A friend asked a while ago what was up with my blogging (or lack there of)... The truth is, I've let everything but the hubby, kiddos, and house slide to the wayside for a while. I've taken on a number of projects and while they're going well, I realize my poor time management skills simply by the dust I'm having to Swiffer off of the blog today. :)
Some of the things I've been working on around here--posts coming soon!
--Family File Organization: We've never shared a filing system, and both of our filed records had gotten out of hand by the time of the move. Upon completion of this process, it is likely I will Never Want To Shred Another Document---EVER. Actually, I'll get back to myself and love my shredder, but this has been a rather tedious process with a slow visual change sort of outcome. There were documents from the 90s in our files folks... and we're not talking birth certs or social security records. We're talking receipts from the grocery store and checks that cleared the bank. LOL We hardly even USE paper checks anymore!
--Utility Room Makeover: This will be a work in progress for a while, and that will drive me crazy. It is a test of my own patience though and I have to work on acknowledging that some things take time and will not be complete in a couple of days. We have a substantial amount of space in our utility room and will be utilizing that space for storage. Right now it's an open space with no shelving or real functional options for organizing. Boxes are stacked on one another, and while we know what's there right now, the room being what it is now is like inviting clutter to take over that space. It will happen easily, and very quickly. I got to paint the concrete floors in that room a fun blue color though! It's lively and I love it!
While these are two major projects taking place around here, we've had painting and decorating going on in the Big Kid's room, repeated attempts at finding what works for US in our laundry room and our rather small pantry. And, we're still unpacking... There are only about four boxes that are not completely emptied BUT they're sitting in our master bedroom just glaring at me day in and day out. We'll get there. Everything else in our home has fit so well and become "ours" in such short order that a few boxes are nothing at this point.
So, we have a small pantry with wire shelves which houses the vast majority of our dry and canned goods and an upper cabinet that we have designated specifically for baking. Both of these areas are a constant source of frustration. The pantry is too small, but when it's well organized it works find for our needs, the problem is it tends to only "stay" organized for about 24.75 hours before it explodes and the snacks are with breakfast foods and the pasta has randomly traveled from it's "home" to hang out with our extra bottles of juice and such.
I'll leave that space for another time. I know I need to address it, but I'm still not sure how.
I neglected to take a pic of the baking cabinet before I got started emptying... Impulsiveness got the best of me as I opened that cabinet this morning, nearly got conked in the head by peanut butter that ought not even be in there, and decided today was the day! No more of this! I took EVERYTHING out of the cabinet, wiped down the shelves, and got to work grouping things that should be in that cabinet. Perhaps a pic of all the crap that needed to be taken into consideration may help....
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| Baking cabinet junk |
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| More baking cabinet junk! |
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| Even MORE baking cabinet junk! |
I moved the bottom shelf to accommodate the OXO storage containers we use for flour, sugar, powdered sugar, brown sugar, and now chocolate chips. This way I'm able to stack two small containers on top of one another. I also noticed that most of the baking supplies that belong in this cabinet are SHORT. The container of salt, baking soda, corn starch, various types of extract, and boxes of Jell-O. They're all super short and fit perfectly in the now much smaller second shelf. The largest bulk containers of oats and raisins found a home on the top shelf, which is fine because they're not used so frequently that this will be inconvenient for me.
Here's this lovely, more organized, and much better. Assuming this setup works for us, this cabinet should no longer drive me bananas, or threaten a concussion from falling peanut butter.
While emptying the baking cabinet I realized this would be a perfect opportunity to make the first batch of oatmeal breakfast bars my husband typically takes to work for breakfast. Prior to moving to this house, we made these all the time! I guess it's easy to get out of the habit. I LOVE these things though and want to share the recipe because they are truly one of our favorite and most convenient breakfast foods! The freeze incredibly well, so I will often make a large batch of them and freeze them in sandwich size ziplocs--two bars to a bag, and pull a bag out each evening so they're thawed and fresh for the hubs in the morning. LOVE them! You can also throw in craisins instead of raisins, or in combination with raisins. We've made them both ways and they're equally as delicious!
I began making these bars after it was featured on "
Cooking During Stolen Moments". You can see the original post
here. I have made the bars with both 3/4 cup canola oil and 1 cup canola oil--I think I prefer the lesser amount just a little bit, but both are fine.
Oatmeal Breakfast Bars
- 4 c. dry oats (old-fashioned or quick cooking)
- 1 1/2 c. flour
- 1 c. brown sugar
- 1/2 c. sugar
- 1 t. cinnamon
- 1/2 t. salt
- 3/4 – 1 c. canola oil
- 4 eggs
- 1 1/2 c. raisins (or your preferred combination of raisins and/or craisins)
Combine all ingredients in a large mixing bowl (I use the bowl for my Kitchenaid mixer, because I do not mix this by hand.) You can mix all ingredients by hand just until mixed or use a mixer on low until all ingredients have just mixed together.
Press mixture into a greased 13x9 baking dish--I have typically used a well-greased glass pyrex baking dish for this and greased with Crisco. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes. I check for the edges to start to brown, it gives the bars a bit of added texture.
My confession.... while these are fantastic for kids or adults to take for a quick on the go breakfast, my absolute FAVORITE time to eat them, is just a couple of minutes after they've come out of the oven when they are still quite warm but have already set fairly well. A large glass of cold milk and a couple of wonderfully warm oatmeal bars on a cool winter day--not much better!
Three cheers for a productive day!
Until next time,
Nic
