March – April 2007
Dear Friends,
Time is certainly flying here! It’s hard to believe that we’ve completed six weeks of home hemodialysis for my husband. He is doing better and we’ve found a new routine to our days as we do dialysis each afternoon in the comfort of our back bedroom. We sincerely appreciate your prayers!
Did you know that there are
FCH groups in Europe, Africa and Australia? It’s wonderful to hear from others around the globe who are teaching their daughters to become Godly homemakers. Girls worldwide really enjoy cooking, sewing, and related skills.
Two missionary families in Switzerland sent the photos below of their 12 year old daughters doing the quick bread lesson. Their mothers take turns teaching the girls and sometimes other friends join them. For this lesson, they made pumpkin bread. To decorate it, they set leaves on the cooled bread, sprinkled powdered sugar over the top, and then lifted the leaves off. What a pretty way to decorate your pumpkin bread! They also created a table centerpiece with seasonal décor and candles. Well done, girls!
Homeschooling is very rare in Switzerland, their mothers report. The group meets once a month and they vary the lessons to include cooking, sewing and cleaning. Both girls enjoy knitting.
Recently they did the ground beef lesson and the girls converted the American measures into metric; what a great math lesson! Girls, I am so very proud of you! Keep up the great work!
The girls used the Pumpkin Snack Cake recipe from my October 2004 Online Letter. Here’s the recipe:
Pumpkin Snack Cake 2 Cups sugar
1 Cup oil
4 eggs
1 ½ Cup canned pumpkin (not pie filling)
2 t. pumpkin pie spice
2 t. baking soda
½ t. salt
2 Cups all-purpose flour
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 9 x 13” pans, or an 11 x 14” jelly roll pan. Beat together the first four ingredients in a large bowl. Use plain canned pumpkin, not pie filling. In another bowl, combine the dry ingredients and whisk together. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir just until blended. Spread batter into prepared pan(s) and bake for 25 - 30 minutes. Yield: Approximately 30 bars.
If you live overseas, you may need a
metric conversion chart. You can find an excellent one – along with many other helpful charts – on the Betty Crocker website. You will find the Metric Conversion Guide, as well as charts for Emergency Substitutions, Food and Freezer Storage Charts, Cooking Times for Meat and Poultry, and so much more.
While you’re on the Betty Crocker website, be sure to check out the sections on Cooking and Baking Basics, party ideas, meal ideas and recipes. There is a wealth of helpful material on this site that will help you expand your Future Christian Homemaker’s lessons.
Click here.I get many requests for Gingham Embroidery patterns. Pegasus publishes several books of “Chicken Scratch” patterns. They coined that term because the diagrams of the patterns looked like chicken scratch to them. The stitchery is so much more beautiful than that! You can view their books at
www.pegasusor.com . Click on “Chicken Scratch.” They also have a free lesson online. They do not sell their books directly to the public. Click on “Order” to find a dealer. If there is none near you, many will mail the books to you.
I have posted more photos of my
Grandma’s gingham aprons and plan to post more as time permits. Although I don’t have patterns for them, they are not difficult to replicate. Enjoy!
