Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Hangin With My Crew

First of all I want to say.... I need to get batteries for my camera so I can upload some pictures! I am sorry there have been no personal pics for a while. If it stays as hot as they say it will today.... I may be back for those later!
We had a great day hangin as a family yesterday. There are some days I just love the crew that we are. We were pretty much locked in till seven because of the heat. We slept in very late, cleaned the house a little, watched the kittens romp and play, made fajitas from scratch, attempted to make tortilla's homemade (one of the biggest culinary frustrations of my life but my neighbor has a press for me so I'm hoping that will work better), Princess made some pudding cups to put in the fridge for dessert, watched a library DVD on Washington State, Fell asleep (girls went in their room with the kitties while Superkid fell asleep on top of daddy on the couch), finally went outside at almost seven. From there, the kids played, Lilo strung bead bracelets and necklaces while I sanded their loft bed and daddy mowed the lawn. We were out as long as we could see. The smoke was heavy again yesterday. Do you know there are now a total of 1800 fires in ca? Some are contained but that is the total. It is the summer of the smoke!
Also in there I finally cranked back up my bread making in the machine. The first loaf was absorbing the attitude of the tortillas and refused to come out for me. It came out, it just had a bubble that rendered half of the loaf hallow. I was able to cut enough for Rick's sandwich for work today and that was it. So, I started up another in the evening and this morning it is lovely. I have not cut into it but it feels right. I finally am noticing the bread at the store is going up in price as the wheat costs have finally trickled down to what's on the shelf. So, I'm trying to crank back into homemade.
Rick and I are noticing on that note, our budget tighten all of a sudden. They hired a help at the Post Office so he is not getting as much overtime. Plus, all groceries have gone up. I think I will do a big garden next spring. It won't really be preference but necessity. Gas is just killing us since we live 10 min from town and 30 min from our church famiy. I also need to beef up on my coupons after the summer. Right now I don't want to stock up since we will be away so much and then the girls both have camp for a week. So, yesterday I made up menus to use up what we have instead of going out and getting more.
Today we will once again, be in. It's to be 105 and that means another wait for 6 or 7 to go outside unless the wind comes and brings us relief from the ocean air.
Pray for Rick if you think of it. He walks more than any other mailman in his city and the heat is not as bad as all the smoke.

3 comments:

Tricia said...

I tried making corn tortillas a month ago. I thought in my head this will be easy I make flour tortillas a few times a week. Boy was I wrong I could not get them to turn out. Let me know if the press helps. I was very discouraged by the try. I would love to make my own corn tortillas. This heat is horrible. I am baking the next few days to add to the heat. Praise God for a/c.

Karen said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Karen said...

Alicia, I've actually dusted off my bread machine recently making a regular loaf last week and pizza dough Monday night for dinner.

Do you have a good bread machine recipe for sandwhich bread? I love bread machine bread but usually what comes out is more yummy for a nice thick slice next to dinner moreso than for a sandwich.

I'm also surfing the internet right now for bread machine recipes as my fav bread machine cookbook got lost somewhere in this last move. If you have a fav site I'd love the info!!