I can't wait for warmer weather. I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels that way. Dill Pickles has been having a lot of trouble for the past week. Meltdowns over seemingly innocent things have become the norm lately. I couldn't figure out why, then I read this post at The SPD Blogger Network and it clicked. Hop on over and check it out. You might be in the same boat too.

Where have you been Mama Pickles? You know, I wonder that myself sometimes. The past few weeks have been filled with reading, thinking and sewing. And, oh yes, potty training hell. Sweet Pickles just doesn't seem to care that he has tinkle running down his leg and he certainly isn't phased when he walks around the house smelling the the elephant house at the zoo. He's going to be 3 in May and I just don't know what to do with him.

I've been doing a lot of reading trying to figure out what kind of education will be best for the Pickles family. I finished reading The Well Trained Mind: A Guide to Classical Education at Home by Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise. It was amazing. Classical education is what I want for my children. Reading through this book made me realize how much knowledge I did not acquire while in elementary and high school. I've moved on to reading The Core: Teaching Your Child the Foundations of Classical Education by Leigh Bortins. I haven't gotten very far through this book because I have had a lot of sewing to do in the last few weeks, but more about that later. When I finish The Core I have Designing Your Own Classic Curriculum: A Guide to Catholic Home Education by Laura Berquist waiting at for me on my nightstand. As much as I want Dill Pickles to attend school with his peers, I just don't see that as a reality. Sadly I don't think our local Catholic schools will be tolerant of his sensory needs and I just don't feel comfortable with our local public schools beyond kindergarten. Daddy Pickles and I want to explore all of our options now so that when the times comes to make a decision, we will be well informed.

I have been busy sewing weighted blankets for everyone but my Dill! As my mom liked to say long ago when I was young, "The cobbler's children are always the ones without any shoes!" Dill's teacher has asked me to sew a weighted blanket for his classroom and two of his classmates wanted weighted blankets for their homes as well. Busy, busy, busy. I love sewing and I love that I can sew one for so much less than the expensive ones in the therapy catalogs. I'd like to think that mine are a lot prettier too! April is Autism Awareness month and I'm trying my best to put together a tutorial for making your own weighted blanket.

That's what I've been up to these days. How about you? What things in life have kept you busy?

SPD Blogger Network and Soft: Clothing for All Children are having an awesome Spring Sensory Giveaway. Over $200 worth of amazing sensory items are being given away in a really cute Easter basket from Pottery Barn Kids. Check out these great prizes!

"I'll Tell You Why I Can't Wear Those Clothes," by Noreen O'Sullivan

Soft Seamless Sock 2-pack

Vestibular Wedge

Sensory Body Sock

Alex Toys Monster Bubbles

Alex Toys Sack Racing: Frog and Monkey

Squiglet Fidget Bracelets

One complete Springy Soft look for girls OR

One complete Springy Soft look for boys

Click here for your chance to win this wonderful prize pack! I know Dill Pickles will just love the Sensory Body Sock and I think I'll pass the soft seamless socks along to a friend. Dill doesn't seem to have trouble with seems, but her daughter really dislikes seems.

Can someone please wave a wand and make the sickies plaguing this family go away? Pretty please? Thank you. Much appreciated.

Happy Valetine's Day!

I started The Promise: How One Woman Made Good on Her Extraordinary Pact to Send a Classroom of 1st Graders to College by Oral Lee Brown last Saturday and finished it Tuesday night. It was a book I just couldn't put down. I really enjoy reading about education a lot, especially administration and reform. When I was still teaching I used to read books on this subject all.the.time. I have a whole box of these books sitting somewhere in the garage. Daddy Pickles and I really should go dig those out.

Finishing The Promise makes me want to read How to Walk to School by Jacqueline Edelberg. I read a review of this book a while ago in some parent magazine and it has been on my list of books to read for over a year and a half now. (Side note, I just discovered that I lost my list of books to read when my computer crashed. I am so sad. I guess I'll just start a new one maybe in a post here so I can always have it available.) How to Walk to School is about a group of parents coming together to transform their failing neighborhood school. This book is available at my local library, but I think I'm going to check Paperbackswap.com for my own copy. I'm pretty sure this is a book I'd like to have on my shelf.

Until I get a copy of How to Walk to School, I started The Well-Trained Mind: A Guide to Classical Education at Home by Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise. I am curious about homeschooling. I always thought I would send my children to a Catholic school, but now I'm not so sure that it would be the best environment for Dill Pickles with his sensory issues. I guess I'm reading this book to learn more information about homeschooling. So far I am really into this book and I keep trying to find ways to sneak away and read it. I really am torn about what is going to be the best type of education for Dill. Hopefully this book will help me sort these things out a little better in my brain.

I asked Dill Pickles what he wanted for dinner last night and he said, "A big pizza like Mommy and Daddy's." Hmmmm......that can be a hard one since Dill has severe milk allergies. I've tried a few dairy free frozen pizzas and he didn't like them. We've made our own mini pizzas on English muffins and sandwich rounds. Dill didn't like those either. A big pizza sounded really yummy especially since I had a few DiGiorno pizzas in my freezer that were on sale last week. What was I going to do.

I thought and thought and then remembered that Michelle over at Just Add Whine posted a recipe for homemade pizza dough. She eats clean, like we're trying to do, so I figured her pizza crust had to be healthy. And delicious. I tweaked her recipe a little bit because I didn't have any white flour in the house. You can find her original recipe here.

Whole Wheat Pizza Dough
1 cup water
2 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1 1/2 cups oat flour
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 package (2 1/4 teaspoons) yeast

Using the dough cycle on your bread machine, put ingredients according to how written. When dough cycle is complete, either roll or form with hands to desired shape. Bake on parchment lined pan for 8-10 minutes at 400 degrees. Top with sauce and topping of your choice and then bake for an additional 10-15 minutes until cooked through.

I made 6 small pizzas. Three were cheese and 3 were mozzarella flavored soy cheese. I thought they tasted delicious and they got a great big thumbs up from Daddy Pickles. Dill Pickles INHALED his pizza as did Sweet Pickles. I see this recipe being used a lot in the future. It was a lot easier to make than I thought and healthy to boot!

Soy Cheese Pizzas-I'm still trying to figure out how to make the cheese melt a little better.

Cheese Pizzas

What do you do when there's 20 inches of ice an snow on the ground and it's -5? You paint with ice of course!

Sweet Pickles is channeling his inner Picaso.

Dill Pickles is busy painting thundersnow.

Ice paint is not hard to make at all. I filled up our popsicle molds with warm water and a few drops of food coloring.
Place in the instant freezer provided by Mother Nature.

Viola! Ice paint.

I used to read a lot before I had kids. When I moved into my townhouse long before I met Daddy Pickles I was trying to cut corners so I never transferred my cable service. I read books instead. All.the.time. That's all I did. I got my news from the Internet, the radio, the newspaper or if there was something crazy insane going on, I walked across the courtyard to my friend's townhouse and watched her TV. I read tons after Daddy Pickles and I got married too. Then came the baby Pickles. My reading time went out the window.

I started reading more last year, especially when Sweet Pickles was in the hospital for so long. I needed something to do in the middle of the night when all the beeping monitors won't let you sleep. I polished off the whole Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan. Thanks to my sister Sheesh for letting me borrow them. I decided setting a reading goal for myself for the year might help me read more. At first I thought a book a month would be good. But then I thought about it. Twelve books in one year? That's pathetic. I used to read 12 books in 12 weeks. Twenty-four books a year sounded good; that's 2 books a month. Nah. Let's split the difference and say 18 books. Eighteen books seems like a doable goal. If I do more- super! I had better not do less.

January brought Run Like A Mother: How to get Moving and Not Lose Your Family, Job or Sanity by Sarah Bowen Shea and Dimity McDowell. I loved this book. I started running last year and I stopped for various reasons. I can't wait to get running again.

I also read Trans-Sister Radio by Chris Bohjalian. I read it for a book club I belong to. One of these days I'll actually make it to a meeting. I can't say it was one I would have picked up on my own, but it was interesting.

February so far is bringing The Promise: How One Woman Made Good on Her Extraordinary Pact to Send a Classroom of 1st Graders to College by Oral Lee Brown. It's for book club and I'm picking it up from the library on Friday. Anything education interests me. I can't wait to start reading it.

I'm not sure what other book I will read when I finish The Promise. Diagnosing Jefferson by Norm Ledgin has been going back and forth from my dresser to my night stand for almost 5 years now. Maybe it's time I finally read it.

My sister Sheesh loaned me The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan. I loved the Percy Jackson series so I'm sure I'll like this book too. Geeze. I need more hours in my day.

How about you? Do you have any reading goals for the year? Have a great book I should add to my to be read list?

It's cold outside. It's Saturday and we're out of ketchup. Heaven forbid you run out of ketchup in this house. Especially on a Saturday when Mama is home alone with the boys. I really had no desire to drag 2 boys to the grocery store on a Saturday afternoon to get a lousy bottle of ketchup.

I dug through my recipe binder and found Tosca Reno's ketchup recipe I copied out of one of her books months ago. I always meant to make this, but never did. Now that I have finally made it, I don't think I am ever buying ketchup again. Is it really possible for ketchup to taste amazing? I mean, it's only a condiment after all. But wow. This stuff is good. The boys wanted to eat it out of the bowl with a spoon. I can't blame them. It really was that good. I saved and washed out our old ketchup bottle. From now on I think I'm going to make a double recipe so I can fill the bottle. And it's so cheap too! Here's Tosca's recipe with my tweaks in red.

1 can tomato paste
1/4 cup water
2 Tbsp Sucanant sugar (1 1/3 Tbsp Agave nectar)
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp dry mustard
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground cloves (I omitted because I didn't have it)
2 Tbsp cider vinegar

In a small bowl mix all ingredients together. Place in a tightly sealed glass container.


That's it. Easy peasy delicious! Try it and let me know what you think!