oday is Leap Day and we’re off to Washington, DC to visit the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History with our homeschooling co-op. We’re riding the metro to get there, a first for the boys and me. Should be fun!

A cute little Leap Day poem

and More Poems

Leap Day Celebrations (with frogs) in my neck of the woods

Leap Day - Famous Birthdays and Events

…and if you’re a Leapling, Boston Market will give you a free lunch!

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Pioneer Woman has posted the most decadent (definitely not a Lenten recipe!) and easiest apple dumpling recipe I’ve ever seen.  I can’t wait to make it!!!

I very much recommend the Pink Velvet Cupcakes but do double the icing recipe.  (It still wasn’t enough.)  I wound up making the hearts and roses out of colored fondant.  It was very easy…Delicious!

ooking for new ideas for Valentine’s Day I googled the words heart and valentine and wound up…
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• At Home with Kim Vallee where there are lots of great Valentine’s Day ideas. Then I clicked on the link to Bakerella…Wow! I love all the different ideas and recipes. Two new keeper food blog links.

• Everything a Teacher Needs for Valentine’s Day with lesson ideas, crafts and more
• A cute little widget from Google that lets you say “I Love You” in different languages
• and a poem, Valentine’s Day with Jesus.

oday is Honey’s birthday!!! I can’t believe my baby sister is 38 years old. I have so many wonderful memories of her childhood. I baked a yellow butter cake (with a bit of grated chocolate bar in it) in my Wilton heart-shaped pan and frosted it with chocolate buttercream for her.

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Been busy with doctors, dentists, co-op, schooling, boy scouts and haven’t had a whole lot of time for the computer this week. *smile*

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Krispy Kreme Donuts…mmmmmm! Taste of the South Magazine held an Ultimate Krispy Kreme Recipe Contest and the winners and runners-up recipes are posted on their website. I want to make them all!

Krispy Kreme Donut Recipes

Roasted Chicken w/ Garlic Thyme Butter
au jus

Colcannon
(leaving out the bacon so I can eat it)

Buttery Mac and Cheese
(for Michael)

Buttered Peas

Buttery Thyme Bread

Chocolate Buttermilk Pie

…

EVERYTHING’S BETTER WITH BUTTER!
*smile*

‘m giving Chocolate Walnut Fudge, Raspberry-Laced Brownies and Cupid Poop (I have boys that like gross things…what can I say!) for gifts this year.

Chocolate Walnut Fudge

• 1/2 cup pure honey
• 1 (14-oz.) can sweetened condensed milk
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 12 ozs. semisweet chocolate chips
• 4 ozs. bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
• 1 cup coarsely chopped walnuts, toasted

1. Line an 8 x 8-inch pan with foil; butter and set aside. In a large bowl, combine honey, sweetened condensed milk and salt; mix well. Melt in the microwave, stirring frequently.
2. Add chocolate chips and bittersweet chocolate, stirring constantly, until chocolate melts completely and mixture is smooth. Stir in walnuts.
3. Pour immediately into pan and smooth top. Let cool, then refrigerate until cold. Cut into 25 pieces.

Raspberry-Laced Brownies

• 6 tablespoons butter, room temperature
• 1/2 pound bittersweet chocolate
• 3/4 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
• 3/4 cup white granulated sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chunks
• 1/4 teaspoon raspberry flavoring
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 350º. Line an 8×8-inch pan with parchment paper; lightly grease paper.
2. In a medium microwave-safe bowl, combine butter and bittersweet chocolate. Microwave on HIGH, in 30-second intervals, stirring after each, until butter and chocolate are melted and smooth (about 2 minutes total). Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, and using an electric mixture at high speed, beat sugars and eggs until fluffy. Gradually beat in flour and salt. Add melted chocolate mixture, stirring well. Stir in chocolate chunks, raspberry flavoring, and vanilla extract.
4. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake 35 to 40 minutes, or until center is firm. Cool completely in pan. Using a serrated knife, cut into squares.

Tomorrow is my Daddy’s 72th birthday and I’m making him a German Chocolate Cake. After viewing several online recipes I decided to try this Inside-Out German Chocolate Cake recipe. Sounds delicious! A good tip: If the recipe you want to try has reviews/comments, read them! They are usually full of helpful tips to make your recipe the best it can be.

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Pioneer Woman has a new Mike story and it’s a good one…I LOVE her Mike stories!

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IT SNOWED YESTERDAY!!!!

or those that still need to write out their holiday thank-you’s here are some cute and creative printable notes.

Misery loves company…we weren’t the only ones sick.  I actually ran across several different blog postings like this one bemoaning family illness.

My friend, Shelley, posted a really cute youtube tutorial on how to create a fairy in a jar…and then I ran across this version.

Want to turn your crafting into a small business?   A Few Small Helpful Tips

Store it with Style - Using Collectibles to Organize…I dream of being this organized.

Another Valentine’s Day blog, Two Old Crows Valentine Craft and Recipes…how could you not love a blog with a name like that!  *smile*

We did have a tiny little snow shower yesterday but I guess I need to get my winter fix online.  Awesome Winter Photos from Way Cool Pictures:  Candy for your Eyes!

Winter Homeschooling by HomeEd Magazine’s Helen Hegener.

As the weather gets a bit colder I’ve been keeping my bird feeders full and I’ve noticed that Mr. Squirrel(s) is not coming around quite as much…are they starting to hibernate, maybe?

Italian Winter Foods to keep you warm…the Chocolate Bread Pudding with Warm Butterscotch Sauce sounds like a winning recipe to me.

Baa!!

ow! are there a lot of great food blogs out there. I usually go to the big websites for my recipes but last night I spent quite a bit of time just browsing from one food blog to another and found lots of great recipes. Now, being a lacto-ovo vegetarian who loves to bake and cooks for meat eating boys, what catches my eye and tastebuds won’t necessarily catch yours, but you can find food blogs geared to your taste by just following the blog writers’ links or blogrolls.

A Taste of Home Cooking

Kitchen Mage

Cook. Craft. Enjoy

Everybody Likes Sandwiches

Farmgirl Fare

Gruel Omelet

Kalyn’s Kitchen

FatFree Vegan Kitchen

Fresh Approach Cooking

Milk and Cookies

Simply Recipes

and some Gluten Free for my sister, Colleen…

Gluten-Free Girl

Gluten Free Journey

I’m in the midst of my cookie baking frenzy…trying to bake them quicker than the boys can eat them. *smile* I baked for six hours straight yesterday and only have six gallon freezer bags of cookies (and they were not full mind you when I got up this morning…I think the boys are getting sneaky and dipping into different bags to try to hide their munching) to show for it. I made Russian Tea Cakes and a variation of Martha Stewart’s Thin and Crisp Chocolate Chip Cookies using mini chocolate chips (and only half of what the recipe called for because I mostly like the dough part) and about a 1/2 cup of toasted hazelnuts, ground. The Russian Tea Cakes I dusted with edible multi-colored and white glitter. They are very sparkly and pretty.

Today I’ll bake several batches of shortbread jam thumbprint cookies and one of our favorites Oatmeal Coconut Crisps. Since I give so many away, I like to make double/triple batches. My wonderful KitchenAid Mixer, courtesy of my husband 2 Christmas’s ago, makes it very easy.

Talking about kitchen appliances, my crockpot is really coming in handy these days. I’ve made things in it that I wouldn’t have thought possible…macaroni and cheese (2 cups macaroni, 1/2 stick of butter, 1 lb. velveeta and 1 qt. milk–cook on high 3-4 hours), baked raviolis and baked potatoes. At the store this week I stocked up on clementines, fresh vegetables, bagged salads, ciabatta and french breads and a supermarket roasted chicken to help make feeding my bunch easier. After a meal of roasted chicken, salad, garlic bread and herbed rice, with the leftover chicken, I’ll make a bit pot of chicken noodle soup using a whole box of kluski noodle soup mix, more noodles, chicken stock, potatoes, carrots, onions, celery, parsley and garlic. Hopefully that will last a couple of days though with my crew you never know. Growing boys surely do eat a lot.

We’re a sweet-loving family…all of us. I usually don’t have enough time to make a variety of Christmas candies, instead concentrating on baking many different batches of Christmas cookies, however, the twins (with Quinn’s supervision *smile*) are old enough now to make the fairly simple Christmas candy recipes that I’ve found online. Make sure you have all of the ingredients, plenty of table or counter space to decorate and containers to store the goodies in before you begin.

We’re not making all but I’m hoping to get 3 or 4 different varieties done before the 25th.

Most of these would make cute Christmas party favors, tucked into the little holiday cellophane bags that Walmart and/or Michael’s sells and tied with pretty Christmas-y ribbon.

Candy Sticks

Sugarplum Treats

Linda’s Chocolate Dipped Pretzel Rods

Peppermint Bark

Permafrost Peppermints

Candy Cane Reindeer

Candy Kisses Twists

Cashew Macadamia Crunch (okay, this one’s for me!)

Chocolate Toffee Crunch Squares (and this one too!)

Since we picked a peck or more of apples last Friday and I have no desire to can anything, I’ve been trying find some good recipes. In this month’s Rachael Ray Magazine there is a recipe for Caramel Apple Layer Cake…I made it yesterday and it is absolutely delicious. My sister, Honey, came over yesterday and offered me $20 for the cake but after a few bites upped it to $50…and I think she was halfway serious. *smile* Click on the photo to get the recipe.

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To take advantage of the abundance of apples in the house, Quinn and I will do a little theme study on apples, again. *smile* He won’t eat a raw apple but thankfully applesauce is one of the few foods he enjoys. I’m going to set him up to the table with some peeled apples, his knife, a cutting board and I’m going to try to coax him into cutting the apples in small pieces for applesauce. For more ideas…

Little Giraffe’s Apples

Tooter4Kids - Apple Theme

Alphabet Soup - Apple Activities

First Grade Themes - Apples

I made a little apple-shaped book on the computer and printed it out in yellow, red and green cardstock.  On one page we’ll do the “use your five senses,” on another write (and learn) an apple fingerplay poem and on the last page, since we have some apples with the leaves still attached, we’ll draw (well I’ll draw) the cross-section of an apple and label/talk about the fruit, stem, leaf and seeds.  You can find apple printables here, here and here.

The twins have been diligently working toward trying to finish up their Calvert school work by the end of December so they can start 7th grade in the new year (we homeschool year round so our new year always starts in the actual new year and not in September).  It’s been awhile since I’ve given them anything really fun to do and since they did such a wonderful job on their Thanksgiving lapbooks last year, I think we’ll do a Christmas lapbook this year.

I made this delicious, rich potato soup yesterday…very easy.

4 cups of peeled, diced Yukon gold potatoes
4 cups of vegetable or chicken broth
1 cup of water with 1 vegetable or chicken bouillon cube dissolved in it
1/4 cup of minced carrot
1/4 cup of minced onion
1/4 cup of minced celery
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 Tbsp butter
2 Tbsp flour
1 8 oz cream cheese, at room temperature
1/2 cup of shredded cheddar cheese
a nice splash of heavy cream
Jane’s crazy mixed up salt
pepper
cayenne pepper

Shredded cheddar and chopped chives for garish

Melt the butter in a large Dutch oven and cook the carrots, onion, garlic and celery until soft. Add the flour and cook for about a minute. Add the potatoes and broth, water with the bouillon cube in it and bring to a boil. Cover, gently simmer until the potatoes are soft. Using a potato masher, mash some of the potatoes. Break the cream cheese into small pieces and add it to the soup. Let sit for a moment and then stir until melted. Add the cheddar cheese and the splash of heavy cream. Season with salt and peppers and garnish with chives and more cheddar cheese.

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I haven’t posted much lately…we’ve just been so busy! Sharing a few autumn photos.

We took a trip to Boyds Bear Country in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

Quinn playing in the apple orchard.

The twins made a rope swing to play on down by the water. It’s hard to see but at the top of the photo you can see the huge beam that it’s attached to jutting out. The beam was used to lower boat motors into the wooden boats that Mr. Lloyd (original owner of my house) and my Daddy built many, many years ago. Our long term goal is to remove the boat railway and build a nice, solid bulkhead straight across our property.

Daddy and Quinn at Cracker Barrel.

Cade and Connor playing checkers at Cracker Barrel. Look at the top graphic on their website (also taken at a Cracker Barrel) to see how much they’ve grown.

The covered bridge on Jericho Road in Historic Jerusalem Mill Village.

Some pretty autumn scenery…soon all the leaves will be gone.

I have to finish up getting ready for the twins big 13th birthday bash on Thursday evening but I’m hoping to fit a drive up to the Skyline Drive sometime this week.

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A Child’s Calendar
November
~ John Updike ~

The stripped and shapely
Maple grieves
The ghosts of her
Departed leaves.
The ground is hard,
As hard as stone.
The year is old,
The birds are flown.
And yet the world,
In its distress,
Displays a certain
Loveliness—