Baby Hats

I have been knitting baby hats to be donated to a pregnancy center that our church supports. The ladies at church as part of our Titus 2 ministry, are going to have a 'knitting night' and make hats or blankets for the pregnancy center. Some of us who know how to knit will teach others so I have been looking for a very basic hat pattern. I found a pattern at Lion's Brand, Baby Hat - O Natural!, and made some variations on the pattern.


Here is whatI made on Thursday and Friday. They work up really fast since there is no shaping.
The shades of blue and white on on the right side are pretty much according to the pattern except I only made one pom-pom for the top. For the varigated pastel one, I ran a piece of yarn around the top about an inch from the edge and pulled it tight. I did the same for the white one with the eyelets around the bottom - I plan to run a pink ribbon through the eyelets and tie a bow off center on the front of the hat. The blue and yellow stripe one is my favorite. I made eyelets around the top about an inch before the end and then made a yellow cord by crocheting a chain. I ran the cord through the eyelets and tied the bow.
To make an eyelet you do a yarn over followed by knit 2 together. That way you have a small hole but you do not increase the number of stitches. I did this about every third stitch. So for that row the pattern would be k1, *yo, k2 tog, k1, repeat from * to the end.
I may have to try the booties and sweater that are pictured with the hat pattern. They are very basic also. I found a really good buy of baby yarn on E-Bay so I have plenty of yarn to play with.

Bunny Bread

I made this bunny bread several years ago and it was a hit with the little ones, so thought I would make it just for us. DD19 wanted Ranch Fiesta Dip with our Easter dinner so this is a fun way to serve it. I found this recipe in Quick Cooking magazine.

The recipe calls for 2 1-lb loaves of frozen bread dough, thawed. I have a recipe that makes a 2 lb loaf in the bread machine so I used that on the dough setting.

From 1 loaf make the head and body. Take 1/4 of the loaf and make a pear shape for the head. Place it on a greased cookie sheet. With a sharp knife, make a couple slits on each side of the face for whiskers.
Take the remaining 3/4 of the loaf and shape into a rectangle for the body.
Divide the second load into 4 equal portions. Take 2 of the portions and shape into ropes. Fold over and place the ends next to the head for the ears. Divide one portion into two and make the hind feet from those. Make two cuts for the toes.
Divide the last portion into two. From one half make 3 small balls (one should be a little smaller than the other two) and make the cheeks and nose. From the other half, make 2 balls and place for the front legs. Make 2 slits in these.
Add 2 dried cherries or raisins for the eyes (I like the cherries as they are larger and the raisins seemed to be 'lost' in the face) and 2 slivered almonds for the teeth. Brush with a beaten egg.
Let rise in a warm place for about 30 minutes.
Here is my unbaked bunny before rising.


Bake at 350 for 25 to 30 minutes. Let cool.

When cool, cut out the tummy to make a bowl for the dip. I used a cream cheese container to make my circle. The fun part is getting to eat the fresh bread from the tummy :-) DD17 and DD19 helped me with that!
I used the cream cheese container placed in the tummy to serve the dip (I don't like getting the bread all soggy around the dip - no one here eats it so it just goes to waste. This way all the bread gets eaten :-)

Easter Eggs

I remember doing Easter eggs while growing up, usually after Good Friday church. We did dozens and then helped with an Easter egg hunt on Saturday at the church. Mom would always tell of many years before when some families would donate eggs for the hunt but would not cook or color them, so mom, grandma and Aunt Nina would dye hundreds of eggs.
I have my mom's old ceramic coffee mugs that she used. She had 6 or more of the plain white mugs at one time but eventually had to add another to have 6 cups. So one has a gold band around it.
She also taught us to make some tie-dyed eggs (don't know where she got the idea but my guess is she saw it in a Family Circle or McCall's magazine).


Take a piece of white cloth (we used a cloth diaper today). Twist it tightly around the egg. Take a spoon and put just a drop or two of dye on the cloth. Continue with desired colors.

Hold for a few seconds, then unwrap.



DD17 tried some of her own creations. Here she is making a splatter paint egg.
She also took some dyed eggs and did the tie dye over the solid colored egg.
Here are some of the tie dyed eggs and her splatter egg.
She said they were too pretty to eat!

Monday Menu - oops!

I thought I already posted this - oops!

Sunday -
Barbecue Turkey sandwiches
Slaw
Butter beans

Monday -
Celebration dinner - for DD17's grade improvement during third quarter
Sushi and hibachi shrimp at a local restaurant

Tuesday-
Celebration dinner - for a huge project at work - the VP is treating the team to a nice dinner
Steak Tenderloin
Baked Potato
Salad
Grilled Portobello

Wednesday
Subway - family appt at 6 pm so will grab a quick sandwich at Subway before that

Thursday
Chicken Parm (Freezer Meal)
Spaghetti
Salad

Friday
Enchilada Pie
Lettuce, tomatoes, sour cream, taco sauce

Saturday - in Topeka

Sunday - Cooking for sister-in-law (new mom) in Topeka
Red and green lasagne
Salad
Dinner roll


Not a good week for Weight Watchers but so far I have not done too bad. Not only are we eating out more this week but we had a major upgrade at work that I coordinated - and when I am stressed I want to EAT! I did walk up to the the coffee shop but nothing looked good enough to waste the points - so I went back to my office empty handed.

Currently reading

Here is what I am currently reading - both are in a series of mysteries based on crafts.
I have 'A Deadly Yarn' next to the bed. This one gets into the art gallery world and an up and coming weaver is killed. At first it looks like suicide but you know that can't be.

"Cutwork" is in my tote bag that I carry back and forth to work (It also has a baby blanket that is about 2/3 done at the moment) This book starts with a wood carver who has his throat slashed at a large craft fair. The name comes from the fact that the main character is learning to do cutwork between her 'snooping'.

Snow !

We woke up this morning to a dusting of snow! This is unusual for late March but not unheard of. I remember many times growing up that we would have a light dusting of snow over the crocus blooms scattered in the yard.
DH is glad - he was hoping it would snow enough to be considered accumulation so he can mark it on his 'weather records'. He records the high/low temps and the percipitation every day and each month charts the average high/low temps and total precip. He also charts these yearly.
While this is not the 'latest' snowfall he has recorded (April 6, 1996 holds that record) he was still excited to have a late March date.
This is looking toward the east from our back door - the trees all belong to neighbors. To the right you can see one of their Bradford pear trees which is almost bloomed out and full of leaves. In the curve of our flower bed is a flowering plum that is full of buds.


This is looking out to the southwest and you can see in the background a couple trees in bloom. I know one is a tulip tree but not sure what the white one is - but it a pretty view in the spring.

Avoiding shopping and other ramblings......

Avoiding going to the store yesterday turned out to be more work than I thought - but it was still worth it. When I started looking over my menu for today I realized I did not have any hamburger buns for the barbecue turkey. I had already 'tweaked' the menu from Carolina Crock Pork (barbecued pork basically) to Barbecued Turkey Sandwiches - since I had some leftover turkey in the freezer. (It always feels good to use up something I have put in the freezer thinking we will eat is in the future.)

So I got out the bread machine and mixed up my favorite butter roll recipe and tried making some Silver Dollar Rolls. I like using them for sandwiches in place of the larger buns anyway - smaller sandwiches means fewer WW points :-)

I think they turned out pretty well (can't say the same for my photography attempts). I really need to use my 'readers' when taking digital pictures - without them I can not see the image on the camera clearly :-)

I rarely use my bread machine to make loaves of bread. Even at the lightest setting, the crust tends to be darker than I like. But I often mix up rolls and pizza crust using it then do the shaping myself. That way I still get my hands in the dough but don't have to do the stirring and mixing.

So we had a bonus of hot rolls with our supper last night (I divided the batch into the silver dollar rolls and some 'knots') . For the knots I use the amount for a serving and roll it between my hands to make a short rope and then 'tie' it in a knot. That is my favorite shape as it is easy but a nice decorative look.

The Chicken with Sour Cream Curry Sauce was very good - I had half a serving of the chicken on a cup of rice and that was plenty of sauce. I shaped the rice using a measuring cup then placed the chicken piece on top and finished it off with the sauce. Very nice presentation. I'm sure we will have that one again. There was plenty for DH and I (DD17 decided she did not want to wait for supper and had a sandwich and fresh pineapple earlier) and I have 3 meals in the frig for leftovers this week.

I have been trying to add some Thai and Indian cooking into our menus. We have a Indian restaurant in town that is supposed to be very good but we have not gotten to try it yet. We planned to do so for our anniversary last year but they were closed - it was Thanksgiving Eve. Don't think we'll be able to celebrate our anniversary there this year (or anywhere on the actual date) since it falls on Thanksgiving. Guess we'll have to pick an alternate date :-)