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The Rewards of the Day

The sights of this mornings Farmers Market….

big onions

walking advertisement

willy nilly

Obama even made an appearance!

Hi Obama

I spent the day with my dear friend Lynne who is wise in the ways of canning.  She helped this novice can a 1/2 bushel of peaches.  Very satisfying!!

peaches

We managed to make it through two summers at this house with no fire pit.  Last year my Mothers Day present was..you guessed it, a fire pit.  And one of the things our family really enjoys is cooking and eating around our fire ring.  Tonight we had a local spread of green beans and corn and a cucumber and tomato and fresh herb salad from our own garden.  We roasted hot dogs over the fire and completed the party with smores of course.  It’s like a short camping trip!

dinner

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Thursdays Quarter Recipe

recipes

I really enjoy cooking…when I have a clean kitchen, time, and  people who are actually going to eat what I make.  This is usually not the case these days so my dinners are usually easy  to make and easy to clean up.  But tonight I actually made a whole Indian meal.  It wasn’t too time consuming.  I used the crock pot and the rice cooker and got those started around 12:30pm and we ate around 5:30.

indian meal

I made Chicken Curry, Rice, Curried cauliflower, Cucumbers and sour Cream and heated up some Naan.

The Sri Lankan Chicken Curry is really easy.  This recipe serves 4.  I always make more.

3 T oil

2 onions finely sliced

1 one inch long piece of ginger chopped

2 garlic cloves

1/2 t turmeric

1 t chili powder

2 t garam masala

14 oz boneless chix (today I used a bag of the flash frozen chix tenders)

3/4 cup plus 2 T unsweetended coconut milk

2 tomatoes quartered

1/2 t salt

heat oil in a medium saucepn.  Add onions cook till golden. add ginger, garlic and spices-mix well for one minute.  add chicken mix well cook stirring for 5 minutes.  (at this point I threw mine in the crock pot with all the rest of the ingredients!)

Pour in 1 cup plus 2 T water.  bring to a boil.  reduce heat, cover and cook for 10 minutes

reduce heat to very low. add the coconut milk.  cook 10 minutes of until chicken is thoroughly cooked.  stir in tomatoes and salt.  cook 5 more minutes.  add fresh cilantro to taste-I add LOTS!

serve this over rice.  basmati is what we like best-I mix 1/2 brown and 1/2 white-cuz my family won’t just eat brown!  I added some olive oil, salt, frozen peas, a couple cinnamon sticks, cardamom pods, and some whole cloves in with the rice to cook.  It smells divine!

I also always serve this with cucumbers and sour cream-or you can make a riata.  I skin cucumbers and use the slicer part on my grater and grate into a bowl.  add salt-don’t be stingy with the salt here- and set aside so they make some juice.  add a few spoonfuls of sour cream and lots of black pepper.

Curried Cauliflower

1 head cauliflower cut up into pieces and put in a bowl with 1 t turmeric and 1 t salt.

Heat 6 T ghee (butter or oil will do) and saute cauliflower until tender. remove and set aside.  In same pan fry 1 t cumin, 1 t cayenne (use less this will be HOT), 1 t fresh ginger stirring constantly.  add 3 small chopped tomatoes and 1 t sugar and cook for 5 minutes.  add cauliflower back to pan stir, lower the heat, cover.  cook 8-10 minutes.  garnish with chopped coriander leaves (aka  whole lot of fresh cilantro).

We also always have Nan with this meal.  You can usually find it frozen if you can’t find it fresh.

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Found my Backbone

The unschooler in me has left the building.  At least for  few days.  I don’t make a habit of forcing my kids to do too much.  They usually have a compelling reason if I give their side consideration.  But Molly has several craft projects started ,very few finished and is signed up as a vendor for KidzArtz on Saturday.  Her cousin is in town visiting for the week and the fun is calling her away.  I was a bitch and said “No.”  I told her she needed to finish a few things this afternoon before she could go visiting.  Maybe I should let the natural consequence of disappointment be my guide.  But I decided -not this time.  I think I the consequence of follow-through and commitment are the route we will be taking this week.  Go me!

So today was a day of crafting.  Molly spent a good part of the day at the sewing machine.  They did some painting…drippainting

some dumping and cooking…hmm..what shall we have?

cooking

Too hot to cook…so egg salad is is on the menu…foam

But not for me!!  I am going OUT for free Wifi and ladies night..woohoo!

And come to think of it…I actually I used my spine 1 1/2 times in the last 24hrs.  Yesterday we found 2 kittens outside our library.  The animal lover (sucker) that I am took the babies home..just until we decided what to do with them.  I never really wanted 2 more cats!!  But of course my kids were crying and making lots of promises.  I couldn’t make a decision…so my husband came home made a few phone calls and asked me what I thought and I said, “Take them away”  I had a very upset 9 yr old girl for many hours and thought I was a horrible parent, cuz they can guilt me real easy like that!!  But not a mention was made today of those kittens-I am so glad we didn’t keep them!!-So there is my 1/2 a spine story.

Oh my-I was upgraded and now I  have no spell check…Dawn??

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ABOUT ME

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    I'm a creativity obsessed wife and camera totting mama to three homeschooled kids who is living in middle America and always dreaming of our next vacation.

    Read more about me here!


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