My Ghools!!

My three ghools!

Allie

Nicholas

Caroline

I'm in purple and my neighbor is in black.

A bunch of us gather together and canvas the neighborhood trick-or-treating! We take a cooler with adult beverages in it on a wagon that we pull. The kids run from house to house and we all walk together!

Happy Halloween!

"It's a spooky kinda day..."

Last night I finished the pirate doll for Nicholas and I gave the little guys to my little monsters this morning. Caroline LOVES her ghost, Nicholas his pirate and Alexandra her Pumpkin! Tonight they will dress up and I will take lots of pictures. Their costumes are perfect for them. My orderly/rule follower guy (Nicholas) is a police officer, my "princess"(Alexandra) is Jasmine, and my "superhero" (Caroline) is Violet from the incredibles. Caroline said last night at dinner that she told everyone in the class yesterday what she was going to be for Halloween but they didn't understand her. When she says "Violet" it sounds like "Pirate" with her speech difficulties. So last night she got in her costume and I took a picture of her and printed it out for her to take in to SHOW everyone what she is! She truly is a super hero!

Here is a picture of the pirate I finished for Nicholas!!

Scroll down for pumpkin carving pictures!!

Pumpkin Carving

We carved pumpkins today!!

Wanna see where I work?

Here it is...

This is the view from my desk which sits in the "back" of the classroom by the door. This is looking toward the left and the other is toward the right.

Notice the windows with the bars. The board that I use is a state of the art "Smartboard". It is hooked to my computer and I can project the computer screen up on it by my LCD projector mounted at the ceiling. I can touch the board and control the computer like a touch screen. It is pretty cool and the kids love to come up to the board to use it. I also have a regular white board that is on the right side of the room. The tables are weighted and weight a ton. The chairs are made of a durable plastic and are one piece.

For the most part it is a pretty normal classroom. I can't have too much stuff out sitting around. There is no bulletin board as we can't really use staples. The kids come in to class in small groups of 8-10. They are mixed in age and grade levels so they area all usually taking a different social studies course. I teach about 10 minutes to the whole group and then they begin their individual work, independently. In the first 10 minutes I tend to think of it as similar to Jay Leno's monologue. I stand up in the front and talk for a minute about whatever is on my mind. Recently it has been my frustrations in playing the McDonald's Monopoly game on the Internet. (Windows 98 vs. Vista) Then I instruct about some little topic, many times it is a skill of some sort or we watch CNN Student News for current events. Then they get settled in their books. They each have assignments on the regular white board that I didn't take a picture of. I walk around and help them out or sit with one person and instruct on a specific event in history or a concept.

The weird stuff: I have to flip mentally from Ancient World History to Modern (1500 to present day) World History, American History, and US Government in a flash. I can be helping someone with the definition of a complex civilization or why mummies in Egypt pulled their brains through the nose with an instrument that looks like a fish hook to answering questions about the electoral college, then to the first battles of the American Revolutionary war and back again. I have to count pencils going out and being collected each class period. When a child breaks a pencil lead we have to find the lead that got broken off. I can't use paper clips, real adult scissors, or leave my stapler out on my desk. I can use staples in paper only when absolutely necessary and then I have to be ever vigilant about watching the kids who have staples in their papers. We can only use pencils, not pens, not mechanical pencils. The kids can only use yellow legal pad paper. They can't use regular notebook paper to write on AND I have to give it out one sheet at a time. I have to report every doodle on every paper, book, or table.

A majority of my students go to school intermittently when not locked up with us. Therefore, they often won't get much credit for the work they do in our school. They do get credit for the time they are with us, don't get me wrong but when they go to a new school after they leave us it is up to the new school to decide whether or not to give the kids credit for their work with us. Knowing this, I often will work specifically on lifetime skills that will help them in real life and not require them to memorize massive amounts of bogus info that they won't ever use. I am not stupid and I do realize that most people don't love history like I do and I don't hold it against them.

Oh, did I say I love my job?

Turkey Time

Last year in January, I came across a huge sale on leftover turkeys. They were 16 cents a pound and I decided to get one. The one I chose was 22 lbs and cost something like 4 bucks! Kenneth went through the freezer on Saturday morning and announced that the turkey was still residing in the freezer and suggested that we cook it. So we thawed it out and had it for dinner tonight. Man, the house smells amazing! Just like the holidays!! What a great start to the holiday season.

Here's how I prepared it. I cleaned him out and dried him off. I put him in a Reynolds Turkey Bag and melted a stick of butter, added a teaspoon of minced garlic, several sprigs of fresh thyme, a teaspoon of kosher salt, and a several shakes of pepper. After mixing it all together and letting it cook for a second, I poured the mixture all over the top of the turkey making sure that the thyme sprigs were all on the top. I tied the bag and stuck him in the oven for 3 hours until his button popped. I let him rest before cutting.

If you have never cooked a turkey in a bag you will find that he is juicy and delicious. He isn't dry at all and often when you attempt to move him from the pan to a platter he will completely fall apart. Now that is the sign of a juicy turkey. In the bag there is no more basting every 30 minutes and you don't open it at all while cooking. Now you can't really put more than vegetables in the cavity. If you put stuffing in it you will find that it just turns to mush. So leave the cavity either empty or just put some rough cut vegies in there like carrots, celery and onion.

I served it with red skin mashed potatoes, broccoli, and rolls. I didn't want to make a traditional Thanksgiving dinner because it wasn't Thanksgiving.

Update on "the experiment"

I tried it and the results were average. I put it in the oven on 350 for about 30 minutes. Cakes usually take about 40 minutes to cook so I figured that I would see something in 30 minutes time. 20 minutes into it I couldn't stand it so I checked and it still looked like dry cake mix on top and nothing going on underneath. At 30 minutes nothing had changed and I started searching for some recipes on line similar to this.

One recipe said to take a large can of mixed fruit, a dry cake mix and mix the two together and bake. Mmm... that sounded good and also gave me the idea that it needed to mix together a bit. Another said to mix the cake mix with eggs only and put on top. Eww. Another said to put butter pats on the top. I remembered that one of the guys said to pour some butter on top. So I went in the kitchen, pulled it out of the oven, kinda chunked the mix into the now-hot peaches beneath and I put a half a stick of butter in the microwave and melted it and then poured it on top and stuck it back in the oven for another 20 minutes. When I pulled it out it was looking much better. It was slightly crunchy on top and the cake mix now looked more like baked cake and the peach juice was bubbling all around the edges. I let it cool down a bit and after the kids went to bed I spooned some out and heated it back up in the microwave oven and then scooped some vanilla ice cream on top.

It turned out more like a cobbler than a cake. It was all gooey underneath with moist cake on the top with some crunchies from the butter.

Would I do it again, you ask? Yes, I would if I were serving it hot with ice cream that same night.

So here is the recipe...

One large can of fruit in juice
One box of yellow cake mix
1/2 stick of butter

Pour the fruit and juice in the bottom of a baking dish. Layer the dry cake mix on top evenly. Melt the butter and pour on the top all over. Bake at 350 for 35-45 minutes. You will know when it is done when it looks like cobbler. Let cool slightly before serving with ice cream.

An Experiment

I was talking with some co-workers and we were talking about how to make "Apple Betty". The conversation moved to an easy way to make a fruit cake. The men explained that you take a can of fruit in juice, put it in a baking dish. Then take a box of cake mix and pour it on top. (Yes the dry cake mix). Then put it in the oven and bake. The other gentleman said that he does it all the time with his boy scout troop in a dutch oven while camping. He said it works. The third gentleman then chimed in and asked me if I was going to make one. I said, "I'm game. Will you eat it if I bring it in tomorrow?". He agreed as he loves anything that I bring in to share. It is in the oven now. I will let you know how it turns out.

The Ghost

I started the purple fuzzy monster and I didn't like it so I decided to do a ghost. I got some white yarn and started on what I thought would look like a ghost. I finished the first side and it turned out to be a triangle. It didn't look like a ghost at all. I then got on line and started looking for bell patterns. I found one and started to work it up and it didn't look like a ghost at all. Then I started playing around and voila, I got my ghost. I added eyes and a smile and there he was. A few arms and we had our ghost.
Now I am off to work on the pirate and I will have all three done before Halloween.

20th High School Reunion

Last night was my 20th high school reunion. It doesn't seem that long since I graduated but it has been 20 years they tell me. I certainly don't feel that old! I am not real sure why I was nervous but I was. I didn't RSVP until the very end and even yesterday I had thoughts about not going. But as I told my husband when we went to his, if it is bad and we want to leave then we will go and have a nice dinner somewhere. As it turned out we arrived around 7:45 and before I knew it, it was midnight! Everyone looked just the same. Some of the men had turned grey and some had lost some hair. The ladies really all looked very much the same. I would have recognized them in a heartbeat at the mall. Speaking of which, I am not sure why I don't run into more of them. Most everyone there lived still in Richmond. We have spread out a bit but I was surprised to find out many still live within the same high school district that we lived in growing up.

So to anyone out there reading this and thinking that their reunion is coming up and it questioning whether or not to go. GO! You will find that you will have a really good time. I can't wait until the next one now!!

When all Else Fails...

use Italian Salad Dressing. Or if you like a good Ken's Caesar does well too. No, I am not talking about eating salad. I AM talking about marinades. Italian salad dressing is great on fish, chicken, tuna, pork and turkey. It is also great on shrimp! You can also marinade most kinds of vegetables if you are going to grill them. I am talking about zucchini, squash, onions, eggplant, and even fresh green beans. What a versitile item!!

Crazy Hat Day

Yesterday was "Crazy Hat Day" at the Logos church group. This was Alexandra with her crazy hat that we made and the butterfly wings that she got at dinner the other night.

Our local sports bar has "kids eat free" night every Tuesday night. They put in a kid friendly movie on the big screen TV's in the restaurant side of the place and keep the sports on in the bar area. It is a fun crazy night. There are tons of kids and the movie is playing loud and they have a guy "uncle bert" who comes around to the tables and makes balloon animals and such.

Applesauce

Because we went apple picking two weeks ago, it seems that all I am cooking right now is applesauce. I have made a ton of applesauce in the past two weeks. It should keep my family happy until next summer.
Here is my recipe:
I take about 10 cups of apples peeled, chunked and cored, about 3-4 cups of water. Put all in a big pot and cook on medium high heat until the apples are soft. Stir often! Once the apples are soft mash them with a potato masher. If you like smoother applesauce then put in a food processor and mix until smoothness desired is achieved. Add about 1 to 1/2 cups of sugar and about a 1/2 TBS of cinnamon and stir. Taste. You may want to add a bit more water if it is too thick, you may want to go light on the cinnamon until you taste it and then add some more. Fill canning jars and process in a water bath for about 10-15 minutes.
The chunky style is great served warm with pork chops or ham. The smoother, cold stuff is great, well, anytime!

Another New Blog

I have contacted Lion Brand website and asked them to please look at their blogs that they have on their site. They have approximately 7 blogs and only one blogger is writing at all. I asked them to consider adding other bloggers to their site and to consider me as one of them. They responded with a very nice email stating that they are redoing their site and will be making changes in the spring time including adding and deleting their bloggers who don't write. They asked me to contact them in the spring and they would be happy to consider me.

With that said, I thought it would be wise for me to begin my own blog of my handcrafts for two reasons. One, if they consider me they will need something to look at and this blog would be an excellent example of what kind of material they would get from me. Two, I do so much handwork (almost nightly I pick something up) that it would be a great outlet for you all to see much of my work and my thought process in completing it.

So do check it out. Remember that I have just begun this blog and there isn't much on there right now but it will bulk up quickly.

www.whitneyshandwork.blogspot.com

Couple photos of the Beach!

Here are a few photos of the beach for you. It was very nice and the weather was great. We got a new camera, as you may have guessed by now. It is great and can take video too.

We go to the Outer Banks in North Carolina and my step-mother still owns my father's house down there. We go when the house is not rented and this summer weren't able to go because of that. So we had to wait until the Fall to get our beach time. Unfortunately we can only spend a weekend because of school.

Nicholas Sells Popcorn

Want Some???

Allie gets a haircut!

Allie got her twice yearly hair cut yesterday evening. Her hair was well below her waist and it was time for a trim. So I pulled out the scissors and started chopping away. I cut 3 inches off and it brought her hair back up to the top of her pants waist. This way she doesn't have to pull it out of her pants when she is getting dressed.

I asked her today if anyone noticed her hair cut. She said not one person.

How to Cut Fresh Pineapple

Many people are afraid to buy a fresh pineapple because they don't know how to properly cut it. It is quite simple if you follow these steps.
1. Cut the bottom off about 1/2 inch from the bottom, then cut the top off. Now you are left with the spiny outside and a very flat bottom so it doesn't roll around.
2. Next start cutting off the spiny outside from top to bottom about 1/4 inch in. This way you get most of the seeds out too. Just go around the outside cutting in small strips the outer skin and spines.
3. Then, look at it from the top and you will see the round core in the middle. For chunks begin by cutting large strips one the sides from top to bottom cutting away from the core. You will cut 1/4 of it first then turn it 1/4 turn and cut again straight down, then turn and cut and turn and cut the last bit. This will leave you with a square core if you did it right.
4. Take the large chunks that you just cut and slice them as small as you like. Trim off any outer spines that you didn't get when you "deskined" it.
5. If you want circles then cut the pineapple sideways and then use a small knife to core out the inner core. If you have a small round cookie cutter that will work too but they are very hard to find.

My oh My...

So it has been quite a while since my last confession and I wonder what I have been doing since then.

Here is the long and short of it. Soccer, soccer, apple picking, soccer, scouts, OT therapy, soccer, soccer, and then we went to the beach. The beach was fun but short. It is still there though not as much anymore. We played putt-putt and had a great time.

Caroline on Kenneth's shoulders picking apples.