First, it would help if I actually typed the word “curds” instead of “cruds.” HA!

Tonight’s dinner was supposed to be chicken with Alfredo sauce. I found a lower fat recipe that I had all the ingredients for and decided to try it. I put the chicken on the stove at 3:30, so by dinnertime all I had to do was debone it.

When it was time to actually start the rest of dinner, I cut up the broccoli and put it in my pan with the steamer basket and turned the burner to high. Then I started trying to make the sauce. I figured the broccoli would steam pretty quickly so I could wait to start the sauce until after the broccoli got started.

Just then Little man comes tearing into the kitchen, and runs into me head-on. I told him, “Don’t run into Mama, especially when she has a knife in her hand.” The little guy misunderstood me, went to the silverware drawer, opened it, and pulled out a knife. He brought it to me and set it on the stove.

I giggled. What a little helper, lol! I was thankful it was just a butter knife (he can’t reach any of the sharp knives).

At that moment I realized that something was burning. I stirred the sauce, trying to see if that was it (I have an incredible knack for burning white sauces almost every single time!), but it wasn’t. I knew the broccoli was in a steamer basket so assumed that couldn’t be what was burning.

It was the broccoli though – the pan had boiled dry. I quickly removed it from the burner and set the pan (on a hot pad) on the counter and turned to my pan of Alfredo sauce.

You know what’s coming next, don’t you? I can just about hear you laughing now.

My beautiful sauce was now boiling. My first thought was, “Great! Now it’ll thicken up.” Unfortunately I forgot that when milk boils, it breaks. And break it did. Into a whole bunch of curds. Big curds, with a lot of buttery-looking milky liquid.

Oh well, right?

So I dumped it over the chicken and served it anyway. Stephen just laughed.

Chicken and Curds. I invented a new dish! It wasn’t half bad either. . .though I will be more careful the next time I make it. It’s kind of hard to pour Alfredo sauce over your dinner when it plops out of the pan in chunks. . .

It’s cold and snowy out and we aren’t allowed to bring the dog inside. So. . .the dog has straw in his doghouse to help him keep warm.

What does he do? He goes to sleep at the bottom of the hill, right in the middle of the blowing snow.

Oh wait – I take that back. He’s up now and looking like he’s considering going in his house. It’s about time!

We had whole wheat pizza for dinner tonight. We topped it with fresh mushrooms (my favorite!), pepperoni, and diced ham. I used an Italian blend of cheeses to top it. It was delicious!

I’ve been experimenting with different wheat doughs trying to find one that was soft and moist instead of having the texture of cardboard. I haven’t found one that I like, so I experimented with the white bread crust recipe that I already had. Tonight I added an egg for extra protein, some wheat gluten to help it rise, and powdered milk to make the dough softer. It turned out wonderfully – the dough baked up nice and soft. Next I’m going to try making it with part oat flour, but other than that, I probably won’t make any more changes to the recipe. I like the texture and flavor of oat flour (it’s softer and sweeter than wheat flour), so I want to try it and see what happens. Oat flour is a lot higher in carbs though, so I probably won’t substitute it for too much of the wheat flour.

———————————-

Whole Wheat Pizza Crust
Makes 1 crust

1 cup warm water
1 tablespoon yeast
2 teaspoons wheat gluten
1 egg
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons oil
1/3 cup dry milk
2 1/2 cups wheat flour, whole-grain

Sprinkle yeast into warm water and let dissolve. Add all other ingredients and mix well. Let rest for 5 minutes

Preheat oven to 400. Knead dough and press into a greased pizza pan. Bake dough for 5 minutes or until no longer shiny but not browned.

Remove from oven and top with sauce, toppings, and cheese. Bake for an additional 10 to 20 minutes.

Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 146 Calories; 5g Fat (31.4% calories from fat); 6g Protein; 20g Carbohydrate; 3g Dietary Fiber; 21mg Cholesterol; 200mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1 Grain(Starch); 0 Lean Meat; 0 Non-Fat Milk; 1 Fat; 0 Other Carbohydrates.

Let me just say that I love Meijer and will really miss shopping there after we move. They have some of the best sales!

Several weeks ago, I purchased half a dozen packages of smoked sausage at a Buy 1 Get 2 free sale. I was thrilled. What made me happier was that most of the packages had a coupon on them to buy 2 packages of link sausage and get a package of little smoky links for free. I used a couple of the coupons on that shopping trip to get free links, and saved the rest for a later time.

This week Meijer had the link sausage on sale again for Buy 1 Get 1 free, so I put them on my list to use with my coupons I saved from earlier. Then when I checked the sale ads later, they had put a Super Saturday ad on their website for today.

Because the Super Bowl is next week, they had a lot of game-related things on sale. They had the little smokies on sale for Buy 1 Get 2 free. I started thinking. If I used one coupon and combined it with their sales, I could buy a package of sausage and get one free, and then use the coupon and get a free package of little smokies. But, because the little smokies were on sale, I could actually get three packages for free.

When I walked out of the store today, I had gotten 9 packages of little smokies and 6 packages of the regular link sausage for the price of just 3 sausages. WOW! That was nice – my freezer will be stocked with sausage for a good long time now.

But that’s not all.

They had a sale on printer ink, which was good since we’re about out. If you bought a two-pack of ink (one black and one color cartridge), you could get a HP printer for free.

My first reaction was, “What?” It really was true though! The two-pack of ink was almost the same price as a regular black cartridge for my printer. We’re not the type of people to just run out and buy a new technology something-or-other unless our current item is unrepairable, but at this price, it didn’t make sense not to. Why would I pay more for a single ink cartridge, when I could get a new printer and ink for it for less than I’m accustomed to spending for the ink alone?

I had been praying that God would provide and that we’d be able to get some good deals today to make our money stretch farther. At the bottom of my receipt, it shows how much we saved with sales and coupons. We saved $81.56 today – and that’s not counting the printer deal!

Little man woke up from his nap this afternoon in a foul mood. When he wouldn’t quit whining, I finally asked him what was wrong.

“I brumpy, Mama.”

I stood there for a moment, trying to figure out what in the world “brumpy” was. I finally figured it out.

“You’re grumpy?”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

What a silly little boy I have!

Yesterday our local thrift store had a $1 bag sale. Those sales are so wonderful!

Once again God provided for both our needs and for a couple of my wants. Stephen needed another sweatshirt for work, and I managed to find him a black one with a John Deere tractor embroidered on it. Little man promptly declared that the shirt was, “MINE!” when he saw that tractor. I also found him some sweat pants, another pair of overalls, and another dress shirt.

Little man was a bit harder to shop for this time as most of the little boys’ clothing had been picked over already. I only found him one shirt, but found him a pair of Nike athletic shoes and a nice pair of brown dress shoes. His everyday shoes fit him right now, but he’s about to grow out of them so I was happy to find him a pair in the next size up.

I found several tops and sweaters for myself. I have quite a few tops that fit right now, but several of them are just big enough that when when a little bit more weight comes off I’m going to have to pack them away because they’ll be too baggy to look nice anymore. About half of the tops I bought fit me, so I freecycled the rest. There was a really cute denim jumper in the pile that was too tight. I was a little disappointed until I discovered that somebody had taken it in and that when I rip those seams out, it should fit me.

This time I also found some neat household things at the thrift store. When we put Little man into a twin bed, Stephen’s mom sent us the sheets that Stephen used to sleep on. They have lions all over them, and they match the quilt that’s on Little man’s bed (Mom made it for Stephen when he was little also). Imagine my surprise when I found a sheet at the thrift store that matches the two sets that we already have!

Another neat find was four sets of cloth napkins. Three of the sets coordinate with my plates and the other set, well, I just thought it was pretty. I’d been wanting to start using cloth napkins for everyday use instead of buying paper ones, but hadn’t gotten around to making any yet. Now I don’t have to make them.

There was a huge box of old patterns, so I dug through there and picked out some that had parts that I thought I might use someday. One of them was a pattern for a little girl’s pinafore. It was so cute that I couldn’t resist it.

The best part was paying $3.18 for everything!

It’s that time again. We’re moving.

God has given us peace that our time here in Indiana is over and that we are to return to South Carolina. We’ve been praying about this for several months now, and God has completely confirmed what we’ve been suspecting for a while.

Once again we’re stepping out in faith, and once again, there are those who don’t understand. That’s ok. We know what God is calling us to do, and we are following His leading.

We began packing a few weeks ago. Stephen wanted me to go through my old clothes and Little man’s baby clothes and get rid of them so we don’t have to move all those tubs of clothes back across the country. I was saving most of it for a garage sale this spring, but since we won’t be here that long (most likely), I put everything on freecycle instead.

A lady came last week to get five garbage bags full of my old clothes in the bigger sizes I can no longer wear. Another lady is coming tonight to get some of the baby clothes. Several more bags of baby clothes went to ladies at church who have little boys. The clothes were given to me when we needed them, and it is a blessing to see them going to families that I know can use them now.

Our basement is getting emptier and emptier. . .as things get removed and other things get packed and set aside.

I knew we had a lot of stuff, but I didn’t realize just how much we really had. What amazes me more is the amount of stuff that we had that we weren’t even using. It’s nice to get those things taken out of there and to be able to use the plastic tubs and boxes to pack other things away.

So. . .the adventure begins again. . .

. . .and all he wanted to do was ride his bike! Silly boy!

This month I participated in an unfinished projects challenge on Prairie Homemaker. The project I wanted to finish was a tree skirt that I started the very first Christmas we were married. I had no idea what I was doing when I decided to draw up my own pattern. Despite the lack of knowledge, I think it turned out pretty anyways.

I hand quilted along the edges of the border. I’ve toyed with the idea of quilting some sort of design in the middle, but have never been able to make up my mind as to what exactly to do there. Since the border is quilted now though, I’m calling it done. Maybe some day I’ll go back and add a design; I don’t know.

For those of you who have gallery access, it’s up and running again. You’ll need to create a new account though since the software’s been upgraded.

If you have any problems with it, contact me.