My Famous Whipped Cream Cheese Frosting!

 

OK, so it's not that famous but my sister-in-law likes it! Here's how to make it:

Ingredients

One 8 oz package of organic cream cheese (room temperature)

Two cups of heavy whipping cream (cold) plus 4 Tsp. heavy whipping cream (room temp.)

1 tsp. Vanilla (optional)

2 tsp. orange zest (optional)

1 Tsp. raw honey (optional)

Place the cream cheese and 4 Tsp of whipping cream in a medium sauce pan. Turn your burner on low and stir until creamy. Set aside. In another bowl whip the cream until fluffy. Add optional ingredients to the cream cheese. Then add the cream cheese to the whip cream (be sure it is not warm any longer it should be back to room temp.) Stir slowly, folding the two mixes together until just mixed. Place in fridge for about 20 minutes. Then you can frost a cake with it! Makes a great topping to fruit bowls, cupcakes, waffles, pancakes, etc!

Lacto-fermented Blackberry and Marmalade Jam

I cannot express how scrumptulecent this jam is! It has an old fashion holiday taste with the blending of the citrus and berry flavors. This has fast become my favorite jam - ever! The bonus is that it's so easy to make! Here's how...

3 cups of crushed berries and finely chopped oranges (peels included)
1/4 cup rapadura or sucanot
1/4 cup whey (the watery stuff on top of yogurt)
1 teaspoons sea salt
Filtered water

Place all ingredients together and mash until well squished. Put into, scalded, quart sized mason jar, pack down as best you can to avoid air bubbles and close the lid tightly. Be sure there is at least one clean inch of room from the top of the jar. Leave out for 48 hours to ferment. Enjoy! Store in a cool place or your fridge for up to two months.

So nummy you wont believe it!

Autumn Equinox / Michaelmas Celebration - Day Two

So we are two days into our week long festival, are you following along? If so please comment below and let us know how it's going!

Last night my family and I dove into these bad boys...

Then I dressed as Sir George and told the beginning of our celebration story

The kids are really getting a kick out of Sir George even Seth comes and listens to the stories!

Tonight after our Sir George tale we lit candle all around the house to shine while Father Sun starts going to bed early.

 

Waldorf Playroom Decorating

In this post I gave some ideas about play room decorating for boys. Here I have pictured one area we worked on this week. More posts to follow as we are also creating a "Space" area!

Here is the wall to hang dress ups. How I did it: I took a Mananita branch and sawed off the smaller branches leavings knobs to hang clothes on. I then added some small nails on the branch for additional hooks. I then nailed to whole branch into the wall on the studs.

This is a shot of the general area we "made over."

Here is what the boys call the "Mans area." I like to think of it as the gnome home. It's basically a space to play with figures/models. Everything from Fairies to Star Wars. How I did it: I took a Mazanita branch, sawed it to fit the space and nailed it into the wall on both sides. I hope to add more to this area soon. I'll post about it when I do.

Fall Equinox in Our Home

Two fat little green pumpkins for our dinner table this evening. We will hollow out their seeds and slime, leaving the flesh, then fill them up with cream, cheese, bread crumbs and butter. We will bake them until they are tender and eat them up!

The trees around our home are mostly evergreens but even they lose their needles this time of year, just not all of them. They turn golden red and drop all of the place in huge, happy, piles!

Cute, fat, little seed babies fall all around, darning fluffy caps.

The day and night are perfectly equal today.

I love the golden look the sun has this time of year.

 

 

 

 

Science lesson, berry picking!

World's sweetest little boy.

Home school science lesson, blackberry picking. We are lacto-fermenting our blackberries this year, I can't wait to try the jam! I'll be posting recipes and results soon!

Weaving Together Fall Equinox and Michaelmas, A Guide for Celebration

Photo Credit

I wanted to post this one a week early so you can mull over whether or not you would like to join us in our week long celebration! It's super simple and lots of fun! Join us, wont you?

A chilly wind makes my toes curl, my heart skips a beat at an amber colored leaf - in short, I’m an Autumn addict. Every year I try and find new and improved ways to celebrate this time of year. This year I have a great plan!

Fall Equinox falls one week prior to the Waldorf celebration of Michaelmas. These two holidays are often celebrated in similar fashions, with harvest feasts and various fall merriment.

Michaelmas adds the exciting adventures of Sir George slaying the dragon through the spirit/guidance/help of the angel Michael. Michaelmas is a fun way to look toward our inner selves for bravery and guidance as the days grow shorter and winter descends.

I’ve decided this year to hold a week long Fall Equinox and Michaelmas bash! The first ingredient in the fun is the story. Told in eight parts the story brings to life the changing of the seasons and weaves these changes into an empowering narrative of one boy’s defeat of a mighty dragon.

To join our celebration simply read the eight parts of the story guide and then expand the story line as long or short as you like. Add places, names, descriptions and details. Be sure to tell the story to your children without reading it from a page, look at them, really engage them.

I plan on dressing up as Sir George with a knitted knight hat and red silk cape when I tell the tale. Be sure and tell the story early on in the day so you have time for the craft or activity I have suggested to accompany the narrative.

If you’re artistic use paper and crayons, paint, chalk or whatever to create a picture to go along with each day’s story. Encourage your children to create impromptu artwork about the story as well.

I’ve also created a list of things you will need for your week long celebration, don’t worry, it’s all very simple!

Supplies for the Week:

Local vegetables (to bake or steam)
Local, grass fed meat
Candles and candle holders
Leaves (don’t worry if they haven’t turned yet, that’s OK)
Paper and crayon for leaf rubbings
Clay Ingredients - Baking soda, corn starch
Silks, scarves or blankets for a cape
Cardboard, scissors, tape
Cookie ingredients - 2 cups spelt flour, 2 tsp baking powder,.5 cup turbinado sugar, 2 eggs, 1 TB vanilla extract, 1 tsp lemon extract, .25 cup oil, .5 cup applesauce

Wednesday, September 22nd, Fall Equinox

Story guide: All the people in the land (Mother Nature’s Realm, Avalon, Zion, or ?) are harvesting their crops and hold a big feast.

Activity: Simple Harvest Dinner using your local veggies and grass fed meats. Talk about where the food came from (hint, not just the store! LOL).



Thursday

Story Guide: Father Sun says he’s tired of shinning all day when the people no longer need him to grow their food. He asks the Angels to make the days shorter.

Activity: Set out candles in your home in anticipation of Father Sun’s long naps or carve gourd lanterns.



Friday

Story Guide: Sister Wind grows chilly without the sun around all day. She blows and blows and makes the leaves cold. The cold leaves try to warm up by turning the color of fire.

Activity: Leaf rubbings



Saturday

Story Guide: But it does no good, they are still cold so slowly they drop one by one to the ground. Some fall upon a huge mound of earth and they become the scales on the back of a mighty dragon.

Activity: Rake up some leaves into a pile, pretend it’s a dragon. Give him a scary name. If you don’t have leaves work with what you have; straw, a mound of dirt, a tree stump or a pile of laundry. To get even more creative make a head or tail.



Sunday

Story Guide: The dragon frightens Mother Night and she is too scared to let the moon come out. The people know that without the fall moon there will be no winter and without a long winter nap the animals and seeds will not have energy to grow next spring. So the people ask their angels to help them.

Activity: Make clay angels using this recipe. Bake them with ribbon inside and a loop at the top. Hang your angels on the trees outside to protect you from the dragon (or inside if your dragon is a pile of laundry).



Monday

Story Guide: The Angels agree that something must be done. They send a magic cape and sword to a young boy named George and knight him, Sir George, the brave knight of Mother Nature. He is afraid but he accepts the challenge to fight the dragon.

Activity: Make a cardboard sword



Tuesday

Story Guide: George chases the dragon all around the earth, up into heaven and back. George prays and asks for strength.

Activity: Make a cape. You can get fancy and use silks that you dye naturally or simply use a cut up sheet, blanket or scarf.


Wednesday, Michaelmas!

Story Guide: God sends Michael and Michael tells George about the war in heaven and how he cast out Lucifer. George gains new strength to slay the mighty dragon. All the people are happy and bake good things to eat and give them to the brave George.

*Don’t be tempted to think this tale as too violent for young ones. Children view the world and death differently than we do as adults. The simple triumph of slaying the dragon will not translate into violent animal murdering adults, I promise. Fairy tales speak to the soul and part of that magic is the death of the evil in the story. This empowers children to believe they can conquer their own woes, putting them to “death.”

Activity: Dress the family up and act out the whole story, Bake sugar cookies cut them out to look like dragons, swords, angels, etc.

Hint: If you’re Christian you may want to read Revelations Chapter 12 at some point in the week.

Happy Michaelmas!