Full Steam December

We got our tree and I've been busy decorating. For some crazy reason I didn't pack any christmas ornaments, so I've had to make them. Good thing we got a small tree!

Gingerbread Ornaments

A seed pod from a bush outside my house made a nice ornament 

a bit o bunny for your tree?

I've also been making some ornaments out of bits of rabbit fur. That's a sign of getting used to a different culture. I've never ever worked with or worn fur before now, but the school has a ton of fur waiting to be used by the kids in a native cultures project. the hard part is finding someone to teach a native cultures project, so in the meantime, I used some sealskin and bead earrings that were given to me by friends in Anchorage as a model for rabbit skin and bead earrings. I decided that they also make good christmas ornaments. I got the 6th and 7th graders making earrings and ornaments, and they did well, though one of them said "oh, that stuff stuck to the fur is skin?? I just thought it was something they glued on to hold the fur together"     sigh....

Julia supervising

Whitney's earrings

Miguel's ornament

Julia has come down with athlete's foot. I couldn't believe it, having never heard of a baby getting athlete's foot, but I took her around to all the moms here in the village and that was the consensus. I got ahold of a doctor who recommended an antifungal cream for a week, so we are working on that process.  She's also got the signs of more teeth coming in, general fussiness, an increase in drool, a rash on her chin from said drool, but I can't feel any more teeth yet. I'll keep you posted. Her new trick is sticking her tongue out at us.

Julia's wearing a sweater knit by her dad's grandmother

Julia's favorite place, hanging onto my leg

In the kitchen part of life, I've made my first successful batch of sourdough bread. You can find Oregon Trail Sourdough, at http://carlsfriends.net/ It's an old strain of sourdough, and they will mail you enough to get started if you send them a self addressed stamped envelope. I did so, and activated it in water and flour, fed it a few times, then I followed these directions: http://carlsfriends.net/carlospics/PanBreadRecipebyHand.pdf
and made my first ever sourdough!

I'm also going to give out Bambi's Carrot Pie recipe. We had this at thanksgiving, and she created the recipe because her store received a shipment of carrots that got frozen. Trying to salvage them, she pureed them up and substituted them for pumpkin in a pie. It was actually quite good.
Here's my favorite pumpkin pie recipe, from Joy of Cooking
2 c pumpkin, pureed
1 1/2 cups cream or evaporated milk
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp allspice
1/8 tsp cloves
2 beaten eggs
Mix it all up, I like to do so in the blender. Pour into a prepared pie shell and bake 15 minutes at 425 and then 45 minutes at 350.

To make it carrot pie, substitute the pumpkin for pureed carrots.
happy baking.