Time goes by

Wow, time has passed since I was here last. I never realized how much time one child in school can take. I do not want to think about more than one, and since I have only one, I do not have to. Idaho History project took up alot of time. Caitlin made a rag rug with the help of Oma. She won "Best Homemade Project" and was very excited about it. She can also enter her project into the county fair, which she is going to do. School is now out and we made it. Now her time is spent playing. I want that life. She is taking Horse 4-H and seems to be enjoying that. One of the neighbor girls is also in it, but she is a year ahead, same age, which is hard for Caitlin, you know only child needs to be able to do everything and at the same level.
All of our cows have calved. Yeah. Seem to be all doing well.
Right now we are working on Caitlin's party this weekend. She turns 10 on the 15th. So we are having a party, and who knows if its going to be rainy or not. So we make double plans. We are having a Luau, on a very small scale. Hawaiian Pizza is as close to Hawaiian food as we are getting. Thinking of also having some carnival games. Working on that today. That would work best for outside, but who knows.
Today is nice weather, no rain, YIPPEE! Looking forward to the weekend.

Spring is Over

Woke up this morning to over 7 inches of very heavy wet snow, and the wind blowing. It's April 6th and the conditions where so bad they called off school for the county. It took me 45 minutes to get to work for a drive that is normally 20 minutes. Fun stuff, I want a snow day!
What fun the weather in Idaho is.
Its depressing actually, I think I need a vacation. I think I might work on that.

A bit of spring

Okay I got a bit of spring today, but not because of the weather, although it is nice outside, but I think we are back to rain/snow mix Friday.
My bit of spring came in the form of starting seeds. I love flowers, and gardens, and since I get to start fresh at the new place, I thought I would start my seeds indoors for a good start. Not that this is a new thing, by any means, it just gets me excited for the possibilities out there. The vegetables I started are Tomatoes of course, eggplant, pumpkin, watermelon, and sweet peppers. Most of the flowers can be direct sowed, so only a few I started indoors, like; Nasturtiums, Delphiniums and Hollyhocks. Today I'm just soaking the seeds to jumpstart their germination. Tomorrow or the next day I will plant them in seed starter trays and in a couple of months, when we have the hopefull last frost of spring, they will be planted outside.
Not all my flowers will come from seeds, I will still hit the garden centers.

I want spring

First off let me say that I love winter, love snow, lots of it. However once March hits I want it gone. I start thinking gardens and flower beds. So of cours since it is March, I'm ready. We have had some days, that toy with me, make me think okay its getting closer, then it usually snows the next day, just to remind me, that I am not in control.
The house we have now, has lots of beds, but since we bought it in late November, I do not know if there are many flowers. We did see the house in late summer just briefly, but there was only one flower in bloom.
I think the beds have good bones, so I get to add the color, which works well. We have so much pruning to do, not looking forward to that. I mean LOTS. All the beds have curbing so its even better. There is no garden though, so plotting where that will be, I'm thinking several raised beds in the back not to far from the patio door. Then off to the side, a bed for corn and such big space needs. I really enjoy laying out the plans for new beds. Now if the snow would just melt!

Surviving my child's hospital stay

Always in the back of my head there has been that little thought/panic of what will happen the first time Cait stays overnight in the hospital. What will I do. Well, we found out this week. Last Thursday night, Caitlin had a fever, that Tylenol did not help, but by morning all gone. Friday and Saturday she was fine. Sunday she woke up with a stomach ache. She ate a little breakfast, not much then said she was so full her stomach hurt. So we figured here we go, stomach flu coming on. So she worshipped the porcelain god numerous times, and the usual 7-UP, Gingerale, Coke or Peppermint Tea did not help at all. Lots of pain, tired, slight fever. So we did a little research online, and came up with appendicitis, but she had so few of the symptons that we thought, maybe not, let's wait. So Monday morning we woke up and decided to keep Caitlin home. She said the pain was less, but still curled up on the coach. She also said the pain in her stomach was now lower. We decided, that's enough off to Community Care. The Doc took blood, which considering she had not eaten for 24hrs and drank very little was not a fun thing. The took a urine sample, her temp was normal. He said, I think she might have appendicitis, but she is having less pain, which is the opposite, and was hungry. But he thought we should take her up to the hospital for a CT scan to be sure. So we decided Rexburg would be the quicker ER to get into for the scan. They had to put an IV in, which was awful, they had her arms wrapped in warm blankets to increase blood flow. Finally they got it in after one failed attempt. So hard to watch your little girl cry and you cannot make it better.
They put the stuff into the IV and then we had to wait for two hours before they could take the scan, and she could not eat or drink anything. Miserable time. Chris gave Cait a blessing with my nephew Riley. Finally we had the scan done and the Doc saw the results right away and yep her appendix was big fat and juicy, ready to burst, if it had not already and it needed to come out right away. So shortly after they where rolling her into surgery. I have a very brave little girl! One of the worst parts was the nurse going over the living will crap, that had me in panic mode. I could not think of that. I thought I would loose it, but cannot do that in front of your child. So we waited in the waiting room by the day surgery suites for her to come out. It took the doc 15 minutes to complete the surgery, regular surgery, not scope, that would have taken longer. Anyway the appendix had not burst thank goodness, but needed to come out. Then they came and got us cuz she was having a hard time in the recovery. She had no clue what was going on, still foggy and crying her eyes out, hyperventilating. That about killed me, trying to calm her, and she still fuzzy and not knowing what was happening. Finally after 20 minutes we got her calmed and could go back to the room. She slept a little. Chris's mom came to see her. Brought her flowers and a teddy bear. So she stayed for a while and visited, my folks would come the next day and my mom has been staying with us since she is out the whole week. She finally could have a liguid diet. Which she said was great, thought the beef broth was so good, tells you how hungry she was.
Chris left to go home at ten and I stayed. Not much sleep, when they check every 1 and a half. But she was doing so much better. What a tired little girl. We finally got to bring her home late Tuesday afternoon. She had been doing so good. Still in some pain, but no fever, no sickness. Me, I'm so tired, and hope that I do not go thru that again anytime soon, so much stress and worry. So hard to see her in the hospital bed, but she is so brave and did so good. She has been working on her schoolwork so she is not behind. I think she is starting to get a little stir crazy from being inside. This is good, it means she is doing very well. I'm very glad it is over and all is well. Hate sleeping in hospital rooms. Hate the food, but the nurses get an A+, so awesome! Kept Caitlin in videos, and DVD's, jello, milkshakes!

Bountiful Baskets

Well purchased my first basket from
Bountifulbaskets.org, a food coop in AZ, UT, ID, and Washington State.
It's primarily produce, but a great deal.
You go to there website and sign in and make a donation ($15 for the bountiful basket) and choose the pick up location you want. This is all done during the time period stated on the website. For Idaho it's Monday at noon I think and goes for about 36hrs, although very few locations last that long. Since each location has a certain number of baskets.
I picked up my basket on Saturday at the location specified. Interesting process; you get in line, they take your name, point you in the direction for your purchases and you go fill your basket, bags, or boxes (I use the reusable grocery bags since those are always in my car) most used a laundry basket. For the fifteen plus 1.50 handling charge that pays to keep the website running and ccard charge fees, my basket included the following;
1 pineapple
1 honeydew melon
3 pomelo (large grapefruit, sweeter though)
box of strawberries
8 ears of corn
7 bananas
3 baby cucumbers
6 small yams
8 apples
2 squash
3 tomatoes
1 bag of spinach
A great deal! Now for me and my family we would not need to do this every week, but every other week, probably. They also offer an ethnic food pack with varies every week, I bought that also for $7, it included;
2 onions
1 elephant garlic
2 baskets of mushrooms
1 bundle of parsley
bunches of basil, rosemary, etc.
I think this week it was oriental.
They also offer a 20lb fruit box that changes, right now its citrus. Then they offer some bread to.
Check it out www.bountifulbaskets.org !! But remember they do sell out. Give it a try once. The value is really good.
PLUS if there is not an area right near you, get enough people interested and they will try and add a location.
Now you will not know what each week brings, it changes, but it is fun to see what you are going to get. I noticed quite a few people that I had seen at the pickup at the grocery store later. Smart, you find out what you have then go grocery shopping to make it work for you or look up some recipes first then do your shopping.
Now, my typical grocery shopping does not include buying lots of produce, which in it self is not a good thing. For some reason I feel compelled to make sure we use everything up that we got in our basket, although I admit to passing on the yams.
Also I have eaten more fruit this week than typically I do. So thats a good thing, now with this co-op you need to volunteer now and then since thats a co-op, run by volunteers. But it's a little more than an hour on a Saturday every once and a while.
Also, you only have a brief window to pick up, and if you don't pick up its passed on to the local firehouse. No refunds.

Getting Caught Up

Wow, didn't realize it was almost a month ago that I posted...in my head I posted some really grest post, thought provoking, however it appears non of that happened. I'm sure its actually a computer glitch. Like my fingers failed to type on the computer, see a glitch....!
Well today is Monday and I'm working on my menu's for the week. I have menu planned for a long time, but I go thru phases of now and then. Since its a new year I'm trying to do better. Its so much easier cooking dinner when its planned. When I get home its just getting it fixed or Chris fixing it. I have a written list of the most common meals we eat, about 20. Makes it easier to plan. Now there are times when I look at that list and I think yuck. So I go thru cookbooks, these are the reliable cookbooks not the fancy ones, that you know you will never cook from, or search websites, again reliable. Online, I search thru Taste of Home, CD kitchens and foodtv or course, I also use websites from Kraft, Pillsbury etc. Now Taste of Home is so realible, you know they are tried and true. I also have a few of their cookbooks. I have also gone to a couple of their cooking classes which I really like. There is lots of promoting of brands and things, but you get a good bag with lots of samples, a magazine, etc. All the recipes they make are pretty quick. They have their schedules online well worth the cost of admission.
Online I check the reviews written for the recipes and the numbers of reviews.
So on my menu planning I try to add a new recipe every other week, if it's liked then its added to the meal list. I also have been trying to use my crockpot more.
I'm looking at a food coop for fruits and vegetables. I'll let you know how that goes.
The other thing we have been working on is the indoor house projects. Tried some paint samples on the wall, will live with them a week or so and then decide. I know that once the weather gets nice, there are too many outdoor project that need to be tackled. So I need to work on the indoors now.
Oh and Way To Go Saints!!!