Easy Homemade Bread

I know I’ve mentioned in a few posts that we’ve been making our own bread again. We love sourdough bread but a few of the kids had mentioned that they really wanted something more like store-bought so I tried a few recipes and with a couple of tweaks we have found a combo that we really like… Mr. Awesome and I haven’t been eating much bread but we have tried a slice here and there as it smells so good! It is quite exceptional when it’s still a little warm and smeared with real butter and then drizzled with a bit of local honey… mmmmm!

This bread is great to use as rolls and as an alternative to English Muffins for breakfast. It also toasts up really nicely! We save all the breadcrumbs in a baggie in the freezer to use in our recipes where breadcrumbs are needed.

I recently converted my sourdough starter ‘Fran’ to a pasta madre/lievito madre/stiff dough and I like the results so far. You can learn more about this process HERE. I think I want to try to make some Panettone for Christmas this year so I wanted to get some starters going and get a little more familiar with the process.

I’ve also been researching about the Herman starter and Charlie starters so I may want to them out as well.

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Getting Ready for the Holidays Week 7 (The Week After Thanksgiving)

Thanksgiving is over but there’s no time to rest yet as the real preparations are beginning for the holidays! One of the biggest things we need to do is to take time to sit down and evaluate how our Thanksgiving was. What was everyone’s favorite part? Was there anything that didn’t work well? Do you need to set up a rotating schedule to have dinner at other family member’s homes? (Odd year here, Even year there, or every 3rd, 4th, year?) Would it be better to have a potluck-style meal where everyone brings something? Was there anything you would like to do differently? Start now for your planning for next year so you don’t forget these ‘little things’! We will also be getting all of our Fall decor ready to be put away next week so we can start pulling out the Christmas decor.

Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels.com
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Smoky Maple Walnuts

These were pretty simple to make and they almost didn’t last until Thanksgiving Day because they were so good!

Smoky Maple Walnuts

Ingredients:

  • 2 c. walnuts
  • 1/3 c. maple syrup
  • 1 t. liquid smoke, optional
  • 2-3 T. soy sauce or alternative
  • Kosher salt or salt flakes for sprinkling on top
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A Christ-Centered Thanksgiving and other Thanksgiving homeschool resources

This week we have been focusing on Thanksgiving with our homeschool studies. I had purchased ‘A Christ-Centered Thanksgiving‘** several years ago but just never got around to using it. This season I am trying to be a bit more intentional and I have included different seasonal activity slots into our school schedule to help me remember to look through what I have.

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Fall & Thanksgiving Themed Activities for Kids

I’ve written a couple of posts about getting ready for the holidays and I’ve mentioned that I would be gathering ideas for activities for the kiddos. The following list is some of the activities that we already had on hand… hopefully, they will still be available for you to download if you wish. If they aren’t available a quick Google search will quickly deliver a list of fun activities.

I have already pulled out the Fall-Themed activity box for the youngest… it is just a plastic shoebox filled with fake leaves, bugs, nuts, and pinecones. She loves to dump them out and look for the bugs.

Pilgrim Unit Study & this cute Pilgrim hat and bonnet for the kids to wear.

Printable Thanksgiving Placemats with Activities

Thankful Cornucopia Craft

Thanksgiving Activity Pack

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