Pioneer Woman at Heart

  Tuesday was our "Monday" this week.  We both took Monday "off" and spent the day enjoying it.  Tuesday was the day for thunderstorms to roll in late afternoon, so laundry went out on the line early. I am working my way through my garden freezer goodies, and made us some flourless pumpkin bread with frozen garden pumpkin puree.  It is a very dense, thicker bread, and with less sweetness and flavor, but by adding some extra cinnamon and nutmeg it's pretty good. The bread is also about half the height of other baked pumpkin breads.  I test the bread about 30 minutes into the cooking time, and let it cool almost completely in the pan.  I finish the cooling on a wire rack before slicing. Flourless Pumpkin Bread In a blender mix all of the ingredients: 2 cups organic old-fashioned oats 15 oz. of frozen, thawed garden pumpkin puree (I measure it, as it will weigh differently depending on the thickness of your pumpkin puree).  You can use 1 can of pure pumpk...

We are to have a very cold day today (yesterday's sunrise).  However, we are to warm up after that, so it's not staying long. One more winter job off the to-do list - making travel soap.   I am slowly working items out of my closet (total chaos). The soap base was in solid blocks, so I grated it first. I decided, after trying both sizes, that the rectangle soap makes a smaller soap, and better for travel.  the oval is perfect for a spare bathroom or gift giving. I decided to get those made, and soap stored for any traveling this year.   Very easy to make and are great for adding to gifts such as a crocheted washcloth and face scrubbie pad. Not all of the soap is in that photo, but the bars came out to about $.57/each minus adding essential oil.  I did not (obviously) add any coloring.  I am also sharing some with the kids, but perfect for travel trips/camping and gifting. In hindsight, I should have made a few regular sized bars, but that job is d...

My Valentine's day gift to Hubby.  He can't have sweets, our trip was canceled, and I came up with this.  I purchased a small photo album, and have printed photos of him with me or just me, and I'm using scrap paper and stickers to decorate every other page.  I'll be writing personal notes on them as well.  I hope he likes it.

The homemade Kahlua I gifted at Christmas has been a hit.  You can get the link to it here .

Sharing another recipe we've been making here for a few years now.  We love this version and have gifted it many times.  I use organic/non gmo ingredients.

I opened the fridge, only to find some grated zucchini I had thawed.  Not letting it go to waste, I made us some zucchini muffins. These come in handy for a healthy after school, or take to work, snack.  Do you think I can count is as a vegetable? Ha ha! My stove was already heated up, so I turned down the heat and picked out another recipe in the pile.  Don't worry, I won't share every new recipe.

I had a stash of chocolate left from last Christmas.  I had cashews that I had not yet made Curried Cashews with, and I had some organic dried cranberries for salads. ....and I had 10 m inutes before my washing machine was done. I made Cranberry Nut Clusters.  Easy, quick and delicious.  Another new , and amaz ing ly quick, recipe.

You finally get to see it.  We had our very last Christ mas-fam ily gatheri ng ye sterday. Here is what I gifted this year for Christmas.  1/2 pint jars of hom e canned s weet pickle relish 4 oz jars of hom e canned Queen Anne's Lace Jelly   Mom received a set 

I'm still cracking English walnuts.  I've put 3 pounds (and counting) in the freezer so far.   I have more to crack. This year, my herbal journey will be experimenting with mustard (s).  I'm looking into different ones for greens as well as one for the seeds (there isn't one plant that is good for both, that I have found yet).   In the past I have baked a honey mustard pretzel in the oven (store bought pretzel's with a mustard sauce baked on them). This past Christmas,

I have only posted one herbal bath tea, and it was difficult to find again.  Blogger is having a few issues I guess. Herbal Bath Tea ~ Cold and Flu I pu rcha sed chemic al and tag free "press n' brew" bags for tea making, but will mostly use them for traveling , and for bath teas.  We used muslin before, but ended up with tea leaves in the bath water each time.  By the way,

Like most of you, my hands, face, and lips are feeling dried up and awful already (cold and wind).  My younger two girls love the homemade lip balm, and we are almost out of homemade hand lotion.   That is now on my to-do list now al so. The last time I made the lip bal m I used small plas tic , round cont ain ers.   This time I u sed lip b alm tubes.  I used 10 of them.

You'd think there would be a scien tific term, for a syndrome defini ng ch ronic recipe colle ctors .  Specifically for those who collect new recipes to try, while att empting to try all the stashed recipes they already have.  It's an obsession I tell ya . Sigh.... New recipes find me w hether I want them or not lately.   Cranberry butter was a new, delicious butter for me to make. You can simply use it, freeze it or gift it. I'm sharing the recipe

 45 different scarp yarn colors, and 90 ends sewn in later......

I went back through my blog recently, and compiled a post today to share many handmade gifts I made over the years.  Hopefully, you will find an idea here, or have one to share. What I gifted in 2015:  Christmas 2015 Handmade Hand Lotion (they loved this!)  I ended up putting it in 4 oz. canning jars to gift.  I do suggest adding the preservative for gifting too.

. . . making progress on the scrap crochet blanket.  I have not repeated a color yet.  

I think I have enough new recipes to challenge myself into trying a new one every day.  For a year. Sigh.... Guess what I found?  More recipes.   I pulled my favorite crock pot cookbook off the cookbook stand to clean, and found a few recipes held together with a clothespin.  Top one looks like it may be good too.  Well, I guess meal planning won't be so difficult this fall. As for that collard frittata recipe?

I couldn't hold myself back any longer.   I mean why not?  Hubby is still fixing his truck, so the tree(s) still stands. I found this recipe by purchasing a discarded library book at a library book sale. You never know what you'll find at one. And a note:  I do not go looking for recipes like this one, they seem to find me.  And I really enjoy making them, and trying them.  I've been making this one for four years now.

Canning season started early for me this year (giddy excitement).  I canned jelly yesterday.   This was the first time canning with my new stove.  It heats up much faster.  I wanted to get a feel for it, before I start canning fruit jams, which tend to be the beginning of my yearly canning.

Happy Valentine's Day! I wanted to make something useful for the kids this month - a little something to say "I love you."  I don't like to simply wait for February to tell them, so my challenge to myself is to tell them more often. I used scrap fabric to make these homemade cards (right), and old book pages (left) to create the envelope.  I used a fine-line black marker to make dashes around the scrap fabric heart (adhered with fusible web).  What's inside?

Homemade "vaseline" - I have used more than half my jar already.  After bitter cold weather (even with my face covered out there), my skin was very dry.  I even used this on my face when it was very dry from winter air.  I will definitely make this again.