Spring Planting

Today we took a trip to our local BiMart (one of Mike's favorite stores). Mike browsed the hunting/outdoors/ammo area and I browsed through all of the gardening sections. Eileigh split her time fairly equally between the two. We walked away with some ammo and a bugle for Mike and some veggie starts, seed packets, and two pear trees! We bought one Bosc pear and one D'Anjou pear tree. I really want to get one more, a Bartlett pear tree- but they didn't have it at BiMart so I'll have to keep looking. While Mike planted our trees I started to plan our garden. We have three raised beds but we might be building a few more! I'm not sure we have enough space now- I have starts for strawberries, Walla Walla onions and cauliflower, seeds for corn, bell peppers, lettuce, and green onions, and plans for tomatoes, basil, and various other herbs. It's so exciting to plan, plant and enjoy our very own garden! Last year the summer went by so fast and I was so busy with Eileigh and EPing that I feel like I hardly ever got outside, much less invested time in the garden. So I'm really looking forward to this year. Now I just need to figure out my flowers- the front of our house needs some help!! :) It was dark by the time Mike finished planting the pear trees so I wasn't able to get a picture of them but I did take a picture of our little starter plants!! :)

Homemade Laundry Soap

In my quest for bargains and cheaper, better ways of doing things I have discovered something new (to me) and decided to give it a shot: Making my own laundry soap. The cost savings are incredible when you figure out it will now cost me a penny ($0.01) a load!!! The other upside for me is I can use it for Eileigh's diapers, for which I'm not supposed to use any detergent with fabric softeners or additives (which generally costs more anyways). So I am pretty excited. It didn't take long to make, either- pretty simple process. I didn't add any essential oils to make it scented since this was my first try but we'll see how it goes- I might decide to add some for my next batch.

Homemade Laundry Soap

1/3 bar Fels Naptha, grated
1/2 c. washing soda (Brand to look for: Arm and Hammer Washing Soda- not baking soda!)
1/2 c. borax powder (Brand to look for: 20 Mule Team)

Place grated soap in sauce pan. Add 6 c. water and heat until the soap melts. Add washing soda and borax and stir until it is dissolved. Remove from heat.
Pour 4 c. hot water into a 2 gallon or larger bucket. Pour your soap mixture into the bucket and stir.
Add 1 gallon plus 6 c. water and stir.
Let soap stand for about 24 hrs. and it will gel. Use 1/2 c. soap per load.
Optional: You can add 1/2 to 1 oz. of essential oil or fragrance oil for scent.
*Note: The finished soap will not be a solid gel. It will be more of a watery gel that has been accurately described as an "egg noodle soup" look. This soap is a low suds-ing soap. If you don't see suds, that is okay- suds are not what does the cleaning, it is the ingredients in the soap. We have a high-efficiency front loader and haven't had a problem since this is a low-suds soap.
**All ingredients were purchased at WinCo.

Two soup-er recipes!!

The weather being a bit on the chilly side, I have been cooking up some good ol' comfort food perfect for fending off the cold: soup. One recipe I received from a friend for my bridal shower and the other I could swear was passed on to me from my mom (who declared she had never tasted such a great taco soup before and wanted the recipe... *sigh*).

Lasagna Soup

2 oz. Italian sausage (I used our homegrown pork sausage)
4 stalks celery, sliced
1 sm. onion, diced
1 lg. garlic clove
5-10 mushrooms, sliced
1 (28 oz) can diced tomatoes
1 (15 oz) can tomato puree (I think my can was only 10 oz but it worked fine)
1 beef bouillon cube
4 c. water
1 tsp. each basil, oregano
1/2 tsp. each thyme, crushed red pepper (or less if you don't want it quite so spicy)
8 lasagna noodles
2 c. ricotta (I omitted)
1/2 c. mozzarella cheese
1/2 c. parmesan cheese

Remove sausage from casing, crumble into 4 qt. stock pot and cook until browned. Add onion, celery, garlic and mushrooms. Saute veggies for 5 minutes. Add tomatoes, puree, bouillon, water and spices.
Bring to a boil, reduce and simmer uncovered for 30 minutes.
Break lasagna into pieces and add to soup. Cook over medium 15 minutes or until noodles are tender. Serve topped with cheeses. Serves: 6
*You can also do this in the crock pot! After browning sausage, add everything to the crock pot except all the water (2 c.?- experiment). Add noodles the last 30 minutes. Cook 4-5 hours on high in all.

Taco Soup

1 lb. boned chicken breast
6 c. chicken broth
1 onion, chopped
1 tsp. garlic salt
1 (15 oz) can diced tomatoes
1 (10 oz) can tomatoes with green chiles
1 (15 oz) can pinto beans, drained
1 (15 oz) can black beans, drained and rinsed
1 (15 oz) can creamed corn
1 pkg. taco seasoning
1 pkg. ranch dressing
1/2 tsp. cumin
Tortilla chips, shredded cheese, sour cream and avocado as desired

Cut chicken into pieces. Place chicken in broth, onion and garlic salt. Cook until done, about 10-15 minutes. (I used chicken breast I had baked previously and added it to the broth while the onion simmered). Add rest of ingredients, cook about 20 minutes.
Serve over crushed tortilla chips, place shredded cheese, sour cream, and avocado on top! *Even better the second day!!

Yeeeow!!!

Tonight I had the privilege of being Eileigh's first bite victim. I'm just thankful I didn't drop her, since that was my initial instinctive response. She'd been clingy since it was getting close to (early) bedtime and I was holding her on my hip while wiping off the dining room table after dinner. All of a sudden I felt a searing, blinding pain to my shoulder and I screamed this very sissy, very high-pitched scream that would definitely stop an attacker in their tracks. (And in fact, did). I managed to squelch my initial reaction to FLING the cause of my suffering to the floor (this would be Eileigh) and instead set her down quickly. I don't know if it was my scream or being put down that had Eileigh in tears right along with me but I think she grasped the concept that biting is NOT okay. I had been somewhat surprised that up to this point she had never bitten anyone since she's always seemed to enjoy chewing on and biting toys, the bottle (and prior to the bottle: me- but that was before she had teeth, thankfully). I am REALLY hoping that this was an isolated, one-time event that was traumatic enough for her to not attempt again!! Or if she decides to, maybe it can be a light nibble on someone else's shoulder....

Tub Surprise

In the interest of sharing the latest "ew", I thought I would relate my most recent experience with the seemingly never ending poo-tastrophes. Our regular habit is to follow breakfast time with bath time, resulting in a generally much easier clean up on Eileigh's part. Yesterday was a different story altogether. Eileigh has pretty much gotten into a routine: up in the morning, drink milk, walk around and poop, eat breakfast, take a bath, get dressed, poop, etc. Pooping takes up a significant portion of the day although she is frequently able to multi-task and I am unaware of her accomplishment until she careens by and I catch the rather fragrant essence trailing along behind her. So as is my custom, prior to dumping Eileigh in the tub I peeked into the backside of her diaper to ascertain the need for a full change and clean up. Nothing noticed, I stripped off her diaper as she stood there peering into the tub, letting the diaper fall to the floor- face down. I swung Eileigh into the tub, bent down to pick the diaper up and realized after doing so that there was poop all over my floor. Soggy, vegetable mush. I stared dumbfounded at the floor, progressed to staring at the diaper in my hand and (finally making the connection) turned my eyes toward Eileigh- now contentedly admiring all of the floaters whirling and swirling around her. I was stricken for several seconds, torn between the need to wipe up the floor to reach Eileigh and my desperation to keep Eileigh's hands OFF the new tub toys. As I hurriedly scrubbed the floor I kept one eye on Eileigh and informed "No, Eileigh, icky, no touch!" She then enjoyed running around naked while I drained the bathtub turned toilet and scrubbed everything from the tub to the smeared bath mat to every single toy that had simmered in the sewage. Finally finished, Eileigh enjoyed a freshly scrubbed bath tub while I made a strong mental note to always, always fully check the diaper PRIOR to plunging Eileigh into the tub.

Happy girl, lots of teeth!

Just thought I would share a couple recent pictures of Eileigh and her mouthful of teeth! She currently has eight in the front, a ninth bottom molar, and is working on two top molars- one on each side! They definitely do not seem to bother her as much as when her other teeth came in which is a blessing! I was reading somewhere about the effect inflation has had on the Tooth Fairy- apparently it's not uncommon for her to bring anywhere from $5-$20 a tooth! I'm pretty certain that will not be the case in our household... I figure 5 cents to a quarter sounds about right. :) I remember as a little girl accidentally swallowing one of my teeth and having to write the Tooth Fairy a letter... something along the lines of "Dear Tooth Fairy, I swollowed my tooth. Please send me a quarter." Misspelling is all mine. But she did bring a quarter!! I'm looking forward to experiencing that with Eileigh- not the losing teeth part necessarily (kinda gross) but the excitement of the Tooth Fairy visits. I even have the tooth box already!

Ear Muffs!!!!