Saturday, May 31, 2008

May Co-op Harvest Share

HARVEST SHARE-Lots of Veggies and Fruits

The picture is missing about 1/3 of the harvest share since we shared this lot with my parents. The full harvest share contained the following:
1 bag potatoes, 1 bag rice, 2 bags mini carrots, 6 fuji apples, 6 pears, 6 navel oranges, 1 bunch of broccoli, 3 artichokes, 1 bunch of green onions, 2 bunches of Romaine lettuce and 1 loaf of Stone Ground's Wheat Bread

The picture is missing the loaf of bread, 2 pears, 2 apples, 2 oranges, some of the green onions, 1 artichoke, 1 bag carrots and 1 of the bunches of romaine lettuce.

The Harvest share was only $14! See the food co-op site for more details on how to order for June. Orders for June are due by Friday June 13th.

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Delicious Dutch-Oven Dishes (Dish #4)

Baked Chicken thighs in sauce.We had everything from garlic, ketchup, onions, spices, oil, jam (apricot is good with chicken) and some other ingredients. Basically you just make a barbecue sauce like mixture. Place the chicken in a greased dutch oven, top with sauce and bake. We used about 20 coals-7 on the bottom and 13 on the top and let it bake for about an hour or so.
We consumed most of the dish for dinner-leaving only a little bit for Dave's lunch which he said was even better the next day.

Sunday, May 25, 2008

Birthday Puzzle #2

Geburtstag-puzzlespiel #2

This second birthday puzzle Sarah received came from MB Puzzle. It was 100 pieces, measuring 12 1/2" x 15" with no official title. The MB puzzle site is a part of the Hasbro site-who are the well know makers of such games as Battleship, Candyland, Sorry, Life, Clue, Hungry Hungry Hippos and many more games under the retail names of Milton Bradley and Parker Brothers. Plus there are many more games of which I only recognized a few. For a more complete listing check their website at www.hasbro.com/games/

Friday, May 23, 2008

Random pictures from the past #1

And now some random pictures from the past:
Garden produce: tomatoes, pears, peppers and beans

Sarah and Eva by a tree.

Jessica by some bushes.

Ah...memories of parks and church and family and gardening and camping.

Monday, May 19, 2008

Delicious Dutch-Oven Dishes (Dish #3)


Dinner featuring mostly yellow foods. Dutch Oven pork chops with stuffing and peaches, homemade baked macaroni and cheese, and creamy crockpot corn. Everyone really like the baked macaroni and cheese. The creamy corn was good but rich with butter and cream cheese. The pork chops were tender and moist and the stuffing and peaches were delicious with them.

Pork chops with stuffing and peaches in the dutch oven-the chops look a little pink but they were cooked all the way through and the lighting does not do them justice.

Sunday, May 18, 2008

Birthday Puzzle

One of the gifts Sarah received was this 300 piece puzzle: Roger Nannini "Home Sweet Home" Apple Glen with 300 pieces and measuring 24" x 18" from Ceaco. It mentions it's for ages 12 and up but we all worked on it a little and finished it in less then a couple of weeks. All the detail and words in the puzzle made it easier to put together than the tiger puzzle we did earlier.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Taking a page from a friend's book in reverse

After we went to Chuckie Cheese and played games we enjoyed dinner at the Joy Luck Restaurant. We sampled Moo Shu, Tangerine Chicken and Pan Fried Noodles.
The girls liked the games more than the rides.

Dave and I were even willing to have our picture taken during the outing.

We weren't celebrating anything spectacular other than coupons, spring, group birthdays, and family. It was actually quite fun just to go to Chuckie Cheese and only play games while following up with dinner elsewhere.

Saturday, May 10, 2008

Convention Time

REPUBLICAN STATE CONVENTION


Attended the state convention today as a delegate with my dad.

  1. Long.
  2. Sometimes boring.
  3. Saw some politicians.
  4. Talked with some candidates.
  5. Received an assortment of flyers.
  6. Enjoyed meeting others involved with politics.
  7. Munched on one truffle but not more.
  8. Happy to see people involved in the process.
  9. Glad to participate in activities that strengthen our country.
  10. Learning what it means to follow parliamentary procedure in groups.

Sunday, May 04, 2008

Delicious Dutch-Oven Dishes (Dish #2)

CORNBREAD!



Thanks again to Byron Bills for the cornbread recipe. It was fantastic. As you can see, I browned (or rather blackened) the top a little too much but other than that (and making too much for the pan size) the cornbread was delicious. The recipe was for a 12" dutch oven and I cooked it in a 10" so some of the batter I made separately into muffins. I probably should have made a dozen muffins instead of 6 muffins because the cornbread was a tad moist (not doughy but just with a moister crumb) in the middle. We're just moving right along with our dutch oven cooking this year. By the way, at first our children thought it looked like yellow cake and were actually happier that it was corn bread. We're just not really cake fans although we do like cake occasionally. Keep looking for more dutch oven delights in the future!

Thursday, May 01, 2008

Piece by Piece Puzzles

Another way to have quality family time and help ward off Alzheimer's at the same time! Yes, you too can enjoy puzzle making with your family. An article from Ezine Articles addresses how one can "Create A Family Tradition" utilizing Jigsaw puzzles. The article also confirms that putting together puzzles utilizes both sides of the brain at the same time-a feat not often achieved by most activities. (Another activity utilizing both brain hemispheres is crawling.)

A different article from USA Today talks about hobbies and how they can help slow Alzheimer's. Puzzles are mentioned in the article. One of my latest family hobbies has been completing puzzle on a little rickety card table with the kids.

These are a couple of the recent puzzles we've done. The Bakery Bear was missing two pieces which made it a bit more challenging.

But the Tiger puzzle had so many pieces that were similar in shading that we almost thought it would never be completed.



But here they are in completed glory and we just completed the outside frame for the next puzzle.