Getting things back to normal

My main goal in life is to get things back to normal right now. I’m on the right path, but not there completely yet. Since the move we have gotten back to normal for our works lives and bedtime stuff, and mostly our eating. I know that sounds pretty good and I swear if I stopped there we would all survive, but I want more. I want my frozen homemade food back so we can eat something yummy and somewhat healthy at a moments notice, I want more things unpacked and I want our homeschool area ready. One thing at a time.

I can only do so much at once so I’m stating slowly with the frozen food. Last week I made our favorite tomato soup. I always make a double batch and freeze the leftovers, so now I have just about 3 meals worth of frozen tomato soup ready to go. I had never done it with the cheese sandwich croutons before, but this last time we had the soup I made grilled cheese sandwiches on our new panini press and we finally figured out why people eat grilled cheese with tomato soup. It was awesome! Due to my lovely gallstones I only had a bite or two of sandwich, but loved it. Waldo and Lily were sold and I think I’m never going to get away without the cheese sandwiches.  So now I’m going to have to make sure I always have cheese slices in the freezer.  What we did this last time worked great. Waldo sliced the leftover cheese from our Costco blocks of cheddar and Gruyere and put what he felt was one sandwich’s worth in a slightly offset stack and wrapped them in parchment paper (next time I think we’ll try freezer paper as I just found it in a box) and then he put them in a freezer bag. We took them out a few minutes before we were ready to grill the sandwiches and they worked out awesome.

Today was a big day, I made banana bread just for fun and because our banana started to look really sad. I have read that you can unpeel the bananas and put them in a freezer bag for later bread making (or whatever floats your boat), but I’ve never tried it myself. I always just make the bread. I don’t have a link for the recipe I use because I didn’t note where it came from and I’ve changed it quite a bit. I will try and remember to post my recipe at some point.

After I finished the banana bread I made southern biscuits and froze them unbaked, now when we want some biscuit love we just have to pull them out and bake them. I’ve never done this one before, but it’s noted on the recipe so I have high hopes and I’m looking forward to a surprise of buttery biscuits for breakfast one day. Side note: these are buttermilk biscuits and I never have buttermilk at home. I use powered buttermilk and it works out fine.

Now I’ve got pasta sauce simmering on the stove. That is again a double batch and I’ll put it in freezer quart bags and we’ll have months worth of easy pasta dinners almost ready to go. I don’t change much with this one, except that we don’t like chunky tomatoes so after this is all simmered I use my immersion blender and make it fairly smooth. I think I need to start simmering this sauce longer because once we put it on our plates the sauce kinda leaks water that drives Waldo crazy. It’s still delicious, but he hates the water portion. Our cook friend suggested that I cook it longer. I’ll try and remember to report back with how this works.

Next week I plan to make pizza sauce and chili. Whew, I’m tired just looking at all of this.  We love this pizza sauce, it’s the BEST. Much like a lot of Alton’s recipes it’s a lot of steps and fiddly, but I think that’s what makes it so perfect, it’s very tasty and full of flavor. I use my immersion blender on this too and we make it fairly smooth. I think you’ll see a trend when it comes to tomatoes and us. I can’t recommend this sauce enough.

**I started this post a few weeks ago and have been trying to get it finished this whole time. At this point we have polished off the soup and pizza sauce. Waldo has informed me that he wants us to try and find another chili recipe. The one I use is good, but not knock-your-socks-off.

Lily made my birthday special

I turned 38 at the end of March. It was a Monday and Lily was none too pleased when she asked “what special things we were going to do for my birthday” and I told her “nothing until dinner. The rest of the day was going to be normal except for birthday creme brulee after lunch”. Oh No. Lily wasn’t having any of this. She wanted my birthday to be special, like I make her birthdays fun and special. She wouldn’t allow us to go to the library for her little art class even though I begged and pleaded. No way was I going to tell her why I love my Monday morning’s at the library, she gets to do art for about 30 minutes and I get to sit next to a usually sunny window and read my book in relative peace. Bliss. Nope, art is fun for her and we aren’t doing that on my birthday. Fine.

To help make my birthday special Lily decorated the house for me. She asked for the crape paper I keep in the closet and went to town. There was a string of crape paper here and there and a few other on the other wall. This one was my favorite though.

She also made me a wonderful birthday card and best of all a special birthday song and dance.

I made creme brulee for my birthday. I had never had it before, but always wanted to eat it and best of all make it. I mean I got to buy a torch for it. Best thing ever. The creme brulee was amazingly yummy and pretty easy to make.

We did our usual thing and went out to dinner for my birthday. We went to Flatbread Pizza Oven and it was so yummy. I thought I had taken a bunch few pictures, but couldn’t find them. Oh well, who really wants to see our amazing pizza and salad when you could see the pictures we took before we left the house?

Lily and her arm. Silly kid.

Lily insisted that we take a picture with Clarice so we went all out. She was taking the picture so we figured she got to pose us.

Us!

My birthday was very special because I spent it with the ones I love the most. I have no complaints.

Random Mobile Shots

My newest kick is making yogurt. I found a nice yogurt maker at a thrift store and my obsession started.
Since we don’t give Lil cow’s milk I started out making rice milk yogurt, that didn’t work so well. Next I tried almond milk yogurt, sill nope. So we decided to try cow’s milk. I mean we give her regular milk yogurt all the time, I just thought it’d be nice to cut out that one last bit of cow’s milk. I can’t be upset about this cool milk container though.

Here’s the milk cooling in the water bath.

The yogurt is still in the maker so I have no idea if it’s going to work or not.

Even though I posted a video of Lil enjoying her french toast I had to include this picture.

We made valentine’s day cookies this week.

Lil insisted that we have lips for valentine’s day. In order to get the lips I had to buy a set with a mustache and glasses. Lil loved them.

The Valentine Princess is busy at work icing cookies.

All the best Valentine Princesses have bunny tails.

Some of our finished cookies.

Waldo wanted a mustache cookie, I traded him for a picture. We decided that he’d make a great cartoon villain. 🙂

Random Mobile Shots

Party dinosaur mase Lil made

Last night we read a book where the little person made a monster mask. This morning Lil made a party dinosaur mask.

A small swarm on our front porch

Yesterday we had a very small swarm of bees on our front porch. One of the hazards of a bee keeper in the family.

Caged Lily

Caged Lily. This is a family tradition I started with my little sister.

Mama under stuff

I’m buried under a bunch of stuff.

Working Lily Kitty

Working Lily Kitty

Lily and working Lily Kitty

Lily with working Lily Kitty

Bath tub Lil

Bathtub Kitty

Bounty

Garden bounty

Hiding melons

There are at least 8 melons hiding in there.

Gardner Girl

Gardner Girl

“Carrots come out of there”

Yum

After zoo ice cream

She's so proud of the flower stuck to her nose

She’s super proud that the flower sticks to her nose when she inhales it

Do you mind, I'm thinking

Do you mind, I’m trying to draw.

Lily drew this while we were at dinner one night.

This pole was what she was trying to draw. I’ll update this post with the finished work of art later.

Bunny Lily making a jelly fish

Bunny Lily making a paper bag jelly fish

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