Tiny Dancer

No, she wasn't lost at the end. She just couldn't figure out how to get over to where we were sitting. In the end, she didn't want to sit with us anyway. She wanted to keep her front row seat with the other girls as they watched the remaining performances.

Snow days

Despite being from South Dakota, I loathe the cold and swear I was meant to be born in the tropics, I can deal with frigid temperatures as long as there is snow. Last week, I got my wish...5+ inches of snow. Yes, this pales in comparison to the snowfalls further north, but it was something and we were going to play. They even closed the schools and Rob didn't have to work for two days, all for a little snow.

Thanksgiving tip + recipe for leftovers

As I was finalizing my Thanksgiving grocery list I thought I would share a juicy turkey tip: For about ten years, I've been roasting my turkeys, breast side down for the first hour to hour and a half. Then I flip it over until the turkey is done to brown the breasts. It's kinda' tricky to flip the bird (well, maybe not for some people, it seems to come rather easy to some), but if you have a pair of silicone oven mitts or one mitt and a heavy duty set of tongs it's not too difficult. Cooking the turkey "upside down" Always makes for a nice juicy turkey. The breasts are never dry. Sometimes I brine the turkey prior to roasting and that makes for a tasty turkey as well. However, if you buy a turkey that has already been injected (most found in the grocery store are) then don't bother with the brine or you'll end up with really salty turkey, blech. I prefer to not add stuffing to the turkey (I know that's a sin to some of you). Instead, I stuff a couple of celery ribs, carrots, a quartered onion, fresh sage, rosemary, and thyme sprigs and crushed garlic cloves into the cavity. Then I slice several garlic cloves and place the slices under the skin all around the bird, brush it with melted butter and season it with salt and pepper. I do baste it every 30-60 minutes with chicken broth and dry white wine

Save your turkey carcass and make homemade turkey stock. Or, better yet, make homemade turkey noodle soup. Yum!

For the soup:

If possible, save half of the drippings from the roasted turkey for the turkey stock. I even use the leftover gravy as well. Don't worry about picking the bird clean when you carve it, that just means more meat to flavor your stock. This might sound gross, but the skin from the roasted bird also adds GREAT flavor to the stock. You just skim all the yucky stuff from the stock as is bubbles in the pot. Everything will be removed from the stock before you actually make the soup. Also, make sure you have a pot large enough to hold the bird carcass (sounds really bad) with enough water to cover it entirely.

Ingredients

1 Whole chicken (4-5 lbs) or 4-5 lbs. chicken parts or one turkey carcass

5-6 carrots

4-5 celery stalks (one or two with lots of leaves)

1 large onion, quartered

3 Tbsp. butter

2 large leeks, split in half lengthwise, then thinly sliced into half-moons
4 cloves garlic, minced

1 tsp. thyme

2 bay leaves

Salt and pepper to taste

Place chicken/turkey in large pot. Add just enough water to cover the chicken. Place on burner over medium-high heat and bring to a boil (make sure chicken doesn't stick to the bottom of your pot). Boil for 30 minutes, while skimming the impurities from the top. Reduce heat to medium and add two whole carrots, one or two whole celery stalks with leaves, the quartered onion, thyme, bay leaves, salt and pepper. Simmer for 3 hours, stirring occasionally. Remove chicken/turkey to a platter and allow it to cool. Strain the vegetables from chicken stock, making sure to save every last drop of stock in another pot or bowl. This stock will be the base for your soup and can be used in any recipe calling for chicken stock.

After chicken has cooled, remove remaining turkey/chicken from the bone and shred or dice it. Take care to feel for any tiny bones or cartilage and discard them. Place pot on stove with the strained stock and turn on heat to medium. Add chicken/turkey to the stock (you may or may not want to add all of the chicken. I like to reserve about 1 cup of shredded chicken to make chicken salad). While stock is reheating, Dice remaining celery (2 stalks) and carrots (2-3). In a large skillet, melt butter. Add diced veggies and sliced leeks to skillet. When leeks are slightly translucent and fragrant, add minced garlic. Sauté for 1 minute longer, then add veggies to stock. Allow stock/soup to simmer for at least 2 hours before adding noodles (recipe to follow). The noodles cook quickly (3-4 minutes), so wait until you are ready to serve before adding the noodles.

GRANDMA'S HOMEMADE EGG NOODLES

2 ½ cups flour

3-4 pinches salt

2 eggs, beaten

1/2 cup milk

1 Tbsp. butter, melted

In a large bowl, stir together the flour and salt. Add the beaten egg, milk, and butter. Knead dough until smooth, about 5 minutes. Let rest in a covered bowl for 10 minutes. On a floured surface, roll out dough to 1/8 or 1/4 inch thickness. Cut into desired lengths and shapes. Allow to air dry about 30min. to one hour before cooking. To cook fresh pasta, drop in a large pot with boiling water (salted) or stock, making sure to separate noodles. Cook for 3-4 minutes or until desired tenderness. If pasta is not going to be cooked right away, it may be refrigerated up to 5 days or frozen for up to 6 months. If cooking with frozen pasta, it is not necessary to thaw the pasta, just cook for 6-8 minutes instead of the 3-4 minutes for thawed.


Oh, one more thing about roasting turkeys, don't listen to that baloney about cooking your bird to an internal temp of 185°F, that's overcooked. All you need is 165°F (even the USDA says so).

How to get a free pet at Wally World

Meet Sasis (M's made up name for her new pet Eastern Gray Treefrog -- well, I suppose she could be Cope's Gray Treefrog but the only way to tell these two species apart is by the sound of their calls). On November 8th, we were in Wally World in Manhattan picking up a couple of lights when M asked to go look at the Christmas stuff. As we were headed in that direction, I felt and saw something tiny jump between my legs near the houseplants. It was Sasis! She must have hitched a ride on one of the houseplants and chose us to make her escape. I had Rob and M keep an eye on her while I ran to grab a Rubbermaid tote. We snatched her up and made our way to the check out. M already had a little toy aquarium of sorts that came with a coupon for a mail order leopard frog. Since it was already late we decided to bring her home, give her a little water and then shop for a more appropriate home and crickets in the morning.

Well, she has a voracious appetite and is downright vicious when she goes for the crickets--fun to watch. Rob says she looks like a linebacker when she charges for them. She's doing really well, fattening up nicely and really seems to be enjoying her enclosure. M picked out a really nice fake piece of driftwood with lots of hiding places. Treefrogs are small and she's approximately 2.25" (snout-vent length). Sounds small, yet the largest recorded frog of her species was 2.375" (snout-vent length)! She's a giant! Oh, and I believe she's a she because her throat is white (males have dark patches on their throats) and females tend to be larger in this species as well. Not that anyone reading this really cares about all the details, this is just the closest thing to research I have now that I'm a SAHM.

While this little treefrog's distribution does overlap our area slightly, the native ones are probably overwintering right now since we've had a couple of freezes. So...we feel that we are giving her the best chance of survival here. Besides, she has a guaranteed food supply. Her species is freeze tolerant, by the way -- so freakin' cool. That was one of my favorite Herp subjects.

Trappy Nappy II

This was actually finished in October for my friend Jane. Although it's difficult to tell from the photo, the bag is a subtle trapezoid, not quite as obvious as the first one I made for Meredith. This one has a magnetic snap closure. The divider is attached on the bottom of this one (it wasn't on the first) and no inside zippered pocket. I added a zippered pocket to the outside instead. I think I may do both on the next one. There are four main gusseted pockets inside, with two pen pockets (inside a gusseted pocket) and a cell phone pouch. Outside is the zippered pocket and two side pockets. I included a coordinating changing pad and nursing cover-up (cover-up isn't in the photo since I had already given that to her)
I'm trying to decide if I want to add a flap to the next one. I go back and forth because, while a flap would make the bag look more tailored and neat, it isn't as easy to access the goods inside when you're scrambling to do a quick diaper change in a nasty public restroom just to get out of there as humanly possible. I'm struggling with looks versus functionality.

Printable Grocery List

This has been my grocery list for several years now. In Germany I finally typed up a general list, organized by aisle (Hanau Commissary layout). When we moved to Kansas, I altered it to flow with the Fort Riley Commissary layout. Anal? Totally and I'm not one bit ashamed. Wouldn't you like to make your life easier? You can print your own here. It will print two on one 8.5" x 11" sheet of paper.

I posted this list a couple of years ago but it kinda' got lost in a very long posting.

My little listmaker

A few weeks ago, maybe a week or two before Halloween, I was writing the weekly grocery list and M decided that she needed to make her list, too. Even though I could hear her sounding out letters, I just thought she was drawing so she could be with me. After about 20 or 30 minutes she says, "Mommy, I made my grocery list!" Typically, when she's writing words she asks me to help her sound them out so she can spell them correctly. However, when she made her list she decided to spell the words as they sounded phonetically to her. She still spelled salad and mushrooms correctly all by herself! "S's" and "J's" get her all riled up sometimes because she sometimes writes them backwards and realizes that there's something wrong but she says that her fingers keep doing the wrong thing. I have Never made her practice her letters. I have asked her before, but she's usually the one who asks for some practice paper for her letters. She truly loves to learn!

"Okay, Mom, I'm ready to go!"

From Tigger

"So...I hear my family really misses me. You know, I had a pretty great life with them.

They rescued me from the animal shelter in August of 1996 when I was only 11 weeks old. I fooled them into thinking that I was a puppy. I loved to play fetch and was a typical lap dog. I suppose I became too sophisticated for fetch by the time Shasta arrived, since she wanted to play fetch, too. Such a child's game. My adoptive parents would do anything for me. I had them wrapped around my little pinky pad. You know, they even let me drink out of the bathroom faucet when I convinced them that I didn't like the taste of my water in a plastic bowl? Eventually they wised up and bought me a proper stoneware bowl...much better.

Well, Dad is in the Army, so we had to move a lot. I didn't like it when the packing started. The sound of the tape totally freaked me out. However, I did love the road trips -- moving across the country, even overseas. Okay, I could have done without the plane rides to and from Germany. The rides in the cold cargo area made my eyes water and it was kinda' scary. Worst of all, I couldn't eat any food.

I miss my buddy, Shasta. Hope she can stay warm without me and that she doesn't get too bored not having me around to pounce on.

Up until we were in Alabama, I kept growing and growing and growing...okay, I was Fat. I grew to a stout 22.5 pounds! Our roommate, Matt even started a new form of measurement, "the Tigger." What is your weight in Tigger's? Mom and Dad couldn't figure out how I was swelling. The only table scraps they allowed me to have were a couple of slivers of roasted turkey each Thanksgiving Day. I sure had them fooled. ;) I was eating Shasta's food and some of our roommate's cat's food. After we moved to Alabama and Mom and Dad finally wised up and separated my food from Shasta's, I lost the fat and was a trim 12.5 lbs. They thought I needed liposuction, the way the loose skin dangled from my belly. I didn't mind a little extra skin.

Mom and Dad still love telling the pizza dough story from when we lived in Germany. Mom set out some frozen pizza dough (to thaw) wrapped in parchment and in a Ziploc bag that she had made a couple of weeks before. The family decided to step out for a bit and left Shasta and I behind. When they returned home, Mom found half of the pizza dough on the counter, along with shredded parchment paper and a half eaten Ziploc bag. Boy was I in trouble. More importantly, ugh...Man, was I sick!

Gosh, I miss them all so much. Even little Maia knew how to make a lap for me. They were such good snugglers. I miss their laps."

It's been 10 days since we said "goodbye" to Tigger. When I was vacuuming a couple of days ago and still found some of Tigger's fur on one of the dining room chair cushions, I was actually happy to see it, but sad to vacuum it away.

We sure miss having him there, waiting for his lap the second we sat down. We love and miss our Tigger.

Rob's birthday

Wednesday was Rob's birthday but he had to fly that evening. Since we knew our day would be short with him, we started off the day with yummy Æbleskivers, a danish ball-shaped pancake. M calls them pancake balls. Here's my favorite recipe, adapted from here:



Æbleskivers
4 eggs, separated
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter, melted
2 cups buttermilk
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 cups all purpose flour
several pea-sized pieces of butter for the pan


Beat egg whites until stiff; set aside. Combine remaining ingredients until batter is completely smooth. Gently fold in egg whites. Heat Æbleskiver pan over medium heat with one pea-sized drop of butter in each of the 7 holes. Fill each hole about 3/4 full with batter. Be sure to add a pea-sized drops of butter to each well in the pan before the next round of batter.
When browned on one side (almost right away), turn with knitting needle or fork (a tiny cocktail fork works best for me) and cook until browned on the opposite side. We like these with a light dusting of confectioner's sugar and raspberries (place one 10-14 oz. bag of frozen raspberries in a medium saucepan with a 1 Tbsp cornstarch and 1-2 Tbsp. granulated sugar. Heat until mixture bubbles and thickens) This last time I made them I didn't have any raspberries so I just warmed some raspberry preserves to go with our little pancake balls.


I received my pan as a gift several years ago but I have seen them at Target and they are widely available at several retailers online.







Warning: while this recipe will make around 45-50 Æbleskivers, small children will scarf them down (I guess adults enjoy their fair share). M will easily polish off over a dozen by herself if I'm not paying attention.


Before Rob had to run off to work, I made one of his favorite dishes, Chicken David (renamed, "Chicken Rob"). This is an ultra-rich recipe with chicken, hard salami and pancetta with a Marsala tomato cream sauce. A couple of bites suffice for me but Rob loves it--must be all the meat. If you wish to give it a try and make your husband the happiest man alive (I totally promise), you can find it here on Allrecipes. Oh, I use dry Marsala wine instead of the Sherry called for in the original recipe because I think it has a nuttier, fuller flavor and I keep it on hand for other recipes.

Poor guy, he didn't even have time to eat lunch with us so he had to take it on the go and eat during his briefing. We'll celebrate more this weekend. After all, we have to make up for the past two birthdays that he missed while he was deployed.


After Rob left for work, M and I took Tigger outside to try and perk him up. I took Tigger outside to sit next to me and waited for M. She came out a few minutes later, so proud. She tied her shoe all by herself. When I told her ho proud I was of her she said "I just kept trying and trying and I didn't give up!" Then she tied the other one in front of me. Both Rob and I have explained what we do when we tie her shoes (bunny ears style, like my Uncle Dave taught me), but I think Rob should take credit for this one since he was just working with her the day before.

Once M was outside and saw Tigger, she wanted to sit with him. He seemed to enjoy being with us but didn't even have the energy or stomach to nibble on a piece of grass, something he has Never turned down. When Tigger saw M sitting on the steps, he slowly wobbled over to her and lay down next to her. Such sweetness.

What a lovely day.

The previous post was probably misnamed. I no longer intend to include a "Backtracking Part 2" since that would probably mean never being able to catch up. So, I'll continue with my random rantings.

Backtracking Part 1

These were done in August for my sweet adorable neices. The little dress, bloomers and booties are from three different patterns in Amy Butler's book, Little Stitches for Little Ones (loads of super cute projects, by the way). The jumper is The Little Vintage Jumper by Favorite Things (one of my favorite patterns for little girls) and the bag is a downsized version of Rae's Buttercup Bag.

They're just so darn squeezable! Love those cheeks!