Wow, I can’t believe my last blog post was October 20th! Everything just sort of went crazy between October 20th and January. Between making loads of candles for orders, a bazaar, and Christmas,,, sick kids, me and the hubby being sick, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and everything in between, I just felt like throwing in the towel on my blog. So I quit blogging. I thought I would never want to blog again, but I’m beginning to feel like maybe a couple times a week wouldn’t be so bad. Especially after going back and reading some of my posts. It’s kind of nice to go back and read some of the things that have happened in the past. I don’t keep a journal, except here on this blog.
So anyway, I may be back a couple times a week. I’m going to quit trying to blog everyday because there’s just too much “life” going on to be sitting here writing about it instead of living it. Some people may have the time, energy and discipline to do that, but I just don’t!
So now I’m going to say goodbye till next time because I’ve got to go get a screaming 16 month old out of his highchair……
All posts by Melissa
Wacky Cake Eggless Chocolate Cake Recipe and a Math lesson
Today was a Wacky Cake kind of day….( Also try this delicious Oat Bran Muffins Recipe using this Wacky Cake mix!)
Well, we started schooling late this morning. I had set my alarm for 7:15am and we normally start school at 8:30. I was soooo tired this morning….soooooo, I reset the alarm for 8:00am. Then when the alarm went off again, I got up and sat at the computer for a few minutes. Then 8:20 rolled around…..then Baby woke up so I laid in our bed with him to nurse him, partially hoping he’d go back to sleep, but, no, he was definitely awake at that point. It was nice to lay there and cuddle with him for a little bit though.
So we finally get out of bed about 8:45, and the other 2 boys finally rolled out of bed too. I fixed breakfast, and we got started with school about 9:15. We did 3 reading lessons from the Mcguffys 1st reader, and then Nboy wrote out his spelling words while I took care of some business that had to do with a water bill I thought I had up to date, and then having to pay a fee because they had turned our water off right before I called about the message they’d left on our phone yesterday that I didn’t get until this morning……Ugh!!
So I decided we were going to skip math this morning. We did our exercising at 10:30, and then I made lunch for Chris because he comes home for lunch. Then I had promised to make a chocolate Wacky Cake recipe with the boys today, so we started on that.
So as Nboy was measuring, I went ahead and taught him about fractions and how 2 half cups makes 1 cup, and that is why it says 1/2 , and 4 fourth cups makes 1 cup, so that is why it says 1/4, and so on…… He seemed to get it, and both boys had fun helping dump the ingredients in. So we had our math lesson anyway! I love how hands on things really help clear up any misunderstandings or questions about math! When I started cooking alot, I got so much better at fractions and dividing fractions, and so forth. It just makes so much more sense when you can actually see what’s happening.
So the Wacky Cake. I….LOVE….Wacky Cake! I made it with my mom when I was a kid and it is sooooooo yummy and moist!! So here is the recipe. Nboy wanted to add cinnamon, so we did. They dipped their fingers in and tasted the batter and went crazy over it :)
Eggless, Chocolate, Wacky Cake Recipe ingredients:
(Easy eggless chocolate cake recipe made with no milk or eggs by American Heart Assoc.)
1-1/2 cups Flour
1 cup sugar
1 tsp Baking Soda
1/4 cup Cocoa Powder
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
1 tsp Vinegar
6 tbls Butter
1 cup Water
-Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
-Spray an 8×8 baking pan or cake pan with vegetable cooking spray.
-Sift together directly into the pan the flour, sugar, soda and cocoa. At this point, we added 1 tsp. of Cinnamon. You could also think of other yummy things to add too!
-Make three wells in the cake flour mixture.
-Into one well put the vanilla, into the second put the vinegar, and into the third put the butter.
-Pour the water over all and mix with a fork until ingredients are entirely moistened.
-Bake the Wacky Cake for 30 minutes
-Makes 8 servings.
Wacky Cake Eggless Chocolate Cake Recipe Analysis per serving:
Calories: 261
Total Fat: 10 grams
Polyunsaturated Fat: 4 grams
Monounsaturated Fat: 2 grams
Saturated Fat: 2 grams
Cholesterol: 0 milligrams
From: The American Heart Association Cookbook, 1979
Hope you enjoyed this eggless Wacky Cake Recipe! It’s so yummy!
Also try this delicious Oat Bran Muffins Recipe using this Wacky Cake mix!
Never leave a baby unsupervised with……
Christopher Columbus hero or villain?
So I had planned on teaching Nboy about Christopher Columbus today. I mean, when I was in grade school Christopher Columbus was the man! He was a hero. He discovered America.
Now, since then, I’ve learned that he did not in fact discover America, but when I googled Christopher Columbus today so that I might teach my first grader about his accomplishments and what he did for this country, I found out some things I’d never known. He was not a good guy. I plan on teaching Nboy about him and other explorers that landed here in America, but I want to do it with all the facts, and obviously what I was taught when I was a child were not facts, or were incorrect facts anyway.
So was Christopher Columbus hero or villain? That’s what I intend to find out. From what I’ve seen, he seems to be falling more on the villain side of things, I mean, killing Indians that were very peaceful and not even armed? Sentenced to life in prison by the Spanish for thievery, and something else I can’t remember at the moment?
But maybe, just maybe with some digging we may find out that he is somewhere in between. Or maybe not….
So I guess what I’m planning on doing is just to start teaching about the first explorers who landed here in America, and how our country got it’s start. I thought that since it was Columbus day today, that it would be fun to look up the simple facts about him, but what I found is that it’s not as simple as I thought! So back to the drawing board!
Kid’s fall craft project-Autumn Poster
Hello. Long time no talk. So I haven’t had much to write about this week and I’ve been busy trying to keep a schedule and actually clean my house at certain times during the day and do a load of laundry every day, plus working on candles, and I’ve had a couple sick kids, so I just haven’t felt like I’ve had anything interesting to write about. But have been planning this post for a few days now.
I decided the boys and I should do a fun fall craft project that would be easy for them to help with, yet would look nice for a fall decoration in our school room/dining room/play room…..
I’ve had this hankerin’ to decorate my home for fall. I love decorating my house and I don’t usually get to, except at Christmas time. So in the name of “homeschooling” I’ve decided to decorate for the seasons this year! So I went out last week and bought a piece of yellow poster board. I also bought a pack of 75 fabric leaves from Target in their dollar section, and Tuesday I went to Joannes fabric and bought a 35 pack of even nicer, real looking fall leaves for 50% off which came out to $1. Before I went to check out, though, I was very, very tempted to purchase more fall floral stuff since it was all 50% off! Oh, how I love Joannes!! I decided to wait a bit before buying more fall stuff from there though, because usually they end up at 75% once it gets closer to winter and I wanted to be wise in my spending.
But I was oh so tempted….. must….wait…..patience!
So anyway, then I printed off some fall/harvest/thanksgiving pictures from the computer onto some photo paper and cut them out. I let Nboy help with some of the cutting and then he and Ekid helped me glue the pictures on first and then the leaves around the edge of the poster. I didn’t think the leaves were going to stick well at first until we left off gluing them and then I came back later and they were stuck firm. The fabric leaves just take a bit longer to dry, so be patient.
And here’s the finished product! We all enjoyed this easy fall craft project. I loved it because it’s not very messy and it’s something that is pretty easy for young kids to help with. I plan on making a poster like this for each season, and then I can just save them and bring them out the following year and reuse them!
I decided to go with the not so realistic looking leaves from Target because I hated the thought of gluing those beautiful real looking ones from Joannes forever to a poster.lol I plan on using those for maybe just spreading out on a shelf, or using them when I take pictures of my candles for my fall specials.
Boys and worms….(earthworms)
Oh the joys of boys. Although, I must admit, when I was a little girl I used to collect slugs! I collected them in a coffee can and put them under my bed one time……can you guess what happened? Yeah, my mom found them there a while later and it was a bit stinky…lol I even held slug races on our slide….
So what kinds of dirty, slimy things/creatures did you collect when you were a kid? (or your kids) I’d love to hear your stories!