Buckwheat Pancakes

by Donna Posted on January 19, 2012

Buckwheat is our new “flour” of choice for all out gluten-free, grain-free, egg-free, dairy-free, yada yada yada cooking. Mind you, I still prefer to use almond flour, having gotten used to that, but one makes adjustments as needed. I like coconut flour to a certain extent, btu the problem with it is that it requires so dang much liquid and seems to work best with eggs. Which Middle Child currently can’t have.

Besides, I haven’t been able to come up with a decent coconut flour based pancake recipe yet.

So, on to buckwheat which, of course, isn’t a wheat at all. It is, rather, a pseudocereal and not in the least related to wheat. We are banking here on the idea that Middle Child can tolerate buckwheat better than he’s tolerating everything else in the world, but, unfortunately, only time will tell. In the meanwhile, I’m going with the idea. So far, we’ve tried buckwheat cereal–somewhat akin to oatmeal, with raisins and maple syrup added–and, as of tonight, pancakes. The pancakes came out rather well, actually, though I think I will have to do a little more recipe tweaking. The recipe I worked off used eggs and milk, neither of which Middle Child can currently have, so I tweaked it around, added a few things, deleted some others and came out with the following, which bears no actual resemblance to the original recipe, other than using buckwheat:

 

Buckwheat Pancakes

1 cup buckwheat flour

1/4 cup palm coconut sugar (could go with less here, but we like sweet pancakes)

2 TBSP grapeseed oil or thereabouts

1/4 cup applesauce (yeah, like I actually measured that as opposed to guestimating)

1 TBPN + 1/4 cup water (this is the substitute for the egg)–mixed together and let set a couple of minutes

1 TSP vanilla or thereabouts

dash cinnamon

dash salt

dash baking soda

Mix the whole shebang together, then add enough water (or milk of whatever variety you like–we would be pretty much stuck with coconut milk around here right now) to get the pancake batter consistency you like and cook the suckers up on a nice griddle very lightly oiled. I’m thinking about adding some diced apple bits next time. I also think the sugar could be replaced with maple syrup, but we are pretty much big fans of real maple syrup around here, so that’s just a matter of personal taste. In any case, these got the boys’ seal of approval and certainly didn’t last long.

 

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Re-resolutions

by Donna Posted on January 11, 2012

Well, the New Year’s Resolutions are only 11 days old and they are somewhat failing, to be sure. Oh, we budgeted and planned and did all the things we should have done and we have repeatedly discussed the importance of not running off to buy new things just because we want to. That part, we are handling moderately well. Still a work in progress, but an active one that seems to be producing results.

Nope, it is food that is tripping us up. We’ve made menus and purchased our food according to the menus. Then we’ve gone over budget and had to reajust (yes, already, in 11 days). The damn food just costs to freaking much.

Unless, of course, one plans to eat Top Ramen and cheap boxed mac-n-cheese all the time. Should you do that, you likely can keep the amount well under the $50/week we budgeted for the four of us to eat on (now up to$65/week). You might pay for it later in Doctor bills, but that’s later, right?

However, if you want to eat moderately healthy–meaning fresh fruits, fresh veggies, no canned food or food processed to any significant degree, you are going to have a hellish time keeping the food budget under $100/week for a family of four. Oh, yes, that includes keeping it gluten-free, which ups the cost a bit more.

Let’s face it, it is ridiculously expensive to eat decently in this country. It’s a fairly well known fact–and, oddly, a fairly widely accepted fact. Strange world we live in, but I guess one can get used to anything.

Of course, if they don’t, they end up like Middle Child. We been trying to find the dietary issue with him for quite a long time now and, about a year ago, concluded through trial and error that gluten was the culprit. His multiple GI issues, none of which anyone particularly wants to read about in a blog entry about food, seemed to start resolving when gluten was removed from his diet.

Then, months later, he started getting worse again.

So I finally broke down and had him tested for food sensitivities. After a fair amount of research and talking to others, I settled on Enterolab. Many seem to have a problem with Enterolab simply because they are not “peer-reviewed”, yet I could find no fault in Dr Fine’s background, reputation, or reasearch–in fact, he appears to be fairly widely respected in his field. Additionally, the methodology used seems logically sound and, based on the folks I have spoken with, has not produced and undue number of false positive. If anything, unexpected negatives have cropped up more often.

In any case, being neither an idiot, nor medically naive, I elected to use Enterolab and take into consideration that further testing may be required. As a sort of slight double-check, I also had them run a fecal fat as well as DNA tying for known celiac genes.

Everything came back positive. And I do mean everything. Enterolabs, for a fee, tests for many of the known frequent antigenics. Middle child came up as reactive to them all one one level or another. He also came back postive for one celiac gene and one gluten sensitivity gene–by themselves onlu an indicator of increased risk of gluten issues, but with two it is a significantly increased risk. And his fecal fat–which indicates malabsorption issues (generally caused by some type of GI damage, such as, potentially, celiac, crohn’s, pancreatic dysfuction, etc) was 691–normal is less than 300.

So what does one do? Allergy testing? Well, that would actually show allergic reactions, but not necessarily sensitivity issues (which, over time, can cause significant issues). Are the results believable? Unfortunately, yes, since there is a known link between ADHD/Dyslexic kids and food sensitivities–they don’t appear to know why, but it is incredibly common. The question sin my mind is whether he truly is sensitive to all the listed foods or whether over time his immune system has becaome over-sensitized and started reacting to things it wouldn’t normally have a problem with.

There doesn’t appear to be any real way to determine this other than to remove all known foods causing issues for a span of time–perhaps a year?–then add in some of the lesser reactive foods. Even that might not work, though it is worth considering.

For the New Year’s Resolution end of things, however, it has basically just blown our budget for the month right out the window. Over half the foods in the house were one’s Joel reacted to. In the spirit of support, we will all eat the same diet–there is nothing more disheartening than being told you cannot eat one of your favorite foods while everyone around you is happily chowing down on it. If one’s entire family eats the same way, it becaomes the norm and is rather easier to deal with. Not to mention is motivates one’s mother to learn to bake tasty treats with acceptable ingredients.

So out with all the “bad” foods. And now we must replace it all with good foods. Not sure what those food will be, but we depart momentarily to the nearest Whole Foods to look for foods that meet the criteria. The goal is to find the foods, then work out meal plans that wuit an acceptable budget, and to do it before the next paycheck so we can get back on track with the whole New Year’s Goal of micromanaging resources.

Should be interesting.

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Almost New Year’s

by Donna Posted on December 24, 2011

Two things almost always come up with New Year’s Resolutions—yep, weight and money. I can deal with the weight thing–it comes, it goes, it makes return visits and it is pretty much always a matter of eating right and not sitting on my growing behind any more than needed.

But the money thing…well, let’s just say that has never been my strong suit. I worry about that incessantly, not just for my own financial future, but for what I teach the boys. I am, unquestionably, an emotional shopper, and that is a very dangerous thing to be these days.

I also have a tendency to go through a rather nasty little cycle–I spend a bit more than I should, then I work a little extra to try to make up for it. Having worked overtime, I feel like I have a bit extra to spend and round and round we go. Pretty soon, I am working overtime all the time just out of habit and my spending raises to that level, making it very difficult to give up the overtime–not because it would put me in debt, so much as it would force me to stop the overspending.

And, of course, by working all that overtime, I’m missing out on time with the boys. They have begun to show significant upset over that. Despite the fact that the older two, at least, have figured out they get all those little extras in life when I work more, they have become rather vocal in stating they would rather have me home.

So, back to New Year’s Resolutions. One wants to control the money better, of course. But I want a little more than that. I want an experiment. I’ve read several times over the past year about people who have tried to do the zero-impact thing or tried to spend virtually nothing for a year. Interesting idea, but there is the mortgage and the kid’s clothes and the ever-rising cost of food and the general living expenses that we all have to deal with when we have a house, a job, and three kids. Not everyone can take off in an RV and live off the land. In point of fact, I’m pretty sure DCFS would frown upon me packing up the little chitlin’s and living the life of a nomad. Not to mention the fact that there is no way in Hades the boys are giving up their four cats or fifteen leopard geckos. Or the chickens.

However, I’m pretty sure they would adjust to giving up the iPad. They would likely adjust to giving up a whole bunch of things if the tradeoff were worthwhile enough. How does one cut expenses and outgoing money down to the bone while making it seem like something fun and exciting?

And that would be my experiment. It must be possible. I’m a creative kind of person. The boys are certainly creative. Surely we can come up with methods of getting things done without spending money or with only spending a bare minimum. It will require setting limits–what is necessary and what is not. And, of those things that are necessary, how can one get them without putting out a few shifts worth of overtime?

Food, for instance. Bane of my existence. Not only does it cause an ever-widening of the rear, but it costs a bloody fortune. However, I’ve noticed an appalling amount of waste going on. True, we feed our scraps to the chickens for the most part, but I am still convinced we are throwing away perhaps a couple of hundred dollars worth of food each month. The application of a moderate amount of creativity there would likely stop that nonsense and, as a side effect, put a stop to the widening of the behind, perhaps.

So this is my project: live on the bare minimum reasonable (after defining reasonable, of course) and make it at least interesting, if not fun. Yes, I know that is very general, but I’m still working on the specifics.

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The Chore of Chores

by Donna Posted on November 29, 2011

I hate chores. They are the bane of my existence. Seriously.

Oh, not my own chores–my kids’ chores. I can do my own chores quick and easy, having had years of practice. I can have the house in semi-decent order within 30 minutes and not break a sweat. Mind you, we aren’t talking sparkling clean here, but pleasantly tidy.

And my kids, in those same 30 minutes, can merrily decimate the place without breaking a sweat.

How nice, no sweat.

Sadly, they can do this multiple times a day, so no matter how many times I clean up, the mess returns within  an hour or two. It makes me want to rip my hair out. It makes me turn purple, jump up and down, scream, swear, and basically behave like an ill-mannered two year old. How very becoming of me, yes?

So my kids have chores. In short, they essentially must clean up their own messes. That includes wiping down counters, sweeping, vacuuming, making beds, etc. Mind you, I do all the same things when I am home and awake, but my general philosphy is that, if I am not even home or awake to make the mess (i.e., I’ve worked all night and been asleep), I refuse to be the one who clean up.

This works astonishingly poorly. I come home from work and the house is slightly messy. I get up after sleeping and the house is even more messy. After a few days of this, I go ballistic. The house gets clean, at the cost of my elevated blood pressure, stress-level, and the boys sense of self-esteem. Repeat ad nauseum.

It’s a constant struggle. I want the house to be somewhat tidy–particularly the kitchen and bathroom. I don’t like bugs in my house, I consider a dirty bathroom to be a health hazard, and I refuse to cook in a dirty kitchen. Seems reasonable to me, and, when explained to the boys, it seems completely reasonable to them. They also agree that, given I work very hard and I am not the one making the messes, they should pitch in and clean up after themselves.

It is all very reasonable. Sadly, children, in general, do not seem to follow general logic in their day-to-day lives. Baffling, but true.

For instance, most parents have likely noticed that children suffer from selective blindness. I would say it is a guy thing if it weren’t for the fact that I have come across many adult females with the same issue. Take a child, point to something that needs picking up or cleaning, and they will look anywhere but at what you are pointing at. They will walk right by it 50 times without seeing it. While you stand there in exasperation shouting, “It’s RIGHT THERE! For pity’s sake, look where I am pointing!” They will look all around in utter confusion, unable to locate the offending area/item. It is as if their ability to play “what here doesn’t belong” has failed utterly because, in fact, everything belongs. Mess and all.

So we make a list of daily chores, a la Flylady. A morning routing, and afternoon routine, and an evening routine. Simple, straightfoward routines, none of which should take more than 15 minutes to complete. A total of 45 minutes a day to complete all cleaning. How tidy.

Yeah, right. What should take 15 minutes, for some reason, takes about an hour. I have not figured out what time-warp is causing wiping down the counter to to take 20 minutes, but there it is. I wouldn’t mind if they were simply having a good time and being relaxed about it, but it is more along the lines of a major trauma. Why? No idea. And really, if is that much of a trauma, wouldn’t it make sense to do it as quickly and efficiently as possible, so one doesn’t drag out the pain of it?

There I go with that phenomenally useless logic again. When I mention the above idea to the boys, they nod their heads sagely and marvel at the wisdom the years have granted me. Then they take another 30 minutes to be traumatized by wiping down the counters. Oy.

When I attended the Unschooling conference this past September, it was put about that children should not have chores per se. Rather, one sets an example by joyfully and givingly cleaning up one’s house and doing for others. The Dalai Lama somewhat echoes this with his messages of compassiona and service. At first blush, it is a ridiculous notion to not hold children accountable for the messes they make. The Radical Unschoolers shift the ideology to state that it is actually the parent who wants the place cleaned up, not the kids, so it is the parent’s problem, not the kids. Setting a good example of service and caring will, it is assumed, eventually inspire the children to do the same and one will eventually find oneself being helped.

I raised the question of what to do when one gets overwhelmed by the sheer unendingness of a life that moves from work to sleep to cleaning in an ever-repeating cycle. How does one deal with matters when one’s children make a giant mess while one is sleeping, then again when one is at work. It is lovely that the kids can experiment by making volcanoes in my kitchen, but if I am spending all my time cleaning, working, and sleeping, I will soon end up in the funny farm. Additionally, if this method works so well, how is it that I have met so very many adults who constantly assume someone else should be cleaning up after them? Adults who think someone else will do their dishes, their laundry, their cooking?

In raising these questions at the homeschooling conference, I garnered many pitying looks, as though I just didn’t get it. It was suggested that perhaps I should consider hiring some help if I couldn’t handle the cleaning on my own. And these adults who didn’t do anything as menial as housework for themselves, well, that probably had nothing to do with the fact that their mothers did everything for them when they were growing up. It likely had more to do with the attitudes they were raised with. And, really, it was obviously something I needed to work on myself. In short, I got a lot of irritating non-answers. I don;’t like being irritated. It makes me think too much about whatever has irritated me. Mainly because I am usually certain I should not be irritated. Make sense?

And I’m left working on it myself. Clearly, having a major cow everytime something isn’t cleaned up is not working. Hasn’t worked in 12 years. Probably won’t work in the next 12. Nor can I simply decide to do all the housework–not only am I not convinced that will work, but I simply do not have that kind of time. By “not convinced that will work”, I mean in the long run, I don’t actually see that I am doing my children a service. Try as I might, I simply can’t see it. Perhaps that is where the pitying looks came from. Perhaps I am simply mentally deficient in this area. And the suggestion that I hire someone to do the cleaning I can’t do is financially out of the question.

So where does that leave one? Consider this–children, even a 12 year old–do not live in the same mind-frame as an adult. They live in a world of shifting importances and a need to keep their parents (and other authoritative adults) happy enough that they do not leave them. Harsh sounding, I know, but the fact is that a child’s biggest fear is that they will be left alone, to fend for themselves. Now, you and I logically know that most parents aren’t going to leave their kids on the nearest street corner, regardless of how pissed off they get but, as we have already pointed out, children’s logic does not seem to run in the same ways as adults.

So my kids try to please me and feel fear when they perceive they don’t, whether that perception is real or imagined. What a ridiculous thing in life when a dirty countertop causes fear in a child, however slight that fear might be. Some kids will feel it more or less than others, depending on their temperament. Yet the counter needs to be cleaned or it will, in fact, start growing unpleasant things, and if I do it all the time, I will eventually break down from being constantly overwhelmed. Seems like a no-win situation.

However, I think there is an answer. It is taking a lot of time and redirecting my thinking and, frankly, isn’t all that comfortable for me, but there is a middle ground. It seems to be taking months to get it even slightly balanced out, but it might work.

When I see the counter (that poor counter is taking a beating here) dirty, instead of pitching a fit because I didn’t make the damn mess and shouldn’t have to clean the damn mess up, ask a kid to clean it up. But don’t leave it there. Help them. Now there are two people cleaning up and the mess goes fast. When one kid is doing the dishes and looks like the world has just come to an end because they have to do this task, remind them to simply ask for a little help. The chores need to be done, but it seems to me there is nothing wrong with asking nicely for help. Half the problem here seems to be that everyone is very conscious of how much work the others are doing and constantly comparing it to make sure the others don’t have to do less. I start it with insisting I shouldn’t have to clean up other people’s messes, and the boys continue it by constantly pointing out to the others “I did the bathroom, so you should do the kitchen and living room!”

Take that comparing and complaining out of it. All jobs are everyone’s responsibilities. Every job in the house belongs to each person. Everyone in the house is welcome to ask for help. Everyone is the house is expected to give some level of help, as they are able. Everyone is expected to lighten the load of those around them. Including me.

Its a nice idea. It’s an idea that is hard to remember when in the midst of things or when one first wakes in the morning. And yet, it sucks to have chores be the bane of one’s existence and, as much as that is currently true for me, it is doubly true for the boys.

So we keep trying, and we can see that this idea can work. Things need to get done, for the peace and health of our hosuehold. The place doesn’t need to sparkle. In fact, I wouldn’t much like to live in a shiny perfect house. But there is a degree of cleanliness required for comfort and health (mental and physical). People can argue what that level is into the ground–it doesn’t make it any less true that the state will condemn your home when the rats and roaches invade.

So yes, the Radical Unschoolers are correct (to my thinking) on one level. You have to figure out what works for you and your family. Individual chores don’t work for us without a lot of pain on all sides. Taking the responsibility completely on myself doesn’t work either–it is simply too overwhelming on top of all the other responsibilities of being a single working parent of three very active jobs. Very pretty to think that one’s kids didn’t ask to be born and that one is, in fact responsible for everything in their young lives, but the reality is it is sometimes simply too much.

We will be not-quite-Radical Unschoolers for a little while longer, I think. We will see how this intercooperative little hive mentality works for us. And maybe my blood pressure will stay within acceptable ranges. I’m working on it.

 

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Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

by Donna Posted on November 6, 2011

Just made these today and they came out very tasty. I was looking to make the recipe for Oatmeal cookies from Rhiannon Lawrence’s cookbook, but I didn’t like the measurements and some of the ingredients she used, so I pretty much just made it up as I went along. Seems to have worked pretty well.

Dry Ingredients

1.5 cups gluten-free rolled oats

1.5 cups almond flour (Honeyville is what I use)

dash salt

dash baking soday

1 tsp cinnamon

3/4 cup palm coconut sugar (you could probably use brown sugar here is you don’t mind refined sugars)

Wet Ingredients

1/2 cup butter, melted and cooled

1 TBSPN Vanilla

2 eggs

Other Ingredients

1 cup raisins

1 cup fine chopped walnuts

 

Mix dry ingredients together, then add wet ingredients all at once. Stir it all together, then add the raisins and walnuts. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper, then drop batter by heaping teaspoons onto parchment paper. Press each heap down lightly with a fork to flatten (almond flour baking doesn’t much spread or rise or flatten). I suppose if you like them crispy, you could press them fairly thin, but I personally prefer chewy, so I press them just enough to round them out and make them look cookie-like.

Bake at 375 for 8-12 minutes, until the edges are browning nicely. Let them cool at least 10 minutes on the cookie sheet after you take them out of the oven.

Next time I make these, I’m going to replace the raisins with butterscotch chips to make an oatmeal scotchie type thing for Zach. He’s a maniac for butterscotch.

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Peanut Butter Bars

by Donna Posted on October 28, 2011

I originally found this recipe in Rhiannon Lawrence’s “Eat Free” cookbook, but after making it to her specifications once, I tweaked it pretty solidly and ended up with a recipe that only moderately resembled her original one. The modifications I made passed the Three Boys Test as well as the Work Test. Nonetheless, it is still a work in progress, since I don’t like using so much agave nectar (I prefer palm coconut sugar) and can think of a few more modifications I might like to try.

1/2 cup + 1/4 cup butter at room temp

3/4 cup + 1/2 cup agave nectar

1 egg

1 16 oz jar natural peanut butter at room temp

dash baking soda

dash salt

1 1/2 cups gluten free rolled oat (or regular rolled oats if you have no prob with gluten) You can vary this amount depending on how much texture you want in the bars. The original recipe called for about half this amount.

1 cup blanched almond flour– I use Honeyville, not having had great luck with Bob’s Red Mill. Honeyville can be ordered online, or locally picked up in various locations in Utah.

TBSP vanilla

1 cup very finely chopped walnuts

1 cup chocolate chips–I use dark chocolate here, but whatever your preference is would be fine.

Throw 1/2 cup butter, 3/4 cup agave, egg, 2/3rds of the container of peanut butter into a mixer and mix thoroughly. Toss in the baking soda, salt, almond flour, oat, and walnuts. Mix until combined. Press into a lightly greased cookie sheet and bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes, until nicely browned on the top.

While that’s cooking, whip together remaining butter, agave nectar, peanut butter, and vanilla until fluffly (it will seem slightly runny). *NOTE* You can replace the butter with an 8 oz room temp package of cream cheese for a much smoother, better filling here. Worked great.

When the cookie sheet layer is nicely browned and you pull it out of the over, immediately spread the whipped mixture over it wil a butter knife. Sprinkle the chocolate chips on the top and stick it back in oven for 3 or four minutes. Pull it back out and very gently use the butter knife to spread the melted chocolate. Let it cool completely–I stick it in the fridge for at least an hour, then cut into desired pieces.

It isn’t difficult to make–the biggest deal is actually having some of these ingredients on hand, particularly the agave nectar and almond flour. Locally, Costco, Whole Foods, and Smith’s sell agave (price is better at Costco, of course). Both Smith’s and Whole Foods carry gluten free oats. None of them sell a decent almond flour–Like I said, Honeyville’s is the best I’ve found, and one can only seem to get that from the company itself, though I might ask them about that next time I go to pick some up. They have about 4 or 5 retail stores across Northern Utah, as well as the online ordering. It’s a bit cheaper to just go out to the store to get it, unless one is buying in some serious bulk. About 70% of my baking involves almond flour, so I like to have quite a bit on hand when possible. Fair warning–almond flour is not cheap, running in the area of $25 for a 5 pound bag. On the other hand, even if you have no problem with gluten, almond flour is a hell of a lot healthier than any form of wheat out there. Sadly, in our culture, you either pay for your health in terms of high cost of decent foods now, or you pay later in terms of high cost of healthcare. Disgusting, but true.

 

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More gluten free recipes!

by Donna Posted on October 23, 2011

I went to Honeyville Grain in Salt Lake to pick up some almond flour yesterday and came across another gluten-free cookbook.

Eat Free: No Gluten. No Sugar. No Guilt.

So far, this is the only one I’ve found that primarily uses almond flour other than Elana Amsterdam’s work (Elana’s Pantry). Most gluten free cookbooks seem to have the overwhelming need to use all kinds of mixtures of starchy flours like potatoe flour or other grains like rice flour. I’m not a fan of these types of flours because they all basically act like sugars on the body. Since I am basically anti-refined sugar, that doesn’t work for me.

In any case, the woman who made this new cookbook (new to me, at least) is local here and, happily, has a website with a few more gluten-free recipes on it. I’ve only tried one of her recipes so far, and I had to adjust it to suit what I wanted, but that’s pretty much standard for me, so I am still happy.

 

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PB&J Cookies

by Donna Posted on October 11, 2011

A few days ago, I made the Peanut Butter and Jelly Cookie recipe from Elana’s Pantry. I’m not much of one for measuring things, so I just haphazardly eyeballed amounts of things like peanut butter and sweetener. Then I looked at the finished batter and decided I wanted an egg in it. Then a second egg. And a bit more almond flour.

In other words, I pretty much completely changed things up in Elana’s recipe–not out of any sense that it would be better, mind you, but just because I felt like it. As far as I am concerned, Elana is a freaking genius with the whole gluten free baking thing and 99% of what she does also falls nicely into the Food Rules, getting my all around hearty approval.

That doesn’t stop me from messing with things, apparently.

The cookies came out good. More than good. They tasted exactly like a bite of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich served on fresh white bread. As everyone in this family loves those sandwiches (which we, of course, never have anymore), they were a huge hit.

So the next day, I thought I would make them again. Only, this time, I didn’t want to mess it up. So I followed Elana’s instructions exactly. I figured it was sheer dumb luck that I didn’t mess up the previous batch entirely, so I didn’t tweak it around.

It was a little disappointing.

Don’t get me wrong, the cookies were perfectly edible. They weren’t bad. They just weren’t all that remarkable. Tasty, yes. Delicious, no. They all got eaten in fairly short order, but there was no drooling to be seen and I didn’t actually have to beat the kids off the plate.

Now I’m pretty sure Elana made some dang tasty cookies and there’s just something about my own cooking style that didn’t quite jive. In any case, I made the cookies again two days later (hey, it’s that baking time of year, you know!), but this time, I did my tweaking. Then I measured what my tweaking did.

Come to find out, my eyeballing is (unsurprisingly) a bit off. I seem to be using nearly double the amount of peanut butter and half again as much shortening. Then there was the addition of the eggs. And about 1/2 cup more almond flour. But the cookies came out right. Just like the first batch. So at least my inaccurate eyeballing is fairly consistent. I managed to at least get a picture this last time before the boys descended and made 28 cookies disappear in 28 seconds. They don’t look like much, but they sure taste good…

 

PB&J Cookies

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It’s like the Flu…

by Donna Posted on October 11, 2011

One of the possible downsides of unschooling is, of course, that your kids don’t go to school. Ergo, you get the uninteruupted joy of their near constant presence whether you are in the mood for it or not. Most of the time, it is actually a very good thing around here–our lives do not revolve around the school year and school hours, our vacations are not determined by the school system, our time is considerably more our own that it otherwise would be. The flip side of this is that one’s children are always around. There is no break. Now, I have some pretty fun and interesting kids, but even the best of children can occassionally make you wish you had learned to use a bullwhip a la Indiana Jones.

Asher, for the past few days, has been in a phase. Not a growth phase, or a phase of eating only one food constantly, or a coloring on the walls phase. No, no, nothing so nice. This phase has involved finding that which will most irritate those around him and doing it loudly and constantly.

Seriously, even his brothers are ready to ship the little guy off to the nearest artic wasteland just to have some peace. They have taken to going for long walks without Asher, leaving me alone to listen to an endless stream of bullhorn-volume chatter interspersed with amazingly loud belches and wierd little spitting noises. If I didn’t know for certain the kid was doing it on purpose, I would be seriously questioning some sort of bizarre seizure disorder or possible demonic possession. As it is, I have been seriously questioning the price of a variety pack of duct tape.

Nonetheless, having been through two previous boys, I am somewhat familiar with this phase and, as I recall, it doesn’t last all that long. Asher, of course, is somehat more stubborn and tenacious than his elder brothers, so he might hold on to this phase for a little longer than the others did, just to entertain himself. Hard to say. He is currently standing behind me, pleasantly singing “Suuuuper Doooork!” at Joel, who (remarkably) is not lunging for his throat, so it is just possible the child will actually live through this phase. Again, hard to say.

Despite the sheer aggravation of dealing with a child who seems to feel the need to shout everything he says whilst running through the house like a baby rhino, it is clearly evident that not only is he better off at home–I am also better off for having him at home.

Imagine this kid in school. In a classroom, shouting over the teacher, unable to keep still. Belching as loudly as he can manage (which is actually rather impressive, all things considered). How long would it be before phrases like “ADHD” and “Oppositional Defiant” started coming out of the teachers mouths? How many parent-teacher conferences would I have to drag myself to?

As annoying as these little phases are–and, trust me, they are enough to make you rip your nerves out at times–they are, in fact, normal. It isn’t that school teachers cannot handle a kid with a bit of high spirits–after all, they deal with similar kids every day. Classrooms full of them, in fact. Imagine, thirty little Ashers belching, shouting, and running about with stomping lead feet while fake-spitting on everything. How would you deal with that as a teacher? Stun-gun? Bullwhip? Medications (for you or for the kids?)? Detention? Sitting them in a corner? Various other forms of punishment? What the heck is a poor teacher to do to make order out of chaos?

Don’t get me wrong–we don’t exactly put up with Asher’s ill-conceived idea of shouting in our ears then laughing maniacally. Let’s face it, it is irritating and rather painful on the nerves. After a day or so of it, the entire household has had it. We speak sharply. We tell him in no uncertain terms to stop shouting at us. Sometimes, ironically, we shout it at him. The elder boys go for walks without him. In general, we make our feeling known to him quite clearly.

But we recognize it is a phase. There is nothing particularly wrong with the kid. He’s just being a kid, with all the fits and starts and phases that comes with. This, too, will pass. It is not permanent, and it does not indicate a flaw in the child. Were he in school, this behavior would have to be stopped immediately. Here at home, unschooling, we can afford to allow it to run it’s course, somewhat like the flu virus. It’s annoying, it can’t be ignored, it exhausts you, but, if properly taken care of, it will run it’s course with no major complications.

In the meantime, invest in earplugs…and maybe thing pretty hard about that bullwhip.

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Unschooling the Blog

by Donna Posted on October 7, 2011

At the same time I set this blog up, I also set seperate ones up for Zach and Joel. Ash was more than a bit miffed that he didn’t get one and the explanation that he couldn’t yet read or type did not impress him. The volume of his howls over the matter, however, impressed even the neighbors two blocks over.

Nonetheless, he has mostly adjusted to the situation, and the other two boys have been exploring their blogging worlds. Joel seems to have written the most, using his blog as a forum for writing his stories. Zach is a little more experimental with his, trying to figure out the world of RSS feeds and tweaking the appearance of his blog.

The whole idea of a blog seems to thrill them, what with it being their own space and their own domain names. I think Zach might have been mildly disappointed that he couldn’t actually blow anything up other than in a virtual sense, but I’m pretty sure he’ll make due somehow.

Joel no sooner had his blog up with a couple of posts than he was calling everyone he could think of. Twice. And he started to call them all a third time before I insisted he raise his hands and move slowly away from the phone. Someone mentioned needing photos on his blog to him and the next thing I know, he’s figured out how to upload pictures and video from the computer and it merrily uploading away. Little scary, that.

 

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