menu for the next two weeks

So I decided to share my menu.  This accomplishes two things.  It gives other people some meal ideas and it safeguards my hard work in computer memory should anything happen to my paper copy. That has happened more than a few times and it pretty much drives me to tears.  The first meal is lunch, the second is dinner.  The meal in parenthesis is what will be the meal for the following week night.  Only a few meals are different so that way I won't write everything out twice.  I've linked to the recipes that will be new for us this time around in case anyone else is interested.  Breakfasts are not set in stone, as I we usually on have a few things we make for breakfast and I rotate as I see fit.  So if we are having a slow morning and need to get a move on we will be having granola and saving the time consuming pancake making for another day :-)

Tuesday:  bread (for sandwiches)/ beef stroganoff (shepherd's pie)
Wednesday: pizza burritos/ baked beans, cornbread and salad
Thursday: gyros/ baked potatoes
Friday: potato broccoli soup/ pizza
Saturday: smoothies and turkey-veggie wraps/ tacos
Sunday: ravioli/ soup-chicken or beef
Monday: bread (for sandwiches)/ chicken salad (chicken quesedillas)

For snacks we usually do fruit, smoothies, popcorn or other odds and ends.  Soccer starts this month and with is will come the dreaded snack time after the game (cookies, cracker, chips and kool-aid type drinks).  I've already talked to the girls about the fact that they may not eat any of the snacks that they dole out after the game.  I found a recipe for granola bars that I plan on trying along with sending them some homemade lemonade or other healthy drink.

Some things I plan on bulk cooking to help with daily meal prep are:
granola
granola bars
ravioli
pizza roll ups
tortillas
chop onions in bulk to put in fridge

There you have it.  Oh, and with meals I don't plan out our side dishes as that will depend on what we have on hand that is fresh, or if it's at the end of the week and we have a frozen veggie.  Just depends on how long our fresh produce lasts. 

I have in the works to transform some of my maternity jeans into skirts.  I also plan on trying to copy a pair of pants I have and make them maternity wear.  I'm pretty excited about it!  I will just have to see how much my sewing machine will cost to get fixed.  If it's gonna be a biggie expense then I will have to ask around to borrow someones machine.  I do have a serger, but I'm not too familiar with it and I don't think it can do all the sewing I will need for it to do.  I'm sure it will all work out.

Off to eat some dinner :-)

Chocolate milk

Yes, you are about to see a few posts from me in one day.  Only because the topics seem to be totally non related (not that that has stopped me from posting multiple topics in one post), but also because I wanted the most important post to be separate (the prayer request).

Anyways on to this topic:  chocolate milk.  Now some might not think that chocolate milk and healthy eating can go hand in hand.  But it just depends on how you make it! This is NOT my idea, I got it off of the gnowfglins site (or her personal site).  I tried once before and it didn't turn out too great with the amount of ingredients that I used.  I decided to try my hand at it again.  I am taking a prenatal vitamin now (six per day---which is the dosage) and I thought it might be easier to swallow them with something that goes down smooth (milk) and that had a bit more taste to it (chocolate).  You have to understand (no laughing Jeremiah and Tracy!) that I have a wee bit of a problem swallowing pills.  And that is putting it mildly!  So in my effort to make sure I take my pills I gave the chocolate milk another try.  These are only approximate amounts, but should give you a start if you so choose to try this yourself.

1 cup raw milk
1 tsp cocoa powder (or carob)
2 drops of liquid stevia

Put it all into a blender (I tried just shaking it up and the chocolate wouldn't dissolve) for a few seconds and drink up!  My girls have not had chocolate milk in years!  We've had chocolate smoothies for some time now, but I didn't think there was another way to make chocolate milk without Hershey's syrup or Olvatine.  You can adjust the ingredients to taste.  I thought it was yummy, Jeremiah thought it needed more sweetener. 

God cares about the little things

As you know we are on a sugar and dairy free diet. This was going to represent a problem as my children are very accustomed to decorated birthday cakes for their birthdays. I was really trying to figure out what in the world I was going to serve for Flannery's birthday, which is the first birthday of the year, just 16 days away. I decided to pray about it. Yeah, it does seem silly to pray for such a thing, but I was really at a loss for what to do. Well tonight, as I was waiting for some children to finish their showers I got online and decided to check out Dr. Fuhrman's blog. And wouldn't ya know...there was a recipe for healthy brownies!!! And a chocolate cherry pie as well!! I am not sure if I can come up with a healthy way to decorate them, but we are half way there to a healthy birthday alternative. I am hoping that come her birthday we will have been sugar free for almost two months, and that these will taste divine :-) We'll see.

You can check out the recipe here:

Black bean brownies

Let me know if you try them out. And if anyone else knows of a healthy alternative to birthday cake, please let me know ASAP.

As a side note we are giving Jed a three day trial period of no daytime tube feedings. He has been coming to me about 20 minutes before his feedings asking for food. So we decided now was the time to see if he would be able to eat enough on his own. We will continue with his night time feeding for now. After the three days if he hasn't lost more than a couple of ounces we will continue on. If he lost more than that we will have to try again at a later date. Please pray that this would be successful. So far today he ate pretty decent. Not outstanding, but he was clearly hungry. He was also showing signs of "dehydration". Not true dehydration mind you, but his body is used to an all liquid diet and without his liquid feedings his cheeks were getting red. He asked for some juice and drank it all down, and his cheeks returned to normal! Yeah! I am excited for him to be tube feeding free for the next few days. He has really had a growth in mental/emotional development. We had a lovely evening of playing Zingo together. And he spent half the day "talking" with/to me. Plus he has been helping out more around the house. It's these little 'normal' things that he has started doing that have been so encouraging to my mommy's heart :-)

Good night!

bean burgers

I just wanted to pop in here and give you all the link to the black bean burger recipe. I will be trying others out over the coming months. But this one seems to be the best I've had so far. I made a big batch and froze them in patties to be used for a quick lunch or dinner. I have really been enjoying them. Let me know if you try them and how you like them, or let me know if you have a tried and true recipe. In the recipe I left out the green peppers, and went light on the hot sauce.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Homemade-Black-Bean-Veggie-Burgers/Detail.aspx

Come and make bread with us

Isbella and I had a great time putting together some videos of us making bread. We created a channel on youtube, so as to hopefully cut down on anyone elses indecent videos popping up. Do be careful, as youtube is a dangerous place for any young person to be on unsupervised. I wish I was proficient enough with this type of media to have put together the videos in just two batches, but alas, that is something I must learn to do. So for now you will just have to click on the next video in the series (they are numbered) to see the whole demonstration that we give. The videos showed a bit of real life in them, although we tried to minimize that :-) If we went ALL real I am not sure if you would have been able to see what I or Isabella were doing as we would have had many, many hands in the way :-) So go check out our demonstration of the mixer we have (Electrolux) and the breadmaking.

Southern Peaches Productions