Thanksgiving

A new post. I have been without my laptop the past week and a half, making timely blogposts even more challenging than normal! 

Thanksgiving. How was yours?  So much to be thankful for. A great marriage, wonderful kids--including a new baby born this year, dear friends, a warm and welcoming home, more than enough food to eat...I am so blessed. And this year, I am also blessed by how many friendships I have made through our blogs.  I treasure each and every one of you!

Our Thanksgiving...each year, my husband and I spend the day cooking together. He likes to do the turkey and the sides. I prepare the stuffing (2 kinds this year) and the desserts. Audrey helped make a blueberry cobbler this year; doing most of it herself. She was so proud with the end result. It tasted delicious.

Thanksgiving is one of those meals where we actually eat in the dining room.

 The kids always like it when we eat in there. Everyone was so happy, except Charlotte, who found herself in a really bad mood come dinner time...

And, it was Baby Brooke's first Thanksgiving.  Everyone should have a baby this happy. We are so thankful for her easy going, happy temperment.

I wish you all to have a happy and blessed holiday season!

Katie

FAST AND EASY: Lemon Ginger Butter

Lemon Ginger butter is one of those great, under 5 ingredients, recipes that makes your meals taste extra special with very little extra work.  I prepare this whenever I serve salmon. It also makes a great side when you are serving mashed potatoes.  With Lent coming soon, I will be making this often, as our meals on Fridays start having a seafood flare.

Lemon Ginger Butter

Ingredients:

1 stick butter, room temperature
juice of one lemon
2 tablespoon minced ginger
2 scallions, chopped

Mix ingredients until blended. Serve wtih your favorite seafood, vegetable or potato.

Christmas Crafts

We have two Christmas trees each year; one upstairs with the breakable ornaments and one downstairs, a kids' tree, that the kids are in charge of decorating and making ornaments for.  We always make paper garland rings for this tree.

you will need:  strips of paper (we use red and green), 1 inch wide and 5-6 inches long,
                      glue stick for each child

We ordered our strips of paper from Oriental Trading Company. It was so worth the $4.99 to have all the paper come pre cut.

 My 4 yr old needed a little assistance but was able to do all the glueing independently which made her extremely happy. Once I started the boys, who have special needs with two circles on their chain, they were able to do the rest independently.

Chicken Science

Our chickens have been a wonderful science project for our whole family.   For awhile they were in a brooder in the garage and we would go hold them everyday.

We have finally figured out what breed they are all and they all have names:

white cochin-"baby"
blue splash cochin- "abbey"
polish- "bertie"
brahma- "jennie"
partridge cochin- "poppy"
salmon faverolles- "effie" and "sunny"

We put the coop together, a saltbox coop from "My Pet Chicken" and moved them all into it last week. Thanksgiving Day was their first day they got to forage and explore around the side yard.

Edward the Duck seems happy to have some company since Bella (our white pekin duck) passed away a few months ago.

Feature Friday: Ekat's Kitchen: Crock Pot Stuffing

Welcome to the first "Feature Friday" at Wonderland Kitchen! This week's featured blog/blogger is Erin from Ekat's Kitchen
 http://www.ekatskitchen.com/  who is sharing her recipe for Crock Pot Stuffing.

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Hello to everyone at Wonderland Kitchen! When Katie first approached me about guest posting I was so excited! I love sharing recipes and getting to know new people. In fact it's one of the things I most enjoy about blogging... that and sharing and gaining inspirations for meals! I've learned so much about so many things and learned A LOT about what I want in a kitchen (Everything!) I hope you enjoy my recipe for crock pot stuffing and I will hope to see you all soon!


Crock Pot Stuffing
12 cups lightly toasted bread, cubed (I used stale bread)
1 onion, chopped
3 large stalks celery, thinly sliced
1 apple, peeled and diced
1/4 cup butter
1 tablespoons ground thyme
2 teaspoons ground oregano
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped
1 1/2 cups chicken stock

Place bread crumbs in a 6 quart crock pot.

In a medium saucepan, melt the butter, and saute the onion, celery and apple until soft.

Stir in the spices and then toss over the bread cubes.

 Stir together well.
Pour chicken stock over the mixture and coat evenly. Cook on high for one hour then reduce to low and cook another two to three hours, stirring each hour. Remove from pot and serve.

Enjoy!

Getting to know Erin.*****

Erin:  "This Thanksgiving will be my very first!  That's not to say that I haven't thoroughly enjoyed 27 prior Thanksgivings, but it is the first time I will have cooked my very own turkey and other Thanksgiving fixings.
I'm also a little nervous, and planning things more and more. The turkey is in the freezer and K & I have both been watching lots of cooking shows and pouring over magazines.

We have a game plan in place -- sort of. Until it changes again!  That leads me to discuss this past week, when I decided to do a test run of some crock pot stuffing.  Though my inspiration comes from Gayle @ Grocery Cart Challenge, I made several substitutions. And I'm thoroughly impressed with this fantastic recipe."

Q and A with Erin :-)

Q:  Tell me a little abour your blog, Ekat's Kitchen...  http://www.ekatskitchen.com/
Q : When did you start blogging?

EKat's Kitchen started in April 2010, when I learned that I had hereditary high blood pressure and I wanted to keep track of the recipes that I fell in love with that were lower sodium, as well as some of my favorite recipes in general. It's morphed into so much more, I've started getting into the social aspect, and love meeting new people and sharing inspirations and ideas for ways to get creative with food. I try to keep my posts and recipes healthier and low-ER sodium, while maintaining excellent flavor.

 Q:  What are your favorite types of foods to cook?
It's no secret in my house that I love starch - pastas and potatoes are high on my list of favorites, but I really also love seafood. Still, that said, it's hard to pick a favorite. 

Q: Do you have a great time or money saving kitchen tip to share?
Though it's not something that I do intentionally, I cook in bulk a lot... it's difficult for me to cook for less than 5-8 people. So we end up cooking a few meals a week and having lots of leftovers, and freezing meals for later.

Q:  You grew up in Alaska...what is your favorite Alaskan dish?
Seafood! Especially freshly cooked shrimp from my Dad's boat (cooked just about any way), fresh salmon, or fresh halibut! YUM!

Q:  What is your favorite thing about writing a food blog?
Seeing all of the inspiration out there and incorporating new ideas and techniques. It forces me to keep things interesting at home, and trying to innovate new ways and new tastes for my good old stand bys:)

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I hope you enjoyed this week's Feature Friday!,

Katie

(if you are interested in being featured in a Feature Friday here at wonderland kitchen, email me at homeschoolfam@gmail.com)

Monday Advice

It's Monday.

Are you daunted by the week ahead?

perhaps you didn't get the house cleaned...

or the meal planning done...

or the laundry finished.

It's okay.

Avoid those who would criticize you

or would attempt to derail your plans.

Take time for quiet moments.

Take a walk...

or visit with a friend.

Do not be fooled by appearances...

or by first impressions.

Be thankful for the smallest gestures,

And share a magical moment...

Find the beauty within someone today...

Even if that someone is you.

Have a beautiful week, everyone.

Katie

Feature Fridays start next week!

We are only one week away from our first "Feature Friday" here at Wonderland Kitchen. Our first featured blog and blogger? Erin of Ekat's Kitchen  http://www.ekatskitchen.com/ !  Erin will be sharing her crockpot stuffing; a great timesaving recipe just in time for your Thanksgiving preparations. 

Would you and your blog like to be featured here at Wonderland Kitchen for an upcoming Feature Friday? Leave a comment!  Blogs featured have their button displayed  for the week leading up to their feature date and receive a button for their blog letting their readers know they were featured.

I can't wait to see Erin's crockpot stuffing she is going to share with us next week...just in time for the holidays!

Nominated

I was thrilled this week to learn that my homeschool blog, Wonderland Homeschool, ( http://www.wonderlandhomeschool.blogspot.com/ ) has been nominated by the Homeschool Post for Best Special Needs Homeschool Blog. 

I don't expect to win but am happy with the visability this is giving my blog as that is the whole reason I started it to begin with: to have somewhere other special needs families could go to find encouragement and useful content when homeschooling (or thinking about homeschooling) their child/children with special needs.

As I peruse the other nominees' blogs in all the various categories I am inspired and encouraged and amazed at these women and what they do. There are some amazing families out there. I feel very honored to be in their company this year. ( If you want to vote for me, you can follow this link and vote for Wonderland Homeschool at the bottom of the list.    http://hsbapost.com/best-special-needs-homeschool-blog-2010/  Voting is open until November 18th. What a wonderful way to start my week!

Sunday Dinner : Duck--A lesson on improvisation

Sunday dinner this past week involved my first time cooking duck.  I found it to be easy, and though it did need to roast for four hours (with me having to turn it each hour) the overall prep/work time was very little.  I also found that when I went to tie the ducks legs prior to roasting, I had no kitchen twine in my kitchen. (Why is that one of the items I always seem to be out of when I need it?) 

Since I didn't have the "want to" or time to make a last minute run to the nearest grocer, I needed to find an item I already had on hand, that I could use to tie the legs together that would work in a 300 degree oven over a 4 hour time period.  My answer?  Aluminum Foil

Aluminum Foil is pliable. I took a sheet, rolled it into a thin "rope" and then cut it to be about 6 inches long. I used this to tie the legs together and it worked great. 

As for the rest of Sunday dinner, I decided to not do the fig sauce for the duck since the pearl onions with port made a great garnish on the platter and i took the juice from that side dish plus the drippings from the pan to make a port based gravy that tasted delicious.  Sides of yukon potato puree and instant stuffing (made with beef broth instead of water)  made for easy and fast sides to complete the meal.

The end result was a Sunday dinner that appeared to take alot of effort and was actually very easy to prepare. Have you roasted  duck before? What was your experience?