Uncategorized – Page 5 – CatChick6 Creations

Staring….

As a mother, do you constantly feel that someone is staring at you…sneaking up on you…ready to pounce with a need, want, or request?

Sometimes that’s how I feel…..like there is always someone there…waiting…staring….until you sit down for two minutes….waiting until you sit on the toilet…..waiting until you decide to call somebody on the telephone…….waiting until you step into the shower….just staring at you and waiting…..

watch out……

Also, don’t forget about The Cloth Diaper Foundation and the Green Mountain Benefit Auction now through April 30th! And the giveaway I’m having!

Banana Cream Pie….

I am not a huge Banana Cream Pie fan..but some people in my family are…so it is a tradition to make it ONCE a year….The recipe is quite complicated. The first time I made it, I tried to make the caramel drizzle sauce..but I ruined my sauce pan. Now I just buy caramel sauce.

The other problem is that it only stays fresh for about two days….so you must eat it ALL within two days…not an easy task!

It requires about a dozen bananas!

I got the recipe on Good Morning America. It is by Emeril Lagasse. The link to the recipe can be found here: Emeril’s Banana Cream Pie Recipe.

Quiet……

The quiet is from the lack of an embroidery machine. My embroidery machine is officially dead….unrepairable….broken beyond repair…worn out…….there is no pretty way of saying it……

So, in the meantime..I’m catching up on my paper work…….

Beautiful Snow….

Over the weekend we had lots and lots of gorgeous snow! My children love to eat the snow…they would eat and eat and eat it all day…if I let them.

It was almost too much snow…..River had a hard time walking through it…she stayed out for over 2 hours…she loved it so much. I think she would have stayed out longer.

The dogs weren’t too happy about it. I tried to get them to play in the snow…but they didn’t want much to do with it..until I dug a path for them.

Don’t forget to go on over to the Etsy Cloth Diaper Team blog….enter to win a custom made woolie……custom made by me!!!

Who knew dry milk has an expiration date…..

So yesterday I decided to be a wonderful mother and bake a wonderful and delicious homemade cake. I found a great recipe…..Praline Turtle Cake…I know my kids don’t like pralines..so I figure I would just omit the pralines….

The recipe called for sweetened condensed milk…well, I didn’t have any..but I think no problem..I have a recipe for a “substitute” for sweetened condensed milk…which calls for instant dry milk. So, I get out my instant dry milk and whip it up…..I had to melt the “sweetened condensed milk”, butter and brown sugar in a pot……no problem..though I do notice a strange smell….

Then I proceed to make the actual batter..which smells and looks delicious. River is eager to help me out. I do notice that many many dishes are getting dirty..but I know it will be worth it when my children see this wonderful cake that I made for them…

The next thing is to pour the batter into the cake pans, on top of the melted carmelized goo….interesting…….so, that is what I do and pop it into the oven….umm..still a strange little smell…..

Well, in a few minutes I start to notice a smell…. and I mean a horrid smell…..a smell liked burned milk that has gone bad….a long time ago…..so I walk into the kitchen and it is filling with smoke…..(believe me, I tried to get photos, but they just didn’t turn out!)…well, the cake is bubbling over…all over the oven..and is smoking and smoking and carmelizing and smelling..but I must finish this cake..so I have to keep the oven on until the cake is done! I just keep thinking how happy my children will be when they see this delicious cake……

Well, the timer goes off and the cake is done….. it’s not pretty! And the smell is horrid….At this point, I’m getting worried that something went horribly wrong…..of course by now, I have had to open every window in the house and I’m trying to fan all the smoke detectors! The recipe says to wait ten minutes and then get the cakes out of the pans..(Yes, I am still holding out for hope!) So, I wait the ten minutes and then take the dumb things out of their pans…and if the smell wasn’t bad already…it now hits me in the face like a piece of wet bologna (and I’m a vegetarian)!

Okay.. so the cake ended up in the sink..along with all the dirty dishes….I then turned to the box of nonfat instant dry milk…..I mean, I didn’t know it could go bad…….the expiration date….1993!!!!

Split Pea and Barley Soup….

So yesterday I decided to make split pea and barley soup. I haven’t made this soup in about twelve years. I used to love making many types of soup when I was a vegan. They were inexpensive, easy and hardly ever contained any dairy, so I didn’t have to worry about dairy substitutes. I knew the kids would be a bit hesitant about this soup, so, I decided to get River involved. I figured if she helped cook it and got all excited about it..she would love eating it! So, we went to the store and got all the ingredients and got started!

I decided to make it in the crock pot, so that I wouldn’t have to worry about it on the stove all day. River loved helping…she helped cut and dice and get everything ready! She loved putting all the ingredients into the big pot. She said everything looked and smelled delicious!

This particular soup is incredibly hardy and so easy to make. The best part is that the barley and split peas don’t have to be soaked the night before….you just throw it all into a pot and wait about two hours!

So, did everybody love it! I wish I could say yes…..but the answer is no! River took one look at it and said, “Yuck!” Same with Tuesday. The only one who ate the whole bowl was Quinn…and that was only after I promised to take him to the bookstore that evening if he ate the whole bowl! Oh well, I enjoyed it!

Craft Hope….

There is an incredible team of volunteers over at Craft Hope that have put together an Etsy shop to sell things to benefit Doctors without Borders. I donated a custom woolie and it sold instantly! They are accepting donations for items until this evening! If you can’t donate an item, you can buy an item!

Those in Haiti need your help…..

Charity:water needs your help today to help those in Haiti who are going through incredible tragedy. There are also many other ways you can help. This post by Chris Sacca also provides many links where you can contribute.

Review and Contest….

I completely forgot……Katie over at thinkPINK has done a review and is helping me sponsor a giveaway of one of my woolies! Check it out! The contest is running through November 8th! Good Luck!

What’s Hot..What’s Not…part two…

Okay….here we go again….(once again…I borrowed this idea from Loobylu )

what’s hot……

*rock creatures…..my children love creating them..they gather rocks from the yard, wash them and then paint or marker them…then the hot glue comes out and I get to put them together! This can end up being an all day project!

*felt board people…..I love taking my daughter’s favorite story book characters and making them into felt board people. She will spend hours playing with them all and re enacting the stories. Now my elevent year old daughter has gotten into the act and is creating some characters for her! Her latest story is Cinderella.

*apples…we always have to have a huge selection of apples. Just something about this time of year makes it perfect for biting into a crunchy apple….perfection!

*everything Halloween! We just started getting out the Halloween decorations…but they just can’t get enough….

*books…as always books books books and more books….my children never stop reading books and these are some of their current reads.

*painting…everyone always loves to paint..but right now it is all my 2 1/2 year old wants to do…….

What’s Not…..

*dying plants…I inherited this plant when my mother died..it is a rabbit foot fern…this plant was her father’s plant..my grandfather! I was warned not to kill the thing..and of course…I already am! help! I am not a plant person…..

*leaves…don’t get me wrong..I love Fall and I love leaves…but they always end up all over the house!

*my middle school daughter’s mess….my daughter has always been messy..but now that she is in middle school..the mess is getting worse…..