Little D's Spring Sing!

Last Thursday was Little D's last day of Kindergarten. He is very excited to be able to go to the 1st Grade! On Wednesday of last week all the Kindergarten classes had what they call a Spring Sing. Where they all go on stage and sing 4 or 5 songs. Little A, Little C and I all went to the event and brought along the video camera. It was fun to see him up there. He was so proud of himself.

Here he is singing "Each of Us is a Flower"

This is when they wanted them to teach the parents how to sing the Tooty Tot.


Thumbs Up... Elbows back... Feet apart... Knees together... Bottoms up... Tongue out... Eyes shut... Turn around!


These are pictures of him and his teacher Mrs. Greene. On the top is a picture taken at the beginning of the year and on the bottom is one taken on Wednesday.

I'm hoping that Big J can help me tonight and get the video of him singing on here for the Big Grandparents to see so stay tuned.

Did You Know?

Most Amazing! I think that I was reading a food storage email I got the other day and it had this tip in there. On the side of the rolls of Saran wrap and aluminum foil they have these little tabs on there that help keep the entire roll from coming out. I always have this problem. And until I saw that I had never looked at the side of the box to know that it was there. However, I am now wondering why they don't do it on all their boxes of things like that. I could see that some brand names wouldn't have it. But if my Reynolds aluminum foil has it, then shouldn't my Reynolds Wax paper have it? Well it doesn't and now I am wondering why?

Quilted Binder Cover

This is something that I saw in a Magazine a while back and has been on my list of crafts ever since. I did make it a bit different than the magazine though. Mostly because the magazine was covering a composition notebook. I am going to make some that size but Yesterday I decided to cover my compassionate service binder instead. So it did require a little bit of guess work and I only had to unpick something once. But I think that it turned out pretty cute for my first one. Next time I will embellish it a bit more.


I don't have a fancy machine that quilts so I only quilted 1/4 in on either side of the seams.



There is a ribbon that you can tie to keep it closed. Really not that practical.(Who has time to tie things like this) But it makes it look pretty when you do.

Fruits of our Labors

So here are the first fruits of my Labors. I have gotten 4 zucchini and one cherry tomato! Pictured are 2 of the 4 zucchini and the cherry tomato that I carefully sliced and split between the 4 of us. I stuck a quarter in there so you would have a reference size. The children were reluctant but I thought that it was tasty and Big J just said that it tasted like a tomato. The kids were excited that it came from our garden though.

Then I peeled, seeded and grated the Zucchini. One half of the above zucchini made 2 Giant loaves of zucchini bread or 5 mini loaves. I made 1 large and 2 mini loaves. Pictured below are the 2 mini loaves that I am going to give to our Home Teachers that should be here shortly. I will also be sending them each home with a large zucchini.

Child Torture

So today I made the best chicken salad ever! I love it! The first time I tried it I was like, "I have to get this recipe!" but never did. Until I was talking to a friend and she told me that it was in the Ward Cookbook! It was here in my cupboard the whole time. Right under my nose. The whole time I was making it I couldn't stop picking. (which is bad for my diet)

Anyway the reason that I am sharing this is because you would have thought that it was some form of child torture! Little D looked like we were poking him with sticks! I was so confused. To me it is heaven. And he likes everything that was in it. Apples.... GOOD, Grapes..... GOOD, Chicken.....GOOD, Pasta..... GOOD! Whats not to love?

Here is Little D as I was "poking" him. He made this face just about every bite.

Kids and the funny things they say

Every Tues and Thurs night Megan Okerlund goes swimming at the pool and all are invited. We go to swim laps. By laps I mean swim back and forth in the pool talking. So yesterday I decided to go running to the pool instead of drive there. It was only 1.5 miles and It wasn't dark yet so I thought that I would run there and get a ride home. I had Little D's backpack filled with a water, a towel and my cell phone. As I was leaving Little D ran out and said, "Bye Mom, I hope you come back...... Because I really need that backpack tomorrow." And then left to get back in bed. There I was thinking that he was concerned that I would run in the dark, but all he really needed was his backpack!

Little D Day

So Friday was Little D's 6th Birthday! Wow time flies. Well in spite of having to take Brownie Cookies to school, I think that he had a great Day. I put up the Birthday Banner and he loved it. He knew exactly what it said. Before school he got to open his presents and was very happy with the outcome. He received a soccer ball, 2 goals, Star Wars V, Lego Indiana Jones PS3 game, Remote control motorcycle, and lots of cash. Thanks to everyone (from Little D) who gave him things.

After breakfast he wanted to play his new game so we let him until it was time for school. Big J had the day off and it just happened to be the Father-Son camp-out weekend. So he got ready while Little D was at school. Then they left and went camping! He thought that it was so cool to go camping with all his friends on his birthday. Since they were gone Little C, Little A, and I got together with the Fordham's and went out to dinner and played a game. The next day the boys got back and I have never seen Little D so dirty. It was straight into the shower for him. He wasn't too happy about that.


The rest of the weekend was spent mostly playing the Indy game. He even got Big J and I into it. Its pretty fun to run around with each other trying to get all the hidden artifacts and things.

And as a side note: Little D said, as soon as he got off the bus, that all the kids loved his Cookies and wanted him to bring them again!

Birthday Treat Disaster!

So I needed to make a birthday treat for Little D's class last Friday and I decided to make the above pictured treat. We had eaten them at the preschool party we had at the park that Wednesday. The kids loved them as you can see and they seemed easy enough. I looked a few recipes online and bought 2 boxes of cones and 2 boxes of cake mix. (There are 30 kids in Little D's class) So I made one batch but realized that I had only added 2 eggs instead of the 3 needed. But it was too late, they were already in the oven. So I thought oh well we will try batch 2 and if it works I will go buy more. Here is what batch one looked like before it went into the oven.


Here is the after.

So sad. Both batches turned out the same. I have no idea what I did wrong. It wasn't that they were filled too much because after they cooled there was nothing in the middle of the cone. And the second batch was not as full either.

So alas I decided that I would make Choc. chip cookies. That was, after all, what he wanted in the beginning, before I convinced him that these were way cool. So I started to make the cookies and needed to soften some butter and ended up melting it. Then when the recipe needed brown sugar, I had none. By this time I was so frustrated!. I had gone to Fresno and back that day and now I couldn't even make cookies! I ended up making cookies from a brownie mix that I had in the house. I was not about to go to the store again.

Who knows maybe I will try again in July for Little A's Birthday.

Birthday Banner

Here is the new Birthday Banner! I just finished it today! It took me about 3 days and now we will have a Banner for all of our Birthdays. Hopefully the kids will like it and look forward to having it hanging when they wake up on their Birthdays! I want to make one for other holidays too like Valentines and Halloween etc. So stay tuned for them. Little D's Birthday is on Friday so I had to complete this one first.

This is what all the letters look like up close.

I threw these on the end of 'HAPPY" just for something fun.

Bread in 5 mins. HUH?

Ya so apparently there is this new book out called Artisan Bread in Five Minutes A Day. I had never heard about it until my sister (Samurai Mom) told me about it today. They even have a site with ideas and things to make with the different bread recipes. I looked it up and it looks so cool! I have to try it. All I need is an ice cream bucket.

I'll keep you all posted on how it turns out. I think that you all should check it out. There are some videos on Youtube if you want to see it actually done.

What have I been up to?

I am on a dehydrating kick if I can slice it I will dehydrate it! So far I have tried Apples, Pineapple, Strawberries, Bananas, and I even tried mandarin oranges. The bananas didn't work because I didn't use the slicer so all the pieces were not the same thickness and therefore were not dried right. Also the mandarin oranges I just had a few in the fridge and thought that I would try some. They were not a success either. But all the others are soooo yummy. Every time I go into the kitchen I take a few to eat.

Here I am showing how I made the apples all the same size. First I peeled the apple with my peeler. (you can use just a knife if you don't have one.) This is actually also a corer and a slicer but I tried using these slices but they were too thin.


Here I am getting the core out. I'm sure that there is a better tool for this but this is what I had.


Here I am using my Mandolin. (I had no clue about this thing until Big J insisted that he needed it to make some squash, zucchini thing) But now I am glad that I have it. It worked great for all the food that I dehydrated.



Here are the strawberries... they look so pretty. I didn't take a picture of the apples cause I forgot.



After I sliced it all I put them into the Dehydrator over night and wallah! Some day when I do this again I will put them into Jars and seal them up and add to my food storage.



Big thanks to Tiffany for letting me use her Dehydrator. I promise to give it back!