All of the projects raised money and they were fun for me to make/ put together. It was fun to see that people did really like them and made me think that gifts like that might be appreciated.
Have you been working on any projects lately?
Showing posts with label kitchen matters. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kitchen matters. Show all posts
Project time Tuesday
All of the projects raised money and they were fun for me to make/ put together. It was fun to see that people did really like them and made me think that gifts like that might be appreciated.
Have you been working on any projects lately?
Tropical Traditions Golden Flax Seed {Review and Giveaway}
This past week I had the pleasure of receiving a box in the mail (don't you just love boxes in the mail!?) containing Whole Golden Flax Seed from Tropical Traditions. This, like everything I have ever received from Tropical Traditions, is a high quality product. It is packaged in a nice reclosable bag and the flax seeds are of great quality.
I have used flax seeds for quite a number of years for several reasons:
- Flaxseed oil is one of the richest sources of OMEGA-3 fatty acid, Alpha-linolenic acid (ALA) an ESSENTIAL FATTY ACID (EFA). This fatty acid is considered essential, meaning that your body cannot make it but requires it and so must derive all of it from the diet. The average American diet is lacking in this fat. Supportive but not conclusive research shows that consumption of EPA and DHA omega-3 fatty acids may reduce the risk of coronary heart disease. One serving of Organic Whole Flaxseed provides 9 grams of EPA and DHA omega-3 fatty acids.
- Golden Flaxseed is unique in that 48% of its total fat content is omega-3 fatty acids.
- Flaxseed contains very high amounts of DIETARY FIBER, both SOLUBLE and INSOLUBLE. Golden Flaxseed is 28%-35% fiber, 1/3 of which is soluble, and the other 2/3 insoluble. Soluble fiber also plays an important role in maintaining the “good bacteria” in our bowel, like Lactobacillus Acidophilus and Bifidobacteria. Insoluble fiber increases the bulk of stools.
- Flaxseed is an outstanding source of many essential nutrients, including: proteins, carbohydrates, minerals, folate, vitamin B-6, pantothenic acid, magnesium, potassium, iron, thiamine, copper, zinc, calcium and phosphorus.
The way that I have found to be the easiest in using flaxseed is simply to add it to all of my baked goods. We I grind my grains I simply grind my flaxseed as well. It is also commonly added to smoothies or to top your morning cereal. It is recommended that you have around 2 tablespoons a day. We don't always get that much but at least we do have it on a regular basis.
Here is a recipe that I made last week using Tropical Traditions Golden Flaxseed:
Rhubarb Cheesecake Bars
Crust:
1/3 cup butter
1 1/4 cup flour
4 tablespoons ground flaxseed
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup oatmeal
Filling:
8 oz. cream cheese OR homemade ricotta cheese (I used the homemade ricotta as we have lots of extra milk just now and to use it I added just a bit of milk and then blended it until smooth)
1/2 cup sugar (you might prefer 3/4 cup but we try to use as little as possible.)
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 1/2 cup rhubarb, cut into small pieces
CRUST: Combine all ingredients and mix until crumbly. Pat half of the mixture into ungreased 9x9 inch cake pan.
FILLING: Combine cheese, sugar, egg and cinnamon, beat until smooth . Add rhubarb and stir to blend .
Pour over crust, top with remaining crust crumbs. Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes. Eat warm or cool. Store in the refrigerator.
Would you like to buy Golden Flaxseed? You can find it here. It is currently priced at $10.30 for the 1 lb. package.
One person also has the opportunity to win a package!
If you would like to try to win please leave a comment on this post. Leave a relevant comment and please don't just say "I would love to win". :-) I would love to hear how you like to use flaxseed or how you have made your diet healthier or something like that.
Make sure to leave a way for me to contact you should you win! (If there is not contact information then you cannot win.)
~If you would like an additional chance to win please "Like" Tropical Traditions on facebook. Leave another comment letting me know that you did that. Thanks!
~For another chance to win you can subscribe to Tropical Traditions e-mail newsletter. Again leave me another comment letting me know that you did that.
This giveaway will end on June 2nd. so be sure to comment before then.
~For another chance to win you can subscribe to Tropical Traditions e-mail newsletter. Again leave me another comment letting me know that you did that.
This giveaway will end on June 2nd. so be sure to comment before then.
What works for me in using whole grains...
A reader of this blog recently asked about our buying of wheat and other grains, storing them and making bread with them. So I decided I would write a post to answer the questions as much as I can and link to places where I have already answered the questions. So here we go...
Buying Grain:
We buy our wheat, corn, rye and some dry beans from a grain elevator. My Dad was the one who first found the place we use but if you live in an area that grows grain I would just check around. Look in the phone book or just stop in at one (they are pretty easy to spot in a town because of their tall elevators) and check and see if they sell grain that can be used for human consumption. This has been by far the cheapest way we have found grain. This last time I spent $13 for bags of wheat that were 50 or 60 lbs. Sometimes we have paid as much as $22 (that was only once) and often it is even cheaper- I think $8 per bag is the least we have paid. Corn cost me $8 a bag this time.
Other options for buying grain are:
- Azure Standard, what I can't get at the grain elevator I usually buy there (Oatmeal, rice, etc. but they sell wheat and such as well.).
- We also used to buy our wheat through the local health food co-op. They would give me a little discount when I would buy a 50 lb. bag at a time.
-
Making Pita Bread A friend of mine who lives in the twin cities (where we are not aware of any grain elevators) has bought her wheat for a pretty good price through a local bread bakery (or something like that). Just start asking around locally and you might find a very economical source.
My dad has been able to get a bunch of food grade 5 gallon buckets for free from some restaurants in town. We wash them out and dry them very thoroughly and put our grain in them. I have an out of the way spot in my laundry room where I put the buckets full of grain. I also will put some of the grain in smaller one gallon (ice cream ) buckets. As long as they are dry and air tight it has lasted very well for us. Some people but sticks of mint gum in the bucket to keep away some sort of bug. We haven't had problems with bugs however.
 |
| Cornbread |
Grinding Grain:
Ken's parents gave a Whisper Mill grain grinder for a wedding gift. As the years have gone by I use it more and more. I have been very happy with it. Grinding your own grain just as you use it allows you to have fresh (not rancid) flours with all their vitamins intact. Here is a post of mine with more details on grinding grain.
 |
| Whole Wheat Bread |
Using Whole Grain Flours:
I do usually have white flour on hand but I use our own whole grain flours more than 10 times as much as the white flour. I just put it in place of the white flour in pretty much every recipe I make. Sometimes I will put a little white flour in as well but not always. It does taste a little different and sometimes it can be drier so adding some extra moisture can sometimes be nice but overall I like the taste much better. If whole grains are a new thing for your family then you might want to slowly add whole grain flours and then start using more of them and less of the white flour just gradually. Taste buds will adjust.
Here are some recipes that I do like to use for making our wholewheat breads:
- Our normal Whole Wheat Bread.
This is how using whole grains works for me! Let me know if you have any questions and please feel free to share any of your own tips!
Happenings on our Homestead
I love Spring! The excitement of things growing again and it being almost time to garden again is so fun! I love the wildly variable weather, the sunshine and the rain and even the occasional snow. I am so glad God gave us seasons.
I have been having fun lately doing springy activities. Last week I finally planted my seeds -the ones that need to be planted ahead of time inside.
I planted tomatoes, peppers, watermelon, cantaloupe, stevia, some flowers, broccoli, kohlrabi, cabbage and probably some things that I can't remember now. I also repotted my aloe vera. I had four little plants in a little pot. My sister Anna and I have been learning how good they are for you and so I want to encourage mine to get bigger so that I can really use them. I also repotted my banana tree that was desperately needing some new dirt and a new pot. I am hoping they all grow and flourish!
I decided to set them up on top of my fridge to sprout (I did have to do some stacking to make them all fit but as soon as they get very big I will move them to a southern window). I discovered that a few of them have already sprouted. I love it when they are quick like that!
Another of those Spring jobs that needed done was turning my compost pile. Here is the "beautiful" collection from the winter. I have two bins (that I made from pallets) side by side so I just flipped it over into the other one, while adding some rabbit droppings (Clover is gracious to supply those) and other natural matter from our garden cleanup.
Aaron helped me work on the compost bin. His motivation was the fact that we get to babysit a baby goat next weekend and we thought we might be able to turn the empty bin into a temporary shelter.
I love the concept of composting because God turns our yucky scraps and the weeds we pull up into good rich dirt. We like to use that dirt on our garden and to put around our fruit trees.
Speaking of fruit trees, The plum trees which my Dad ordered for me along with his order came on Thursday. We planted them in our yard. Now we have 3 apple trees, 2 cherry trees, 2 plum trees, a grape vine,a couple of wimpy blueberry bushes, a few raspberry bushes and strawberry plants which feed the chipmunks. We aren't getting any fruit yet -except a few raspberries last year and there were two apples on one tree last year but some animal ate them before we could- but there is a lot of potential and I am excited about the possibilities!
Another "homesteading" (?) project was our venture in making candy from our maple syrup. A neighbor came over and we had fun messing with a couple different recipes. It all tastes yummy but not everything sat up properly. Oh well, live and learn. This recipe did work well.
And as far as this picture.... We are so enjoying the pussy willows we picked some to have inside. I love the way they look and the natural rustic feel they add to our home.
I am linking up to:New Life on a Homestead
The Prairie Homestead
A fun and productive day.
Because I enjoyed it I decided that I will create a Journal entry of it here. This may be long and not so interesting to you (you don't have to read it if you don't want to) but maybe you would like to have a glimpse of a Saturday at our house. If so read on.
On Saturdays Ken and I give ourselves the okay to sleep in. We often stay up rather late on Friday nights and don't mind getting some extra sleep on Saturday mornings. The kids (especially the boys) tend to get up even earlier than usual on Saturdays. I find that funny since I have to encourage them (well not usually Jonathan, but the other three) to get out of bed on school days but on Saturday they are up and busy around 7 am. The kids generally just play in their rooms Legos or geckos are fun and Mara likes to lay in bed and read, this morning they had the train set spread all over when I got up there. Their rooms are above ours and so I start hearing them and slowly waking up but we didn't actually get up until around 9 am.
After getting up I had my prayer and bible reading time while Ken exercised and showered. Then we had breakfast of sausage (that is a treat and the kids were excited!) and a Serbian Pancake. I had found the recipe in the book that we recently read about Serbia. It is rather like a Crepe and we enjoyed them with raspberries and powdered sugar.
Ken took a quick trip to Ace to get some parts for putting in my new kitchen faucet (the old one had a bad drip problem). Mara went with him (later he had to make another trip and took Megan- he prefers to take one child at a time on shopping trips so that he can still think). Ken and Jonathan worked hard and got the faucet installed and I am so delighted! I love the way it works. The sprayer is the end of the faucet so you can pull it out and have the same pressure as the normal faucet but you can reach up high enough to fill a large kettle or five gallon bucket. There is also a handy dandy soap dispenser which looks so classy for holding my dish soap. :-)
Ken is not all that fond of plumbing but I am so thankful that he is able to work at it and get it done. We are hoping that Jonathan might take a liking to it (Ken thinks he has a knack for it) and before long he can do all the faucet replacing and such that needs done.
Some of the other things we were able to get done today were:
- Aaron and I cleaned up the compost bin. I was working on it in the rain and having a ton of fun which Ken found very humorous. He has a hard time understanding how I can enjoy tossing old egg shells, peelings, dirt and manure around. I just love knowing the potential of helping my garden that it has and I am so enjoying getting to work in the garden again!
- The kids and I also worked at cleaning up the garden in a beginning preparation for planting.
- Jonathan and I cleaned the bathrooms.
- Ken fixed the bathroom closet door.
- Ken and Jonathan replaced the toilet seat.
- I swept and mopped our very dirty floors.
- Mara worked at sewing a raincoat for her doll.
- Megan cleaned her room.
- I worked at cleaning up and out the files on our computer.
- Ken worked on some business on his laptop.
- I answered some e-mails.
- I cleaned out the cupboard under the sink.
Besides the fun working we did together we also did some fun playing together.
The girls and I had a fun walk in the rain down by the swamp. It is pretty full right now and looked pretty in the rain. The girls were looking pretty too! The picture of Mara at the top of this post is from when we were down there.
The real treat of the walk was getting to see a beaver. Mara noticed it swimming and eating and alerted me to it and then it came over fairly near to where Mara was up on a log fallen into the swamp (I wish she would have had the camera) and it got up on a log too and did some eating/cleaning up there. It was so cute. I did take a picture but my zoom didn't really allow me to capture a very good picture. You will have to work hard to see him in the photo below.
We had lunch (leftovers) at around 2pm and then I read to the kids though the boys skipped out on some of it to go outside and play catch with Ken. The girls and I had a fun time reading the Keeper of the Bees together and then had a quick nap.
We worked on more of the stuff I mentioned above in the afternoon and then I made a beef stew and biscuits for supper.
After supper the boys really wanted to play a family game of baseball. The girls weren't interested (Mara wanted to sew and Megan wanted a bath) but Ken and I did join them. Megan did end up watching from the living room window. She told me she was on my team and she cheered and danced quite enthusiastically! We had fun hitting some balls and running around the bases. It was good exercise and quite a bit of fun. I was amazed at how much the boys have improved. They have been practicing a lot lately.
Tonight was when I finally mopped. It was nice to get that done. The whole day felt very satisfactory as far as getting things done. There are still oodles of things that could be done (the windows are really dirty, the living room needs vacuumed, there are a few dirty dishes on the counter) but I am so thankful for what God did help us to do and am looking forward to more fun days of work and play next week.
What do you usually do on a Saturday?
Homesteading fun!
I am once again joining Homestead Revival's homestead Barn Hop. We have had a lot of fun "homesteading" activities this week, for the most part in thanks to my parents. We are so blessed to be able to live near them and get to enjoy their homestead with them. They are way more advanced in "homesteading" than we are and we enjoy spending time over there and are blessed that they share much of the harvests with us too.
My Dad's goats having been kidding (that means having their babies) the last couple of weeks. I believe there are 13 babies so far. Last week we went over for a morning so the kids (my human ones) could have fun playing with and helping name his kids (the goat ones).
Megan wanted to hold a baby. I helped her get it in her arms and then it decided to suck on her ear. She wasn't too fond of that but found it rather funny when Grandpa told her that the baby was trying to find some milk. That baby had "lost" it's mother. No mother was claiming it and Dad had been very busy when the goats were arriving (with church work) and so had somehow gotten mixed up on which baby went with each mother. The baby goat (who Megan named Daisy Flower) is now getting bottle fed.
Mara got to help give Daisy her first bottle.
All of my kids have fun holding the babies. They each named one and left the others for cousins to name.
With the coming of baby goats, my parents now have goats milk again. We are very blessed to have them share with us. When the goats are dry I drive 20 minutes (each way) to a natural dairy farm to get milk but I am happy to have that chore over with again for a while. Mom and Dad also share eggs with us. Farm fresh eggs taste so much better than the ones from the store! Also in the picture is garlic which also came from Mom and Dad's. They raise a big crop.
Today we went over to my parents to help some more (we had gone over at the beginning of the season too) with maple syruping. Today was our first boiling day. I would guess nearly 100 gallons of sap has been collected so far (today and earlier) and it was time to boil.
We cleaned up the boiling pan, set up the wood stove and then poured the sap in.
The boys and Megan enjoyed working on the fire.
Mara thought she would try a taste of the sap.
We did a lot of hauling! It was so fun to get out in the sunshiny weather and get some exercise and fresh air.
Those are some of the fun activities we have done in the last week. We have more fun things lined up for this week. God has certainly blessed us with a wonderful life.
If you have kids that love to read (or if you would like them to love to read!) don't miss my current giveaway of two Imagination Station books!
Ultimate Blog Party {It's a lunch date at my place}
Hello. I am so glad you stopped by to visit! Whether you come often or this is your first time (thanks to the Ultimate Blog Party), I am glad to have you here. Please come in, I can't wait to visit and get to know you better! (Side note- this is what I love about blogging. Not only can I stay in contact with family and friends across the world- I can meet new friends too!)
In case we have never met before I guess I had better do some introductions... My name is Abbi and I am happily married to my husband of 12+ years, Ken. I am very blessed to be the stay at home and homeschooling mom of 4 beautiful children, Mara, Jonathan, Aaron and Megan. If you have kids I hope that you brought them with you as my kids would love to play with them!
 |
| Mara-11, Aaron-7, Megan- almost 5 and Jonathan-9 |
So lets send the kids outside to play in the tree fort if it is warm or they can play inside if it is cool. Come to our living room and have a seat and lets get busy visiting!
What would you like to visit about? It is my goal in my visiting (whether face to face or on this blog) to say things that encourage and build up others and glorify my heavenly Father. I know that unfortunately I don't always succeed but that is my goal.
I have many, many interests (I think the woman in Proverbs 31 did too!) so I am pretty sure we have at least something in common. Maybe you would like to talk about....
- Homeschooling. I would love to hear how you do it and what books you love. I enjoy talking about the ways we learn creatively, making the world our classroom. We love reading around here and I would be glad to show you some of the ones we have really enjoyed and learned from. It is always fun to get together with another homeschooler and pick each other's brains.
- Gardening. I would love to give you a tour but it is still to early to plant here. In fact there is still quite a bit of snow on the garden. I did just get my seeds in the mail though and I will be starting stuff inside right away. I like to garden very frugally and naturally. I love to be able to get a lot of produce from it with which I can feed my family. We do also enjoy having quite a few flowers around our place and we keep adding more fruit trees and bushes about every year in hopes of someday having a lot of our own fruits. I am also studying up on and dreaming of keeping bees which will provide both honey, wax and pollination for our garden.
- Living frugally. I very much enjoy getting to visit with other mothers and sharing tips on ways to live better on less. To me living frugally is not a chore but rather a really fun challenge! I love learning ways to spend less on food though the prices go up- and this while we eat healthier. I also love to challenge myself to make most of our gifts, save on electricity, go as long as possible without buying clothes or just go without shopping in general. So many ideas! I love to hear yours and I try to share mine so that we can all be better stewards of what God has given us.
- Making things. In fact, if you want, I could pull out my stamps and stuff and we could have fun making cards together. I love to keep my hands busy and I also really enjoy looking around our home and seeing things that we have made ourselves. To me it makes a home so much more personal to have much of the furnishings handmade.I have many interests in making things- sewing, knitting, crocheting, floral work, basket making, quilting, painting and more...
- Baking and cooking. If you ask me if I love to cook, "Yes" wouldn't be my first response. I have however learned to enjoy it by making it fun for me. I do a lot of cooking as we eat at home most of the time and I like to have homemade meals. What makes it fun for me is in the process of creating meals that are healthy for my family and help us to keep our food costs low. I also make things interesting in the kitchen by making up my own recipes, figuring out ways to use what we have an abundance of and by using our meals to further our education. I enjoy combining what we are learning in school with our foods. (Such as having ethnic foods to go along with our geography.)
- Raising children, being a good wife,natural health, organizing, taking care of the earth God has given us and not being wasteful or maybe we could even have a Bible study. There is so much to talk about you might just have to come back again!
So, what would you like to visit about? I would love to have you introduce yourself and tell what your favorite topic is in the comments! I look forward to meeting you all! Thanks so much for visiting!
Homestead Barn Hop
A while back I found the blog "Homestead Revival" it is one I have enjoyed as the writer and I share many of the same interests and goals. On Mondays she a few others homesteading bloggers are hosting a Homestead Barn Hop where they encourage others to link up posts telling about their "homesteading" activities of the past week. That sounds like fun to me so I have decided to join in.
To me the idea behind a homestead (by the way, I looked up the term in the dictionary and it simply said "Any dwelling with land and buildings where a family makes its home") is having a place where you can try to go back to the basics. I think of a homesteader as someone who tries to produce as much of their own food as possible, make much of their own things and live a simple lifestyle. I was very blessed to grow up in this way. When I was a baby my parents bought 40 acres of land where they slowly (without going into debt) built our home and outbuildings, they raised goats, poultry and other animals at times to provide meat, milk and eggs, they have large gardens to supply much of their produce and make a lot of things on their own. I very much enjoy this way of living and even though my little family hasn't done things on our own quite to that level we are doing what we can on our 1 1/2 acres.
Here are a few of the "homesteading" activities we have enjoyed this past week:
: : Making cinnamon raisin bread with wheat we ground.
I have been reading a book on Survival skills out loud to the kids and after reading the book on fire we decided we needed to brush up on our fire starting skills. If you are in an emergency situation starting a fire can often be very helpful for keeping you warm (this is especially important in Northern areas such as we live in), cooking food and heating water and also helping you feel more secure, safe and happy. Many people in emergency situations are not that good at starting fires, they get frantic and they don't do a good job of it often wasting the few matches they may have. Practice makes a person much more confident.
We decided to have a race the boys against girls and I was the advisor to both teams. They were each given 5 matches and instructions to use as few as possible. The boys made a new fire pit and the girls used our existing fire pit. They had to find dry material outside in our snowy conditions to make their fire with.
: : Making Waffles from wheat I ground and enjoying them with Maple Syrup.
We had run out of Maple Syrup for the year but when we went over to help my parents with the tree tapping Mom found out that I was out and sent me home some extra they had from other years. We do love our real maple syrup!
: : Crocheting a rag rug.
I am looking forward to sharing some of our "homesteading" activities on as many Mondays as I can. Have you been working on any "back to the basics" activities lately?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
