Bread Ministry!

Bread Ministry is one of my most favorite things ever!  I had never heard of it until we moved here and my neighbor told me about it.  I love it!  So, the premise is that the local military communities teamed up with the local Food Pantry and the local Vons stores.  The various military neighborhoods each have a designated person for nearly every day of the week.  

I am now the Monday lady for my neighborhood!

This means that Monday mornings, I go to my designated Vons store. I drive to the back and tell them I am there and they bring me the day old food they typically would throw away.  I load it into the van, fill out some paperwork and bring it home.  I set up camp in the driveway and post to our Bread Ministry FB page and the people come and take free food.  

My first day was one of the coldest days we have had here.  Plus, it was rainy and the wind was out of control.  It was quite the adventure!

This was the cart of dairy goods.  Most of the milk expired that day or the day before, and same with the yogurt.  But it is still good stuff!

My cart of produce.  I have discovered that most of the fruit has an odd tase, but hey, free fruit!

There were also 2 carts entirely filled with bread!  This is what my van looked like once we had put everything in it.  Usually there will be sweets too, but there were none this day.  I didn't have room anyway!

I put the stuff out for display in the garage.

So. Much. Bread!!

The milk table.

And my sad little shelf with eggs and baguettes.

Did I mention that this time the bread was GOOD bread?!  Lots of good bread.  Oh yeah, when I post that 'm ready, I post these pictures as well so people know what I have.

I hang out and meet my neighbors and other military folks trolling for goodies for an hour or two.  After the first hour or so, I have to dispose of any unclaimed cold stuff.  I can go inside and keep an eye on things periodically after that.  (After 4-6 hours, whatever is left needs to be tossed.)

I downsized and moved it from inside the garage (while we do have a lovely community, it is still not wise to leave the garage door open and unattended.).  This is what was left after 2 ours.  I closed the garage door and went inside to warm up a bit.  When I finally closed up shop 2 hours after that, I had 35 loaves of bread left.  35!!  I had to throw away that much bread. I almost cried.

So, this is how I spend my Mondays.  I like it.  I like keeping the grocery store waste down.  I like meeting my neighbors. I definitely like free food.  The girls have told me no more cake. But of course, I still keep some cake!  I troll my neighbors when they host Bread Ministry too.  I know most of the places in my neighborhood, so if I'm having soup for dinner, I'll check to see if someone has french bread.  What the stores send out each week varies.  I had no bread at all one week. And sometimes there is a ton of stuff, and sometimes there is not much at all.  My neighbor picked up 7 shopping carts one week.  She begged us to come get cake.  Hence the current cake ban.  Apparently you CAN have too much cake.

Jumping on the Cocoa Bomb Bandwagon

Sometimes you figure if EVERYONE really is doing it, then maybe there is something to it.  After seeing all these cocoa bomb pictures and how-to's and videos, we decided maybe it was time to give it a try ourselves.  

So we did.  Of course we don't have any round molds, and of course they are all told out everywhere.  No problem.  We have this.  We used a silicone muffin one as well  Totally worked! No one said cocoa bombs had to be spheres!  The girls coated the inside of the molds with a thin layer of melted chocolate and stuck them in the fridge to help it set.

Our lovely model Rylee is showing how she scooped the cocoa out of the packet and put it in the mold.  Okay, fine. She's just having a good time, but that's what she's doing!

Once you put the cocoa powder inside, you cover the top with melted chocolate, to encase the cocoa powder.  If you are feeling frisky, you can put a candy cane in it too. Then put them in the fridge or freezer to set the chocolate.

Once the chocolate is solid, pop the shapes out of the milds and finish decorating.

The girls had a marvelous time.

 

And created some lovely and delicious treats.  I confess though..... they were a bit rich.  You heat up milk, and once it is steaming hot, plop your cocoa bomb in it and watch it melt.  Stir it into the milk and ta da.... hot cocoa.

Keeping.... sort of.... busy

I got a great Instant Pot recipe book for Christmas and Marian has been looking for things to try.  She made this beef stew and it was delicious!  I have never purchased a rutabaga or a parsnip before, so that was a new experience.  But again, this was so yummy!!

Callie and Levi, sharing a blanket and snuggles.  And some Netflix.

We went back to hike the Mission Trails with our friends. It was rather chaotic with 6 girls and two dogs, but it was fun.

We tried making donuts.  I really don't like frying food, so we did the baking kind.  I was underwhelmed and unimpressed. I may look up a different recipe, but these were pretty forgettable.

This is my sink.  Dan got me a faucet that is high enough to make the sink more user-friendly.  It is still a work in progress as we need to get a soap dispenser for that empty hole.  I'm just thrilled to have a sink with a faucet that makes life easier!

 

Another Tuesday, another Trail

We went back to the big mountain for our Tuesday Trail. Okay, fine, I finally looked it up and it is the MissionTrails Regional Park.  It just has lots of different paths to take and I am running out of little canyon trails.   The weather was warm and sunny and the sky was glorious.  We had a good hike and I think everyone enjoyed it.  The girls had fun posing for me on the rocks, so I consider it a success!

 

Wisdom Teeth Blues

It was recommended that Callie get her wisdom teeth our sooner rather than later, because the roots on her bottom teeth were growing into the nerve.  Since Rylee and Marian had had decent experiences with the oral surgeon up the road, we took Callie there too.  I will not embarrass her (too much) by mentioning how hysterical (and not the funny kind) she was about the iv. The oral surgeon was awesome and got it done and then she went to sleep.

This is her, right after getting home.  She's giving me a thumbs up so I know she's okay. She had just spent 2 minutes shaking her head and giggling at how it felt like she was on a roller coaster, and then she flopped over.

Levi was very concerned about her and she told him she was fine and that he was a good dog.

Callie was vastly amusing and I laughed so very hard. We got some great videos. When I asked how she felt, she told me she was like a toaster, and you put the toast in and it goes to another dimension, and she's the toast in another dimension. 

She's telling me that she can't feel her tongue, and can't tell if she's touching her tongue or her lips.  I told her that if it felt dry, it was her lips, but if it felt wet, then it was her tongue.  She thought I was brilliant.  

She did amazing, even when the hilarity wore off. She wasn't in too much pain, but she kept on top of the meds.  She was really swollen (all 4 teeth were impacted), and she couldn't move her jaw for almost a week.  But she was great, and she survived!

 

A Great Tuesday Trail

We tied a trail that turned out to be a lot of fun.  It took us into the canyon and had a lot of terrain variety and we had a good time.

We like a nice trail without a lot of rocks.

And look!  Everyone was willing to pose for me!

Fallen logs make it even better.  We like climbing on stuff.

An extra nice feature is that this trailhead is by a park.

So we played there too.  But mostly climbed the trees because they were more fun than the playground.

 

Post Christmas Fugue

I do love Christmas Break, and I love having nothing to do.  But when there is nothing to do, it is hard to remember what day it is and what you maybe meant to do and nothing gets done. Here are the "post Christmas, before life found a routine again" pictures.

I thought this was quite appropriate this year!

Dad sent me glorious photos of the snowy weather he was having and included a gorgeous snow covered tree picture.  So I sent him this.  This is the tree in my backyard, where it was sunny and 74.

Marian and I trolled the Christmas Clearance.  Pickings were slim, but still worth the effort.

Callie tried a recipe from her new cookbook and proclaimed it tasty.

McKenna got these cute pots for the girls.  They painted them and put cute succulents in them.  And now they decorate the window and make me happy.

Marian made lumpia.  I never make it because it is so tedious.  But with two of us, it went pretty well and the results were so worth the effort!