01] Please comment!
02] Credit mrbnatural or iconzicons if taking!
03] No hotlinking or altering, please!
04] I am no bird; and no net ensnares me.



( JANE EYRE (1997): 118 Icons! )

I need a little help. I have about 8 bananas and was thinking of using a few of them for a banana cake, but I don't know how it would turn out because their all going bad. Would I still be able use them? Anyone know of a few other recipes I could use for them? I'd hate to throw them away.


Thanks,
Yuni

So, I impulsively bought a 5lb bag of fresh cranberries at Sam's Club a few weeks ago, thinking that I would be all creative and stuff...

aaaaand, I apparently suck at being creative, without some source of inspiration. Everything I've found online seems meh to me, but I've been too lazy to do a detailed search.

My grandmother has a great crumble/casserole/either side dish or dessert recipe that I need to mooch, but I'm kind of craving some savory recipe with cranberries. (Chicken, maybe?) Can anyone help? Bonus points for simple or crockpot! (And I rarely go through the trouble to measure anything, so just an ingredient list/prep steps would be appreciated).

Thanks, all! :D

This will be the first Christmas in a few years that everyone will be together at my parents' house. The last time, we did a Chinese cuisine themed Christmas dinner. We want to do something equally fun and interesting again this year.

Do you guys have any suggestions? Nothing that centers around lots of sugar or lots of spicy foods.

So far this weekend has been very busy.
Yesterday we cooked a turkey for dinner, turkey was on sale and we got a 12 lb bird for $8.00. I prepped it at lunch (in an oven bag) and my wife put it in the oven while I was at work. She made mashed potatoes and homemade gravy (from the juices) to go with it. After dinner, we stripped the turkey and put the bones in the crockpot with some water and fresh thyme and other seasonings.
This morning I woke up, filtered the broth from the bones and left over meat, and then refrigerated the broth (to be able to skim some fat.) At noon I cut up an onion, some celery, and carrots and put those in the crockpot and set it on high. After our son's baseball practice, we came home I cut up the left over turkey and my wife made homemade egg noodles to put in the crockpot. Dinner is about an hour away.

So my question is: How else could have we used the turkey? Could we have ground the "bones to make my bread?" Or maybe ground the bones and put them in the noodles? How does one go about grinding bones (a clean coffee grinder perhaps)? Do you have any cool recipes with turkey bones?
How else might we have used other parts of the bird? What about the cartilage, or the skin? Or what about the fat?

from a tiny vietnamese restaurant around the corner from my apartment!

Recent pictures with the Kodak Brownie Target Six20
Taken at Philippe Park, at home and at the medieval fair

I used a hand-cut squarish mask and got about 14 frames in a 24 photos roll of 135 film. Advancing the film is a guesstimate always.

It took me a good 2 hours to scan, crop and adjust levels.



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I still like scanning the sprocket holes since it's the best way I can use the space of the camera and sort of compose the pictures. If I was going to ignore the sprocket area, the photo area would be too thin in comparison to the viewfinder. However, I do believe that the sprocket photography in itself is a gimmick at the best, a cute effect that gets repeated from photo to photo. In b&w it's a bit less obtrusive than the red line in color photos.

I would rather shoot good squares using medium format film. But of course there's the deal of processing medium format film. These pictures were processed at the local pharmacy in 45 minutes (and then I spent 2 hours scanning and adjusting).

Definitively the best results are at least 6 feet from the subject. At smaller distances, the image is too blurred, and even at 6 feet, it's hard to correct the horizontal alignment. In a number of pictures, I thought I had my subject centered, and then I would find it to the side or even on the sprocket holes area.

A WWYD question.

DH and I are in the process of creating our first will. Our big sticking point is the question of custody of Daina should anything happen to both of us.

Current options*:
1) Our parents are all in their 60s.
2) BIL and SIL are both single and younger, not really ready to take on a baby/child even if they could.
3) Friends #1 - Husband is terminally ill... so just, no.
4) Friends #2 - Would be excellent parents, but are of a significantly different religion. We are pagan, they are Mormon.

WWYD P101?



*Haven't asked anyone yet as we want to have a preferential order first.

edited to add, since several folks brought it up: Raising her pagan isn't as big of a deal as being raised to explore options and make her own choice. This goes for more than just religion and isn't an issue with family as it's how we were raised ourselves.

Also, 3 & 4 should be reversed

We call it "sopas" in the Philippines, and we always have this one during rainy days. I don't know what's with the rain but the soup really taste good when the weather is cold, and all you want to do the whole day is stay home and just bum around.

It's a little chilly already here in China so I started off my day with a hot macaroni soup ("mainit na sopas")! I miss home, already... this soup makes me cherish the not-so-old cold rainy days back home.

My seven month old was sick last month and refused to sleep at all unless he was in my bed with a boob in his mouth. Before this he had been sleeping more than half the night in his pack n play. Now that hes used to it this is the only way he'll sleep. He wakes up within seconds of being laid down somewhere besides cuddled to me. I get it- its nice and secure, but I just cant take it anymore. Hes up atleast 6-10 times a night. I'm not getting any sleep and I'm mean.

I cannot bed share with him, I HATE IT. It makes me so tense and sore. Theres just not room for the three of us. I understand that he may be genuinely hungry and I have no problem with nursing him throughout the night, just preferably not continuously.

I've tried putting him against a pillow like its a body (I know- not smart, but I'm desperate.) which works sometimes, proping him up so hes not flat and giving him a blanket that I've been sleeping with so it still smells like me- no luck.

How do I get him back in his pack n play (Bonus points if it gets him in his crib)? And maybe sleep a little longer?
Sometimes I feel like such a failure, because I'm the only mom I know who a. breastfeeds and b. doesnt believe in crying it out, and my kid is the only one I know that sleeps like this. I feel like I'm doing it all right and being punished. Fix this kid please.

(Pardon weak phone photography)

The first contender: John Campbell's Irish Bakery. ($6.00) Simple corned beef and cabbage with pickling spices on a Belfast bap. (I added brown sauce.) Heated up by the nice folks at the counter, it was glorious. Everything I've had there so far is glorious. And there's a whole lot of everything in that little shop. If you're in or visiting the Bay Area, you must go.

I'm starting to think of the holiday season and was planning on giving my boyfriend (a 1L) a coffee-themed gift.

Does anyone belong to any monthly coffee clubs? The kind of thing where you sign up and they send you a different kind of coffee each month? Or something similar- maybe with fresh fruits and veggies? I've never subscribed to one or known anyone who has. Thoughts, suggestions? Any specific companies that are better than others?

For my darling husband's birthday I made us a romantic feast. On the table is homemade lasagna with homemade noodles and my Sunday gravy from scratch. I also baked a loaf of whole wheat bread along with a lemon chiffon birthday cake with buttercream frosting.

The photography isn't stellar, and my decorating isn't great but this was an amazing dinner.

The whole feast.


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I'm looking to buy a board game for a 6 year old boy. What are your 6 year old's favorites?
T.I.A.

To preface this, my husband has a confirmed case of Swine flu. We spent a few hours in the ER on Thursday and are currently in quarantine. My son started getting sick today. Initially, I attributed his lack of appetite and low grade fever (99.2) to him getting his canines. He has been coughing a lot today which made me wary and right before his bath he had a 101.2 fever. His appetite still stinks but his activity level is normal.

Have any of you mamas had little ones with Swine Flu? If you have, at what point did you go to the ER/call your pediatrician?
I plan to call her on Monday as long as my son's fever stays below 102 and his activity level remains normal (though I am wary about the 101.2 and may just call the nurse's line tomorrow). I gave him Motrin before bed and plan to alternate Tylenol and Motrin until he feels better.

While out running errands today, we realized we were hungry, it was late and we hadn't had lunch yet. There was a Macaroni Grill across the parking lot from where we were (at Target) and so we stopped there.

Naomi enjoyed a plate of fettuccine alfredo...and even made some attempts to eat with a fork.

Apologies for the poor quality of the video-it was shot with Cayne's blackberry and looks kind of weird.