In His Presence

Scrapbook Cookbook

How my heart strings are constantly tugging and drawing tighter! My heart aches for simplicity and to grow closer to His teachings in being a godly woman. I enjoy cooking and baking with great passion.  It seems that in today's fast paced life-style, many times people do not gather together for a cooked hot meal, a truly homecooked meal, something like our mothers and grandmothers generations befor use have made. I have been wanting to gather favorite family recipes of ours that my brother, sister and I just love from our mother's cooking. When I went through my mother's recipe box, with those index cards that have stains all over them (a sign of loving use with all the times that card was taken out to read from), that many of the food we love were not there. I have asked my mother if she could show me how to make many of the meals that she has made, even to this day. Every weekend, we make something different and as we lovingly make these foods together, I write down the ingredients and how to make them. Slowly, I am gathering a collection of recipes that were not written down.

I have a plan in mind for these recipes. For Christmas, I love making homemade gifts for family and friends. Last year, I made hand-made cross stitched stockings for each family member. Each one was different, according to that persons personality. For instance, I have a stocking with a cat cross stitched on it, for I love cats. My mother's stocking has and ornament on it with a quilt pattern design on it because she quilts. This year, I thought it would be a wonderful idea to give each person/family a copy of collected family recipes. These recipes would be gathered in one book using scrapbooking paper and adornments. I will also tuck between the pages photographs of family members and poems about family. Also, I can add funny and loving stories from our lives to make it more personable. Stories are already coming to mind.  I remember the time I was making my first roasted chicken following my mother's directions. The house smelled so yummy and delicious, our mouths were just waiting for this chicken. I brought out the roasting pan from the oven and took the lod off. I started to cry. I looked down as saw a hole in the chicken. I had no idea what happened. My mother started to laugh uncontrolably. I put the chicken in upside down (breast side down) and through the cooking in the oven, the chicken collapsed. It still tasted mighty delcious and finally, after all these years, I can now laugh.

Maybe you, also, have recipes scattered all over. Or you may not have recipes of mom's delicious apple pie recipe or grandma's stuffed cabbage recipe that everyone raves about. Or maybe you do have the recipes and would like to gather them together in a homemade book to give to family members. This is something I am starting to do. Yes, it will take time to gather the recipes, type them onto scrapbook paper, learn the recipes of those that I do not have. Put that is the joy in this journey. When it is all complete, each time any of us opens the cookbook of family recipes, we will be cooking a meal with our family with us, of those that have gone before us and with those who are miles away.

~Blessings and prayers~

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{ 12:09 , Thursday, February 7, 2008 } { Posted by Mistypearl }

What a lovely idea! It will be a blessing to all who read it, I have no doubt. I ,too, have many fond memories of my mother and grandmother, cooking and laughing together in the kitchen. What a blessing to have those memories!
You should hear of my first foray into cooking mac and cheese!
God bless!

Edited by Mistypearl on Thursday, February 7, 2008 at 11:10

my daughter did this

{ 12:17 , Thursday, February 7, 2008 } { Posted by HSBFrontPorch }

My daughter made a scrapbook cookbook last year as her 4-H project and we had so much fun working on it together! It is something she'll cherish, I'm sure!

Kris Price
Senior Editor, HomesteadBlogger.com