we know it was really very easy and there is something about saying you've made anything yourself.  So it continues to be a yearly tradition now.

Homemade Whole Berry Cranberry Sauce

(Makes 2 1/4 cups)

Recipe from Oceanspray.com

1 c sugar

1 c water

1 12-oz. package Fresh Cranberries, rinsed and drained

Combine water and sugar in a medium saucepan. Bring to boil; add cranberries, return to boil. Reduce heat and boil gently for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Cover and cool completely at room temperature. Refrigerate until serving time.

That's it!  It is the easiest Thanksgiving recipe by far.  Try it!  You'll love it!

Homeschool Preschool

We had gone back and forth for several months trying to decide if/when we should enroll our daughter (3 yrs) in preschool.  One night while I was at work I was talking with a coworker about it and, while encouraging me to do what I thought was best, she told me of a time her mother had told her that children should be home with their moms, not in preschool.  It really struck a chord with me as I thought back to my own childhood.  I was never enrolled in a day of preschool and I learned so much about day to day life from my mom, particularly in my early years.

Now I won't get all preachy--especially considering that there are a lot of moms out there who do enroll their kids in preschool early and have great success at it (and we've already tentatively decided to do the same immediately before she goes to Kindergarten just to adjust her to the situation)--but it has been so nice having her home.  I haven't regretted our decision at all.

Obviously I feel like this puts a greater responsibility on her parents to teach her not only the ins and outs of life but also her ABCs and 123s.  I started doing homeschool preschool awhile ago (I blogged about it here or on my personal blog...I can't remember.)  But I thought I would share what I've done.

Basically, every week we choose a theme, find books at the library to go with that theme, a few new vocabulary words, a poem and song or two, and an art and science project to solidify the theme (science is my favorite part!)  We also learn a color, shape, number, and capital/lower case letter.

I made a poster that I found at this website to present all of the things she's learned through the week.  My daughter also loves to draw so I hung a clothesline for her drawings and school "assignments."

Here is how it looks at the end of the week.  Each unit has a different theme (I get most of my ideas here.)  This particular week was around Mother's Day and I chose a theme based on mothers.  (In this case we didn't have a rhyme that week so the color went on the purple square.  My OCD daughter can't have blank spaces.)

Here are some closeups of her work for the week.  These were 6 months ago.  She is freakishly good at drawing stick figure people and animals now.  I mentioned my mom is an artist.  I'm guessing those genes skipped a generation because, while I love arts and crafts and sewing and the like, I suck at drawing  people and animals. 

We took this hectic summer off and focused on worksheets from a preschool workbook.  I started up again the first week of traditional school for our area.  I started over at the letter A, choosing Airplanes for the theme (which was timely since her daddy was flying on an airplane that week for work), the number 0, etc.  The next week was the letter B for Birds, the number 1, etc.

I used to choose themes based on seasons, holidays, and events.  Now, it is a little easier to prepare with a systematic approach.  Plus, it is a whole lot easier to find books at the library about "eggs" while the whole community is scrambling for books about Halloween.

Each unit takes 2 weeks.  We aren't home every day and I don't generally do school on days that she has dance, toddler time, and church.  My work schedule has me home  through early afternoon so we usually have plenty of time to get ready for the day and do school as well.  It is especially nice having that mommy/daughter time on the days I have to go to work.

So there you have it.  She is having a lot of fun learning and I am having a lot of fun teaching her.   Plus, I'd like to think that I've done a little bit to help her to prepare for her academic future.

Whimsical Flower Arrangement

I just love it when I actually finish something I've been meaning to do for awhile.  And, in this case, awhile means a few years.  These were meant to go in my daughter's nursery.  She just turned 3.  Luckily they still fit in her room.

I had this leftover floral container from a previous arrangement that we had received for our wedding (we just celebrated our 10th anniversary.)  I really liked it so I didn't want to just throw/give it away.  When we decided to loosely base our baby girl's nursery on a garden, I thought I would make a floral arrangement to go in there.  I found the long stem gerber daisies and quickly envisioned a Suessical floral arrangement.  I opted to leave them long and floppy.

By the time I actually got around to finishing this project it was Easter so I easily found some Easter grass and stuffed it around the base.  I am amazed that most of it is still there.  Every once in awhile I'll find a stray piece on her floor, but for the most part she leaves it alone. 

Finally all it needed was a ribbon tied around the base and, voila!

Tip(s) of the Week

In my quest to achieve baking perfection (yeah, right) I have learned the hard way that not having the right tools, or not following the directions precisely, will often end in sub-par if not disastrous results.

Hello, Obvious.

If you are like me, you are too busy to read the directions thoroughly, let alone follow them, right?  And if you are like me, you avoid buying the tools you really need thinking that you will just make do with what you have, right?  Or maybe it is just me...

Anyway, on the outside chance that I am not the only one out there who suffers from impatience or cheapskate -ness, here are a few things I learned from my summer of baking that have made a big difference in how my baked goods are turning out.  (Again, hello, obvious.)

(1) I got a sifter.

It was actually a Christmas present from my mom who was with me in Spoons & Spice when I saw one and said, "You know I really should get one of these."  Lo and behold, on Christmas morning...

Anyway, it only takes a few seconds longer and does a much better job at making sure my dry ingredients are nicely de-clumped.  It does a much better job than Martha's "whisk to sift" trick.

(2) I started using this (yes, I know, another plug for Crisco...):

to do this:

When the instructions say "grease the pan" I always just cheat and use the spray variety.  It's a lot faster, after all.  However, one time I broke down while I was making zucchini bread and actually greased and floured the pan (as I was instructed to do) and the crust of this particular bread was SO delicious!  It was well worth the extra time and effort.  So, since then I have taken a few extra minutes to grease the pan and I have never been disappointed.  Plus, as you can tell from the picture, I have help from little hands as well.

Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookies

I discovered something about myself this summer while on maternity leave: not only do I love to bake, I need to bake.  There are so many links between cooking and science as it is, it's ridiculous.  But Baking and Chemistry are, in my mind, the same thing.  One small error and you could blow a room up (or in this case, end up with two hours wasted on a disastrous batch of baked-goodness.)  It's that kind of suspense that has me keep trying again and again until I have success.

I also discovered that my sweet daughter likes to bake, too.  Her favorite part is licking the spatula, of course, but she knows she has to be an extra good helper to get to that point.

I found this recipe on the cardboard overlay for those Crisco baking sticks (SO worth the extra cost to have that stuff premeasured for you!)

These are arguably the best chocolate chip cookies I've ever made/had.

Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookies

Makes 3 dozen

3/4 c. shortening
1 1/4 c firmly packed light brown sugar
2 T milk
1 T vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 3/4 c All Purpose Flour
1 t salt
3/4 t baking soda
1 c semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 c coarsely chopped pecans (optional) (If nuts are omitted, add an additional 1/2 c chocolate chips)

Heat oven to 375.  Beat shortening and brown sugar in large bowl at medium speed until light and fluffy.  Beat in milk, vanilla and egg.  Stir in flour, salt and baking soda.  Blend in chocolate chips and nuts.  Drop by rounded measuring tablespoonfuls 2 inches apart onto ungreased cookie sheets.  Bake 8-10 minutes for chewy cookies or 11-13 for crisp cookies.  Cool 2 minutes on cookie sheet.  Transfer cookies to cooling rack. 

Mixed Media

Have I ever mentioned that my mom is an artist?  Like, a real artist.  Oil paints, watercolor, you name it.  She is so talented.  I've always aspired to dabble in the world of fine art but the most I have ever done is watercolor. 

I found another Spark-related picture in my photo-decluttering. 

This time it was from Donna Downey's mixed media class and I would definatlye place it in the "fine art" category.  It was absolutely my favorite class that we did there.  (Which is funny because it was also the only class that we were late too and I just had to kind of jump in and figure out what the heck everyone else was doing.)

Basically we used a gel medium to adhere some regular old tissue paper to a canvas.  Then we used pan pastels (I think faber castell?) and stencils to make the hearts.  Then the rest of it was really up to us.  I felt that last year was really a turning point for our family in a lot of ways so I chose colors to express that.  I LOVED how she had us finish with those swirly stamps.  Donna Downey is amazing and I am so lucky that I was not only able to meet her, but to take a class from her. 

 

 

This is the last of my Spark projects that I have a picture of.  Did I also mention that they cancelled Spark this year?  Truth be told it probably wasn't the best year to go, both time-wise and financially (I forgot how expensive having a baby is!!)  But looking through these pictures has really made me want to go back.  Where else would I have had an opportunity to take a mixed-media class from the expert in person?! (She's from back east, I think.)  Or felt soap?

 

By the way, it's one of the only things I've made that I actually display in our home.  I also asked for a set of pan pastels for my birthday last year but I have yet to use them.

 

Also, the craft room is making major progress.  I am so excited!!

 



Tip of the Week

If you read my personal blog (and have for awhile) then you might remember me talking about my hubby two-toning the paint in our new house a long (like, a long, long, long...) time ago.

While I'm on "my mommy vacation" I've been going through all of my old pictures that I was going to add to a blog "someday" and found these. 

(Actually, the top picture was taken right at the end of his painting project, like, a year and a half ago and he never actually painted the doors until we were finishing my newbies nursery.  Having the doors off in a craft room makes it easier to see all of my stuff.  Which is why my room downstairs may never have doors on the closet.  Anyway.)

(Also the before picture was taken during the day and the after at night.  Also I had the foresight to take the after picture before all of the tractor decals went up for newbies room.)

Before:

 After:

I think it is an amazing difference!  We bought our home as a spec home so we had zero input into how we wanted things.  Luckily, we liked 80% of how things were.  Obviously, or we wouldn't have bought it.  I loved the wall color at first.  It is that sort of dark clay color that is so popular now.  Plus it has that old-world-plaster-type finish.  But it was all monotone and after living here for a few months, I realized how dark it was and we felt like we were living in a cave.  The obvious solution was to just two-tone it (i.e. paint the trim and doors semi-glossy white.)  I don't remember it being terribly expensive.  And it seemed pretty easy.

I say seemed because I actually didn't even lift a finger for the entire project. 

I'm grateful my husband likes to paint so much.

Anyway, an easy solution to drab paint: try two-toning!