Hot/Cold Packs

My oldest sister, Janeal, is exactly 14 years older than me and we share a birthday, so we consider ourselves twins. She pretty much raised me, since my mom went back to work full time from the time I was a year old. She was born with cerebral palsy and wasn't supposed to survive, but if she did she was supposed to live her life as a vegetable, not able to take care of herself or do anything. With alot of hard work and therapy she was able to crawl and eventually walk with the help of a cane. She also was able to graduate from college and eventually marry in the LDS temple and give birth to 2 sweet boys. They are now 15 and 17 years old! She is such an inspiration to me of hard work and determination. She is not able to work, because of her disabilities, but unable to qualify for disability benefits. She would like to earn a little money to help her family and is selling these cute hot/cold packs she is making. They would be perfect for anyone with aches and pains or would great gifts for family members or for Chirstmas!

Her friend she makes thes with has a 14 year old grandson who has Brittle Bone Disease and recently broke his femur. After surgery, nothing helped with his swelling including the cold packs the doctors gave him, but these cold packs are the only thing that reduced the swelling and relieved him of that pain. They are not selling these merely to make money, but because they truly believe in the product!

These rectangular ones are 4 in. wide x 9 1/2 in long, and 5 in wide x 10 1/2 in long. You can buy them individually, or in a set. Smallest to largest, they are $6 and $8 or $13 for the set

These squared ones are all 5 1/2 in wide and 6, 6 1/2, and 7 1/2 in long. You can buy them individually, or in a set. Smallest to largest, they are $5, $7, and $9 or $20 for the set

If you would like to buy any, you can email her at pulsatron2003@gmail.com to make a purchase. I am really excited to help her with this and hope you like her creations, they are super cute!

Our First Garden

This year, we decided to start our first garden! We cleared the space in the Fall and Paul worked with the dirt and brought in some treated soil (well... what I mean by treated, is...turkey poop, ewe!). We planted our seeds back in April and it's really growing now! Wow! This pic shows the different kinds of lettuce we planted including a Black Seeded something or other, Swiss Chard, and Mesclun. What you can't see is that we recently added some Spinach and Kale that are just comin up. Paul is really into trying everything out this year to see what we like. In the very tippy-top of the pic, you can hardly see, but we also have a row of Peas and a row of Celantro

I thought it was going to be really hard to get a garden to grow and that most things wont even grow your first year....I really had no idea how a garden works! Haha! If you can't tell, Paul is the one with the green thumb in our family. In this picture, you can see in the back there are 2 Blueberry bushes, a Raspberry, and Strawberries, and the middle row includes a Green Pepper and 2 Big Boy Tomato plants. In the front there are 2 rows of Carrots and 2 rows of Onions. Oh ya, and Paul just added some Radish seeds around the tomato plants as well. It's hard to keep track anymore haha!

Here is a view of our garden from the yard. It is in the back corner by our backyard neighbor's garden and we chat and share ideas with them as we work. Love it! What is not shown, is to the right of the garden, we also have a Zuchinni plant and 2 Cherry Tomato plants growing....like I said, it's hard to keep track of everything anymore! We lined the front of our garden with some small boxwood plants to create a nice view from the rest of the yard and created a stone pathway down the middle

We love our garden and have recently decided we want to be farmers! Ha! Just kidding! I have to admit Paul does most all the work on it, but I work just as hard watering it and keeping the kids out of it as he does actually in it! Thanks Paul, for your green thumb and hard work! Love ya babe!

Freezer Meals

My mom sent me this picture and explaination in an email recently. I thought it was awsome, so I thought I'd share since I will be doing this next time I do freezer meals

Mom says: Wish I had learned these tricks hundreds of freezer meals ago...
1-Freeze individual servings in muffin tin then put in freezer baggies
2-Use wide-mouth quart jar to hold freezer baggie while filling

Thanks Mom!

The Amazing Wonder Box

Meet the Wonder Box! It is my newest addition to my emergency preparedness items
It is made with a heavy cotton fabric and filled with styrafoam beads (the smaller the better it works)

The bottom is made with an area in the middle to place something you would like kept hot or cold

You then put on the top and it acts as an insualtor, so in emergencies you can heat a pot to boiling, place it in the wonder box, and it will then continue to cook while saving your energy of your stove

It was tested and kept a gallon of ice cream still frozen solid after 4 hours. Some people use them daily when transporting a hot dinner or cold treat over a distance, keeping the temperature or keepig it from spilling. Here is a funny view of the inside as the lid was lifted. It is really good at closing up all the gaps so no air can escape

I am proud of my Wonder Box. If anybody is interested in more information or the pattern, let me know!

(May 2011)