How to make a Rudolph Birthday Cake.

My son wanted a Rudolph cake for his birthday, so I had to come up with something. I found some ideas on line, but they called for a round pan that I don't have so I had to improvise.

First I baked a large rectangular cake. I guess you can use a mix or use any recipe that will produce a cake that will not fall apart on you when cut and handled. I used this recipe and it was fabulous. Not low fat, but still a lot healthier then some of the other ones I tried :) It need no food coloring at all. I also used a lot less sugar than the recipe called for and it was still mighty sweet. I doubled the ingredients and had enough to have 2 layers with some strawberries and chocolate ganache in between :))

Here's how I cut my rectangle

First I used a pan lid to trace a circle for Rudolph's head. But I left one of the corners on for the nose. Then I cut two leaf shaped pieces for ears, I actually ended up shortening them a little, that was a bit too long. I stuck some popsicle sticks in the ears and then pushed the other end of them into the head - to have them stand secure. Then on to decorating.

The brown is that chocolate ganache that is suggested in the recipe of the whole wheat Birthday cake - SO yummy!!! And the white is your basic cream cheese frosting. The pupils are left over chocolate chips from the ganache and the nose is a large strawberry.

Almost forgot - the antennas are peanut butter cookies that I shaped into that Y-shape. And I had lots of antennas left over :)) Little tip - if you don't want antennas to get soggy, stick them in right before lighting the candles and always have extras just in case your first pair brakes. I left antennas in my Rudolph overnight and they were nice and mushy for the party - still eaten and very much enjoyed :) - especially the part that was inside the cake - MMMMM..! :))

I also stuck that tiny cake in front of Rudolph's nose for the candles, so that he helps blow them out so I don't have to sick the candles in his face.

I am no cake decorator, but that was fun and easy and even with my less then perfect icing job, I got lots of excited kids. They had so much fun picking which part of Rudolph they wanted on their plate! :)

Best smoothie ever!

I think I have just made the best smoothie I've ever tasted (children agree!)
SO, before I forget:
2 bananas
juice of 1 young thai coconut (about 1 cup or more)
1 huge orange peeled (or more, I only had 1)
a ton of organic locally grown hand picked by yours truly only yesterday(ok, just organic will work also) spinach
2 heaping spoons of hemp seed
water or ice to taste.

It was so so good!!!

for all the tandeming mamas out there or those considering it.

We tandemed twice and were even triademing ;)) (is that a word?) at one point. Yes, it was hard (motherhood just is), sometimes I wanted to rip my hair out, but I also cherish the lessons I learned through that. Yes, patience, obviously. But also, living in the moment while seeing the bigger picture clearly.
And the usual things too - when you are tired from puking all day or whatever your pregnancy difficulty is, you toddler is still self absorbed in his/her stressful (the banana has a spot!!!) life and it is the end of the day, it is just a lot EASIER to simply lift a shirt and see the stress just melt away in an instant. Same goes for those days when daddy is working late and it is about dinner time and everyone is just tired - a quick nurse seems to settle everyone nicely, centering the family around this beautiful, bonding, loving and CALM, QUIET activity ;) No hassle, no preparation, no clean up :)
Life saver during the sickness too, when anything else is refused and you are just praising God for the gift of this miracle juice just simply oozing out of your body with no effort on your side whatsoever, that nourishes your sickly baby with increased dose of antibodies, and just the right proportion of all the right stuff that his body needs to recover. Again, at no extra effort from you! It just doesn't get better than this.

And the moments of sibling closeness - that's just the gift for life. No other siblings can bond on this level. No other siblings spend this much time together, on a daily basis, doing something so positive, engaging into tons of skin to skin, looking into each others eyes, stroking each others hair or just holding hands.

We are not tandeming anymore and I can totally testify that the ripping hair days are a lot LESS vivid in my memory than all this. I remember our tandeming as something very special and would do it all over again (and enjoy it a lot more thoroughly!; )). Kind of like parents enjoy their consecutive children a lot more - they understand how fleeting this all is and tend to soak it all up, rather than struggle and fight it :)

And the last word of encouragement.
"1To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven (...) 11He hath made every thing beautiful in his time."

God obviously thought it was a great idea to have you experience tandem nursing with your precious blessings right now :)

Read the Bible - it is good for your soul.

So...Today I read that ALL people know God in their hearts, but many "suppress the truth". Yes, ALL, those who don't believe in God, believe in themselves, and Mother Nature and other people and things, mythical or real.., and everything in between, we ALL KNOW GOD. The existence of God is obvious when we look at His creation. Check this out, I know it might be tricky to understand, but you can actually go to Biblegateway.com and punch in this passage Romans 1:18-32 and read it in a different translation, even in paraphrase (like the Message translation) some people like that better. Anyhow, try your best, it is not rocket science, I promise! :)

18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

One friend also pointed out recently that men tend to RUN and try to hide from this truth hiding in big cities where there is little nature and inside their houses and inside virtual reality - all man made.

But look where it takes us:

21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles. 24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

Isn't this what has been and is going on right now? We admire our bodies for birthing babies, giving them milk, without giving thanks to the One who made them! We are all about Mother Nature and our inner strength, substituting and praising the creation (nature) rather than the One who made it. This is worshiping creation instead of the Creator.

And this is just a natural consequence:

26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.

28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.

Some would say - no, it is not THIS bad - it is in some parts of the world. And it will become this bad here also if we continue to deny God what is due - our faith, worship and giving thanks for what He has done.


I can't help but thinking about these verses when I look at the sky. Yes, I live in a place where I have to seek out nature, but the SKY is always there, no one can take this away from me. Look up some times and see His love letter written all over!

how do we treat the temple?

Know ye not that ye are the temple of God and that the spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy: For the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are. - 1Cor. 3:16-18.

I know most people think that it is only talking about things we watch or listen too, but how about food? I have heard a lot that everything is ok in moderation.
Are we defiling the temple of God when we eat junk? How much can we apply moderation when speaking about defiling the temple?
We see a lot of sickness these days from heart burn and obesity to heart deseases and cancer. Is this not God destroying our temples just like he said he would?




How much is our service to God affected by it?

From this point of view it is especially upsetting to see churches serving junk to their flock, especially children. We offer them brightly colored candy as a reward for memorizing the Scripture. We feed infants formula just so we don't breastfeed in the service. Church's potlucks? Ugh, I feel like fasting just thinking about it!

Quick pancakes :)

When I heard you can bake pancakes in a pan I thought - what a great idea!!! I loathe standing by the hot stove for half an hour flipping them! So making them easier AND healthier sounded like a great idea. AND there's an added bonus - it's more fun! When you take them out - you put the whole pan on the table, let it cool and then give your kids cookie cutters - they have fun with it and you get the left over odd pieces :))

Anyway, I have just found a pancake recipe that will make it even easier - you mix a whole bunch of stuff once in a blue moon and then when you are ready to have pancakes, you just add an egg and some buttermilk to 1 cup of the mix and you are ready to bake you some yummy AND healthy pancakes. I LOVE IT!


Don't forget to get some real maple syrup! :)) It's the best!

Here's my Mother's day entry

We all are products of the society, yet, many of us choose the path that is quiet different from what our society sees as normal. That means that there was a person in your life that influenced you more than the whole world gone mad! And yes, chances are that person didn’t point out the things you were doing wrong, didn’t make you feel guilty, didn’t imply that you were a faliure of a mother.
Mine was just like that! I started as a very mainstream parent with all the staples – a gorgeous nursery for a baby, a huge stroller, a beautiful crib.., a hospital birth and an epidural.
My mother came over for the first few months after birth to help – to make the baby take a dummy and nurse no more than every 3 hours, to give her gripe water for “colic” and to take her away at night so she learns to sleep through the night. I remember her voice when she was warning me to never NEVER fall asleep with my baby!
Motherhood was stressful back then – my daughter just didn’t want to ‘behave’! We went as far as CIO with her, that didn’t work well either, since everything in me was crying with her.
And then there were ladies at LaLeche – calm, confident, gentle. They just gave information, never judging or implyng anything. I remember my first call – I had mastitus! What? You want me to feed her every 2 hours even through the night? I wonder what went through that leaders head as she was talking to me Simple suggestions worked like a charm – I was as good as new the next day.
At the meetings I found out that some mothers sleep with their babies, I never even suspected it was an option! Once we tried, there was no turning back! That’s when I actually felt like a mother! Not just old me stuck with this screaming thing. That was the begining of my motherhood jorney – about 1 year after I gave birth!
There was a second baby born naturally at a birthing center and a third, born in at home. 8 years of continuous breastfeeding, cloth diapers, elimination communication, full term weaning, gentle discipline, and now homeschooling… all because of a few nice ladies just being there, sharing the wisdom of mothering with all who are willing to listen. Never judging, always helpful with whatever you are going through.
On this Mother’s Day I want to say THANK YOU to LaLeche League women who were there for me and for many other mothers, filling the gap in this interrupted continuum society we live in.
We all are products of the society, yet, many of us choose the path that is quiet different from what our society sees as normal. That means that there was a person in your life that influenced you more than the whole world gone mad! And yes, chances are that person didn’t point out the things you were doing wrong, didn’t make you feel guilty, didn’t imply that you were a faliure of a mother.
Mine was just like that! I started as a very mainstream parent with all the staples – a gorgeous nursery for a baby, a huge stroller, a beautiful crib.., a hospital birth and an epidural.
My mother came over for the first few months after birth to help – to make the baby take a dummy and nurse no more than every 3 hours, to give her gripe water for “colic” and to take her away at night so she learns to sleep through the night. I remember her voice when she was warning me to never NEVER fall asleep with my baby!
Motherhood was stressful back then – my daughter just didn’t want to ‘behave’! We went as far as CIO with her, that didn’t work well either, since everything in me was crying with her.
And then there were ladies at LaLeche – calm, confident, gentle. They just gave information, never judging or implyng anything. I remember my first call – I had mastitus! What? You want me to feed her every 2 hours even through the night? I wonder what went through that leaders head as she was talking to me Simple suggestions worked like a charm – I was as good as new the next day.
At the meetings I found out that some mothers sleep with their babies, I never even suspected it was an option! Once we tried, there was no turning back! That’s when I actually felt like a mother! Not just old me stuck with this screaming thing. That was the begining of my motherhood jorney – about 1 year after I gave birth!
There was a second baby born naturally at a birthing center and a third, born in at home. 8 years of continuous breastfeeding, cloth diapers, elimination communication, full term weaning, gentle discipline, and now homeschooling… all because of a few nice ladies just being there, sharing the wisdom of mothering with all who are willing to listen. Never judging, always helpful with whatever you are going through.
On this Mother’s Day I want to say THANK YOU to LaLeche League women who were there for me and for many other mothers, filling the gap in this interrupted continuum society we live in.

We have a home church but then on Wednesday go to a different church that is really close to our house where my kids enjoy AWANA. There's a Bible study they I joined that runs at the same time. It's a bigger church, so the restroom is huge too - so I decide to go before the class, and what do I see at the very very end of the restroom tucked all they way in the back in a little space between the last stall door and the wall? A rocking chare with a side stand. YOU KNOW why it is there. I felt rather controversial that day so I left a note in the chair saying something to the point of "Jesus was breastfed and I bet Marry didn't nurse him in restrooms! You don't eat in the bathroom, neither should your baby."
Of course it was gone the next time we were there. I just pray it made at least one mother think.

Out of all people Christians should be more open to the idea. God made a woman with 2 breasts to nourish her children. Why are we feeling ashamed of it? I am all about modesty, but if you tell a new mother who is still learning to be modest - that's what happens - she hides or uses bottles just to be modest. A lot of times breastfeeding is sacrificed in the name of certain people's ideas of modesty.
Check out this awesome video - them Ausies hit the nail right on the head ;)))

I am a vegetarian wannabe.

I have stumbled on this old post of mine here and I can't help but laugh at myself. It turned out that cutting meat out of our diet wasn't all that hard at all! What whas hard was re-learning how to cook! But as long as I am eating, I am fine :) And my family is ok too.
Occasionally my carnivore of a husband would bring some dead animal and devour it with the kids, but even he lately has been saying how yucky he feels after doing so. I just love him ;)

Now I am on a new mission - I want to incorporate a lot more raw things into our diet and I am raw on Mondays. Now, don't laugh (I prolly will a couple of years down the road) ;) that's all I can do for now. I know babysteps work best for me, when I change my whole way of thinking. That just doesn't happen overnight. And again the hardest thing is re-learning how to cook again!
So here I am again, asking if any of you have your favorite raw recipes. Some already became staples at our house like Kale chips, Chocolate Avocado pie, 'Cheese'cake (cashew cream cake), raw vegan sushi, massaged kale salad, raw zukini hummus.. I know I am forgetting something, but if you have a fav, do share a link or the whole recipe with me - it will be greatly appreciated!!