How to clean up or what to do if you miss your dig out day!

Monday is my dig out day. I like a day at home to re-group from last week and the week-end. Today was not a normal Monday. Other demands, sick cat, fair ribbon drop off, etc. made it impossible to have my dig out day. What to do?

We all have times when we look at dread upon a bedroom or whole house of unsettled "stuff". Today had me thinking about this problem. I like the fast approach on this also. Don't tell anyone, cuz they won't believe you anyway, but I am a lazy person. I just don't give into lazy, I work fast. I have techniques for things that I don't like to do or things that must be done.

If you don't have a plan you can sit and stare at a messy room all day long and it will still be there to haunt and make you miserable. I think kids would benefit from this blog today as it was in my teens I began to apply my techniques. I needed to get to the beach or off to the all day movies or anywhere but my messy bedroom. So once again this is about not thinking too deeply about the job.

1) START FAST

2) HAVE A PLAN

3) THINK AHEAD

Yes attack the job with lightening speed. I had neat children and I had messy children. I liked clean bedrooms and so at times that meant cleaning out the messy rooms. I hated the job but it had to be done.

MY PLAN: I used a few boxes, lined them up and went to work. That's it. No fancy plan just practical fast work. Remember the beach is calling! One box is for everything that goes in another room.

1) Look around the room and put stuff in it fast. It's a race. Another box is for trash, you won't throw away enough if you just use the waste basket that's in the room and you will waste time emptying it when it's full.

2) Look around what is trash, quickly toss it. What we are doing is working in layers. You won't always get all the trash in the first round, or all the stuff that goes in other rooms etc. Another box is for things that don't have a place to go, something I just bought, mail I'm not sure of, etc.

3) Now look around the room, what is still there? Well hopefully it is the stuff that has a place to go and a bit of mixed items we haven't seen yet. So quickly put away the stuff that has a place.

4) Do a trash round again. Do a round of stuff that goes in other rooms again. So what's left you simply don't need or want any more, can it be put in the trash, go to the D.I or the Goodwill?

Some people can do better if they divide the area up and clean one area and have it encourage the next area. Use what works best for you.

THINKING A HEAD: My experience with cleaning house, or your bedroom is that "It will get messy again!" If it is a horrible experience every time you do and it takes you hours, days, or weeks to do it how can you ever face this kind of task? You must learn to do these chores fast, and with a plan. Look ahead to the fun you will have when it is done. Don't labor over every item, if it was important it would be in a special place or it will be soon right.

I'm sure some of you are wondering about this advise because you have seen my house. Well I can do a chore fast and keep up with things, what I suffer from is clutter. My depression era parents and grandparents taught me never to toss anything you might need it. I am learning that sometimes you will and sometimes you won't. I know what each clutter area is, sadly I can find anything. I just wish the clutter had never gotten in a pile. So I am in process of cleaning out the places that have things stored in them. Maybe this stuff needs to be passed along so my hobbies and life of today can go into the cleaned out spaces. Wish me luck 23 years in a house can leave a lot of layers.

So today I'll grab just one bag and go collect all the stuff out of place and put it away and I'll mop the floors, clean the bathrooms and the laundry is in motion now. And a shortened dig-out day is happening, quickly. I have a clean up basket in each bath room, but if I have a bleach cloth in hand I can walk from bathroom to bathroom, yes I have three, and can wipe down the counters the light switch anything that needs a little bleach. Next I go to each room and scrub toilets, then to each room and sweep. I find if I do one motion over and over it gets faster. This doesn't work in all places but it's great for the water areas.

Good-luck fellow workers!

Adoption and dear friends

So today I want to tell you about Steve and Christine. They are adoptive parents. Belle their little doll of a girl came to visit a few weeks ago. My has she grown. Happy little girl, had fun feeding maple leaves to my goat Gracie.

Steve and Christine are trying to adopt another child, they have been aproved by L.D.S family services since Sept 2007. I remember the 9 month plus wait for the birth of my 5 babies and it was horrible wondering and waiting. Just think what it is for an adoptive parent who has no delivery date. Oh how slow time must go.

If you know of a birthmother looking at parents for her child take a look at their profiles on http://www.itsaboutlove.org/ and search adoption profiles then typing "SteveandChristine (no spaces) in the search box.

These are great parents with a lot of talent and drive. I've seen the warmth of their first home, which they re-did themselves. I've enjoyed their fun quilt they entered at the fair. I've seen the happy friendship they have had with our youngest daughter. These are good solid people, always there with a smile.

Happy to help them out!

calorie burning chart......

click on chart to enlarge

1/2 cup chicken salad

1/2 cup of chicken salad spread out a bit

I've been thinking for a while about how to loose this weight. I see these advertisements for stomach bands. Way too scary for me, but I like scientific evidence and these surgeries have them. Seems when an over weight diabetic person has their tummy shortened they suddenly are no longer diabetic. I mean within a week their blood sugar goes back to normal. Now that is a shock. Just by having a smaller tummy they are given a new start. So I began thinking about this. No way I'm doing this kind of surgery but why couldn't I eat like they have to with that tiny stomach?

It's not hard to find how much we should be eating. At the simplest is the labels of products, they all tell how many servings are in the package. You will be shocked how small a serving really can be. If you want a more through way to know how much you should eat there is a fairly new chart that tells you calories by how active you are. Now this is important for me. Here in the Northwest we can be wildly active in the good times and very sedate in the dark cold times.

Since I moved here 23 years ago I have watched my hobbies swing from outside hobbies to inside activities. I think this may be why I gained weight to begin with. None of those 5 children added weight to me, and age hasn't done it. No it's been the adjustment I so easily made to quiet, still hobbies. Not good! So using this chart I can see to loose weight I must change my calorie intake during those slow times. Despite the believe that Northwesterners don't melt (yes it rains a lot) I do melt (born and raised in Los Angeles) so with that in mind you won't find me out on long walks in the rain. I'm smiling at the thought. Not this girl!

I don't suggest that you measure, and weigh everything you eat. You would loose weight but you won't last long I'm sure. I do suggest we all measure a few of our meals after we have them dished up. Am I eating two or maybe more servings of a food per meal? For the last year I've read the cans, and boxes for what a serving is. I've tried to start eating just one serving. It's a lot less food and I'm growing used to seeing less on my plate.

Now that brings me to another thought. How about we eat on a lovely looking small plate and only eat what fits on it. You'd have to be honest about it, I've seen my husband pile that Mongolian plate higher than the Andes! What we need is to find a way to eat small, shrink that stomach so that we know when we over eat in the future.

The photo is of 1/2 cup of chicken salad. It doesn't look like much in a cup shape but see what it does spread out on my plate. A 1/2 cup is a lot of chicken salad. If you read my other blog you know that to be healthy we need a lot of different foods. If I eat a half cup of everything I'm going to be over eating. So here is another chart just as an example of some basic serving sizes. It may be OK for my swimming every other day, husky bleached boy to have two servings of something but for me it would be too much food.

common one serving size of some basic foods:

1 cup milk or yogurt

3/4 cup Fruit or veggie juice

1 medium sized piece of fruit

1/2 cup berries

1/2 cup raw non-leafy veggies

1 cup raw, leafy veggies

1 small potato

1 1/2 ounce of cheese

meat servings the thickness and size of a deck of cards

So don't go on a diet, don't change all your foods for just salad. Try my pretend Stomach band, eat what you will burn and use a small plate and let's all see what this does for us. If you are at a happy weight do tell us how it feels and how you eat?

my next weight blog will finally be the one I started writing first "how we think where weight is concerned"

If you got a Wii-fit for Mothers day please tell us your favorite game and favorite features. I hear it's great for getting Fit!

My connection to food

I wasn't even a year old when they introduced me to picking the grapes that grew at Grandmothers. I can remember picking those grapes even as an adult. And what luck to have these two photos of me milking our cow. Who ever had time to eat, seems it took a lot just to collect the food!

chart I planned my meals from long ago

Quality and Quanity

Now that is a big bake set. How happy I was to see a photo. I have one medium sized envelope of my childhood photos.

My history with food is long and broad. I started as a child with a giant bake set full of box mixes. I thought it was the best Christmas ever. In High school I took cooking in the summer because it was such a fun program.

When I got married in the early 1970’s we settled in Northern California wine and pear region. It was the “Back to Nature” period of the hippy movement. I met and enjoyed many a cooking spree with these back to nature folks. Our closet city center was San Francisco and when Laurel was just working on her kitchen book we were eating at the wonderful natural foods café’s in the bay area. I learned to cook any and everything. A group of us formed a natural foods club and had food shipped up from SF which we weighed out and shared with the members of the group. This was early on, long before the organic title on foods. This let me use so many ingredients I would never have known about.

Then I read “Diet for a small planet’ and I was changed. I began to eat in combinations. I’ll put the chart above and you will see. As time has passed since the 1970’s we have learned so much more. I now know we didn’t need to be as exacting as the chart above. But the plan still works and it makes meal planning so much easier. You feel good when you eat. I do know that this is how my grandmother did eat without even knowing that whole wheat bread and milk and walnuts were really good for us and made a great protein balance.

My grandmother would make bread, by hand, in a big galvanized tub. I don’t even know how many loaves she made each time. I did know that there were 5 boys in that house. I was the oldest grandchild and my mother the only girl in that family. On bread day we always went to grandmothers for lunch, dark whole wheat bread broken into pieces in a bowl. A drizzle of honey, some chopped onions and a handful of nuts on the side of the bowl were added. If the cows had just been milked we had warm milk on the bread but mostly it was cold milk. I loved this lunch. Yummy as ever.

As we think over our weight loss plans we can get more by eating less and choosing better foods. We need to get in touch with food as it comes to us when we pull a carrot or harvest a nut. I remember helping harvest the walnuts. About 3 very large trees in the front of my grandmother’s house. A walnut has a heavy green husk on the outside. It has to be removed so the walnut shell on the inside can dry to what you know as walnuts. You don’t want to eat a walnut that isn’t nice and dry…..Yucky. If your hands touched the outside covering they would be dyed black for a very long time. After the green was off the brown shells would be spread on tarps to dry and everyone would keep their eyes on the squirrels who love walnuts too. My point in this story is to remind myself how much work would go into the food I ate as a child. Nothing just hopped on my plate. The cows had to be milked, the eggs collected and the vegetables planted. You might be surprised to know this was in a suburb of Los Angeles also. I doubt very much that we over ate during this time. Food was carefully used. I’m guessing if I want to loose weight I need to return to the food of my youth. Return to my connection to food.

Maybe you never have enjoyed growing and harvesting as I have so learn from me what a wonderful thing it is to know your food.

200 wedding dresses

If you live in the Seattle area and know someone that needs a wedding dress send them to the Women's Assistance league in Everett. It's on Evergreen way. They just had a donation of over 200 dresses. There are also shoes, gloves, veils, and brides maid dresses. Pass around the word The Women's Assistance League of Everett on Evergreen way.

What can I say, I'm overweight and need to correct some things!

This is part two on weight loss. Or healthy eating really. Part one has been so hard to write. You can have it when I have it cleaned up and made it easy to read. This however is easy to write and you will be happy to have this to think about.

I have a cook I watch on PBS, his program is called Mexico: One Plate at a Time. The cook is Rick Bayless. I have so enjoyed his program which now comes on very late at night sadly. I have become a much better cook because of his cook books. I still have the smells of Mexico in my head from childhood and I'm sure it helped me buy his cook book "Mexican everyday". The real gift in this book is his introduction at the beginning of the book. He didn't want to be a heavy weight famous cook like so many gifted cooks are. He didn't want to sacrifice his health to his love of cooking. So Rick began to look at his life and his choices and he came up with some essential learning points to control his weight. I will list them here. He writes a lot about each point and you should check your library or local book store if you want to read more.

Essential learning #1 My weight reflects a mental picture I have of myself.

Essential learning #2 No matter what weight-loss diet plans promise, monitoring the quality of food is essential to maintaining healthy weight. The real truth is: I need monitor the quantity of calories I consume....

Essential Learning #3 Eating a wide variety of food ingredients is fundamental to nutritional fitness.

Essential Learning #4 Processed foods, many prepared foods and most fast foods have no place in everyday eating.

Essential learning #5 The world's most time-honored cuisine's illustrate that: 1) everyday eating is best kept to deliciously seasoned simple preparations of natural ingredients (mostly unrefined and balanced among a variety of fruits, vegetables, grains, legumes, and meat) served in moderate portions, and 2) fabulous feasts-once a week, or, for special occasions, more often-are an essential part of our healthy nourishment.

Essential Learning #6 For us to be able to enjoy great food without gaining weight, our bodies need to burn as much fuel as possible.......

I list these essentials because I think Rick Bayless has found some of the truths I have been collecting. The truths that Steven Gurgevich has in his Medical Hypnosis tapes I suggested you listen to. The truths that Mireille Guiliano shares in her book 'French Women Don't Get Fat. And more recently people like Michael Pollan, as in his interview with Night line, are voicing my thoughts about food and eating.

(read his interview at http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Story?id=4757669&page=1 ) I remember how my grandmother ate and it's not even close to how we eat now!

So to get us started let's think about #5 from above. If we develop a simple daily eating style and save our bigger, richer meals for special occasion will we be happier? I can come up with 6 simple meals a week. I can cook up some grains and have them ready in my fridge. I can prepare some healthy meals based on just the ingredients. We could ask my #4 child what was in the fridge, most days, when she was on her mission in the way south end of California and I'll bet she'd say Menudo , a tripe soup that is a mainstay in Mexican kitchens. In Japan it's Miso soup, in Mireille's books it's leek soup, can you think of other cultures where there is a basic food everyone depends on for daily life? This week I'm going to work on a list of simple meals based on variety and freshness. Will you look at your meals, do they fall into the fast food, the middle of the grocery isles, in a box style of eating? Let's look at our food, what we eat. Maybe at the end of each day we could think about what that days eating was to us. As you look at this I will start a list of foods that can be prepared once for the basis of several daily meals.

Food is going to be fun to talk about weight is going to be hard and self image even harder but talk about all these I will.

This is just a beginning....

Discoveries come in interesting ways

Discoveries today offer some fun ideas for you. A friend called asking about my little rototiller. Wondered how it was at removing moss. So bleach boy and I went out to test it on live moss. We've used it many times on dead moss with great success. We tested, it removed the moss and we called the friend back. So now is the time for the discovery. In that brief moment the two of us set out to do the whole lawn. We worked fast, we both had been working on other projects, we had the lawn done in 45 minutes and an hour to haul it all back to the compost. What a feeling of accomplishment!

I think half of what keeps us from getting things done is thinking about it. Sure it will be a stress. Hunting for what we need to feel we can do a project. Not sure we are in the mood. I understand all this, I do this all! But in no time at all we did a big job. What was the key to this success? Just doing! NOT Thinking. Doing.

Back in the early 90's my sister gave me a gift. It was a see through bag, colorful and bright, it was full of small folded papers. At the bottom of the bag was a little round hole to extract the papers from. She said when I didn't know what to do to pull a paper out. This concept seems useful in today's discoveries. I need one of those bags and I need to fill it with projects that I avoid and know I could do fast if I didn't think about it. No collecting of materials, grab as you go and get it done. I think one a week would be a good start. Can you make a list of jobs you avoid when you think too much?

And if you search your mind for these ideas it will lead into my weight loss blogs. The first one will be on what your mind is doing to your weight. If you want to get a head of me a bit, go to the basic cd. Go to the Health folder, now to What's a diet, now to hypnotherpy. Listen to 1-5 don't be put off by the discussion of how to be hypnotized, keep listening as he talks about what your mind does to your body. It's very good.

See you in the next blog

Need a chocolate fix?

I hear that we are all trying to loose weight. I have been collecting some success stories to share with you and the hints they include. BUT tonight is about a chocolate fix and fast! Isn't Friday date night? Well we can't afford the gas or the dinner out for date night so it was 'Master and commander' and Easy Pots de Cre'me. My Bleached boy (new name for husband who has been swimming in the pool a bit much) thought it was chocolate pudding. It is ever so much more than that. Of course the chocolate you use will make a difference. Semi-sweet chocolate chips makes it taste one way and those rich 60%, 70%, and 80% chocolate bars make it taste completely different. How rich, or dark do you like your Pots de Cre'me?

This is fast to make, a little goes a long way so it serves a lot and it will satisfy your need for a chocolate fix.

3/4 cup milk plus 2 tablespoons (I used 2%)

6 ounces of chocolate pieces your choice (1 cup)

2 eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla or any flavor you wish I hear orange is good (use less)

In a bowl or saucepan heat milk until small beads form on the edge. (bowl for the microwave (saves energy) saucepan for the stove top) Do not boil. In a blender combine chocolate in little pieces, eggs and vanilla. Blend until just smooth. Add hot milk and blend again. I had to stop the blender and take a spoon and pull the chocolate up into the hot milk twice to get it to blend the milk in.(I fixed this problem by putting eggs and vanilla in and blending until smooth and then adding chocolate.) Blend until smooth and creamy. Pour into 6 little cups. Chill. Top with anything you like or nothing. This is really rich. It chills really quickly too.

If you have the Basic's Cd you will find this recipe under treats. I have adjusted this one slightly.

Hope you find this week-end treat chocolaty good and that you can put a stop on the goodness on Monday and get back to healthy eating.

Smiles

Have a nice week-end

Wash their hands and BAKE

We made these many times in the early years. Everyone likes to make food with their hands. Hopefully you have a little hand brush and along with soap you can do a fast scrub job on little hands before starting. Let's make Aggression Cookies Preheat oven to 350 degrees

In a very large bowl (I had one of those plastic Tupperware bowls big enough to put your youngest in) put: 6 cups of oatmeal 3 cups brown sugar 3 cups butter (yikes I know, it's a pound and a half) 3 cups flour 1 tablespoon baking soda

I cut the butter into a bit smaller pieces but you don't have to if they are at room temperature. MASH, KNEAD, and SQUEEZE this mixture until your aggression is under control. Or until there are no more lumps of butter and the flour is all mixed in. Once it is all holding together, aggression is gone you can form it into balls the size of walnuts. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet. Butter the bottom of a small glass, have your child dip it in sugar and flatten each ball of cookie dough. These cookies spread so give them space on the cookie sheet to do so. Bake 10-12 minutes or until lightly brown. Cool until crisp. They are very tasty and good. Store in air tight container to keep them crisp. The dough keeps in the refrigerator nicely in a Ziploc bag. Your children can not mess up these cookies and nothing is better than playing in your food! If you make these, take a photo and send it to me for a blog of everyone making aggression cookies.

(Recipe comes from my favorite book "The Mother's Almanac" but Marguertie Kelly and Elia Parsons. I still haven't mastered why this program takes every space I put in the recipes and mashes them all together in a mess (aggression I guess) so to help you read this I put every other paragraph in a darker text. One day I figure out how to fix this!

1978 That was a good year!

We have three family members who were born in 1978. Yes count it up, they will all turn 30 years old this year. The first spent her birthday in Prague. A fitting start to her 30th year for her. Our son-in-law, husband of our youngest has his birthday today. He is Daddy to two very cute kids. I know plans have changed for his birthday. A new baby for one must be keeping them at home. Congratulations on this Special day. Look at the beautiful family you have! What is more wonderful to note as you start this 30th year of life. Let's all think good wishes for Jared's birthday today! You can leave a comment for him here if you wish! Happy Birthday to you, happy birthday to you! *************************************************************************

So what else happened in 1978?

The first ever radio episode of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams is transmitted on BBC Radio 4. The Blues Brothers make their first appearance on Saturday Night Live. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints opens the priesthood to "all worthy men,". The first so-called test-tube baby, Louise Brown, is born. Odie makes his first appearance in the cartoon strip Garfield. Anni-Frid "Frida" Lyngstad and Benny Andersson, members of the Swedish pop group ABBA, are married. The sitcom Diff'rent Strokes premieres on NBC. Jonestown mass suicide. In San Francisco, California, city mayor George Moscone and openly gay city supervisor Harvey Milk are assassinated by former supervisor Dan White. He claims eating Twinkies made him crazy! Spain becomes a democracy after 40 years of dictatorship. A renovated Hollywood Sign is unveiled, replacing the older version that was built in 1923. US President Jimmy Carter signs a bill into law that authorizes the minting of the Susan B. Anthony dollar. Muhammad Ali beats Leon Spinks for the world heavyweight boxing title. Double Eagle II becomes first balloon to cross the Atlantic Ocean when it lands in Miserey near Paris, 137 hours after leaving Presque Isle, Maine. The Solomon Islands become independent from the United Kingdom. Czech Vladimír Remek becomes the first non-Russian or non-American to go into space, when he is launched aboard Soyuz 28. The first computer bulletin board system is created (CBBS in Chicago, Illinois). Laureen, Jared and Eden are born. Their parents are all thrilled!

Paper dolls

Hope that title didn't put you off. This is really fun stuff. A young child will be amazed and want you to do it over and over. An older child will take the paper and scissors and start on their own connected dolls.

So grab some paper, a pencil and scissors.

Fold the paper in some nice wide accordion folds. You can see my fold lines in the dolls above. One fold in (Valley fold) and one fold out ( Mountain fold) You can draw your figure in full at this point and cut it out but it is easier to fold the accordion fold in half now and only draw half a person. It is important to leave parts attached to the fold. A bit of pony tail, the hands, a foot. If you forget and don't keep some of the folds attached you will get dolls apart. That is fun too.

Don't limit this adventure to just people, some great monsters come from this kind of play. You can use colorful construction paper, printer paper or the news paper for a nice long line of dolls.

Have fun. This takes no planning at all.

My Children loved music games. Yours will too!

remember you can click to make larger and print from

Also I'm having problems with keeping spacing in my blog hope it doesn't make it too hard to read the songs.

Have you done motor boat motor boat with those 4-10 year olds? My how they laugh and laugh. There is a music game for every age. We start with 5 little monkeys jumping on the bed and ring a round the rosie and London Bridges. I'll put them below. We move up to wheels on the bus, and here we go round the Mulberry bush. You need several children for motor boat and a hunting we will go. As kids get older they can enjoy the talking rhymes like Betty botter and Peter Piper Picked a Peck.

The beauty of music games is you need nothing but your memory. Good for all of us to stretch. No you can't do this in a long church meeting but I will share my hand games this week for those moments. And find yourself a handkerchief and I can teach you three great things to make in church or quiet places for child play.

London Bridge

London bridge is falling down falling down, falling down, London bridge is falling down, My fair lady O.

Chorus: 1) Take the key and lock her up......etc

2) Build it up with iron bars......etc

3) iron bars will bend and break..........etc

4) build it up with silver and gold............etc.

You can do this with just you and one other. Hold hands both of them and lift and lower them to match the song. You have the child go around you and under your bridge and when you get to "My fair lady O" drop your hands down and catch the child. Sway back and forth. To get free you can ask "do you want to pay with silver or gold? let them free once they state what they will pay with. You can have them pay with imaginary cake or marbles, or stones, etc.

Pop goes the Weasel.

My nearly one year old grand daughter Lillian love this and we can sing it all day long and she loves the POP!

All around the cob-bler's bench, the monkey chased the weasel. The monkey thought t'was all in fun.........POP! goes the weasel. A penny for a spool of thread a penny for a needle that's the way the money goes .....POP! goes the weasel.

Where is Thumbkin? ( sing to "are you sleeping")

Where is Thumbkin? Where is Thumbkin? Place your thumbs behind your back

Here I am, Here I am. (show thumbs one each phrase)

How are you today sir? How are you today sir? (have your thumb bow)

Very well I thank-you, Very well I thank-you. (bend the other thumb back)

Run away, run away.....(wiggle those thumbs away).

2. Pointer

3. Tall man

4. ring man

5. baby

6. all men

I was just remembering all the baby songs I know. If you'd like a baby song blog just let me know. My sister and I made a tape of all the songs we knew. Not sure it still works but I think I remember them all...

Five little monkeys

Five little monkeys jumping on the bed one fell off and bumped his head

mama called the Dr. The doctor said "no more monkeys jumping on the bed.

use your open hand to be the bed. Take your other and and let the fingers be the monkeys.

grab your head on both sides and swing back and forth.

Shake your finger like the Dr. saying no more monkeys jumping on the bed.

Here is the Church

Here is the church (fingers interlaced upside down, finger inside)

here is the steeple (put your two pointer fingers up into a steeple)

open the doors and see all the people (Your two thumbs are the doors, close and open them)

close the doors,

Listen to them pray (put your ear to the hand church)

Open the doors and they all run away! (open the thumbs and have the fingers run away)

So I'm out of breath now from singing all these fun game songs. There are plenty more we can add to after we learn what we don't know of these. Don't worry about your voice. Your child doesn't care, he loves that you sing to him/her. They want to be noticed in this special way. Your voice will be beautiful. Just sing!

Enjoy, little ones!

Thinking of things to come

Yes a real Zen garden. We visited it in Japan and so do thousands of visitors each year. This is a very famous one and people sit there all day and just look at it. I understand the Zen master did it until he didn't need his arms so they fell off. And he didn't need his legs so they fell off. Any way the story gets worse as we go so I'll leave it here. This month is a sit at the Zen garden and study it month. Can you believe we have 5 family birthdays in June? I didn't believe until I looked at my wonderful calendar made by my youngest. We didn't have any children in June but we do have two son-in-laws born in June and three grandchildren. Two of those grandchildren will have their first birthday this month. So to honor them this week I will put in fun games and activities for children. One a day so check back. I know I'll have fun collecting them for you to use. But for now.......................... Guess I'll go back to the Zen Garden and think on this a bit! Hope nothing falls off, I need every thing I've got! Smiles Grammie

Test results on whole wheat master mix

I'm happy with this mix so far. At first I wasn't sure. Whole grain really drys out recipes. I haven't had to add but a tiny bit of extra liquid and the biscuits have been amazingly fast and very good. As with any biscuit they are dry the next day. I'd say these are a bit dryer than regular biscuits. I made a dinner from the Bisquick site and it had hamburger and cheese etc on top of the biscuits dough, padded into an 8X8 pan. It was odd on first bite but after a moment I found it crunchy and good.

Did you make a batch? How is it working for you? I am very happy with the oil in the master mix. Doing the blending in the mixer with the whisks was a perfect way to really blend this in nicely. I think we will end up using this whole grain mix a lot. Think I'll make a 2nd one and add some chopped sunflower seeds and some sesame seeds and what ever else I think of. That should make a really healthy breakfast! I rolled the biscuits out on corn meal and they were really good that way.

It's now Oct. and I have been using this whole grain mix for a good long time. We really like it! The crunch is becoming more common to our mouths and for two of us I have now made 4 big batches. It's ready for most any thing you need, however the cinnamon rolls were better with the traditional white flour mix. Do make and use this!

Help?

Sorry everyone. This blog system seems to take my carefully placed spacing and put it all in one lump. So the recipes are coming out all a mess. Any hints? Is there a setting on the blog I need to change? Thanks

whole grain master mix

Hello ladies,

How is life going? What do you need? We should talk about what everyone is thinking about lately. Winter seems over, spring peeks its head out in some places and summer has arrived in others. Let me hear from you a bit.

In the April Fools Basic cd I questioned how good the master mix with oil would be. I hadn't tried it yet but included it because it seemed such a good idea. Remember I learned in high school to make the master mix with tons of shortening. Very bad for us. This week I have been testing the oil done master mix. I have been using the whole grain master mix to improve my health!

Here is what I have learned. The master mix is quick to make and easy to use in recipes. I said it may not save money. True, wheat products are so expensive. But what it does is allows us to remove extra chemicals from our food. We know what is in it and it is pure and simple.

I made the whole grain mix in about 5 minutes. I put it all in my mixer with the whisk attachments on. As the mixtured turned I very slowly poured in my oil. It worked perfectly! The oil was mixed thoroughly in just a few moments. Then I put it in my Tupperware pour container and that night I made dinner with it. The difference with the whole grain is that it is WHOLE. It's heavier, but not too heavy. The biscuits were still nice the crust crisp. Because I didn't use dry milk in my master mix I used milk instead of water to make the biscuits. I will test other recipes and see how it goes and report to you.

If you didn't get a Basics Cd here is the recipe. If you did get the cd the recipe for master mix, whole grain and plain and recipes to go with them are in the hints file, then cooking hints and then master mix folder and you will find two master mix folders. Use your index. Is that helping? Who didn't get one? I can e-mail you one. With over I think 400 entry's you need an index!

http://www.bettycrocker.com/search/searchresults.aspx?terms=bisquick&Tab=Recipes

You can go to the Bettycrocker recipes at the address above for recipes using both of the master mixes on your cd. If you make a pudding master mix, a snack cake master mix and a master mix for all the other bread things you are set for a month of great easy additions to your meals.

You will find all those mixes at this college site. And don't forget colleges are my favorite places to find great thing of all subjects.

http://www.msu.edu/~flower49/FoodWebSite/recipe_113.html

When my children were pre-teens and teens I had a lot of different mixes in containers and the recipes were blown up and put on cards so they could make their own yummies. A lot of fun and like I said fast to make.

Give this healthy recipe a try.

Whole Grain master mix Servings 12 half cup 2 cups white flour

2 cups whole wheat flour

¾ cup nonfat dry milk (opt)

½ cup oats

½ cup cornmeal

3 tablespoons baking powder

2 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon salt (opt)

½ cup vegetable oil

Mix as in recipes above. Whole wheat flour also can go rancid so long storage should be in the fridge.

Cleaning up messes my way

This is the reality of life. There will always be messes to clean up. After 50 plus years I know that. Sorry but it's true. Different kinds of messes. Today we will start with the easiest. If I smell a mess and go to clean it up, I puke. Yes sadly. My husband taught me to use perfume under my nose to manage the smells of the dentist and I found it worked to trick my brain for messy, smelly clean ups. I've not only had those little kid clean ups to do but after years of the animal kingdom I've had bad wounds, sick horses, I won't go on, I'm sure you are getting the picture, kinds of clean ups.

So I use my imagination. Sure this is what it was made for. A mess should be addressed fast. In your mind it gets worse with age. I dab that perfume and grab the cleaning tools and consider that an imaginary guest is at the end of my drive way and how fast can I clean it. Or I figure It must be diamonds and if I don't get them fast someone else will........IF ONLY.

The next great tool is Costco's Kirkland brand small wastebasket size bags. They come in a million in a box or so it seems. They are hard to unroll and sticky to open but when they are open they are magic. Light weight they can be used to clean up anything! It protects your hands and your arms if you wish. when you are done you just take your other hand and pull the bag inside out, over the paper towels, or rags or what ever was used to clean up. Now everything is in a bag you can quickly seal (to keep the smell away) and off to the trash it goes.

If it's carpet you need to clean you must get the liquid as fast as possible. There is a pad under your carpet. What ever soaks in there stays. I get an old bath towel, nice and thick (we call them horse towels as my middle child used them to dry her horses after their pre-show bathes) I lay that towel over the mess and stand, hop and put as much weight on the area as I can. Move that towel every few seconds to let the dry areas soak up what it can. Now take a peek. what do you have left to deal with? If the mess has color to deal with it you best take a cup of clear water, a fresh horse towel and pour that over the mess and lay the towel down and do the hop again. Is the color gone? Keep doing it until it is. I know a lot of towels, but it is better then other ways to pull wet messes up. (got a shop vacuum?)

Now for smell. Human, urine, animal smells all respond to an enzyme found in several brands of cleaners. We get ours by the gallon at the feed supply (farm supply) but you can try a pet store they just sell it in smaller bottles for more money. We buy the brand Natures Miracle. You need a sprayer and read if it needs diluting, some do, some don't. Put that bit of miracle in your sprayer and moisten the spill area. Only do this at the end when all moisture is pull up into the towels and nothing else needs to be done. Let it dry and try to keep family and pets from walking on a wet spill. They will make the spot dirty. My kids would see me put a towel over it until they went to bed so they couldn't leave dirt on the spot. I think they thought that is how to clean up a mess! Nope that towel came off at night so the spot could dry un-walked on.

Remember the key to cleaning up messes is the right tools, a bit of perfume and your imagination. Do it fast.....it's always better. Don't think much about it, its a reality of life and being a Mommy is hard enough so don't add the messes to your stress! Save your frustration and concern for the people not the messes.

Happy Memorial day

Who are you thinking of today? Our freedom's have never been ours without sacrifice. I know who sacrificed for me to live free. My dad, my uncles they took seriously this need to protect the freedoms I enjoy now.

My dad went into the Army as a teen. His dad signed the papers to let him go in early. Right away my dad was in a mess. The day he flew out 3 of the planes that took off that day crashed because of bad weather over the south. Survives were put back on another plane and off to Africa, from there to Italy where he landed in the most brutal winter they had ever seen. His unit was the first to reach the German border, held back to let the Russian's in first he must have been horrified once he saw what was over that border. He never talked of it, but we have photos with striking reminders of WWII.

My husbands dad stayed in the states and trained dogs. The dogs took messages around the battlefield. We are both proud of the flags put over their caskets at their burials.

My husband served during the Vietnam war in Korea. Our family has a history with freedom. Phil's family came from Ireland around the revolutionary period of the U.S. My family, the whole of it left Sweden for religious freedom. Phil's Moravian family left a troubled country to find freedom here in the U.S. Their immigration papers are precious to us.

We would not be the people we are without the freedoms of this county and the people who worked to serve it. I also think of Charles, a Canadian friend who flew some really important flights during WWII. Flights to save life, to preserve freedom.

I hope you will say a prayer of thanks today, remember all those who have served our country. Put a flag on a grave. Let your children know there is something so valuable, so precious, so vital to our lives that many have given much to protect it. Enjoy this freedom we love, it came at a great cost.

Happy Memorial day, have a joyful day.

Index for the April fools Basic Cd

Well it's time to get back to business! There are always little brakes in our lives. Time to herald something that helps us mark time. Anniversaries, birthdays, accomplishments, but now it's time for me to get back to the business of a women's life.

I made an index for your basics cd. A few phone calls asking for recipes already on the cd told me I needed to do more. I even burned a few extra Cd's last night and added the index in. If you want to give one as a gift or know someone who still wants one I'd be happy to mail it out.

That piece of rich chocolate cake is double chocolate cake made from the make-a-mix recipes. You'll find them in the Treats/cake/snack cake. It makes several different fast cake recipes all made right in the pan you'll bake in. I made this snack cake for my husbands after swim treat. It's not your light and fluffy cake, it's hearty and can be eaten right out of your hand.

I've e-mailed the index to as many of you as I had e-mail for. If you want a copy it's a word doc. and you can send your e-mail in a comment and I won't post any of them as before.

Next blog will be on the messes we encounter. I have some thoughts on what to do with those!

It's memorial week-end.

A time to honor those who have left us. I hope you will take time to think of someone who made life better for you in their passing and give thanks for them. I'm putting my flag out on Monday, maybe you will too.

Smiles

June 12 1981 I can still remember it!

Tonight at midnight our local theater is showing the new "Indiana Jones and the crystal skull" My midnight movie days aren't as exciting as they once were so you will see me at the first matinee tomorrow. My childhood was full of all day, Saturday, at the El Monte theater. We'd watch exciting movie after exciting movie, all on one price ticket. This included some great cartoons in between each. Now keep this in mind as I tell you the next story.

In 1981 we had 3 children and were 8 months along with #4. Getting a baby sitter was a major deal. A thirty minute drive each way, over the hills of Ukiah, to reach our sitter. We needed a brake, seriously a brake. Our friends the Fawsons worked out a sitter and we met them at the theater. We were just a tad late and hurried into a filled, old fashion, sticky floored, theater. We found seats way off to the side past lots of people. The movie looked to be in full swing, Harrison Ford was running for his life. Already? We must have missed a lot of the film. Thought maybe we'd stay for the start of the next showing. I didn't have much time to think about it. I was suddenly caught up in the story. I was suddenly back to saturday afternoon at the El Monte Theater. Oh my what a treat for a weary mother of 3 3/4. As it turned out we didn't really miss but a moment of the movie, the action was there from the beginning. It was sure a pleasant change from the serious movies of the time. Thank you Steven Spielberg!

Well the biggest surprise is that our son, oldest child, worked on the movie that will be released tonight at midnight. He added some of his creative juice to this movie. He is a pre-viz artist and maybe someday I'll explain what that is. We are deeply proud of him. He was always such a great artist and to get to work with Steven Spielberg on such an exciting movie is so neat. I will be proudly clapping loudest when his name passes by on the screen! On a side note, as he worked on the film he was given little bits and never got to know what or where it was placed in the movie. Guess he'll be surprised when he sees it too.

Look for me tomorrow in the darkened theater!

Grammie

Happy Anniversary

Today is our daughter and son-in-laws 9th anniversary. The first wedding in our family. Our 2nd child. It was a wonderful occassion. We decorated in her beloved garden forest scene. Everyone pitched in, Jana sewed pale green place mats, her dad made a heart shaped back drop from trees in the forest around us, he also made wooden boxes we filled with moss and little handmade dragonflies, Yoko made flowers for everyone to wear, I made her dress, Katherine sewed ivy lace down the dress.

Grandma Reagan flew up to join us, middle sister flew home, it was a wonderful day! We did a luncheon at a nice Hotel and all the women gathered in the free room we had that came with the luncheon and helped Shannon dress and get all ready for her wedding. what fun that was with young, old, friends, family and sisters!

Kind ladies I know did all the kitchen work, the slide show was a laugh and before we knew it everyone was gone and the kids were heading off to the east coast.

The beginning of a family is so nice to reflect back on. They are now raising 6 little children, their oldest just turned 8 years old.

Happy Anniversary kids!

A childhood dream of mine

I was imaginative child. Too bad my mom is no longer here to attest to that. She'd tell you about my imaginary friends and my thinking at 2 I was a horse.

There was a lovely song that goes as so...

White coral bells upon a slender stock

Lilies of the valley deck my garden walk

Oh don't you wish that you could hear them ring?

That will happen only when the fairies sing.

I didn't look these words up. They have been firmly planted in my head all my life. About 6 years ago Anna Rose gave me a bag full of lilies of the valley. They were taking over her yard. I was delighted, couldn't think of anything better to take over a northwest mossy yard! I planted them and today they deck my front walk. After a day of heat I noticed a strong heady fragrance as I walked into the house and to my amazement the lilies of the Valley are all in bloom.

Oh how I love these flowers, I hum this song in my head as I pick them. My home fills with their presence. I love their waxy sturdy bells. And I still listen for the Fairy's to sing so my bells will ring!

Enjoy wish I could share their deeply rich smell

beating the system

Life is getting harder. Don't you all agree? Grocery's are way out of whack, gas is high and believe me when I say "it will stay high". Wages are not getting higher to help and on top of all that my property tax goes up yearly higher and higher.

But it's not a downer I am sharing today, nope! It's clever, tricky beating the system ideas. It started with the yogurt. Yes we are back to Yogurt sort of. I wanted to settle an on going tummy upset. Stress maybe but I knew yogurt would help if I just ate some each day. WELL! Those tiny cups of yogurt were much too expensive so I began making my own on a regular basis. Very satisfying and with a 1/2 gal of milk I can make a lot of yogurt. (I keep an orange and a lemon in a baggie in the fridge and give my yogurt a zip of peel and a few squeezes of juice)

Next came the Buttermilk. A friend ,who's a great cook, make blueberry scones for our book club. They were so good I wanted to make some for husband. To save gas I had him stop at stores on his way home from swimming. Trip after trip didn't yield any buttermilk. Why? I wanted a quart and no one sold it in quarts any more and it was all non-fat and runny and expensive. How can you make anything work without thick, sour buttermilk. I began applying the yogurt principle to the buttermilk. I bought one of the expensive little pints and a half gallon of whole milk and I went online and found a buttermilk recipe. (this is not the same as adding lemon or vinegar to sour milk, this is thick wonderful stuff)

I always find my favorite and more trusted web sites are colleges, they end in edu in the web addresses. In this case most rural colleges have dairy programs. Our middle daughter went to our states agricultural college in the East. We always treated ourselves, on visits, to some ice-cream and a can of cheese at the dairy shop at the college. Wonderful stuff. Before I get off subject with my mouth watering, I found a buttermilk recipe, the dairy proffesor's recipe, it was perfect. You make it very much like yogurt, heat the milk, cool the milk add a cup of cultured buttermilk. When I opened the jar I had thick, clotted buttermilk. Just as it should be. The Blueberry scones were heavenly. I have enough for pancakes or even chocolate cake!

So with one half gallon of whole milk I made a quart of buttermilk, and two quarts of yogurt. Amazing. Read your Basics cd to discover why cultured milk is so good for you. I am a happy lady to beat the system once again.

In the 70's it was hard like this and my sister and I shared all kinds of ideas on how to save money by doing it ourselves. We made our own bagels, our own sausage, our own soap (still do!) and all kinds of things. You have to judge when the ingredients might cost more than the end product, it's not always better to do it yourself. Soap I make because my skin is happier with handmade. Cereal in the morning is ever so much cheaper for me to make my own. (Check the basics cd for all kinds of grain cereal recipes and granola.

I will make this Beating the system an on going blog. Pass along your ideas, ask your questions. We can smile in the comforts we ourselves can have despite the lack of money in our lives!

Laughing as I go down the grocery isles

Grammie!

I looked out the window and what did I see?

click on music to enlarge

Popcorn popping on the apricot tree. This is the first line of a delightful children's song we teach to the little ones as soon as they can reach their hands up to do the pop pop of the popcorn. The hand motions come natural. Make that popcorn ball and smell that nice ball you make. I'm including the music for those who play an instrument. It's a wonderful sing along song!

Enjoy the nice weather if you are having what the Northwest is enjoying today!

Sing along:

I looked out the window and what did I see? Popcorn popping on the apricot tree

Spring has brought me such a nice surprise, blossoms popping right before my eyes.

I could take an arm full and make a treat, a popcorn ball that will smell so sweet.

it wasn't really so, but it seemed to be, popcorn popping on the apricot tree.

Yogurt hints

Guess I better redeem myself.

No more hot dog art.

I had a question about scalding milk and the bits of browned milk, what to do? It's funny when you make a food or recipe, so long you don't use a recipe any more, you forget that others don't know those little things you do that make it work better. Guess I should say "I'm sorry" I didn't think of this hint. I do all my scalding in the microwave. Nothing ever burns to the bottom of the bowl. Well I take that back, I have burnt chocolate chips trying to melt them with too much time!

Take a nice glass bowl bigger than the amount of milk you use for the yogurt. That's a lot of milk so a big bowl. Put it in the micowave and put a piece of wax paper over it (you don't want to let anything drop into the bowl this is a process to kill any bacteria we don't want to culture)

I start heating the milk at 3 minute intervals. It can take a while to boil milk. Remember we are trying to get to about 190 to 210 degrees. My next hint is buy a little thermometer at a kitchen area in your grocery or home/linens store. They are not fancy and are not expensive but so useful for yogurt and testing things like meat when it comes out of the oven. You don't leave these in the oven you just put them into the milk to cover the little bump on the stem (that is how high you must cover to get a correct temperature. I've taken up to 12 or 14 minutes in my microwave to get to the higher temperature. You don't need to stir. Just lift the wax paper and put in the thermometer, you can stir it around a bit to blend the heat of the milk. Wait and watch the temp rise. When it stops you'll know how much more heat you need.

One other hint that is on your basic Cd is to remember to add the semi-cooled milk to the room temperature yogurt culture and really stir it well. I take a little whisk and really mix this up. You don't want to make bubbles in the yogurt but right at this point it is only the yogurt starter and about 1/4 a cup of milk and you can't make much in the way of bubbles. If you don't get this culture all the way through the milk you can't make yogurt. It's not hard just keep stirring gently once you've got it all together.

Do you have any other questions? I love a good question like this was!

Grammie

to Max who just started walking before his 1st birthday

and to Natalie who is just now 2 weeks old

and to all the others, 10 total!

For my amusement mostly

I'm so sorry. I know we don't eat hot dogs twice a week as I did growing up. I came upon this 1971 women's day article called "putting on the Dog" I wasn't even married at this time but I kept this article for the creative spin on an every day food. Maybe you know of some healthy hot dogs and can put this to use. If not do as I am and have a good laugh at nostalgia!

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha......................................

Welcome any new readers

I've had people asking if they can tell their friends about my Blog. Well of course you can! I welcome all readers. Your questions are welcome as are your comments. We are just women looking to improve and enjoy our lives. If you have older or younger children let me know. I have a wealth of things to do with children. I'd like to make this site reflect what you can use. I found having a lot to do, to brake up the stress, the mundane, the loneliness of life, made living with my five children fun and enjoyable. Let me share what I have with you. You are all welcome.

Tomorrow I will answer a question about making yogurt. If you have tried my recipe on the basics Cd you may find these hints helpful. It seems the more you practice a craft, like cooking, the easier it is for you and the more you forget how hard it is for someone else. So I will add all the little hints I didn't even realize I knew! Be sure to check it out, you can save a bundle making your own yogurt.

Smiles..........

frogs frogs every where

Remember to click on this diagram to enlarge.

I love this project! I was on the hunt for an Amish doll pattern I used for Girl Scouts. This had me pulling out all my Girl Scout note books, real treasures in my mind, and I found the frogs.

Made from 3x5" recipe size cards. They now come in such delightful colors, even green. Don't forget to add eyes. I know many of you are seasoned Origami folders so this will be easy for you. Once you are done let the kids push down the bums and off the frogs hop. Yes make a dozen and have races. Set a low bowl or basket out and let them try to hop those frogs into it. If you need step by step directions just let me know. Can do!

Happy frogging.

Step #1 fold point to point at just the top of the card

Step #2 fold bottom of card up over the X of the last folds

Step #3 This is one of those steps that is easier to show than do push in the sides to make a pointed nose on your frog.

Step #4 Take that folded nose and fold up the points of the top triangle

Step #5 Fold in long sides of whole card making sure you don't fold into the nose. Then take the back of the nose and fold down "legs" using the bottom of the diamond shape

Step #6 do a zip zag fold. If your card is green on one side and white on the other be sure you are folding the back legs so they show the top as green. Don't crease this zip zag too much it is what gives the frog it's hop so leave it bouncy.

Oh were any of you in the GS troop when we made the Amish dolls? I can't remember where this pattern came from, does anyone have a doll I can copy? Thanks

A birthday and a birth

What delights there are in the Spring. Life blooms everywhere!

We have a new baby in the family. Natalie Elise born on Wed. April 30th. She was a surprise and not expected until the end of May, but she is so lovely and sweet as you can see.

Our oldest granddaughter had her 8th birthday on Sunday May 4th. She is growing into a nice young girl and I know she must be looking forward to all that special stuff that happens when you are eight years old.

Happy birthday to both of you!

Gas, what, why and who?

Daughter in law asked a very good question about beans and gas. I do have an answer but let us digress a bit. When I was learning to cook and, that would have been high school home-ec, we were taught to soak the beans in baking soda. It turns out what that removed was a lot of the vitamins in the beans.

Now science has jumped forward and we can give some names to what happens with certain foods. There are several foods that are at fault, cabbage, onions, peas, soybeans and the other legumes. It's a carbohydrate, yes a sugar that is at fault, called raffinose sugars. oligosaccharides are the family of sugars this carbo comes from. Sadly our enzymes in the small intestine do not know how to brake up this sugar. All these carbohydrates can do is move through the small intestines into the large where bacteria, what ever is there at the time, takes over and that produces gas.

What can we do? There is a way to prepare the beans that removes a lot of this sugar, I will include it for you. This is how I prepare beans. I haven't had trouble with the canned beans so it maybe in how they were processed before canning. We eat tons of bean with no ill effect. Aside of preparations there is a product called Beano that really can help. They have made drops from an enzyme that will do what your small intestines aren't doing. Try it see what you think.

How to prepare beans for reducing gas gotten from the University of Washington (our local extension) can answer question about most any thing.

WASHINGTON STATE UNIVERSITY:Beans are full of starch including some that do not digest easily. Digesting this starch can produce gas, giving rise to the rhyme Beans, beans, the musical fruit.... There are several ways to quiet this music so you can enjoy the health benefits of beans.

Soak beans overnight then discard the soaking water. Some, but not all, of the hard-to-digest carbohydrates dissolve into the water and are then poured off.

This quick method also helps reduce gas: Cover beans with water. Bring to a boil for 2-3 minutes. Let set at least one hour, but preferably four hours. The longer beans soak, the more gas-causing substances are removed.

COOKING DRIED BEANS TIPS FOR PREVENTING GASCOLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY COOPERATIVE EXTENSION:

Dry beans also are easy to prepare. They have, however, gained a reputation for being hard to digest and are known to cause a little flatulence or "gas."

To help eliminate this problem, try cooking dried beans like this:Soak dried beans overnight or at least for five hours. (This isn't necessary for dried peas and lentils.) Discard the water, add fresh water, cook for half hour and discard the water. Rinse beans thoroughly until water runs clear. Cover with fresh water and cook until tender.

This method will help prevent "gas," which is caused by complex carbohydrates (raffinose sugars) that are not broken down in digestion. If you want to include more beans in your diet, but increase your "comfort zone" with them, you should: Start slowly by eating beans only a couple of times a week at first. This helps your body adjust to digesting them. Drink lots of fluids to help the digestive system handle the increased dietary fiber.

Soak and cook thoroughly to eliminate the raffinose sugars that make beans hard to digest. Other helpful hints for cooking beans are to add one tablespoon of oil to beans to keep the foam down while cooking. If your recipe calls for tomatoes, lemon juice, vinegar or other acidic foods, add these items after beans are tender. The presence of acid keeps beans from softening.