Creating... the Yummy Way

We have had a fabulous food day in our house today!

They boys are learning equivalent fractions so we practiced by baking Brown Eyed Orange Bars while making them figure out how many scoops they would need if they only had one size measuring cup at a time! This delightful recipe is one my Mum made when I was a little girl. I don't know the origin of it but here it is:

For the squares:
1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup skim milk powder
1/3 cup white sugar
1-1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup butter or margarine, melted
1/2 c. orange juice
1 Tbsp. grated orange rind
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 cup chocolate chips
Heat the oven to 375°F.
Grease and flour square 9”cake pan and set aside.
Sift the flour with the skim milk powder, sugar, baking powder, and salt.
Beat in the butter, orange juice, orange rind, vanilla and egg until well mixed.
Stir in the chocolate chips.
Spread into cake pan.
Bake 20-25 minutes until done.
While still warm, spread with orange glaze.
Leave to cool completely before cutting.

For the orange glaze:
2/3 cup sifted icing sugar sugar
1 Tbsp. orange juice
1 tsp. grated orange rind

Mix all ingredients together. Add more orange juice as needed to make
glaze consistency. Pour over bars while still warm.

Tanner has been wanting to try making his own ginger tea for quite awhile so tonight he did it. He brewed his own ginger tea! It was way too spicy for me but he quite enjoyed it!

And finally Michael made dinner tonight - a Chicken Chow Mein recipe he picked up from watching Jamie Oliver videos online. It is delicious but we ate it all so sorry, no pictures!

Creating a To-Do List

I spent last year focusing on organizing our home and life. The difference between our home last January and this January, both in terms of physical organization and our scheduling, is huge. Not that we are ever truly done becoming organized!
I am trying something new this spring - I am mentoring a conference through our school's online discussion forum on organization. It is great to be able to continue to structure our home and school, as well as to encourage others to do the same.
As part of that I have been reading a book Organizing Your Day: Time Management Techniques That Will Work for You by Sandra Felton and Marsha Sims. They give lots of great advice about how to organize yourself by managing your day, whether at work or home. The most helpful tip I have gotten so far is to make a to-do list.
Yesterday I made my list and subdivided it in to categories. I did not completely follow the authors in this area, choosing instead to make ones that match my life. I have "Computer" which includes all emails, finances, research, etc. that I need to be on the computer for; "Home" which is everything else I need to do around the house, both work and fun; "Calls", which reminds me of the people and places I need to contact when I have a few moments; and "Errands", which lets me group together all the things I need to do while I am out of the house. I also added one more, "Anywhere" which reminds me of simple tasks, like reading my magazine or transferring birthdays from the old to new calendar, that can be done when I am waiting or otherwise killing time.
This list is not a one-day list. It is an ongoing list. I then choose my priority item or items to work on first and keep plugging away until they are done, then move to the next couple.
I strongly recommend to-do lists for everyone! I was amazed at how much I was able to get done in just one day! One of the biggest reasons for this change was that when I needed a break from a project, I could see what else I could work on for a change of pace instead of just wasting time. It also meant that as things come to mind, I can write them down and forget about them for now instead of trying to hold them in the back of my mind. What a difference that made - being able to fully concentrate on the task at hand!

I challenge you all - make a to do list and see what you can accomplish today!

Creating A Home

We all, or at least most, of us are blessed with a place to call our own, to live in and rest in. But is it a house or home? And what is the difference?

My kids have pondered this question many times over the past few months as they have really struggled with the transition to a new house. Yes, they can see all the ways this place is a blessing but they still wanted to go home.

I think we have finally turned the corner. What has made the difference?
Family time, and building memories together.
We have spent time playing games. We have done lots of baking and group cooking sessions. We have had our first holiday in our new place. We went all out on the decorating at Christmas, and used the opportunity to host an open house to show our friends our new place.
We hosted Christmas dinner. We had Nona to stay at Christmas and now have Grandma here. All these things have served to weave a spirit of family and connectedness into our new abode.

Now we have taken one more step. We have put paintings up on the wall. Decorations on a wall speak of permanence, of staying in a place for a while, enough to personalize it. Our last place never really got pictures up. We got one up in the living room but had to remove it to protect the painting from little boys. No others ever got up. Now we have multiple paintings up, with a few more to be added once they are frames. And the best paintings of all? The three beautiful watercolour paintings made by our children as a Christmas present to us.

Finally, we feel we really belong. that this is our home and not just a borrowed abode.

Making Our Daughter a Room

For those of you who know us you know our daughter already has a room so you are probably wondering what on earth I am talking about.

Here is the story (and sorry, but to protect the guity there are no photos!):

Our daughter's room was the one area I had not managed to get to before we moved, so it had WAY too much stuff. Plus, it had gotten messy over the summer and when we started showing the house her things got stuffed in boxes and loaded in the closet, where they stayed until moving day. You can see the disaster already brewing, can't you?

Then we moved, which brought the blessing of new furniture for her room, a very girly set handed down from the neighbour of a friend. The trouble was that she lost most of her toy storage space.

Over the past couple months her stuff has slowly gotten unpacked, but stacked in tubs on the floor, never a good idea. Finally over Christmas, when she pulled the last boxes out looking for special clothes and shoes, the whole room erupted. The final straw was Tuesday night, when Michael could not get across her room to kiss her good night!

Last night we hauled absolutely everything out to the dining room (except for the few clothes that were still in drawers). We then spent last night and this morning sorting and purging, and Michael managed to actually clean her floor while we were at it. We gave a lot of way, threw a lot away, have hidden her stuffies in our room for sorting at a later date, and moved a couple things to the garage playroom (Barbies and Lego).

The result? We have created our daughter a beautiful room she can actually live in! Not as much fun as making crafts, but certainly a project worth making!

Wall Hangings with Character

I did it!  I finally made my first crafty project of the year! These wall hangings were originally meant to be filled only with photos, and given as Christmas presents but I ran out of time! Then we decided to give each member of our family a character trait to work on for the year, and I had the brilliant idea of incorporating them into the wall hangings!
Each child's wall hanging has 4 sections, all cut out of Stampin Up's Top Notes die. They were then each covered with scrapbook paper. Tanner's is camouflage because he loves all things military, Nicolas' is nautical as he has started collecting models and I thought it would co-ordinate nicely, and Amanda's is pink and blue as they are her favourite colours.

I printed out their names, character traits (with a brief definition) and a complimentary Bible verse onto regular paper and modpodged them on to the first three sections. Then I discovered the modpodge makes the printer ink run, so I printed them again, on white cardstock, and used Zipdry to glue them on over the original writing. The final section of each one has a copy of our favourite family photo. Then the fun part, which Amanda and I did together - embellishing them all! The funny part is that I was most worried about how to do Tanner's yet I think his worked the best! I found some great stickers at Michael's craft store, then a friend of mine found some army trinkets there on clearance, including great words like "army", "navy", "air force" and "courage". I also hung the  trinket of the helicopter off the bottom.

Nicolas' is done with a mixture of brads (anchor and starfish) as well as with travel stickers. I am not thrilled with the final result of his, but he loved it so that is good!

Amanda's - I wanted to do more to hers but she wouldn't let me! Very ironic as she is usually an over-embellishment queen! It still looks good, though, just not as sparkly as I envisioned!

And that is my first crafty project of the year done! Woohoo! Now to figure out which of the ideas bubbling in my head to turn into reality next!

My Kids Create

We had our first snow of the calendar year and the first one where it was good packing snow. My kids had a blast today, building a snowman and a snowfort. They even shovelled both our driveway and our neighbour's! They wrapped up the afternoon with a snowball fight with Daddy (Mummy has more sense).

I just had to share their create (but expensive) snowman with you! He has cinnamon hair, with a black pepper strip through it for the earmuff band, broccoli earmuffs, stick eyes, carrot nose and mouth, and vitamin drink for rosy cheeks. Gotta love their creativity even while cringing at the effect on my food budget! LOL

Here's the pictures:

Creating Opportunity for Humility

Tonight I practiced one of my favourite methods of nurturing my children, date night with one of them. My son and I went to McDonald's to try the new Oreo pie (he is an Oreo nut) and then brought it home to our empty house and played a game of Risk. I was doing very well, which brought out his puppy eyes as he received the game for Christmas but has never won. Looking at those eyes and debating which move to make, I chose the more compassionate one. Bad move! He proceeded to make me eat crow and stomped me out within about three or four turns!
Still, I joy in the laughter and fun we had together, and winning will make him more willing to play again next time! Monopoly anyone?

Process over Product

Yesterday I was reading the book Plain and Simple by Sue Bender. Sue is an artist who became intrigued by the Amish lifestyle and spent time staying with them to learn about their culture and ways. While there she learned to live in the moment, to focus on the process and not just the product. For example, when canning tomatoes, enjoy the smell and feel of the fresh, ripe fruit, the warmth and sparkling of the clean jars, the satisfaction of filling them with home-grown produce, and so on. Sue talked about the methodical nature of the Amish that relaxes and enjoys the whole process, instead of rushing anxiously to the end to have something done.

That focus on process rather than product struck a chord with me. How ofter am I short with my children because I am too focused on getting things done? How often do I deny them the chance to work alongside me because I can work faster alone, or because I am sending everyone off to get their own jobs done?

Next I started thinking about the craft project I wanted to make them for Christmas. I had desired to make them wall hanging for their room with their name and photos on it, but unfortunately didn't get unpacked in time to make them. One of my goals for this week was to complete the hangings, although I am changing them a bit, as we have chosen a character trait and Scripture for each child for the year and I am incorporating them. However I digress.  I realized that I have a daughter who loves time with Mummy, and loves crafts, and who would much rather make something with me than be presented with a gift from me. Tonight we spent some time together working on the wall hangings. She is very excited that they have become our secret project (the boys were given a choice of helping me or having their gift be a surprise and they both chose to be surprised). What a blessing to have that time with my daughter, hearing her animated chatter and her giggles as we completed each step. How precious the process!

Create - A Word for 2012

Much as I longed to spend another year seeking simplicity in my life, I felt God calling me a new way - to seek to create.
I love creating and have a passion for it, but it is not something I have ever really had time or energy for. When I first felt pulled towards this word, I saw it in a very narrow focus - creating crafts, which I love to do and hope to do a lot of! However, I am feeling God spreading His arms, and showing me different ways to create this year:
-  crafts for fun
- crafts for business - something I have longed to do but never had time for
- creating a home out of our new house
- creating a more nurturing environment in our home
- creating a blog
- creating a book (I have felt a longing to write for years, and my kids are really pushing me on this one)
- creating better ways of managing our lives and our school

I am looking forward to this year, and to seeing how God seeks to push me beyond my boundaries, out into new territory to explore and learn from.

The Word That Started It All

A friend of mine has been selecting a word to focus on each year for several years. I thought that was a great idea, and although I never wrote it down, my word for last year was "Simplify". I prayed over it all year and God repeatedly showed me places and ways to simplify my life. I cut down on outside commitments, finally finished unpacking the house (after over 9 years living in it!),  threw out and gave away mountains of things, made personalized school and home goal sheets for myself and my kids, and finally, ironically, repacked our home to move to a new place. Even our new house was a way God simplified our life, with a very different layout that is much simpler to live in and promotes both family unity and designated living spaces (bedrooms, school room, play room, large main living area). For those still laughing that I barely finished unpacking before starting again, let me tell you that having everything unpacked and sorted made packing, moving, and unpacking a breeze! There are still boxes but the overall process has been so much easier! And another way God found for me to simplify life - we moved a month after two of our friends so scooped all their boxes and never once had to go scrounging for any!

"Simplify" was such a great word, and one that I made such progress in, that I really wanted to use it again for my word this year. However, God said, "No". He had another idea, and tomorrow I'll share where He has me going from here!

Creating a Functional Schoolroom

I haven't got to the creative pursuits I had in mind, but this week I have managed to create something much more necessary - a schoolroom we can work in! We have a large extra room that we have converted to a multipurpose room - it is our school/craft/gym/guest room. How's that for multipurpose?

I am loving how organized it is looking. All the supplies and materials have assigned spaces, and each child has their own desk. I have found it incredibly helpful to invest in baskets and plastic containers of miscellaneous sizes. I find that breaking things down into smaller groups makes it much easier to keep things neat.

We have a big table in the middle for group lessons and activities. And last night I splurged, or at least Michael did - he bought me a nice large, sturdy desktop carousel for my table to hold all my supplies I need handy on a regular basis.

Next up is making the room pretty. Wendy gave the kids a lava lamp, and Christina made me a sign for my wall with my word for the year, "Create". Now to figure out what else I want to do to add a nice touch to the room!