It's snowing!!!

But just not alot :). We have had flurries all week, nothing amounting to anything really. Well it seemed like today it may be a bit more...but It still didn't do anything. Oh well we had fun, I decided to bundle up the girls and take them out to enjoy the snow...

Tasting snow flakes :)


Our nice jackets keeping us warm

Look there are a few flakes of snow on the car!!!


Lets go out back!!

Seesaw in the snow....yeah...kind of . Ok not really, but it was fun...and cold...And we had hot chocolate when we got inside!!! Yay for hot chocolate!!!!

Pizza night, and more baking!

Today started out pretty chilly, so I decided to make bread :) yumm. Then the girls and I made pumpkin bread for dessert tonight, and this is the best pumpkin bread I have ever had... yumm again!
Then I decided tonight on a cold and windy Tuesday night that it would be a good night to have pizza night! yayyyy. So I threw together some pizza dough and set it aside to rise (i will post the recipes at the bottom).. Then when it was time to make dinner I called all the kiddos into the kitchen and gave them each a piece of dough and they went to town creating their own personal pizzas.



Then with all the toppings available to them they created their masterpieces. Nathaniel choose chicken and cheese. Alex choose frozen veggies and cheese. Brianna and Caitlynn both choose chicken and veggies and cheese.

Then it was off to the oven and about 10 min later it was dinner time!






Yumm dinner was so much fun tonight! Now for the recipes.....

Amish Pumpkin Bread

3 c. granulated sugar
1 c. vegetable oil
4 eggs, beaten
1 lb. canned pumpkin
3-1/2 c. flour
2/3 c. water
2 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. salt (scant)
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1 tsp. EACH: cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg

Mix sugar, oil and eggs together. Add pumpkin. Then add dry ingredient and finally water, stirring just until mixed. Pour batter into two (2) greased and floured 9x5 inch loaf pans. Bake at 350 degrees for one (1) hour.

Whole Wheat Pizza Crust
1 pkg. active dry yeast
1 cup warm water
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 tsp granulated sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 Tbs. olive oil
1 1/2 cups white flour

Dissolve yeast in warm water, and let rest 5 min. Stir in whole wheat flour, sugar, salt, olive oil, and white flour. Knead until smooth and elastic.
Grease a medium sized bowl with olive or vegetable oil. place dough in bowl and turn to coat thoroughly. Allow to rise covered for 15 min. Grease pizza pans.
Makes one 14 inch or two 10 inch pizza's. Top shaped dough as desired and bake at 425 degrees until cheese in melted and crust is browned.
Enjoy!!

Pancakes

Ok I mentioned yesterday that I had Nathaniel make pancakes with me. I just wanted to share my pancake recipe because it is easy yummy and easy to change LOL. I use the same pancake recipe to make all sorts of pancakes, It is really hard to screw up.
So the base recipe is

2 cups of flour
1.5 tsp. baking powder
0.5 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp salt
3 or 4 TBS. sugar (I don't really measure it lol)
1 egg
1.5 cups of milk
2 tsp vanilla
1 TBS. oil

That will make a really good basic pancake..A lot of times if I have it I will use one cup of all purpose flour and one cup of wheat flour.
Now I have used that basic recipe to make banana pancakes, gingerbread pancakes, and yesterday Nathaniel made lemon pancakes.

Banana pancakes I added 2 mashed over ripe banana's, I used about 1 and 1/4 cups of milk, left out the vanilla but added 2 tsp cinnamon.
You do have to cook those a little longer to make sure they cook through.

Gingerbread pancakes. These where very good (and I wasn't sure they would turn out). For these I added 2 tsp ginger, 1 tsp cinnamon, and about 1/2 tsp cloves I used just under 1.5 cups of milk and added a few tbs of molasses, And I used about 3 tbs of brown sugar in place of the white sugar.


For Nathaniel's lemon pancakes, we made the basic recipe Used 2 tsp. of lemon extract, 1 tsp of vanilla and used 1 1/4 cups of milk and 1/4 cup of lemon juice. Then we added 2 extra tbs of sugar... These were very very good They had a very slight taste of lemon, almost like a sugar cookie with a hint of lemon zest (if I had a lemon we would have added lemon zest to it).

You can also just add things to the basic batter, chocolate chips, blueberries (or dried blueberries) or any other dried fruit.. It also works well as a waffle batter!

Things done today...

Well today was sunday, so nothing important was planned, Just playing with the kiddos and having a nice day.. Oh yeah and staying in our jammies all day :). Today I got out my sewing machine, and finished the girls blankits, Then I played around making some skirts for the girls. Then I decided Nathaniel needed a little one on one time, so I sent all the other kids down stairs to watch TV and Nathaniel and I made dinner. He choose to make pancakes and eggs. He measured all the ingredients, cracked the eggs, and mixed everything up. He poured out the pancakes onto the pan and tried his hand at flipping a few. He did a really good job and had fun. Then I tried to get picture of the kids....That was probably one of the most fun thing I have done all week...

(and they didn't cooperate at all)Brianna modeling the first skirt I made

That is Caitlynn in his lap


Yeah babies are messy eaters sorry about the gross looking shirt

They kept crawling into my lap...ackkkkk

and jumping in front of each other

here is the second skirt...We both like this one better..

psssttttt mom I bet you remember this fabric ;)

It was a good day, I realized I need more fabric and supplies (I only have one needle for my sewing machine left)...and I also realized it is hard to sew when Caitlynn doesn't take a nap...hmmm but she is easier to measure awake... bah decisions, decisions LOL I will probably make her a few skirts when she is in bed tonight LOL.

Oh my Caitlynn

Dear sweet quite Caitlynn with her golden curls and spunky little attitude has been causing me no end of trouble lately... Now My mom will remember as an infant Caitlynn just wasn't happy at all unless she was wearing footed sleepers, Now it seems we have the other end of the problem with her...Lately she is either hating her clothes, or just enjoys undressing...I'm not sure which yet.. So far today she has gotten out of 2 different pairs of footed jammies, pants and a tee shirt. Now she is wearing a pair of tights a onsie and a pair of overalls.... I think she has started to figure out the overalls though....arggggg

And then she looks at you like this when you fix her clothes
Needless to say I am not her best friend today..... sigh...
Oh and the other day while I was making dinner she managed to strip off a shirt a pair of jeans a long sleeved onsie a pair of tights and her diaper, in about 10 min....yeah....anyone know of any stripper proof toddler clothing????? helpppppp

A trip to school

All this week the boys school has had a guest speaker, and author who write some pretty funny children's books. They have been reading his books in the classes preparing for his visit and so on and so forth. Well yesterday he was kind enough to have one last presentation at night, for parents and siblings. The Author was Jarrett Krosoczka.
He spoke to the children about how he became an author, how to go about getting a book published, and most importantly not to give up or get discouraged if someone turns you down. Last night in his presentation he asked the kids what the remembered from the presentations they heard during the school day. And of course Alex raised his hand. Mr. Krosoczka said "you sir what do you remember?" Alex responds with "My name is Alex actually" and then he continued with what he remembered from the presentation he heard .... Hubby and I were almost rolling on the floor though... Then he tried to show everyone the publishing/ printing process, he asked for volunteers. Alex was again chosen, he was to be the printer, and it was pointed out that the desk he was at was "way over there in china". Yeah hubby and I were rolling again. but let me tell you I have never seen the kids so interested in writing stories, by the time we came home they were brimming with ideas. And ready to write and draw them out....I feel bad that it was bedtime.. But I am sure I will have a veritable library when they get home. I think this may be just what they need for Christmas......

Sunday mornings

I love Sunday mornings,. For the most part we wake up with no plans, nothing to do, just a day to relax and hang out together.
This morning the girls and I made banana muffins .
They were very very good :). I doubled the recipe (b/c 12 muffins would never be enough for my 4 kiddos). For the flour I used 2 cups of all purpose flour, and 1 cup of whole wheat flour. I then added 1 teaspoon of cinnamon to the batter, and about 2 tsp. of vanilla. These were soooo good! yumm (Oh and the recipe doubled made about 30 muffins so I think the first measurement was just a tad off.)

Then Brianna decided to play dress up....I love love love seing what she comes up with sometimes LOL, Here we have a pink tee shirt with puffy sleeves and blue birds, and then a skirt I made for her out of scraps of green and brown brocade....She says she feels like a princess :).
Then I finally convinced Alex to put on his costume from Halloween so that I could get a few pictures of him. Not that he took much convincing, he also like to dress up.... (shhhhhh don't tell him I told you!!!!)
ackkk this face...it is pure trouble I swear...
Then Caitlynn... my little pigpen...She decided that she wanted to sit in the doll highchair...and then she couldn't get out...And she has such a mean mommy That I took pictures of her instead of getting her out...
As for Nathaniel...he scarfed down his breakfast and disappeared into the basement to play, read, watch TV... So he ran away before I got my camera out this morning.. Spoilsport LOL

Happy halloween!

We had so much fun this Halloween, we went to my friends church and did Trunk or treat there. The boys saw some friends from school and we almost didn't see them until it was time to leave :)Brianna had a fairy costume, but that night she decided she would rather be a princess, so she didn't want to wear the wings .
Here is Caitlynn and her friend Seriah :).
Nathaniel is a ninja!
oh he loves to have his picture taken, can't you tell!
tinkerbells :)
awww
amazingly these girls are only weeks apart in age LOL

So sweet,
And yes Alex was there but he ran of with his friend from school before I could get a picture, I will have to dress him up and take his picture later :).