All posts in Domestic Damsel

Menu Planning HELP!

by admin on September 22, 2009 in Better Check Out Blogs, Better Check Out Links, Bits Of My Personality, Domestic Damsel with 5 Comments

I am all about trying new things when it comes to cooking. I get bored and wanna learn more and try new types of food. I also menu plan and used to find it hard to get enough material to quench my need for NEW RECIPES! Since we have become regular internet users that has all changed. I keep finding sites on line that make whipping up my monthly menu a breeze.

All Recipes is my current fav and most used site for recipes. It has a vast and varied collection put together by regular cooks with special finds. I have a profile so I can take advantage of all the special features like the recipe box, question feature and option to rate and review recipes. The review option makes it easier to avoid the dud recipes!

I have never doubted that ‘Mennonite Girls Can Cook’ but this beautifully maintained blog proves it. I just love eating this blog up and enjoy its big selection due to many contributors.

I also make it a habit of checking out the sites of my favorite food brands or products because they will often have really good recipes, since they want their product to shine!

Anyone else have a really great site I can check out? Let me know and leave the address in the comment box.

TTFN

Apple Festival!

by admin on September 10, 2009 in Domestic Damsel, Four Little Eggs In My Nest, Mama Heart Mushings, My Romance with 3 Comments

I need your help! Let me tell you about my evening and then ask you for the assistance I seek.
Dad and the big kids got busy tonight and collected apples from our tree. This was no simple task as our tree’s apple grow very high and the tree is hidden behind our cedars so access for picking is pretty limited. With no ladder tall enough my husband climbed the one we had and shook the tree with a rake.

The kids stood by with a sheet to catch the apples. I have to say they did alright but we are hoping their catching skills will improve. Most of the apples still hit the ground and then the kids kept kicking them when they went to collect them and threw them into the sheet, which was laying mostly on the ground (thus no soft landing for our sad little apples). The apples where pretty much apple sauce before I even touched them.

I couldn’t help enjoying Garnet’s grunts and groans. Each time he gave the tree a shake a shower of apples would pummel his noggin. He decided looking down and getting them on the head was better then the few times he looked up and got them in the kisser.
I set to work tonight with two happy little ones at my feet (sneaking bits of apple when ever they could). My Little Woman and Baby Boy watched me make two large pots of apple sauce and freeze enough apples cut up for six pies. My little ones had a blast smashing the apples together, rolling them, bouncing them and chewing on them. It is amazing how happy a bunch of bruised, sorry old apples can make my baby boy and little woman.Garnet and I had a good laugh about our little harvesting adventure and we decided to make this a fall family tradition. We couldn’t agree on a name for our families little festival so we are asking for suggestions and if you have none then opinions on the ideas we came up with. The ideas are as follows:

1) Tree Shaking Festival
2) Alley Apple Festival (due to the apples being most accessible from the alley beside our house.
3) Shaking Tree Festival
4) Shake and Sheet Apple Collection Festival
5) Falling Apple Festival

Please leave your ideas and/or preference in the comment box:)

TTFN

Snacking on Pancakes

by admin on August 26, 2009 in Bits Of My Personality, Domestic Damsel with 1 Comment
Barley Pancakes!
(I just love their warm brown colors!)

Sitting here with another cup of tea, munching on yesterday’s breakfast. I love eating pancakes cold and plain the next day. I especially love my golden barley pancakes.

Basically I took my mothers faithful ‘Scottish Pancakes’ and altered it a little. Less sugar (1 cup of white sugar is now 1/2 cup of organic sugar and 1/3 cup of wheat germ) and different flour are the main differences (white flour switched to 100% whole grain barley flour). The barley flour is surprisingly light (much lighter then whole wheat) and so switching it to all barley is not a big deal.

My barley pancakes are more filling, they cook faster and have a gorgeous color. They taste lovely, mildly sweet and doughy with a nutty taste that makes me wanna keep snacking. The kids love them and I feel good serving them (feel even better eating them YUM).

The kids would love to share the left overs with me today but they understand there is a limit to Mommy’s generous nature and when it comes to cold pancakes I draw a line. I hand them a cookie and remind them ‘the pancakes are mine!’

Gotta go, the last pancake is waiting to unite with a perfect cup of red tea and help me have a perfect moment of inactivity as I sit on my couch and stare at the pine trees out my window. I have a lot to say about those pine trees but that is a story for another time…

TTFN

Lemon Juice?

by admin on August 18, 2009 in Bits Of My Personality, Domestic Damsel with 2 Comments

Just thought I would add a little to my last post…

I have REAL lemon juice in my cleaning cupboard because it is a natural alternative to harsh bleach. It will get stains out of whites without the harshness or worry of bleach stains. Apply the juice to the stain and wash.

Vinegar cleans SO MUCH! I use it on most surfaces (floors, windows counters) and when put it down a drain with baking soda it will make the sink sparkle and unplug the drain!

As my friend mentioned in the last post, olive oil isn’t just for eating. It is a safe and natural way to treat your wood items around the house.

Anyone else have great tips to save on cleaning supplies and do it SO NATURAL? It is amazing how we are convinced we need so many types of cleaning chemicals when so much can be done with items we already have, that are safe enough for us to eat! Honestly I can’t remember the last time I payed for cleaning products. I don’t even go down that isle in my grocery store anymore.

TTFN

Baking Soda

by admin on August 17, 2009 in Better Check Out Links, Bits Of My Personality, Domestic Damsel with 3 Comments

For years I have had a real affection for baking soda. My cleaning supply closet has baking soda as a main item (along with lemon juice and vinegar). I have used it to put out small fires in my oven. It works wonders on the laundry as well. Just today I found a great link with all sorts of other things baking soda is good for.

http://lifehackery.com/2008/07/22/home-4/

Check it out!

DID YOU KNOW (I didn’t!)

Flowers will keep longer if you add a teaspoon to the water in the vase!

Doesn’t just take smell from the fridge! Try it on your shoes or suck it up your vacuum if it is getting smelly!

Apparently it can be a useful modeling clay when added water and cornstarch.

It repels rain so try it on your car windows!

It repels ants so put it where they are getting in!

Supposed to sweeten tomatoes if you put it on the soil around the tomato plants!

TTFN

My Frequently Annual Ladies Tea!

by admin on July 20, 2009 in Bits Of My Personality, Domestic Damsel, Foodie Like Me, People In My Heart with 2 Comments
This years tea party was the biggest yet!

So happy to have it at OUR HOME! The patio worked perfectly. We rounded up some patio tables and had it all looking pretty with table cloths and flowers from my yard and my mother in law’s (thanks Deb!).Potluck style was how we pulled together the above feast! It worked out beautifully! There where home made chocolates, home made cheese cakes and plenty of veggies and fruit as well! The night before I was a little nervous as to whether I would have enough tea cups in my collection but it JUST worked out (phew). A good reason to find a few more pretty cups though!One of the finest moments of the day was when my big girl and a good pal of hers picked some treats from my gardens and went around offering them to my guests. I had to laugh when I heard them asking the ladies, very politely, ‘Would you like a raspberry or an onion?’ They where trying to convince ladies to try some very fresh chives of mine as well as the newly ripened berries!

(This is most of the ladies from the poker night we have once a month!)(My eldest daughter has been to each tea and this year she looked particularly mature!)
(This is only the second my younger daughter has been to and since is a bit of an introvert she spent much time avoiding the crowd!)(Now we don’t invite dogs, but since my sister Karla’s doggy was there and the weather was hot we had to let her have a cup of tea too!)

This was the fifth tea I have hosted, and as with each year, it is the big group photo at the end of the day that is my big reward! I look back at them when I add a new one to the collection and I always feel so blessed to have had all these wonderful women take part in my life story!

TTFN

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