Ok, I have a real treat for you today!!!

Are you ready?

My favorite breakfast smoothie:

*First let me clarify that I am one of those lucky people who will end up in a clammy, trembling heap if I don’t have a constant stream of protein in my diet.  So the more protein I can pack into my breakfast, the better my whole day will be.

So, my fave smoothie contains: 

1/3 c. plain yogurt

1/3 c. milk

1/2 a frozen banana

2 yogurt (ice) cubes (I try to keep a tray full of plain yogurt ice cubes in the freezer)

about 2 tbsp. of natural peanut butter (the kind where you have to stir up the oil)

My blender has a “frozen drinks” settings, so I run it on that a couple of times (there must be NO lumps or I won’t drink it).  The banana being frozen, and the ice cubes made of yogurt make it extra thick and creamy.  It’s so good!  You’ve got to try it.

**FYI: Hombre hates this drink!   I am not allowed to drink it anywhere near him….he kind of has issues with peanut butter.  So you know it’s got to be good or otherwise I wouldn’t put up with the dirty looks every morning.   

(P.S. Yes, there is a weird black spot appearing in some of my pictures lately, and yes, Hombre is going to make me cry my eyes out by sending the camera in for repairs, and yes, I have absolutely. no. idea. how to live for a single day, let alone several without a camera.  Now you know my tragedy!)                                            

Did you know that for the last year I’ve been baking most of our bread at home?

I really like making it.  Once I got over my fear of yeast, I found it to be really enjoyable.

That hasn’t changed.  I still enjoy it.

But the bottom line is I can’t do it all.  I want to so badly.  But I just can’t.

I can’t bake all of our bread, make all of our snacks, cook all of our meals, line dry all of our laundry, clean my whole house, homeschool my two big girls, play with all three girls, spend time with my husband, go to church, serve in our ladies ministry, spend time with friends and family, attend homeschool events, participate in storytime at the library, scrapbook all of my photots, post daily on my blog, hand make all of my gifts, read my Bible, read for my bookclub, do the yardwork, take care of the garden, …….

I think you get the idea.

There are so many wonderful things I want to do and be, and I just can’t do it all.  And sometimes I think when I’m trying so hard to do it all, I end up missing out on the things God really has for me to do because I’m just too busy to notice.

So I’m making myself evaluate, and trying to invest my time and energy in the best of the good things.

So I quit baking our bread.  I will buy it at the store and it will probably have something artificial in it that wouldn’t have been in my bread.  But honestly I think the stress of trying to live up to unreasonable (self-inflicted) ideals is going to kill me a lot faster than a little corn syrup will.

I’ll still bake bread from time to time for fun, or special occasions.  We all enjoy kneading the dough!  But I’m no longer the solitary bread-source of the house.  And I’m glad.

I’ve decided that in the midst of my busy-ness, I do a lot better with writing when I have a bit of a theme.

SO, my new Friday theme is going to be “My Favorite Things”. I figured this is broad enough to be interesting, but still gives me a little help.

 For the first edition, I’m giving you a tutorial.

I know I’ve mentioned before that I really like my homemade yogurt.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been messing with the recipe and trying some new things, and I now LOVE my homemade yogurt. (and my kids love it too!)

So I’m going to show you how to make it. Because you all need to try it. It’s super easy, I promise.

Here we go: you start with a gallon of whole milk. MUST be WHOLE milk, no messing with that.

Pour 8 cups of whole milk into your crockpot.

Turn the crockpot on low and let heat for two and half hours.

When the time’s up, turn the crockpot off, and cover with a thick towel or blanket.

Leave it like this for three hours.

After three hours, it’s time to mix in the starter.  I know you can buy actual yogurt starter at certain stores, but I’ve never tried that.  I just use plain, FULL FAT (again, not optional) yogurt.  You want to make sure of course that it has “live active cultures”, and no extra ingredients…just milk.

For 8 cups of milk you will mix in 1/4 c. of yogurt.  Take a cup of milk out of the crockpot and put in a small bowl.  Stir the yogurt into this first,

then stir this mixture into the rest of the milk in the crockpot.

Once this is done, cover the crockpot again with the blanket, and leave for 8-10 hours (eight is enough, but if you are leaving it overnight it’s okay if it goes a little longer).

At the end of this time your yogurt will look like this.

If you want to, you can stop at this point.  Just put the yogurt in a clean container with a lid, and refrigerate.  I don’t suggest stopping at this point unless: you like runny yogurt (some people do) or you plan to use your yogurt mostly for smoothies or baking.  For those things the yogurt at this stage will work perfect.

But if you’re looking for thick, creamy yogurt to eat by itself,  continue with the next steps.

Line a large bowl with some type of cloth to strain the yogurt.  I use a flour sack dish towel; works great.

I use clothespins to clip it to the bowl.  You want to spread your cloth pretty taut so there is plenty of room for the liquid to collect underneath as it drains off.

Now, CAREFULLY, pour the yogurt into the cloth.

Once you’ve dumped it all in, stick this into the fridge for a few hours.  The longer you leave it, the thicker the yogurt will be.  I generally let it sit for  6-8 hours.

When it looks thick enough for you, remove from the fridge.  Mine looks like this:

I transfer my yogurt to a glass dish with a lid.

A spatual works really well to scrape the last of the yogurt off of the cloth.

This is what will be left in your bowl:

If you discover some awesome thing to do with this liquid, please let me know.  I have yet to find a use for it.

And here is the finished product.

I do a couple of different things to flavor it.  Sometimes I will puree fruit to mix in and add a few spoonfuls of sugar.

Our new favorite though, is to just make it vanilla.  I add a teaspoon of vanilla and 2-3 tablespoons of honey.  The girls love this the best.

Other tips:  Timing-wise, I usually start my yogurt first thing in the morning, so the crockpot part is finished by bedtime and I can put it in the fridge to drain overnight.  Or, I start it around three in the afternoon, mix in the starter just before bed, and leave it in the covered crockpot overnight.  Then of course the straining happens the next day.

Cost-wise, I haven’t calculated out to the penny, but I have roughly figured that even with buying the milk and the yogurt for starter, I am spending about half of the money I would to simply buy this much yogurt.

The yogurt is generally fine in the fridge for a week.  If you don’t flavor the yogurt, you can use your homemade yogurt as a starter for the next batch, but you double the amount you’re mixing in (1/2 c. instead of 1/4 c.).  I often just keep the purchased container of yogurt in the fridge only for starting batches; I can usually get three or four batches out of a container before the yogurt is too old to work well.

I think that’s it.  I hope this doesn’t sound too complicated, because it’s really easy.  I know it sounds like a long process, but each actual step of the process takes about two minutes, so it’s really not a big deal. 

Let me know if you try it.  Especially if you find any flaws in my instructions.   

I’m so happy for a real sunny day.  The last couple of days have been this very strange state of sunshine covered in wispy gray clouds. 

I don’t really have anything exciting to share today, so I just thought I’d direct you to the new recipe the girls and I tried out today.  We had some lemons to use and these muffins turned out great.  Not too sweet, but sweet enough everyone thinks it’s an exciting snack.  I’m always so happy when a new recipe actual works out well.