Christmas is coming!

Over the holidays, I plan to update my blog on all we have been doing with school.  My camera lenses died, and blog posts are no fun without pictures!  As a birthday/Christmas (and maybe Valentine's Day/Mother's Day/Anniversary gift), I got a new lens.  Yea!!!!  Pix of projects are coming soon!  Here's a quick note about what we are going to be doing this holiday season.  First, we are taking a break in the MFW-ECC curriculum to look at Christmas Around the World.  We are also doing the Truth in the Tinsel book.  Secondly, as cute as my friend's elf on the shelf pictures are, I have enough mischief in my life without creating extra, and I know my kids well enough to know that if it's cute for the elf to do it, they would try it too!  As a giving focused alternative, I am planning to combine the Christmas Angel with Light 'em Up activities.  :)  I plan to post some of these as we go.  Since tomorrow is Dec. 1, I read the Christmas Angel book tonight, and I am making plans.  What do you do in your house to keep your kids focused on Christ at Christmas?

And, while 52 weeks of cookies was cancelled by our household running guru, I will be making cookies through the holidays, and I'll post the recipes.  :)

Outrageous Chocolate Cookies and Potato Soup



Smiley: my ever-present
kitchen helper

It's week 2 of my 52 Weeks of cookies!  This past Friday, I made Outrageous Chocolate Cookies to share with our friends at co-op.  I followed a pin to this blog post, which had a recipe link to here, for these deliciously rich cookies.  They were good, and gone fast!  I made them and hurried out the door, so I didn't get a picture of the finished product.  I didn't have chocolate chunks, so I used 2 cups of chocolate chips instead, and I used 1 1/3 cups of chocolate chips for the semi-sweet chocolate.  I buy them in bulk from Sam's Club.  Also, it turned out, that I was out of brown sugar, so I used 3/4 cup of regular sugar and a tablespoon of molasses.  Smiley helped me make them.  She scooped the dough, which was more like brownie batter onto the pans to put in the oven. 

Smiley was tickled at the shapes of her cookies.
It took a lot of self control for her not to lick her
fingers until she was finished!

Last night, soccer was cancelled due to a torrential rain, so, I stayed home and made potato soup.  It was the perfect weather for it!  Sadly, it is a crock pot recipe, but my crock pot died, and has not been replaced yet.  Thankfully, she gave suggestions for cooking it without one.  I made adaptations, of course, because I always do.  The last time I asked Bru Crew Dad to get potatoes at the store, he bought a 5 lb. bag of yellow potatoes.  (Isn't he a gem to go shopping for me?  I just have to remember to be more specific!)  Since the meal I needed them for required baking potatoes, I wondered what to do with these.  Soup was the perfect thing!  I peeled most of the 5 lb. of potatoes.  We have discovered that we like the skin in our potato stuff, so I left a couple with skin that I just scrubbed well.  I also used 3 qt. of stock, 2 cans of cream of chicken and a can of cream of mushroom.  I was out of onions, so I used a Tbs. of dehydrated onion, and a tsp. of onion powder.  I doubled the pepper and garlic powder.  I cooked my diced potatoes for about 30 minutes, added my cans of soup in, then divided it in half.  We had half for dinner and froze half for another night.  I returned it to the stove to warm the cream soups through and melt the cream cheese.  (Shh!  Don't tell Little Man that I put cream cheese in it!)  Each of the kids ate thirds!  Yum!

52 Weeks of Cookies

 A friend of mine did 52 weeks of cake last year.  I really enjoyed seeing all the cakes she made and posted on facebook each week.  I considered joining in as well, but we are not big cake eaters.  We want cake for our birthday, but that's mostly it, and sometimes, even then, we will choose a cookie cake over a cake or cupcakes.  I prefer cupcakes to cake because they require no dishes and are more convenient, but to make each kind look different takes a lot of work.  However, we LOVE cookies!  Bru Crew Dad's first word was cookie!!!  So, being the cookie lovers that we are, since I tried new cookie recipes two Fridays in a row, I felt inspired to do 52 weeks of cookies.  The plan is for each cookie to be from scratch and different from the others.  I don't know exactly how this will work, but it will be fun to try it!  If you make any of the cookies, let me know what you think!

MFW-ECC Week 2

 

Smiley had to use her finger to smooth out the
lines, so it would look pretty.
 

Little Man's N. & S. America ("and don't
forget Greenland!")

This  post is delayed because the last thing on  Week 2 was a world cake.  Well, we are not big cake eaters, but we love cookies!  So, the Bru Crew decided to make world sugar cookies instead, but soccer kept getting in the way!  Each child made 2 cookies: one for North and South America and one for Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia.  Only Ms. Quality Time left room and thought to put Antartica at the bottom of each cookie.  Little Man had me outline his continents, then he filled them in.  Smiley had me do all of it.  Tenderheart and Ms. Quality Time completed them on their own.  As far as school itself went, Week 2 was MUCH smoother than Week 1.  We were finished by lunch most days, and those that weren't finished up shortly after.  It was SUCH a relief to me!  I doubt our schedule will be great and things will be super smooth until soccer is finished, since right now we have a lot of evenings where we aren't home until 9:00 or later with all four kids needing showers, but it is what it is.  Part of the beauty of homeschooling is that we can be flexible.  The Bru Crew is lot loving the science this year.  We have done Apologia sciences in the past, and they interest the children more than Properties of Ecosystems, but biomes aren't really covered in Apologia, and I think this is important.  The teacher's manual indicates that science gets more interesting in Week 3, so we'll see.  :)  Here are more pictures of the Bru Crew and their world cookies. (Notice the soccer uniforms in the pix.  They all had a game that day.)

 

Ms. Quality Time making
her hemispheres.

 

Tenderheart getting the frosting bag ready.

 







Little Man had me outline the continents,
then he filled them in.

After I took pictures of her hemispheres,
Smiley piled on the green frosting to make them "yummier."

*ETA:  Find our cookie recipe here and the frosting recipe here.  I didn't follow the cookie recipe at the frosting site because I didn't want to refrigerate and wait!  I rolled the first tray of cookies in colored sugar crystals because I knew they would want some warm from the oven.  The rest I left plain for frosting.  I noticed that these cookies need to be flattened or they bake up tall instead of out.  Bru Crew Dad is not a frosting lover, so he enjoyed the sprinkle cookies better than the frosted ones, but the rest of us loved the frosting!

Cookies for Breakfast

What?  Cookies for breakfast?  You may be thinking that Bru Crew Mom has lost her marbles.  :)  Well, it all started a couple of years ago when Bru Crew Dad replaced his daily breakfast with Oatmeal To Go bars to lower his cholesterol.  (It worked beautifully, by the way.)  The kids were jealous, and wanted these yummy oatmeal treats too, but they came six to a box, and cost over $3 each box, most days.  I told them no.  Then, one time, the store was out of the bars, and I bought Bru Crew Dad Oatmeal Breakfast Cookies.  Then, the Bru Crew was REALLY jealous.  Dad gets cookies for breakfast?  We never get cookies for breakfast!  I tried to explain that these were different, but in a child's mind, there is no difference.  Cookies are cookies are cookies.  So, I set out to find a recipe for breakfast cookies, because I am NOT spending that much money on breakfast for my children regularly,  especially considering that they are still hungry after they eat one!  It took a lot of hunting, and I still didn't find the perfect one, but I found one that was close here.  I have adjusted it to meet our taste preferences, and my easy cooking preferences.  I reduced the sugar because I could.  I reduced the oats because I use whole wheat flour, and it absorbs more liquid.  I also use whole eggs.  I avoid using just egg whites whenever I can because we tend to not use the yolks later, and I hate wasting food.  I also replaced the oil, water, and prune puree with just apple sauce.  (Side note:  I have also used banana puree, pumpkin, and others.)  I have one that won't eat nuts in his foods, and I don't keep apricot around, so we use dried cranberries.  Here is my recipe with adjustments:

Bru Crew Breakfast Cookies:

1 1/2 c brown sugar
2 c rolled oats
4 c whole wheat flour
1 Tbs baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 c unsweetened apple sauce
3 whole eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
3/4 c raisins
1/2 c dried cranberries

1.  Preheat oven to 350*F.
2.  Line cookie sheets with parchment paper or spray with non-stick cooking spray.  (I used a seasoned stoneware pan, and I do neither of these.  They are non-stick already.)
3.  Mix first 7 dry ingredients in a large bowl.  (I use my Kitchenaid Stand Mixer.)
4.  Make a well in the center and pour in wet ingredients.  Mix well again.
5.  Stir in raisins and cranberries.  Dough will be thick!
6.  Using an ice cream scoop (or Large Pampered Chef Scoop) place balls of dough 2 inches apart on the sheet.  (If you do not have a scoop, you can roll golf ball sized balls of dough.)

7.  Spray your hand with non-stick cooking spray and flatten the cookies.  Because of the lack of fat in these cookies, they will not spread on their own.  (See picture above.)
8.  Bake 8 minutes for a soft and chewy cookie, 10 minutes for a more cake-like cookie.
9.  Cool on pan for a couple of minutes, the move to cooling rack to finish cooling.
10.  This makes around 3 dozen large cookies for us.  They freeze well, but stick together, so layer with waxed paper before freezing.

*Also, I have used banana puree instead of apple sauce, and used nuts and chocolate chips instead of fruit to make "Banana Nut" cookies, and I've used canned pumpkin with pumpkin pie spice and cranberries for a fall version of these cookies.  Varieties are endless, but different purees cook up differently, so the texture isn't always exactly the same, but they still taste good and are healthy.  Soon, I plan to try sweet potatoes!