Honey custard

I love, love, LOVE custards! I have never made one at home because I thought they were too difficult, and 'tempering' eggs does NOT sound like fun to me! Well, I came across this honey custard at Cook.Eat.Think it's foolproof and simply divine! You MUST try it!
Resist the urge to eat it right out of the oven! It needs to cool to room temperature, or better yet, let it chill in the fridge a couple of hours. We drizzled honey over ours before eating!

I'm not green...I'm just cheap!

There is something about a Swiffer duster and mop that just make the kids want to clean! A while back, I posted about making your own REUSABLE dusters (Click here for the tutorial!) This morning I sewed a few more dusters for our stash when I thought, hey, why not make some mop replacements, too? You'll need half a yard of that fuzzy fleece blanket material-it will make about six mops!
First, take your mop head and cut around it leaving approx. 3-4 inches extra for the width:

Fold the ends over the mop and pin, then sew around the outer edges to make a pocket for your mop:

Slip in the mop head and you're ready to clean! When you're done, just throw them in the washer!
The kids LOVE to dust and mop with these things! Maybe it's the supa-stylish colors:

Or maybe it's simply because they make really good weapons after you're done cleaning!


Here's another fabulous tip for all my peeps! Here is a picture of my extremely disgusting microwave:
Embarrassing isn't it? Well, you just fill a cup with water and put in a few slices of citrus zest:

Cook for five minutes and then let the cup sit in the microwave for ten minutes to "steam" the inside. All that crap and crud just melts and easily wipes off with a paper towel! It also leaves behind a nice citrus smell!

I really like this method because there are no chemicals involved that might leach into our food, it REALLY works well....and it's totally cheap!
My work here is done....now go clean your house!!!

Mmmm muffins

Ryan discovered some blackberry bushes in the woods near our house and yesterday he went out and surprised me with some! He only managed to get a couple of cups (because most of them were still unripened!) but it was just enough for some wonderful muffins this morning for breakfast!

While I'm sitting here enjoying my muffin and tea, it just dawned on me that berry picking in the woods is not such a good idea! But Ryan reassured me that he took his BB pistol "just in case" there were snakes out there. Umm, just in case?!?! We both know that there are PLENTY of snakes in the woods! Something makes me think that the berries were only secondary in his excursion...
Ahhhh.....life in the country with boys!

My "new" cabinet

We found a yard sale this morning where I got this super ugly sewing cabinet for a steal at five bucks!

After a coat of paint, new knobs, and some decoupage, I have a new phone/message station for the kitchen!

What happens when little soldiers don't take naps...

...they fall asleep at their posts!
Hopefully, by being under the table, he will avoid detection by the enemy!
(and yes, that gun is as big as he is! YOU try telling him he's only 3!)

I was productive today!

I guess I really should be taking it easy, but when I'm resting, my mind is wandering...not a good thing! Aside from getting the 4000 loads of laundry that have accumulated washed, folded and put away, I have been having doing a little experimenting with the food dehydrator.
Doug's mom gave it to us a couple of months ago because she never used it. I was so excited to get it because I have always wanted one (those late night Ronco commercials still play in my head!) I decided to start out simply by drying some herbs from the garden. They turned out great! Here are some dried sweet basil and cilantro:

Then I saw the recipes in the instructional book for fruit leathers! My kiddos go crazy for the pre-fabbed ones in the store (which I doubt have much fruit in them at all!) So I got some packages of frozen fruits-no sugar added, and went to work! I blended the fruit in the food processor with citrus zests, juice and honey, and I think we came up with some winners!

The tray already in the machine contains strawberries with orange zest and the juice of one orange with 2 tbs of sugar. The one on the right is peach with honey. It is by far my favorite! Only two simple ingredients, but soooo good! The one at the bottom is apple and cinnamon. The one on the left is blueberry with lemon zest and the juice of one lemon and honey.
I felt so good making these because I controlled the ingredients AND the sugar content (or lack thereof!) It will take approx. one day for these to be done and then I will cut them into strips and store in ziplock bags. For more fruit leather recipes and a simple oven drying method, click HERE or HERE

Update on us

Thank you for all the cards, flowers, emails, meals, and most of all, prayers. I do not know how we could have survived the last four days without them. Please continue to pray as we begin healing from this ordeal.

Sunday night, our precious baby - Dominic Philip, was beheld by us. Perfectly formed, perfectly loved, and entrusted back to His Heavenly Father.

I had to have a D&C later that night due to excessive bleeding, but we definitely felt your prayers carry us through that difficult time and I was able to come home after an overnight stay in the hospital.

So we are home, we are healing, and life goes on...

Please pray...

Please pray for us and for repose of the soul of our precious baby.
I had a routine appointment today and the baby had no heartbeat.
Our hearts are broken...
Please continue to pray for us in the days ahead.

Menu Plan Monday

It's another super crazy week in our household! The start of baseball season adds another crunch for time to our already busy schedule! We moved to the country for a simpler lifestyle....um, still waiting for that to happen!

Monday: Chicken fettucine alfredo, salad, garlic bread.
Tuesday: Enchilada casserole. Working day for me so this will go in the crockpot the night before.
Wednesday: Tacos and pintos.
Thursday: Baked penne and salad.
Friday: Homemade pizzas.
Saturday: Hot dogs and tots. Doug has a wedding, I have a class I have to take for work and Kyle has a game! Pray for us!
Sunday: Beef stew and cornbread.

Bubblewrap!

YOU.MUST.DO.THIS.NOW!

Cloth napkins

I came across some of my vintage cloth napkins today. I collected these treasures from yard and estate sales but never used them much because I wanted to "save" them for a special occasion. Who am I kidding? We hardly ever have dinner parties or special luncheons, so I thought I would get a few out to use this next week. I put them in a cute little basket on the edge of the counter and hopefully I'll remember to use them!

Who knows, maybe I can get the boys to start using their napkins and stop wiping their mouths on their sleeves!

Divine Mercy Sunday

Eternal Father, I offer you the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Your dearly beloved son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. In atonement for our sins and for those of the whole world. For the sake of His sorrowful passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.



Read more here: Divine Mercy Sunday

Let's see what's growing in the garden!

Our family garden is coming along really great! All the seeds that were planted have germinated and are surviving the wind coming off the field (in another 4 weeks, the hay will be a nice wind shield!)
The corn has sprouted up nicely. I double planted each spot in case of some of the seeds didn't germinate...they ALL germinated! Now I have to pluck out one of my babies so the other one can thrive :-(

There was also the surprise of a little baby bell pepper growing! I had seen the flower bloom, but thought the plant was too young to actually produce anything!

My fruit trees seem to be happy, too! I thought it would be years before we'd see any apples, but this morning I found a beautiful deep pink blossom (with two more to come!) We still might not get any apples, but the flower show will be really nice!

And here is our ever faithful fig tree. It seemed to have popped out all those leaves overnight! Sonya, if you're reading this, you're going to have to come down this summer and help me make strawberry/fig preserves!

...and yes, that's Shorty's behind you see there in the picture! He was busy chasing the birds out of the yard this morning!

First thrifting of spring!

Found this great platter at the thrift store today. It's hand painted and extremely heavy (and was only three bucks!) When I was checking out, the lady said, "Oh what a pretty tray! With a little touching up it will be perfect!" I'm thinking, touch up? Who the heck would want to do that?

I also got some awesome baskets for .75 cents. Nice big sturdy baskets for books and garden tools.
....Now to get geared up for garage/estate sale season!

Spring Scrapbooking!

I spent the evening digitally scrapbooking our Easter fun. I downloaded a FREE spring kit HERE.
I really prefer digi-scrapping to traditional scrapbooking. First of all, it can all be done for free by downloading different kits online. Second, it took me less than 30 minutes to do these three pages. Third, I can get them printed for less than two bucks a page! I'm all about simple, quick and cheap!