Getting There

This and that.

Last week I was pleased to get one of the 5 kg (11 lb) buckets of Ontario sour cherries at my nearby grocery store, while they still had them. They get a small number of them in every year, but I've never chanced to see them. I made up a batch of cherry jam--my jam shelf is now looking rather impressive, and I haven't even done blueberry yet!--and I made two cherry pies. The rest of the cherries I put into the freezer for a rainy day.

We're hoping to go blueberry picking this weekend, and then I will be getting out the canner again. 

Chris tried teaching me to crochet yesterday. He's quite an expert crocheter (is that really a word?)--when we were first dating he made me a blanket with my name in purple (my favourite colour). I was going to try making a dish cloth. I found it rather frustrating actually, but Chris was enjoying himself, so that maybe I think he'll be the one crocheting the dish cloth. :)

I do have a few balls of cotton yarn in reserve, so I will be knitting a dishcloth or two very soon. 

I know I can do that at least. I am determined to succeed with knitting and sewing, although neither of these things comes naturally to me at all. Somehow my mind is not methodical enough. But I figure if I just keep trying, and doing silly little projects like dish cloths, I will "get it" eventually.

Another thing I am planning is to fix up my little sewing area:

I really want to start doing more sewing projects here, and I figure that if I brighten it up a bit, it will encourage me. This is really the corner of the laundry/utility room, but I think it could be a lovely space with so much natural light. I'd like to get a few pictures I like for the wall, maybe an interesting clock, a more comfortable chair. And I need to paint that homemade desk, which is currently just bare wood and not washable. I wonder what colour I should paint it?

Back in June I made some homemade baby powder using cornstarch and rose petals. It was okay, but the rose petals I had didn't really smell. This time I made a new batch of powder using arrowroot flour (from the bulk store), which I think has a nicer texture than cornstarch, and crushed dried lavender flowers, which smell just wonderful! Now the corner of our bedroom that is the diaper change area smells lovely. I have never used dried lavender before for anything other than a decoration, believe it or not, and I'm very pleased with its effectiveness as a natural fragrance.

It has only been since I've started this blog, really, that I've started doing even small and simple creative projects like these. For many years, I was sort of stuck in a rut of being nothing but Mama, and while that in itself is a glorious thing, it can get tedious with nothing to break up the endless routine of laundry, cooking, cleaning, and dirty diapers. Adding other things to do into my daily routine, things like sewing or canning jam, doesn't feel like I'm giving myself yet more work. Rather, it feels like my life is more interesting and varied than it used to be. And it's awakening my creativity, which I think was laying dormant for many years. I can't wait to learn more skills and do more things for myself. It's so satisfying. :)

Making Homemade Laundry Soap.

Recipes for homemade laundry soap abound on the Internet. I have wanted to try it for a while, because those who do make their own laundry soap usually rave about how much money it saves. And with three young children--one in diapers--I do a great deal of laundry.

I saw that Arm & Hammer Washing Soda was on sale this past week at my regular grocery store, so I picked up a box. I was quite surprised, and disappointed, to realize upon arriving home that this brand of washing soda is very heavily perfumed. (I didn't notice at the store, because a person standing in the laundry aisle is surrounded by a cloud of artificial fragrance!) I was surprised because everyone I've heard talking about making homemade laundry soap mentions how nice it is to have unscented laundry. And everyone, from what I can tell, uses Arm & Hammer brand...I suppose maybe they scent the washing soda for the Canadian market only for some strange reason? 

Well, I still wanted to try making the laundry soap, and I was out of my regular non-scented natural brand, so I decided to go ahead and do it. I hoped that the scent wouldn't be too strong once it was mixed with the other ingredients.

I used this recipe that I saw a while ago on Simple, Green, Frugal Co-op.

I bar grated soap

2 cups borax

2 cups washing soda

1 cup baking soda

I used a plain bar of Nature Clean brand unscented soap, grated with a cheese grater.

When it was all mixed together it looked like this:

I did two loads of laundry with this soap yesterday, using 1/8 cup for the regular load and 1/4 cup for the more heavily soiled load. It seemed to work just fine. I was relieved to find that although the laundry room stinks now of the washing soda's perfume, it seemed to rinse away in the laundry and the clean, dried clothes don't have a discernible smell.

I will continue making up and using this laundry soap until my washing soda runs out. But, unless I can find a source of non-scented washing soda, I will not be able to stick with this in the long term. As it is right now, I get a sudden headache every time I walk past the laundry area and smell that heavy perfume. I am a person who buys unscented everything. I haven't worn perfume in many years and I strongly dislike it when people around me wear it. So I will not willingly bring another box of Arm & Hammer washing soda, doused in perfume, in to my house. I do hope that I can find another source somewhere, because my rough estimate is that this kind of laundry soap is half, maybe even a third the price of the natural powdered laundry detergent I usually buy. And who of us these days doesn't want to save a bit ot money?

A Prayer for Womanhood.

I posted once before a poem by the American poet, Grace Noll Crowell. Here is another that I wanted to share, that I think is lovely. It's funny to think that when I was a teenager, I would have thought a poem like this dreadfully old-fashioned and out of date. At that age, I thought happiness and fulfillment would surely come to me from having a successful career. Now, in my early 30s, having experienced both the working world and the life of a mother and homemaker, I feel much differently, to say the least. Our home, raising our children, with my husband by my side, is where I find the greatest happiness--even if this home is a rental townhouse in the city instead of a quaint farmhouse. The love that exists between these walls is what matters.

A Prayer for Womanhood

God, give each true good woman
Her own small house to keep,
No heart should ache with longing,
No hurt should go too deep.....
Grant her age-old desire:
A house to love and sweep.
Give her a man beside her,
A kind man, and a true,
And let them work together
And love, a lifetime through,
And let her mother children
As gentle women do.
Give her a shelf for dishes,
And a shining box for bread,
A white cloth for her table,
And a white spread for her bed,
A shaded lamp at nightfall,
And a row of books much read.
God, let her work with laughter,
And let her rest with sleep.
No life can truly offer
A peace more sure and deep....
God, give each true woman
Her own small house to keep.

~Grace Noll Crowell~
~~~~~~1934~~~~~~

Canning Adventures.

Yesterday was a beautiful, warm, sunny day, so we took the opportunity and went strawberry picking as a family. It was challenging to keep Jasper from trampling all the poor strawberry plants (he was a little bit too excited), but overall we had an enjoyable time. The strawberries were very ripe and red and sweet.

After berry picking we had a picnic at our favourite park just down the road, and then on the way home we stopped for some delicious soft icecream.

After supper, I cleaned the kitchen, got out all my supplies, and got to work making my very first batch of jam. I used the "light" pectin crystals, which require less sugar.

The end result was jam which was quite frankly, the most delicious jam I've ever tasted. Just bursting with vibrant strawberry flavour, and not too sweet either. However, it did not set at all. It's quite runny, and as you can see in the picture all the fruit chunks rose to the top.

This morning when I got up and realized it had not set, I looked it up in my canning book, and apparently it's not a good idea to use overripe fruit to make jam, as it doesn't contain as much pectin as regular fruit--it's even recommended to add in a few unripe berries for added pectin. The berries I used were quite ripe, and exceedingly juicy and soft, which would explain the runniness (and also the delicious flavour!). It's also extremely important to boil the jam hard for the full minute the recipe specified, and I can't quite remember how hard it was boiling when I started timing, so that might have been a factor as well.

Overall, I think this isn't too bad for a very first attempt at canning. The end result was still delicious. It's too runny to spread on bread, but I imagine it will make a yummy oatmeal topping throughout the winter.

This morning I made another small batch of jam, using a full-sugar recipe. This time I made absolutely sure to boil it hard for one minute, and it seems to be slightly firmer than my first attempt, but not as firm as it should be. This leads me to believe that the fruit was just too ripe and juicy. Lesson learned! Next time I'll be sure to use ripe but not overripe berries.

I Have Found Such Joy.

Isn't it strange sometimes, how just as soon as you learn about something, it starts popping up everywhere? This happened to me recently. A few weeks ago I saw a poem by the American poet Grace Noll Crowell on someone's blog. I loved it, and I printed it out to put on our fridge. Since then, I have seen her poems on several different blogs...they are all lovely and they seem to speak to the place I am in my life right now. 

Grace Noll Crowell, born in 1877, was a very popular writer in the United States in the first half of the 20th century. She wrote poems, devotions, and books for children. I am currently trying to locate online somewhere a copy of the her last printed "best of" collection--it seems to be very rare however and almost impossible to find. I think it's sad that such a wonderful poet would not still be in print. But I suppose most modern publishers would consider her too old fashioned. What a shame.

~I Have Found Such Joy~

I have found such joy in simple things;

A plain, clean room, a nut-brown loaf of bread

A cup of milk, a kettle as it sings,

The shelter of a roof above my head,

And in a leaf-laced square along the floor,

Where yellow sunlight glimmers through a door.

 

I have found such joy in things that fill

My quiet days: a curtain's blowing grace,

A potted plant upon my window sill,

A rose, fresh-cut and placed within a vase;

A table cleared, a lamp beside a chair,

And books I long have loved beside me there.

 

Oh, I have found such joys I wish I might

Tell every woman who goes seeking far

For some elusive, feverish delight,

That very close to home the great joys are:

The elemental things-- old as the race, 

Yet never, through the ages, commonplace.

 

Grace Noll Crowell

Sprouts!

A little while ago my sister sent me this link from care2.com about growing your own sprouts. I was intrigued; I had never really thought about growing sprouts although I had heard of others doing it. I did a little bit more research. It turns out that turning seeds like lentils or beans into living sprouts not only provides an inexpensive and easy source of vegetable matter at any time of year, but  vastly improves the seeds' vitamin content and digestibility.

This page at freedomyou.com does a good job of explaining the amazing chemical changes that occur when a seed sprouts which render it healthier for us and easier to digest than when it is just cooked. This page also gives us this neat tidbit of information:

In 1940, the United States Army sponsored a full investigation on sprouted seeds, studying their usability as food during war. During World War 1, the British Army sprouted beans to ward off scurvy in the trenches. When building the trenches, they calculated the sprouting area needed to feed a battalion.

You learn something new every day! 

For my first attempt at sprouting, I chose lentils, since I already had some organic brown lentils that had been lingering in the pantry for a while. I found some instructions for sprouting lentils specifically in Carla Emery's Encyclopedia of Country Living--there's a link to it on your left, it's an amazing book! I placed about a third cup of rinsed lentils in a clean pickle jar, covered them well with water, placed a double layer of cheesecloth over the jar with an elastic band, and let the jar sit over night. This soaking is necessary to begin the sprouting process--but the seeds would quickly rot if you just let them sit under water all the time.

So the next morning, without removing the cheesecloth I poured out the water, refilled it, and poured it out again, trying to make sure it was drained well and that some of the lentils were up on the sides of the glass, like this:

Then I continued to rinse the sprouts in this way 2-3 times per day. I kept the jar in the cupboard because Carla Emery told me you would get white sprouts that way; leaving the jar out where light can reach it would give you green sprouts. Apparently (according to the freedomyou.com site which I linked to above), sprouts created in darkness have more vitamin B2; but green sprouts have chlorophyll and more vitamin C. So they're both good!

I can't remember if it was 4 or 5 days later, the sprouts were done:

I think actually 1/3 cup of lentils was too much for this jar. As you can see, they were pretty tightly packed in there!

Here's a closer look:

Pretty cool, eh? I was impressed that my first attempt actually worked so well. Shortly after I started these sprouts, I tried sprouting some black beans which I had in my cupboard--but these did nothing. I'm not sure if it was because they were too stale or because they had been treated with something...I think to be safe I'll stick with organic lentils and beans from now on (which I should do, anyway).

What I did with these sprouts, was stirfry them with a bit of sesame oil, garlic and soy sauce, added some chow mein noodles into the mix, and instant lunch! It was quite tasty, and easy too. The sprouts added a delightful chewy crunchiness to the noodles. I'll definitely try sprouting again. I look forward to trying more kinds of sprouts. Does anyone have any recommendations? Please, share your experiences with home sprouting, I'd love to know. :)

Laura's favourite recipe for no-knead bread.

Although in many ways I'm an utter neophyte to the world of homemaking skills--I can barely sew, and I've never even made my own jam!--one thing I do know how to do is bake bread. Now that I think back, this was probably the first step towards a simpler life that I took several years ago, when I started experimenting with different recipes.

Like most things, in bread baking you make a lot of mistakes before you hit your groove. And I made plenty of mistakes! But although I think I'm pretty competent now at making "regular" bread, most of the bread I make is of the oh-so-easy "no-knead" variety. It's so easy, anybody can make it with success, no matter how much of a beginner you are. I'm going to share my favourite recipe here--I think it's safe to call it my own, as I have altered it quite a bit from the original. (Note: that is my 1-year old's hand in the picture below--he always tries to steal Mama's toast!)

Laura's Favourite No-Knead Bread.

Take a mixing bowl--not too large. I use the stainless steel bowl from my mom's old electric mixer.

Dump in:

1 1/2 cups unbleached flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

1 cup multigrain mix (I use the 12-grain bread flour from The Bulk Barn)

1 tbsp ground flax seeds

1 1/2 tsp salt (reduce the salt if you like, this is the amount I think tastes good though)

1/4 tsp active dry yeast (yes, this is all it needs!)

Mix all this together with a wooden spoon. Then, pour in 1 2/3 cups warm water. Add more water if you need to. I find that this recipe is pretty forgiving with the amount of water used--you can accidentally use too much, and it doesn't seem to matter, because you're not going to be kneading it. The important thing is that you need enough water to incorporate all the flour.

Stir the water into the mixture until you have a gloopy, lumpy looking mass, with no dry flour visible.

Cover the bowl with a plate (this is why you can't use a really big mixing bowl) and put the bowl somewhere safe for 18 hours.

Like the water, this amount of time is kind of flexible--Sometimes I forget about the dough for a few hours too many and it's always been fine.

After 18 hours, pick up the lumpy gooey dough (it will also look stringy now too, from the gluten) and plop it into a loaf pan. I find that a stoneware pan produces the nicest crust, and I also find that butter works better than anything else for greasing this pan.

Let the dough rise another 2 hours or so, or until it is slightly above the level of the top of the pan.

Bake at 425 degrees for 45 minutes. If you take it out, and it isn't nicely browned on the bottom, put it back in for 5 or 10 minutes. Once again: The amount of baking time need not be exact, as long as you bake it enough. Because of the high moisture content in this bread, you can accidentally leave it in the oven an extra half hour (um, not that I've ever done that!) and it will be fine, except that you might want to cut the crust off. :)

No-knead bread uses a high moisture content to bring out the gluten, rather than kneading as in traditional bread. This high moisture content gives you a very dense, chewy bread. I admit, it's a bit heavy for making sandwiches. But for toast, it can't be beat, no question. Cut a couple of thin slices (once it's cooled of course), crank up the setting on your toaster (because it takes a lot longer to toast than regular bread), and when it pops butter liberally. Enjoy with a hot cup of tea!

I make this recipe twice per week, and use it for breakfast. I have eggs and this toast for breakfast every day, and often it's what I give the children, too. I have tried many fancy breads from the grocery store, but nothing comes close to homemade no-knead bread for good old chewy, yummy toast first thing in the morning.

As a bonus, it's cheaper than store-bought bread, and healthier, because it has no preservatives, and because the long rising time makes the grains easier to digest.

There you have it!