Just shy of half way finished on day 15 of 30.
Day 1 – 4,065 words
Day 2 – 4,735 words
Day 3 – 768 words
Day 4 – 1,016 words
Day 5 – 2,871 words
Day 6 – 0 words
Day 7 – 0 words
Day 8 – 557 words
Day 9 – 0 words
Day 10 – 1,428 words
Day 11 – 1,995 words
Day 12 – 1,680 words
Day 13 – 1,907 words
Day 14 – 0 words
Day 15 – 3,126 words
Running tally – 24,148 words
There is no phrase to describe how I’ve felt about my latest kitchen adventures other than “tickled pink.” Over the last two days, every time I step into the kitchen, I have been absolutely tickled pink. I tried something new and it was successful!
We found painted pie pumpkins on clearance the day after Halloween. I bought two. On Wednesday, I decided it was time to see if I could cook a pumpkin correctly.
First I cut my pumpkin in half and scooped out all the seeds. I felt like I was a kid again, playing in the slimy seeds and innards of a pumpkin. Picking out all the seeds by hand was easy. Then I started the more difficult process of scraping out all of the membrane.
I put the pumpkin halves face down in a baking pan and added 1/2 inch of water. Then I baked the pumpkin at 450 degrees for 45 minutes.
Here’s what it looked like after being baked:
After it cooled off a bit, I scraped it out of the shell, which was a very simple matter of peeling off the shell:
I threw the cooked pumpkin in the food processor:
I ran out of time to make pumpkin pie so I refrigerated the pumpkin overnight. Yesterday morning, I started making pie (this is my own recipe).
Vegan Pumpkin Pie
Ingredients
2 c. pumpkin, cooked and blended
3/4 c. sugar
1 t. cinnamon
1/2 t. ginger
1/4 t. cloves
1/2 t. nutmeg
12 oz. tofu, drained and blended
Directions
1. Cream the pumpkin and sugar together.
2. Add spices and tofu.
3. Cook at 425 degrees for 15 minutes and then 350 degrees for 40 minutes.
Next time I’m going to increase the cinnamon and possibly the nutmeg. The pie turned out really well but tasted like it needed a bit more spice. I just need to learn to make pie crusts and then the whole pie will be homemade!
I visited the library this evening and came home with fewer books than I returned. That never happens! And it should never happen again!
I figured it was time for an update on my novel. I currently have 32% of it written. I’m a little bit behind my set schedule but I’m happy with my progress.
So far it’s flowing pretty well. I was planning on writing from the perspective of two characters. However, doing the actual writing, I’m only finding the voice for one character. I wrote one scene from the other planned character so during the rewrite, I will either have to take out the second character or add numerous scenes from his perspective. Right now, I’m thinking I’ll just write about the one character I’ve been working on.
I’m almost a third done with the 50,000 words but I’m still writing about the second plague. If all the other events in the novel take this many words to write, I’ll have plenty of material through the end of November!
It’s been interesting writing about the plagues and how God worked in Egypt. I really wonder how I would have lived during that time period, especially when there is no record of God communicating with His people after Joseph died. The Israelites were in Egypt for several hundred years before they were allowed to leave. Several generations would have been born and died since God communicated with Joseph through his dreams. That’s not to say God was quiet during those years but we have no record of Him communicating with anyone until Moses was called to the burning bush.
I haven’t intentionally neglected my blog. It has been an insane few days.
Last Thursday, my brother and his wife came into town and stayed with us. On Friday, I was running errands with them and then we picked up my niece. All three of them stayed with us until late Sunday morning.
On Friday night, we went to my mom’s house for dinner. Sabbath morning, hubby and I went to church while my brother, his wife, and daughter went to the science museum. Then we all ate a late lunch together. On Saturday night, my mother and her boyfriend came over for dinner and I made homemade pizza.
I spent a lot of time cooking over the weekend. From scratch pancakes, sub sandwiches, homemade pizza (including the crust), cinnamon rolls from scratch for the first time ever, and scrambled eggs. There was a TON of dishes even though we ate from paper plates most of the weekend. My kitchen finally was completely cleaned today.
Yesterday was spent mostly at the church. I didn’t get home until 3:30 in the afternoon. My quilt top is coming along nicely! I finished all of my blocks and sewed about half the sashing. I have another hour or so of work to do at home before the next meeting (next month) and then we’ll be doing the border. I’m so excited! The church let me borrow the rotary cutter and the mat so I can do some quilting at home without having to struggle with scissors.
Because the women’s ministries leader was nice enough to loan me the church’s rotary cutter, she also said I could use it for a personal project if I wanted to attempt my own quilt or sewing project. I don’t think we can afford to buy material for a quilt but I am going to sew up something for a Christmas present. Also, hubby said we could buy the material for me to make a skirt. I only have two and they only each match one top. I want to find a pretty brown material so that I can wear the skirt with multiple tops.
My goal is to eventually switch over to wearing skirts full time but I have to build up my wardrobe for that. Since we’re still trying to pay off credit card debt, I can only justify spending so much money on things other than bills… We’ll see what I can find on sale. I really want to make this skirt and this apron.
In the past week, I’ve had one kitchen failure and one tremendous success.
I tried to resurrect the bread dough I had forgotten to add yeast to. The bread raised a little bit but not enough to save it. Also, the loaf ended up entirely too dense and didn’t cook in the middle. It was a complete failure. Next time I’ll make sure to add yeast.
I also found a new method of frying onions. My weight fluctuates because my motivation to be healthy fluctuates. I’m trying to make small changes to my food preparation that will help my body in small ways. Happy Herbivore posted a recipe in which she talked about cooking onions in a skillet using water.
It worked!
Using water instead of oil lowers my fat intake (specifically the trans fats created from heating oil) and it tastes just as good as traditional frying methods. I just filled a skillet with water, heated it on high to boiling, added onions, stirred, and cooked for 4 minutes. That’s it! I’ve done this twice and the first time I had to add some water because it all cooked off before the onions were done. But it worked!
I interrupt this normally scheduled Nano time to bring the following important announcement:
We have paid off our lowest balance credit card!!!
I sent the final payment this morning.
We have paid $1,589.25 since August 30th. Our goal was to pay off this card before November 30th and we are 4 weeks early. Wahoo!!!!
If we had paid only the minimums, it would have taken 60 months to pay off this card. Under our current interest rate, we would have paid $403 in interest over the next 60 months. The $403 doesn’t even include the hike in interest that our credit card recently informed us about. Instead, we paid $21.23, for a savings of $381.77.
Hubby and I both need to visit the dentist ($95 each just for an exam and x-rays!) and we’re also planning on diverting some of our snowball into savings. We are very gun shy about employment as we’ve suffered several layoffs in the past 18 months and would like to build up a bigger emergency fund. So we’ll be taking a few days to discuss our next financial goal and then I’ll post about what’s next.
Letting myself get pulled in too many directions is not a good idea.
Today I’ve been doing laundry, which of course means I have to line dry everything. That takes longer. I’ve done most of the dishes, except the ones I dirtied for lunch and cooking. I mixed up dough for a loaf of bread. And in the middle of all that, I’m working on my novel (6,600 words so far!).
The problem with jumping from one thing to another is that sometimes things don’t get done properly because I’m not paying enough attention. What was the problem today? I left the yeast out of my bread and didn’t realize it until after the rising time. Oops. That was the last of my whole wheat flour, too. I can’t buy any more until Friday.
I’m going to attempt something that probably won’t work. I just added the yeast to the dough, mixed it up really well, and I’m going to let it sit for an hour and see what happens. The worst that will happen is that it won’t rise and I’ve wasted a tablespoon of yeast. I’ve made this recipe once before, a no knead whole wheat bread that tasted really good. I made this one Italian style by adding some spices. Maybe we’ll get to try it.
$699.82 starting balance
– $256.59 snowball payment
+ $8.67 interest
– $164.00 contract paycheck
= $287.90 current balance (82% paid)
Total paid in October: $999.37 If I had realized we were that close to an even thousand, I would have found the extra 63 cents! Oh, well.
I didn’t even realize we could find that much money to send the credit card company. A good portion of that money is from my contract job so it’s too bad that my hours are so unpredictable. It will be hard to duplicate months like October because I can’t predict my hours and I am paid a month after completing the work.
Woohoo!! Another week and that credit card will be gone! Adios. Sayonara. We don’t ever want to see you again!
We’ve also reached another milestone. Our consumer debt is now 50% paid. We owe about $21,000 but we’ve paid just over $21,000. The numbers are way too big and each month doesn’t make much of a dent. But we’re at the half way point and are slowly chipping away at it!
God is so very good and I am so very proud of my hubby!
Hubby met with his boss today to discuss his job performance and how hubby feels about the company thus far. He walked away with a raise and a bonus! Praise the Lord!
Hubby’s boss also gave him a $50 gift card to the Olive Garden so that hubby can take me out on a date. It’s the boss’ way of saying “thanks and I’m sorry” for taking up a good portion of our evenings and weekends in October. Hurray! We’ve never spent that much money at the Olive Garden. This means we’ll be able to get an appetizer, two entrees, and dessert! What a treat!