Thanksgiving and Gearing Up for Christmas

Thanksgiving went really well this year.  We got up early and watched the parade, then the dog show stayed on while Pinkie and I prepped and stuffed the turkey.  Pinkie had never done it before, and since she's interested in cooking, I decided it was time, especially if she wants to go into culinary.  It's going to be necessary to learn how to work with raw meat, as much as she doesn't want to.  She was pretty proud of having helped make dinner for Thanksgiving.  Then the kids did their favorite thing to do ever, played lots and lots of Minecraft.

No, I'm sure it's not surprising that the kids played Minecraft, but this time they played in Festive world, which is the Christmas world on Minecraft.  We listened to the "Friendsgiving" station on Pandora while the tree was brought up from the basement.  Though it's not a traditional Thanksgiving thing to do, we set up the tree.  The kids loved watching it go up in the background while they played Minecraft.  They had a lot of fun exploring all the different places they could go.  They found things out like the presents were made of wool.  It was great to see them working together to build their house, and to hear their comments as they flew through Santa's Workshop.

While that was fun for the older kids, Bear got quickly bored of watching them.  Together we sat to work on something we'd gotten started with a long time ago, making potholders, though I guess they don't call them pot holders anymore.  We picked out "Frozen" colors, though the lighting isn't good to see it here.  It's dark blue, light blue, pink, and purple.  And, no, Bear isn't hiding because I don't want my kids' faces on the internet, but because that's what Bear wanted to do for a picture.  Silly Bear!

I absolutely love the idea of making these little pot holder things.  They're great for the manual dexterity thing.  It's not exactly easy to weave those loops through each other to get them hooked at either edge.  It takes patience to work through each segment, making sure that everything is crossed the right way and over or under both sides of the loop it's passing.  I ended up weaving the edge together because that part is frustrating and challenging, even for me, and I'm an adult.  As much as I used to love doing those as a kid, I can't help but think how complicated the craft really was.  The funny thing is I used to love doing them when I was younger, but now it boggles my mind how I did it all those years.  It's kind of a pain to work with.

And oh my goodness the food!  We had so much food, more than we could ever possibly eat in one day, or so I thought.  This is my stove.  On it are gravy, mashed potatoes, peas, corn, green beans (dressed up with breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese), and carrots.  As you can tell, my little four burner stove isn't quite large enough for the amount of food we made.  All of that was being kept warm by the heat coming off of the oven roasting the turkey.  On top of all that and the turkey, we also had stuffing and cranberry sauce.  It was quite the feast.  Of course, the turkey was started so late that we ended up eating crazy late, but it was totally worth it.  We snacked on round one of the meal while watching Turkey Hollow and went through round two towards the end.

I'll be honest, I expected to put half of what we made away for later.  Instead we ended up eating most of it.  There were no potatoes left, only about a single serving of green beans, not enough corn to save, a decent amount of cranberry sauce, and small bowls of both stuffing and carrots.  Of course, there was a decent amount of turkey, but the leftovers only lasted us one more day.  I didn't plan for that at all.  I mean, we are a big family, so that's something, but those kids can really put away some food!

As the weekend went on, we decided it was time to finish the tree.  Out came the ornaments and the lights for the little tree and we went to town.  We started with the big tree.  We don't have a lot of ornaments for the big tree yet, so only the front got finished, and we don't have a tree skirt or anything fancy, but it turned out pretty well.  Most of the ornaments on the tree are handmade.  I even have a few that are possibly older than I am that my mom made.  My mom gave them to me last year when she heard I needed ornaments for my tree.  I'm surprised at just how much coverage we have on the whole thing.  I was expecting it to be far more sparse.

Eventually I'd like to get to the point where the big tree is decorated with nothing but ornaments that were made by the family.  That would really make me happy.  That's a tall order if I were just going to keep it to the immediate family, but there are some nice pieces that will stay from my extended family as well.  I just really like knowing that the ornaments each have a history, they were made by someone and that makes them special.  That means a lot to me.  I'd even be happy to extend that to friends who are close enough to be family.  Whatever gets the tree covered with pieces from important people in our lives.

The little tree, on the other hand, doesn't have the same flair.  Its branches are small, which means it can't hold the heavy ornaments the other tree can.  Instead of going for handcrafted ornaments, we've opted for some cheap ones with glitter on them.  The lights are a bit large and heavy for the little tree, but it definitely looks pretty.  They change colors gradually between blue and white.  Between the colors and the lights, we've dubbed that tree "the Frozen tree."

Last year we had four trees, the big one, the Frozen tree, "the owl tree," and "the weird tree."  Each kid had a tree of their own where their presents sat.  This year we're going to be doing the same, with some modifications.  Each of the kids has picked their "tree."  I use that term loosely because Creeper decided he didn't want a tree this year.  He wants to use his Christmas cactus instead.  Link is getting "the weird tree," which is nothing more than an overgrown bonsai style tree.  that poor tree has taken a lot of abuse and kind of looks more like a Charlie Brown tree these days.  The big tree goes to Pinkie, just like last year.  The Frozen tree goes to Bear, since Bear was the one who selected everything to make it the Frozen tree in the first place.  Finally, "the owl tree," which is another Norfolk Island Pine with a glow in the dark owl post stuck in the pot, belongs to the adults that will be celebrating Christmas with us this year.

They Joys of a Local Meat Market

Just the other day a friend of mine finally dragged me to the local meat market.  She insisted that the meat packets you could buy there were far less expensive than buying the meat at the local grocery store.  The cuts of meat would be better and local meat markets are known for having meat from local suppliers.  That appealed to my desire to buy local in the first place.

For various reasons, getting down to the meat market just didn't work out.  We kept meaning to go, but all the good intentions in the world got us nowhere.  It's nice to mean to do something, but until you actually do it, it's just out there in space.  Strange how living closer actually meant doing less of what we said we were going to do.  I guess things were just meant to work out that way.

Finally arriving at the meat market I was overwhelmed by their selection.  I'd never bought my meat at a meat market before so the idea was kind of shocking to me.  There were lists and lists of meat packages offered and a whole window full of meat available to order.  There were so many possible selections it was dizzying!

Looking over the lists I saw one problem right away.  Every single option on the list included a good share of pork.  I can understand this as pork is cheap.  Putting a lot of cheap meat in the package deals means allowing for a larger quantity at a lower cost.  Let's face it, beef is expensive, and the only chicken they really seem to do there is quarters and whole, so that doesn't leave a lot of options.  Many Americans I know have a very pork-heavy diet.  Ham, sausage, and hot dogs make up a large component of many families' diets that I know of.  Bacon and pork chops are also pretty popular.

Now, I know there are a lot of reasons not to eat pork out there.  For me it all just started because I didn't like it all that much.  As I got older and started studying medieval history more I decided I didn't want to eat an animal that had been used by so many cultures as a garbage disposal.  When my littlest was born he made all sorts of little grunting pig sounds instead of crying, so I kept calling him my little piggy.  This, of course, made it that much harder to eat pork.  We've done a lot of work with the Native American concept of totem animals in this house.  We discovered my daughter has rabbit on her totem, so no rabbit stew for us!  I wasn't surprised because she used to kick like a rabbit before she was born and when she was very small.  She had some serious leg strength!  My younger son has some kind of cat, though I forget which.  I believe it was a lynx, but I might be wrong.  I never put much thought into it because we don't exactly eat cat in this house.  My littlest was determined to be boar, so that's a close relative to pig.  In Native American tradition it is considered in poor taste to eat your totem animal, so we've planned our diet accordingly.  Chesh breaks the rules on pork a good deal because he loves it, and we're not terribly strict, but we try to keep the pork down so the little one won't eat it, at least not until he's old enough to make that decision on his own.  For all we know he may grow up to decide he doesn't really care about the whole totem idea, or maybe he thinks it's not disrespectful to eat his totem animal.  No matter how you look at it, we have a long list of reasons for keeping the pork in this house pretty minimal.  Of course the older kids do like to have ham sandwiches now and again!

So, going to the meat market meant some careful figuring out so we wouldn't end up with pork that wouldn't be eaten.  We're considering our options for the future, both in splitting our arrangement with another family so we can trade for things we'll actually use or buying our meat by the item versus by the pack.

Going to the meat market actually saved us a good deal of money, in some ways.  The truth is we spent the same amount as we normally would on meat every month.  The difference is we got a whole lot more meat, and we got a better selection for each of the meats we've gotten.  It's nice to know we've got a local place to pick up good quality beef, save ourselves some money, and buy locally.  There's nothing like stretching our food budget even farther!

I think the best part of shopping at a meat market is having the ability to get what I want and not rely on what I've got the availability to get.  I don't have to worry about a store's selection.  I can go in and tell them exactly what I want.  If I feel like cooking a roast, I know I'll have several options instead of the three or four cuts of meat of one or two varieties.  Often times that ends with more meat than we can use, or not enough to feed the family.  True, chicken doesn't come with many choices, but we don't tend to eat a lot of chicken.  We tend to be more of a turkey family when it comes to poultry.  It's nice to go in with my shopping list and tell them what kinds of meat I need for my weekly or monthly shopping instead of having to look and hope they have something that works with what I want to make, or to plan my bigger roasts and things on the fly based on what they have available.

I have a feeling this local meat market is really going to do well for us.  I'm glad we've got one available.  Now I just need to start planning to take advantage of that!

The Death by Chocolate Competition

Yesterday I got an e-mail through the homeschool group.  One of the girls was entered into the Death by Chocolate competition in Salado and the whole group was invited to attend.  It was a small, free event held by the Friends of Salado Public Library.  Everyone was invited to enter a chocolate recipe as part of Salado's Chocolate and Wine Festival.  Everyone could vote, and at the end of it they gave away prizes to the winners.  It was a chance for free chocolate and time to hang out with some of the kids from the co-op, so we decided we were going to go.  Why not?  It would be fun for the kids, right?

After a little bout of being lost, thanks to the navigation on my phone pointing us to South Main Street instead of North Main Street, we arrived.  The event was admittedly smaller than I'd imagined, not surprising because Salado is kind of a small town.  Sadly, a lot of the stuff had been picked pretty clean by the time we'd gotten there, but the kids didn't seem to mind.  It wasn't long before my daughter and older son took off to play with the kids they knew from the co-op and I was left with the baby who was happily munching on a moon pie cookie on a stick.  I have to admit it was kind of nice to have the kids run off with friends instead of having to listen to them whine that they were bored and there was nothing to do.  Being held in a library, the kids all ran off to the children's section to play and look at books.

At the end of it all, the kids all went outside to play.  My daughter ran off with the girls.  I have to admit it's hard for me to watch her because she's kind of left out with that group.  The girls have known each other for years, so it must be hard for them to include someone new, but my daughter doesn't seem to mind.  I don't think she even noticed that she was kind of being left to the side a bit.  I've noticed she doesn't have that problem so much at the co-op because there's a girl she's made fast friends with there.  I think in time she'll fit in a lot better.  When you're joining a group of kids that have been friends for years it's not always easy to jump in and be a part of everything.  I've noticed the older kids are, the more time it takes to warm up to each other.  In time I'm sure they'll all be just fine.  Most importantly, it may be hard for me to watch, but it's kind of a good social lesson for her to learn.  It takes time to be included in a group and really make friends in the adult world.  The fact that it doesn't seem to bother her now probably means she'll be just fine when she gets out there in the "real world" and wants to start making friends wherever the wind may take her.

My older son, on the other hand, finally broke away from being in his sister's shadow.  For the first hour and a half we were there he wanted to stay with the girls.  He felt more comfortable there since his sister was with him.  I think that's proof that he needs more exposure to other kids.  He's spent a good deal of time playing by himself or with his sister.  He's not so sure on how to jump right in and be a part of a group.  When we went outside, however, all it took was a suggestion to go play with the friend he'd gotten so excited to see when he got there and he was off like a bolt.  His friend and his friend's cousin were sword fighting with sticks, so when he jumped in walking and growling like a monster (his new favorite thing to be), I was afraid they'd give him odd looks and leave him out as has happened so many times at the playground.  Instead they just started "attacking" him (without actually hitting him) and when one boy dropped his "sword", my older son just picked it up and joined in the play.  Next thing I know they're running up and down the side of the library playing robbers together.  He'd lost his shy nature and jumped right in.

Even my youngest was thrilled.  He kept trying to run off with the older boys, but he's so small and not so great on the running, so he kept getting left behind.  He was walking so funny!  With each step he looked about to fall over.  The grass was soft and spongy, which is pretty strange considering the drought we're having.  He was thrilled to bounce around through the grass, which provided something new to study.

On our way home, I talked about the competition with my daughter.  She's decided she might like to enter it next year.  I have a great recipe to teach her, my mother's fudge recipe.  The only problem is figuring where I'm going to find the right ingredients.  We may have to plan ahead and order some Marshmallow Fluff online in order to have some for the competition.  She may not win, but at least she'll get a great chance to both learn the recipe and do something a little bit fun.  Not many kids her age do things like the chocolate competition.  There were only four kids in the youth competition this year!  It will definitely give her something to look forward to next year.  And who knows?  Maybe she'll come up with her own recipe to enter, or an idea of her own!  We'll have to mark it on the calendar for next year.  I'm sure she'd really enjoy being a part of it next time!

Lessons from Life: Cooking Fried Potatoes

Given my push to get away from anything I'm allergic to, it's been a challenge to get up in the morning and cook for myself, especially if I'm feeling run down and low on sugar.  I asked Chesh to cook me some breakfast this morning, the fried potatoes he always makes, without the meat and eggs.  We had to switch from vegetable oil to olive oil so I can escape the soy too, but we're still adding a soy-based butter.  It's been an adventure to try and figure out what I can eat, and sometimes waiting to eat has left me so exhausted that the last thing I want to do is cook.  I'm blessed to have someone that actually cooks for me.

Today my daughter decided she wanted to learn about the process of cooking.  She's always been interested in cooking.  It's been a favorite subject of hers.  I wasn't surprised that she wanted to be his little assistant, even though there wasn't much for her to do.

From the kitchen I heard all kinds of questions.  Why do we use a butter substitute?  Why are the potatoes red?  She thought all potatoes were white on the inside.  Why weren't these?  In return she got answers.  I'm allergic to dairy so we can't put regular butter into it.  Potatoes come in yellow, brown, and red on the outside, occasionally even white.  They're just different kinds of potatoes.  As you cook a potato it sometimes changes color.

Isn't this what learning should be about?  Shouldn't kids learn about everything in their world?  Won't it drive them to be interested in other things?  Won't they expand their own knowledge on their own?  Or is better not to expose them to these things in place of a standard education?  Personally, I think my kids are learning just fine the way they are!

Cooking for my Family, the Cost of Cooking from Scratch

In the past I've always said I didn't want to cook from home for a reason.  Cooking from scratch is expensive.  It means you've got to have all the ingredients themselves on-hand, which isn't so expensive, I guess, if you have them all on hand already, or if you just need to pick up a little bit of this or that.  For me, cooking from home always seemed more of a luxury than I could afford, even with all the extra work required.

Yesterday was a prime example of that.  I went to the store with my dear friend.  We had to get some things into the house that I could actually eat.  Since I'm kicking all the things I'm allergic to, that doesn't leave terribly much, and as I looked at the items in the store, it became even more apparent that "not much" should really read, "nothing your average grocery store in Texas sells."  I ended up making sacrifices for things I really shouldn't be eating because I just don't want to give up everything I like all at once.

To give you an idea of what this diet means, doing it right means giving up everything.  There's no butter substitute (they all have soy), no cheese substitute (they have milk protein and soy), no store-bought flour in this area, no bread, no baked goods, no cereal, no granola bars, no candy, no snack food, no anything.  Even things that seem safe, like salt and vinegar chips, as it turns out, the vinegar flavor is made with dairy.  It's not so much the dairy that's the problem, though that is a challenge in it's own.  It's giving up soy.  It's shocking how many things are made with soy these days!

Taking a look at what's available to me, that leaves a very meat and potatoes kind of situation for meals.  We can't do anything creative because most creativity involves dairy of some kind, flour, or breading.  I suppose in many ways it's healthier to take a meat and potatoes kind of approach to things, but it's definitely limiting when the local grocery store's idea of produce is a small selection of broccoli, carrots, corn, and potatoes.  I was lucky enough to find some summer squash and acorn squash.  I've never eaten acorn squash, so I'm interested to see what that's going to be like.

It doesn't help that some of the substitutes are very expensive.  Coconut milk, rice milk, rice flour (which I have to order online around here), and all of that are very pricey.  I'm learning that fresh meats, fruits, and vegetables are very expensive too.  I'm not sure how long we can afford doing this!  Then again, we may find that cooking like this actually reduces the overall amount that we eat, but it's frustrating nonetheless.

Last night's grocery bill doubled our family's meal cost for the week last night, and all we did was avoid prepackaged foods.  Because I'm gravitating towards things that are good for me, healthy for the whole family, and are fresh, raw ingredients, things are getting that much more expensive.

Healthy and organic, one would imagine, wouldn't be a significantly more expensive option when it comes to cooking.  Families should be able to eat for less when they buy foods they make from scratch, things that will be healthy for them.  I've always thought the exchange was supposed to be things made from scratch cost less, but required much more work.  Prepackaged foods were supposed to cost more, but were quick and easy.  Now it seems like there's no exchange at all.  You have to be made of money to cook good, quality, healthy meals for your family.

Dietary Changes for 2011

Okay, I'll admit it, I haven't been that great at taking care of my own health.  I've been saying I'm going to change my diet for quite some time.  Some of it's stuck, but some of it really hasn't.  However, I notice a complete change in myself when I start keeping to the rules I set for myself, so I think I really need to start working on changing my diet for the new year so I can live as a happier, healthier me!

Here are the biggest problems I need to address in my diet:

1. I have a dairy allergy and I need to pay attention to that.  I have less headaches and irritability and more energy when I avoid dairy.  It can also make me very nauseous depending on what variety of dairy I eat.  This seems only to extend to cow's milk products, eggs, and honey.  Feta cheese seems to be okay.
2. I have a tomato allergy.  Eating tomatoes makes my stomach upset (along the lines of nausea, not heartburn) and also makes me more irritable.  I also find avoiding tomatoes does seem to have an impact on my energy levels as well.
3. I have an allergy to MSG.  This allergy also presents itself with irritability, migraines, stomach upset, and low energy.  In addition, MSG also seems to be directly related with having a lack of appetite.
4. I have an intolerance to processed sugars.  Eating processed sugars upsets my stomach and results in low energy.
5. I have a caffeine intolerance.  Drinking caffeine tends to give me the shakes, makes my heart race, and if I have enough of it can make me really anxious, which can lead to jumpiness and irritability.
6. In my observances of my own diet, I notice that gluten seems to be a point I need to address.  I can't say for sure if I have a full blown gluten allergy (though I do show symptoms, I'm not about to label myself without more information), I think it's worth cutting gluten out of my diet on a temporary basis to see if it helps.

So, that's the list of things I really need to address.  My partner likes to joke that I'm allergic to everything with that list alone, never mind the animal allergies (I'm allergic to cats), household allergies (like dust, bleach, many scented soaps and laundry detergents), environmental allergies (like ragweed), textile allergies (notably wool), and metal allergies (I can't wear anything in my piercings but surgical grade and can't wear most regular metals against my skin).  I have to admit, I am kind of inclined to agree with that joking statement!  I am allergic to a good deal!  However, some of those allergies are very easy to control and will make our lives run that much more smoothly.

Here's some of the plans I have for 2011 to address these problems and see if we can minimize or eliminate their effect on my life:

• Stop eating out, or at least do it with as little frequency as possible.  Eating out generally means consuming MSG and dairy.  I also tend to choose sugary and caffeinated sodas.  There's also a lot of wheat in foods you eat out, especially fast foods!
• Attempt to stop "just this once" excuses for things I shouldn't have.  Instead I'll attempt to experiment with new treats and "sweets" so I can still indulge, but it won't come at the cost of activating my allergies.  Besides, home made cookies are far better than store bought candy!  I can still make hot chocolate and such with soy or rice milk.  I treated myself to some Silk Nog this holiday season and I think I like it better than the real stuff!  Anything with honey can be changed out for agave, which seems to taste very much the same.  It's a good excuse to try new stuff!
• Start cooking from scratch more frequently.  By cooking from scratch I can substitute soy, rice, or coconut milk for cow's milk as needed.  Egg and cheese substitutes are also possible.  These options aren't frequently available in boxed foods and frozen foods.  Also, many prepared foods or partially prepared foods at the grocery store contain MSG.  Even some of the quick and easy ingredients contain MSG as a preservative.  By making it myself, I can avoid possibly all MSG!
• Avoid temptation for things I can't have.  This may make for tricky grocery store trips, so planning ahead to make as few trips and as little time spent there as possible will be ideal and necessary.  When possible, I'll either bring my partner with me to shop (even with the kids) so he can help keep me on track, or I can send him with a list, especially when it's just a quick trip to pick up a few needed items.
• I will research gluten-free recipes, gluten substitutes, and other aspects of a gluten-free diet.  After I accumulate enough knowledge and supplies for a week of gluten-free cooking, I'm going to attempt to go gluten-free for one full week.  Depending on the results of the experiment, we'll decide whether we give it another week to continue the experiment, give it up all together, or go over entirely to a gluten free diet.  This isn't just for me.  If I don't benefit from it, but someone else in the family obviously does, then perhaps gluten-free is the way to go for our family.  I expect this process to happen several months after eliminating the other allergens from my diet so I can most accurately assess the effect of gluten for my personal health and well being.
• Start a journal for my new diet.  Each day I will record the approximate time I wake up, what I eat for each meal or snack and at what time, how my energy levels are and how I'm feeling at three points in the day (probably at meal times), what fluids I take in, and how much and what kind of exercise I do, and approximately when I go to bed.  This will help me keep on track, monitor when I slip up on my diet, and hopefully mark some positive changes on my energy levels and overall well-being in the process.  It should also be a good motivational tool!

In the end, I'm expecting to see a rise in energy levels and an overall happier and healthier me.  I'm expecting to be less irritable, which will probably help me to better manage other aspects of my life.  I expect to start sleeping better, as much as it may seem unrelated, because I'll be feeling better and staying more active during the day, which generally leads to resting better at night.   I expect that eliminating gluten will have a positive effect on my own health and well-being, as well as for my older son, but I will give it a fair and unbiased assessment.  I also expect that I'm going to have my partner thinking I'm pretty crazy in all of this!

All in all, I need to do this for my own health and happiness.  It's time to stop making excuses and start making changes in my life.  Once 2011 is over, I give myself until everything is moved into our new home.  I'm allowing myself a little bit of leniency to get everything moved since that needs to be our number one focus, but once it's all in the house, I know it will take time to settle in.  If I give myself until everything is unpacked, somehow I'll always leave some stuff to be packed and sorted out first, so I'll always have that excuse.  Nope, not going to happen!  I'm going to be motivated on this!  My health and happiness is at stake!

Baking with Kids

I was thinking about the whole idea of baking cookies today.  Tonight was the first time I've ever actually baked cookies with my kids.  I mean, I've baked cookies for them before with my daughter sitting over me, asking what she could do, but losing interest when it came to something she was actually able to do herself, but I've never actually done it with my kids!  It's actually shocking that this huge part of my own childhood has somehow been forgotten!

Tonight we were doing something special.  We were making cookies for Santa (and yes, I'm writing this on Christmas Eve to post later!) and I promised we would do it as a family.  I did all the measuring and egg cracking, but we all had to take part somehow.  My daughter mixed one batch of cookie dough all by herself after I showed her the way I found that worked best.  It was kind of cute to watch her sitting there and doing it exactly as I told her, words and all ("stir, 2, 3, 4, scoop, 2, 3, 4").  Then with the batch of ginger snaps we all took part in it to mix it together.  I had to help my older son because the dough was just too hard for him to stir.  Even my partner took a turn at mixing it!  We sat around the counter and I handed out cookie dough and everyone rolled a few cookies up to put on the sheet.  All together we pressed them flat.  The only one that wasn't involved was the baby.  I was tempted to help him mix it like I had with his brother, but my partner pointed out that he'd just try to eat it, and we agreed that would be nothing but messy!  I thought the same about using his hand to press a cookie flat, but had visions of him grabbing it off the cookie sheet and eating it!  We thought better of it and he just got one when it was finished.

I think that's the first family activity we've done in a while!  My older son decided rather than rolling the dough, he'd just eat it, which made us all laugh.  We all shared soda for once, even though I really don't like drinking Coke, but it was a special occasion.  Normally we plan ahead and get sparkling cider or grape juice for the occasion, but we didn't plan ahead this year.  We had a little toast to Christmas and all in all it was a pretty good time, something we definitely have to do more often.

This year I cheated.  One day I'll have a recipe book with cookies in it, but for the time being, we're using those box mixes.  It's not the greatest of ways to do it, and I know I could always look up a recipe online, but it was an impulse buy at the store.  I hadn't decided we were making our own cookies until I was at the store thinking about my daughter's sadness at not getting any of the brownies my room mate's friend made while she was visiting.  I felt really bad about it, so I was going to get brownie mix, but the cookies seemed like so much of a better choice.

When I was a kid we made cookies quite a bit.  It seemed like making cookies was part of every holiday season, be it Halloween, Easter, or Christmas.  I think I even remember making them for valentine's one year.  We made everything from sugar cookies to Toll House to ginger bread men.  We had cookie cutters for every occasion you could think of, and probably a few you haven't!  It was a huge part of my childhood, something I really wish I'd carried on with my own kids before now.

Of course, I know why I've got this inclination to have my kids sit by while I'm doing all the work.  That's pretty much how I remember it being when I was a kid.  My mom would mix the dough and roll it out.  All we got to do was cut out the cookies and decorate them.  I don't even remember getting to help with putting regular cookies out on the cookie sheet.  As a result, I think I've got this thought in my mind of doing all the work myself because I know I'll do it right and the kids, well, not so much.

However, I do want them to learn how to do it, and with good reason.  I think about my older two's father's story of making Toll House cookies when he was a kid.  He didn't realize that you had to mix the ingredients a certain way, so he just threw it all together and mixed it up.  The cookies were horrible, almost inedible!  I don't want my kids to go through a situation like that.  It must have been so disheartening for him, even though it was a learning experience, I'm sure!  I just want their learning experiences to be more positive than that.

Again, thinking back to my childhood, I remember reading the Pee Wee Scouts books when I was little.  There was one of them, I think it was Cookies and Crutches, that they decided they were going to make cookies, but it all went wrong.  They didn't have any baking soda, so they decided to use regular soda instead.  Their soda of choice was root beer.  The cookies turned out to be a disaster, but it's one more thing to add to my list of cookies and kids!  Maybe I'll pick up that book for my daughter.  I think she'd like it.

While baking may not be a necessary life skill, cooking kind of is unless you plan on eating nothing but box dinners for the rest of your life.  It's a skill I never learned when I was younger, so I struggle with it now.  Baking and cooking are two very different arts, but I do feel that you can learn some of the fundamentals of cooking just as well from baking.  There's the same basic concepts of measuring and blending.  For me, it's almost like a less advanced version of cooking.  Better yet, it's easier for kids because it doesn't mean standing over a hot oven.  With help from the parents, the tray goes in.  With help from the parents it comes back out.  Everything else can be done perfectly well by a kid all by themselves.  Perhaps we'll graduate to cooking after we've gotten a little more baking time in, at least for my daughter.  She's seven and old enough that she can pretty well make her way around a kitchen.  She may be too young for any serious cooking, but she can at least learn to do some basic stuff.  I think she'd enjoy it too!  She's been asking to help me out in the kitchen for as long as I can remember!

I think I've found one more thing to add to my list of things I need to do in the new year.  I need to spend more time baking with my kids.  Maybe it won't just be cooking.  Maybe we can pick up a book with some fantastic desserts or breads.  There's even the possibility of graduating to a colonial cookbook.  Wouldn't that be an excellent way to bring homeschooling into the kitchen?  I'm really starting to look forward to sharing more of my cooking time in the kitchen with my kids!

Frito Banditos, My Way...

I remember this old camp recipe we used to love called "Frito Banditos".  They were single serving bags of Frito chips with taco seasoned beef, lettuce, and cheese tossed in.  The idea was to scoop the stuff out of the bag with a chip and eat it, like tacos, only much less messy.

My partner adores Mexican style food.  He'd been asking me to make tacos for what seemed like forever.  I told him I was going to make him Frito Banditos.  He thought I was nuts, but agreed to try it.  It couldn't possibly be as good as real tacos (or so he thought), but he would give it a fair chance.

At the time I couldn't remember how to make the stuff.  I swear, pregnancy brain had eaten away any of the memory I had left, so I could only hazard a guess.  I used taco seasoning with the beef and threw in some cheese (we gave up on the lettuce because no one felt up to cutting it), tossed in a bit of taco sauce to make it a bit spicier, and went at it with chips.  It was a minor success, but we decided that the cheese would be much better if it was melted.  We would have to try that next time.

The next time we tossed in the cheese just as the meat was finishing cooking, just long enough to make it all melty.  It was a hit!  Since then my partner and my kids have both been begging me to make it again!  It's more of a success than mac and cheese!  It doesn't hurt that it brings a bit of diversity to the table too.

This last time I decided to go all wild with it.  Okay, so we've got the general idea, and have turned it into a pretty good dip, just by melting the cheese and adding a little bit of hot sauce (well...medium or mild for the kids).  Let's see just how far we can take this baby!  I'll admit, I went a little nuts at the grocery store.  I was stalking the aisles like a mad woman, comparing things, picking things up, then putting them back, only to go back to it three or four aisles later when I decided I really did want it after all.  I must have looked half crazed as I stopped in the middle of an aisle as inspiration took me and I went trotting off to another aisle just to pick something up, reconsider, put it back, and start texting like a mad woman on my phone to make sure something would be edible for my partner.  He may not be very picky, but what he's picky on, he's VERY picky.  I'm sure it would have been quite comical to see a video of myself on my mad quest for the right ingredients.  It's as bad as taking me to a fabric store when I've got a specific project to make!

Finally, I packed my ingredients up and took off out of there before I could come up with anything else to throw into the mix.  Throwing in too much could be dangerous, and a recipe for disaster.  I was quite satisfied and couldn't wait to put it all together.

Here's what we ended up tossing in:
2lbs of lean ground beef (browned)
2 packages of taco seasoning (with water to match)
1 full package of shredded Mexican cheese (the one with pepper jack...nummy...can  you tell we like cheese?)
2 cans of refried beans
1/2 a regular sized jar of Pace hot salsa
Hot and Medium taco sauce to taste
1 whole large tomato
Some random amount of lettuce that looked pretty good.

Pretty much it went just like that.  We seasoned the beef after it was browned as per the instructions.  We heated up the beans as per the instructions as well.  Then we tossed in the cheese to melt into the beef, as always.  Then we threw it all into two separate bowls to mix up.  One bowl got medium sauce for the kids.  The other got hot sauce and hot salsa.  It was incredible!  I'll never make it the old way again!  And we've got enough leftovers that we've already gotten two meals out of it, and we could still get at least one more!

If you have a thing against some of the ingredients, it's easy to sub stuff out.  Want vegetarian?  Just use a meat substitute and vegetarian refried beans (yup, they make them...almost bought some).  Dairy free?  Just use a melty cheese substitute.  It's easy enough to do!  Mind you, it'll look kind of nasty once you mix it all up, but it tastes wonderful!  At least, my family thinks so.

Next time I think I might go for a bit more of a bold nacho style.  We definitely needed more lettuce.  There wasn't near enough green.  I think I might even get wild and think about adding some sour cream.  I think maybe I need to figure out some more veggies to toss in.  Any suggestions?  It's got to be something that can be cut up small and bite sized.  Ooo...an onion might be good!  I wonder what else I can come up with...maybe I should start checking out nacho recipes.

To think, all of this started with a well-loved childhood favorite recipe, something I learned at Girl Scout camp of all places!  Who would have thought it would have me adventuring into so many new flavors and possibilities?  I think I'm going to like feeling like I can really cook again!

Oh, and if any of my family is out there reading this (and I know at least one  person is) or anyone else who knows just how picky I am, yup, you read it right.  I ate refried beans.  I've used tomato.  I'd like to use onions.  I'm thinking sour cream would be a good addition, maybe some black olives...or that green stuff with a name I can't remember right now made from avocado...  Yes, picky little me is learning to diversify!