Great Lent right now

This past week, my sister and her daughter flew down from Canada mainly for the baptism of my new little nephew.  She was also here while the icon of the Mother of God, "The Softener of Hard Hearts" was visiting our parish.

Elizabeth, who we call "Liza" for short loves to draw.  I'd gotten this easel at IKEA for $14.99 recently (and a roll of paper was $4.99) and Hannah and Olivia drew with her.  Liza is now 20 months old and asked the girls to draw books, cars, crosses, horses, etc. AND says, "I lub you." 

I'm really enjoying the cookbook Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian that I got from my aunt and uncle last month. 

I made French panisses, which is a nice vegan treat.  Basically, this recipe:  http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Panisses.  In the cookbook, she goes into great detail about how to handle the gram flour (chick pea), which is very fine and can clump easily.

 We sprinkled them with powdered sugar.

Our friends invited us over to make a grass garden with a small pot to resemble the tomb of Christ. 

The girls did a great job.  We helped them make 3 crosses to put on the top, and we talked a lot while doing this activity, about what Christ said to the men who were crucified with him, and the one who said "Remember me, O Lord, when Thou comest into Thy Kingdom." -Luke 23:42 

It's a Great Lent project that I think we'll do again in the future.  Maybe with our Sunday School children next year?  Hopefully by Pascha (we have 10 days more), it will be full of green grass!

Chapati

Yesterday we made chapati.  We followed this recipe:  http://rasamalaysia.com/chapati-recipe/2/

And will be making them again!  Very simple and delicious (best warm off the pan). 
I have a wonderful memory of my Uncle Jim sitting on the kitchen floor rolling out chapati in their Massachusetts kitchen when I was a child.  My Aunt Ellen and Uncle Jim were in Ohio this week.  That's what spurred my desire to make them, recollecting that first time I had chapati...

Aunt Ellen gave us a copy of Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian as a gift.  I look forward to trying many recipes in that cookbook!

Uncle Jim played several pieces on guitar for us...one was especially beautiful by Fernando Sor.

This is my dad's sister, Aunt Ellen, with her husband Jim and our girls and Rob.  It's also the day we celebrate my dad's "namesday" as when he was baptised he chose St. Paul the Simple as his patron saint. 

January 1, 2014

Last night Hannah and Olivia's cousin, Brianna, came over.  The girls played Monopoly after dinner, then we watched "Turbo" a movie about snails racing.  I really enjoyed it and so did my husband and the girls...

Today they played LIFE.  Last night at midnight, we went outside to watch the fireworks going off in our neighborhood and noticed a new truck in the parking lot.  We took our dog for a walk.  We gave the cat a bath.  The truck was still there.  We saw a note taped to the window.  The girls wanted to wish the lonely truck driver a safe trip home...and a little something inside a bag...it was nice to give a RAK (random act of kindness) to start off the new year.

This morning we made homemade 2014 bread and ate it with lunch!

Sweet little mouse New Year animation by Maggie Rudy:
http://mouseshouses.blogspot.com/2013/12/happy-new-year.html

Wedding reception of our dear friends

Our friends were married in the church on Nov. 17th, 2013 in Cedar Rapids, Iowa...and had a wedding reception over the weekend in Cincinnati, Ohio with their family and friends.  ♥

Olivia and Rob went to the bar and got a Shirley Temple...then another and another...

And Hannah, had a few...made with ginger ale and a splash of grenadine, garnished with a cherry.

One beautiful wedding cake, and two vegan cakes...

Rob and Hannah...who did a little reel for the newlyweds.  She loves Irish dancing!

Our family with the new Mr. and Mrs. Davis....they are so sweet.  ♥

Sledding

We got more snow this week!  That's our car covered in it...

There is Olivia in the midst of shoveling Peepaw and Grammie's driveway.

Afterwards, we went to pick a friend up and go sledding...

We packed 2 stainless steel flasks with hot chamomile lavender tea...and some dark chocolate from Trader Joe's for a mid-sledding snack.

I blanched my own almonds (4 cups of them, I got a 16 oz. bag of them at Trader Joe's for $4.99), by letting them sit in a bowl of boiling water for a minute and then pouring the water out and removing the skins.  It took me a full hour!

My old Hamilton Beach food processor (which was given to us USED by an elderly man from church, after his wife passed away), which was probably 15-20 years old, stopped working a couple of months ago.  Finally, this past Saturday, we got a NEW Hamilton Beach one for $49.99 at Target...it shreds, slices and purees.  I use it to shred cheese & carrots often and also want to use it like a blender to make smoothies. 

The snowballs were good, but still too wet and squishy, didn't set up nicely.  I just used vanilla extract instead of amaretto, maybe that's why they didn't seem great.

I made a second batch and used "Just Cashew Meal" ($5.99/16 oz. bag of simply ground raw cashews) from Trader Joe's in place of the coconut in this recipe (I like that it called for maple syrup instead of icing, and I think the coconut oil helped it firm up a bit better)...I rolled those in confectioner's sugar, instead of shredded coconut so they looked the same. 
 
Cute new flannel bedsheets with Russian matroshka dolls on them, from Target!

Snowy day

Edible snowballs...I hope to make these soon:

Amaretto Snowballs
(from http://pureella.com/amaretto-snowballs-glutenfree-vegan-quick-no-bake-dessert/)

ingredients:

• 2 cups blanched almonds
• 1 cup gluten free icing sugar + extra for coating
• 2 tsp almond extract
• 1-2 tbsp amaretto liqueur (or amaretto extract for a non-alcoholic, child-friendly version)

directions:

Soak the blanched almonds in water overnight. Drain completely and grind in a food processor until a very smooth paste forms. Add the icing sugar, almond extract and amaretto towards the end and continue processing to combine all the ingredients well.

My girls each made a giant snowflake.  They are hanging from the ceiling in our living room.  It is really snowing outside.  It's been coming down for about 5 hours so far here in Ohio.  My husband made a fire in our woodstove before he left for work.  We are quite cozy. 

A wonderful video tutorial here (I ♥ how the girl says you can use the scrap you cut off as a bookmark):
http://letslassothemoon.com/2013/11/29/diy-3d-snowflakes-video/

I found a frame (8.5 x 11) for my new icon of St. Herman of Alaska that we got last weekend in Lake Odessa, Michigan. 

Almond milk...and sweets!

Did you notice the new tab atop?  It's a recipe index, a work-in-progress, as I sprinkle recipes that I have been making throughout my blog posts.  I will keep adding to it as I sift through old posts.

I made a batch of almond milk over the weekend.  I followed this recipe:
Almond milk
 (you'll get 2-3 cups)
1 cup almonds, soaked 8-12 hours beforehand
3 cups water
6 dates or 1/4 cup agave (I used 1/4 cup maple syrup)
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
a pinch of salt

Rinse off your almonds and discard the soak water. Add the almonds and the other ingredients (water, sweetener, vanilla) to a regular blender or food processor. Blend them on high speed.  Then, simply put a cheesecloth or strainer over the top of a jar (and put a rubberband around it to make sure it stays) and scoop the milky pulpy almond over it and let it sit, give it a good 15 minutes.  I took out the almond pulp and put it in a bowl...

...and made cookies (SO many awesome recipes on this blog) with it!!!  By the way, the almond milk turned out wonderfully.  We poured it over homemade granola this morning.

Almond chocolate chip cookies

1 cup dried almond pulp “flour” (I didn't dry mine, so I added about 1/2 cup flour to the mixture)
1/4 cup coconut oil, softened
1/4 cup pure maple syrup
6 tablespoons raw almond butter
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
dark chocolate chips, as needed

Mix all ingredients well, except chocolate chips.  Scoop onto baking sheet lined with parchment paper.  My daughter pressed 3 chocolate chips on each one.  Bake 8-10 minutes in an oven heated to 350'F.  Allow to cool (or eat warm, as we did, and the melted chocolate chips are gooey) and enjoy!

We also made bird's nests over the weekend.  We used:

3 tablespoons coconut oil, melted in a pan
1 bag of marshmallows
6 cups crispy rice cereal
5 jelly beans in each one (we got a 15oz. bag of natural color and flavor ones at Trader Joe's for $3.99, made in Ireland, ironic, because on Saturday we old calendar Orthodox Christians celebrated St. Patrick's day!)

After the marshmallows melt, mix in the rice crispies well and form by pressing into bowls, using wax paper, then add jelly beans to look like eggs.  My girls wrapped them in bitty bags and wrote "Happy Easter" on them, put 6 in each of their baskets and passed them out to some of the residents at the nursing home where Rob's Grandma lives....

Doesn't she look cute in my purple sunglasses?  We stopped at Long John Silver's and got some lunch and rootbeer.

Rob played his mandolin at the cemetery, where we spent time at the Grandpa's graveside.  Playing and singing "Amazing Grace," as Grandma holds his music...