In Mourning
My brand new camera (the one that Oldest dropped a few posts back) finally completely gave up the ghost this week. So it is in loving memory that I dedicate this post to the cameras I've loved and lost with a pictorial tribute from photos past.
Egg Noodles
Our rock candy suckers are coming along nicely, although they aren't quite done yet due to the humidity and other factors that slowed our rate of evaporation down around here the last week. BUT, they are forming and in another few days we should be able to eat them, which is clearly the best part!
Now, I have a message for all those out there who buy over processed, neatly packaged egg noodles at the grocery store. STOP! That's right, stop it. Just say no. Sure the so-called egg noodles that you buy in the store are edible and they come already dried but seriously they aren't nearly as tasty as homemade noodles and most of the time they don't even have eggs in them. Instead they contain ingredients that are barely pronounceable like thiamine monoitrate.
Homemade egg noodles are EASY to make. That's right, e-a-s-y. They are inexpensive. They are quick to make. It will take you more time to drive to the grocery store and fight your way past the crowd in the pasta aisle to pick up the store bought, chemistry lab by-products that we call noodles than it will take you to make your own at home with ingredients you likely already have on hand and can definitely pronounce. If you are thinking about dipping your toes into the water of a more free and self-sustained lifestyle than there is no better place to start than right here.
There are several different recipes for homemade egg noodles. Some call for water, some for milk, some for chicken broth and all of them are great. Personally, though, I like my simple recipe best.
Step 1. Combine the flour and salt in a mixing bowl.
Step 2. Make a well in the center of the flour.
Step 3. Crack both eggs into the well and beat them up. You could beat the eggs separately and then pour them into the well if you don't mind adding an extra dish to wash.
Step 4. Gradually mix the flour from the sides of the well into the eggs. Eventually you will get a nice ball of dough.
Step 5. Turn out your dough onto a well floured surface. Use your flour liberally on your hands, your surface and the ball of dough.
Step 6. Kneed the dough gently, adding flour as needed to keep the dough from sticking, until the ball is smooth and no longer sticky. Cover the ball in plastic wrap and place it in the fridge for at least 30 minutes or up to overnight.
Step 7. Flour your rolling pin and surface and roll out your dough to whatever thickness you like from 1/4in. to paper thin, the choice is yours. Then grab your pizza cutter (easiest) or butter knife and cut out long strips, try to stay as straight as possible.
That's it. You're done. You've made noodles. You can use them immediately or lay them out on a wire rack (faster) or dishtowel (slower) to dry completely. Drying is usually the most time consuming aspect of noodle making and typically takes several hours . But once the noodles are completely dried you can store them in an airtight container on your shelf for up to 5 months.
Now, I have a message for all those out there who buy over processed, neatly packaged egg noodles at the grocery store. STOP! That's right, stop it. Just say no. Sure the so-called egg noodles that you buy in the store are edible and they come already dried but seriously they aren't nearly as tasty as homemade noodles and most of the time they don't even have eggs in them. Instead they contain ingredients that are barely pronounceable like thiamine monoitrate.
Homemade egg noodles are EASY to make. That's right, e-a-s-y. They are inexpensive. They are quick to make. It will take you more time to drive to the grocery store and fight your way past the crowd in the pasta aisle to pick up the store bought, chemistry lab by-products that we call noodles than it will take you to make your own at home with ingredients you likely already have on hand and can definitely pronounce. If you are thinking about dipping your toes into the water of a more free and self-sustained lifestyle than there is no better place to start than right here.
There are several different recipes for homemade egg noodles. Some call for water, some for milk, some for chicken broth and all of them are great. Personally, though, I like my simple recipe best.
- 1 cup of flour
- 1 t. salt
- 2 eggs
Step 1. Combine the flour and salt in a mixing bowl.
Step 2. Make a well in the center of the flour.
Step 3. Crack both eggs into the well and beat them up. You could beat the eggs separately and then pour them into the well if you don't mind adding an extra dish to wash.
Step 4. Gradually mix the flour from the sides of the well into the eggs. Eventually you will get a nice ball of dough.
Step 5. Turn out your dough onto a well floured surface. Use your flour liberally on your hands, your surface and the ball of dough.
Step 6. Kneed the dough gently, adding flour as needed to keep the dough from sticking, until the ball is smooth and no longer sticky. Cover the ball in plastic wrap and place it in the fridge for at least 30 minutes or up to overnight.
That's it. You're done. You've made noodles. You can use them immediately or lay them out on a wire rack (faster) or dishtowel (slower) to dry completely. Drying is usually the most time consuming aspect of noodle making and typically takes several hours . But once the noodles are completely dried you can store them in an airtight container on your shelf for up to 5 months.
You may be looking at this last picture and wondering to yourself where all the noodles went. Well, it's a sad story really. You see, homemade egg noodles are not safe at my house. They will sit there, minding their own business, trying to dry and my DH will come along and devour them one by one. I try to protest on their behalf but my pleadings fall on deaf ears. So I've had to resort to drying my noodles in batches. One small batch that I keep on the counter in the kitchen, the sacrificial batch if you will, which DH spends all day picking at. And the other batch, which I don't get out of the fridge to cut and dry until just before bedtime. They are dry by the time I get up in the morning (usually just before DH gets up) and I can put them all away before he even notices that they were there at all. I know it's pathetic but that's life when you are a married to an egg noodle addict.
It's a Little Hot
90 degrees today at 2pm in the shade. By the time the sun had set we had reached a peak temperature of 94 degrees with a heat index of 103 or 104 depending on who you ask. But it gets better. Tomorrow is supposed to be one of our hottest days on record, if not THE hottest day on record, with temps crawling at least to 95 and a heat index somewhere between 105 and 115. Yep, you read that right, 115. I think hell is about to swallow Ohio whole.
So what is one to do about the heat? Well, for starters, we spent the day playing in the sprinklers. Watering the critters. Hosing the critters. Hosing ourselves. Sitting in the tub, kiddie pool, shower etc. Eating chocolate dipped frozen strawberries, peaches, bananas and watermelon chunks and slaving over a hot stove.
"Wait, what!? Did she just say 'slaving over a hot stove'?"
Yes, yes I did. Now you are probably thinking that I've gone all squirrely in this heat, perhaps I've lost my marbles. Nope. You see, there is one treat that I always associate with summer (and you really don't get much more "summer" than 95 degree searing heat). It isn't ice cream or slushies or snow cones. It's rock candy.
Rock candy has a looong history dating at least back to 9th century India and Iran possibly even earlier than that! It's been referenced by many authors and poets, including William Shakespeare. In earlier times it was used for therapeutic purposes as medicine instead of simply as the sweet treat we know and love today. For the life of me I have no idea why we ever stopped delivering our medicine via rock candy. I mean, when I was a kid (probably even now as an adult) if my doctor had said "Here's your medicine" and then handed me a bag full of rock candy suckers, you better believe I would have spent much less time hiding under my bed and in closets to escape my mother and her medicine spoon.
None the less, it wasn't until about the 1700's that Rock Candy began to be widely used primarily as a sweet treat. Rock candy is still more than a simple lollipop though. It also makes for a darn tasty science project. I use rock candy to teach my kids about crystals, solvents, solutes and solutions as well as evaporation.
If you've never made rock candy before then now is the time. It is relatively easy to do. First, you need a few common kitchen items.
1. A couple of sterilized canning jars.
2. Some wax paper
3. A couple of rubber bands (or in our case hair ties)
4. 4 bamboo skewers with the sharp ends cut smooth. You wouldn't want a little one to kabob their tongue.
5. A medium saucepan.
6. 1 cup of water
7. 3 cups of sugar (White or brown sugar. Either one works fine.)
8. Flavoring or food coloring if desired. We used watermelon and grape.
The first step is to heat the water in the saucepan until simmering. Heated solvents (water) can dissolve larger amounts of salutes (sugar) than they can when cold which makes it possible to super saturate the solution, a necessary step when making rock candy.
Then stir in the three cups of sugar slowly, a couple of tablespoons at a time, stirring constantly and making sure that each batch of sugar dissolves completely before adding more.
Once all the sugar is added you can stop stirring. Allow the syrup solution to heat to a rolling boil.
Once it reaches a rolling boil, remove it from the heat and dip your skewers in the solution.
Place the skewers on a plate or on some wax paper and allow them to dry while you divide the solution evenly among your two canning jars. Then add any flavoring or food coloring you want, making the solution just a bit darker than you want the finished product to be.
Place two skewers in each jar then cover with squares of wax paper, poking the paper over the top ends of the skewers. Place a rubber band around the wax paper to keep it in place and set the jars up on the fridge or in any area that is out of direct sunlight and where the jars are unlikely to be disturbed. DO NOT TOUCH THEM even though it's tempting. The humidity in your area will determine how long it takes for the rock candy to form. The less humidity there is is the faster the water will evaporate and therefore the faster the crystals will form. You're probably wondering why it is, then, that we can't set these in direct sunlight as that should speed up the evaporation. Well, that's correct. It would speed up the evaporation...too much. If the water evaporates too quickly then the sugar won't have a chance to form into those nice big crystals that become the rock candy.
In 3 days to about a week we should have some rock candy suckers to show for our trouble.
Happy 4th of July!
For independence day this year we spent the morning cheering for Oldest and Middle as they walked in the Fourth of July parade, then we picked raspberries. I've got burgers and chicken breasts on the grill and a yard full of friends and family. And tonight we'll be heading to the fireworks display in town. Doesn't get any better than that.
Hope everyone is having a wonderful 4th of July!
Hope everyone is having a wonderful 4th of July!
Is It Normal to Not Favor One or Two of Your Children?
I was reading an article on a blog this morning that was talking about how this woman liked one of her kids more than she liked the other and how she felt guilty for it. The comments about the article made it seem as though this was the 'norm' but that most people wouldn't openly admit it and saying, of course, that it would be wrong to show to your children that you liked one more than the other.
So now I'm feeling a little awkward. I really, in all honesty, do not like any one of my children more than I like the others. I do like different things about each one of my kids. I like Oldest's generally sweet disposition and even (usually) appreciate the fact that she is a bit of a drama-queen. I like that Middle is very charismatic and full of personality and I like Youngest's calm and quiet nature. But I can't honestly say that I like any one of them more than I like the other. I really do love, and like, all of my children equally.
There are times when they drive me crazy, get on my nerves, frustrate me. There are times when I really feel overwhelmed and tired and need a break from my children. There are days when I question my decision to home school and wish that they were sitting in a classroom instead of jumping on my couch. There are times when I butt heads with one or more of them. There are times when we all can't stand each other. Those times are few and far between though, thankfully. That's normal family dynamics. We have our ups, we have our downs but it works that way with all of my kids. Even if I'm doing my best, most introspective, deep and brutally honest assessment I still can't say that I like one more than the others or that I don't like one as much as the others.
I used to think that's how it worked with parents. Kids always seem to feel, even into adulthood, that their parents favored their brother or their sister more than they favored them. But I always assumed that most parents were like me and they really didn't have a favorite. Now I'm starting to wonder if I'm some sort of freak of nature. Before I thought I was in the majority, now I'm wondering if I'm a real weirdo.
So now I'm feeling a little awkward. I really, in all honesty, do not like any one of my children more than I like the others. I do like different things about each one of my kids. I like Oldest's generally sweet disposition and even (usually) appreciate the fact that she is a bit of a drama-queen. I like that Middle is very charismatic and full of personality and I like Youngest's calm and quiet nature. But I can't honestly say that I like any one of them more than I like the other. I really do love, and like, all of my children equally.
There are times when they drive me crazy, get on my nerves, frustrate me. There are times when I really feel overwhelmed and tired and need a break from my children. There are days when I question my decision to home school and wish that they were sitting in a classroom instead of jumping on my couch. There are times when I butt heads with one or more of them. There are times when we all can't stand each other. Those times are few and far between though, thankfully. That's normal family dynamics. We have our ups, we have our downs but it works that way with all of my kids. Even if I'm doing my best, most introspective, deep and brutally honest assessment I still can't say that I like one more than the others or that I don't like one as much as the others.
I used to think that's how it worked with parents. Kids always seem to feel, even into adulthood, that their parents favored their brother or their sister more than they favored them. But I always assumed that most parents were like me and they really didn't have a favorite. Now I'm starting to wonder if I'm some sort of freak of nature. Before I thought I was in the majority, now I'm wondering if I'm a real weirdo.
Alas, it's finished!
I finished staining and hanging the first gourd birdhouse of the batch a couple of days ago. I used an acrylic stain and finished it with about 4 coats to get it to the desired color.
The picture came out a little dark but you get the idea anyways.
Now I just have to finish Oldest's birdhouse that she's entering for the fair. She decided what birds she wanted to attract and I cleaned, drilled and grinding the opening for her. But I have to smooth it out a bit. Then she's planning to paint it with her own design. We still have a few weeks though, entries don't have to be in until near the end of July. Hopefully we'll have enough time that if we screw up this one we'll be able to make another one in time to turn it in. :D
Cleaning the Inside of a Gourd
I've gotten the outsides of all of the gourds completely cleaned and scraped down and ready to go. Last night I worked on the first birdhouse of the batch. Now if you are going to make a birdhouse, bowl, jug, drum, etc. out of dried gourds (anything that requires large-ish open holes) you will need to clean the inside of the gourd as well as the outside.
Not to sound redundant (in other words, yes I realize that I said this in the last post but it bears repeating) but you will need a dust mask of some kind...something more substantial than a bandanna or dew rag or t-shirt tied around your face. I strongly suggest a full on respirator, I use one-P100 hot pink filters and everything. At the very least you will need a dust mask made for filtering fine particulate matter.
The other tools I use for cleaning the inside of a gourd are my trusty variable speed dremel tool with various sized grinding/sanding attachments (a drill and a hand saw or handheld jigsaw/router would work fine too). I like the variable speed dremel because it cuts down on the amount of dust and offers better control. I also use an old jigsaw blade, curved awl, and a thin wire brush.
For making a birdhouse the first step is to drill four small holes into the bottom of the gourd to help ensure proper drainage, it is a birdhouse after all not a birdbath. The next step is to determine where you want to place your opening. I use a compass to draw a circle that is 1"-1 1/2" (the type of bird you want to attract will determine the size of hole you need to drill...check out a chart here) in diameter and use a pencil to mark the center of the circle. That's where you'll drill your starter hole. Then you need to drill two small holes into the handle of the gourd for your hanging wire, leather strips, strong string or whatever other sturdy material you'll use to hang your birdhouse.
I use the various grinders and sanders for creating the hole opening instead of a jigsaw or handsaw in part so that I can sand the hole opening while I'm making it...you know, killing two birds with one stone and all that...sorry for the poor choice of idiom but you get the point. Anywho, once the opening is made it's time to clean out the inside of the gourd. I use the old saw blade to break up the pith and the seeds and I shake out the loose material. Then I use the awl and wire brush to loosen and grab whatever is left for a completely clean result. Some people leave a bit of pith in the bottom to help the birds gain footing. Personally the birds that come to my birdhouses never seem to have any trouble with footing without the pith and the one or two times I've left some in there the birds usually throw it right out anyways. Ultimately though the choice to pith or not to pith is really one of personal preference.
That's it, now the gourd is officially cleaned. After it's cleaned you can finish it off by painting or staining it and sealing it and it will last for decades.
The paper like stuff inside the hole is the pith. It's usually moldy and gross.
Not to sound redundant (in other words, yes I realize that I said this in the last post but it bears repeating) but you will need a dust mask of some kind...something more substantial than a bandanna or dew rag or t-shirt tied around your face. I strongly suggest a full on respirator, I use one-P100 hot pink filters and everything. At the very least you will need a dust mask made for filtering fine particulate matter.
The other tools I use for cleaning the inside of a gourd are my trusty variable speed dremel tool with various sized grinding/sanding attachments (a drill and a hand saw or handheld jigsaw/router would work fine too). I like the variable speed dremel because it cuts down on the amount of dust and offers better control. I also use an old jigsaw blade, curved awl, and a thin wire brush.
For making a birdhouse the first step is to drill four small holes into the bottom of the gourd to help ensure proper drainage, it is a birdhouse after all not a birdbath. The next step is to determine where you want to place your opening. I use a compass to draw a circle that is 1"-1 1/2" (the type of bird you want to attract will determine the size of hole you need to drill...check out a chart here) in diameter and use a pencil to mark the center of the circle. That's where you'll drill your starter hole. Then you need to drill two small holes into the handle of the gourd for your hanging wire, leather strips, strong string or whatever other sturdy material you'll use to hang your birdhouse.
I use the various grinders and sanders for creating the hole opening instead of a jigsaw or handsaw in part so that I can sand the hole opening while I'm making it...you know, killing two birds with one stone and all that...sorry for the poor choice of idiom but you get the point. Anywho, once the opening is made it's time to clean out the inside of the gourd. I use the old saw blade to break up the pith and the seeds and I shake out the loose material. Then I use the awl and wire brush to loosen and grab whatever is left for a completely clean result. Some people leave a bit of pith in the bottom to help the birds gain footing. Personally the birds that come to my birdhouses never seem to have any trouble with footing without the pith and the one or two times I've left some in there the birds usually throw it right out anyways. Ultimately though the choice to pith or not to pith is really one of personal preference.
The inside of the gourd after it has been cleaned and the pith has been removed.
Finished (or nearly finished) product. Please ignore the extremely cluttered work table :)
