Candid shots at the Nursery

March update.

I’m so horrendously tired. Sometimes I just feel like I’m about to burst into tears. We had the girls’ birthday party last weekend and this past weekend we moved our room to the Nursery School dorms. And during the week, I’ve put in more than 10 hour days. I wear dirty clothes on the weekend because I have no time to wash. The stress of being outside Vision’s walls, leaks in here and there, when I go to the house and realize, we’ve been broken into again and again. The fact that I am only good for what I possess is making me feel psychologically unstable. Not many people here have experienced it to the degree I have, so many cannot relate. We look like the perfect family. The pictures are mesmerizing but no-one can imagine the level of racism we’ve experienced and what we have had to pay to live together.

No bake recipes

No-Bake Salted Caramel Popcorn

1/2 cup unpopped kernels (or make 10 cups of the microwavable popcorn)
3/4 cup unsalted butter
1 cup brown sugar
heaping 1/2 tsp of sea salt
1/4 tsp baking soda

Preparation Instructions

1) Pop the popcorn as instructed by the packaging. Set aside in a large bowl.

2) In a medium-sized saucepan, heat the butter until melted and stir in the brown sugar. Bring to a boil for 3 minutes.

3) While the caramel is boiling, mix together the salt and baking soda. After 3 minutes of boiling has passed, add it in and stir till combined.

4) Take the saucepan off the heat and pour it in batches into the popcorn, stirring the popcorn after pouring the caramel in each time. 

Herbed Garlic Parmesan Focaccia

2 1/2 tsp active dry yeast

1 3/4 cup lukewarm water

2 tbsp olive oil

4 cups white flour

2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp dried rosemary

garlic salt

1/2 cup parmesan

extra olive oil for drizzling

Preparation Instructions

1. Add the yeast to the warm water and let activate for 10 minutes. Add in the olive oil.

2. Sift together the flour, salt, and rosemary. Add the wet and dry ingredients together in a stand mixer and use the dough hook tool to mix together the dough for 2-3 minutes.

3. Let the dough rise for two hours in a warm place, covered.

4. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Punch the dough down, then divide into three different balls and place in three mini skillets, spreading out the dough to fill the skillets. Let rise for 20 minutes.

5. Use your fingers to make indents in the dough, then sprinkle with garlic salt and the parmesan. Drizzle with a tablespoon of olive oil on each skillet.

6. Bake for 15 minutes or until golden brown. If the top begins to burn, cover with aluminum foil.

Easy 30-Minute Pizza Dough II

• 
  3/4 cup warm water
• 
  2 tablespoons olive oil
• 
  1/2 teaspoon honey
• 
  1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 
  1 1/2 cups bread flour
• 
  1/2 cup whole wheat flour
• 2 teaspoons active dry yeast
• In a large bowl, place the warm water in first then the honey.
• Sprinkle the yeast on top, agitate the bowl slightly if you have to so the yeast gets immersed in the water. Wait 10-15 minutes or until foamy.
• Add the oil and salt.
• Blend in the flours and knead until elasticy, about 5 minutes or so.
• Cover with parchment paper or a dish towel and let rise for 20-30 minutes.
• Spray a cookie sheet, pizza stone, or round baking dish with cooking spray and put some dough in and you're set! I get about 3-4 little pizzas out of this amount of dough; it's thicker than my other pizza dough recipe.

How I make pizza.

The orange thing is the "stove" with hot charcoal in it. I take out some charcoal and put it in the silver pan. Then I put the pizza crust in the cast iron pan.

I put the cast iron pan on the stove.

Then on top I put the pot of hot charcoal so the top of the pizza bakes as well as the bottom.

These turkeys love the pizza.

The back yard, overlooking the garden.

Bathroom

This is the bathroom out back with a shower space. It is quite coveted in the neighborhood. Once I found a lady showering there. She thought I was not around.

This is the current unfinished bathroom. The hole in the far corner is where the water exits. We use the one outback. We will eventually install a toilet so that we don't have to go out at night for a short call. It's not safe to unbar the front door in the middle of the night.

Kitchen

The kind of frying pan and "scrubbie" typically found here. Scrubbie has seen its last day months ago but we combine them all and continue to use it. The frying pan was intolerable last time I was here 5 years ago. That is why I brought my cast iron pan.

This is the kitchen sink. And why is my toddler crying? Because her dress is wet.

The porch with the kitchen door at the end and the living room door open to the right.

The kitchen. It is an upgraded kitchen because it has a gas stove--even though the oven and all but one burner is inoperable. It has a roof and a floor and it is attached to the house. Most kitchens look like the one below. To me, this kitchen is such a mess I don't know where to begin to clean it. I suppose it could start with evicting that mother bird that keeps dropping it's babies onto the stove top. And the hundreds of ants--I have no idea what to do about those. I'm just glad I don't have to cook in the woods with firewood.

These are likely the worst pics of all but in them I have what is considered so much and am so rich (add to that my white skin) that I am in danger of getting robbed any night and I should put up a security fence with barbed wire that might cost me $5000, so that nobody comes and terrorizes me to steal that terrible frying pan pictured above. ...okay, so I'm only joking somewhat about someone stealing the frying pan but then again someone did steal the terrible wheelbarrow with no wheels. What the heck! Seriously, I don't know.