Here's what's for dinner tonight!

I am making this for dinner tonight using my cabbage from the CSA.  I am substituting pasta sauce for the tomato sauce and paste since that is what I have in my pantry.

Ground Beef and Cabbage Skillet

Ingredients

1lb Ground Beef(ground turkey works very well)

1/2 head of cabbage roughly chopped(if the cabbage is huge, use a 1/4)

1/2 med onion diced(about 1/2 cup this isn’t critical)

1 cup uncooked rice

1 15 oz can of tomato sauce

 1 6oz can of tomato paste

 2 cups water

 1/2 tsp salt – pepper to taste

 1/2 tsp dried thyme

 optional 1 bay leaf (I’m not a huge fan of bay leaves)

Optional Additions

diced bell pepper

frozen corn

kidney beans

 

Directions

 Heat a large pot over medium heat, add the ground beef or turkey and cook until no longer pink. Be sure to use your spatula to break up any large chunks. Drain the fat off. Add the onion and cook for another two minutes or so. Stir in the cabbage, rice, tomato sauce, tomato paste, water, and seasoning. Add any extras at this time, too. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low and cover. Simmer for 20 – 25 minutes stirring occasionally.

CSA produce week 2

This week's bounty consists of: new potatoes, cucumbers, a tomato, lettuce, beets, onions, par-cel, squash, and cabbage.  Looking forward to that tomato!  And those potatoes!

I didn't make anything super special last week.  I just sauted the squash and swiss chard, and roasted the kale in the oven.  The onions are great, nice and sweet.  The beets were good too, but the small ones were a tad bitter.  I do have to figure out what to do with the cabbage though, so I need some ideas.  I have to cook it since eating it raw can cause baby gas since I am breastfeeding.  So send your cooked cabbage ideas my way!

CSA produce week 1

Okay, so I am sort of following in the footsteps of my friend Amy by blogging about my adventures with a CSA co-op.  Click on her name to visit her blog; her last post about her CSA adventure is quite comical. :)

The above photos show what we received in our box this week.  Lettuce, sweet onions, cabbage, garlic, summer squash, kale, swiss chard, beets, and par-cel (a cross between parsley and celery).  So now I am forced to "step outside the box" of what I am used to cooking for meals.  Because I certainly don't want anything to go to waste, but I will have to get creative when it comes to preparing things with some of the produce that is "new" to me.

Feel free to share any of your favorites with me if you see something here that you like to cook with.

Gardens and CSA co-ops

We finally got our garden in two weeks ago.  Our neighbors Kelvin and Casey are sharing the garden with us this year.  We will share the labor and the harvest, it has been fun!  In the photo above Kelvin is tilling, he and Ron took turns.  And Ronnie and Blaise helped plant, but I didn't get any photos of that.  The beans, beets, and carrots have sprouted.  They were planted from seed two weeks ago, so it is nice to see some progress.

In the meantime while we wait for our harvest later this summer, I am starting a CSA co-op next week.  I am so excited!!  It is a local organic farm, and each week for 10 weeks we will receive a half bushel box full of fresh produce.  Yummy!!  I am so thankful to be a part of this CSA as they were one of the unfortunate ones who had the tornado rip through their property in April.  It tore up their greenhouses, chicken shed, and another small out building.  But God provided and they had many helpers come and get things cleaned up and helped get it in order.  And we had no frost hit after that either, so their exposed plants were spared, which has allowed them to continue with the summer CSA.  God is good!  And I look forward to tasting the bounty of this harvest where God obviously had His protective hand on them.

Photos from this week

It's a GIRL!!!

Elise Mae DePew arrived on May 22nd at 2:57 am in our bathtub.  She came so fast my midwife was not even here yet!  It was an amazing experience to deliver my own baby in the bathtub myself.  I just scooped her up onto my chest and held her.  What a miracle from God!

She weighed in at 8 lbs 14 oz and 21.5 inches long.  She has been nursing like a pro from the start, I am so thankful for that!  She even sleeps well at night.  We are just loving on her and enjoying her.  I feel like such a blessed mama to have two beautiful children!  More to come later.

More blessings from others

The top photo is a changing table I just received from my neighbor Shelley.  We recently met after learning that we are both clients of the same midwives for our homebirths.  Shelley had her 2nd baby at home in February.  And they live only four houses down from us!  So it has been a huge blessing to get to know her and let our boys play together.  Her son is 9 months older than Ronnie.  She is going to be one of my backup people for Ronnie when I am in labor.  The changing table was an extra one she had that she was not using, so she said if I liked it I could have it.  I am just thrilled to have received this as we were needing one very badly.  

We are slowly working on making the office/drum room into a sort of bedroom/baby room.  We moved the bookcase out into the living room now, and we put Ronnie's books on the bottom two shelves.  That has been so neat for him.  He can just pull a book out and sit down and look at it.  Much better than the pile of books that was forming on the floor before.  So I put the changing table in the office room where the bookshelf was (see photo above).  Our next goal is to get the desk and PC out of there and probably have to put Ron's drums up for a bit so we can put the full size mattress on the floor.  That will be a place for me to crash if me and the kids are having a long night of night wakings.  That way we can sleep somewhere without worrying about waking daddy up.

And if this baby is a girl, then we will eventually be converting that room into a bedroom for her anyway.  But that is not needed immediately.  Ronnie slept in the Co-sleeper by our bed until he was 8 months old.  I am sure this baby will sleep in there for quite a while too.  It sure makes night nursings and wakings a lot easier than having to get up out of bed! :)

The second photo is the gifts I have received from my diaper shower over the weekend.  I have a good supply of disposables, and 9 newborn sized cloth diapers.  What an absolute blessing!!  I am very grateful for people's generosity when we have been expecting a baby.  It is so helpful and I appreciate it more than words can say.  It is truly humbling to see how God provides our needs through others.