My Love Of Cloth Napkins

My love of cloth napkins began a year ago. I showed you in an earlier post the zero-waste lunch box that my children use. In order for it to be zero-waste, I needed cloth napkins. I set about making fun napkins for my kids in order to make taking their lunch a little more fun.

I loved my cloth napkins so much that we decided to start using them for every meal. It took awhile, but eventually I made a drawer full of napkins for everyday use. We no longer use paper napkins at all. It feels good to be saving all those trees and other resources.

I am not very handy with a sewing machine. I can sew a straight line. This is a picture of my sewing machine. As you can see, it is nothing fancy. I love this machine. It was my Grandma Sarah's machine. She sewed many quilts on it. When I sit down and sew my cloth napkins, I think about her, sewing her quilts, and the labor of love that she put into them. My napkins are my little labor of love. It brings me closer to my Grandmother as I remember her.

Hi-Ho-Cherry-O

I bought this cute little handmade owl on ETSY. His name is Weston. He is made out of recycled scraps of material such as upholstery. I had to buy him because I love owls & I love recycling. To my surprise I found him down from his usual perch on the living room piano playing a game of Hi-Ho-Cherry-O with my three year old son Eli.

They were having so much fun. It made me stop from my usual busy tasks & remember once again how much I love my children & why I love being a Mom!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

My son Joe has to take his lunch to school everyday because he is sensitive to the many different additives that are present in the school lunch food.. It is a challenge to find different things that excite him. The other day he said that his friend came to school with "his favorite cookie that his Mom makes for him once a month." It turns out that the cookies were Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies. So I began a search for a good recipe. I found this one on the King Arthur Flour web site. I tweaked the recipe slightly. I liked this recipe because it called for 1 can of pumpkin. Many recipes call for 1 cup & then you wonder what do do with the leftover pumpkin since it isn't enough to fill another cup, you can't just double the recipe, & then you end up wasting good pumpkin.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

2 1/4 cups King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1 1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground ginger

1 cup softened butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sugar

1 (15 oz) can pumpkin

2 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla

1 bag chocolate chips

Glaze

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

2 1/2 tbsp milk

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

add a little cinnamon to taste

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Spray the baking sheets with cooking spray. In a bowl, mix together the dry ingredients & set aside. With an electric mixer on medium speed, cream together the butter & sugars. Scrape down the sides of the bowl. Add the pumpkin, eggs, & vanilla, beating well to blend. Slowly add the dry ingredients, beating well to blend. Stir in the chocolate chips. Drop the dough onto the prepared cookie sheets using a tablespoon sized scoop. Bake for 18 minutes or until edges are lightly golden brown. Let cool on the baking pan for 5 minutes before removing to a cooling rack. Stir together the ingredients for the glaze. Drizzle the cookies or dip the tops of the cookies into the glaze. Makes about 4 dozen.

Front of the Class

Last month CBS aired this Hallmark Hall of Fame movie entitled FRONT OF THE CLASS. It is a movie about a young man with Tourette Syndrome. While Brad was growing up, everyone, including his own family thought he was acting up. As a result he was hated at school. It wasn't until a principal learned that his "acting up" was a result of his TS & the principal held an all-school assembly to educate the faculty & students that Brad was finally understood & accepted.

This movie is wonderful & I will be buying two copies when it is released at the Hallmark store in February. One copy I will keep, the other copy I will donate to the public library so that hopefully others in my community can check it out & become informed.

As some of you know, my son Joe has TS. I have been surprised at the number of people that seem to think that we should brush it under the rug and not mention anything about it because people will look at him differently. Well, they will look at him anyway because of the sounds that he makes and I would rather have them look at him and know the truth. Knowledge is Power.

Here is a sampling from a conversation that my son had at school the other day with a classmate. Recently we made his class aware of his condition by giving a little presentation. Last week Joe's tics were quite loud because he was having a reaction to some citric acid he had ingested. He doesn't seem to tolerate it & after eating it, his tics will be out of control for about 5 days. Joe had a coughing tic that was quite loud & frequent.

Classmate, "Is that your new tic, Joe?"
Joe, "Yeah it is."
Classmate, "That one is pretty annoying."
Joe, "Yeah, I know, it is annoying for me too."

End of discussion.