Dr Horrible on Seasame Street (sorta)

Link!

thought some of you might appreciate this!
-DAve

Days of Summer Three: Summer Food Part I

Summer brings the most fulfilling activities, which also sometimes happen to be the most delicious! For instance, strawberry picking!

Dave, Corrina and I picked 12, 4 L pails of strawberries, and had quite a time figuring out what to do with them all. My oh my, did it take alot of shuffling to fit all those plump berries into the cool fridge so they could keep until I could get my hands on them.

I had many ambitions for creating delectable strawberry dishes, from shortcake to scones, to pies. In the end we froze most of the berries, turned many into jam, ate 2 strawberry crisps, and dehydrated a pail into perfect cereal pals!


We've been having fun doing strawberry smoothies and shakes, and even went wild and made fresh strawberry daiquiri's.

I contemplated making freezer jam but decided against it for a few reasons. One, Corrina is allergic to fresh strawberries (but did phenomenal at abstaining from eating the berries while picking!) but can eat cooked berries, and two, my wise woman sources tell me the taste and texture of the cooked jam tops the freezer version.

For the Jam I used the less sugar certo pectin for a few batches and regular for a few, following the directions inside the package for each. I actualyl found the regular batches to be a little too sweet. It also bothered me that for the regular certo there are 7 cups of sugar to 4 cups crushed berries, whereas the less sugar certo called for 6 cups of berries to 4 cups of sugar. The only difference is shelf life: regular lasts 1 year, light lasts 6 months. However, I imagine the shelf life won't be a problem, as we are almost done an entire pint of jam already!
The hustle and bustle surrounding the berries was very energizing to me. Washing, hulling, cooking, slicing, and just being consumed by a nutritional task brought me a lot of joy. Won't be quitting my day job sadly (or school, as it were!), although I have thought about becoming a chef or pastry chef before.

We 'tested' Corrina's allergy to fresh berries and few times, so we had the chance to watch her devour a sweet fresh strawberry. She definately looked at us with that "How come you've been holding on on me... these things are amazing!" and came back for me. It became very tricky to monitor her for hives because our test got a little out of control since every time I turned around she was helping herself to another berry! In the end we only found one little cluster of hives, but this only happened about 5 days after eating a few berries a day. Corrina was not bothered by them and they disappeared quickly. We are still sticking to cooked berries for the most part though. My next adventure will be to make cooked strawberry popsicles. I plan on mashing and boiling the strawberries for a short bit of time, letting them cool, and putting them into molds. I doubt they will need sugar to be delicious, but I may reach for a teaspoon of honey if necessary.

Wow, with all this talk about fresh strawberries I really wish they weren't all frozen. Oh well, I guess I will just have to have a handful of the fresh Saskatoon berries that fill my fridge this week! That's another post though!

We've been married for four years now! Yippy!

Days of Summer: Two

First cutting of Zinnias from our garden! I appreciate that you sent me the seeds to grow mom. What an excellent little gift to slip inside a letter. I'll have to remember that next spring.
There is just one thing that is not right about these Zinnias. Do you see those little holes on the bright pink's leaf? Well, some of the leaves in the garden are almost all eaten up. Who or what is doing this? Slugs ate all my butter leaf lettuce, and I did not act in time to stop them. But if I can I will do my best to keep the Zinnias safe. Although, I guess they are feeding some special little bugs... but I want flowers this summer more than bugs. Great, now I am feeling so disconnected from nature the way the world works without human destruction. Really though, if you know what is eating the leafs, please leave a little comment, perhaps with a suggest as to how to fix this problem.

I have been absolutely amazed to see flowers and vegetables burgeon from seeds. I still do not believe that these flowers had their very beginnings, their first steps if you will, in the spare bedroom as seeds. And now, here they are, back in my house again! The cycle! I am sounding like an empty nester, so I'll stop.
What are you growing right now? What is blooming in your garden (take that literally or figuratively!)
Now go, get on with summer, or commenting!

Days of Summer One

Days of Summer


Now that the weather is warmer in our neck of the woods our summer time activities have really picked up. We've been berry picking, swimming at wadding pools, having bbq's as a family and with friends, and spending countless hours swinging and sliding at the park. We've painted the sidewalk with, well, sidewalk paint, watered our flower gardens, played with neighbor friends, and put our legs to work riding tricycles around the block! Yet it's the little things that have been wonderful, and I must say that my most favorite part of the summer is just following Corrina around, going where she goes, doing what she wants to do.

I'm going to try something a little different this week. I will be posting a picture and a few words everyday, both to give a better glimpse into our summer life, and to be more consistent yet simple with blogging. So, here we are, this first day of summer!


Two more thoughts:
Certain dates have not passed yet regarding potential exciting changes in our upcoming year. These changes do not include anything new, cute and bald. They are still pretty cool though! Keep your eyes peeled (really, this is a rather crude saying, don't you think... yuck, peeled eyes!)
Second thought: Actually, more of a friendly welcome to check out some blog links I am adding to our sidebar. Both are family and crafting related. Both are published authors. Check them out!
Angry Chicken
Soule Mama

Corrina Singing

Currently some of Corrina's favorite songs are:

Happy Birthday

Brown Squirrel

Twinkle Twinkle

I'm a little Tea Pot

ABC, and...

Johnny Apple Seed

Personally, I LOVE how almost every video we have of Corrina ends in her violently grabbing the camera!

-Dave 

Splash Happy

For anyone who does not make it over to facebook, here our some photos from out latest summer play... in puddles!
They say climate change will take its nasty toll on developing countries first due to their placement in the world (and ironically, the fact that they do the least to affect climate change and have the fewest resources to deal with the horrible results)... okay, enough of me being political... all this to say that we have had some very different weather (all across Canada) and our summer has mostly been rain. For having such a typical BC summer I wish I were at least surrounded by mountains!
Dave took these photos of Corrina playing with her neighbor friend.

The rubber boots are the ones brought back from England for Corrina. They still fit and work very well... no wet feet, unlike our neighbors walmart ones! Go Walmart!


I thought the sun would be shinning today, as it was streaming through the curtains when we awoke. The clouds rolled in and took over the sky in the end. I really do want to get up and wash some dishes, but the chore is much nice when the sun is beaming through the windows.

Corrina is at daycare today, but my (one month of) summer job hasn't started yet, so I have yet another day to myself. I am beginning to get bored. Sure, I have lots on my to-do list but it is so dull to be by myself all day long. Instead of sitting home and being grouchy I called a new mom from church asking if I could take her and baby out. She is single, and does not have a car. I really like spending time with her though, and remember being at home all day with a very new baby. Since it is raining we will probably just go to the mall and walk around, but I doubt she has gotten to do that in a long time. Hope it goes well! Her little baby boy is cute cute cute, and I can always stand to hold a new born!

Lots of interesting things going on around here, but nothing I can peep about yet... have to wait until a few dates pass by before I can share cool secrets! Do I have your interest now???

It's greener on the other side

I am absolutely sure that most people really will not care at all about the photos I am about to post. But than, I am sure that mom and dad colvin will be happy to see them, and other horticultural freaks (not that mom and dad are in the category of freaks, they just have an interest in what we have done with our yard!)
Lush, Green Grass! Just starting of course! And as you can tell we haven't even finished laying down the dirt. Afternoons have been spent typing papers, or watching the rain. Both cause major dirt laying setbacks. But, the sun shines today!

My garden has really taken off since planting the seedlings. The only color right now is green, but that's what comes of growing annuals from seeds! Next year I will start a perennial garden, which will supply endless June/July color!
My Nasturtiums are growing just fine now!

These Zinnias will bear flowers eventually, brightening the garden space!

Dave finds the BEST toys for Corrina. Check out more here!!!

The Superfort (on sale for $20 at our Zellers!) really has endless possibilities for building.
Thanks Dad!

Have I posted a picture of our place since the white went out and the green came in? Well...
I am growing beans up along the fence in the front corners. Our house still looks so plain to me, and I really am not a plain Jane, so this is worrisome. I want color, pizazz, brightness, life, zing, zang, whatever... I just don't want blah beige and brown... but I am working on a budget here, any inspiration? Maybe I'll do a little search and post what I find.
I am thinking that wedding lanterns could be hung from various area, but even then, they are small little jars, with just a twinkling of color.
Time to hit the thrift store and the hardware store for some bright tremclad! But not on a whim, rather with divine direction and inspiration!

Summer Summer Summer

We mixed some food coloring and glitter into glue and corrina 'painted' on tracing paper. It dried rather neat!




A week or so ago we took Corrina to Kids Fest! It was such a great event, with amazing performances, activities, food, and of course people and kids! You can't really tell, but that's Fred Penner (at the fest every year since he is from MB) in the photo below. She actualy didn't want to sit and listen to him though. She was distracted by the police tent just outside and spent about 30 minutes just playing with the model lights and sirens they had set up!


As Corrina gets more patient with sitting I get more creative with hairstyles.
My garden is in, and growing (the most important part of course!).My neighbor gave me a bunch of bricks to line the edges with. It looks great! Don't have a picture of that though...
Tomatoes... that have doubled in size since planting, sweat peas at the back, and Zinnea as a border plant.

These are my nasturtium pre-planting... they are all dying now... The leaves are shriveling or going yellow. The stems are brittle. What do i do???? I LOVE nasturtium and want to save them. They are spread out, about 6 inches from one another, and i wove some leaves into the fence for support since they are a climbing type. Help!?

I'll Try to Catergorize on this very long post!

Food I've baked or made and actually remembered to take a photo of:

On the occasion that we make it into a unique winnipeg store or bakery Dave often says things like "oh, that looks good" to the pies, or breads, or action figures. To which I reply "I can make that."
Oddly enough, when I do go and make something, like these delicious apple pies, he eats it enjoyable and than talks about how I bake too much and how he's going to get fat. There is no winning...We decided it would be fun and important to have some other Anglican youth leaders (that Dave works closely with) over for desserts, so I made strawberry tarts.
As it was April in Winnipeg, fresh strawberries (at least any that would be good) were not an option, but a good friend of mine gave me some frozen berries from her summer picking. What a lucky duck am I!
I've always used the tenderflake recipe for my pie crusts because I like easy, no fail flaky crust!
I thrifted an old molded tart pan a year or so ago, but don't often have a chance to use it except for muffin making (which turns out to be Corrina's favorite thing to do! My little baker!) . The tart shells took the design so nicely, which doesn't really do anything except make them a little more fun! To avoid a puffy tart shell I use beans (dry ones, not from a can) as pie weights when I am baking the shells or pies empty. Oh, and always remember to prick empties with a fork! Once the tarts are cooled the 'pie weights' drop right out. Gotta love being cheap!Because the berries were frozen the classic "strawberry tart" recipe geared towards fresh berries was not going to cut it. I went the route of sugar and cornstarch to achieve these delicious masterpieces! I actually do most of my heating in the microwave (yeah I know, lab rats that were given microwaved water did not benefit from any nutrients, whereas the ones that were given fresh water did... blah blah.. I still like my microwave!), so this filling was done in the microwave too, hence the giant Pyrex, my most indispensable kitchen tool! I've always wanted to try this giant cookie cake and finally found an excuse to make it for a friends birthday party!
The recipe calls for a cream cheese frosting between the layers. I changed this up a bit, for the better. One, I didn't want to buy 7 packages of cream cheese. Two, I thought that would be a little much. I ended up making a whipped cream & cream cheese frosting by whipping cream (with some sugar and vanilla as usual) to stiff peaks, and folding in whipped (with some sugar) cream cheese. I will never make plain cream cheese frosting again! The whipped cream version was so much better, lighter and tastier. Mind you the cookie layers absorbed alot of it, so i think I would double the icing next time, but this frosting on top of a cake would be amazing!

Crazy Colvinson's:

Can you believe that Corrina has been hearing for ONE YEAR with her right implant?

It doesn't feel so long ago that we were off to Sick Kids Hospital in Toronto to have her head carefuly sliced open in order to give little Corrina hearing!

Corrina has gone from nothing more than a screeching "aaaaaaaa" spoken randomly to a vocabulary full of words and a mind even more full of understanding!
We spent a few mintues going over language developmental levels with Corrina's speech therapist a week ago. From our own observations of Corrina her development seems to be in the range an average 15-20 month old child (most two year olds are far beyond the 'average' development for their age range, so while Corrina is no where near the actual development of her peers she is at least catching up to the average level of development.)


We got a few new toys around here this spring. Dave is doing his part to make sure they are safe for Corrina.

Actualy, Corrina spent the entire evening riding tricycles and 'driving' cars with a few other 2 year old girls on our block. We have been meeting so many neat families and lots of little kids on the street. Right now we couldn't have asked for a better neighborhood for our family to grow into!

Our backyard still does not look too good. We have a fence along the back, and some bird feeders. We have started digging out garden plots. Good friends helped us weed, cut grass, and prepare our yard for soil and sod, but there is still alot of work to be done before things look, hmmm, how shall I say it... normal!
Corrina really doesn't mind though, in fact she doesn't really know the difference! She loves to dig in the dirt and at least right now she doesn't have to stay out of mommy's flower beds!
I am hoping that by next week I will be yelling at her to get out of them though, as my plants really need to get outside!

Corrina really enjoyed seeing her Grandma and Grandpa Colvin in May, as did we!

They helped us paint our house, and did a great job putting up the fence with Dave.

Corrina and I have been spending lots of time doing crafts together. It is a great time for me to talk to her and teach her words, or refine ones she has because she is actually sitting down!!! Her focus while painting is just incredible. She loves tasks that require fine motor skills and detail. Although she is playing language catch up she is very advanced in many other aspects which both helps her and frustrates her at times.
I am very excited for this weekend, yes, because of Father's day, and also because of Winnipeg Composting day. Once a year the city sells compost bins for a reduced rate and we are getting one tomorrow! I have never been so excited about vegetable peelings and yard trimmings in my life! We also get the dirt for our yard tomorrow.
Not actually sure yet what I will do for Dave for fathers day... must come up with a craft...

Well, this post is definitely long enough now! Hope you all feel sufficiently updated!