More Recipes and such

so I had a chance to try that Granola bar recipe I said I was going to try in the last post. WOW. They are very yummy. The first batch I made had everything the recipe called for including the dry fruit.I did add about 1/2 to 3/4 of cup of almonds though. I found when they were done that the sunflower seeds were a little overpowering so I decided the next batch I would reduce the amount of sunflower seeds I put in. I am also not a dry fruit lover ( Cr likes dry fruit so I made those for him) and so I decided I would try the recipe again doing things slightly different and making them in a way I would like. So I reduced the amount of sunflower seeds and instead of putting in almonds I put in Macadamia nuts and baked those along with the other nuts. I also put into the mixing bowl with the oats a cup of White chocolate chips. Needless to say...YUMMO! ( I stole that from Rachael Ray)I am going to try another batch and put the almonds back in and just use semi sweet chocolate chips and see how that one comes out. Oh and you should know by now that Ilike to know if I am saving money by doing this. I already know they are healthier but with my budget if they aren't cheaper we will stick to the unhealthy stuff=)Anyway when I compared..WE like the Nature Valley chewy bars..they are 6 in a box for 3 something and you get a total of 7.4 oz. A batch of homemade weighed in at about 24 oz. When I took the ingredients I used and broke it down into individual serving costs I was at about 23 cents a granola bar. The store brand in roughly 60 cents per bar. So Now I know they are healthier and cheaper. You should keep in mind that to purchase all the ingredients to begin with can get pricey..around 20 dollars to begin with, however with the ingredients I can make 3 to 4 batches before having to purchase more nuts etc.Happy Granola Bar Making. ( here is the recipe again for those who need it) Here are the pictures of the finished product.

This is the White Chocolate Macadamia nut ones..



These are the dried fruit ones. They still taste good to me, I just pick out the fruit.



I also wanted to share the news about the Wheat Grinder I got. I used it the other day and showed the flour to our Food Storage and Baking Guru at church. She said that it was a medium fine flour and that my bread may come out slightly course. She said to try putting it through the grinder one more time. So it will be more time consuming but I think overall it is still going to work just fine for us and considering we couldn't afford the 200 dollar ones..this one will do just fine. This is the picture of the Grinder and of the Wheat after going through the grinder once.





I wanted to share this because I thought it might be something others may be interested in. my friend Raquel found these products on Amazon.com from a place called Barry Farms. She said I should check it out and I ended up buying several things from them. I got 3 one pound bags of Cheese powder at only 3.99 a piece, a one pound bag of sour cream powder for 6.79, a bag of Wheat Gluten( for bread making) for 3 something and 2 bags of 5 oz citric acid( used to treat fruits before you dry them)for 1 dollar a piece. My whole order with shipping was $25.26. The pictures are slightly decieving online because the bags look very big but in reality a one pound bag of cheese powder is only about the size of a can of pam spray. However it will still make a lot of servings of food because you only use small amounts at a time. We have already used some on popcorn last night to make cheese popcorn. Yummy. Anyway I just wanted to share the info in case anyone else wanted to buy some but maybe wasn't sure where to get it or what they would get if they did. Some other websites I found cheese powder on wanted 16 dollars for a pound so that is another reason I am sharing this info so you can get it for cheaper. Good Luck hope the info helps.

Our Garden

Well it is moving right along. Cr has been working on getting the fencing around it done. We want to keep out the critters and birds especially. Our neighbor planted tomatoes and the birds attacked them before he even had a chance to pick them. anyway this is what it looks like so far. Roughly halfway done. We also planted a large cabbage plant that Chace got from school. it is a contest to see whose can grow the largest. We are going to see what happens. We are using it as a test grow to see if we need to put more plant soil or other stuff out there. Anyway..enjoy the pics and hopefully in a few weeks we will be able to plant.

This is Chace's cute little cabbage plant.It is suppossed to be 30 to 50 pounds when it is finished growing. We will see.

Primary Temple Trip

On Saturday the Primary took a field trip to the temple. We met at the Chapel building across the street from the temple and had doughnuts and muffins. They were Krispy Kreme!! Yummy!







Then we went over to the temple and met with the temple president. He took the kids around to the side and sat them down on the stairs. He talked to them about the temple and the things that are special about it. He talked to them about some of the things we do in the temple. It was so sweet to see all the kids there listening to the president speak.





Then the kids all went over to the side and we took pictures of the kids and their families because the primary presidency was going to print them and put them in frames for the kids. These are some pictures I took while we waited for our turn.

This is Shaylyn and her little friend Jordan.



Shaylyn decided she was tired and so she plopped herself down on the Temple grass.



Shaylyn and her cute self



After we had walked around the temple I asked the kids if they wanted to take some pictures in front of the house of the Lord. They said yes and these are the pictures I took.

Makai has such a great personality and he wanted to look like a Missionary in front of the Temple. I think he looks like a very confident little missionary.









I have a very cute little story from our Temple trip. I talked to the kids before we got there to remind them that it is the House of the Lord and that we needed to be reverent even outside. I wanted to make sure they understood how they were to behave. When we got to the Temple Shaylyn had to use the restroom, so we went into the Lobby.I watched her looking around and I wondered what she was thinking. A few moments later she asked me " Mom, Where is Jesus?" I said he is upstairs and you have to be a big girl to go upstairs. She processed that for a moment and then said that she was a big girl and she wanted to go upstairs and see him. When I explained again about not being quite big enough she seemed to be ok with that. A while later after the President was done speaking to the children she said, " Mom, I need to ask Jesus something, can I just go upstairs for a second? Please Mom."I thought about what I was going to say and after trying to explain eventually she realized that it was not possible for her to go upstairs and she stopped asking but it was just so great for her to have such faith to know that when I said he was upstairs she knew he was. I am grateful i went to the Temple with my kids that day because it reminded me to have the faith that Jesus really is there and that I need to go more often to be able to be with him.

Boys and Boxes

So the last few weeks we have been receiving boxes of items and the boys asked if they could have them. This is the fun that followed. I love to see the creativity of the boys when they play.

2 things I can relate to...

Have you done your visiting teaching yet this month?

Why I do what I do

This is a video of a newscast in south Florida. It is about the Southeastern Guide dog program and really gives you an idea of what I do and why. the video takes a bit to load and it says 26 minutes but the part about Southeastern is the first 8 minutes. So if you have the time I would love for you to watch and see what I do and why I love it and get such a great satisfaction about my time and effort.The Couple at the end Bob and Mary are actually in my group.




This is another shorter video of a girl and her Guide from Southeastern named ANDRE. He was raised by my Area Coordinator Rita.

Good Question

Well I already got my first question about the Laundry Soap and I thought it was a good one. The question was How well does the soap work and does it leave your clothes dingy.Since using the soap I have not noticed any problems with the darks or towels etc. However Cr and I did see a bit of dinginess in our whites.The issue was easily solved though by filling your washer with hot water and adding the laundry soap and a few cups of powder cascade. Stop the wash and let your whites soak for about 20 to 30 minutes. Then run the load as normal. This should fix any dinginess and you don't have to do this during every load, just when you notice a bit of dinginess. Cr and I also like using fabric softner. I have a downy ball that we use. It gives the clothes a pleasing smell and obviously softens them. Softner is not too expensive and a big bottle of it lasts a long time. This is also what I use for the dryer sheets. If you find your darks getting faded or dingy you could always try a color bleach too.I always have a stain stick hanging around too. I have 3 kids and they get dirty, even with store brands a stain stick was required for some of their clothes. The costs involved with buying a few of the helpers to the soap etc. is minimal and they tend to last a long time so the cost of them is spread out. Well it has worked great for us and when I first started I had to buy a box of borax for 2.00 a box of Washing soda for 2.25 and since making our own soap I have bought 2 bars of Zote at 99cents each. So a total of 6.25 cents.I have not had to buy the borax or washing soda since and still have probably several months worth left. The only thing I have to buy more of is the zote because it only makes 3 batches of soap each. I have not bought store brand Laundry soap in 4 months. I used to buy laundry soap at 10-12 dollars a bottle ( Gain) and I usually had to buy 2 a month. So in my mind in the 4 months I have been doing my own I have saved $73.75. Wow. Definitely worth it to me. Hope this helps answer the question and encourages a few of you to try it.