All Things Fall -Part 2

   So one thing I enjoy in the fall is braking out the soup recipes.  This week has gotten colder, and will not get to warm again until Spring.  So on our menu for the next two week I have a lot of soups planed out.

   So on Tuesday night I made carrot soup and lemon pepper chicken nuggets.  I will share the carrot soup recipe I use.  It is from The Pioneer Woman with my own little twist.

Carrot Soup: about 8 Servings

3lbs of baby carrots
2 quarts of chicken or veggie stock
2 sprigs of Thyme
1/3 cup honey or if you are out of honey you can use 1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup heavy cream ( sometimes use up to a cup)
4 oz.  of cream cheese


1. Put carrots, Thyme, and Stock in a stock pot.  Bring to a boil and hen let is simmer for 45min to 1 hour.

2. Take the stems of the thyme out.  Use an emergen blender to blend the carrots smooth.  If you don't have one you can do this with a blender in to batches.  It will be very hot, do be cautious.

3. Once smooth add in the cream cheese and heavy cream stir until the cream cheese has melted.  Taste and add slat and pepper if needed.

For the Lemon Pepper Chicken Nuggets:

2-3 chicken breast.  I cube them up
lemon pepper seasoning

1. I put all the pieces of chicken into a gallon size baggie.
2. Add the seasoning, and close the bag.
3. move the chicken around in the bag until the coated.
4. cook the chicken in a frying pan, I like cast iron skillets

All things Fall Part 1

     So I love fall.  The crisp weather allows me to were my favorite boots, jeans, and sweaters.  I love decorating for the fall and the vibrant colors of the leaves.  In the fall football on the TV is a must.  Family movie nights become more often as the sun sets earlier. As a family we enjoy outings to the pumpkin patch and to other fall events that have become family traditions. 
  
     I enjoy the smell of warm soup cooking on the stove and hot coco in my cup.   The smell of home made breads come into our home more and more in the fall.  Fall is the time when I do some canning.  I can apple butter, spaghetti sauce, and a few other things.

    I enjoy planning fall activities for our family.  Every fall our church homeschool group does a harvest party.  New this year our youth group will be going to a local pumpkin farm.  We will be having a bonfire, food and fun.  The last couple years, our neighborhood has been doing some fun Halloween night things for the kids also.  

     By mid October I start to plan Thanksgiving.  We are blessed to be able to take the whole week of Thanksgiving off.  I do most of the cooking so it can take me almost 4 days to cook every thing.  I try to get pies done earlier in the week and have a schedule of things I make or prep each day Monday-Thursday of that week.  The kids don't get off the hook and get to do nothing all week. They are on cleaning and cooking prep duty also.  J- our 17 year old is an amazing cook, even though he does not think he is.  Each of the kids have a dish they like to help with.

     This month I am hoping to share with you all some of the fun things we do, how to plan a Thanksgiving meal and much more.

Homemade Mac & Cheese

For dinner tonight I made homemade mac & cheese with chicken strips and a side salad.  I am going to share the mac & cheese recipe with you.

Ingredients:

2 boxes of Cellentani Noodles

16 oz of white cheddar cheese ( shredded)

2 cups heavy cream

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1/4 teaspoon paprika

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

1 cup milk

4 table spoons butter

4 table spoons flour

1 small onion finely chopped

2 cloves of garlic finely chopped

Directions

1. Cook the noodles according to package directions.

2.  In a medium sized sauce pan melt the butter and add the onions and garlic. Cook until they  are translucent and tender. About 3-5 minutes

3. Add the flour and cook another 1-2 minutes. Until fragrant.

4. Add the heavy cream and milk to the pan and stir on low. Simmer for 2-3 minutes.

5. Add the cheese to the sauce pan and stir until combined.

6. Before draining the water skim off about a cup of the pasta water and set aside.  Drain the noodles and return them to the pan.

7. add the cheese sauce and the cup of pasta water to the pan with he noodles.  Mix everything together. 

8. Enjoy!!!

Homeaschooling Year 10: End of the First Month

     Our 2017/18 School year has started out to be a productive one. We are in full swing of our school year schedule.  All of our actives have started or will start next week. This year our boys are in scouts again and our daughter is in American Heritage Girls.  Our church is starting our youth group up again.  All of our other church groups have also started back for the school year.  It feels good to get back in our routine.  Don't get me wrong I love summer break, but I miss some of our weekly actives during that time.

     We started off history learning about ancient Egypt.  We read many books about the pyramids and how mummies were made.  We learned about daily life in Egypt at that time. We will be finishing our unit with make old Barbie dolls into Mummies. The kids were not as interested in the unit as they had originally thought they would be.  That is ok, not every subject is appealing as you start off thinking it would be.

     We are reviewing in Math and will start with new information with in a week. In English we are working with the younger two on writing different types of papers.  K is learning how to write a personal narrative, she is doing very good for her first one.  P is also working on a personal narrative, he is not excited about English and rather do Math all day.  He is doing very well and learning how to fine tune his writing.

     Our two high school kids are doing amazing at keeping up with there work.  We use Switched on Schoolhouse for High School.  They are for the most part independent in their studies.  J is also working on studying for the ACT. He is working on getting everything together for applying for collage.   A is loving his freshman year in high school.  He is enjoying watching the weather channel online to see the coverage of Hurricane Harvey.  His likes weather study, that has been one of his favorite merit badges he has earned, in scouts.

     Also during our first month of school we learned about the solar system and the solar eclipse.  We were able to see the solar eclipse (98% of totality).  I am glad we were able to experience it as a family.   The kids loved seeing the moon moving to block out the sun.  Waiting for the Eclipse and during 98%.

So many adventures await us this year.  I am looking forward to writing about them.  See you all soon.

Spiced Beef with Couscous

 

So I found a recipe in the Food Network Magazine from July/August 2016. I like to basic concept of the recipe but I tweaked it a little.  I share with you my tweaked recipe.

Serves: 8-10

Ingredients:

2 carrots finely shredded

3 tablespoon of extra- virgin olive oil

3 cups couscous

2 cup plain yogurt

3 teaspoons of sweet paprika

4lbs. ground hamburger

8 chopped green onions

2 teaspoons ground cumin

1-1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

3 cups water

1/2 teaspoon onion powder

1 teaspoon dill

salt and pepper to taste

1. combine the ground beef with 1 teaspoon paprika, 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, 1 teaspoon ground cumin, 1/2 teaspoon onion powder.  Mix together and form 8-10 paddies. If you need to adjust the amount of hamburger for larger paddies do so.  Cook on the grill or in a grill pan to your desired doneness.

2. Meanwhile place 3 tablespoons of olive oil in a heated pan.  Place the dry couscous in the pan and cook until you smell a nutting smell. about 2-4 minutes.  Add in the 3 cups of water, 1 teaspoon paprika, 1 teaspoon cumin, 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, salt and pepper to taste and carrots, cover and cook for 8-10 minuets. Stir the couscous a couple times during the cooking process.  Add 3 of the chopped green onions and fluff with a fork before serving.

3. the yogurt sauce: mix together 2 cups plain yogurt, 1 teaspoon dill, 1 teaspoon paprika, 1 teaspoon cumin, 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, and salt and pepper to taste.  You can adjust the dill, cumin, paprika as needed for your taste.  When I plated our food I added a little bit of the remaining green onions on top.

Serve and enjoy!!

We added Pita bread to our meal and ate with our hands for a fun change. 

Our 10th Year Homeschooling!!!

     As the 2017-2018 school year starts (August 1).  I think back over the last nine school years, how I was nervous to start teaching our children at home.   That first school year I taught third grade, Kindergarten, and preschool.  We also had a newborn.  We did not know what our family was heading towards in some ways.  All we knew is that we were going to take homeschooling one year at a time. 

     The first year is a blur for the most part.  Some of the year I spent trying to replicate a public school classroom. But having a very set schedule.  Because as someone that attended public school that is what I thought that was what was expected of us.  I then sought out council from other homeschooling moms and found out that my homeschool did not have to "match" a public school classroom. Wow, I thought how much stress I was feeling about that was not even necessary.  If the kids and I got done with our lessons that it was ok for them to just play, read or be read too.  It was ok for them to paint, draw, or play outside.  I did not have to keep them cooped up in the house on nice days.  We could have impromptu "field trips", even of it was to the store down the street.   I remember one day we took our school work to the park by our house and took lunch with us.  I did not have to fear having someone call in on me because my kids "were not in school".  The first year we built a cover wagon out of sheets and my boys bunk beds.  We talked about how westward expansion happened, the Oregon trail and so much more with that unit.

     Over the years we have changed up some of our curriculum and we have done unit studies.  We have gone on countless field trips to places like our state capital building, museums, the zoo, and so many more.  This year is biter sweet for me. We have a senior in high school, a freshman, 7th and 4th graders. How have things changed for our school?  Well not much we still go on field trips, but the conversations about the field trips are much more in-depth with my kids.  Instead of just mommy look a lion, we talk about classification of lions or what ever animal we are in front of.  We might look for one particular style or artist in the art museum and talk about other works from that time or artist. Instead of can we find all the paintings that have the colors blue, read and yellow in them. If we are at the history museum we take a closer look at a particular time or culture.  Instead of when they were little hearing things like mommy look they have a train can I go see inside it. Ok, I will admit I still hear when we go to the Durham Western Heritage Museum, " Mom can we go on the train?"  When we go to the library the stacks of book don't get shorter in fact they seem taller, but the count of books has gone down for most of my kids.  It is just that the books they are reading are now four or more times the page count they used to be. 

     I will say that it has not all been easy, but it has all been worth it.  We have had times were everyone has cried about not understanding something new.  We have had times of celebrations, because someone learned something new.  So as we start our tenth year homeschooling I know that we will have many more ups and downs, many more field trips, and many more conversations.  I would say that the most important thing I have learned on our Homeschool Journey so far is that time goes by way to fast and I am glad that I can spend the time I do with my kids and help them learn the things they need for life and so much more.

Homeschool and Gardening

     With spring comes our yearly planning of our garden.  I use our garden as an opportunity to teach my kids science, home economics, and so much more.  Gardens help with keeping our food budget in check as we harvest.  This year we have moved our herb garden inside.  We are lucky enough to have a greenhouse window in our kitchen.  It is a great spot for all the herbs I love cooking with.  We had our herb garden outside last year and the chives and thyme came back. So we transplanted some of the plants into their new homes. we also planted rosemary, lavender and basil.  We worked on the herb garden today as part of school.
    
     Also this year we are planting tomatoes one cherry tomato and one or two roma tomato. We are planting corn, carrots, bell peppers, cucumbers, and a few other things. I also am getting dill for our herb garden.

     I love canning so I like using the roma tomatoes in my homemade sauce.  I also use many of the fresh herbs and bell peppers in my sauce.  I will share my recipe and a blog about canning spaghetti sauce at harvest time.

This is our herb garden!!!

Until Next Time