Irish Oatmeal

Irish Oatmeal

One and a half cups steal cut oats, or Irish oats if you can find them. I get them at Wegmans in the granola health food section.

Add lots of water and bring to a boil. When boiling, lower temp to simmer and cook for 45 minutes or so, keeping an eye on water level.

When the oats are chewy, add 1/2 cup of raisins, 1/4 cup sunflower seeds, 1 cup chopped or diced apples, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 cup maple syrup, and 1/4 tsp salt

Add a little more water if needed, and cook another 5 minutes.

Scoop into bowls, add milk or soy milk if you like, and more maple syrup to taste. Reheats really well. It is very good for those trying to lower their cholesterol.


I have to apologize to anyone reading this. My husband came home from school, we had a summer from heck, we got a new rescue dog, and now I am in school part time as well.

AHHH!

Seriously, I am juggling it all well so far. Tess is our new rescue. She is a 1 year old pit bull, who looks like she may have a little lab or boxer in her. She is the sweetest thing, a real snuggler, who learned to catch a 40 yard frisbee throw in 4 days. She has some stranger issues, due to being tied out in the yard for 6 months on a choke chain, next to the pizzaria, grocery store and bank. She had no hair on her neck, and a deep infection which took a 3 week course of antibiotics to clear. She wasn't house broken, so that has been a battle. We did take her to the Adirondacks last weekend, and she climbed her first high peak, Cascade. She did awesome, a couple of barking jags at people who suprised her, but nothing I couldn't get under control immediately-most people she just ignored. And, she did NOT pull me up and down the mountain. She was a real lady.

If anyone knows someone looking for a dog let me know! I am looking for a sports home for her, frisbee, maybe flyball or agility. SHe would make a great obedience dog, her heelwork is gorgeous.

Lets see, the bees are doing well, it is actually warming up today for th efirst time in weeks, so I may get to work them one more time before winter. I am a little worried because it was not a good goldenrod year apparently, and my bees are very new to their hive. If they do not get enough honey stored they will not survive. I am planning on insulating the hive with blue board insulation, so hopefully that will help.

The chickens are really good. I got two new ones this fall, Florish and Blotts. They are black banty cochins. They basically look like feather balls with heads, since their feet are feathered. The cool thing is that we went to the county fair to see the chickens, and my cochins would have cleaned house. So next year I may enter them in the fair. Flo and Blotts do not come when called since I got them as adults, but you can walk right over and pick them up-they are extremely tame. They stopped laying eggs after the daylight shortened up to under 12 hours. I really should have put in lights, but I don't really mind them not laying. Gonzo is still the little Napolean, taking after the 7 foot giant he is named after and taking no crap from anyone!

My husband has been warned by his doctor that he needs to get his cholesterol down more-he got it down from over 350 to below 200, but apparently his bad cholesterol is still too high. So, we sat down and talked about what needed to be done. I have tried to cook healthy for him, but then he goes out to lunch, supersizes everything, or goes to his families and eats porkrinds and curly fries out of the deepfryer, and gorges on too much meat and BBQed chicken, undoing all the healthy cooking. Or he downs an entire bag of chips or can of peanuts-he cannot eat small portions.

So I actually told him (I am not one for 'telling' him things, nor him for listening!) that if he wanted to get it down he had to listen to what I told him to eat. All the time, both in and out of the house. SO I researched cholesterol foods, and spent hours going through my vegitarian cookbooks to make a list of meals he could eat. Soy, flax, seeds, almonds, fish, whole grains, veggies, legumes, but no dairy, fatty meat, white flour, etc. Most of the recipes in my vegitarian cookbooks use lots of cheese and eggs.

I am trying to get to the big store more often so I can get the harder to find ingredients, like soy products. I am trying to plan my meals every week and stick to them, which is better for our budget as well. So this reallyis a good thing.

I just feel bad because I make the dog food now from scratch, and they get beef stew! My poor husband, jealous of the dog's food!

Anyways, I am also in school part time. I am taking psychology and honors forum. With the honors class i will be able to graduate with honors. I am doing my project on treating dog aggression with positive reinforcement training. I am using a client's German Shepherd as a case study. This dog scared the crap out of me at first, but after a few months I really like him. He and I now trust each other, and he is doing really well. The cool thing is that the owner is an old school method person, and did not believe any of this would work. She is noticing the dog's improvement, not only with me but with everyone. He is learning a new way of handling the world, and the weight is off his shoulders. I really enjoy working with him.

The kids, last but certainly not least, are great. Tom and I are taking Karate lessons, and having a fun time. We are both yellow tip white belts (that means we are very new at it) but are improving every class. I actually am getting definition in my abs, from doing so many sit ups- (yeah!) I can do 40 now. Tom is slimming up a bit as well, and seems to have more endurance, and energy. He rushes everything, but I think is starting to see that it is not a contest. He can do more push ups than I can the little bugger! He got high honors at school, 100 in science, lots of 90's and high 80s. We are very proud of him.

Nick is moving along at Nick pace. ;-) He passed everything, which we were happy with. His hair is really long, he is one of those kids who is naturally 'cool'-he just is, and the girls all watch him go by, and he ignores them completely. I am really lucky he is so shy-we would all be in trouble otherwise! Or maybe we are in worse trouble, since only the most aggressive girls will even talk to him. His drumming is coming along, he practices in fits -two hours one night, then three nights no practice, but again, that is Nick pace. He has been doing his model cars and all the same building stuff. He is 15 now-15! Boy do I feel old! He still is a nice kid too, he gets surly in the morning, ( of course so do we all) but I have not hearn him say he hates me yet. Of course he is supposed to, so maybe that isn't a good thing? That child will worry me until I die I think.

So, that is the latest. I will try to keep adding new stuff, sorry about the hiatus.