Pumpkin Muffins

I know, I know.... these recipes are a dime a dozen this time of year but here's another one for free =)  This is a tried and true recipe that we've been using for many years.  This is easy to double (if you want leftovers you better make double!) It also works beautifully with dairy free milk and even vegan egg (flax egg)!  Anyone who has read my posts before knows that I am not a strict recipe type of person.... more of a use whatever you've got on hand kind of person.  I have made this recipe with many different variations out of necessity over the years.  Today I will show you the base recipe and also how today's version was baked.

Let me start by showing you the world's best cookbook!!  This particular cookbook was printed in 1969 and was the property of my mother-in-law.  She passed away before any of our girls had a chance to meet her but things like this give them a glimpse of their Nana.  Written beside recipes are her own notes on how she may have changed a recipe or what to change next time.  This book is filled with notes, stains, old receipts, and magazine clippings.  The binding has been falling off since the book came to us so to me that really shows how much this was a part of Nana's life.  I can't recall a single recipe I have used from this book that hasn't turned out exactly as it should.  It has a plethora of information on basic cooking and lots of pictures and diagrams.  If you ever see one like this at a yard sale or thrift store I would highly recommend picking it up.

Base recipe:
1 1/2 cups All Purpose Flour*
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
1/4 cup butter or margarine, melted
1 egg
1/2 cup raisins

*If using self-rising flour, omit baking powder and salt. 

Today's Version:
1 1/2 cup AP Flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1 TB cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground clove
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
1/4 cup salted butter, melted
1 egg
1/4 cup pecans
1/4 cup chocolate chips

(for add-ins just make sure the total volume is 1/2 cup.  Could use all pecans, walnuts, all chocolate, or raisins.  What do you have in your pantry today?)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Mix all dry ingredients, separately mix all wet ingredients then add wet to the dry.  Mix just until flour is incorporated!  Batter should be lumpy.  Fill muffin tin (lined or greased) 2/3 full and bake for 18-20 minutes depending on your pan.  You can sprinkle tops with more sugar before baking if you want.

This is a simple, plain pumpkin muffin that doesn't fail to impress!  These are great for bake sales and will keep several days at room temperature in an air tight container...... good luck making them last though!   
 

Homemade Ghostbusters

Who ya gonna call?  The thrift store =)  Here's how I was able to make costumes for our whole family for under $25!!

First thing to keep in mind is that it's Halloween not a Hollywood movie set so no one will be critiquing each little aspect of your costumes and it's dark outside so when in doubt just fudge it to work!  So obviously for several reasons these are not exact movie replicas but the entire night no one had to ask, they knew we were Ghostbusters. 

Thrift early and thrift often!  I had an idea of what we wanted for each costume but I went shopping with an open mind and a willingness to see things as how they could be. 

I will start with the Ghostbusters.  I will do my best to be as specific as possible because I did not take step by step pictures.  I had wanted to find Khaki school uniform dresses but I didn't have much luck since very few schools here wear uniforms.  So I was able to snag matching khaki skirts and boy scout shirts.  I made emblems and name tags to cover the existing boy scout patches.  The color was slightly different from the skirt and shirts so I wanted to make a wide belt to take attention away from the colors.  The belts are duct tape, velcro, and printer paper.  Add black leggings and black long sleeve shirts for warmth. 
My husband's was just an Army jumpsuit found at a local military surplus store. 

 Black portion is double wide tape with a half width piece of glow-in-the-dark, back side is also covered in tape then the closure is sticky velcro.  The emblem is just printed and covered in contact paper then affixed with duct tape.  My husband had one too but he forgot to put it on =(

 Name tapes and emblems on the shirt were all just printer paper covered in contact paper, edged with glow-in-the-dark tape then lightly tacked down with white thread.  It held up just fine for a few hours =)

Here's the trial run to make sure everything fit.  Notice the little one had to be bribed to put hers on LOL 

Now I present to you: Stay Puft Marshmallow Girl! 

 

This one took a little while longer to figure out.  My original plan was to find white sweat suits one in the right size and one a few sizes too big and sew them together and stuff them..... then I found a 1 piece bunny costume about 5 sizes too big and had an epihany....  I promptly cut off the tail and realized I could take a pair of footie PJ's and cut out the feet and sew it inside the bunny suit leaving a hole for stuffing.... voila!  I used an old pillow and pulled out the stuffing then set to work getting the stuffing in all of the right places.  The bib was an old baby blanket sewed on and the red tie was made out of duct tape.   I realized on Halloween night the the actual stay puft guy wears a sailor hat, not a chef hat.... but once again no one even noticed. 

 

 



 

I almost forgot about the proton packs!  These were pretty fun to make.... mostly things salvaged from the recycle bin, lots of duct tape, and a hose from the thrift store.  The straps (not pictured here) were also duct tape that I stapled the the cardboard base to make sure it had enough stability.  I even used a shower curtain ring to hold the hose and keep it from falling apart.  The glow sticks were attached on Halloween night by using a piece of styrofoam inside the tube then sticking the glow sticks into the foam to make it look as though they were shooting. 

A few days before Halloween and I still had not found myself a jumpsuit or anything khaki.... but I found this green robe... it had a triangle piece at the front, I believe it was some sort of wizard robe at some point but I just cut off the triangle and made myself the Statue of Liberty..... and yes, technically a different movie than the Stay Puft but it all worked out okay =)

If you have any questions about how to improvise your own just leave me a comment!!

Easy Ranch Dressing!

As the temperature outside gets hotter, one thing I crave is a cold, crisp salad!  Growing up I don't think I ever truly realized that there were other salad dressing options other than Ranch.   I mean seriously, I doused it on just about everything!  As I have become more and more aware about the ingredients in processed food, compounded by our kids' food allergies, I have started making more and more from scratch.  I have learned a few things along the way..... most of it isn't that hard!  Makes me wonder why I didn't start doing all of these things years ago!

First off I will show you this post over at Fooducate about the ingredients in a certain very well known and much beloved Ranch Dressing.   Ingredients!  Just thinking about how many bottles of this stuff I have eaten and it sickens me!

Now I know that all people who suffer from food allergies can vary in different degrees.  We were given full reign to explore and try different dairy options (other than Cow) so that's how I came to whip up this gem that is now a staple at our house.  If your allergies are more severe, I would highly suggest asking about testing for goat dairy.  While we do enjoy some alternative plant based dairy products, being able to consume and cook with goat products has made this journey so much easier.  We've found a wide variety of products from Chevre (which is easy to find) to cheddar, provolone, and yogurt!  But as always when dealing with allergies check the labels!  I don't know all of the brands out there so I can only account for our personal experiences. 

For this recipe it is basically equal parts goat yogurt and mayo, then thinned with 'milk' and add seasonings.  Any of the milk alternatives will work obviously you want the unflavored ;o)  I have found this actually works better than goat milk in this recipe because the alternative milk mellows out the tang of the yogurt.  If the thought of the yogurt is too much for you just think of it as sour cream.... it has (to me at least) the same taste as sour cream just with a yogurt texture.  We even use it in place of sour cream in many other dishes or even dolloped on tacos!  The ratio of spices can be adjusted or even add it new spices to suit your own taste buds.  If you like a bold garlic then add fresh minced garlic, if after a mellow flavor use powder. Think of this recipe as a base to add and change however you want!

Ingredients:
1/2 cup goat yogurt
1/2 cup mayo
1-2 TB milk
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1 tsp garlic powder (or fresh minced garlic)
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp dill
pinch of paprika (or splash of hot sauce)

Mix well, taste, adjust seasonings, then let it chill in the fridge before using.

Easy, ranch, dairy free, goat, goat yogurt, dressing, homemade, fast, delicious,

Garden Markers

I was searching for ways to mark the areas of our garden so that we could remember where things are planted..... anyone who knows me, knows that I can't even keep my kids' names straight so I really can't remember where we planted things.  I found tons of cute ideas, thanks Pinterest, but none of them seemed like anything we wanted to do.  Then walking through the Dollar Store and had an epihany..... I could use some cheap pinwheels and duct tape!  Okay, so maybe this idea costs a tad more than painting rocks but it won't break the bank and it will help keep birds away! Even grossly overestimating how much a small strip of tape costs I would say these come in at just about $.60 each.  You can use whatever color tape suits your fancy or you could even use different prints to code them instead of writing on them. Whatever floats your boat!

Here's one finished! I'll post more pics once the whole garden is full! 

 Supplies are simple enough: pinwheels, duct tape, scissors, and marker

 Start by pulling 4 inches, give or take, of tape then halve that piece.  (These are small pinwheels, if yours are larger just figure out how long you want the flags and double the length) 

 Place your flag low enough so that it doesn't interfere with the spinning.  Put the pinwheel stick at roughly the half way point and carefully fold over. 

 It's okay if the end doesn't perfectly line up, just cut notches in the end to make it decorative. 

Then write your plant name and you are done.  Cheap and very quick project!! 

Surviving Long Distance Road Trip

So this post has been almost a year in the making.  I have written it many times in my head and I have truly wanted to share about our journey moving across the country.  These days it seems like no matter what you do you will always offend someone.  I will start this post by saying that what we have chosen to do is our choice but we also do not hold any judgements against other families who do things different.  It's silly to me that just writing that statement, or even this entire post, has caused me to be stressed.  It just brings to mind all of the debate about working moms versus stay-at-home moms...... to me I just don't understand the issue, aren't we all moms?  Then what about the dads that stay home?  Why is there so much hostility towards different groups?  My not writing this post was simply because I feared the backlash of comments of people defending themselves but even that just doesn't make sense because I am not writing this to prove that our way is better and that others are not and I am in no way shape or form attacking anyone.

This post is to share our tips with others who may be looking for information on how to do the same thing.  So here goes nothing:

Our cross country road trip with 3 kids, 2 food allergies, 1 dog, no DVD, and no fast food.

Yes, you did read that correct.  We took this trip pretty old school.  We did have a few tricks and a little bit of technology.  Before beginning this trip we had been dealing with pretty harsh allergies.  Our oldest has a dairy allergy which by the time of this trip we were pretty well versed in the world of avoiding dairy.  However, our youngest was not quite 2 years old and was only able to eat rice and chicken with sea salt.  OOOOHHHH man, talk about interesting.  We had doctors telling us she had food allergies so stop giving her X foods, then when not cleared up stop giving her Y foods, then we think it might be Z foods, then we think it's pollen so don't give any uncooked fruits and vegetables.......  I use X, Y, and Z because I can't remember the order in which we eliminated foods but basically we just kept eliminating, and eliminating with no relief for her at all and also without being given the go ahead to add foods back.  When she (finally) got her allergist appointment the office couldn't see her until after we moved, so little help there.  All we could do was continue on with what we had been advised to do until we reached our destination.  So before our trip we stocked up on a brand of rice cakes that are literally just puffed rice.... and so our trip began.  

When faced with the reality of planning the road trip, we decided to go ahead and purchase a Leap Pad for the older girls to share.  They were going to each get a maximum of 1 hour per day, after lunch and it was all dependent upon their behavior.  We bought the pad about 1 week before our departure and set everything up on the computer, changed the batteries and had extras in the glove box..... on day 1 of the trip after lunch we decided to let the girls have their play time.  A quick game of rock, paper, scissors decided the lucky 1st player..... then we get a notification on the screen: "Please have your parent connect this device to a computer for updates"  SERIOUSLY?! We don't have a laptop so this great little toy ended up just taking up space on the trip.  Then I remembered in the emergency fun drawer I had a backup plan.  I hadn't planned on breaking it out until halfway through the trip but a very good friend had sent a MobiGo for the kids =)  They played it that first day then we stayed so busy that they didn't play again until day 4 or 5...... but it was worth it and I will explain that one later!  The big girls each had a backpack that I had packed for them and they had NO idea what was in it.  This is what kept them occupied for 90% of the trip.  In the backpacks I had several small toys (I had gotten bags of little toys from the thrift store) and we had some great friends who contributed to the bags with goodies like toys, sticker sheets, snacks, and coloring activities.  Those were great but the pièce de résistance were the BINDERS! 

Both of the big girls had their own binder.  Inside of the binders were all sorts of goodies.  I had a printed map of the trip in it's entirety with our highlighted route, then sections broken down by state.  Each state had a map, again with our route highlighted, then several sheets for each state (below are some of the sites that I used)  everything from coloring sheets with state flags and facts, word searches, information about historic sites, etc.  Each state had a sheet protector for them to put in small things like ticket stubs or smooshed pennies (I know that fellow parents know what I am talking about HAHA our kids can spot those machines at 100 paces)  Behind the state info was a section of random paper, mostly rejects from the printer where it may have printed a line or just a web address and I don't like to waste them, then a bunch of color wonder sheets removed from their original packages them hole punched to fit in the binder.  Each binder had a pencil pouch that held twistable crayons (they don't get crushed), colored pencils, etc.  Also in the pouches were several car BINGO cards.  In addition to the sites below that I used for the majority of the printing, I did sometimes just google for specific terms and found worksheets that way too.

Maps
Coloring State Sheets
TONS of printables
BINGO

Now that the entertainment has been taken care of how about food?  We carried a cooler with us for the trip and opted to go grocery shopping every few days instead of eating out or grabbing expensive snacks at a gas station.  Lunches were easy, we ate a LOT of peanut butter roll ups.  Peanut butter and jelly on a flour tortilla.  I will be the first to admit that I do not enjoy peanut butter but for us it was important to save as much money as possible.  On more than 1 day we were able to eat while sitting in heavy traffic due to accidents because everything was handy and easy to pass around.  We did have a few days with lunch meat roll ups and usually with a side of popcorn.  Dinners took a lot more planning.  We purchased a thermal cooker specifically for this trip.  On the very first morning before leaving our old house in NC, I cooked our dinner and added it to our thermal cooker.  When we arrived at our first hotel we checked in, carried in our luggage and had a wonderful chicken and rice dinner.  The way that the cooker is set up we cooked ours in the bottom big pot and plain chicken in the top smaller pot.  The 2nd day we traveled to visit my mom, we stayed there for a few days sight seeing and spending time with family.  When it was time to get back on the road, I once again used the thermal cooker on my mom's stove and once again had a lovely hot meal!  In addition to the thermal cooker alone, we also had a small one burner cook top that we took to use when we didn't have access to a stove.  In lieu of ice, for the 1st leg of the trip we used containers of frozen chili and frozen bottles of water. Once we reached our 1st stop we put them all back in the freezer (they hadn't thawed since we never opened the cooler on the 1st day) then let them thaw once we started back on our journey after our stop, so chili heated up in a hotel microwave was also great one night mid way through the trip!  Another tip with water we used our reusable bottles and just bought gallons of water when we needed to refill.  Whenever possible we would freeze large bottles of water instead of using ice in the cooler.  I don't think we paid over $1 for a gallon of water which filled all of our cups versus buying tons of individual bottles.  Plus, it's just better for the environment. =)

Saratoga Jacks Thermal Cooker
My Pinterest for thermal cooking recipes

So, the biggest sanity saver of the trip was probably our attitude.... we had a 'why not' attitude.  We made a few unscheduled stops because well, why not, and those ended up being some of our best memories!! Hotel has a pool?  Why not!  Just put suits in the dryer before bed.  I suggest taking a roll of quarters on any trip!!



Here's a cool site for finding interesting stops!  Roadside America however, I couldn't bring myself to pay for their app but we searched their site on our phones when we had WiFi. 

COFFEE!!  A definite MUST when traveling for us but we managed to only buy coffee one time.  Opting to fill our cup at hotels before checking out.

And last but not least, SAFETY!!  BE PREPARED!!  Check out my post about vehicle preparedness!  Plus I added lots of things to the van just for the trip.  Backup entertainment, glow sticks, suckers, hand sanitizer, stamps for postcards, roll of quarters, extra sunglasses, sunscreen, and jackets for bad weather.  Speaking of bad weather the day I was super glad we had the MobiGo is the day we ran into a tornado/storm.  Our oldest had her blanket over her head and played the game to keep her mind off of what was going on all around us.  I know we were super close to the confirmed tornado because of the gusts, hail, and the dreaded pressure change that makes your ears pop and feel sick to your stomach.  Yes, we seem to have a target on our backs!! 

So it is possible to travel over 3,000 miles with 3 kids and no DVD or fast food.  It does take a little more planning and whole lot of patience but it was worth every minute and we won't be going back to the way we used to travel.