What a Way to Wake Up!

Ten minutes to 5am on a lazy Tuesday when you have absolutely nothing planned until 4pm that day is not when you want to be awoken from a blissful (2 hours) of sleep by a cat!  However, that is exactly what happened this morning...  Baby, our 7 year old butterball (we think he's a Ragamuffin), decided to get sick at the head of the bed this morning!  I was awoken by the sounds of impending cat-sickness near my left ear and shouted, which usually startles the cats enough to get them to stop...I only succeeded in waking up Garrick though!  Baby continued making his prep for illness and I finally was able to get him off the bed to get sick on the floor (way easier than cleaning it out of my hair, right?)...or so I thought!  While cleaning up the bit of foamy yuck that he left on the floor, we noticed a larger (baseball sized) wet spot with obviously laid in bit of yuck where Garrick's shoulder normally is while he's sleeping.  Super yuck!  It gets worse though...it getting the sheet off the bed, we found it was very cold (had been there for quite some time) and very liquid-y (I, of course, figured this out by sticking my finger in it).  That sent me into dry heaves...making it even harder to get out of bed (luckily I was not alone and Garrick is able to pull me out of bed while I'm trying to not add to the mess)!  After we got the sheet off the bed and most of the fluids cleaned up (and by we I really mean Garrick...I was of no use unless the sound of someone dry heaving in the corner is helpful), Garrick went to take a shower (he laid in it, remember) and I went to rinse the bile out of my mouth.  Afterwards, we debated putting clean sheets on the bed and returning to sleep, but we were both wide awake and I didn't think that I could lay back down in the bed without getting sick again.  So, we got up at 4:50am this morning and have had an extremely productive morning so far (and it's only 7am)!

I have a few BzzCampaigns that I'm involved in right now, Dentyne (see my post about that one here), SmartFood Selects (I'm still waiting for this one to arrive in the mail), and Glade Expressions Collection!  For the Glade one, I received coupons to get both starter kits for free.  Of course, the hard part about this product was finding a store that had them in stock!  What a popular product and after trying them, I see why!  At first, I was only able to find the Fragrance Mist Starter Kit in a single scent!  Luckily, it was one that I wanted (Pineapple & Mangosteen), so I snatched it up.  We've been using it for a few weeks and both of us really enjoy the smell...it smells a bit like a Pina Colada.  The scent is very light and it really doesn't take a ton of spraying to scent a large room!  I do a quick (2-3 second) spray in my dining area to scent the whole surrounding area (dining room, kitchen, and the whole of downstairs since it's open from up here)!

On the dresser in the Nursery...

The Scented Oil Diffuser starter kit proved to be more difficult to find though...these seem to race off the shelves!  I did finally find them at Target though!  Not only did they have them, they had them in all four scents that are available (Pineapple & Mangosteen, Fuji Apple & Cardamom Spice, Lavender & Juniper Berry, and Cotton & Italian Mandarin)!  I prefer the "look" of the Pineapple starter kit for most of the rooms in my house, the decorative panels with the leaf cutouts is wood-grain in a light wood color, while the other scents all come in white.  However, for in our Nursery, the white works perfectly!  After smelling each and every scent option, I chose to get the Fuji Apple & Cardamom Spice.  This one has turned out to be my absolute favorite!  In fact, I liked it so much, that I also bought it in the Fragrance Mist as well (in a starter kit because the price difference was very small and I wanted to be able to use both scents without having to "swap" the refills)!  I should probably mention to be careful handling these...my Mom had one of my Misters slip out of her hand and the top shattered when it hit the floor (from about counter height).  Good thing I bought two starter kits I suppose, lol.  Unlike when you break the top of a traditional room spray, these aren't wasted!  The mist is contained in a separate canister inside the plastic bottle part!  You just unscrew the bottom and out it falls, making refilling the "cute" sprayer easy and more economical (I believe the refills run about a dollar less than the starter kits).  The labeling comes off the outside of the kit too, making leaving the can sitting out a little less like "hey, this is what I use to cover up my funk"!

Photo "stolen" from my sister's blog...

The Fuji Apple & Cardamom Spice scent is just as light and easy on the nose as the pineapple one is...since we still keep the baby's door shut to keep the cats out for the most part, the room was getting its own "funk" from being closed up and basically unused.  Having the oil diffuser in there has really made it nice in there again!  In fact, my Mom has commented that when she goes home, she is going to get the same scent kit for her bedroom (which is similarly closed up all the time)!  To me, this scent smells a bit like a fresh baked apple pie...I love it!

I mentioned earlier that today was already productive...since everyone is up now, we have the latest batch of dog food simmering on the stove, Carne Asada meat and Beef Heart strips!  I figured it was time for some beef...Rosie has gotten a ton of chicken in the past month and the last batch I made was using Ham (which she absolutely loves...it was way off from my "normal" though).  Mom is doing most of the cooking, but from the smell, I should go see if the meat is cooked.

My Latest Adventures in Dog Food Cooking...

I'm late this week in getting my batch of dog food made...I have really been trying, but my energy level seems to come in very short bursts.  So, here we are at Thursday and her food for the week is still in "pieces"!  She actually ran out of pre-made portions Monday, but we've been feeding her "scraps meals" and last night I scooped out a cup of rice, a cup of Veggies, and a big handful of chicken (previously all were cooked and the chicken was de-boned), then I poured some Chicken broth on top and popped it in the microwaved (because she won't eat it cold).

I'm trying to get ahead on her food...mostly because in three, very short weeks, we're going to be a little preoccupied and I don't think it's very fair to ask my Mother to cook food for the dog!  So, I started this week's food by boiling 12 pounds of Chicken leg quarters and 2 pounds of Chicken Gizzards (and hearts).  To the larger pot, I added some Parsley, Nutmeg, and Black Pepper...to season the chicken a little but also to help with the smell of the cooking chicken (which smells horrible by the way).  Once the chicken was done (Tuesday...I bought it on Monday), I poured the liquid into three containers, cooled it and put it in the fridge to help separate the fat from the broth.  The next day, I skimmed the fat and filtered the "bits" from the broth (I got enough filtered broth to use it to make 20 cups of rice and fill a 2-Quart pitcher along with half of another pitcher).  After I filtered the broth, I warmed up the fat and ran it through a paper towel to get the particulates out of it.  I ended up with 2 cups of purified fat!  Which, I plan to warm it up and pour it over the mix when I add the yogurt, gravy, and such.  But, once I got the broth filtered, I started the rice in the big cooker (I had 10 cups of rice, so I just made all of it).  Yesterday, I cooked up five large bags of veggies (Cauliflower/Broccoli mix, French cut Green Beans, Broccoli Cuts, Carrot Coins, and a bag of Peas and Diced Carrots).  But, by the time they cooled enough to mix, I was exhausted!  So, today after shopping, I made up 3 cups of Brown Gravy (not exactly "healthy" I'm sure) and added about one-third of a jar of Creamy Peanut Butter while the gravy was hot.  The PB really thickened the gravy, so I also added about a cup of Chicken Broth to thin it back out.  Then, I tossed the whole thing in the fridge to cool for an hour before mixing it into 64-ounces of Plain Yogurt (I buy Nancy's Organic for her...).

Rice & Veggies!

Brown Gravy & Peanut Butter!

And since I have now mixed everything together...the dog is currently chowing down on a serving of this new batch!  To mix this huge batch of food, I broke out my big Turkey Roasting Pan (pictured on the left with the Rice and Vegetables in it)!  With everything in it, this batch filled it to the brim!  Of course, 14 pounds of meat (without the bones) filled one and two-thirds gallon-sized Ziplocs, 5 pounds of Veggies filled another, and roughly 20 cups of Rice filled one and a half bags!  Top it off with 3 cups of Gravy, half a jar of Peanut Butter, and 64-ounces of Plain yogurt...and there's a lot of dog food that's been made!  My hope is to put half of it in the freezer for after the baby's born!

Actual "recipe":

• 10 cups of Rice (as measured by the scoop that comes with your cooker)
• Chicken Broth to fill Rice Cooker to the fill line (if cooking rice without a cooker, it's 1 cup rice to 2 cups liquid)
• 12 pounds Chicken Leg Quarters
• 2 pounds Chicken Gizzards & Hearts
• 5 pounds Frozen Vegetables (I used Carrot Coins, a Broccoli/Cauliflower Mix, French-cut Green Beans, Cut Broccoli, and a Peas/Diced Carrot Mix)
• 3 cups prepared Brown Gravy (which is 9 tablespoons dry mix & 3 cups Water)
• 1/3 to 1/2 Jar Creamy Peanut Butter
• 64-ounces Plain Yogurt
• 2 cups Chicken Fat (microwaved to liquify)
• 4 to 6 cups Chicken Broth

Optional Additions:

• Hard-Boiled Eggs
• Scraps (Meat & Veggie)
• Leftover Pasta

I still need to get it all bagged up and in the fridge or freezer, but that is just gonna have to wait until I have help.

On the dog front...Rosie just turned 11 years old yesterday!  She was born September 12, 2001 and was given to me in mid October of 2001 (when she was 7 to 8 weeks old, I forget the exact date I got her).  She didn't have a name until close to Christmas though!  My childhood Lab was named Licorice (as in Black Licorice...), so I had wanted to keep the "color-theme" in naming this new puppy, but nothing I came up with really "fit".  She was almost named "Shady", but it reminded my partner at the time of Shady Pines (the retirement home on Golden Girls).  Which is how Rosie got her name!  She was named after Betty White's character on that show!

Hello 3rd Trimester!

According to the "handy dandy" app I have on my iPhone from What To Expect...  today marks the very first day of my third trimester with the little man!  I am so excited and a little scared all at the same time.  I can't wait to meet this little guy, he's been wanted for a very long time, but at the same time, I don't feel like we are "ready" yet.  We're ready to be parents, but the house...oh the house!  His future bedroom/nursery is still a working office, we have nothing (okay, I do have a few {dozen} diapers, but not nearly in the quantity we need) to put on his rump, clothes...well, we have lots of hand me downs, but not a ton in any one size (my sister has given me everything nephew #4 is outgrowing and another friend gave me a box of 6+ months stuff) and I just have this sneaking suspicion that this guy is gonna be tiny! 

I was complaining (whining really) over the weekend that it felt like the little man was trying to "make more room in there" for a growth spurt and I think I was right!  Besides the fact that clothes that fit last week no longer fit, he is really rocking and rolling in there!  Last night before going to sleep he was really hunching/kicking really hard, harder than I have ever felt!  And he continued it all...night...long!  Even as I type, he's in there practicing to be an MMA fighter I think!  I'm thinking tomorrow will be a "quieter" day though since he seems to be doing a lot today!  Just as long as he cooperates on Friday, we have yet another ultrasound because the doctor hasn't been able to "see everything" he wants to see yet, this will make our third "anatomy scan"!

Other than baby stuff, I have had a pretty full week so far (keep in mind it's only Wednesday)!  Yesterday I made another batch of dog food, this time we used Hamburger, mostly because we had bought a pound for us to eat and plans changed...we are horrible about using stuff in our freezer, so I made dog food with it instead of trying to "save" it for another day.

Before the Rice got added!

Beef/Veggie/Rice "Dog Stew"

• 2 lbs Hamburger (I used 1 80/20 & 1 93/7, we buy leaner meat for us than we do for the dog)
• 12 cups cooked Rice
• 2/3 of a 1 lb bag Frozen Chopped Spinach
• 1-1 lb bag Frozen Green Beans (French style cause they're $0.98 a bag)
• 1-1 lb bag Fozen California Blend (Cauliflower, Broccoli, Carrots)
• 1 Qt Beef Broth (I use 4 cups of hot water and a heaping tablespoon of Better then Bouillon in Beef Flavor)
• 1 container Cottage Cheese (okay, it was more like 3/4 of the container, but it was going bad)

I started by making up a batch of rice in our (still new) rice cooker, it makes 6 cups of rice at a time.  After that batch, I took the rice out and put in a big glass bowl to cool and let the cooker cool so I could handle it to clean it and get another batch going!  After getting the second batch of rice set up, I grabbed the steamer basket that came with the rice cooker and tossed in about two-thirds of the bag of frozen Spinach, it filled the steamer basket!  By the time the rice was cooked, the Spinach was perfectly steamed and all the nutrients from it had dripped into the rice (I see a few dinners for us being made this way in the near future), turning some of the rice green!  After the last batch of rice was cooling (the first batch went into a ziploc and the rice and spinach went in the bowl), I got the hamburger cooking in our "dog food pot", which is a 12-Qt stock pot that I burned rice in (you remember the day my rice cooker died and I got to talk to the alarm company because I set off the smoke detector, right?)...most of the black is gone from it, but we weren't using it for anything else and this way, I can add doggie supplements (when we have them) without worrying if I have them all scrubbed out before I cook for the humans in the house.  I didn't bother adding any oils this time, the meat had plenty of fats in it! 

While the meat browned, I finally got my Laundry Soap bottled (in milk jugs that have been washed out and saved)!  I don't fill the jugs all the way, that way there is room to shake up the contents and distribute the soap in the water better.  This batch (the double batch I made a month or so ago) turned out really runny.  But, I got it in three 1-gallon jugs and four half-gallon jugs (but really it's only about 4 gallons of laundry soap)!  Some of it is going to go home with my Mom when she visits next month, but with what I have left still from the first batch I made (about half a gallon) and what I keep of this, I should have a year's supply of soap, lol.

Between filling each jug, I stirred the meat.  Once there was no more pink in the meat, I added both bags of frozen vegetables, normally I thaw these while the other parts cook, but I forgot, so they went in straight from the freezer this time.  It works either way, but the frozen veggies solidified all the fat and looked really gross.  After giving the veggies some time to hang out with the meat a little, I added the Beef broth (to make this, I take my 2-Qt glass measuring cup, [get one if you don't have one they are a kitchen neccessity] and this time only used 4 cups of hot tap water because the rice was already cooked.  I used a Tablespoon and just made it heaping, 4 teaspoons of the base makes 4 cups of broth.  Once you get it off the spoon, microwave it for 2 to 3 minutes and get it nice and hot!  It'll help dissolve the base.).  Let that all come to a boil, it cooks the veggies and lets everything soak up a little broth.  Then, turn off the heat and dump in the rice!  I mixed between each addition of rice, it gets really hard to stir with 12 cups of rice in there!  After it's all mixed, I divide the mixture between the glass bowl I let the rice cool in, the measuring cup, and the stockpot so that it cools faster...don't add dairy to hot food!  Then, we left the house and went to lunch...this stuff takes forever to cool off! 

 

Rosie follows me when I'm cooking Dog Food!

Later in the afternoon, I divided what I had of the Cottage Cheese between the dishes and gave it one last mix.  Then, it was portion-bagging time!  Rosie weighs in at 61 pounds, and most sites suggest 2-3% of the dog weight be fed daily, that puts her food needs at 19.5 to 29.3 ounces.  We give her roughly 2-cups of food, twice a day (two bags of pre-portioned food weigh in at 25.0 ounces).  We bag it all up once cooled into sandwich size ziploc bags for easy feeding throughout the week (Garrick does most of the feeding, I do the cooking).

This batch gave us 13.5 servings (or 6.5 days of food and a little "taster" plate for Rosie when we were done bagging, because who can resist that look on her face after hours of seeing it?

The chickens got the rest of the bag of Spinach, but they didn't eat it!  It's the first thing other than potatoes that they refuse to eat!  I was shocked because they loved it in the winter, but this time it was served room temperature, not hot like before.  Speaking of the gals, they got a mini-coop clean up this morning!  I noticed that the hook we hang our water from was being bent under the weight of the water, so I took it down, scrubbed it clean, and moved it to a new hook (we have 3 to use for the water and food, luckily).  I also hosed out their sandbox, which has been empty for a while now and was beginning to look more like a public bathroom than a place to take a bath in!  Since I was out there anyway, I also took them one-quarter of a "personal size" watermelon that I bought (in June).  The flesh was still very firm, but it was beyond anything I would want to eat.  It took some convincing to get the girls to try it, but they eventually did and last time I checked, they were enjoying the cool treat!  The rest of the melon got cut into sections, bagged, and tossed in the freezer (we have some high 90's days headed our way) for the girls to have another day.  To get them to try the melon, a new food for them, I sprinkled the pieces with Red Chili Pepper pieces (a favored treat and natural wormer), BOSS (just a yummy treat), and finally, a few Meal-worms (Gerty is the only chicken I have that likes these, but once she got interested in the melon pieces, Clyde and Henri soon followed)!

And since I was outside anyway...I went ahead and watered my "deck plants".  They don't get any direct sun in the afternoon/evenings, so I figure I'm okay to do that.  It also is only 83 today, so not scorching!  My Raspberry bushes are really filling in this summer, as is all the weeds and "voluntary" Blackberry bushes!

The one and only tomato plant that I have actually producing any tomatoes is absolutely loaded with them!  I may pick one or two to have with dinner tonight, they look like they might be ready.  They're a little bigger than a Cherry Tomato!

One night this week I'm finally going to harvest some of my Pineapple Sage too, though I'm not sure what night that will be just yet.  It is such a full, bushy plant this year!  I'm hoping that it will make the transition to an indoor plant this Fall, the Stevia did well last year so I am hopeful.  I'd really like to have this herb around year-round!

I'm not quite done with my busy day today either, I need to go do some shopping!  (Twist my arm, huh?)  I'm looking to get enough fabric to make two reversible/lined slings...mostly because my pre-pregnant size is between sizes on the cutting chart, but also because Garrick is squarely in the lerger size and I want him to be able to pack little man around too.  Also, I found a tutorial for making a quilt out of a Jelly Roll that looks super simple and a new skill to be learned (quilting) at the same time!  Then there's the "cover the window on the door" project that I still need to get some magnets for, groceries to buy, and baby stuff to ogle!

Crafts and Fruit!

So, last night I went out to collect the day's egg(s) only to find that one had been broken and half-eaten!  Ew...  So, I had to remove the nest box, bring it inside, and wash the icky, sticky egg gunk out of the bottom of the box (the bottom half of an old, deep, litter box used by our first cat (Garrick's cat).  I left it to dry by the back door over night and this morning, filled it up with fresh straw from the garage (which is where we are currently housing the coop supplies) and took the fresh box out as the girls were looking for their beloved Magenta nest box!

On the way out to the coop, I noticed a bit of bright red poking out from the Raspberry bushes!  We got 6 starts from a lady that Garrick works with last Spring.  I have talked about how and where I planted them before, but the short of it is this...  When we moved in, there was a plastic pond liner in the raised area of our backyard.  I removed the pond and liner after we lost a small bird who couldn't get back out once he/she got in the pond.  So, for several years we had a bog hole in the raised area of our yard...an ugly, filled with weeds, hole.  So, last year, I dumped four large bags of potting soil in the hole and added the Raspberry starts!  Well, nearly one year to the day after getting them planted (they lived in a potting soil bag for a really long time)...I got actual fruit off my bushes!  And oh my god are these yummy!  Super sweet and juicy berries!  After eating two of them, I stopped eating to post this photo on my wall over on Facebook...5 minutes later, I still had that yummy Raspberry flavor lingering in my mouth, like I had just eaten one!

Sadly, while picking my first berries, I also found slugs on my bushes!  I didn't even know we had slugs!  Teeny tiny slugs, but slimy, nasty slug none the less.  So, I guess I need to relocate those homemade slug solutions that I have always zipped right by thinking I didn't need them.  The best solutions I have found are either beer or a mixture of yeast, warm water, sugar, and a bit of salt.  If the girls would behave themselves outside the coop...they are actually better than any other solution to spray and/or trap the little slimy things!  Alas, the girls are too flighty for me to let out and I don't want to risk the berries I have ripening either (I could put one of the girls in the "chicken crate" near the bushes and see if that helps).

I don't know why this one insists on being upside down...

Today's agenda also included finishing pair number two of crocheted baby socks!  They are so "cute"!  I mentioned the other day I was thinking of making "extras" to sell...I'm still thinking about that.  To go with both pairs of socks, I also have made "bookmark bracelets".  I got the patterns (they are different) from a blog called Don't Eat the Paste, I have found several things there that are super fun!  Lots of printable items and such...  Of course, I changed both patterns just a little bit.  The solid blue one got a single crochet (sc) back up the strap and was made using the "diamond" pattern.  Then, I made the "round" pattern in the Ocean variegated thread, but I used one size larger crochet hook and the strap area got a double crochet (dc).  I also added a button to the center of the circle, making it easier to get on/off.  I plan to use one or both of these as "booby bands" or "milk maids" or whatever you want to call them...keep the bracelet on the wrist of the arm nearest the boob that was used last.  I may be able to remember this system...if not, at least I have two pretty cool looking bracelets that also double as bookmarks!  No photos of the bookmarks though, sorry.

I've been trying to get a pair of crocheted baby Converse to work...but I just cannot get that pattern to work!  I guess it's time to get cracking on the reversible baby booties (in chocolate brown and Giraffe print), but those have to wait until I at least get the upstairs vacuumed...my beige carpet looks very black these days.

Other things that I have gotten actually completed recently?  I got a double batch of Laundry Soap made, but not "bottled" yet.  I have a 35-pound cat litter container totally full of soap and 7.5 gallons of empty milk containers waiting to be filled (though I really only have like 4 gallons of soap).

Also, I made a new batch of Shaving "cream" last night!  I ran out of the Rosemary and Mint Conditioner (I also use it to make my Fabric Softener), so I decided to try a new "flavor"!  This time, I bought Suave Professional in Almond & Shea Butter...this is their "moisturizing" formula.  I forgot I needed both Shampoo and Conditioner in this recipe...so there's a bit of both smells.  I went ahead and made a full batch this time.  I also added extra lotion and coconut oil too.  Here is the recipe I used this time:

• 1 cup Rosemary & Mint scented Suave Shampoo ($2.74 for the big bottle)
• 1 cup Almond & Shea Butter scented Suave Conditioner ($2.74 for the big bottle)
• 6 Tablespoons Suave Vitamin E Lotion (I forget what I paid for this, but I have made 2 batches now and still have most of the big bottle left)
• 6 Tablespoons Coconut Oil, melted (I reuse a glass quart jar that had Organic Coconut oil in it, but I use LouAna brand from WalMart...under $8 for a 32-ounce container of it)

I dumped everything into a large yogurt container (I bought two Whole Milk plain yogurt containers on clearance for $1.79 and used the yogurt in making dog food), whisked, and then used a half-cup measure and a funnel to pour the mix into my "shower container" which is a 3-ounce travel container, it holds just under a half-cup perfectly!  I love the scent of this stuff!  In fact, I even used it this morning in the shower as a body wash!  I can't see anything in here that would make it "not appropriate" to use as a body wash.  I get the shaving recipe from One Good Thing by Jillee, I get a lot of recipes from her...including my Fabric Softener!  The above recipe is how I adapted her recipe...it is a very runny mixture, this is why I keep it in a little squeeze tube in the shower...I've also used a ketchup/mustard container, but I found the container just too "big" for my shower.  If you want it thicker, you could reduce the amount of oil in the mix, but that would also reduce the moisturizing properties in the mix too.

I made a ton of dog food this past weekend too!  Well, not so much a "ton"...but it ended up making 16 2-cup servings (or 8 days worth for Rosie)!  Recipe for that as follows:

• 2.25 pounds Elbow Macaroni ($0.58 a pound = $1.30)
• 2 20-ounce packages Ground Turkey (I got these on sale for $3.99 each = $7.98)
• 1 16-ounce package Frozen French Style Green Beans ($1.08)
• 1 16-ounce package Frozen Mix - Broccoli, Cauliflower, Carrot rounds ($1.18)
• 64-ounces Chicken Broth (I used up what was left in my Better than Bouillon Chicken Base, mixed in 8 cups Water)
• 2/3 cup White Rice (this was given to me ages ago)
• 1 32-ounce container Nancy's Organic Whole Milk Yogurt-Plain ($1.79 on clearance)
• 2 Tablespoons Coconut Oil
• 2-3 Tablespoons Olive Oil

First, I cooked the pasta (it was the cheapest one I could find in the bulk bins)...this really only takes me about 10 minutes after the water is boiling.  I then drained the  pasta and piled it into a huge mixing bowl.  Since some of the pasta stuck to the bottom of my stockpot, I added a good helping of Olive Oil to the pan before I put it back on the burner and added both packages of raw turkey meat to the pot.  Once the meat was no longer pink (but not really browned), I added both packages of frozen vegetables, which had been sitting out on the counter since we got home from the store, and gave the mix a good stir.  Then, I dumped in my Chicken Stock, which I had microwaved to bring to a boil before hand.  At this point it looked more like soup than the stiff mix we feed the dog!  I then added the rice to help absorb some of the liquid, I really could have used 1/3 cup or less...the pasta soaked up plenty of the liquid too later on.  Once the rice was cooked, another 10 minutes of boiling, I dumped the cooked pasta into the pot and gave it a really good stir!  At this point, it filled my 12-quart stockpot!  I had to separate my mixture into 3 portions to get the yogurt mixed in to it once it had cooled for a little while!  I didn't let it cool "enough", but after it cooled for about 45 minutes, I got help mixing the quart of yogurt in to everything.  Then, we gave the dog dinner...which we then had to take away from her and put in the fridge to cool it down enough for her to eat, I know...I'm a mean Mom that way!  After she got to eat, we went out to dinner and when we came home, we spent the time to bag individual portions making morning and evening meals much easier!  This batch cost us $13.33 or $0.83 per meal.  We buy canned food for when Rosie won't be with us (and for when I'm super lazy and don't get food made) for $0.68 each.  The problem with the canned food though, Rosie has actually lost weight (3 or 4 pounds in about a month)!  She weighed 61 pounds when I took her in to the vet for a boarding stay at the beginning of the month, she has to be boarded again at the beginning of August, so I'll have a better idea of if I need to up her food consumption.

I think that's all for now...

My Week in a Ramble...

Staying "busy" this week!  Well, not as busy as  I "could" be, but I have got a few things accomplished so far.

Yesterday, I put together a cheap shelving unit to hold all of our "needs charging" stuff (cell phones, Nintendo DS, iPads, Nook, etc...).  Really, it's a shelving unit to hold CD's and DVD's, but it was just the right size to stick at the end of our hallway!  Once we get the offices moved downstairs, it'll be nice to be able to charge cell phones and such near where we sleep and spend most of our time...though that may change with moving the offices downstairs!

I also got a small batch of Banana Chips made using my new Food Dehydrator!  I only bought 3 smallish (medium) bananas, so only got one and a half trays out of the bananas.  It was enough to make maybe 3/4 of a cup once dried, I'll get lots more next time!  Eight to 10 bananas should fill my dehydrator. 

I also (finally) got around to trying that fresh cheese recipe yesterday!  I used half a gallon of Whole milk (the recipe called for raw milk, but store-bought pasteurized milk worked fine), 4 Tablespoons Apple Cider Vinegar (also known as 1/4 cup, but I used my "measure from above" cup that is marked in tablespoons), and 1/2 Tablespoon of Salt (table variety, but to be different I could have used the Black Salt...).  I wasn't really sure how long to let the milk go at a "slow boil", so once it was immediately starting to produce tiny bubbles when I stopped whisking (I used my silicone coated  whisk so I didn't scratch my pot, the original recipe says to stir...her photos looked to have larger curds than I got, but I love the texture I got).  I turned off the heat and started to drizzle the vinegar in, stirring the whole time.  I had added about half the vinegar before the curds and whey started to separate, in fact I was just beginning to think I had messed something up when it "magically" became two distinct textures in the pot (the curds are solid and the whey looks like a pale yellow liquid)!  To strain it, I layered a tightly woven tea towel into a fine mesh strainer over a large bowl.  Then, I laid a double thickness of cheesecloth in the towel.  You really don't need both the cheesecloth and the towel, one or the other would work fine, I just don't think my cheesecloth could handle the cheese on its own (it's the cheap stuff you can get at the grocery store in a little package).  Next time, I'll use just the towel!  To make a harder cheese (think cheese ball here), I added the salt (as suggested in the recipe).  However, next time I think I won't out quite so much salt in, it made the end product very salty!  I dumped my curds into an empty bowl to mix in the salt, it was still too hot to really handle, and I wanted to make sure the salt got distributed.  The recipe says to hang the cheese for several hours (after a few other "get the moisture out" steps.  I'm plain out of places to hang things in my kitchen (ding room, living room, bedroom, office, etc...), so I had to do a bit of thinking about how and where I was going to hang my cheese.  My solution came in the form of my banana hook!  My particular hook happens to be attached to a basket (for fruit and veggies), but since we have never been really "good" about having a spot to keep said basket, it normally just hides in a closet.  It made the perfect place to hang my cheese though!  I set the large bowl I used to catch the Whey under the cheese (in the basket) and tied the towel around the hook for the bananas!  Not only was it out of the way, but I could transport it to other locations (since it was sitting on my stove-top, that came in really handy).  The cheese is now in the refrigerator, along with the (cleaned out, empty) half gallon container, which now is nearly full of Whey!  I was a little surprised with how much Whey came out of the process!  I really don't know why I was though...the cheese ball that was produced was actually quite small, roughly one cup of cheese was produced using one-half gallon of milk.  Without the salt to help harden the cheese, this same recipe makes fresh Ricotta cheese.  It's an extra step, but if I was going to try my hand at making a Lasagna...I think this would be perfect in it!

Today, I have already cleaned the dehydrator's trays (sticky bananas and no wire mesh inserts) and drug out the meat slicer (I guess I should just call it a slicer).  I started peeling my apples because I generally don't like the skins on Apple Chips, but after one apple, I decided to leave the rest with their skins on!  So, I got the slicer set up and began slicing away at the bag of small, red apples I bought over the weekend.  After the bananas yesterday, I was assuming I could do the whole bag of apples (8 apples in total), but was so glad I stopped slicing after 3 apples to load a few trays!  My 3 small apples filled my dehydrator!  I'm glad I got this batch going early in the day now, I'll have an idea of how long they take to dry and came hopefully do another batch overnight tonight.  We're going out of town this weekend for an overnight trip and I want to take some dried fruit with me for snacks!  I also still have a Cantaloupe and a small (personal sized) Watermelon to dry out this week (though one may have to wait until I get home based on the time I have left and other things going on toward the end of the week).

I also need to make another batch of Dog Food up today, mostly because we are down to one serving left of the Hamburger/Veggie/Pasta food I made last weekend.  We actually have a large bag in the freezer with three and a half days worth of the pasta meal in the freezer, but I am/was trying to get ahead of the game (again because of the trip out of town).  So, I need to start the "Pumpkin Barley with Turkey" recipe soon so it has time to cool and I can bag it up.  My plan is to keep out three day's worth of food (Thursday, Friday, and Saturday) and freeze the rest in single day bags.  That way, when we get home of Sunday, I can pull out a few bags and they will be thawed and ready to serve by Monday morning.  For her stay at the vet, I'm not sure what we will do about food...Rosie has been getting a bag of homemade food in the morning and a can of food in the evening.  Plus, as treats (and pill pockets), she has been getting bits of hot dog and other softer foods that I know she likes.  This morning, I broke up one of the apple slices into "easy to swallow" bits for her, the whole slice was just too hard for her to eat!

In the realm of "those pets that live under my deck"...Clyde has decided to go broody!  Gah!  Of course, she waits until I am going to be gone and can't really do anything about it...  I know she just wants to hatch out some cute baby chickens and be a Mom, but I can't have any more chickens, so the answer is no right now!  I noticed it "for sure" yesterday and immediately went down and pulled the fake eggs out of the nest.  This was all I had to do when Henrietta did this in the Fall, so here's hoping!  I've also been making sure I go get the eggs as soon as I see one has been laid.  This morning, when I went to get the egg I saw I also turned the coop lights on to make it not as dark and "homey" for brooding in, I'll turn the light off tonight when I go down to put any stray nesters back up on the roost for the night.  When Clyde decides to sleep in a nest box, unfortunately, so does Henri!  But, last night all I had to do was put Clyde on the roost and Henri followed her up there too (they really are each others shadow), they even stayed on the roost the rest of the night, so I don't think she's as set on brooding as she thinks she is...

My plants are in a love/hate relationship with this weather lately!  The tomatoes are doing well up on the deck, growing inches a day it seems!  But, the lack of sunshine this week is really taking it's toll on them!  As is the colder weather...just past noon today and it is currently warmer in Anchorage, Alaska than it is at my house!  The Rhubarb is thriving in this weather though...especially the set of 6 plants that don't have a hose going out to them yet!  We did buy hoses this last weekend, but I'm not going out in the rain to set them up.  Even the Raspberries are enjoying the added moisture, or it could have been the buzzing bees from a few weeks ago, but I have little fruits forming!  I wasn't expecting any fruit from them this year because they are still such tiny plants!

My weeks just keep getting busier too!  While the weekdays look fairly "clear" if you were to peek at my calendar, they are really filled with my trying to be domestic and all that entails...I hate laundry (putting it away, I actually like washing it), so I have been avoiding that for a few days.  I love to cook, but hate to do the clean up.  But, with only a few really "good" pans, I have to wash dishes just to make the things I need to make (like the dog food)!  Cleaning...this is really something I don't mind, but I have to be "in the mood" for it and it never seems to coincide with when (or how) Garrick gets the same bug!  It's also not something I have been in the mood to do for quite some time, lol.  I'm not a complete slob, we don't live in a filthy, stinky mess...bu it is cluttered and "full".  This week has it's on "busy-ness" too.  On Friday we have our ultrasound!  This is the one where we will hopefully see girl or boy parts!  Yikes, that came up fast (and oh so slow at the same time)!  Because we'll be out of town this weekend, we won't be registering immediately, that will have to wait until next week at some point!  However, the baby shower is right around the corner (first weekend in July), so I can't put it off too long!  We also have plnas to go out to dinner with friends on Friday night...so it'll be a long day.

More on the Dog Food...

So, it's going to cost us somewhere between $1200 and $1700 to have the dog's teeth pulled/fixed!  I'm going to call tomorrow (they aren't open today) and see if there is still time/room to get her in on Thursday...if not, the vet doesn't have another available surgery day until after June 20th!  In the mean time, she needs to be on a soft diet so it doesn't hurt her to eat (when she was forcing herself to do so).

To accommodate her diet needs, I decided that I would spend part of this afternoon making her "meal bags" for the week (knowing I won't want to be getting up with the dog every morning when she wants food).  This is where the problems began...

First, I had a low blood sugar shortly after putting the hamburger (90% lean top sirloin) on to boil.  Of course, the water boiled all over the place while I was off dealing with the low!  So, after we got most of that mess cleaned up, I set a timer for 5 minutes, left the lid cracked and walked away again.  Upon my return to the kitchen (5 minutes later), I discovered that our rice cooker decided that in the middle of cooking a big batch of rice was the perfect time to die (problem #2)!  So, I quickly got the rice dumped into another pot set on the stove.  I stirred my meat that was happily boiling away and set the timer for another 5 minutes after dumping in all the veggies into boiling meat and water.  After another 5 minutes,  I returned again to stir the veggies and check on the rice.  Veggies were almost done, but the rice pot looked "foggy"...  I decided to crack the lid to check on it and was met with a cloud of thick smoke (problem #3)!  In 5 minutes, the rice had not only finished cooking, but had begun to burn!  I quickly got it off the burner and dumped into the now drained meat and vegetable pot.

The smoke from the rice, of course, set off the fire alarm!  I say alarm rather than detector because it set off the alarm that is hardwired into our home security system!  The alarm is beeping, the security panel is yelling "smoke alarm activated", I'm opening windows and pouring water into the pot...and then....the phone starts ringing!  It's the alarm company letting me know that the detector has been activated!  Because, ya know, it was a great time to take a phone call...sheesh!  He was just doing his job, I know that...and it really was nice that he was there making sure I didn't need help from our local fire department today...but why on earth wouldn't they just use the two-way radio that is built in to our system?!?  Garrick was down at the panel trying to get it to shut up...he could have talked to them while I tried to corral all the dog food mess!  I did manage to save the pan I was cooking the rice in...I think, but it really just reinforced the need for a new rice cooker (I ruined a pot making rice in our first year of dating doing this very thing...in fact, I ruined two pots before we bought the rice cooker)!

So, after getting the dog's new food all mixed up and cooling...we made a trip out to Best Buy (because we have a "credit card" there, along with a "reward card" that gives us discounts back, & I have tax exempt status there...we also had a $5 cash off reward to use) to get a new rice cooker.  The old one (that died) held 7 cups of rice, before cooking it...prepared, that was roughly 14 cups of rice!  I never made over 6 scoops though...it tended to boil over when I tried to do 7.  The new one only makes 6 cups of prepared rice (3 scoops).  But, for $20 ($15 with all our rewards) it wasn't a bad deal.  It was also the only one they had, so we didn't really have a choice!  It came with the scoop for adding rice, a paddle (for retrieving rice once cooked), and a steamer basket for meat/vegetables!  The steamer basket will be handy if I choose to continue making food for the dog (which I may have to do depending on how many teeth she looses).

So, besides making 7 bags of meals for the dog...(one a day with a can of wet food in the evening as well), I boiled meat water all over my stove top, "broke" the rice cooker, burnt a pot to black, and set off the smoke alarm!  Yup, I'm that talented...

If anyone is still curious about the dog's food for this week, here is what she gets!

• 1 pound Hamburger (90% top sirloin that we bought for us last week but didn't use)
• 1/2 bag chopped Spinach (frozen)
• 1/2 cup or so of Green Beans (what was left of a frozen bag)
• 1 bag Broccoli Florets (we had 3 bags in the freezer!)
• 3/4 cup Fresh Pumpkin (cooked and frozen back in November)
• 6 scoops of rice (cooked, approximately 12 cups of rice)
• reserved liquid from boiling meat and veggies
• 2 sample size supplements

Boil the meat, when cooked add frozen veggies (not the pumpkin though) and continue boiling until Veggies are soft.  Cook rice.  Strain meat and veggies, but save the juice, that's beef broth packed with vitamins from the veggies!  Add frozen pumpkin and rice to pot with meat and veggies...stir.  I used my rice scoop to scoop some of the broth, as needed, back into the mix, but kept it pretty dry looking overall.  I had a couple of supplement samples left over from DinoVite...Rosie loves their Lick-O-Chops (fish oil for dogs), but was never crazy about the powdered supplement samples, so I sprinkled those in to boost the vitamin content of the food as well.

After it cooled completely, I scooped 2 cups of the mix into Ziploc baggies (I got 7 bags).  To each baggy, I added 1/3 cup of the cooled "broth" as well before sealing them up.  When we give her a bag in the morning, I'll crack a raw egg over it to add a little extra protein as well as all the other things found in yummy "farm" fresh eggs!  Some sites recommend grinding up the eggs, shells and all, but for now, I'll stick to the egg innards only.  She'll also be getting a can of commercial dog food in the evenings to help supplement anything this is missing and provide her with enough food to maintain her current weight (ideally).  Using a "by weight" food calculation for dogs, she should be getting 20 to 30 ounces of food each day, my 2 cup baggies only contain about 16 ounces.

Without the dog supplements in this...it would be perfectly fit for human consumption...but it smells awful, to me at least.

Guilty Dog Mom...

Among other "runnings around" yesterday (that I will talk about later, I promise), we had to take poor Rosie to the vet for a check up and her shots (all way over due).  She'll be 11 years old in September, so we opted for the "Best Care Senior Wellness Checkup", which means they charged us three arms and 6 legs to run blood, urine, fecal tests, as well as take some x-rays too.  With her shots (Bordetella, Rabies, Parvo, and Distemper) the bill for the afternoon was over $400!

We knew she had some bad teeth, but last time we were there, we just could not afford the $400 (or so) per tooth they wanted!  We had to borrow money from Garrick's parents to have our kitty cremated (I know it sounds silly but the alternative was not getting her back at all)!  Yes, it really has been that long since we took the dog in to the vet...at least for a full check up (she was there about 18 months ago for shots when we had her boarded last time).  So, now her teeth are really bad!  We are waiting for a call from the vet today with the blood work results and a price estimate on her teeth (I expect this to be in the thousands of dollars...).  In the mean time though, we have chosen to take Rosie off of her normal diet of dry dog food and just "plump her up" on wet food.  We do have a single can left over from several weeks ago when we were trying to coax her to eat the dry food by mixing some wet in with it, but at 2am last night I had the brilliant idea to use our leftovers to make her a soft food that she would really enjoy (and I could stand the smell of)!

Rosie's Doggy Heaven Breakfast:

• 2 ice cubes frozen Pureed Pumpkin
• 1 small handful frozen Celery (pre diced)
• 1/2 cup of frozen peas
• 1/2 cup frozen green beans
• ~1/3 cup prepared Country Gravy (we buy a powder that you mix with water and "cook" for a few minutes on the stovetop)
• Large helping of leftover Jasmine Rice (from our dinner several nights ago)
• 2 Hard-boiled Eggs (from our girls outside, I keep these pre-peeled and in a jar of water in the fridge)
• 1 RAW Egg (again from the girls!)
• A little of the cooking water from the veggies

I started by microwaving the pumpkin for 30 seconds, then swapped bowls an put the frozen peas and green beans in another bowl with some water and popped those in the microwave for about 2 minutes.  To the pumpkin, I added the celery to thaw it out and cool the pumpkin down a bit.  Meanwhile, I prepared the gravy (I made a half batch, just enough for 2 meals for the dog) on the stove.

After the veggies came out of the microwave, I strained them, but saved the cooking water, and added them to her dog bowl with the pumpkin/celery mix.  Next, I added the rice, I just broke this up the the bag (a ziploc for easy access) and dumped about half of what we had in the bowl (to help cool the hot veggie mix down.  Next, I added the gravy and stirred.  To help up the protein in this, I quickly diced up a couple of hard-boiled eggs and stirred them in (no pre-cooked meat or that would have been good too).  I added a bit of the cooking water because it looked really "dry" to me.  Lastly, I cracked a raw egg over the bowl and gave one last good stir!

All in all, this filled about half of her dog bowl and she gobbled up the whole thing (I assume) and is now hapily asleep at my feet 5 minutes after putting the bowl down for her!

The Dog LOVES It!

So, here it is...a review of the Bil-Jac Dog Food that Rosie has been taste testing for me!  At around $17 for the 6-pound bag, this is one spendy dog food!  Especially since it looks more like Rabbit or Chicken feed!

My dog, who just turned 10 years old, has always been a fussy eater.  She has also had a very sensitive digestive system!  As a puppy, the only thing she could keep down was boiled hamburger and white rice, even a little salt or pepper meant big trouble.  So, as the years have gone by, we have always had to try to balance what she could eat with what we can afford, not always an easy thing to do!

The price of Bil-Jac dog food really saddens me, it is nearly twice the price of the food she was eating before getting the opportunity to try Bil-Jac!  We have been discussing making this a permanent switch for her diet, as she has been doing very well on this food.  Our minds were made up for us the other day after giving her the “Two Bowl Challenge”!  While she did end up eating both bowls of food (half a scoop of each kind), her overwhelming choice was Bil-Jac!  She barely gave a sniff to her old “favorite” food until she had licked the bowl of Bil-Jac clean!  However, the addition of the old food meant she spent the day begging to go outside due to stomach “troubles”…poor old girl!  As we used the last full serving of the bag of Bil-Jac this morning, I am on my way back to the store to purchase another bag of Bil-Jac!  The dog obviously prefers it and I honestly don’t want to put her through the trauma of digestive stress again! 

It may be worth mentioning that they were out of the senior formula when we went to get our trial bag, so we got her a bag of the sensitive formula.  The next bag will be the senior formula, but we will go back to the sensitive if the senior causes any issues.

For now anyway, Rosie will be munching on Bil-Jac...until we can't afford it any more.  I really hope this stuff goes on sale soon though!  My plans for today are to go buy her the next size up bag (17 to 20 pounds)...it runs around $23 for that size though!  If anyone else has a finicky dog food eater, I do have coupons to share!  For now...I will be keeping a close eye out for this to go on sale (and buy in bulk if/when it does)!

Has it really been that long?!

Oof!  I suppose it has been a busy week for me...

Let's see...the Spokane Interstate Fair started last Friday.  I was called in to cover a shift that evening.  What I learned from that shift was that all of my capri length pants are too big!  That includes the pair I bought in May...I have hardly even worn them!  So, on my "to do" list before my shift on Tuesday was a little shopping!  I ended up at Dress barn (I hate the name of that store by the way...) where I was lucky enough to find some really nice "dress" capris!  Not only that, but since "short pants" weather is technically behind us half-way through September, they were on clearance for 50% off!  Sadly, they only had one pair in my (new) size, or I would have bought more!  The sale price made them $15 each.  As for my size, I have gone down another size!  Since October 7, 2010 I have gone from a size 28 (yikes!) to a 20!  Go me!  Ha!

I was also called Monday to find out if I could work at the fair, but I hadn't got my shopping done yet, so I didn't go Monday morning...I went and bought the above mentioned pants, a pretty new shirt, and another pair of shoes.  This is my third pair this summer!  I "popped" the toning ones with their air-filled medicine ball type design after only 3 weeks and the pair of Airwalks I bought to replace them seriously hurt my feet!  I got another pair of "toning" shoes, but these have a solid rubber sole, no air pockets to pop!


Yesterday was my day as a "dog promoter" at the fair...Spokanimal brought a puppy to the fair!  Way too little in my, oh so humble, opinion...he's only 3 months old and hasn't had all of his shots.  All of the cats and the puppy were on antibotics too...no idea why though.

Today I am running the prize wheel!  Come win a prize (if we have any...we ran out yesterday morning)!  Then it's off to spend quality time with my other half before we go see the Weird Al concert tonight!!!

News from the home front...we got our coupon to start Rosie on a new dog food from BzzAgent!  Awesome program where you get stuff to try/test out and then give your (or in this case my) honest opinion about it!  Right now I am participating in two campaigns...one for a clothing website, which I will discuss later, and the second is for Bil-Jac dog food.

There was no need to "transition her to the new food, just opened the bag and started feeding.  As a picky-ish eater of dog food (she'll eat everything else without stopping to taste it), I was a little surprised when she scarfed this down!  She is absolutely in love with the new food!  It looks like pellet feed for rabbits or chickens...but she likes it.

I'm a bit rushed this morning, so more on that later too!  Have an awesome Wednesday!

Happy September!

Yes, I know...I'm late.  It's been another one of those stretches where I just don't feel like typing out anything lately...  But, now I get to play catch up!

If you haven't figured it out by now, I'm a huge "math geek"...I do math problems for fun!  This works out well for my Diabetes needs sometimes...it has led me, on many occasions, to charting out my blood sugars in more detail than any health care provider could ever dream of!  My medical chart at my pediatrician's office was a 5-inch 3-ring binder!  At that point (way back in the early 1990's), we didn't have a home computer, so I did it all by hand, using graph paper, a ruler, and colored pencils!  Thank "Fluffy" for Excel!  These days I chart my blood sugars using an Excel workbook that I have created and adapted over the last 4 and a half, or so, months.  The latest addition to my workbook has been a Hemoglobin A1C predictor...  I looked everywhere online for something I could refer to, but since it is such a specialized test, not too many have any interest in knowing exactly how it is calculated...this is the first time in nearly 21 years I have bothered looking it up.  To make things that much harder, the powers that be decided to "update" what the numbers reflect in 2010!  What that means is that the lovely chart I did manage to find was essentially useless now!  So, I set out to replicate it using the "current" number data.

The first thing I had to do was figure out exactly "how" the A1C's were calculated.  For this, a quick Google search brought me to eHow health, this article actually gives the calculation in it (step 4)!  To double check that it was indeed using the current numbers, I had to do my math thing and get it to work "backwards" and give me a mean blood sugar (average) reading based on an A1C number, it worked!  In comes a spreadsheet...

5% is a little low...but nice information to have and 16.9% is way too high, but again, I think it is nice information to have on hand!  As a child/teenager, my HbA1C was usually around 12%...I can see now why they wanted to lower it!  My last test result was 7.1%, up from 7.0% from the visit 3 months before.  I also have another test coming up on Tuesday, but I have a better idea of what it should be now that I have this (and 3+ months of records)!

My weekly logs in Excel run Tuesday through Monday, but I keep a daily record of each day's average blood sugar (the mean) and then get an average of the averages at the end of each month.  I suppose I could take each reading individually, but this way is just faster for me!  I already had my spreadsheet set to color code readings, but I will be changing that so that each whole percentage point has its own color (for quick reference).  The center number (182) is the weekly average so that I can double check my numbers and make sure there isn't a typo somewhere.  The 3-month average here is June, July, and August...I am assuming that on Tuesday, I will get a 7% test result...which will be down from the last one, which is good, but I wish it was even lower!  My goal for the appointment I will inevitably be having in December (I go every 3 months), is to have it down to 6.9 (6.8 if I am very lucky)!  I did extremely well in June...my month-end average was 143 (6.2%), but July and August have been harder for me to control my blood sugars.  I picked up a new prescription of Humalog yesterday...I'm hoping "newer" insulin will fix my issues with my blood sugars!  The last time I picked up any Humalog was January...the pens aren't set to "expire" until October of 2012...but I wonder if the temperature in my refrigerator caused some ill-effects.  We shall see soon enough!  I am about halfway through my last "old" pen and have a fresh box to start on next!

Speaking of Tuesday's appointment...I have a whole list of stuff to go over with my doctor (nurse practitioner)!  Without having exact dates for surgery (or knowing what type they are thinking about preforming...depending on the type, I could be hospitalized for the afternoon or up to a week), I need to know what she has to say about my diet and potentially being "laid up" where I can't necessarily make my own food and medical choices.  Not that I plan to give those over to anyone...but they might fight me on it, lol.  I am totally prepared to eat nothing but Atkins bars and shakes (most likely shakes until they okay solid food) that I will have smuggled in.  Well, not "just" Atkins...I have flavored protein shakes that I like that I will also smuggle in.  I'm also planning on bringing my Excel workbook...at least a portion of it!  My meter loses time and the daylight savings feature never works...so the info it gives is useless, when, that is, they can get it to upload at all!  I'll just bring a copy of my records...they are better anyway (I don't record my meds in my meter, even though it does have that feature)!  I also have pretty graphs...even though I can't seem to figure out how to get my high/low lines to show up properly!

In "Chicken news", Gertrude likes her meal worms so much, she is learning tricks for them!  She does know "sit"...I swear, she just wanted to show off how she could jump for the goodies when I had video rolling!  Her "sit" is basically just a squat, but it is so damn cute!  As soon as I even touch the bag, she is at my feet begging for them!  The other two don't even like meal worms!  They do, however, love BOSS!  So, I have been tossing them BOSS before Gerty gets any worms...
Another favorite for all of the girls is "weed salad"!  We have a hill in the backyard that is perpetually covered in weeds...we tried to eradicate it earlier this year, but it didn't last long.  This works out for the girls though, I grab them a handful every day and toss it in the coop to give them something "new" to do and stay busy.  Yesterday, I just had to capture this after I tossed in a rather large load of "salad"!  They just love ripping apart the whole plants and the grass is a favorite for all!  There is also Dandelion greens and some unknown weed that Henri just loves eating the flower/seeds off the tops of!  There was nothing left but stalks by bed time...

The coop and run are getting "prettied up" today!  The bedding in the coop needs changing (I don't scoop the poo out, I just mix it all in, so it needs changed now), the sandbox is nearly empty, so I need to scoop the poo out of it and have the other half help lift a new bag of sand into it (I can't get the bag out of the trash can we use in the run for storage), I need to add hooks to hang the feed and water from (the feeder got here Thursday evening and water nipples should be here by next Friday...drilling buckets for those today!) and generally just making it look "less messy" as the girls are having visitors tomorrow!  Another Spokane resident is looking into building himself a coop and having a small flock and wants ideas on how to go about it, so I told him he could bring his family over to check out the setup we have.

I finally got around to trying a Cheesecake recipe too!  I ended up making a Chocolate Cheesecake with a Hazelnut Crust, only 4 grams of net carb per slice (1/12th of the pie)!  It is silky smooth and a little bit bitter...but that is expected with only 1/4 cup Splenda in the whole thing!  The author recommends serving this with a drizzle of Sugar Free Chocolate Sauce (Hershey's makes a decent one...), I forgot it though when I served it!  This is also one of the simplest cheesecake recipes I have ever made!  First, there is no cream cheese in it...the "cheese" in cheesecake comes in the form of Cottage Cheese and a little Sour Cream!  It was super simple, with only a few ingredients...cottage cheese, sour cream, eggs (I used our backyard fresh eggs), baking chocolate, Splenda...that's it!  The crust was simple too...Hazelnuts, Protein Powder (Vanilla, but this would be even better using Chocolate!), and Butter!  It looks, acts, and tastes very close to a Graham Cracker Crust!

Did I mention it has been a busy week?  I also got some new crochet projects finished!  The square(ish) thing is a hot pad...It's cute and all, but I don't think I'll be making that pattern again!  The other thing is a hearthstone...for those non-WoW (World of Warcraft) players...this is a thing in your inventory that you click on and it sends you "home".  For the WoW players...yes, I know the colors are backwards!  My first few attempts at this pattern were painful to say the least, as it turned out, I was following the pattern wrong (it was written badly) and the yarn I was using (the "white") was just too thin to use for the body of this project.  Since it is going to the newest member of the family...I didn't think he would mind, but hos oldest brother might!  It is about the size of my hand and made from soft baby yarn, so I deemed this a perfect baby toy!  I even know how and where it is going...ha!

The cat stuff finally got moved upstairs to a location we are more likely to remember to do things like scoop the poo every night.  Having two large cats, this is a necessary evil...otherwise they fill the box in a couple of days!  This is their new set up...the chest of drawers is pulled out from the wall about 6 inches so they have easy access to the litter box, but the dog cannot get in there for "snacks".  The step stool is blocking the "kitty hallway" from the dog as well.  We cleaned off the top of thew chest fpr their food, the large feeder has the "normal" food and the small one has Baby's "special" food (only he eats it, but it is good for both of them).  That is Baby hanging out on the step stool...it is his new favorite hang out spot!

I'm not sure if I posted this or not, but last weekend, my other half and I went out to Liberty Lake so I could volunteer at Mutt Strut!  While the shelter's "big dogs" were on the 1.5 mile walk/2.5 mile run, we got to hang out with the 3 puppies the shelter had brought along!  They are labs mixes (and most assuredly gone to homes by now), so freaking cute!  The other shelters that were there were sure my other half was going home with this sweet little girl, we did not though...  Looks just like Rosie when I first got her (10 years ago)!

I think that's it...we did have plans this weekend, but without consulting me, those plans were changed...so back to making my "logbook" Excel workbook even better instead!