Tiny Fingers and Tiny Toes!

I am sorry for being absent for so long! I have been occupied with our new baby! He is a precious little boy. We will call him Boy in the Mid-west here on the blog or BMW for short. (We don't make a practice of sharing our real names or face pictures on the internet.)


He was born one week past his due date. I was not looking forward to labor so I didn't mind waiting. God was so good to me, though, and labor and delivery was so much easier than I imagined it would be. After spending a few hours holding our little boy I realized if I had known what joy he would bring I would have found the waiting very hard and been quite impatient.

Praise the LORD for so many answered prayers! He has blessed us beyond measure!

O taste and see that the LORD is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in him.

 Psalms 34:8

While I Waited

While I was waiting for BMW to arrive I busied myself with piecing together quilt blocks. My sewing machine has been inoperable for many months. Several weeks ago a friend told me about a sewing machine at a local garage sale.

I went to look at it and ended up coming home with it. The lady was only asking $10 for the sewing machine. It is a very basic machine, but it can do pretty much everything that I need a sewing
machine to do.

Secret Love VS. Open Rebuke

copy right free image

Open rebuke is better than secret love.
Proverbs 27:5


Tell the people you love that you love them. A feeling of love that stays in your mind and and never manifests itself in your actions is worse than than if you openly rebuked them.

Today make sure you tell your; husband, wife, father, mother, brother, sister, children, fiancé, grandma, grandpa, whom ever it is that you love, that you love them.

Thank You!

 Thank you to my former co-author and kind sister-in-law for her words of commendation and trusting this blog into my hands. I hope to move forward with this blog in the same direction that we've been going. I will try to publish a post weekly on Tuesdays. Sometimes I may have to skip weeks. Sorry, in advance. :) I hope everyone is having a good week!

 

copy right free image

 

2 Corinthians 9:8

And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work:

A New Blog

 

Hello everyone! My sister-in-law, who has been sharing this blog with me,

has kindly agreed to take over the blog, (she has done a great job helping me with 

keeping up with the posts on here!) while I move over to here. 

 I hope you'll come on over and pay me a visit! :)

Getting Ready For Baby!

We have one week and four days left until the due date for our baby. Of course, the baby may wait until a few weeks after the "due date" to make an appearance. We are getting ready to meet him or her. :) We are really excited about meeting our baby soon!

Here are some pictures of some of the things I have been working on to be prepared for our little one.

I sewed a nursing cover. My sister suggested that I make it out of a light weight material and larger dimensions than the pattern called for.

My Dear Husband put the crib together this past week.

I installed the car seat yesterday.

I am planning to cloth diaper our baby. I have been working on modifying inferior quality gerber pre-folds by taking out the polyester middles and adding birds-eye cotton to the center so that they will be more absorbent, making some flats out of flannel, collecting old receiving blankets, and prepping the new cotton by boiling it. To break in un-used cotton it is good to boil it for thirty minutes. This step will make the cotton more absorbent.  This is what my new born cloth diaper stash looks like:

I am going to use the Econobum new born size water proof cover with pre-folds and flats on the inside.

I have 11 of these gauze rectangle flats,

34 assorted pre-folds,

8 flannel rectangle flats,

 and 10 old receiving blankets to use as flats.

I hope to stick with cloth diapering. Maybe I will write a review of what I liked and what worked best for me after a few months.

These disposable diapers were a gift from my grandma. I am going to be grateful to have them in the first week especially! :)

 I have also been cooking some freezer meals to make things easier when the baby comes. Sorry, I don't have any pictures of those to share.


That is what I have been up to. I hope every one out there is doing well!



 

Psalms 127:3

Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.

 

Recipe For English Muffins Upon Request

English Muffins

Heat in a saucepan until very warm(130* F.):
1 1/2 cups milk
1/4 cup butter
In large mixer bowl, combine:
2 Tbsp. sugar
1 tsp. salt
2 1/4 tsp. dry yeast
1 1/2 cups flour
With mixer at low speed, gradually beat liquid into dry ingrdients. Increase speed and beat 2 minutes, or beat vigorously by hand. Beat in:
1 egg
1 cup flour
With spoon, add:
2 cups flour, or enough to make stiff dough
Turn dough onto lightly floured surface and knead just until well mixed, about 2 minutes. Shape dough into a ball and place in greased large bowl, turning once. Cover; let rise in warm place until doubled, about 1 1/2 hours. Punch down.

Turn onto lightly floured surface; cover with bowl 15 minutes, and let dough rest. Meanwhile, place cornmeal in a pie plate. Roll dough about 3/8" thick. Cut dough into 3" circles; reroll scraps to make 18 circles in all.

Dip both sides of each circle in cornmeal; place circles on cookie sheets. Cover and let rise in warm place until doubled, about 45 minutes. Brush large skillet or griddle with salad oil and heat. When medium hot, put in 6 muffins, cook 8 minutes on each side or until brown. Repeat until all are cooked. To serve, split muffins horizontally with tines of fork and toast.

Recipe For Breakfast Sausage Upon Request

I found this recipe for breakfast sausage at Queen of the Red Double Wide via a Google search. (She also has a delicious Italian Sausage recipe.) I was looking for a homemade seasoning blend for sausage because MSG is in so many of the store brands. We try to avoid MSG, not only because is it really bad for our bodies, but also because my husband is allergic to the substance. I increased the amount of red pepper flakes in my version of breakfast sausage seasoning. I would still consider this blend to be mild, but if you are sensitive to spices you may want to try 1/4 tsp. of red pepper flakes, (as the original recipe calls for), to begin with.

Breakfast Sausage Seasoning

1 1/2 tsp. rubbed sage
1/2 tsp. thyme
1 tsp. black pepper
1 1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. parsley flakes
3/4 tsp. red pepper flakes
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg

Mix the spices together. Add the spices to 2 pounds of ground meat, preferably pork, (ground turkey or beef will work), mix thoroughly. Chill for a couple hours to allow flavours to blend.