Crock Pot Wednesdays with Debbie

Debbie, thank you for inviting me to join in Crock Pot Wednesday this week! I decided to take you up on it. :-) Please head over to Debbie's blog to view many more delicious recipes that will entice you to dig out that slow cooker!

I'll get this out of the way first... cough I rarely use my slow cooker cough cough ....I know, I know! Slow cookers were made for busy stay at home moms just like me! Moms who homeschool, moms who don't, moms who run the Mommy Taxi service, moms with babies, moms with older kids, moms who work inside and outside the home. Yes, I know all this.

What we have failed to take into account is the lack of mouthwateringly succulent vegetarian slow cooker recipes. Maybe it's just me, but aside from the usual chilis and soups, there just isn't much out there for us herbivores.

A couple of years ago, while perusing one of my favorite places in Barnes & Noble (the vegetarian/vegan cookbook section), I spotted a cookbook I'd never seen before, Fresh From the Vegetarian Slow Cooker by Robin Robertson. SCORE!

Admittedly, I've only tried a few of the recipes. Some are fantastic, and others.....eh, so-so. Today, I'm sharing one of my favorites from the book. This is the perfect dish for Fall. It's also one entree I missed terribly after becoming a vegetarian at age 14. I even crave it intensely at times, so.......

Let me introduce [cue drumroll]

Slow-Fashioned Potpie with Biscuit Crust

Adapted from: Fresh From the Vegetarian Slow Cooker

3 tbs. grapeseed oil

1 medium-sized yellow onion, chopped (I loooove Vidalia)

2 large carrots, chopped

1 large celery, chopped

1 cup plus 2 tbs. all-purpose flour

1 large all-purpose potato, peeled and diced

2 - 15 oz. cans organic chickpeas, drained and rinsed (organic beans are best because beans tend to be riddled with pesticides)

1/2 cup frozen peas (or more, if you like peas)

3/4 cup vegetable broth or mock chicken broth

1 tbs soy sauce or tamari

1/2 tsp dried thyme

1/2 tsp dried savory

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

2 tsp baking powder (non aluminum is best - I like Rumford Brand)

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup milk (soy, rice, cow's, hemp...whatever floats your boat)

Heat 1 tbs of the oil in a medium-sized skillet over medium heat. Add the onion, carrot, and celery, cover, and cook until softened. It takes about 5 minutes.

Transfer that mixture to a lightly oiled 3-1/2 - 4 qt. slow cooker. Stir in 2 tbs of the flour. Add the potato, chickpeas, and peas. Stir in the broth, soy sauce, thyme, and savory; then season with salt and pepper to taste. Cover and cook on low for 5 hours (I've also done it on high for 2-1/2 hours).

About 1 hour before you're ready to serve, make the crust: In a large bowl, combine the remaining 1 cup of flour, baking powder, soda, and 1/2 tsp salt. Quickly stir in the milk and the remaining 2 tbs of oil until just blended.

Spoon the biscuit topping over the surface (homey style) of the simmering veggies. Turn the heat setting to high, cover, and cook until the crust is cooked through, an additional hour. Serve the potpie within 10-15 minutes after the crust is finished cooking for best taste results.

Now, the potpie is super easy, and it definitely satisfies my craving. Is it as good as the Seitan potpie I make entirely from scratch (homemade whole wheat pie crust, homemade chick-mmmmm gravy, homemade seitan, homemade veggies ahem--well, you get my meaning)? No, it's not, but it's fab in a pinch!

Enjoy!

Oh no, she di-in't!

Sadly, yes, she did.

While working on schoolwork a little bit ago, Elise was complaining about her Explode the Code worksheets (or game sheets, if you prefer). Complaining about Phonics is nothing new around here. In fact, that is precisely one reason I considered not homeschooling her this year. Anyway, after a couple of warnings to "Cut it out!" (or something like that) I finally told her if she couldn't think of something pleasant to say, then don't say anything at all. (Yep, I went there....but I digress.)

Taking it a step further, I continued that maybe we needed to play Pollyanna's Glad Game, and every time she wanted to say something negative, she should try to come up with something to be glad about instead. For example, instead of complaining how much she hates Phonics, she could say, "I'm glad these books are helping me to read faster because when I get really good at reading, then I won't have to do them anymore." (or something like that).

Elise continued bellyaching about not knowing how to look on the bright side. So, I assured her we would practice because thinking positively is a good quality, one that will serve her well the rest of her life. "And, besides," I went on, "I am getting tired of your complaining."

Would you like to hear what my almost 8 year-old said to me then? Would you?

She said, and I quote, "Then maybe you should take a nap!"

Oh, yes, she did.

She's currently in her room.

Tempt My Tummy with Granola

Tempt my Tummy Tuesday is a blog carnival co-hosted by sisters Lana and Lisa. Check them out for more recipes to tempt your tummy!

I have never participated in one of these before; however, as I was making granola this morning and anticipating how intoxicating it smells wafting through the house, how warm and cozy the house gets with the oven going (especially on this cold, cold day in the nearly frozen Great North), and how amazing it tastes SOOO (straight out of the oven), I thought I would share it with anyone who cares you guys.

To preface, this is a recipe I've been using for quite awhile. This is what I started with. With a few additions and substitutions, it has morphed into my *go-to* granola recipe. Feel free to make your own substitutions as well. Granola is very forgiving like that!

Granola

4 cups rolled oats

1 cup slivered/sliced almonds*

1 cup raw walnut pieces*

1 cup unsweetened shredded coconut*

3/4 cup raw wheat germ (optional)

1/2 cup brown sugar (or sucanat)

1/2 cup maple syrup*

1/2 tsp black strap molasses

2 tsp vanilla

1/3 cup grape seed or coconut oil*

3/4 tsp coarse salt or less if using sea salt

1 tsp cinnamon

1 cup dried fruit (like cranberries, blueberries, or cherries....raisins will work too)

1 cup semisweet or white chocolate chips (optional)

Preheat oven to 275ºF.

Combine first 6 ingredients in a bowl and mix thoroughly with your hands (it just works best that way, and it's fun for the kids too).

Add remaining ingredients (except dried fruit and chocolate chips) to another small bowl, and whisk.

Incorporate the wet ingredients into the dry, mixing well (with your hands) until it's evenly coated.

Pour onto 1-2 rimmed baking sheets, and bake 45 minutes, stirring every 15 minutes or so.

Let cool a bit, and mix in the dried fruit and chocolate chips.

*Notes:

Feel free to use other types of nuts. I've made this with pistachios, cashews, pecans, and they all taste great.

I lurve coconut, but my husband doesn't, so on rare occasions (very, very rare occasions), I have been known to make this sans coconut.

When it comes to oil, I prefer to use grape seed or coconut oil for cooking because they don't break down as quickly in higher temperatures. In salads, olive oil is fab. Generally, I avoid canola oil because it's genetically modified. Even though you aren't really baking the granola at a high temperature, grape seed is usually what I have on hand, so that's what I use. Any mild-tasting oil works fine in this recipe (safflower, sunflower, etc) though.

Liquid sweeteners...so, I usually try to use homemade maple syrup because pure maple syrup is just not in the budget right now, and I can't bring myself to buy the fake stuff that's nothing but high fructose corn syrup. I've also used brown rice syrup, honey, or agave nectar. Today, I used a mixture of maple syrup (homemade) and honey to equal 1/3 cup, and added a little extra oil and molasses. Excellent!

And, as Julia Child would say, Bon Appetit (Forgive me; I just saw Julie & Julia.)!

One Day in June....

Elusive. That's probably the best word to describe the goal I set for us this past summer. It's something I've been working on, (off and on) in one way or another, for five years! We've taken breaks, decided that perhaps readiness is the issue, and the final achievement of this goal still eludes me.

Elimination Communication, otherwise known as EC, is something I've been thinking more about these past few months. Admittedly, when I first heard about it, I thought EC was a little silly. There is a certain convenience associated with diapers that cannot be denied! Nevertheless, it seems that each time I've potty trained one of the girls, I use this method to some extent. I mean, as a parent, we do tend to observe our children's cues and tell them to "Run to the potty!" when we see them look like they might need to go. If you start when they're even younger, it stands to reason that they wouldn't get used to the feeling of a messy diaper touching their little bottoms and would tend to dislike that feeling.

When you take your first unassisted steps at age 3 but don't start walking independently until you're 3-1/2, it also stands to reason, that you would be well used to the feeling of messy pants, and it just wouldn't bother you all that much. Or, that would stand to reason if you knew Lily and Leah, because not caring if they're wet or poopy has (or had, in reference to the latter) been an issue and a potty training hindrance for both girls.

Additionally, I've always felt that the ability to be independent plays a big role in potty training, and that having those gross motor skills (like walking) would be a huge help in the bladder control arena. EC-ers would probably disagree with me, and at this rate, I think I might even agree with them!

And, who ARE these people that say you can potty train your child in just one day or even in a week?! That has never been my experience! Nev-ver! As much as I would like it to be easy, even just once, potty training has not at any time been a painless experience for us. And, "they" say girls are supposed to be easier to train than boys.

I laugh in "their" faces on that one!

Okay, so back to June. One day in June, I ran out of pull-ups, and I didn't buy anymore. Lily has been in panties with rubber pants for over 3 months now, and she is still not trained. I am relatively trained (I say relatively because there are times when I forget to remind her for a couple of hours, and then she will usually have an accident. Heck, even when I do remind her, she still has accidents!), but she is not.

Yes, things are better now than they were at first. Perhaps, 10% of the time she will tell me when she has to go, as opposed to the 0% when we began. It's an improvement, to be sure, but we still have a loooooooooooong way to go!

I try so hard not to get frustrated by her failure to advance. Really, I do. Eventually, I know she'll get it. She must! Yet, "these people," the ones who say never to get frustrated when your kids have an accident and to always stay calm about it, I'm pretty sure they never had to do this THREE MONTHS with very little improvement!

Don't get me wrong, she has gotten a little better, no doubt. Unfortunately, she still has a ways to go. I'm certain Lily is fully capable of succeeding in this. She stays dry all night, pretty much every night. My guess is going in her pants is a habit, and like any bad habit, it will take awhile to break it.

So we persevere.

Anyway, after all of this, I really think elimination communication doesn't seem like such a bad idea. In all seriousness, it's no different from what I'm already doing!

And, if we ever have another baby, don't be surprised if you see me setting my little newborn on the potty before putting her cute, little cloth diaper back on her!

Oh, and if you're still wondering what on earth my goal was, 3 fully potty trained girls was it. Well, as Meatloaf says, "two out of three ain't bad....." [grudgingly] I guess.

Disaster Area

In the spirit of *keepin' it real,* the images to follow are what my house looked like earlier today. If you can't handle the chaos, you might want to leave now.



Oooookaaaaaay, don't say I didn't give you fair warning!

Bags of tomatoes, bowls to hold unwashed tomatoes; pots to hold washed, cored, and scored tomatoes; pots to blanch tomatoes; bowls of cold water to submerge blanched tomatoes, and peel off the skin; trays of tomatos, onions, garlic, and spices ready and waiting to go into the oven to be slow roasted; a tray of French bread, rising, and waiting to go into the oven when the other loaf is finished.....

...and, it gets worse. This is what I've been trying to work on for the last few weeks, in between sick kids, homeschooling, and other projects.

Baby clothes. Here is a basket overflowing with clean, freshly washed baby clothes.

And, here are the piles I still need to go through. They were stacked up neatly yesterday, and I'm not sure who knocked them over....either the cat or one of the girls would be my guess. The baby, baby stuff I've already been through, and most of that will need to be washed. I've stain treated the items that needed it, and now it's just a matter of washing them...with my tiny washer and inept dryer.

More clean clothes, piled up on the new couch.

And, this is what the girls were doing while I was busy in the kitchen today.

...just a few of the things that have been keeping me away from blogging lately....just a few!

Mommy Has a New Toy!

Or, at least that's what my husband calls it. Mine is black.



He actually compared it to his new Lego set. He may have bought the legos for teaching the computer class, but he and the girls have been having a blast building robots here at home too!

You may be wondering, "Seriously? A stethoscope?" And, the abbreviated answer is, "Yep."

The longer version details how we received two stethoscopes from our DME (Durable Medical Equipment) company when Lily first came home from the hospital, at 6 months old. One was for daily use, and the other was always kept in her emergency bag (the bag with all of her stuff, that we took anytime we left the house).

Unfortunately, several months ago, the girls got ahold of my daily use stethoscope, and broke it. The other one was never as nice. Both were just cheapies, but the E-bag version was abhorrent. Not only was it torture to my ears, but I couldn't hear a cotton pickin' thing out of it, which makes it really hard to distinguish when Lily has diminished breath sounds! Plus, I had to hold at least one ear piece in my hand, so it wouldn't twist out of my ear completely. Let's just say Piece. Of. Junk. would be way too nice a description!

Is the Littmann Cardiology III more stethoscope than I need? Probably. Am I luuuuurving it? You bet I am!! Besides, one of these days, when I do actually make it to nursing school, I'll just be that much further ahead! :-)

---------------------------------------

To update on Lily: She's had good hours and bad ones. She's been on as much as 5L of O2. Currently on 4L and still de-satting. I think that's just because her evening neb worked some things around. It's quite likely that here soon I'll have to go in and give her another Xoponex with some BD's/CPT's. The good news is that her respiratory rate has stayed within normal limits for Lily, and she's had absolutely zero retractions. That's another reason why I suspect mucus plugs to be the culprit behind some of these de-sats and elevated oxygen needs.

Squeak, Crackle, Gurgle

UPDATED:

We made it through the night at home. I ended up doing a neb and a bunch of BD's (pummeling over the lobes of her lungs), especially on the left side, where her lung sounds were diminished. She slept through the whole thing. Actually, the night went very well. I stayed in her room with her last night, and not even once did I have to silence the pulse ox!! So, I was able to get a few, consecutive hours of sleep last night, thank goodness. And, thank God Lily had such a great night! She is currently holding steady on about 3.5L of oxygen, and her sats are mid 90's. We finished another neb a little bit ago. I may try to wean down on the O2, if she continues doing well. Thank you for all of your thoughts and prayers!

ORIGINAL POST:

Lily is sick again. She's been fighting something for at least 3 weeks now, just a runny nose and some noisy lungs, but nothing too serious. At the end of last week, we had a few mornings where she woke up coughing and coughing until she threw up. On Friday afternoon, while the girls and I were at Target, Elise said she had a runny nose.

It didn't hit me until later. Lily likely added a new bug on top of the old one.

So the runny nose has been a sieve all week. The coughing and coarse lung sounds have increased. I've been doing nebs (Xoponex & Pulmicort) more frequently than just twice a day.

Yesterday, we went to the cardiologist, and that's when I noticed Lily was starting to get worse. Her lungs sounded coarse: crackly, gurgly, squeaky, pretty much all the time, even after the nebs. They even had a bit of a tough time getting good readings on her EKG and Echo! The good news is that Lily's heart looks fantastic. Her aortic arch is growing as she grows, which is exactly what we want it to do. At the time of her initial repair, her aorta was 2mm (the size of a cocktail straw). It's now 8mm! The sub-aortic membrane isn't causing any problems and is unchanged from 2 years ago. While Lily's mitral valve definitely is not normal, it functions normally, so that's all great news!

Last night, after Lily's evening neb, I decided to spot check her O2 sats. The reading was only 92-93, so I decided to leave her on the pulse ox for the night. An hour and a half later, she was dipping into the upper 80's consistently, so I fired up the oxygen concentrator. She spent most of the night and today between 2 & 4 L. There were a few hours in room air today, but Lily spent most of the day on O2.

She is now on 5L, which is the maximum I can give with the concentrator, and her sats are low to mid 90's. Not great, but not ghastly either. Currently, I'm trying to decide if I should just hold off and see how the next few hours go, or if I should just take her in. It's a tough call. She has no retractions, is not obviously struggling, which leads me to believe this could be a mucous plug issue, and those I can deal with. They aren't fun, but I can handle them. On the other hand, she did have diminished breath sounds in her left lower lobe tonight..... I've seen her sicker, and I've managed things when they've been worse, so I know I can handle it; the question now is whether or not it would be easier on Lily to just go in or to be at home. And, that's a question, I don't have the answer for yet.