THERE IS A WINNER

Today is the day that Mom said she would draw a winner for the little book that she made for the Altered Oz blog party. She said that since there have been people asking about our where about she would let us be the ones who will do the drawing and announce the winner. We had already planned on doing a post this week and Friday is the day we normally do our posts but because that was the day of the party we decided to let Mom have that day and we would take St. Patrick’s Day instead because that is what our post is about anyway.

So first thing this morning we sat down with our computer to put together our post. When we log on we usually check our email first thing and waiting for Bellamine was an email from Ms. Brenda Black Bear from Camp Good Bear saying they would like Bellamine to become their newest Bearcelor for the Arts & Crafts Program this summer. We were so surprised and Bellamine was jumping up and down and shouting and then Mom came in and wanted to know what was going on and when we told her she was just as excited. We’ll get a formal letter later and we’ll let you know more then.

Now back to our post.

As you all know, we have been decorating our little tree for each season and holiday.

We make most of the decorations that we decorate our tree with  but on our St. Patrick's Day tree we only painted the gold coins. Notice Sampson and Bellamine are wearing their green. Bellamine is really insistant that we all wear green today. It's something she heard about from the O'Dell kids.

We also help our mom doing other things like baking cookies and stuff. One of our favorite cookies to bake is cut out sugar cookies because we have a very nice collection of cookie cutters. What better dessert for today’s Irish Corned beef and cabbage dinner than Shamrock cookies?

Now to that thing we told our mom we would do for her. This is what she is giving away.

We wrote the names of the people who said they would like to have the little book that Mom made on slips of paper and put them into the Leprechauns pot and had our little brother Sampson reach in and pick one and the one he picked was number 17 which is Miss April. Mom is going to need an address to send your book so get in touch with her.

Remember, if you’re not wearing green someone just might pinch you.

OUCH!!! Stop doing that Bellamine. I told you there are green leaves on the flowers.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day

Hugs,

Bellamine & Wendy

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY

This Valentine’s Day thing is not happening the way we had planned. It is nothing like we thought it would be. We thought our mom was going to buy us materials to make cards to send to our friends but she didn’t. We thought that she was going to make us special treats like heart shaped cookies or a Valentine heart shaped cake but she isn’t going to do that either. We thought there might be new outfits for us but she hasn’t brought out the sewing machine or gotten out boxes of pretty fabric so we guess that isn’t going to happen either. All she does is clean closets and cupboards. That’s no fun at all!!

We decorated our tree and set out our decorations over two weeks ago but Mom didn’t seem to notice.  We’ve come to the conclusion that our mom just doesn’t love us anymore.

We got this card from our beary dear friend, Prudence. Isn’t it pretty?

We told mom that she doesn't love us any more and she told us don’t be silly. Now what does that sound like to you? Doesn’t that sound like she’s tired of us?  She always liked our silliness before. She would rather spend all day sorting things and putting things into boxes and labeling them or into big black bags and taking them somewhere not here. The hug has been staying in our room because we’re afraid she’s going to put us in one of those bags and that’s just the beginning.

When we asked her if she was going to make us some cookies or a cake she said that she’s doing something called South Beach and doesn’t want the temptation of having sweet treats in the house.  Now everyone knows that we bears live for those sweet treats. She did put out some candies for us so maybe she still likes us a little bit.

We wish she would stop with the cleaning and stop doing the South Beach whatever that is and start having some fun with us again. Okay, so Valentine’s Day is a bust but we still have St. Patrick’s Day coming up and then Easter after that. Those are good holidays, right?? We need to figure out how to make our mom want to do things with us again and being the relentless and resourceful little bears that we are we will come up with a plan.

So dear friends, forgive us for not sending you some beary special paw made cards and for not inviting you to share Valentine shaped cookies with us or having fun at our Valentine’s Day party because none of this is our fault. We wanted to do all of those things but it just didn’t happen because our mom would rather clean cubbies.

Happy Valentine’s Day to all of our beary good friends

Hugs,

Bellamine & Wendy

Baking with Bellamine & Wendy

It's Bellamine and Wendy here with our Friday post. We didn't post last Friday cause we didn't have a single thing to write about. It's been a very boring time for us cause we have been shut-ins. A shut-in is someone who nevers gets to go outside and play.

For more than a week it rained nearly every day and we even had thunder bumpers. That’s what Robbie, Rudy and Bartholomew call thunder storms. One day when the storm was really bad we couldn't find Oakley cause he was hiding in the bottom of the linen closet cause he doesn't like the thunder. Mom won’t let us outside, even on the porch wearing full rain gear and carrying umbrellas when it rains. She’s afraid well get wet and then get moldy and lumpy or something we’re not even going to guess at. She is one big worry wart so we were stuck inside for days and days with hardly anything to do. It wouldn’t have been so bad if she hadn’t been busy with her dumb experiment.  

On Wednesday it cleared up for most of the day and we took our camera outside and took some pictures of our bushes that had some pretty flowers before the rain made a mess of things. Maybe Mom is right about going outside in the rain. Just look what happened to some of our pretty flowering bushes. The ones that are out in the open really got messed up.

Almost all of the flowers are on the ground.

The poor little things look pretty sad because they lost most of their flowers. The ones with trees protecting them didn’t get as badly damaged.

There were some really, really big bumble bees in Mom’s herb garden and we tried taking some pictures of them but they kept moving and when we looked at the pictures we couldn’t find them. Mom says they’re as big as humming birds.

Tuesday evening Santa and Mrs. Claus came to our house for Spaghetti Super night and we asked Mom if we could make the dessert. She did some hemming and hawing and finally gave us the go ahead but only after we promised to clean up our mess. You’d think she’d have learned not to ask us to clean up after what happened the last time but apparently not.

Once we got permission to make the dessert we weren't sure what we wanted to make. We got out the recipe box and some cook books and looked for something but couldn’t find a recipe that we could both agree on. Wendy suggested we make up our own recipe. Like an experiment.

We figured we’d make cookies since we’ve made cookies before and they turned out really good. We went to the pantry and started taking ingredients from the shelves. We knew we needed to have sugar in the cookies but couldn’t make up our minds about which kind to use so we brought out two different kinds. We both wanted chocolate chips. Walnuts are always good in cookies and we like coconut too so why not use both? Then we found some pumpkin in the fridge left over from the muffins that Mom made and we thought, why not? It was good in the muffins.

We measured and poured and stirred and whipped and blended and folded and scooped and chopped. Then we dropped spoons full of cookie dough onto the baking sheets and stuck them in the oven.

We had plenty of volunteers when the first batch had cooled. Every bear said they were good. When we asked Mom to try one to see what she thought and she said, “These are wonderful. Where did you find the recipe?”

When we told her it was our own recipe she asked us what we were going to call them and at first we were stumped. They weren’t chocolate chip cookies like Mom makes and they weren’t oatmeal cookies either. We had used some of this and some of that and then we decided that was just as good a name as any so they are our “This & That Cookies”.

After dinner that night we were helping clear the table when Santa said to Mrs. Claus, “See if the girls will give you the recipe for these cookies.”

Talk about being thrilled!! We were smiling ear to ear. Mom gave us one the recipe cards she uses and we wrote down everything we did and gave it to Mrs. Claus when they were ready to leave. We decided that since Santa likes these cookies so much that he wants Mrs. Claus to make them you might want to make them so we’re going to give you the recipe too. If you make them and like the way they turn out let us know. With some positive comments we might get more kitchen time and who knows, maybe someday we’ll have enough recipes that Mom can make them into a book. We can see it now. How about “Cooking with Bellamine & Wendy”? Or maybe something like, “Bellamine & Wendy’s Best Recipes”. We have plenty of time to come up with the perfect title since we’ve only one recipe so far.

This & That Cookies

Place the following in a large bowl…

1 stick softened butter

½ c. softened coconut oil

1 ¼ c. brown sugar, packed

¾ c. granulated sugar

Beat together until creamy. Then add the following and beat until fluffy:

2 large eggs

2 t. vanilla extract

1 c. canned pumpkin

Add the following and mix until thoroughly blended:

1½ c. flour

½ t. baking power

½ t. salt

2 t. cinnamon

Fold in:

3 c. old fashioned rolled oats

1 c. flaked coconut

1 c. chopped walnuts

1 c. semi-sweet chocolate morsels

Using soup spoons drop spoonful’s on ungreased baking sheets.

Bake at 350 degrees F or about 180 degrees C for 14 - 16 minutes. Leave cookies on baking sheets for 2 minutes after removing from oven then transfer to cooling rack or paper toweling. Once completely cooled store in covered container. We suggest storing them in a Snowman cookie jar but that’s just our preference although we wouldn't mind if Mom would get a teddy bear cookie jar. This recipe makes 5 dozen delicious cookies.

Mom has put a photo of us on the side bar and would like to put photos of our bear friends there as well. We already got permission to put a picture of Prudence there and would love to include the rest of our bear friends so let Mom know if it's alright to put your photo there too.

Speaking of bear friends, we'll be seeing many of you at camp after only 42 more sleeps. It won't be long now.

We're going to go visit our friends' blogs now so see ya later.

Hugs,

Bellamine & Wendy

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY

The last of the decorations for St. Patrick's day have been added to the display on the buffet in the dining room. I couldn't resist these little lasses and if you'd seen what they looked like before I got my hands on them you would have thought I was crackers for wanting to lay out the whopping 25 cents apiece I paid for them.  They were hideous and in a marked down bin at one of my favorite stores. I could imagine how they would look after I had repainted them.

The complete display. Since green is the main color of my living room and dining room using green to decorate doesn't have the same impact as the colors I'd use for decorating at Easter or Halloween or any other holidays except for Christmas but then I use a lot more red.

March 17 or St. Patrick's day has been celebrated by the Irish as a religious holiday for over 1,000 years. Irish families would traditionally attend church in the morning and celebrate in the afternoon. The people would feast on the traditional meal of Irish bacon and cabbage.


My mother-in-law would make what she called, Irish Stew and this dish has become a favorite with my family and the meal I will be serving today. I don't think she would have minded me sharing the recipe with you.

Ruth's Irish Stew

1     corned beef brisket [5 1/2 pound]

2     large onions, quartered

12-15 small white [Irish] potatoes

2     heads cabbage, cored and cut into wedges

Rinse the beef brisket under cold water, and place in a large pot. I use my largest stock pot.

Add enough water to cover the roast by about 5-6 inches.

Peel and quarter the onions, and place them in the pot with the roast.

Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium-low so that the water is at a gentle boil, cover, and cook for 3-4 hours.

Remove the lid from pot and place the cabbage over the roast and onions and the potatoes on top of the cabbage. 

Cook on medium heat for another 30 minutes, until potatoes are tender.

Remove the beef from the kettle and slice.  Place the sliced beef on a platter and add the cabbage and potatoes.

For dessert we have some delicious cookies baked for us yesterday by my two kitchen helpers.

Enjoy your day~

~Happy St. Patrick's Day~

BAKING COOKIES

This might be a very long post because we had a very long afternoon yesterday and took lots of pictures.

We've been wanting to try our new cookie cutters for the longest time but Mom keeps saying the kitchen isn't a safe place for bears or it's too small for all of us to fit in at the same time and a whole bunch of other dumb excuses. We told her if she didn't help us bake cookies we were going to ask Mrs. Claus if she would help us. That's all it took to get Mom to agree to bake cookies with us. She'd hate to have Mrs. Claus think she couldn't manage to teach two very grown up and responsible bears such as we two to bake cookies. It's not like it's really hard to do or anything, right?

We got the recipe box out of the drawer and found the cards for the cookies we wanted to make.

We're going to be making gingerbread boys using Mrs. Claus' recipe and sugar cookies using Mom's recipe. Mom said we had to assemble the ingredients first. So While we read from the cards Mom started taking things from the pantry and cupboard.

After everything was out on the table and Mom was getting out the cookie sheets and bowls we double checked to see if we had everything we needed.

Shortening?
     Check.
Butter?
     Check.
Vanilla?
     Check.
Allspice?
     Check.
Ginger?
     Check.
Cinnamon?
     Check.
Cloves?
     Check. 
Dark molasses? 

Bellamine, I asked if we have dark molasses.

"Hey Mom, the gingerbread boys recipe says we need something called dark mole asses and I don't see any. Did you forget to get out the dark mole asses? What are dark mole asses anyway?"

"I know the recipe calls for dark molasses but I substitute honey and brown sugar, that's why I sat the honey out."

"Good, cause we don't like any mole asses in our cookies. Do we Wendy?"

"Bellamine, it's molasses not mole asses."

"That's what I said. Mole asses."

 

Here are our cookie cutters. We're going to use the little gingerbread boy cookie cutter not the big one. We just put the big one out so you could see the difference. The big one is the one Mom uses when she makes gingerbread boys at Christmas. The other cookie cutter we're going to be using is the shamrock. It's the one Mom got for us when we told her we wanted a shamrock cookie cutter and we forgot to tell her it we wanted a small one. Now we know to be more precise when we ask her for something.

The recipe for the gingerbread boys calls for 7 cups of flour and Mom says we're going to make a half batch cause we're making sugar cookies too.

We decided to make the sugar cookies first. We measured the ingredients with special cups and spoons. We wore our aprons to keep from getting flour and stuff all over ourselves. We hardly spilled any of the ingredients on the floor. The butter doesn't count cause it wasn't our fault. It was Mom who left it too close to the edge of the counter and the egg was just an accident and not Bellamine's fault.

"Eggs are hard to hold on to cause they're so smooth and round and really big and slippery. I should have let Mom do the egg. Next time I'm staying away from the eggs."

We decided to decorate the shamrocks two different ways for those who like frosting and some with green sugar sprinkle for those who don't like frosting. We got tired of making shamrocks and Mom said she'd finish the rest of them up tomorrow. We really wanted to get started on the gingerbread boys.

There we were again, measuring and then mixing.  The dough had to go in the fridge to chill so Mom said it was a good time to start cleaning up our mess and washing the cookie sheets and bowls. We told her we would let her do that part but she said it was all part of baking and we had to learn that part too. We told her she is always saying the kitchen is too small for all of us and she said we'd have to manage cause we were all going to do the clean up.

Bellamine didn't mean to drop the bowl, it was just an accident. 

"Bowls are hard to hold on to cause they're smooth and round and really big and slippery. Maybe next time Mom will wash and dry the bowl."

We worked on the gingerbread boys for a beary long time and then we got to share a plate full of cookies with glasses of nice cold milk while Mom cleaned up the kitchen. She said we'd done enough for one day. These are the best cookies we ever had and we made them all by ourselves with only a little help from Mom. We all ate more cookies while we watched our movie. Every bear said we really make good cookies and that maybe next time we bake we can maybe bake some honey muffins or cakes. Sounds like a good idea to us.

Now we're going to have a few of our cookies and some cocoa while we go see what our friends blogged about for Funny Friday.

If any of our friends want the recipes we used for the cookies just let us know and we'll have Mom send you the recipes. We're sure she won't mind.

Hugs,
Bellamine & Wendy

Bellamine & Wendy and The Bear's Room

Hi Everybear,

Bellamine & Wendy here and we're going to show you our room and some of the North Pole bear clan. Our friend Prudence thinks if we're persistent we can wear Mom down and she'll give in and let us have a blog of our own. Until that happens, and we know it will cause we are persistent, Mom is going to let us do a post on her blog from time to time to get the feel of blogging.      Do you feel anything yet, Wendy?

Our Mom likes quilts and she especially likes Christmas quilts. We have the prettiest one on our bed. It's got shams to match. Right now it's covered with bears too. They're watching a Christmas movie. We spent the morning helping Mom make cookies and we're all tired.

Our puppy Vinnie is watching the movie with us. He's a real sweetie and doesn't chew our toys and books and stuff like some dogs do. He's a lot like us. Here we are, just hanging out in our room on a Sunday afternoon. This is for you Mom. We're being good and know that you'll tell Santa. You will tell him won't you?  She will tell him won't she Wendy?

We told Mom to take a close-up so you can see some little girl bear's new Christmas dress. It's got a really full skirt and when a certain little bear spins around it goes way out and up. Makes a little bear feel as pretty as a flower, and a little bit dizzy.

They don't even know that I got down off the bed. The movie is so good that nobeary's paying any attention so I'm going to have Mom take a picture of me and our Christmas tree.

We even got some pressies under it. When we wake up on Christmas morning there's going to be more. There will  be a gazillion of pressies. Right Mom? Maybe even more than a gazillion. You think there will be more than a gazillion, Wendy? What comes after a gazillion?

We wanted to take pictures of Santa's work shop but it's not allowed because it's supposed to be a secret. Yeh, right! Like there's anybody who doesn't know about the workshop. Mom said it's cause she had to sign a confidentiality agreement and in it there's a clause that states  cameras are not allowed. Besides, the workshop is off limits to all non workers right now due to this being the final week before Christmas. There's a big ol' count down clock and everyone is rushing to get the orders completed.

We have to go now. We have to vote on which movie to watch next. Since this is one little bear's first Christmas her big sister is helping her choose. Thanks for visiting and we all wish everyone a

              Merry Christmas

Hugs,
Bellamine & Wendy

How did we do Mom? We did pretty good, right?