Cream Cheese Tomato Soup

'Tis the season for soups! Here is another one of our favorites from Dining in the Spirit of Naniboujou.

Cream Cheese Tomato Soup

2 T butter

1/2 cup finely diced onions

6 ounces cream cheese

2 cans (11 oz each) condensed tomato soup

3 cups milk

2 cans (14 oz each) diced tomatoes, with juice

2 tsp basil

Melt butter in pan and saute the onions until tender, about 3-5 minutes. Add cream cheese, stirring while it melts. Mix in the tomato soup until smooth. Add the milk slowly, mixing well. Continue cooking and add the diced tomatoes and the basil.

Ice Skating

Ever since Dan started his new job where he doesn't have to work such crazy hours, the kids have been begging to go ice skating. So we decided that yesterday would be the day. The local ice rink has rather limited free skate hours so our only options were Saturday evening from 7-9 or Sunday afternoon from 1-3. The choice was obvious.

Unfortunately I didn't bring the camera. I figured there wasn't really any point since there were four children who didn't know how to skate, one adult who really knows how to skate, and one adult who knows how to skate but can't for the life of her figure out how to stop (without running into a wall). Plus, when I wasn't using it, where was I going to put it? I wasn't about to leave it out in the open for someone to take.

While I was working on getting everyone's skates on, Dan took Natalie out on the ice (she had her skates on first). She was petrified and cried every time Dan tried to put her on the ice. Eventually we found the little walkers made from PVC pipe for kids to use to learn to skate. I pushed her around with that for about ten minutes and then she didn't want my help at all. She wanted to do it on her own. Even when she fell she told me she didn't need my help. Pretty soon she was zipping around the ice rink having an absolute blast. She'd even skate up to Ellie and tell her that she needed to race her.

Darin did pretty well too. All of the kids managed to snag one of the walkers (there aren't nearly enough there and some were being used by kids who obviously didn't need them) for awhile and that really helped. Kara had the hardest time learning to skate which surprised me since she seems to be the most athletic.

But being at the Rec Center just reiterated that homeschooling is a good choice for us. Some girls can be so mean!! Once when Kara stepped off the ice and Dan was holding her walker, Natalie fell so he leaned over to pick her up and this girl snatched Kara's walker almost right out of his hands! And there were other instances of disrespect that I saw. It made me very thankful for the sweetness of my own children. And I'm not saying that all homeschooled children are well-behaved or that all public school children are rotten. There just seems to be a greater incidence of disrespectful and mean children in the public school.

All in all we had a great time and have decided that we need to go back soon. Several times throughout the rest of the day Natalie would tell me how much fun she had ice skating.

Ellie's new job

Last year Ellie went to camp with her friend O at Ironwood Springs Christian Ranch and loved it. After she got home last year we told her that she wouldn't be able to go every year since it is rather expensive. Well this year O is going to camp again so Ellie, of course, wants to go too. Instead of going to the overnight camp, she is going to the day camp that focuses on horses. O loves horses. Ellie wants to go too but knows that I'm not forking over the dough for her to go. She's got to make the money herself. She has thought of selling friendship bracelets to the neighbors, shoveling their driveways (I vetoed that one since she hasn't yet proven herself on our driveway), and doing extra chores around the house.

She'd pretty much given up hope that she would be able to raise enough money to go until Dan came up with a great idea!! Dan asked me what things around the house I'd most like help with, and I told him washing the dishes and doing laundry. So we proposed to Ellie that we would pay her to wash all of the non-dishwasher dishes and do all the laundry (including folding and putting away) until mid-July when the camp is. She will get paid $10 per week if she does these chores with a good attitude, does them to my specifications and doesn't let her schoolwork suffer.

When we told her what our plan was, we told her that she needed to think about it overnight as it was a big commitment and we didn't want her to take it lightly. And she would still need to come up with some of the money on her own.

At first when Dan brought up the idea that we pay her for doing chores, I wasn't too keen on it. I didn't really like giving up $40 a month to give to her, but I quickly saw the value of not having to do the dishes or the laundry--my two least favorite chores.

The next morning Ellie said that she wanted to accept the challenge and promptly went and folded three loads of laundry that still needed to be folded from the previous week. (Have I mentioned how much I hate laundry?)

This is only the first week and time will tell if she follows through all the way to the end. But so far it is working out well. Her schoolwork hasn't suffered and she's been doing it with a good attitude. She's actually been quite cute. She will frequently ask me to come look at whatever she has washed or folded to make sure that she is doing it right. "I just don't want it to come out of my pay, Mom (if she doesn't do it right)," she often says.

The big adjustment will be when I have to go back to doing those chores. I just may have to try to hire her again!!

Poem by Ellie

Ellie brought me this poem last night that she wrote--completely unprompted!! I thought it was cute so I thought I'd share it with you.

Oasters
I like to ride on roller coasters
I don't like to buy toasters and coasters
I really don't like big, big boasters
I hang lots of pictures, comics and posters.

Waiting for spring

It is almost the end of February and winter will still be around for quite awhile yet. In fact, they are predicting six inches of snow on Thursday. But we are all ready for winter to be over--even Dan who commented that maybe we should move to Phoenix (not that he'd be liking that decision in the middle of the summer there)!! Several times a week I'll hear Dan or one of the kids wonder out loud how long it will be until we can sit outside in our screened-in porch. In the summertime, we practically live out there.

This week we got a Jung Seed catalog in the mail which only heightened our desire for summer to be here. Ellie and Kara have been looking through it and asked me if they could plant something this summer. I have a small garden plot that doesn't have great soil (I have attempted to amend the soil to no avail) and has never done well with tomatoes and green peppers so I told the girls they could plant the garden this year. They have to buy the seeds and plants, water and weed it and harvest what they plant. So yesterday afternoon they looked a little more closely at the catalog and picked out what they wanted to plant. Ellie decided to plant pickling cucumbers (she wants to make pickles), mesclun mix and a row of flowers. Kara is going to plant carrots, peas and a row of flowers.




Here they are adding up the cost of the seeds:

Dilly Bean Potato Soup

When menu planning for this month I found a great-looking and inexpensive soup recipe in Simply in Season. I was a little skeptical about how the soup would taste as I've never made a soup that combines potatoes and beans. But I figured it was cheap and I've not been disappointed in anything from this cookbook so far so I'd give it a try. And it gave me the opportunity to use my new pan (a Le Creuset knock-off). I was not disappointed. It was delicious!! Even Darin (who thinks he's picky) loved it and had seconds. It is just as good warmed up the next day.

Dilly Bean Potato Soup

3/4 cups chopped celery

3 carrots, shredded

1-2 cloves garlic, minced

In large pot saute in 1 tablespoon olive oil.

6 cups chicken or vegetable broth

4-5 large potatoes, peeled and diced

salt to taste

Add and simmer until potatoes are tender, about 20 minutes. Mash some of the potatoes.

4 1/2 cups cooked Great Northern beans (I used dried that I had cooked the night before)

1 T dried dill weed

Add to soup.

3/4 cup plain yogurt or sour cream

1 1/2 T flour

1/2 tsp pepper

Combine and stir into soup. Cook and stir until sour cream has been mixed in and heated.

Serve with fresh bread.

Arizona

I recently went down to Scottsdale to get some sunshine and warmth and it was wonderful!! Dan was working down there for two weeks so at the prodding of some friends (who graciously volunteered to watch our kiddos), I went down for a few days.

I flew out on Friday since Ellie's spelling bee was Thursday evening. I dropped the kids off at a friends and then another friend brought me to the airport. I only took a carry-on with me because I wasn't about to pay to check a bag so since I'd already printed my boarding pass, check-in was fairly easy. My first flight was quite uneventful and short. Did you know that the record for the flight from Rochester to Minneapolis is 12 minutes!?! The flight attendant announced overhead that the record was held by the pilot flying our plane. We didn't get there quite as quickly but it was still a short flight. My flight from Minneapolis to Phoenix wasn't nearly as short. It seemed to drag on forever. When I had boarded the plane I was quite excited to get there. But I was really, really hot on the plane and by the time we got to Phoenix I had the worst headache and was just so glad to get off the plane--not probably what Dan was looking for. Plus, all I heard from the people behind me were complaints about not being upgraded to first class anymore and how it was so much worse to sit in coach. Be happy you are on the plane, people. And if you want first class, pay for it! Sorry, vent over. We went back to the hotel room and I took some Tylenol, had a shower and got some fresh air. I felt much better.

After I'd returned to normal, we went out for supper at The White Chocolate Grill. It was delicious!!!! If you ever eat there, you have to order the Israeli Couscous as a side. It was so, so good. I'm going to have to find a copycat recipe somewhere if I can.

Saturday morning we woke up early, went to Paradise Bakery for a morning snack. They have something called Paradise Oatmeal that was really good and something I intend to recreate at home. It was steel-cut oats served on top of an oatmeal-raisin bowl (yeah, I know, that part isn't so good for you) with sliced strawberries and bananas.

After our snack, we went back to the hotel, changed clothes and went for a run. We asked the guy at the front desk if there were any biking or running trails nearby and he gave us directions to a place about 15 minutes away. Ummmm, I'm not sure what kind of running he was thinking we were going to do. The directions were for a small mountain and the trail was uneven and rocky. It wasn't really what we had in mind nor did we have enough time since we had somewhere to be at 10:30. There was a paved trail about a 1/2 mile back so we went there instead. :-)

On the first day that Dan was there, a friend of mine posted on Facebook that she was going to the airport to pick up her brother and his wife. Her brother (Wayne) was Dan's college roommate and we hadn't seen them since our wedding (I don't think, anyway, a really long time) so I sent Cheri a message that Dan was in town. So we went for brunch there on Saturday. We had a great time eating, laughing and reminiscing over college days. And we got to meet Wayne's wife and Cheri's husband and darling kids, all whom we'd not met before.

Here are some pics from Saturday morning:
















After brunch we went back to the hotel to figure out what we were going to do for the rest of the day and where we were going to eat supper (the most important part you know). Dan had said a few months ago that when he got a new job, we could both go and get a massage. Seeing as how this seemed to be a great time to do that (and he's been at his job for three months now and we still hadn't gotten them), we set up appointments for massages. They were good but I think the last lady I went to here was better so we'll stick to her from now on.

For supper we went to Oregano's. The weather was beautiful and we sat outside on the patio. We ordered some cheesy garlic bread for an appetizer and then ordered a stuffed pizza. However, what they don't tell you on the menu is that the stuffed pizza is stuffed with mostly cheese!!!!!! So after having cheese on our appetizer, we had cheese for our main dish. I could only eat one piece and scraped half of the cheese off. The flavor was good but I'm guessing they put 2 pounds of cheese on one small pizza!!!! If we go there again, I'm definitely ordering the whole wheat pizza crust instead.

Sunday morning we went to Covenant Community Church which was only three miles from our hotel. Cheri's husband Ryan is the worship leader and piano player there. It was an amazing service!!! Ryan is a really, really good piano player (sings well too) and did a great job leading the service. The pastor there gave a great sermon and the people were very friendly. Dan will be going back there the next time he's there over a weekend.

After church we headed over to Dan's cousin's house for lunch. We had a delicious meal, had a good time talking, and Dan got his kid fix by holding Julia (their 16-month-old) for quite awhile. After lunch we spent some time outside in the sun hearing stories about scorpions in the summer and large spiders. It made me glad we didn't live there (although the year-round garage-saling makes it tempting).

Monday was another wonderful day. Dan had to go to work which left me to do whatever I wanted to do (within walking distance). There were a few shops about a mile away that I wanted to browse so I walked there. I browsed The Container Store (one Ellie would love I'm sure given her penchant for organizing) and Whole Foods. I really wish we had a Whole Foods here--their deli area looked really, really good and I probably could have eaten every meal there. After that I walked over to the Paradise Bakery, got a cup of coffee and sat outside to read for a few hours. It was so nice to be able to sit in the sun for awhile. My cheeks even got a little pink--who'd have thought that would happen in January!?

Tuesday morning I packed up and came home. My flight home went much quicker as I wasn't nearly so hot although we did have quite a bit of turbulence. I even flew home with one of my co-workers who happened to be in Phoenix with her two kids the same time I was. She sat next to a ninety-year-old lady who goes to Hawaii by herself every year!!! I hope that's what I'm doing when I am that old.

Anyway, this has gotten really long and for that I apologize. Thanks Gar and Beth for watching the kids over the weekend and thanks Jay and Emily for watching the kids the rest of the time and everything else!!!!!

I'm ready for another vacation.