Chocolate Chip Muffins

Yesterday evening my son and I made muffins for the lunch box.  After almost 3 weeks off over Christmas it has been kind of hard to get back into the routine of the real school and work life......

We made chocolate chip muffins, to use up some of the sour cream from the refrigerator : )

Chocolate Chip Muffins

1/3 cup canola oil

3 heaping tbsp ground flax seed

1 cup sour cream

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

2/3 cup granulated sugar

3/4 tsp baking soda

3/4 tsp baking powder

1 tsp cinnamon

1cup all purpose flour

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1 cup chocolate chips

Mix together in order listed and bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.  Enjoy!

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Gifting Bread

For those of us that grow up on the Saskatchewan prairies there is nothing more comforting than a loaf of fresh bread.  It is like a birthright for us, and it is what we know will always provide comfort.

Maybe it's the being surrounded by grain all of our lives, but we learn how to make this product, and even into our adulthood, it provides comfort and the feeling and sense of "home". 

Today, I packaged up a loaf for my colleague friend - a Stubbler Jumper as well, as I knew she would appreciate this offering. 

In true Saskatchewan frugal fashion I created a wonderful package.

The paper wrap is from the shipping boxes that Stampin Up sends out.  After cutting to size I stamped the greeting with the Creatively Yours stamp set, used Early Espresso Bakers Twine, and a button.  

TAH DAH!

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

A Day of Mourning; Kitchenaid Style

I decided that today I would make bread again, using my ever trusty Kitchenaid Stand Mixer.  For the past 13 years it has been in my home mixing everything from butter cream icing, to bread.  I have grated over 100 lbs of cabbage in a single evening with it, sliced 50 lbs of beets on another evening, mixed countless batches of cookies and just about anything else in between, most recently I have even started grinding whole grains with the grain attachment.

Sadly, today, I believe it has reached the end of it's life.  The smoke pouring out of it's head, and the crackling sound inside leads my horrified self, husband and brother staring in shock at it as it smoked and crackled itself out (yes, we had the fire extinguisher - I keep one in the kitchen - why? why not?).

Now, it sits stinking on my counter, I believe I will have to get more of a heavy duty one of these for what I use it for....

However, before it completely started on fire, I did manage to rescue the bread dough, and bake it:

Here are three of the six loaves I made - and yes it you check out any of the reviews for this stand mixer it will tell you it is good for up to 3 loaves of bread, so if you have one of the 300 - 325 watt mixers, don't over work them like I did mine, however, it did do this for almost 13 years.....

Funeral service will be tomorrow as garbage collection is early Tuesday morning : (

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Steel Cut Oats Microwave Style

Almost every morning, I make Steel Cut Oats for my son and I for breakfast.  Since I know you can make instant oatmeal in the microwave I thought there was no reason why I could not made Steel Cut Oats in the microwave.  This brings me to the point of this blog post, most people cannot believe I do this!

 

To be able to cook it long enough in the microwave, you need a really good microwave dish, which until recently has been a Corning Ware Baker, but sometimes, it boiled over : (

 

Back in November my friend and I attended the SCARS (Second Chance Animal Rescue Society) Christmas Bizarre for fundraising for this cause.  She and her family adopted a puppy from last years event, and I of course have the garbage dump rescue cat for my son.  While we were there I met Andreea who is a Pampered Chef Consultant.  She had on display the Small Batter Bowl!  It is 4 cups/1000 mls, glass and perfect for the microwave.  

 

Today I used it for the first time, and here is how I make my Steel Cut Oats in the microwave:

2 cups milk

2/3 cup Steel Cut Oats

- place in microwave safe bowl

- microwave for 6 - 8 minutes, (I like my oatmeal more soupy than chewy) -cook longer if you like sticky oatmeal

- stir every couple of minutes just to get all the bottom oatmeal cooked

- after cooking pour into glass dishes, wait a couple of minutes before serving

I always add a bit of brown sugar to mine, my son likes sprinkles or a few chocolate chips on his, sometimes a bit of cinnamon - let your imagination go!!!!

Enjoy!

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Sweet Shop Sweets for the Sweet

Last night I decided to play with some of my favorite papers, this of course is one of them!  I LOVE candy (really)!

The card base is Island Indigo, layered of course with Sweet Shop Designer Series Paper, the edges are sponged with Island Indigo Ink as well, and then I just had fun with my left over Sweet Shop Stickers placing them on the Whisper White Card Stock. 

The ribbon is left overs as well (OMG - I am using last years product again) : ) from Sale-a-bration 2012 at Stampin Up, and the little brad was also part of the Sweet Shop line last year.

The greeting is from the Sweets for the Sweet Stamp set.

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Knitting in Canmore

Alright, so I am knitting in Canmore again.  For those of you that frequent my blog you will by now know that I spend a lot of time in Canmore, knitting. 

The reason I spend so much time here is partly because it is beautiful, and partly because my son skis here weekly.  Since I love knitting and it is such an easily transportable craft, I tend to do a lot of it in Canmore.

I actually bought this yarn almost a year ago at River City Yarns.  It took me a while to catch on to how exactly to knit with it, but now that I have figured it out, you can actually knit this during one ski lesson, and evening in front of prime time television!

This is a picture of why I love Canmore and in general Kananaskis Country, and Peter Lougheed Provincial Park.  How much fun is it so ski with this as your view?  It's beautiful!

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy

Knitting in the New Year

I am often asked how I have the time to craft along with working almost full time, taking my child to art, violin, piano, swimming, skiing, and horse riding each week, and making sure that there is a homemade, food group balanced warm dinner on the table every night. 

Well, one of my secrets is that I really do not sleep much at night.  I am one of those people who vary seldom gets more than about 5 hours of sleep, but  I think that they must be quality sleep because I am able to function quite well on this.

Now, New Years was not an exception to my being able to craft all night, not because it was planned that way, but because I managed to somehow destroy/break/generally make unsuable my insulin pump!!!! 

A frantic call to Medtronic late in the evening, and a new pump was dispatched out to me, however its ETA was almost 11 hours later.  That meant that without an insulin pump, I had to check my blood glucose every 1 - 2 hours all night long to give myself injections of insulin with a syringe (OMG - it was like being a kid again). 

The benefit of this I guess. is that while I waited for my new purple insulin pump to arrive I knitted socks all night long, and was able to finish this pair.

Once the pump arrived and I put the new one on, I along with these socks slept most of New Years Day.

Happy New Year Everyone!

Hope this inspires your own creativity...

Kathy