Day to Day

Washing Powder, Cloths & Cottage Pie

After reading this month's issue of Warm Earth magazine (http://www.warmearth.com.au/) online I was keen to make my own washing powder.  The recipe was contributed by Rhonda Jean (http://down---to---earth.blogspot.com):

4 cups grated laundry or homemade soap or soap flakes (Lux)

2 cups borax

2 cups washing soda.

Mix all the ingredients together and use two tablespoons per wash.  I did a costing (see below, using full priced items) and it works out at only 21cents per wash, which is a lot cheaper than buying washing powder from the store. 

Washing Soda 1/2 pack = $1-94, Borax X1 tub = $3-99, Lux flakes @ 69cents per cup = $2-76.  That's a total of $8.69 which I worked out will give you 41 washes.

I did a load of washing this morning using the powder and my clothes are impressingly clean :)  I also hauled out the overlocker and whipped up a dozen or so cleaning cloths as mine were looking pretty torn and old.  I'd been stockpiling the towelling in the cupboard, so it was nice to use a little of it because farout towelling is bulky and space wasting!

Tonight's meal is cottage pie.  I don't know about everyone else, but come winter time I'm usually feeling pretty tired by the time dinner comes around and the last thing I want to do is cook and clean up.  What I try and do is pre plan all our meals for the week, as I find having a visual on the fridge saves me time thinking a million times through the day - what on earth can I cook tonight?  It just makes things easier for me.  What I also try and do is ensure the menu contains one or two (sometimes three) meals that can be cooked through the day when I'm still feeling fresh and just reheated at night.  This cuts down considerably on mucking around in the kitchen when all I want to do is sit down, help with homework, do home reader with Bella or just relax.  I'll pop the recipe in my recipe blog (link on the left in my sidebar) later today just incase you'd like to make it - it's very yummy :) 

By the way - the first felt food tutorial should be up tomorrow :)

 

 

Amish Cookies

Just popping in to let you know that there is a new recipe over on my recipe blog - direct link here: http://melissagoodsell.typepad.com/recipes/2008/06/amish-cookies.html

Choc Chip Amish Cookies - a long time favourite in our house and super easy (are you seeing a pattern here that I only ever cook super easy things!). 

I'm feeling incredibly tired tonight, so I'll keep this short :)

Mmm Yum!

I've been doing a little bit of cooking today - actually it seems like I've been in the kitchen all afternoon and I really haven't made that much.  Anyhow one of things we cooked was some really delicious crunchy caramel popcorn - super easy, quick, crunchy and well, we loved it.  The recipe is over on my recipe blog (I still can't figure out how to link grrrr...but you can find my recipe blog link in my side bar).

Speaking of cooking - James did his first batch of cooking the other day.  From start to finish completely by himself, including icing the slice and the washing and cleaning up.  It was delicious too!

The holidays are going far too fast.  Next week they will be both back at school :(  At the moment we're having a mammoth lego-a-thon in the lounge room.  Bella is working on Fort-Legoredo and James just finished putting his Star Wars AT-AT together.  James has his own blog now so I'm not allowed to post the photo of his finished lego creation on here (apparently lol).  Here's his link incase there are any young (or old) Star Wars fans out there: http://www.melissagoodsell.typepad.com/starwarsboy/

We've also been working on some more of his Star Wars Dagobah - who knew that paper machier could be so much fun!   There is still a fair bit to go before it's all finished though.

I have lots more to share but the washing up is calling me :(  Before I go here's a couple of layouts that I scrapbooked for the Tarisota gallery this month.

Chocolate Brownie

One of our favourite recipes to cook is this chocolate brownie slice.  I've popped the recipe here if you'd like it.

Before I go - I've just designed my first online class for Tarisota.  It's a downloadable pdf format....here's a sneak. 

P.S. I think the class will be available from tomorrow over at Tarisota

Monday Cooking

James went to a friend's house this afternoon for a sleep over, so Bella and I decided to do some cooking to pop in the freezer ready for school lunches.  I don't believe in putting lollies and chips in the kids lunches but I do like them to have a little piece of home cooked slice, cake or muffin popped in there when I can manage it. 

So - we cooked and cooked for several hours.  I thought she would soon be tired of all the stirring and adding and slow baking in our teeny weeny toaster oven where we do the cooking - but no, she loved it and would have baked more if I'd agreed. 

We made Beth's weetbix fudge slice.  I only used 1/2 cup of sugar and it was a fabulous easy recipe that I'll definitely do again - no baking! yay!

Coffee cake that was a recipe from Mum.  I've cooked this quite a few times and so far it hasn't failed.  I'll post the recipe on my recipe blog tomorrow incase anybody would like it.  I actually cooked this one in a really large cake pan so the pieces are a lot skinnier than they usually are in this photo.

Impossible Pie is Bella's new favourite, so we cooked this for tonight's dinner.  It's actually impossible to muck up - I'll post the recipe for that tomorrow too on my recipe blog.

Choc chip muffins - we made a mix of large and small ones for lunches (the boys have large ones, Bella has small).  These are a favourite - the recipe for these is here.

Lastly we baked Kate's yummy chocolate slice - the recipe is here.

So, all that baking made a very happy girl -

On the knitting front I'm still plodding along slowly with James' knitted blanket.

Plus a quick layout.

Hedgehog Slice

I thought it must be time for another recipe.

Hedgehog slice was probably the first slice I cooked when we were first married because it's a non baking one, so there was no room for errors!  It's still a favourite to do every so often and I know half of my family also cook this recipe simply because it's so easy and so yum.

The recipe uses Milk Arrowroot biscuits (these are by Arnotts) but I've also used Milk Coffee or Teddy bear biscuits over the years and I'm sure there are many more that would do the trick.  It's a really nice moist recipe too.

If you'd like to cook some hedgehog slice, the recipe is here over on my recipe blog.

Bush Tucker

Late last week James made a comment that he remembered making damper in Kindergarten and how delicious it was, only he dropped his piece on the ground after the first bite and the teacher told him - too bad there is no more James - and he cried :O(  Rich and I both went 'oooooh James' when he told us, one of those little moments that you find out about later that make your heart sink for your then 5 year old and his little piece of damper.  So, I started googling for a good damper recipe and today after our trip to the movies (to see Surfs Up) we made this mighty fine batch of damper.  I got the recipe from here if you want to give it a whirl.  We cooked it in our toaster oven and it was quick, easy and tasted great straight out of oven loaded up with butter :O)

The kids loved it.  So, now I feel content that my boy has been able to enjoy damper again - he did drop his first piece on the floor but there was plenty more to fill his tummy.

The cubby is nearly finished, I'll be sewing it up tonight and will share a pic in tomorrow's post.

Lastly, there is a new post up over at the Aussie Scrap Source Blog so be sure to check it out :O)  Here are my projects for the challenge.

Hungry??

Then you definitely need to cook this Snickers Rocky Road slice!

Seriously so yummy, so easy and fun for the kids to help too.  Thanks for the recipe Lisa - everyone in our family loved it :O)

Recipe is here on the recipe blog.

Yeehaw!

School holidays start here tomorrow and I've been counting down the hours...no more packing of school lunches for two weeks and I get my babies all to myself again.  We've got a lot planned for the holidays - nothing exciting, just veg out kinda stuff, but I have plenty of ideas in my head to fill in our days.

James and I visited the library this morning to stock up on some books.  He's feeling much better now the antibiotics have started to kick in, just pale, tired and a hurting cough.  The temperature has gone and he's feeling very happy with himself at the moment because Nanny Joan dropped in this morning with some cans of lemonade and the latest issue of 'That's Life' for him to do - he loves doing the crosswords & puzzles and sending off his entry (when I remember to post it - I will remember to post it this time though, I will, I will).

Last night's WIP - the front of a denim and red bag for myself. Another simple design, just like the last monkey bag that I sewed for Bella a few days ago - only this one isn't having side gussets in it, just nice and simple.  The fabric on the bottom is supposed to sit the other way around, so the swirls flow across the bag from left to right, but I rather fancied them up vertically for something a little different.

Today's cooking for the kids - Honey Joys.  I do enjoy cooking biscuits, slices and cakes.  James and Bella don't eat a lot of this sort of food (well Bella hardly eats anything like this I bake as she prefers fruit and vegies 99% of the day), but I do like to {mostly} have something in the cupboard that I've cooked so that on times when they do reach for the biscuit tin, they can reach for the home cooking instead. 

Honey Joys recipe is here (in about two seconds it will be).

Today's WIP and chockie slice

I had many plans for today - errands, grocery shopping, morning scrap group, school assembly and a trip into Bella's classroom in the afternoon.  But, they were all cancelled due to a very tired boy - aka James.  He's home from school today and at the moment is sound asleep on the couch :O)

So, instead I cooked some Easy Peasy Chockie slice (so easy and quick and only 5 ingredients) to feed the clan.  The recipe I'm about to pop over on my recipe blog if you would like to give this one a whirl.

Then I decided to do a little crafting - a funky monkey bag for Bella to use for dance (something to keep her jacket, solo tape, jazz/ballet shoes in).  Scary, scary because I've never stitched a bag before....it should be easy right!??  I've just finished cutting out the pieces and now I'm off to stitch them together...hopefully I'll be back later with the finished bag, hopefully! !