Pixie Hat FO

Over the weekend, I finished the pixie hat for my boy.  An easy knit in fingering weight handspun on size 3 straights – simple knit/purl alternations with twisted cord for the ties (I personally think the ties make the hat - much better than the I-cord version in the Ravelry pattern).  I think I will be making more of these in the future for baby gifts, and might try sizing it up for TumTum when he outgrows this one.

Other knitters who’ve made this hat – Life in Color, Miss Sticks, WhistlePea Knits. 

I hope it still fits when we get back from Florida!  Okay, off to the airport!

Felted Tomten

We have continued to enjoy reading The Tomten the past week or so, and we were so inspired by Mamaroots’ little collection that we decided to make some ourselves.  The girls each have one, and have already scurried them away to their room before I could snap a picture.

This little guy will be going to a certain big brother whose baby sister was born on Christmas Eve.  His mama sends the girls the best Waldorf goodies, so I figured her son might like a little Tomten for his winter nature table.

The snow has all melted in Portland, and the children and I are looking forward to heading out to Florida tomorrow.  Grandma and Grandpa are anxiously awaiting our arrival.  My next post will be full of sunshine!   Yay!

Snow Ice Cream – Tutorial

We had a beautiful, fluffy snowfall Christmas Eve morning.  My friend Joanne suggested we make some Snow Ice Cream.  So, the girls and I collected a huge bowl of clean, fresh snow, and set to it! 

Snow Ice Cream

You will need:

1 gallon fresh, fluffy snow, give or take.

2 cups whole milk or 1 cup whole milk + 1 cup eggnog (or for vegans, 2 cups hazelnut or almond milk would be tasty, don’t you think?)

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

1 scant cup granulated sugar

In a very large bowl, combine the milk, sugar and vanilla.

Add in handfuls of snow until the mixture comes together.

Keep stirring, it takes a while!

Firecracker declares it, “Martha Stewart good!”

Enjoy!

Snowbound Knitting

We are snuggled up in the house for yet another day.  Three cars have gotten stuck in the deep snow on our street, the weatherman says the driving is very dangerous, and another 2-5 inches of snow are expected tomorrow.  Right now, my husband is shovelling the walkway to ease his cabin fever.  We are grateful to not have to leave the house and drive anywhere.   

The girls are in their room playing Susan and Lucy at Cair Paravel (we all finished reading the entire Chronicles of Narnia two nights ago, and the girls are caught up in it with their make-believe.) 

I am, at the moment, curled up on the sofa, holding a sleeping baby.  I spent the afternoon working on a little pixie hat for Tum Tum, listening to these talented ladies sing Christmas music.  (The yarn, by the way, is from Sacred Lily Farm’s Jacob sheep.  It is beautifully handspun fingering-weight 2-ply - wonderful to knit with.  My friend, Sana, raises and cares for her sheep with so much love and diligence, and she spins beautiful yarn.  I wish she had a website, so I could share it with you!)

I hope you’re keeping warm and safe in this weather, enjoying the peace of a hibernation day.

It’s Christmas time in the city…

 This is truly a Christmas to be counting our blessings, with the treacherous weather and all.  We wish our flight wasn’t grounded and we could be lounging on the beach with Grandma and Grandpa, but we’re enjoying the crazy snow as best we can, and looking forward to New Year’s in Florida! 

Merry Christmas from our snowed-in family in Portland!

Beeswax Honeycomb Candle Craft

 

We were sent a surprise package from some wonderful friends down in the Medford area.  It arrived in St. Nicholas’ day – a beeswax honeycomb candle kit from Southern Oregon.  This was a craft made for little children – it was easy to complete in a short amount of time, the girls had fun making them.  Plus, as Little Hen pointed out, they made your hands smell sweetly of honey.

We will get to enjoy their glow for many candle-lit dinners to come. 

Thank you Eva and Lela!

Toasty

Kristi – don’t read below – Christmas present spoiler!

 

Finished a pair of these for my sister-in-law for Christmas (I also plan to make a grey pair for myself, like A Friend To Knit With‘s originals, after Christmas). 

They were knit from Brown Sheep Lamb’s Pride in Victorian Pink.  I made a few little modifications, and am really happy with them.  Two snowy evenings of relaxing knitting (while holding a sleeping baby and watching John Adams) and they were done!

With some leftover yarn from other recent knitting, I also churned out a few coffee sleeves to go with them (my SIL is a Starbucks addict, so I thought they’d be appropriate.)  The pattern is here.

Okay, back to finishing packing and trying to get through on the jammed airline phone system to see if we can get a flight out. (The newsreporter just said some folks can’t get replacement flights until Christmas Day!  Our flight isn’t technically canceled yet, so they can’t rebook us, but ALL the other flights before our flight have already been grounded.  If ours is grounded, we’ll be the last to be looking for open seats – and we are a family of 5 – not so easy to rebook.   Doesn’t bode well…but it just goes to show how little control we really have over things… )

Wishing you all peace and comfort in the midst of a blizzard and stressful holiday travel.

Firecracker’s Snow Day

Pictures from earlier in the week, when it was a little warmer and less blustery, and Firecracker thought she might like to go play out in the snow.  She quickly thought better of it, and came in to warm up on the sofa, looking at some Dr. Seuss books with her sister and enjoying the snow from the window. 

We are currently pretty much snowed-in and the latest news is that our flight out to my folks’ tomorrow may be canceled as the snowstorm turns into an icestorm.  So, since I have some time on my hands, I think may have a second post up later today. 

Hope you are keeping warm and safe in the Iowa winter that has settled over Oregon!

A Clutterless Moment

Our bedroom, in a brief moment of peace and order on a slushy, snowy afternoon.  This post is all for me – I had to snap a few pictures, because there isn’t any laundry wating to be folded and put away.  The books piled on the floor have been (mostly) reshelved, the picture frames dusted.  The Christmas dresser scarves have been put out, but just an everyday, well loved jeans quilt is on the bed. 

 

Before the next round of snowfall hits, the girls and I are going to snip some greenery to tie to the bedposts with red ribbon to make it feel a bit more Christmasy in here.  But for now, I’m happy not to have a clutter for once!

Creamy Polenta Dinner

We finished this book, but the girls’ interest in all things relating to “life on the prairie” has yet to wane.  Firecracker had been asking all through the book, “What does salt pork taste like?”, so when we were in the area, we decided to visit the butcher at our local New Seasons to find some.

He didn’t exactly have salt pork, but recommended some locally made bacon that was very salty, not sweet, and contained no nitrites or dyes.  He said it tasted very different from packaged bacon – much more like salt pork.  We ended up buying the bacon ends, because they were $2/lb less expensive, and for our needs, they would work perfectly.  So, $2 later, we left the store with our “salt pork” and headed home.

Now, the Ingalls family also ate a LOT of cornmeal, so we did a little recipe search to find a cornmeal dish we would all want to eat.  We settled on creamy polenta.  I know it isn’t exactly what they would have eaten, because it had cheese, and was served with a tomato and bell pepper sauce, but it looked good to the three of us.  I wasn’t about to spend an hour and a half making a dish of which the girls wouldn’t eat more than one or two bites!

To make this dinner you will need:

1 lb organic, no nitrite local bacon ends or salt pork, finely chopped

5 large shallots, minced

1 clove garlic, minced (I actually used elephant garlic, because it’s what I had on hand)

3 cups whole milk

7 cups cold water

1 bay leaf

1 cup shredded, hard, aged cheese (I used asiago, because it was on sale cheap!)

one large handful of kale or spinach

1 jar homemade spaghetti sauce

1 roma tomato, chopped

1 roasted red bell pepper, skin removed, and finely chopped

1 avocado sliced right before serving (because I had one on hand, you could add parsley or shredded cheese as a garnish instead, if that’s what you have on hand.)

Directions – First, very finely cube and then fry the bacon ends in the dutch oven.  Drain off and save the fat in the fridge (so good for cooking omelettes or hash browns) .  Set fried bacon off to the side. Add the shallots and garlic to the dish and cook on med. until caramelized.  Remove them, and set next to the bacon.

I used this basic creamy polenta recipe, but substituted 3 cups whole milk for half of the 6 cups of water.  I added the water/milk combo straight to the pot that had cooked the bacon, and therefore omitted the salt, because the bacon was quite salty. 

After the polenta finishes cooking, stir in 1 cup shredded cheese and one big handful of kale (from our garden) cut in a fine chiffonade.  Leave covered, on low heat until ready to serve.

While the polenta is cooking, in a separate pot, heat the sauce, plus tomato, red pepper, cooked shallots/garlic, and half of the bacon.

Serve the polenta with sauce on top, and garnish with more bacon and the sliced avocado.  

We ate half of the polenta for dinner, and the other half was poured into a 9×9 greased baking dish, and tomorrow, when it is set up after a night in the fridge, we will cut it up and panfry it for dinner.

Obviously, if you wanted a vegetarian dinner, simply omit the bacon/salt pork, and increase the salt.  You could serve it with cannelini beans for sufficient protein.

The girls enjoyed the dinner, but we talked about how Laura and Mary would have eaten something similar (sans tomato sauce) for breakfast, lunch and dinner most days while they lived on the prairie.   Little Hen said she sure was grateful for the variety in our diet.  She’s so right – we as Americans in the 21st century really are blessed to have such a huge selection of foods to enjoy.

Next on our Little House menu?  A good friend sent us this book for St. Nicholas’ day, so I’m sure there will be many more dishes to try!  The girls would like to make rabbit stew.  Hmm…where to get a rabbit in the middle of Portland without paying an arm and a leg?

Marshmallows

Homemade marshmallows we brought to the market Friday.  They are so light and special.  A real treat – handmade with love and far beyond anything bought at the store.  Wonderful dipped in dark chocolate, or melted into hot cocoa, or just as they are.   

Today we made another batch to give as Christmas gifts.   I know they made the rounds of various crafty mama blogs awhile ago, which is what inspired me to start making them in the first place – I have learned so many great crafts, and found so many great recipes from so many talented mamas!  You can find the recipe here.  (I also found out that you can substitute Kosher vegetarian gelatin in a 1:1 ratio for the regular gelatin in this recipe if that better suits your dietary needs.) 

Thes are so easy and so much fun for children to make (and enjoy!).  But oh, the clean up! 

And I didn’t even get shots of the powdered sugar clouds in my kitchen! 

On this unusually snow-covered, wintery day in the Pacific Northwest, we’re wishing you a mug of hot cocoa topped off with a big fluffy marshmallow!

Children’s Christmas Market

Our table at the Portland Homeschool Children’s Holiday Market, where our family sold homemade gift tags, peppermint bark, and marshmallows.  It was a wonderful venue for the girls to show off their projects, to raise money for various charities, and to network with other Portland homeschoolers.   

We raised $28 dollars for charity and sold nearly everything we brought (prices were kept low, so all children could participate in the buying as well as the selling –  $1 each, or 3 for $2).  We met lots of other great homeschooling/unschooling families.  The girls came home with tummies full of brownies and a bag full of homecrafted goodies they bought from the other kids at the market – fairy wands, playdoh, postcards, stationery, bean bags, chocolate lollipops. 

Many thanks to Lyla, who put on the event!!  There are future events in the works, and we will definitely attend again!

Peppermint Bark

This is an easy holiday candy that preschoolers/primary-aged children can make with only a little supervision.  The entire project (minus chilling time) takes about 15 minutes.

You will need: 2 lbs white chocolate, chopped, or 2 lbs white chocolate melting chips,

about 10 candy canes, crushed (to equal one cup) (my girls put the candy canes in a large bowl, and went to town with a potato masher),

a double boiler and a jelly roll pan lined in parchment or waxed paper.

Melt the white chocolate in the double boiler (we added half, let it mostly melt, then added the other half – it was much easier for the girls to stir this way)

When chocolate is completely melted, stir in the crushed candy canes until thoroughly combined.  Immediately pour onto your jelly roll pan, smooth into an even layer, and place in the fridge to chill (about an hour).  Then, carefully snap into pieces and enjoy!

Garland

Tuesday we spent the evening stringing popcorn and cranberries for the Christmas tree while sipping apple cider (homemade - from our dear friend, Linda).  We listened to Hubby read our nightly Advent reading, and then to this wonderful music.  Peaceful, joyful.  Now, this is Christmastime.

Our tree has very densely packed branches, so we voted to leave off the paper chains and candy canes this year – they’ll be hung up elsewhere in the house.  Tomorrow night – ornaments and icicles!

Holly Berries

A few more shots from Monday’s card making session.  I kept the holly card for myself.  I couldn’t help it, I love holly, The Holly and The Ivy  is my favorite Christmas song, and this card was too darn cute with the spelling and all.

Repurposed Christmas Cards

This coming Friday, the kids and I are participating in the Portland Homeschool Children’s Holiday Market.  Several families are making crafts and baking goodies to sell at this fair, and all of our family’s proceeds will go to a few charities (Heifer International, OutsideIn, and the Oregon Humane Society). 

The girls are VERY excited about this whole project.  We had originally planned on only making homemade marshmallows, peppermint bark, and a few other easy holiday goodies that children their age could make on their own with only a little supervision (we’ll be making those later in the week).  

Over the weekend, Little Hen asked if she could make gift tags to sell, as well.  I think she was inspired by the few tags we had made together for a baby shower yesterday.   We have a big box of odd-sized cardstock in the attic, just for crafting, and I had saved all of last year’s Christmas cards. 

Throw in some glitter glue and you’ve got a craft a kindergartener can really take over and make her own.  I was really impressed with Little Hen’s precision with the glitter glue.  That girl’s got a steadier hand than I do and quite an eye for detail!   

Firecracker helped make a few, too!

 

By the end, Little Hen had made 57 cards, I made 4, and Firecracker made 3!  They really did the work largely by themselves while I fed the baby.  I helped fold the cardstock, cut out some shapes when the girls asked for help, and get the caps off the glitter glue.  And of course, I helped pick endless little Christmas card snippets out of the carpet…

Some of the finished cards, before Firecracker and I tied them up with ribbon in sets of 4:

 

I love how she knew just where to put the glitter glue – not over-done, a perfect accent.  This was a project she really got into – working for over an hour without interruption.  I have such admiraton for her ability to focus in on something that interests her!

Christmas Book Table

Our nature table takes a little respite during the Christmas season.  First, it is our book table, and then, our Christmas tree’s home (the books transition to a basket on the floor underneath).  The nature table will reappear in late winter. 

Many of the girls’ Christmas books are at Grandma and Grandpa’s house in Florida, where we will spend Christmas.  At our home, along with some library books, the December issues of their favorite magazines, and our books of Advent readings, are a few books that I believe are many families’ Christmas favorites.

I loved these books so much as a child that Firecracker was almost named Astrid.  I love how they convey a sense of quiet hibernation that we experience in the winter.

I think most people can’t help but love Tasha Tudor’s illustrations.   When I was a little girl, I would really look forward to my mom reading A Doll’s Christmas, also by Tasha Tudor, and now she reads it to my girls.  The last few years, we have also kicked off the Christmas season by checking out the video, Take Peace: A Tasha Tudor  Christmas, from the library.   

What books do you enjoy at Christmastime?

Evangeline

Cold, rainy, miserable weather today.   I was glad I had finished my Evangelines because I sure needed them! 

I found this pattern via A Friend To Knit With, and stuck it in my stack of “gotta try these” patterns.  Recently, while thumbing through the stack to look for baby sweater patterns, I came across it again, and thought they’d make a nice quick little project.  They were a quick and easy knit – on size 7s with Lamb’s Pride in “plum” that I had leftover from another project.  I did one and a half times the repeats for a length I thought would be more wearable. 

I felt like I deserved to treat myself after all of the baby shower knitting I’ve been doing lately.  They took me about three days, and I would definitely make them again.  But for now – back to finishing Christmas presents!

Give Presence

 

With the Christmas season in full swing, I thought I’d give a little nod to Advent Conspiracy. 

I firmly believe in making Christmas simple, homemade, and reverent.  It is a struggle to fit our family’s vision of Christmas in with our extended family and the greater culture.  We made the decision to spend very little and to give homemade as much as possible.  As Christians, we believe that Christ gave his life, and we can at least give a little something personal – something that takes a little sacrifice and a little love – in order to remind ourselves of His great sacrifice for us.

Advent Conspiracy Promo

Advent Conspiracy has a greater vision – not the over used saying “Keep Christ in Christmas”, but something more substantial.  Actually give less junk so that you can save your money and your time for acts of mercy.  And let folks know why you aren’t participating in the ever-escalating orgy of spending and giving of junk that you don’t need.  It’s so that you can give to other who have true needs. 

$1 buys clean, safe drinking water for 1 person for 1 year. 

It’s a four-fold plan – buy less junk so you can 1)increase meaningful giving to those in need 2)give handmade, 3)give your time personally connecting with others and 4) spend the Christmas season reflecting on the priceless gift in the incarnation, sacrifice, and resurrection of Christ.

Take my word for it – this is yummy!

As an adult, I have really learned to love prunes.  Now, I know they have a bit of a stigma, but I have found that I prefer their flavor to that of raisins.  They’re quite good for you, and we love the complexity they add to pork dishes, chopped into various stews, and in cakes and bread.

This is straight out of Fannie Farmer (I know, I’m probably mentioning her too much lately, but I did say that I cook from her book or get inspiration from it frequently.)  The only thing I adjusted was the baking time – it took a full 20 min longer than the recipe said for a skewer to come out clean.

I took this to homeschool group and came home with an empty plate. 

Cornmeal Prune Loaf (yes, I fully acknowledge, it needs a better name, but that’s what’s in the book)

1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter (I used 1 stick plus 1/4 cup shortening, because butter is really expensive right now!)

1 1/2 cups sugar

4 eggs

2 cups unbleached flour

1/2 cup yellow or blue cornmeal

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 cup dark rum (I subbed in orange juice, because my kids are eating this, and they don’t like the flavor alcohol adds to bread…except my fruitcake, which is drenched in brandy, and still Firecracker wolfs it down…)

1 heaping cup finely chopped, pitted prunes

Directions:

Preheat the oven 325 F.  Thoroughly grease a 9 x 5 x 3-inch loaf pan.  With an electric mixer, beat the sugar and butter until creamy.  Add the eggs one at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition (If you add all the eggs at once, you will end up with an undesirable consistency.  It really does make a difference.).

Combine the flour, cormeal, salt, baking powder, and stir them together.  Slowly add to the mixer, then add the rum (or OJ).  Gently fold in the prunes.

Pour into prepared pan and bake 1 to 1 1/4 hours or until skewer comes out clean (It took me 1 hr 35 minutes, and it was not over cooked, but I’d start with the minimum time and keep checking.)

Remove from pan and let rest 5 minutes before removing from pan.  Cool completely before cutting, or the loaf will crumble.

Enjoy with strong black tea on a cold afternoon.

It’s beginning to look… a little like Christmas

Little by little, the Christmas decorations are going up in our home.  We keep things pretty simple, and we’re still on the look out for the perfect Nativity, preferably second hand (maybe something like this one, or this one…or a new one from Amber.) 

As the days progress, more and more holiday items will emerge to decorate the house.  But for now, the items are that are appearing just hint at the Advent season – bells that jingle, a little wreath or two, a few German decorations, some red and green linens, vases with evergreen boughs tucked in them.

(btw, now that November (and therefore NaBloPoMo!!) are over, I am not going to attempt to post every day.  It was a fun experiment, and I think Ionly missed one day (but double posted a few other days.) That being said, I think a goal of 3-4 days a week is more realistic, especially during the Holidays!)

L’Arche Christmas Tree

Well, now that we’re living back in the city, there is no longer a farm down the road where we cut our tree.  So, instead we drove down the street to the grocery store parking lot, and picked up a little Oregon-grown table-top tree from L’Arche – a wonderful organization that provides community for the developmentally disabled. (Anyone else out there a Henri Nouwen admirer?) 

We always do a table-top tree, because we have few ornaments, it’s easier with little grabby-hands babies around, and we go to Grandma’s house for Christmas, where she has a HUGE glittering tree. 

(I couldn’t get my oldest to stop eating her candy cane long enough to get a good picture!  Also, we had the pleasure of having our little niece with us for the day, in case you’re wondering.  I still only have 3 kids!)

 

Over the next several days, we will put the tree up in stages – the first day it is always left bare in its little stand.  The second day, the lights go up.  The third, the popcorn and cranberries are strung, and the paper chains put up.  The fourth, we decorate – usually the girls have a friend or two over, we listen to Christmas music, drink hot cocoa and eat cookies, decorate the tree, and watch a Charlie Brown Christmas.  Hopefully, I’ll be able to share some of that over the next few days.

Spice Hunters

This is our spice cabinet (Yes, it’s a bit of a mess.  Yes, the jams and jellies are taking over a bit.  Yes, it looks like I’m single handedly keeping the Clackamas Penzeys store in business.)

This morning, I was feeding Tum Tum in the living room, when I heard some clunking, giggling, and whispering in the kitchen.  Of course, I’m now in the habit of grabbing my camera., so I was able to get some shots of the girls.  They were very busy, playing “Spice Hunters”.  

Little Hen would reach up, grab a spice, open it, and she and Firecracker would describe what they smelled.   The Contintental Rub smelled like “Thanksgiving”; Rogan Josh, “India”; the cloves, “Mama’s tea”; nutmeg, “eggnog”, etc.  Then, Little Hen would read the label to find out what spice they had selected.  When they got to the paprikas (yes, I have several kinds), they declared that the spice hunt was a success, because they had found the “the treasure of the rarest, most valuable ‘pap-ah-reek-ahs’ to bring home to [their] people.” 

At the end, Little Hen said, “Mama, this cabinet smells like that spice store.  You know, the one with the kids’ coloring table, and all the good smells.  I love that place.  What’s it called?”  “You mean Penzeys?”  “That’s the one!!” 

I think this afternoon, we’ll do a little research online about real spice hunters, and the spice trade.  I think it’ll be a really interesting topic (and when would a kindergartener ever  get to cover this subject in public school?).

Pear Upsidedown Gingerbread Cake

I make this every year at the holidays.  Firecracker and I made it yesterday for Thanksgiving.  She helped sautee the pears (local, organic, from Hood River) and make the reduction, measure the dry ingredients, and crack the eggs.  She is a super kitchen helper. 

If you make this, and have little kitchen helpers, I recommend cooking an extra pear for each helper -otherwise, you may find yourself with too few pears to top the cake.   Not much is more tempting than pears caramelized in butter and sugar!   

I have saved every issue of Martha Stewart Living since I began subscribing in 1997 (yup, back when I was a college freshman!).  This recipe is from the Dec/Jan 1997 issue, but I just discovered that it’s also here.  I leave out the extra tablespoon of freshly grated ginger, because I find that with it, the flavor is a bit too sharp for little children.  Also, it’s a little time-consuming, but the flavor of the caramelized pears with the gingerbread is delicious.  I served each slice with a dollop of honey cream cheese frosting.