Making Our New House a Home

We are begining to feel settled in here and the older girls are both in school. We have been working hard to establish our rythyms and routines. We are all very thankful that after the crazy roller coaster ride of not knowing where we were going to live, that we ended up in this house and it works so well for us.

I have been enjoying getting things moved in and set up in our new house and it's starting to feel like home. I have an amazing craft room to work in, which has allowed me to make some things for our house instead of going shopping. Luna needed a new bed and our bed needed a nice blanket both for warmth and to add some color to our room.

The blanket I made from cut up, felted wool sweaters and backed with flannel. It was pretty easy and only took me one evening and part of the next day to finish. I plan to make another one for the couch with red, orange and brown colors in an attempt to tie together our bright red couch and retro orange chair!

Another quick little project I finished this week was this new purse, just in time as my old one was really wearing out. I found the felted bag at The Outlet for only $4.50 and used some wool sweater scraps from the blanket to sew on some pockets.


I really miss being able to grow our own food in the huge garden out at the farm and collecting fresh eggs, but I figured there had to be some way to produce some of our own food still, so I decided to try sprouting.

SPROUTS

The ones on the left are Fenugreek seeds, which I am anxious to try and the ones on the right are chick peas. My first go at sprouting, last week, I tried mung beans. Because of my lack of expierience, I used way to many seeds and had sprouts coming out of everywhere! They were very good, but I had to get creative in trying to use them up which inspired trying this new recipe:

FRESH SPRING ROLLS

I found the recipe in the Moosewood Restaurant Low-Fat Favorites Cookbook and we (Rich and I anyway, the kids weren't big on them cause they were raw and not at all like the egg rolls at the Chinese restaurant that they love.) really liked them. Rich made a sweet garlic dipping sauce to go with them.

We definitely eat well round here! I love having a kitchen that is big enough to work in, a dining room to sit down together in and a dishwasher to help with all the dishes we dirty!

I am still trying to use up all of the zucchini we grew in the garden this summer so the other night I made a double batch of zucchini brownies and zucchini bread. The bread recipe came from my favorite Better Homes and Gardens cookbook and turned out great with part rice flour mix and part sorghum flour and a little xanthum gum. The Zucchini brownies are from the Simply in Season cookbook that I have been using alot for ideas about what to do with the garden's produce.

ZUCCHINI BROWNIES

Simply in Season
by Mary Beth Lind, Cathleen Hockman-Wert
Serves 18-24

• 1 cup / 250 ml flour
• 3/4 cup / 175 ml whole wheat flour
• 1/3 cup / 75 ml baking cocoa
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
Combine in large bowl.

• 2-3 cups / 500-750 ml zucchini (shredded)
Stir in.

• 1 egg
• 3/4 cup / 175 ml sugar
• 3/4 cup / 175 ml brown sugar
• 1/2 cup / 125 ml plain yogurt
• 1/2 cup / 125 ml oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
Combine in separate bowl and beat with fork. Stir into zucchini mixture. Spread evenly into greased 9 x 13-inch / 3.5 L pan.

• 1/2-1 cup / 125-250 ml semisweet or mint chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup / 125 ml nuts (chopped; optional)
Sprinkle on top of batter. Bake in preheated oven at 350F / 180C until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, 35-40 minutes.

Enough room to live, friends nearby, crafts and good food!! It doesn't get any better! In my next post, I'll give you the grand tour of our new house!