Our Daily Bread

Jerry and I were married May 30, 1991.  That first summer together was full of memories.  We had very little money so our fun had to be quite inexpensive, but just being together was enough for us.  I remember a picnic, with tuna sandwiches and popsicles on the lawn of our apartment complex.  I remember borrowing camping gear and attempting a little camping trip up in the canyons.  Before dark even came it began to rain…..and rain and rain and rain.  When the dirt road next to our campsite began to look like a creek, we figured we had best get out of the canyon before it got dangerous.  So much for camping. 

Later in the summer we scrimped together enough money to spend one day at BYU Education Week.  Little did we know that some of what we learned there would be a daily part of our future family life. 

First I need to rewind and reminisce a little.

When I was a little girl we visited my grandparents in Alberta, Canada every summer.  Grandpa was a salesman for Magic Mill wheat grinders and Bosch Kitchen mixers.  In the back entryway, behind the kitchen, was their wheat grinder.  They also had a small table set up with giant coloring books (courtesy of Magic Mill) that I spent hours coloring in.  My Mom had a Magic Mill as well.  She also had a Bosch mixer.  I grew up with homemade whole wheat bread and wonderful cookies and muffins, made with her mixer.  I learned to make cookies and banana muffins and zucchini bread while still living at home, but hadn't ever taken the time to master whole wheat bread.

All of a sudden, when I got married, I wished that I knew how.  My Mom and Dad blessed us greatly by giving us a Bosch mixer as a wedding gift, but I had yet to use it to make bread.  That is where Education Week comes in.

One of the classes we attended was on baking whole wheat bread.  The teacher was excellent and she even went so far as to pass dough around the class so that we could feel what a great dough should feel like.  I came home armed with a great recipe and a determination to master making bread. 

I've made our family's bread ever since.  The recipe has been tweaked slightly over the years but is still basically the same one that I brought home from Education Week that day.  I've handed it out to numerous friends and family and everyone loves the results. 

We store and use hundreds of pounds of wheat each year and save a lot of money by grinding our own wheat and making our own bread.  Sure, we buy bread on occasion, especially when we are extra busy, or when I've been pregnant or had a new baby, or in the heat of summer when we can't bear to turn on the oven, but we are obviously spoiled, because we never like the store bread as much as our homemade.

When we've been having difficult financial times, knowing how to make our own bread has been a blessing.  It's hard to feel deprived when you are eating warm homemade bread with butter and honey or jam. 

Here is the recipe as we make it today: (this makes six 1lb loaves)

3T yeast (Saf brand)
1 1/2 T sea salt
1/8 to 1/4 tsp vitamin C powder (ascorbic acid)
1/2 c raw honey
1/3c expeller pressed coconut oil (you want a good quality oil, but not one that has a lot of coconut flavor)
6c hot water
8c whole wheat flour (freshly ground hard WHITE wheat)
1/2 c gluten flour

Mix the above and then let it form a sponge for about 10 minutes (let it sit in the bowl) .  Add in MORE flour until dough is just right (this varies with each batch) and knead with the Bosch for about 5 minutes.  Rise in pans in a preheated warm oven for half an hour.  Then bake at 350 for 30 minutes.  (If using dark bread pans, bake at 325 degrees.)

Note: I don't even take the loaves out to preheat the oven before baking.  After the rising time I just turn on my oven and start the timer.

Fringe Benefits of Scouting

Having boys in boy scouts, cub scouts and Webelos can be a lot of work for Mom and Dad.  We sew things on their shirts, we help them fulfil requirements, we help them make goals, and get them to meetings…among other things. 

But I've seen a few fringe benefits this summer.  Nathan has been working on his Family Life Merit badge.  One of the requirements was to do a project that would benefit his family.  He chose a pretty ambitious goal.  He decided that he would clean all the carpets in the house.  He'd never used a carpet cleaner before, but Jerry worked with him and got him pretty proficient.  Lucky me!!  My carpets have now all been cleaned.

He also needed to organize a family project that we would all work on together.  He chose another home improvement project.  The boys' bedroom has never been painted since we moved here.  After five boys growing up in it, it was sorely in need of some attention.  He organized us all to help move the bookshelf, move furniture out from the walls, remove pictures and bulletin boards from the walls, and then helped to fill all the holes with mud and sand them down so that the room would be ready for painting.  Yeah!!  The room is now painted and we are just finishing up with painting the closet doors and the bedroom door.  It looks great.

Thank you Nathan, and thank you Scouting program!!

Articles of Faith Songs

Tonight was a rare night when I was able to take a nice soaky bath and crawl into bed a little earlier than usual with my book.  As I was laying there I could hear Emily in the bedroom next to me, singing away to music on the Ipod.  I strained to hear what she was singing and realized that she was singing the Articles of Faith. 

Primary boys and girls are encouraged to memorize the Articles of Faith to earn their Faith in God award once they turn 8 years old.  I love teaching my children the songs for these that are in the Childrens Songbook.  Once they are learned through song, they are hard to forget.  Even now, I can recite the Articles of Faith only by hearing the music in my head as I recite. 

Emily is well on her way to having the Articles of Faith memorized…and is not even 8 yet.  I love turning on the Primary songs for the little ones to listen to as they drift off to sleep at night.  Some of them are beautiful and peaceful, some are fun and spirited, but they all have great messages to fill the minds of my children before bed. 

Of Royal Birth

This past weekend Jerry and I got ambitious and pulled our big wooden bed out from the wall to clean and vacuum behind it.  We pulled off the mattress to clean and you wouldn't believe what I found.  Between the mattress and the boxspring, on my side of the bed was a very old and very shriveled up GREEN PEA!

There is a fairy tale about the princess and the pea.  She arrived at a castle one rainy night looking for a place of refuge from the storm.  She told the family in the castle that she was a princess, but, due to her disheveled appearance that was hard to believe.  They invited her in and fixed up a bed for her.  They piled up mattresses and blankets so that it was nice and soft.  Underneath the very bottom mattress they placed a pea.  They figured that if she were a true princess she would feel the pea as she slept and then they would know that she had been telling the truth.  As the story goes, she had a terrible night, due to discomfort from the pea.  The prince of the castle knew that she truly was a princess, they fell in love, and lived happily ever after. 

Upon finding the pea in my bed I commenced asking my children if any of them remembered putting it there.  Alas, no one could remember…or wanted to confess.  So I will never know which of my children wanted to find out if I really was a princess. 

This morning…..when I woke up to a wet bed from a little girl who crawled in at 5am and had an accident, I certainly did not feel like a princess.  This afternoon as I cleaned up from a flooded toilet, compliments of that same sweet little girl who had a little too much fun with toilet paper, I certainly did not feel like a princess. 

But I hold on to the truth that I have been taught since I was a little girl…that I really am a princess.  I come of a royal lineage, and I have great potential.  Though I may not always feel like a princess I need to remember to be "Loyal to the Royal" within.  (Harold B. Lee) My Heavenly Father is the King.  He wants me to choose the right and continually strive to be like him…to always behave as should the  daughter of a King.

I came across a poem by Anna Johnson that was printed in the Children's Friend back in 1959.  The whole poem is beautiful but I will just include the first stanza:

"I AM a Child of Royal Birth,
My Father is KING of Heaven and Earth.
My spirit was born in Courts on High.
A Child Beloved, a Princess (Prince) AM I!"

Birthday Traditions

Friday night we celebrated Benjamin's 18th birthday.  We don't have elaborate birthday traditions in our family but we always celebrate and look forward to birthdays.  The birthday child always has the option of breakfast in bed and often gets to choose the menu.  On his special day his siblings do all of his animal and house chores for him.  Depending on the child he sometimes has a birthday party with friends, or a birthday party with cousins, or just a fun activity with immediate family.  We bake a birthday cake, and sometimes the birthday child actually wants to make and decorate his cake all on his own. Occasionally one of the kids will request a birthday pie or apple crisp instead.  I think we even had a birthday watermelon once for our Dad's birthday. Often we have a special dinner that is a favorite of the birthday child.

Not long after Jerry and I were married we were browsing in a Pier One Imports store and found a colorful plate and cup that both of us loved.  We decided to buy it and call it our "special plate" and use it for special occasions in our family.  The special plate is used at dinnertime for the birthday child, and even grandparents and special visitors to our home have occasionally been honored to use the "special plate" at dinnertime.  Benjamin used the special plate last night for his special birthday dinner.  This will be his last birthday dinner at home for two years.  We will miss him but are so grateful for his desire to serve a mission. 

One of our most treasured birthday traditions is opening cards from the grandparents with the whole family.  Grandma and Grandpa Winters always send homemade cards along with balloons which is a hit with the younger children.  Grandpa and Grandma Vance have a real knack for finding super fun cards that often sing to you.  And Grandpa Vance is the star of every card opening session.  Why?  Because he writes "Roses are red" poems in every birthday card to children and their spouses and grandchildren too.  Years and years of birthdays and he keeps coming up with new and creative poems to make us laugh.  We try to keep all the cards in the childrens' keepsake boxes so that they will always remember their Grandpa and his poems.  The birthday child looks forward to special phone calls from grandparents on both sides as well.

In the March 1986 Ensign (no author mentioned) it says,

"Family traditions are like spiritual and emotional cement in the foundation of a happy home. They create fond memories, and these memories bond us together as nothing else can."

I have fond memories of birthday traditions in my own home when I was a child.  My mother used to bake fun cakes in neat shapes.  One year I had a cake shaped like a princess.  I remember one of my brothers having a rocking horse cake.  And for those who wanted she would always make the most delicious angel food cake with lemon glaze.  When we were younger we enjoyed birthday parties with our friends with traditional games like pin the tail on the donkey and musical chairs.  As we got older we were sometimes treated to a dinner out at a restaurant.  I always felt so special and important on my birthday.  And still do.  My parents make me feel loved every day, but I can always count on them remembering my birthday and taking special care to let me know that they are so glad that I was and will always be their daughter. 

Toilets and my Toddler

Elder Russell M. Nelson addressed BYU students in a devotional (March 29, 1987) and said,

"I watched some three-year-old children playing one day. I saw them lapping water from the sidewalk after it had spilled through a neighbor’s garden. I suppose the germs they ingested were incalculable in number, but not one of those children became ill. They were defended by their bodies. As soon as that dirty drink reached their stomachs, hydrochloric acid went to work to purify the water and protect the lives of those innocent children."

The entire address was about the magnificence of the bodies that our Heavenly Father has created for us.  He talked about our senses of sight and hearing, our hearts and our brains and our body's amazing ability to repair itself.  He also gave the above little story to demonstrate how well our body can deal with germs.

Recently, David became safe on the stairs.  We don't have them blocked off anymore as I feel comfortable letting him climb from our main level up to the bedrooms whenever he wants to.  He is surely enjoying this new freedom and the ability to explore a little.  During the day our family spends most of our time on our main level.  Since there is not often someone upstairs to keep an eye on David in his explorations I've been trying to get everyone to keep the bedroom and bathroom doors shut when they are not up there….especially the bathroom doors. 

We are not very good at it yet.

This morning we found David upstairs in the bathroom brushing his teeth…with his sister's toothbrush.  Ok - that's no big deal.  But he was having a grand old time wetting and rewetting the toothbrush in the toilet in between brushings.  So disgusting!!  His onesie was sopping and he was so so mad when we found him and took his toothbrush away. 

How grateful I am for the magnificence of the human body.  My children have all been exposed to all kinds of germy things as they've grown up, and they all seem to survive.  Yes, we need to keep our homes clean and sanitary, yes we need to practice good hygiene…  but germs happen.  Little children explore and do messy things.  Thank goodness for our body's built in self defense system.

A Hill and a Hole

A long time ago I read in a book that every child needs a "hill and a hole."  What they meant by that is that children, by nature, all love wild places…places where they can dig and climb and get messy without being told how to play or where to play…or where not to play. 

When we moved to our home here over fifteen years ago our yard needed some leveling.  We have an acre of property and so, since we had the space, we had the backhoe guy build  a nice big hill in the very back of our land with the extra dirt from the leveling.  Over the years that hill has provided so much fun for our children.  In the early spring wild grass covers it making it an ideal hiding place.  In the winter, covered with snow, it becomes a great mini sledding hill.  They build jumps at the bottom to get an even wilder ride.  One year, after reading the Great Brain by J.D. Fitzgerald, Brandon and Kyle decided to dig a cave into the hill.  Wearing their protective safety goggles, they looked very official. It's also used as a "lookout tower" by children using binoculars.  

In the back of our property we have one corner where we have dumped rocks through the years that we have removed in the course of landscaping our yard.  Our children have turned that area of the yard into their own secret fort area.  They've dug a big hole and covered it with spare boards to make a hideout.  Rocks are used to create rooms and lookouts.  The game changes every time they play.  Sometimes they forget about the fort for a while and when they rediscover it the game starts anew and is fun all over again. 

Our big old dirt hill may not be the most aesthetically pleasing aspect of our yard, but it has provided hours and hours of fun for our children and their friends.  "A hill and a hole" has been a blessing to our family.