Freezing Bread

Alright, maybe this should be a no-brainer, but for me freezing homemade bread has always kind of freaked me out. I think I have soggy bread issues from somewhere. Anyhow, I got a new bread recipe the other day that I wanted to try out, but it makes LOTS of bread. My friend said to just wrap the rest of the loaves in plastic wrap twice, and they freeze just fine. So I tried it out.

Making the bread was a story in and of itself. It is not a double rise recipe, which is what I prefer, but I did have to let it sit and "bubble" at 2 different points. I tried making it in my mixer, which is a mini-Bosch, and I thought it could handle the capacity. Well, at one of the "bubbling" parts, I set the timer to let it set for the appropriate amount of time and left the room. A little while later my husband called to let me know that the bread was exploding! Seriously! It was bubbling out of the bowl, onto the counter, and onto the floor. I had exploding bread dough. I've never seen anything quite like it. So I had to transfer it to my largest mixing bowl and then proceed to knead the dough by hand(not my favorite thing). I got things under control and eventually I ended up with 4 beautiful loaves of bread(the recipe can make more loaves, but I made mine pretty big). Hooray!

I took 2 and froze them, knowing that fresh bread doesn't last too long in our house. So last night I took out one of the loaves to un-thaw overnight. I put it on a cooling rack(a tip I got from a friend a long time ago) so that no moisture would build up on the bottom(not sure if this even happens, but I have soggy bread issues so I took the extra precaution). This morning I sliced into the loaf, and it was just as moist and fresh as the other loaves I had not frozen. Texture entirely entact. I am so excited I had to blog about it. So now I know that instead of having to make bread often, I just need to make lots of loaves and freeze the extra for homemade bread all the time! Yeah!

So if you have a bread recipe you like, make lots so you can freeze the extra. But you probably already do, and I'm just a bit slow in this regard. :)

Mealtime Togetherness

This morning at breakfast I asked Roger to say the prayer. One of the things he mentioned in his prayer was that we could have a good time talking while we ate our breakfast. This made me think about some things.

1. Sometimes I feel like I don't do enough as a mom to prepare my kids for the world at large. This made me feel like I am doing a few things right.

2. I try to always eat meals with our kiddos. Maybe not the most adult conversation while Will is at work, and sometimes I feel like I could pull my hair out with all the silliness my boys produce at the table, but at least we are together.

3. The kids obviously appreciate the fact that we eat our meals together.

I love being a mom. It is hard to stay home sometimes and do all the mundane tasks, but I am here for my kids and apparently they notice and appreciate it. We have good and bad times together. This weekend as we were listening to General Conference, there were lots of good talks and many themes, but one I did notice was the importance of being consistent with our kids and keeping the lines of communication open with them. I know I'm not a perfect mom, but I'm glad I can be a mom to my kids and be here for them when they need me. They are our future, and I just hope I can do right by them.

Busy Busy

So I'm totally behind in my blogging entries. So here is a catch up for our recent activities. We've been gardening and getting lots of produce. It's fun to do, even if its not the easiest work.


Yesterday we moved the chicken coop. No pics, but it was funny trying to chase the chickens to their new home. Chickens are interesting creatures.

I've been organizing and sewing like mad. I think I have pregnancy cravings that are hobbies, instead of food. With Roger I craved reading. With Allen I craved exercise. With Margaret I craved cleaning and nesting. With this one I crave crafting. Those crazy hormones I guess. I redid our bedroom, thanks to craigslist. :)

Before
(well I had already started so everything was discombobulated)

After
(still a few things to find home for, but a vast improvement)

And here is a T-shirt remodel I did. We'll see what else I come up with.

Before

After

And in the meantime, with me and my sidetrackedness, Allen has been taking self portraits. :)

Roger's Birthday

I am finally posting about Roger's birthday. He had a great time. He really wanted to have a party like all his friends, but I just didn't feel up to it. So instead I told him he could have one friend come over. His friend came over in the morning, and after playing for awhile and stopping at the Credit Union on the way, we went to Jantzen Beach to ride the carousel. They had a blast. Then we went to McDonalds for lunch and playing on the big slides. Then we came home for more playtime. When Will got home from work we had cake and ice cream and Roger opened his presents. Easy and low key for me, and a very happy 6 year old. It was a fun day for all!

The aliens the kids got at the Credit Union.

Ready to ride.

Here we go!

Yeah!

Hands in the air!

Legos,

Star Wars toys,

Finger skateboard,

and Transformers!!!

And here he is playing with his Transformer.


***Update***

I forgot to mention that that following weekend we had a get together with my side of the family to celebrate Roger's and a couple of his cousins' birthdays and had food, a sheetcake(sheetcake success 2x now), and a swim party. It was fun, and we had a great time, as most of my siblings ended up coming in for "surprise" in the end. Roger also got to go out to gelato with my parents and to the safety fair for a ride on the fire truck. Fun times!

Labor Day Gardening & Fun

So I've been behind in my postings. Here are some pics from Labor Day.

This was our garden this year.

Somehow we ended up with giant marigolds instead of just regular sized ones.

Here are our Roma tomato plants.

A few of the giant heirlooms that we grew.

Some poblano chili peppers.

After a morning of gardening we went for a walk on a local trail. It was kind of a gloomy day, but perfect for a walk.


On our walk, Will and Roger took turns with a little rock baseball. :)

After our walk we went home for some naps, then we went to a cousin's birthday party and then to some friends barbecue. An event filled day, but so much fun!

School is Cool

All excited and ready to go!

Yesterday was Roger's first day of Kindergarten. He had a blast! It was his Smart Start day(the day they only go for a few hours with a small group of kids from their class). Tuesday will be his first full day. Roger loved it. Allen was bored without Roger, but I took him to story time at the library so it wasn't all bad. Here are some pics of Roger's first day.

Roger getting ready to enter his first day.

The classroom. He is part of the KIDS program where they have school at a portable at a local high school, and they get to have high school helpers to work one on one with.

When Roger came home he had lots to say about everything he did. He absolutely loved it! I think he was a little tired though because he opted for a nap while Allen took his(it was a short one though). Allen was glad to have Roger home and they have been playing school ever since. The game should actually be called "Let's go to school" because they walk around the house packing their backpacks and going from room to room to "go to school." It's kind of funny to watch, but they are happy as clams.

In case you didn't know, my children love to wear matching clothes.
They pick out matching outfits all the time.

Although Allen wishes he could go to school, he is happy to have Roger's old backpack.

"Oh it's pear canning time in Vancouver..."

My little helpers

"Oh it's pear canning time in Vancouver."(There is actually a tune to this line, and I don't know what the original song was, but growing up it was a common song for us to sing in the garden or canning or working. Eg: "Oh it's peach canning time in Oregon City," or "Oh it's cherry picking time in Oregon City." You get the idea, so I am passing the ditty along to our kids.)

Check out these tasty looking jars.

Roger asked if he could take a picture and I said yes, hence the closeup.

Roger and Allen were troopers and helped out. Allen had a hard time peeling, so his job was to fish the peels out of the sink while Roger peeled the blanched pears. I canned with the boys on Wednesday and got 14 quarts. Today my sister came up to help and we finished off the boxes I had gotten and got 20 more quarts. Whew! That's a whole lot of pears! We will divide them with my sister and they will be much enjoyed. :)

These are the 20 quarts from the second day of canning.

I should also note that I learned a valuable canning lesson today. Despite many warnings, I finally broke a jar in the canner. :) I generally pour boiling syrup over my cold fruit, so sticking the jars into boiling water has never been a problem. Well today, my syrup wasn't quite hot enough and a jar broke when I put it in. Oops. We salvaged the pears, but I've learned a good lesson. :)

Wednesday afternoon, after all the boys hard work ;) they spent some time skateboarding out on the patio. They got so hot and sweaty that I made them take a 10 minute reading break. They opted to take their books outside, and I looked out the sliding glass door to find them thus.

Boys are so fun!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!