Kids, Lakes, Loons and Pines

Melted Crayon Rocks

Yesterday, I took off with a friend to the shore.  We loaded up six children and two grown-ups and spent a beautiful day next to water and playing with rocks.

We also came home with a weighted vehicle because we collected a bunch of smooth stones for one of our favorite projects:  

Melted Crayon Rocks

materials/supplies:

• smooth stones
• crayons
• oven
• covered work space

Directions:

Heat stones in an oven heated to 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes.

Transfer rocks to a covered workspace with a potholder.

Color on the rocks with crayons - they will melt like butter as you create your design.

Set aside to cool.

Tips:

• This project is good for ages 3 and up with adult supervision.  The rocks are hot, but it is very possible for little ones to participate too with guidance.
• It can be messy - make sure your workspace is covered - the melted wax is pretty permanent - you don't want it on your kitchen table or on nice clothes.
• Use what you have -this project works with other materials as well - like shells or wood.  
• Any type of crayons work, but metallic crayons like silver or gold create an extra special effect.
• You may want to time this activity when you are already using your oven - for example after you take out a pizza, put some stones in.
• The melted crayon rocks make good paperweights or garden accents.  

Have fun!

 

 

why I do what I do.

 

A couple of days ago I made a successful batch of lavender-honey-oatmeal soap, and it turned out great.  

I am not writing this to boast, instead I am telling you this because I am actually pretty amazed.  I make soap.  I am a soap-maker.  I am also a beekeeper, writer, and, somehow, have become a go to person in our community for advice on raising chickens. 

People ask me all the time, "How do you do all this all with four kids?  

I know sometimes some people may think that people like me have it all together all of the time.  That my days flow seamlessly with happy children in tow as I craft my utopian life and effortlessly produce homegrown meals, soap and cheese, and knit my children underwear.  

You may feel judged or inadequate, just as I sometimes do, looking at other peoples' blogs and snapshots of sugar-coated lives.

I want to remind you of a little secret.

No one is perfect.   No one.

Do you want to know how I do this?  Well here are my answers:

::I make time::   

The truth is I just really want to do all this stuff.  Whether it is tending to bees, chickens, making soap, writing, getting outdoors with my kids, whatever I happen to be doing, I just act on it.  I love to learn, and I try to make mindful choices of how I use my time.

::I make mistakes:

I have baked many bricks of bread and failed lots of recipes.  Many of my many well thought-out lessons and activities both at home and at school have absolutely flopped.  I have received several hard rejections with my writing and I admit that I loose my patience, yell, and cry.

::I work hard::

This house in which I live did not build itself.  My husband and I built it with our own hands!  We have been very lucky and blessed as a family, but we have also worked our tails off in the process.  Making conscious choices on what and where we spend our money and we make a lot of compromises. 

I also work hard to learn from my mistakes. If there is something I really want to do, I work hard to stick with it.  I have found that more often than not, from every failed attempt, there is something of value to take away.

::I am real::  

If you really know me you know I have no super powers.  This lifestyle and all of these extra-curriculars are healthy creative outlets for me.  

Some mom's do drugs,  I make soap.  

Most everything I do helps me stay balanced and connected - and also brings me joy.  

We work to incorporate elements of simplicity into the life of our family. But we also buy and eat store-bought cookies and macaroni and cheese, and I do not knit my children underwear.

One thing that I know for sure is that I love to learn.  The more I learn the more I want to know, and the more I know, the more I to want to learn.  

And that is how I got to the place I am right now in my life.  A soap-maker, mama, beekeeper, chicken-tender, kindergarten teacher with high hopes to inspire others to live their best lives. 

I welcome you to tag along on this journey.

 

 

Blueberry Breakfast Cake

It is blueberry season in our neck of the woods.  We made a couple batches of jam and now we are collecting and saving berries for the winter.  

It is always an adventure berry picking with four young children.  

Three young boys find opportunity to wrestle-anywhere-and there is an occasional fight over a single blueberry bush in the midst of thousands of berries.

But it is getting easier with every season, the kids are building their independence and our parameters are expanding just a bit- along with the amount of berries we are bringing home.  

I have been trying to make something to celebrate our foraging harvest every time we go out, and this breakfast cake is turning into a favorite. 

Ingredients:

• 3 cups of flour
• 1 1/2 cups of sugar
• 1 t. salt
• 3 t. baking powder
• 1 1/2 cup milk
• 3 T butter, melted
• 2 cups blueberries
• 1 t. vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease a glass baking pan  Combine dry ingredients.  Add milk and melted butter, blueberries and vanilla and mix.   Spread evenly in the pan and bake for 45 minutes.     *just in case your wondering if I left them out- there are no eggs in this recipe.

Sweet Orange-Peppermint Foaming Hand Soap Recipe

This past weekend my daughter and I went to a mall.  My kids have been to more glaciers and oceans than malls so it was quite a novel experience for our nine year old child.

It was just the two of us and I let her take the lead.  One of the stores she wanted to go in was full of soaps and lotions.  When we walked in the store I was overwhelmed with fragrances and loud music, but she absolutely loved it.  When she is a teenager I am sure she'll spend her money on trendy fragrance-filled synthetic products just as I did, but for now, in her childhood, she will experience rainy days home with her mama creating homemade soaps with essential oils.

Here's one for today:

Sweet Orange-Peppermint Foaming Hand Soap

Materials & Ingredients:

• Recycled/Reusable 8-9 oz. Foaming Soap Dispenser

• Water

• 3 T. Unscented Castile Soap

• 1 tsp. olive oil

• 10 drops vitamin E oil

• 5 drops sweet orange essential oil

• 3 drops peppermint essential oil

Instructions:

Fill the foaming soap dispenser with water, leaving a one inch head space.  Add castile soap, olive oil, vitamin E oil and essential oils.  Screw on pump and shake to mix.  

It's as easy as that!

Touch a Butterfly - Book Giveaway!

I am excited to share with you an interview with the inspiring author, April Pulley Sayre!

 April is an award-winning children’s book author of over 55 natural history books for children and adults. Her read-aloud nonfiction books, known for their lyricism and scientific precision, have been translated into French, Dutch, Japanese, and Korean. She is best known for pioneering literary ways to immerse young readers in natural events via creative storytelling and unusual perspectives. 

I recently contacted April, and she is graciously sharing some of her inspiration here today in my first author interview on Kids and Eggs. 

April, you have written numerous, award winning picture story books for children, which are your favorite, and why?

A.S. -Okay, now, unfair question! That's like asking a mother which of her children she likes best! :-) I'm always most enamored of the books I am currently working on, which are Raindrops Roll and Woodpecker Wham. But you probably mean books your readers can actually find. Well, Vulture View, which one a Geisel Honor, has a special place in my heart because the language felt just right, every piece in its place and Steve Jenkins' art is stunning. We also had a book together last year that I adore. It's Eat Like a Bear. That book is chewier in a good way. Every very was lovingly made and the art and design are just exactly what I wanted. So, you always love a book at the start. But the true test is whether you love it at the end, whether all the team of people in production have pushed and pulled and poured themselves into it to make it sing in ways you could not even imagine on your own. Eat Like a Bear and Vulture View and also Rah, Rah, Radishes: a Vegetable Chant all have that sense of completion. 

You mention that your travels have inspired many of your stories, can you tell us a little bit about how these rich experiences have affected your writing?

A.S. Most of my books come from my own experiences in rain forests, wetlands, prairies, and even in our very wild, animal-attracting gardens. They are slivers of the goofy nature joy that is my everyday life. Vulture View was written in a rain forest in Panama even though it is not set there. Army Ant Parade was set in that Panamanian rainforest as well. I am also a nature photographer so 4-8 hours a day are spent out in nature, photographing it. That's why I've acquired an intimate knowledge of nature that you cannot get from just being indoors. 

The book Touch a Butterfly-Wildlife Gardening with Kids is great inspiration to engage young children in the process of wildlife gardening.  What inspired you to write this book and what is your favorite activity/recommendation from the book?

A.S. If you want to know me and my heart and life, read that book. I pretty much poured into it the knowledge my husband and I have acquired about nature in the last twenty-five years. I'd always wanted to share that knowledge and the folks at Roost books asked me to create it in the form of an activity book for families. 

Are you currently working on a new book?  What adventures are in store for you next?

A.S. I'm always working on several books. I just corrected galleys for Raindrops Roll, a photo-illustrated book coming out Spring 2015. Today I'm corresponding with my editor about flap copy and some endmatter text tweaks for my next book with Steve Jenkins, Woodpecker Wham, which will be released by Holt in 2015.

Anything else?

A.S. Well, I just hope that families will get out in nature every chance they have. Get messy, get goofy, try gardening and don't worry if you don't have all the answers. Let kids help you find them! They are explorers. Hands on science, and hands on experiences in nature, build young people's sense of language, science, and natural joy.  Books can turn our eyes back to these joys in nature. That's my part of the cycle. But its' the follow up, the joy in nature, that is the most important. 

There's a superb program, called Story Walk, by Anne Ferguson in Vermont, that takes books outside...laminates the pages and posts them as signs for temporary or permanent outdoor trails for families.  Because of her work, my books are being used all over the country in the way. For instance, Trout Are Made of Trees has been used for walk through forests to streams. And Honk, Honk, Goose, is perfect for family strolls along lawns and to ponds. 

Thank You April Pulley Sayre for this inspirational interview!

Now there is more!  

I received a copy of April's book Touch a Butterfly - Wildlife Gardening with Kids from the publisher Roost Books for review, and I have decided to share it with one lucky Kids and Eggs reader!

Enter and help spread the word!  I know you'll enjoy the book!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Homemade Ketchup

Today was a beautiful day in Minnesota.   Not a typical mid July hot and humid day, but a sunny cool and breezy 70 degree kind of day.  Perfect for picking berries in the morning and experimenting in the kitchen in the afternoon.

Today's mess was homemade ketchup

I would like to say that I used tomatoes from my garden, but here in these North woods, we are not even close, so I used store-bought canned tomatoes. 

It turned out to be a very productive mess, yielding about 10 pints.  

I created an adaption of a recipe for ketchup that I found in The Homemade Pantry - 101 Foods You Can Stop Buying and Start Making by Alana Chernila.  I tripled the batch and made some revisions to get the ketchup to the taste and consistency that I liked and I processed the jars in a hot water bath.

Here's my take at the recipe:

Mama Megan's Homemade Ketchup 

yields 10 pints

Ingredients:

• 6 T. olive oil
• 3 cup diced white onion
• 6 T. minced garlic
• 9 - 28 cans of tomatoes, drained
• 9 t. salt
• 3 T. paprika
• 3 t. cinnamon
• 1 t. ground cloves
• 1 T. cumin
• 3 T. chili powder
• 2 t. pepper
• 3/4 cup cider vinegar
• 3/4 cup white vinegar
• 1/4 cup light brown sugar
• 3 T. honey
• 1/4 cup corn starch and water

1)  Heat the olive oil in a large heavy-bottomed pot over medium heat.  Add onions and cook until they are translucent.  Add garlic and continue to stir.

2)  Add tomatoes, salt, paprika, cinnamon, cloves, cumin, chili powder, ground pepper and simmer stirring occasionally for about 30 minutes.

3)  Blend until smooth with an immersion blender.  (If you do not have an immersion blender, use an upright blender and blend in small batches until it is all smooth and return it to the pot.)

4)  Add vinegars, brown sugar, and honey.  Simmer uncovered, stirring often.  

5)  In a small bowl add 1/4 cup of corn starch and water to create a thick paste.  Add cornstarch paste , to the ketchup mixture mixture, stirring constantly as it thickens.  Continue to simmer until desired consistency develops.  (This recipe will have a different texture and thickness than store-bought ketchup)

6)  Pour ketchup in sterile pint jars leaving a 1/8 inch head space. recommended hot water bath canning processes for ketchup.

Table 1. Recommended process time for Tomato Ketchup in a boiling-water canner. From the National Center of Home Food Preservation
		Process Time at Altitudes of
Style of Pack	Jar Size	0 - 1,000 ft	1,001 - 6,000 ft	Above 6,000 ft
Hot	Pints	15 min	20	25

 

Book Pick - Blueberries For Sal

I love this book.  

Blueberries For Sal by Robert McCloskey is one of my favorite summer read-a-louds.  This timeless story was read to me as a child and now has its place on our own family bookshelf.

This book is great to read in the season of blueberries or anytime!

But all the more special, if you have your own "little Sal" to share the story with.

If you get the chance, find this book and share it with a child in your life.

 

Strawberry Bluebarb Jam - With Kids

 This week we made our first batch of jam of the summer season.  I wanted to use some of our first wild blueberries that we have been picking, but we did not have quite enough to make a batch of blueberry jam, so we decided to be creative!

We purchased a beautiful flat of strawberries at our farmer's market and we were able to get some rhubarb from a friend and it made a perfect combination:

strawberries+blueberries+rhubarb= strawberry bluebarb jam!

With several little helping hands we made a successful first batch of jam that will be a wonderful complement to peanut butter sandwiches and toast.  

 

Ingredients:

• 2 cups hulled strawberries
• 1 cup of blueberries
• 1 cup of rhubarb
• the juice of 1 lemon (about 1/4 cup)
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 1 package of fruit pectin

 

Follow basic directions for cooked jam and jelly.  I followed the directions here.

To label the jam we used the printable labels from Taproot designed by Jenny Lee Folwer.

Enjoy!

 

Wild Blueberry Hand Pies

This morning the kids and I went out berry picking.  Each year it is getting just a little bit easier, and each of them are getting a little more independent, expanding our parameters and how many berries we are able to bring home.  

Today, each of came home with some berries.  I gave them each the choice if they wanted to "donate" their berries to the family supply or if they wanted to eat what they pick.  Today Zoe came up with the idea to make little tarts.   So we did!  These were so quick, fun, and easy for the kids, I thought I would share the idea so you could try it on your own.

Ingredients:

Makes 4 mini tarts

• 1 disk refrigerated pie crust
• approx 1 cup of berries - about 1/4 cup of berries per tart
• 2 T sugar, plus a little extra to sprinkle on the crust
• a dash of cornstarch
• a sprinkle of cinnamon
• 1 egg yolk,
• 1 teaspoon of cold water

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Cut the pie crust into fourths and roll each section into a ball.

Have your child roll out the ball of dough into a circle shape.

Mix berries, sugar, cornstarch and cinnamon in a bowl.

Let your child arrange berries in the center of the tart, then fold up edges.  

Separate and beat the egg yolk and cold water gently with a fork in a separate bowl.  

Brush egg wash on the crust of the tarts.  Sprinkle crusts lightly with sugar.

Bake for approx 15 minutes or until the crust is golden brown.

Enjoy!

 

Blueberry Buttermilk Muffins

Yesterday evening the boys and I battled the mosquitoes and collected enough wild blueberries to make a batch of muffins this morning. 

I created this adaption inspired by my mom's trademark muffin recipe.

 Warm wild blueberries with a hint of lemon - YUM!

The the kids thought so too - The recipe makes 12 muffins.....and they have quickly disappeared.

Ingredients:

• 5 T.  butter
• 1 cup of sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 t. vanilla
• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 t. baking soda
• 1 t. baking powder
• 1 cup low fat buttermilk
• 1/2 t. grated lemon zest
• 1 cup (or more) fresh blueberries

Directions:

1)  Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a muffin tin with baking liner.  

2) Using a stand mixer or hand mixer, beat butter, sugar, eggs, and vanilla in a large bowl until well combined.

3)  Combine dry ingredients another bowl.

4)   Add dry ingredients and buttermilk to the egg mixture, stir.

5)  Fold in blueberries and lemon zest.

6)   Fill muffin liners 3/4 full with batter.

Bake until tops are golden brown, approx. ____ minutes.  

Enjoy!