Cooking and Crafting, Crafting and Cooking

The crossbody bag I gave to Emily was no longer working for her, so I had my mom pull one that I'd purchased for later from Sarah's basement.  Once Grace saw it, she wanted one too.  So, when I found one in the clearance room of one of my favorite thrift stores, it was an easy dollar to spend.  

However, when I got home, I saw why it was in the clearance area, as it was fraying along the connection between the strap and purse.  With my sewing machine, it took me less than a minute to reinforce, and she didn't even notice until I pointed it out to her!

I broke out my vinyl cutter to add a personalized decal to my mom's free find for my cousin Acea.

I had to repair another rip on my favorite jeans.  And sadly, it's currently back in my repair pile, but I'm going to need a large donation piece from some ripped jeans to repair along the side that my purse rubs up against, as there are many small holes as well as thin spots.  Luckily, rummage sales are starting to surface!

This year, so far, the rule has been, that if you have a snow day, you get to plan a meal to cook!  Emily chose a thai dish to make, and it was liked enough by everyone that I made it again a few weeks later!

But, we don't eat fancy every night, lest you be deceived, spaghettio night gets 'dressed up' with a basil leaf, but they are still spaghettios.

Alice and Emily's eye appointment was pushed back from December, thanks to our changing insurance, to January.  While we were there, I was telling them about an impactful meme that I'd seen.  Pretty much that the internet was a 'place' we would go, while on a pc or laptop, but then we would turn it off and go do something else.  It wasn't always avialable in our hands.  

Anyhow, the same article mentioned the quizzes we'd take then, and so I was telling them about how we would take and make all sorts of dumb quizzes.  The example I gave was "what kind of toast are you?"  So, we spent the rest of our visit taking quizzes for each other to figure out what type of toast we are.  Turns out I'm condensed milk toast.  

Well, I'd never heard of such a thing, so at home, I looked up a recipe for said toast, and made some.  I can now say that it's not bad.  It's not my new favorite, and I'd rather just eat the straight milk, but not inedible.

A second repair on William's pants.  Sadly, this embroidery floss was cut into tiny strips, big enough for only a single stitch per needle threading, so it was slow going!  But, I've started bringing my mending to my weekly mom's meetings, and so it's really pleasant to chat and repair simultaneously!  = )

Grace checked out a cookbook, and really, desperately wanted to make the cupcake recipe.  I was in and out of the kitchen, but she did it almost entirely by herself!

Her biggest issue was that she didn't know that there was a difference between sugar and powdered sugar, so her icing was kind of crunchy.  Aside from that, they came out really tasty. = )

William's snow day recipe called for a rotisserie chicken.  Sadly, my Kroger delivery did not contain said chicken, so I ran by Carl's on my way to collect the twins after school, and they had one single one left!!!

So, William was able to make the pizza for dinner afterall!

I still have two, very productive, Basil plants producing copious amounts of basil on my counter, so I've been drying it and bottling it up.  Well, we didn't use much of the fresh cilantro that we bought for last week's snow day meal, so I looked up to see if I could dry it in the microwave, the same way as the basil, and I can!!!

I didn't get through it all, because cilantro leaves are much smaller than Basil, so it's far more tedious, but I'll try to dry a few platefuls a day, so as not to waste it!

If luck holds, we'll have another snow day Thursday, with a new child made meal! ; )

later days 

SNOW DAY!!!!

On Thursday, the weather forecast started to call for a pretty nasty storm that was due to come through Friday afternoon.  Both of the kids' districts cancelled school for Friday the night before, but we had almost finished our normal bedtime routine by the time Grace and Juliet's school cancelled, so we didn't announce it, and instead just got a good nights' sleep.  = )

I woke before Billy's alarm, since mine usually goes off a few minutes before his, despite having turned off my alarms.

So, what did we do with the day?  Well, After pushing through the laundry, and unloading the dishwasher, and cleaning/polishing the bathroom sink countertop, and refilling the soap, and showering, and bringing up a new gallon of milk, and refilling the oxiclean container, and changing the handtowels, and cutting the basil plants to dry out the leaves, I decided to make kartoffelbrot!

First step was to peel the potatoes.  We had only used 7 of the potatoes in the 10lb bag that I bought, so it took me a while to peel the rest. 

Since my compost bag was full, I took it out, as well as the trash and recycling, and brought in the empty bin from the road.  Luckily, a lot of the snow we had fall the day before, had melted.

The recipe recommended using the water from the boiled potatoes, but was taking forever to cool, and I didn't want to kill of my yeast, so I let the snow help me drop the temperature quickly.

My first loaf didn't rise very well, and was a little overcooked. = ( So, after loading up my dehydrator to make another round of potato flour, I took the potatoes that didn't fit, and made another loaf of kartoffelbrot.

This time, I was very careful with the yeast, and made sure to do everything according to the directions*.  And, it turns out, kartoffelbrot just doesn't rise much!  Both loaves came out similar in outside doneness, but was quite soft and tasty inside!  So, now we have two loaves.  Emily is a fan. = )

The dishwasher has been running non-stop today.  4 loads of dishes through the machine, and at least as many handwashed loads (though, those were admittedly smaller.)

Grace spent part of her snow day sewing a happy mushroom family!

I emptied all the hampers today, finishing probably 5 or 6 loads of laundry.  One of those loads had Billy's repaired undershirt, which had a few new holes.  Some of which were torn along the patch of the other repair, where the fabric was too weak to support the repair.  So, I now have layered patches in places, as well as a few new patches, and a repair along the edge.  Billy wasn't bothered by the first round of repairs, but this will be even thicker, and I had to patch across seams.  So, it seems that this shirt may be headed to the pile to repair the next round of shirts.  We'll see how it wears for him!

He had a second under shirt with a few small holes that was a quick patch.  

And the snow?  Well, it didn't start until 2ish.  The roads didn't look all that bad at either school's pick-up time, but I certainly wasn't bothered by the snow day. = )

Grace wanted to cook dinner tonight, and picked hamburger helper.  She did most of the stirring, but I would consider myself and equal partner with prep work & measuring & clean up. = )

Billy's commute took an extra 10 minutes, since the roads started getting slick and slushy by 5.

I took pictures of our snow gauge in irregular intervals.  What can I say, I was busy!

2:50pm, 4:41pm, 5:26pm, 7:28pm

 

We are expecting more snow tonight, so we will have to shovel tomorrow.  I don't think we're really poised to lose power, but we filled the tub, just in case. Oh, and we have plenty of bread. ; )

Now my blog is up to date, and I finished the third and final book in my series.  So, I'm going to be feeling accomplished, but dreading the snow removal tomorrow.

later days

*The directions specifically say to put the seam side up, so that the loaf is not rounded, but I like a round loaf, so on the first round I cooked it round up.  The second round, I flipped it according to the recipe, and it came out just as done, but not rounded.

Creative Endeavors

Grace really wanted to make snack for her class one day, so she used some corn tortillas and wrapped up meat and cheese.  I helped her with the toothpicks and rolling, but she did most of it on her own!

Alice will get up early to cook for her band classmates (it's a small group, because it's only the middle school band students who are also in algebra.)  She wanted some sugar cookie mix, so I bought her some, and she attempted to use the drill to mix the icing.  It didn't work very well, but I was pleased with her problem solving attempt.

A few weeks later, Grace wanted to make snack again, but this time was able to rope Juliet in as well.  They made 'dirt cups' with pudding and oreos and gummy worms.  We had plenty of the last two, but the pudding was in short supply. 4-6 packs would have been better.   At least I'll know for next time!

The twins were off on one of the days that I made a BJs run, and at the exit, Grace wanted to stop by to get some materials to build a fort.  We found some good options and they were both quite happy in their creations.

One of Alice's online communities was having a pumpkin carving contest, and there was also going to be an in person contest here in our village, so she requested 2 pumpkins to cut up and combine.  She worked hard on her creation.

It didn't quite turn out the way she had envisioned, it was supposed to be a dragon.  Sadly, it was mildewed and gross long before the in person contest, so she only had an opportunity to submit it online.

I found some cute jello molds with Halloween shapes.  Grace and Alice both took turns making a round of Jello.  I liked the candy eye that Grace added on!

One day Emily really wanted some chocolate syrup to put on her banana.  I told her she should make the start of the no-bake cookies, as it' a good syrup.  She did, and then finished making the cookies, as not to waste the rest of the syrup.

I'm not sure what the big girls were practicing for, maybe they were just having fun, but they enjoyed face-painting!

Grace and Juliet got and invitation to a birthday party on the Tuesday before the party.  I didn't have any solid plans for that Wednesday, so I spent the day sewing up a set of bags and cord wraps.  After school (it was an early release Wednesday for them) we went to the Dollar Tree so that they could each pick out two things to give her.  They both opted for a balloon and bag of candy.  

I thought it came out really well, and they had a good time at the party!  They were the only guests, since it was the Sunday before Halloween, and short notice, but they didn't complain.

At the bookfair one of Grace and Juliet's classmates bought a candy machine.  I was working that afternoon (when they were excited about it, and desperate to buy it) so I was able to inspect the object in question.  Y'all, it was such a cheap product.  I am flabbergasted that a toy like that would fetch $18.  I do realize that they are selling to children, but it is a book fair!!!  

The girls looked up a similar toy on Amazon, which was still $12, which is just so expensive for cheap plastic that is just going to break with any sort of harsh treatment.

I had bought a bag of M&Ms that day at Aldi, so I encouraged them to make their own out of recycling!  

They roped Emily into it, and made a device that had a turning component and everything!

It turned out super cute!  It was really neat, until they mixed skittles in with the M&Ms (ew!)  They played with it the entire day, and at the end of the weekend, when it was no longer exciting, I recycled the components again.  And it was a major win for me, as I've not heard another peep about the book fair one!

One of the shirts that Emily inherited from my mom developed a hole.  I had it in my mending pile, and finally pulled it out to work on while I watched through CB Strike again.

I just did a small embroidery stitch, but the material around the hole is very thin, I told her I don't' know how long it will last before another hole appears.  She's happy for now though and there's no longer a hole! = )

When I was in Berlin, Christin pointed out that I had a hole in my skirt.  I just pulled my shirt down over it, but when I took it off to inspect it, I found that it was not just one hole, but several from large to tiny!!  It looks like it was caught in the zipper of our suitcase, and I would think that would be more of the TSA's m.o. than mine, so I'm blaming them!

Either way, I had a hole that needed to be mended.  I had an article about using embroidery to repair holes in clothing, and a separate article about a Japanese method called Shashiko which uses geometric patterned thread lines to mend a garment.  I opted to combine the methods into my own strange conglomeration.

The tip that was the most helpful is to pick a repair fabric that is lighter weight than the original.  I had some silk scraps in my scrap pile, so that's what I used.

My chalk lines did not stay on very well. = (

I was pleased with the final product, or at least happy to no longer have a hole!!!  I'm hoping that I won't have to repair it again for a while, but won't be able to test it out until summer.  Since we're averaging in the 50s now, I'm not willing to try it out just yet. ; )

I bought the twins a used cotton candy machine for $5 at a thrift store!  When I went to test it out I saw that you could put in hard candies as well as the candy floss sugar. After checking out the prices on Amazon for the sugar containers, I decided that hard candy was the way to go!  

We didn't get any hard candies from the trunk or treat, except for lollipops!  So, when I failed to get Billy the brewery for his Halloween village from Menards (they were sold out, and I had a rebate slip burning a hole in my pocket) I grabbed a giant bag of dum dums.

First step was to sort.  They even have a cotton candy flavored one, which will be perfect for Christmas morning!

I has to heat up for 10 minutes before putting in the candy!

Billy picked sour apple for the trial.  Time to crunch it up!

1 Tablespoon at a time!

Success!

8 lollipops made quite a bit, but it was messy!!!  We'll have to set the machine in a box during the holiday, because lollipop pieces flew everywhere!

Considering one of my shower curtains doesn't even use shower curtain holders, I feel like I use them for an awful lot in my life!

I bought some 'shoe keepers' for our snow boots, because the smell was a little much.  I didn't like that we would just have to set them inside the shoe rack though, because the racks get really wet once the snow arrives.  I dug out a basket from my pile, and it worked nicely.  I did end up trading out the red basket for a black one though.

Emily and Avia found a jacket with her school logo on it, but it was for a softball player. For $5, they bought it, and Emily added it to my pile with a request that I change it to Cross Country, as one of her Christmas gifts!

The first step was taking out the original embroidery.  Thankfully, it was embroidered after the jacket was fully assembled, so I was able to access both sides of the thread.

After 6 or 7 episodes of CB Strike: done!

Step two was aligning the original embroidery with the new.  It was tricky, especially with the metal snaps on the jacket, but I think I got it pretty darn close!  And, despite the fact that I can see all of the things that aren't perfect about it, I think Emily will be pleased. = )

This season is really full of fun crafts and activities!

I'm attempting to do a Secondhand Christmas for my crew this year.  I don't want to buy any of the 'trendy' (aka cheap) things on Amazon, but rather used gifts that fit the bill!

I'm finding that some of the components are going to have to be new, like film for the $10 Polaroid go camera I scored for Grace last Friday. And secondhand Children's books in Russian are proving particularly elusive.  But that's still less waste than also buying the camera new or buying all the books new!  And it's stretched my creative capacity as well, which I enjoy.

Here's to more thrift store finds!

later days