handmade christmas

The past few weeks have been filled with family celebrations, gift-making, gift-giving, and so much food!  And while this little blog of mine was on my mind off and on throughout the festivities, I decided it was time to take a little break from it and simply be immersed in the all of the wonderful things that were happening around me.  I hope you were able to do the same!  

However, I thought it was about time to get back into the swing of things and share with you a bit of the handmade goodness that was gifted this Christmas.  There was less making this year than there usually is, with a late end to the school semester, choir concerts, and all things baby-related, but I was rather pleased with the few handmade things that did make it under the tree.  

The first of the handmade gifts was for our two 1.5 year old nieces.  For each of them I made a Pointy Kitty (pattern by WeeWonderfuls).  The girls were delighted with their kitties and both proceeded to cuddle and kiss them, and make everyone else do the same.  I do love handmade gifts that get that kind of reception! 

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For our little nephews, I made them each a set of woodland creature finger puppets (an original creation by yours truly).  I love creative play toys!  While they often get quickly tossed aside for flashier, more recognizable toys in the excitement of gift opening, the little ones tend to come back to the creative play toys later in the day and get lost in their own little worlds creating characters, voices, and stories all on their own.  The spontaneous puppet shows that I saw throughout Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were delightful.  

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There were also a few knitted gifts finished moments before gatherings and given before pictures could be taken, but what would Christmas be if it didn't include last minute handknits!?  This year's knits included A Very Gifted Cowl and a pair of socks.  

The last of the handmade gifts included bottles of our favorite coffee liqueur (recipe in Homemade Pantry), also made just days before being gifted.  My family knows me well enough to expect things like coffee liqueur and soap to come with a "best if used after date."  In spite of the recommended waiting period, the coffee liqueur was fought over and won with triumph in our annual dice game.  I'd say it was a hit!  

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How about you??  Did some lovely handmade items make it under your trees this year??  I sure do hope so.  I love how handmade gifts bring more meaning back into what has become such a consumer driven holiday.  There is something so loving and intentional about the making process that reminds me of the importance of giving and showing others how they are worth more than our money, they are worth our time, energy, and creativity as well.  

As we wrap up this year and move into the next, I wish you all a very happy evening of celebrations and a fresh start into the year that awaits us!

baby bottom salve

The baby creations and preparations continue around here!  This is one that I'm excited to try and see how well it works.  Having read quite a lot about herbs that are good for skin dryness and rashes, I came up with this mixture of herbs and oils and turned it into a salve to be used both as a baby bottom salve and a nipple salve.  The herbs in the mixture are calendula flowers, which are known to promote healing of rashes and skin issues, as well as calm and soothe the affected area, plantain leaves, which are great for treating any kind of skin issue or irritation, and chickweed leaves, which are great at soothing skin irritation.  I was able to find all of these herbs in my backyard!  The calendula I grew this summer and the plantain and chickweed are both considered weeds and I was able to find both in my yard.  You can also find all of them online in dried form at Mountain Rose Herbs.  After letting these herbs infuse in some olive and almond oil for awhile, I mixed them with some beeswax and essential oils.  I chose lavender and tea tree for my essential oils.  Lavender for its smell and soothing/calming qualities, and tea tree for its antiseptic properties.  The salve that I ended up with has a faint scent to it and can easily be applied to skin.  I'll let you know in a few months how well the finished product works!  Stay turned for the update!  

How about you??  Do you have a favorite natural remedy for diaper rashes??

Baby Bottom Salve

1 cup of oil (I used half olive oil and half almond oil)

a small handful of calendula flowers, plantain leaves, and chickweed leaves

1-2 tablespoons of beeswax

15-20 drops of lavender essential oil

5-10 drops of tea tree essential oil

Pick the flowers, plantain leaves, and chickweed and let them wilt in the sun for an hour or so.  After they are slightly wilted (and some of the water has evaporated out of them) combine them and the oil in a glass jar and close tightly with a lid.  Let infuse in a warm sunny place for 4-6 weeks.  After the infusion is complete, strain out the herbs and place the oil and 1 tablespoon of the beeswax in a double-broiler.  Heat until the wax has melted and been thoroughly incorporated into the oil.  Place a small amount on a spoon and put into the freezer until it has cooled.  Test the salve for consistency and add more beeswax, if needed, to reach the desired consistency.  Once you are satisfied with the consistency, add the essential oils, stir to combine, and pour into jars.  

my new friend

The holiday season is in full swing in this house and the itch to get the Christmas making underway is definitely on my mind throughout most days.  So, with all that, I'm so very thankful for my new friend, Naomi the Janome.  (Yes, I named my new sewing machine...who doesn't?!?)  She's beautiful and we are quickly becoming close friends.  You may be wondering how Naomi came to be in my life...well, don't worry...I'm about to tell you...

You see, this past Saturday, I finally had a day with little to nothing that I had to do and I was so very excited to spend a good chunk of the day sitting at my sewing machine.  With this baby on the way, there have been several sewing projects in the works and several more on the to-do list, and so the thought of sewing for hours while Christmas music played and Christmas lights lit up the house, sounded absolutely heavenly.  So, to my machine I went!  However, after about 30 minutes of sewing, a gear on my dear old 1967 Singer Stitch & Sew broke.  Now, I've had many a gear break on me with this machine over the past several years and I've become quite good at replacing them and resetting the timing.  And while I've thought many times that it would be lovely to have a machine that didn't give me so much trouble, it has been hard to imagine not using my dear old beauty.  She has become very dear to me, as I taught myself how to sew on her and she helped me sew my wedding dress and most of Baby's quilt (still in the works!), not to mention all the many, many other creations we've made together over the years.  However, with Baby's soon approaching arrival, I had been strongly considering getting a new machine in order to make my sewing experiences more efficient and more pleasant.  About a month ago I finally decided that it was time and so I started saving a bit of money and added "Sewing Machine Funds" to my Christmas lists.  

Then, when I wound up with a broken gear and a whole open day ahead of me on Saturday...I found myself rather upset about the timing of it all.  It is crunch time for Christmas making and Baby will be here in just 3 short months!  Not to mention, I had been so very excited to make things!  Sad, I was, very sad.  There may have even been some tears (which may or may not have been brought on by pregnancy hormones).  So, I busied myself with other little projects around the house, trying not to let it ruin my lovely Saturday.  But then my sweet, sweet husband came home and brought with him my new friend Naomi--the exact sewing machine that I had been looking at and all as a "just because" gift from him.  More tears flowed at this point.  A new sewing machine?!?!?!  For me?!??!?!  Oh, dear.  I was (and still am) ecstatic!  

For now, my dear old Singer is tucked safely in her table and Naomi is sitting gracefully on a cutting board on top of her.  The difference between the two machines is amazing!  Naomi sews so smoothly and quickly and the way she winds a bobbin is quite impressive!  I must admit...I have a bit of a crush on her... Over the past few days, we've managed to make quite a bit of headway on that baby to-do list.  It feels fabulous!!  I am so very thankful for her and even more so for my wonderful husband.  He is so generous, thoughtful, and loving.  I'm blessed to have a man who knows me so well and who supports my hobbies and me so completely.  I love you a bushel and a peck, my dear.  Thank you for making me feel like a queen. 

pumpkin, pumpkin all week long

I get a little excited about holidays.  I think I owe it partially to my mom who instilled a great love for tradition and celebration in all of us, but I also think its because holidays mean time with family and delicious food and relaxation (at least in theory...I'm realizing that there is less and less relaxation in my adult-woman holiday life...ahem...I'm also not anticipating this getting any better with a little one on the way...).  I also find the winter holidays to be especially magical with the cold weather appearing, the possibility of snow, and candles and lights galore.  Nothing says cozy quite like the holiday season in the upper midwest!  

And so, with the start of this holiday season just days away, I've found myself more than a little a excited.  In spite of a nasty head cold that hit me on Saturday, our house is spotlessly cleaned and the Thanksgiving decorations and preparations are collecting in various areas of the kitchen and dining room.  Candles are burning and filling the house with the smells of the holiday.  And then there are things made from pumpkin.  We can't forget the pumpkin.  

This year I bought two pie pumpkins at our local garden shop.  They've been sitting in the kitchen since before Halloween and every weekend I've had plans to bake them and get them ready to be turned into something heavenly.  This past weekend was it!  And my goodness, did I underestimate the amount of pumpkin puree that those two things would produce!  I ended up with about 8 cups of cooked pumpkin!  So, the week started off with a batch of pumpkin muffins and will continue with two pies for Thanksgiving and hopefully a batch of pumpkin pancakes come Saturday (I'm thinking of giving this recipe a try)!  Hooray for pumpkin!  

How about you??  What are your favorite things to do with pumpkin at this time of year??

winterizing the ladies

Wow!  What a crazy couple of weeks it has been!  With mid-semester grading, baby preparations, winter preparations, choir rehearsals and concerts, and my best friend visiting, I feel as though I've been running non-stop!  Thankfully, though, we've had a enough time to get a few of the winterizing tasks checked off the to-do list, and just in time as the cold weather arrived yesterday and seems to be here to stay!

One of those tasks has been to get the girls ready for the long winter months ahead.  They were in need of a good coop cleaning, but they've also been in need of a bit more space.  When we got our two new chicks in the spring, we knew that we'd eventually need to figure out a solution for the limited run space that we have for our ladies.  For the summer, we made a makeshift fence that connected to the run and allowed them a bit more space in which to roam, dig, dust bathe, and do their chicken things.  This worked great for the summer when we were home so much during the day, but it was not a great solution for the fall, winter, and spring since the ladies had their ways of escaping their confinement.  So, a couple weeks ago, Dan made the fence around their chicken yard, as I like to call it, a bit more permanent!  He also expanded it to include the space behind the coop next to the covered wood pile.  The ladies love it!  They have more places to explore, hang out, and escape from any possible predators.  It's a perfect solution to our crowded run!  Hooray!  Over the next few weeks, the opening from the run to the chicken yard will also become a closing door of sorts with a latch to help protect our ladies from possible nighttime predators.  

The ladies' water heater has also been returned to them, along with their run light which extends their daylight hours a bit.  Once the snow starts blowing, they'll also get a layer of plastic wrapped around the lower half of their run to protect them from the elements a bit more.  They seem pleased with all these changes, both in scenery and weather.  However, at least four of our five older chickens are in the middle of their fall molt right now and so this sudden cold front may have caught their naked little bodies by surprise.  Naked chickens...really, you'd think they'd have more decency!  

Alas, it feels so very good to have the ladies ready for the long winter ahead.  I know I'm ready for the shorter days and the cold quiet evenings. I hope they are too. 

a blanket for baby

Before this baby was officially on it's way, plans for this blanket were in place.  In May I decided to place an order for a lovely colorway of Madelinetosh DK Twist in Deco Green.  A blueish-green had been decided on as an accent color for the baby's room and so I took a leap and ordered yarn online, hoping the color would be right.  And, by golly, it wasn't just right, but it was as perfect as perfect can be!  I'm so very in love with the color (which I've found very difficult to capture in the photos below). With it, I knit up this unique little pinwheel blanket for baby!  It was a super easy knit, perfect for all of our road trips over the summer (my Ravelry notes can be found here).  Now, it's just patiently waiting to be wrapped around a snuggly baby.  Soon, little blanket, soon.  

venison and beef enchiladas

I was asked over a year ago by a reader if I could share a few venison recipes.  Well, while we do eat a lot of venison, I often to stick to the usual suspects when it comes to recipes (roasts, steaks, stews, stroganoff, etc.)  This year, though, I think I'll be doing a lot more experimenting because we have quite a few pounds of ground venison now filling our freezer, since Dan got a buck in early September with his bow and we paid someone else to process it due to the warm temperatures.  Ground venison is an interesting type of meat...and I mean interesting in a true Minnesota Nice fashion.  To be more direct, I'm generally not a fan.  It tends to be gamey and a little tough (which makes sense considering that it is often ground from cuts of meat that are less than desirable).  In the past, I've tried making chili and tacos with ground venison and the leftovers have ended up going to the chickens.  

I think I'm learning the trick, though, to making ground venison work for me.  The key is to always mix it with beef (or pork).  So, two nights ago, I experimented with a venison and beef enchilada recipe and the results were great!  There was very little gamey taste and the texture was not an issue at all!  So, if you also find yourself with a freezer full of ground venison...here's a recipe you may want to try.  Of course, if you don't have access to venison, you can simply use ground beef.  Our enchiladas ended up falling apart because of the type of corn tortillas I used, but they still tasted delicious! 

Enjoy!

Venison and Beef Enchiladas

1/2 lb ground venison

1/2 lb ground beef

1 small onion, diced

1 small green pepper, diced

1 jalapeño, diced

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 tablespoon chili powder

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

salt/pepper to taste

8 ounces queso fresco

corn tortillas

green or red enchilada sauce (I used a jar of my salsa verde)

sour cream

Brown the meat along with the onions, green pepper, and jalapeño in a large skillet.  After a few minutes, add the garlic, chili powder, cumin, oregano, and salt/pepper.  Once the meat is fully cooked, add about 2/3 of the quest fresco, loosening it into small pieces.  Stir to melt and incorporate.  

Heat the oven to 350 degrees.  Pour some of the enchilada sauce into a pie plate or shallow dish.  Dip a tortilla into the sauce and coat both sides.  Scoop 1/4 cup to 1/2 cup of the meat mixture (depending on the size of the tortilla) onto the tortilla.  Gently fold the tortilla and place it with the seam-side down into a medium-sized casserole pan. Continue to fill the tortillas until you have filled your pan or used all of your meat mixture.  Pour the remaining enchilada sauce over the folded tortillas and sprinkle the rest of the queso fresco on top of the enchiladas.  Bake for 20 minutes. Serve with sour cream and your hot sauce of choice!

Serves 4.    

put up and put away

It's official!  The canning season in this house has come to an end!  My canning supplies have been crowding our kitchen for the last few weeks in hopes that a batch of apple butter would somehow find its way into my canner and onto my shelves, but this past weekend, I resigned myself to the reality that we're not going to have apple butter this year (nor any jam for that matter...darn strawberries and raspberries!).  And so, with that sigh of resignation, I moved the canner and it's accompanying parts back down to the basement and put them away.  Away until next June when the strawberries return and the gardens begin to once again produce their bounty.  

Along with that sigh of resignation, however, came a sigh of relief.  THE CANNING IS DONE!!!!  Hooray!!!!!  This means that winter is on its way and with it will come a much slower pace--quieter weekends, quieter evenings, and more time to knit, sew, and read.  Yes, a sigh of relief, indeed!  I love August and September and my many hours spent in my kitchen prepping veggies and such in order to preserve them, but after awhile, it gets a bit exhausting to plan my life around ripe tomatoes and the like.  The freedom that follows putting that canner away is quite lovely--not to mention the shelves full of preserved summer goodness!  

This summer, I was able to put up jars of tomatoes, tomato soup, tomato sauce, salsa verde, corn, applesauce, pickled tomatoes, pickled cucumbers, pickled mixed veggies, and fermented jalapeños, as well as a gallon of frozen blueberries, a gallon or so of frozen green beans, and a few different types of dried herbs.  Running down to the basement to grab some of that home-preserved goodness never gets old!  I find it rewarding each and every time I open a jar, add its contents to a meal, wash it up, and put it back on the shelf for next summer.  It feels so fulfilling, so resourceful, and so very satisfying.  

Yes, putting away the canner for the season is good, but by the time next summer comes around, I'll be very ready to take it back out again and start the process over.