Granny Miller Challenge--Food and Water

Food

We ate well during the weekend. I think, the main reason we did, was that we menu-planned to the nth degree--kind of like we would have if we were taking a trip. It helped us to stay focused and organized to already have the decisions made. I wonder how that would work in any sort of a long term situation, because I know that I am often hit or miss on meal planning on a day to day kind of a basis. (Note to us: work on being more consistent with menu planning, so the habit is there when the need is.)

For dinner Friday evening, we had planned Vegetable Beef (venison) Stew. Plan A was to cook it in wood-fire coals, but Owen worked with a neighbor off the farm and it rained, so we cooked inside on the propane cooktop instead. We all became fans of the long butane lighters over the weekend and laughed at ourselves for turning off burners and trying to light them by the knobs, without any flame.

Saturday morning, we had planned coconut flour pancakes and homemade, homegrown pork sausage with eggs. We thought it would be handy to use an old-fashioned hand-powered hand mixer to mix the pancakes, but it turned out the whisk was much more effective with a batter. The sausage was easier to make than I thought it would be (I used this family favorite recipe from Alton Brown, and used 2 and a half pounds of already-ground pork.) I used an old cookbook holder from the farmers' market box and really learned to appreciate how much easier it is to read from a cookbook or recipe binder that is propped up in a holder and lit with a lamp on the counter. We cooked the pancakes and sausage over the coals outside. Owen and Becca set up the awning to protect us from rain and Owen's Boy Scout fire-making experience kept us in plenty of hot coals. It was hard work to bend and cook over fire just a foot off the ground. The cook cooks just as much as the food does! We decided to leave off the eggs. The pancakes were egg-y enough and plenty filling with the sausage.

We wondered aloud if homemakers of bygone days wore a towel over their shoulder with 'designated spots' for different 'messes'. Perhaps they wet one end and used one corner to wipe their hot, cooked face, and the other wet corner to wipe off dirty hands. Maybe they saved the dry end for wiping only what was clean, like washed hands. We decided that cooking over the fire is almost too difficult and time consuming for everyday meal preparation. We will be improving our dutch oven cooking skills, learning and trying pit-roasting, looking into making and using a solar oven. In the long run, we'd like to build an outdoor stove and wood-fired oven that will allow us to cook in a more upright position without our faces directly over the fire.

Saturday lunch was more of a snack... rice cakes on hand with hummus or egg salad or pb. It made for a nice break in the day and we visited at the table as no one was distracted.

Saturday supper Hannah and Owen worked together over the fire again. We had pork ribs--they had already par-cooked so they warmed over the fire mopped with sauce, foil-wrapped potatoes cooked in the coals, we had sauerkraut that had fermented in our crock (as a side note, the kraut we have made with homegrown cabbage has been much more flavorful to us than that which was made with boughten cabbage), and broccoli steamed on the stove inside. Dessert was dutch oven-baked applesauce hung over the fire.

Sunday breakfast was home-made yogurt, apples or bananas. The yogurt had already been made using a heating pad for incubating. We talked about options for making homemade yogurt without power. One idea would be to place the yogurt in jars in a cooler and adding some jars of warm water to keep the cooler warm. Perhaps this could be done in an oven as well.

Sunday 'lunch', after church was eggs, bacon, refried beans, corn tortillas, salsa, avocado, lettuce. We cooked inside on the propane cooktop (and wondered how many butane lighters or boxes of matches we should keep on hand).

Sunday supper was our celebration meal. We hand-churned coconut milk ice cream, and popped popcorn on the stove. We agreed we had survived the weekend very well, indeed.

The next post will be about Water. I think it will take longer than I originally thought...

A new hobby...

Last weekend we did the Granny Miller challenge. It was a great weekend for us. We learned a great deal and agree with Granny Miller that everyone learns so much more from a hands on experience. We sure did.

It seems that some level of preparation has always been important to us. I grew up in a home that had a stocked pantry (even though we didn't grow our own food, my mom always had the next boxes of cereal, bottles of catsup, cans of tuna and bars of soap in a closet in our hall bathroom). Vern grew up in Minnesota and his mom always had extras in a closet in case they were stuck at home after a snow storm. We have generally carried that with us and expanded on it some. In our first country home in Minnesota, we expanded on the idea more. Since we have moved to our current country place, we are sometimes overwhelmed with how much more we seem to need to expand our skill set.

When we read about the Granny Miller Challenge Weekend, we pretty much all agreed that we should give it a try and test out just how prepared we are for a power outage. We altered the plan a little to suit our family.

For our first challenge weekend, we intentionally chose a weekend that would likely be neither too hot nor too cold. We left the power running to the fridge and the freezers. We also used power to process 18 roosters that have been needing to be culled. We used power to run the well pump for water and the plucker. We do know how to process chickens by hand, and realistically, if we had no power for freezing, we would not process 18 chickens at a time anyway.

In general, we would all say that the Granny Miller Challenge weekend for us was like having all the benefits of camping (reduced stress, time together, minimal interruptions, quiet...) without the negatives (we weren't in a leaking tent when it rained, we slept in our own beds, we didn't have to haul a flash light down to the bath house for a middle of the night run.)

Over the next several posts, I plan to cover more specifics in the areas Granny Miller recommends:

1. Food and Water
2. Shelter
3. Clothing/linens/laundry
4. Hygiene/toilet
5. Recreation/communication
6. Miscellaneous
7. Review/what next?

If you have any general questions, please comment and I will try to address them as I work through the list. Please feel free to share your own helpful tips!

Sunday Treats: Blooming Onions

When I suggested we stop buying potato chips a while back, I got the 'hairy eyeball' look. It's not like we even bought them very often, but nobody wanted to give up the option. Especially for birthdays.

Potato chips have absolutely no nutritional bang for the buck (unless you are horribly underweight and desperate for all the extra calories you can get--even then, the oil and salt used in most brands are bad for us).

So, I had to come up with some good substitutes, enjoyed often enough, to sway the crowd. First I had to find some recipes. Then I needed time to try them. Our weeks are already full, so I thought I would try Sundays. We had been having popcorn in the evening, but not as regularly as we did in winter.

We actually started out with potato chips and then tested a simple onion ring recipe. Then we resurrected this recipe, and adapted it to some of the diet changes we've been making. They really aren't hard, just a little time consuming. Don't worry if it isn't perfect. That's part of the charm!

I should have taken a picture of cutting the onion, but I ran out of hands! This time, I used unbleached white flour. Next time, I will try it with fresh ground spelt.

So, first melt and heat your good, healthy fat in a deep pan (I used coconut oil in a 3-quart pot) Then, you cut the onion. Dip it in an egg and milk wash (I used 2 small eggs and one cup of milk for two blooming onions.)

Then roll and gently toss it in the flour mixture (1 cup flour, 1-1/2 teaspoons sea salt, 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper--1/3 of what the original recipe recommends, 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper, 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano--I was out, so used Italian seasoning), 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme, 1/4 teaspoon cumin).

Dip in milk/egg mixture again and cover a second time with flour mixture to coat fully.

Test the oil temperature by putting a very small piece of onion in the fat. If it bubbles nicely, it's ready for the onion. Gently lower the onion into the fat with a slotted spoon. Fry for about 10 minutes.

Serve with dipping sauce on the side. I doubled the sauce recipe since we were doing two onions for 8 of us. (1/2 cup mayonnaise, 1 Tablespoon tomato sauce, 2-3 Tablespoons taratoor sauce from this recipe, because I didn't have horseradish sauce on hand, 1/4 teaspoon paprika, 1/4 teaspoon sea salt, 1/8 teaspoon dried oregano (or Italian seasoning), dash ground black pepper, dash cayenne.)

Mmmmm.

What kinds of special foods do you like to make to replace old favorite snack foods?

Our mother's day

My mom and dad drove down for mothers' day this year. We had a really nice visit and absolutely gorgeous weather. Vern and the children planned the meal and prepared it and cleaned it up. Delicious food, relaxing holiday with family and perfect weather. We even got to sit around on the front porch!

What else could a girl ask for?

Vern picked a delicious BarbecuedGarlic Chicken recipe from a Lebanese cookbook we were given. It included a dipping sauce (called Tratoor bi Sade) with *45* cloves of garlic in 1/2 cup of olive oil and the juice of one lemon.

He also made and Afghani bread, called Nan or Nani, to go with it.

My mom brought a Nona salad. And the children made herbal mint tea to drink. Mmmmm.

What country children do when they don't have a swingset

Earlier this year, Vern got a nice hoist so we can pull up our own hogs and cows when we process them. We had, at Christmas time, done our first hog all ourselves and found it nearly impossible to lift it up to scrape and gut. So now we are ready for the next time.

Vern and Owen like to think ahead (or so they say :*), I think they just like to play with their new toys!) so they hung the hoist in the carport to practice with.

And our country children put the hoist to work, giving carnival-like rides to anyone in the family that wanted one!

Happy Resurrection Day!

In my mind, I have long thought that the events of Easter, or the Resurrection, warrant a much bigger and more significant celebration than Christmas. The Resurrection is central to the whole purpose and significance of Christianity, after all.

In reality, Resurrection Sunday always falls around week 6 or 7 of a 9-week run of five birthdays in our family. And I never get it together to do the things I would really like to do.

One thing we try to do every year is Resurrection Cookies. I didn't have much hope that we would get to do them this year, but last night at about 11:10, we were putting our Resurrection Cookies into the falling oven. When everyone is up, we'll get them out.

Here are the instructions:

Resurrection Cookies


1 cup whole pecans
1 teaspoon vinegar
3 egg whites
a pinch salt
1 cup sugar
a zipper baggy
1 wooden spoon
scotch tape
Bible

Instructions:

These are to be made the evening before Easter. Preheat oven to 300F. (this is very important --- don't wait until you are half done with the recipe).
Place pecans in zipper baggy and let children beat them with the wooden spoon to break into small pieces. Explain that after Jesus was arrested. He was beaten by the Roman soldiers. Read: John 19:1-3

Let each child smell the vinegar. Put 1 teaspoon vinegar into mixing bowl. Explain that when Jesus was thirsty on the cross He was given vinegar
to drink. Read: John 19:28-30

Add egg whites to vinegar. Eggs represent life. Explain that Jesus gave His life to give us life. Read: John 10:10&11

Sprinkle a little salt into each child's hand. Let them taste it and brush the rest into the bowl. Explain that this represents the salty tears shed by Jesus' followers, and the bitterness of our own sin. Read: Luke 23:27

So far the ingredients are not very appetizing. Add 1 cup sugar. Explain that the sweetest part of the story is that Jesus died because He loves us. He wants us to know and belong to Him. Read: Psalm 34:8 and John 3:16

Beat with a mixer on high speed for 12 to 15 minutes until stiff peaks are formed. Explain that the color white represents the purity in God's eyes of those whose sins have been cleansed by Jesus. Read: Isaiah 1:18 and John 3:1-3

Fold in broken nuts. Drop by teaspoon onto waxed paper covered cookie sheet. Explain that each mound represents the rocky tomb where Jesus' body was laid. Read: Matthew 27:57-60

Put the cookie sheet in the oven, close the door and turn the oven OFF.

Give each child a piece of tape and seal the oven door. Explain that Jesus' tomb was sealed. Read: Matthew 27:65-66

GO TO BED!

Explain that they may feel sad to leave the cookies in the oven overnight. Jesus' followers were in despair when the tomb was sealed. Read: John 16:20&22

On Resurrection Sunday (Easter) morning, open the oven and give everyone a cookie. Notice the cracked surface and take a bite. The cookies are hollow! On the first Easter Jesus' followers were amazed to find the tomb open and empty. Read: Matthew 28:1-9

You could even do them tonight if you like... or you can save the recipe for next year. In the meantime, everyone here wishes you a meaningful Resurrection Sunday!

So much to be thankful for

I took James to Atlanta to see the oncologist today. Katie and Carrie joined us and we had a good day.

When Dr. Keller came in the room, James walked over and shook his hand. Dr. Keller squatted down with his 'simply amazed' smile and just looked James over. Finally, he pronounced, "Wow. He is looking really good, isn't he?"

James' counts are really good. After being perpetually high through all but the first month of chemo, James' platelets are now a little below normal. His hemoglobin is hanging out around 12.5 and his new energy level shows it. His white blood counts are very good for James... just a little below normal for the rest of us, but good for James with Down syndrome. The rash on his face is so much better. The skin looks tender (and maybe a bit dry), but the nasty bump part of the rash appears to be gone. (PTL!) If I haven't already say so, James is supposed to be seen by the oncology team once a month until October (at which point we'll go every other month, weaning us all to the point of our last visit at five years from the end of treatment....all Lord willing, of course.)

I asked Dr. Keller what he thinks is in James' future from his perspective--not looking for promises, just wondering what he sees from his point of view. He said he is very optimistic about James' prognosis. He says the largest group of children that relapse do so during treatment. The next largest relapse group does so within the first three years--James will hit his own three-year mark in March of this year. Once you reach the three year mark, the relapse rate levels out and things look pretty good. Of course, these are only statistics and if you happen to fall on the unlikely end of the statistics, it's a 100% deal. So, for now, we are glad to know that statistically speaking, James is doing very well. But we are ever mindful that there are no promises and our comfort comes from knowing the Master Planner... not from the statistics.

Dr. Keller said that from a leukemia perspective, there is really no reason to delay repairing James' ostomy.

I was able to talk to James' surgeon today too. He was encouraged by our progress with flushes and said we could move to the next step--(WARNING: TMI alert, sensitive folks may want to skip to the next paragraph) we'll be taking his ostomy output and putting it into his mucous fistula--the top of his colon--so he can try to process it like we do. We'll start small to see how he tolerates it, but the ultimate goal is to put EVERYTHING that comes out of his ostomy through his colon to make sure it will work when we put it back together (Lord willing). There really is no test that can show us that James' colon his alive and healthy and ready to do the work it was designed to do. His body has endured nearly three years of chemo, His colon has been idle for 2.5 years. The only way to make sure it will work is to use it. I am just so thankful for a surgeon with the foresight to put the top of James' colon in a place that we could test it out. Apparently they don't all think to do that, but ours did.

We have seen a lot of improvement in James since we finished chemo. He is getting in to more and dancing more. His energy levels are much higher than they were during chemo. He is trying more sounds and saying more (though he still doesn't speak fully or clearly, he has expanded his repertoire of vowels. I love to hear him say, "Uh....Oh!" He is expanding his food horizons too and, while he still has his favorite stand-bys, he is trying and liking more different foods all the time. Over Christmas, Hannah took James and the little girls to some neighbors to borrow some movies. While the rest visited, James invited himself to climb their stairs and visit their big boys' bedrooms!

We continue to appreciate the prayers of so many and are grateful for your investment in our family. We still have lots to ask God for as we move along in James' healing. We need wisdom and resources to accomplish this next step in preparing James for his ostomy repair, and we need God's hand of blessing on James and our efforts to help him.

The wall, part 1

Since we moved into our house--just about 2 years and 2 months ago--we have had one big wall that is still studs. Our hope, when we built, was to cover the wall with some sort of stained wood and build bookshelves on most of it.

Thanks to a very generous Christmas gift, we finally started! Vern wanted to put insulation in the wall between the living room and bedroom to dampen the sound.

Pictures below show the first steps. (I'll put up more once we get them downloaded from the camera.) I really enjoyed watching and listening to Vern and Owen work together. My heart longs for the day when they can work together all the time!

Those birthday photos...

James had a great birthday. He has a couple of little travel pillows that his Nona, my mom, made custom cases for. We tote them EVERYwhere. They go in the car, to appointments, and for diaper changes/bag emptyings. They make his life much more comfy.

So this year, he graduated to the next up size pillow... not quite full size, but still very portable.

And with PIGS... and farm stuff on the new custom cases!

For a long time during treatment, chocolate ice cream was a mainstay for James. Then we tried to cut back on sugar and sweetners because he was having trouble with yeast overgrowth. It had actually been a good while since he had had or asked for ice cream when we asked James what he wanted for his birthday dessert.

And James signed, "ice cream." Loud and clear.

So, Hannah made ice cream towers.

We pretty sure he liked them.

Five

Five years ago we arrived in Holland. At first, there was a lot to learn. We had to find our way around Holland. Now, we mostly feel like we live on the outskirts of Holland. It is a nice place to be.

Happy Birthday, Sweet Jamesie!

'Tis the Season: Advent helps us keep Christ in Christmas

This post is a part of 'Tis the Season: Keeping Christ in Christmas carnival hosted by Hannah, over at her new blog, One Southern Girl, and her friend, McKenzie, from Pecan Pastures. Hop on over to Hannah's blog to find links to more Christ-honoring-Christmas ideas.

I don't remember where I found our copy of Family Celebrations, but I know we have been using it for about 15 years now.

We really enjoy this advent celebration. Although we keep saying we are going to try something new or different each year, we nearly always come back to this book. (One year, we read through Jotham's Journey--it was also very good, but had no 'props' to really involved everyone.)

The advent celebration in Family Celebrations includes a tradtitional advent wreath with candles, a banner with a Christmas tree and homemade felt ornaments appropriate to each night's advent devotional, and devotionals with hymns to sing for 24 nights leading up to Christmas. Initially, I thought that repeating the same thing every year for advent would be boring and less meaningful, but, after 15 years, it seems that the repetition is both beneficial and comforting to the children. It's kind of soothing to us adults as well! Even though the devotionals are scripted, we can tailor it with different questions and extra thoughts, but it is still the same story and the same, timeless ideas.

The book also has a Christmas worship service and an Epiphany Party plan. We use the Christmas day celebration most years and we enjoy doing the Epiphany Party whenever we can.

The Epiphany party is a great wind-down and wrap up of the Christmas Season. It includes a feast (which is relative to whatever you want to make--we have done real feasts and we have done soups with homemade bread), a pageant (in which the children re-enact the Christmas story--ours have been better if they have a chance to plan ahead) and a service (during which time we read all the advent devotional scriptures and take down the ornaments from our tree banner and sing some of the Christmas hymns.) It makes for a late night, but lots of sweet, Christ-focused memories.

This morning

Today

 

Happy Birthday Momma!!!

and many more!

Camping tonight

Tonight in the south (where we haven't felt 'global warming' in nearly a year), Katie, Owen, Becca, Carrie and I are going camping in the yard. It seems that all us children set up our 8 person tent and sleep in it about once a year. Usually, we set it up in the livingroom/diningroom. But this time we are actually going to sleep outside. Some of us (including me!) are wimps when it comes to camping and we wimps decided to take our mattresses out and sleep on those, smothered in our sleeping bags and piles of blankets. Hopefully we'll stay warm, it's supposed to get down to 39* tonight.

Owen has built a fire and beds and bedding is set up. We even decorated with pine boughs inside and outside the tent and we have boards at the entrance, so that we don't track in sand. Carrie is all dressed up in her flannel pantelettes, red turtleneck, blue couch-pouch and two pairs of socks. Becca has her horse sweatshirt, a denim shirt, flannel pantelettes, sweatpants and two pairs of socks on. They both look too cute for words and are eagerly looking forward to sleeping in the tent tonight. Maybe I should go take pictures, so we can share our experience.

Hannah

Mendelssohn's 200th Birthday

This evening, Momma, Katie and I went to a concert given by GCSU, celebrating the 200th birthday of the famous composer, Felix Mendelssohn. It was very pleasant to listen to the choral groups and finally the orchestra play. We heard 'There Shall A Star From Jacob Shine Forth' from his unfinished oratorio, Christus and some from the oratorio, Elijah, and then the orchestra played first movement of Mendelssohn’s famous E Minor Violin Concerto (there are clips of the concerto on the link), which was awesome to listen to. We ended up leaving during the intermission, because it was already 8:40 pm and we had things to finish up at home. As we talked on the way home, we agreed that James would love going to listen and it would have been neat to hear more of Mendelssohn's music. Going tonight inspired me to learn more about Mendelssohn and perhaps get some, if not all, of his music from the library to listen too.

Hannah

A recent dessert

This is what I made for a quick and relatively healthy (wink) treat recently.... Chocolate Pudding, whipped coconut cream and fresh mint leaves on top. Yummy!!!

and the side view.... We had just taken them out of the fridge.

The Little Ones

Momma took these pictures of James and the little girls a couple days ago. After James' hair-cut, known as 'Plan B'. He got a buzz, because he wasn't staying still. It looks pretty cute and James likes to try to make the front stand up, using a pick.

Yep, I think we'll keep them....

Preserving the Harvest: Green Beans

Our Kentucky Wonder Beans have done really well this year, considering the late start they had. About two weeks ago, Katie frenched a whole bunch of green beans and blanched and froze them. She got 10 quart bags full and for our family we sometimes use as many as 2 quarts of beans each meal. So Katie put up enough for at least five meals. Yummm. I asked Momma this last time if I could can some more beans, because we were using the green beans, that we canned earlier this summer, more quickly than we originally thought.
Owen, Becca, Carrie and I picked the beans this time (Usually Momma and the little girls would pick the beans) and got a laundry basket full. All our big pots weren't big enough! The little girls, Owen and I spent the afternoon snapping the green beans. In the evening, Momma and I started to snap them into 2" pieces and James who was sitting with Daddy, signed that he wanted to help and came over to help and so did Becca. James helped snapping beans, and did an excellent job of breaking them into the right size. He developed some funny techniques for snapping beans. Once after James had finished a bean, he looked at us and said 'meen' and did the sign for bean. The Signing Time dvd that has the bean sign, we get from the library up at Egleston's and it had been awhile since James had watched it. So we were pretty excited that James was using signs that he doesn't use on a daily basis.

We washed the beans and since they need to be pressure canned, saved them till morning. In the morning, I started water to boil and filled the jars with the green beans. After I screwed the lids on, we had a total of 14 quarts and 2 meals worth of little beans. Now we're just waiting to take off the canner lid and see if all the jars sealed.

Hannah

Old time TV

I mentioned earlier that we now have a newly refurbished laptop and DSL. These are from the first evening after the DSL was installed.

Vern found YouTube and shared some favorite music with the children (this would be the arts in homeschooling ;*)). They watched and listened to Nat King Cole, and I think Ray Charles singing Georgia on my Mind, some Bing Crosby and others.

Then we found some old "I love Lucies".

Fun times.

Becca turns nine

Last week we celebrated Rebecca's 9th birthday. She LOVES horses and anything cowgirl. She has been wanting a denim skirt and a 'horse vest'. With a little bit of a late night and some team help with other things around the house, we were able to make both.

It ended up being a really good day to drive to Macon to let all the children get the bikes they had saved some of their Christmas money for.

We found them at Academy Sports. Then we came home and opened presents and ate good food and road bikes in between rain showers.

We ate so much, we save her cake for Sunday (we did this last year too!).

Horse lover that she is, this was one of her favorite birthday gifts.


I love you, Sweet Becca!