I was a grown woman before I heard the term Hootenanny. My husband with his southern roots had grown up eating it. Once I discovered it, hootenanny quickly became a favorite.
What is Hootenanny?
The Googled meaning of the word is different than what I expected. I fully expecting it to say ‘a southern pancake.’ But this is the official definition. noun
INFORMAL•US an informal gathering with folk music and sometimes dancing.
“we invited friends to a hootenanny in our backyard”
So my historical take on how this delicious oven pancake got its name?
People took it as a side for a potluck style meal during the party.
The first time I made this, I didn’t know about my husband’s childhood favorite – hootenanny. I found the recipe in the Better Homes & Gardens cookbook under, “Puffed Oven Pancakes” and decided to give it a try.
When I set it on the table my husband was extatic, I had made one of his favorite meals (by mistake 😅). I now only refer to it as hootenanny because let’s be honest, that’s much more exciting than puffed oven pancake.
My Favorite Reasons to Eat Hootenanny
It’s high in protein
Low in flour
Can easily be served sugar free
Can easily have 100% whole grain
It bakes in the oven so I can pop it in and get other things done while it’s baking.
If you want sugar you can always serve it with syrup. Which is how I serve it for my kids, but since too much sugar makes me sick I’ve started searching for great sugar free options that still taste good.
This is not so much a substitute for sugar as a different dish all together.
First top it with plain Greek yogurt (packed full of 5 strains of probiotics). Then sweeten it with honey and blueberries.
It tastes amazing!
It could be that I’ve been going without sugar for so long that it only taste good to me, but really it taste so good, it would taste good to the average sugar eater as well.
What a Sugar-free Diet Tastes Like
When you go off of sugar, food actually starts tasting better. Especially Vegitables, fruit and honey. By cutting out the highly processed sugar your taste buds adjusts and actually taste other foods better.
If you’ve already gone off of sugar, you’ll absolutely love this. If you’re thinking of taking the first step, this is a great dish to start with.
Hootenanny bakes in a large casserole dish – at least mine does – I’ve adjusted the recipe (details below) to make enough for a family of 6.
It gets all these beautiful, golden hills and valleys from the large amount of eggs. They’re is actually more egg than there is flower so making this sugar free, makes it a really great source of protein.
Sometimes I even add chia and flax seeds which are a great source of fiber, iron, calcium, fatty acids and antioxidants.
Without further adieu
Sugar Free Hootenanny
This will make two 8×11″ size casserole dish sizes. It is quite light and fluffy, my family of 6 leaves no left overs.
Hootenanny Ingredients for two 8×11″ Casseroles
2 Tbl butter
9 eggs
1 1/2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups milk (you can use almonds milk, but it doesn’t rise as high)
1/2 tsp salt
Heat oven to 400 °
Butter the entire bottom of each casserole dish. Leave one TBS of butter in each dish and let melt in the oven while you mix the other ingredients.
Mix the rest of the ingredients with a hand held mixer until smooth.
Pull the hot casserole dishes out of the oven. Pour half the batter into the furst hot dish and the other half batter in the second dish.
Bake for 25 minutes or until puffy and golden brown.
A few months ago I was having a conversation with a co-worker about how to correct a child’s behavior within the program. During the conversation I used the word discipline. She shrunk when I used the word and quickly changed the subject.
I was surprised and intrigued, discipline had become a dirty word. The definition is still the same, but the connotation in our society has changed.
What is Discipline
Discipline can be looked at in two different ways as defined in the Merriam-Webster dictionary.
(2) orderly orprescribedconduct or pattern of behavior
The first definition is compliance enforced by external powers: Parents, teachers or the government. The second is compliance controlled and enforced internally by ourselves.
The first definition is still not wrong or bad – but this is where our culture has begun to replace the feeling of the word. Instead of seeing discipline as a way to teach and correct, we often see it as a way to abuse.
(3) language that condemns or vilifies usually unjustly, intemperately, and angrily – verbal abuse
(4) physical maltreatment – child abuse, sexual abuse
As you look at the different definitions you can see how the first two lead to the second two. The first two, corrupt or excessive, take what discipline should be and misuse it. When discipline is misused it stops being discipline (a teaching moment) and becomes abuse.
This is where we need to start having a discussion in society. We can all agree that abuse is bad. The problem is agreeing on what abuse is.
For example…
Legally if it leaves a mark it is abuse. Which I personally agree with.
When it comes to being home alone, some states dictate very specific ages in which you can start giving children autonomy.
Others states have chosen to let the parent decide when a child is responsible enough by protecting what is now being called “free range” parenting.
We used to have “time out” to encourage time for a child to think instead of being hit as punishment, but even that is starting to be seen as abuse.
The truth is, anything can become abuse when it becomes corrupt or excessive.
As a result we have people who are afraid to act at all in the betterment of child behavior.
Where has Our Fear of Discipline Led Us?
We have parents afraid to reign in their children’s behaviors, teachers who feel they have no rights to bring control to the classroom and the government placed with the final choice of penalties and imprisonment.
We can and should teach children how to control their behaviors. This is called discipline.
Discipline with Love
It is vital that we discipline our own passions, so that when we discipline a child it is out of love meant as a teaching moment. Discipline doesn’t always means punishment or consequence and it never means abuse.
If we can view our roles as an opportunity to teach, we will conquer the largest hurdle of possible abuse. We will help a child have a better life by helping them learn to control themselves. It will bless their lives into adulthood.
5 Ways to Implement Good Discipline
Calm down
Let them know you will discuss the consequence with them in five minutes.
Give yourself time
Good parenting or teaching does not mean you have to react immediately. Allow yourself time to decide on a just consequence. It is ok to point out the child’s action was not ok and you will be thinking of a way for them to fix the problem.
Give consequences you can and should follow through with
Nothing is more confusing than having irrational threats yelled at you. As in, “I’m going kick you into next week.” Not only should you not do this, you can’t. Practice giving consequences you can follow through with and that you wouldn’t regret the next day.
Be consistent in expectations and reactions to behavior
Work on talking first. If needed calm down and give yourself time to regroup. Remind yourself this is a learning opportunity for your child. You are correcting them for their benefit. Somethings you can and should ignore, pick your battles so to speak. If anger is building up inside, address the issue to avoid randomly blowing up about things you previously let go.
Discuss with the child what happened that was unexpected
This is the learning opportunity. Believe it or not, children don’t always know why we got so mad. Still even if you kept your cool and told them to go think about what they did, a child will need help to regroup and process what did happen and how it could have turned out differently. As the adult in a child’s life we can be the link to help them understand how to improve things next time.
You are in luck, we just did it and are here to share what we learned. Some people may wonder, can you put an above ground trampoline in the ground?
The answer is yes!
There are several options. Here’s how we did ours for under $100.
Definitely the easiest way to get the pit is to hire the digging out to someone with equipment or rent the equipment like a backhoe or a mini excavator. Depending on where you live, this can cost $200 – $500 to rent.
DIY Trampoline Pit
If you’re really determined and very much into saving money and DIY you can dig it by hand.
My husband dug this completely by hand. He’s amazing right? I thought it was a little crazy and not possible, but he treated it like his workout and did it every day for about two weeks.
He then used the extra dirt to create a greater slope away from the foundation of our house and make a hill to build a fish pond and waterfall for a later project.
So it is possible by hand and you can do it even with hard desert ground, just know what you’re getting into.
Sunken trampoline problems
The ground seemed so hard we decided not to put up a Trampoline retaining wall. Then a few months later, our neighbor’s water main broke and all the water drained into this pit. The sides weakened and then collapsed.
We knew we had to put up a retaining wall of some sort, but left it for the next spring.
Building a Retaining Wall for a Trampoline Pit
This article is on how to create a retaining wall using corrugated metal, because it’s cheap and easy. At the end of the article I will share all the other ways we considered before we began.
How Corrugated Metal Can be Used as a DIY Inground Trampoline Pit
Pros it’s inexpensive, the curved horizontal lines create a strong surface for a retaining wall.
Cons it may rust, it is sharp on the edges.
First you’ll want to dig out enough dirt for the metal sheet to slide into place.
This is what it looked like digging out the collapsed walls.
Fit Corrugated Sheets Around the sides of the Inground Trampoline Pit
We used 4’x10′ corrugated metal sheets. This allowed just enough room to bend around the middle poll while both edges fit behind the first and last poll. They run about $10 a sheet bringing the cost to just under a $100 for materials.
Tip : wear working gloves. As you are fitting the metal into place you will need to push down on the edges, which are sharp.
Bending Corrugated Metal For a Trampoline Pit
We tried two methods. Bending it before we put it in and bending it while we put it in. Both had successes and failures.
Both bends highlighted below were done by bending while we put them in place. As you can see sometimes it worked very well. However our worst bend job also came from bending while putting it in the pit.
We then tried bending it before by having our kids stand where we wanted it to bend while we pushed the sheet up. We got mediocre bends.
Ultimately we decided to just chance it and bend as we went.
A long metal pipe may work better, we just decided to wing it.
How to Avoid Sharp Edges on Trampoline Retaining Walls and How to Create Air Flow
As has been noted, corrugated metal is sharp on the edges. A friend’s daughter slipped on their tramp while jumping and cut her leg. Not a bad cut, but still not desirable.
We decided to combat this by having the metal sit well below the edge of the trampoline and have the earth slope down to the metal.
Eventually grass will grow towards the metal retaining wall and slightly cover the metal edge.
The added bonus of having this slope is it will also allow air to escape which creates a greater bounce. If the trampoline comes flush to the ground the air won’t move out of the way and will create a belly flop, hard bounce.
In ground trampoline drainage
We don’t have a nifty drain in the middle, that would be really smart and we may do that one day. But we do have a down spout draining field right in the trampoline pit.
My husband discovered it while digging. It’s basically a pile of rocks, to prevent erosion, covered with dirt.
We left the whole thing where it was. Eventually we will put up some 2x4s to reinforce the sides where the drain field is.
It also works as a handy slope to get in and out of the pit.
You may not be able to tell from this picture, but I came through with a rake and built up the sides with a slight decline towards the middle.
This will help reinforce the bottom edge of the corrugated metal and any water that does make it in can drain to the middle and evaporate.
How Well Does a Trampoline Retaining Wall Hold up?
We came up with a corrugated retaining wall out of necessity. After the walls caved in, the erosion kept going. Our other neighbor’s garden irrigation was slowly eating away at one side.
If you have alot of erosion from water first put up the wall, then fill with gravel then dirt. The gravel will help filter the water and reduce the erosion effect.
The section I have circled here has been up over a year and is still going strong. No bulging or signs of giving way.
Alternative Spring Covers for an Inground Trampoline Pit
The heat and wind desinegrated our trampoline pad. We wanted something that wouldn’t blow away, but would also protect our kids from spring pinches.
Pool noodles were the thing we needed. They fit the spring with just enough room to slide.
Fitting Pool Noodles for Trampoline Springs
First get these on clearance at the end of summer. This measures the whole inground trampoline package really come to under $100
Next cut noodles with a serrated knife about 5″ or the length of the spring stretch section leaving the metal loops exposed.
This will make for easier assembly onto the frame.
Slide the springs into each pool noodle section.
Put all the springs onto the frame, then begin to put the trampoline mat in place.
How to Assemble a Trampoline
The trampoline mat can be difficult to get on the frame. You will want to have these cool tools that grip the spring and allow you to pull it onto the trampoline mat ring.
Towards the end when it’s really difficult, we found it worked best for me to pull the ring of the trampoline mat while my husband used a long flathead screw driver from the loop on the spring and connected the two together.
And it’s done!
The kids love jumping, we love them getting the exercise and being outside. The longer we’ve had the trampoline the more comfortable and daring our children have become.
So we’re coming up with rules to keep kids heads in place.
What are go – to rules that have kept your kids safe on the trampoline?
Here are some other inground trampoline ideas we also considered
Pros it’s all set up meant to fit your trampoline.
Cons I’ve still seen these bulging, they’re not fail safe. But to be fair to Trampolines down under its possible they weren’t installed correctly.
Check out this design from their company. The curved sides give it added security.
Using a Cut Off End to a Grain Silo for an Inground Trampoline Retaining Wall
Runs you a few hundred. The idea is you buy the whole silo and cut them into sections. You can get 4-5 out of one silo, sell off the rest to pay for it.
Pros it’s one big, heavy duty circle. No bulging from dirt, no rust.
Cons it’s hard to find one.
Build a Trampoline Retaining Wall Out of Brick
The only version I saw of this had a huge 1′ gap all the way around. Which was built that way on purpose so kids could climb under and get things that had fallen. All I saw was my toddler tripping on it and face planting on the springs. It also is a lot of money for brick.
Pros it can look really classy
Cons it can be a hard place to fall.
Well that’s the inground trampoline pit info. We ultimately chose the corrugated metal because we tested it and saw it was working.
I hope this helped as you make your inground pit.
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If you have used wood blind slats or faux wood slats laying around, don’t throw them out. Sometimes these thin, flexible slats can work better than trim you find at the store
Not only can you remove those extra blind slats that sit constantly at the bottom of your window blinds, but you can do insanely awesome things with the left overs.
Use Faux Wood Blind Slats to Dress Up a Boring Door
One of my favorite uses for faux wood blinds is to dress up a flat boring door. To trim out and add a touch of farmhouse style, simply outline your doors (and walls if you want) with trim. Then caulk in the seams and paint. It’s that easy.
The faux wood blinds used here, had holes in them. To fix that, first glue the blind slat to your desired surface. Then come back through with drywall mud and fill in all the holes. Let the mud dry, then sand smooth.
After a coat of primer you are ready to paint.
If you look here, you will see I actually added trim to create the visual effect of wider doors. I cut the window blinds so that it ran across the accordian style door. This gave the visual perception of two wider doors instead of 4 narrow ones.
Upcycle Window Blinds Slats to Add Character to a Kitchen Island
Sometimes you want bigger, boxy trim and sometimes you want sleek and subtle highlights.
Used window blinds work perfect here. Being thin helps add interest without the bulk as shown in my desk to kitchen island.
As the tilt out trash can and storage were added, several gaps needed to be covered. The window blinds did a great job and added an element of elegance once complete.
To see the whole transformation and how-to click here.
Repurpose Faux Wood Blind Slats to Cover Up Outdated Designs
Old window blinds came in handy with this upcycle project. There was so little room to add trim. Faux wood slats would work best because they were so thin.
I attached the trim with an automatic air nailer. Then caulked over the holes.
So seamless, once painted, you will never know about the outdated scalloped edge.
I use recycled, upcycled, repurposed material in my designs because I love to bring value back to something that would just end up in a landfill. We consume so much as a society and so many materials are needlessly tossed.
It’s a good feeling to recycle and have your home even more beautiful.
Thank you for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed this article. Please feel free to subscribe for more cost effective,environmentally friendly ways to update your home.
Grilled cheese is an amazing food. Definitely in the top 10 of my favorite foods. The best part, they never have to get boring.
The classic combination of grilled cheese and tomatoe soup – is perfect, never gets old. Grilled cheese buzzfeed sites pump the internet full of ideas to make sure you have seen every single style known to man.
But the internet hasn’t seen anything like this… Yet! and it’s amazing. These grilled cheese sandwich recipes are to die for.
Double Grilled Cheese and Ranch
Sprinkle cheese and dry ranch mix (about a 1/4 tsp) on top.
Here is another shot with the same idea I just used regular bread and Greek Yogurt Dips Ranch Mix. The thick slices of cheese will give you more of a cheesy sandwich. The shredded cheese will melt up faster.
To get the double grilled cheese you can either put the cheese right on top while cooking, let it melt a bit then flip it.
Oorrr, put the cheese right on the grill and flip your sandwich onto the cheese immediately. Let it grill until the cheese inside is melted and the cheese outside is perfectly crisp.
Voila! You’ve got double grilled cheese and ranch perfection. The cheese outside hits your tongue immediately and adds an extra layer of crisp right before the soft cheesy center.
The dry ranch mix gives a subtle flavor upgrade that the 5 year old to 40 year old equally loved.
I’m counting this as a home run!
Gourmet Grilled Cheese Add-Ons
When it comes to comfort foods, grilled cheese is right up there. Here are a few more gourmet ideas to make your taste buds happy. If you are looking to change things up a bit, try this selection of creative grilled cheese recipes.
Grilled Cheese and Avocado
Avocados are an amazing super food. A great source of healthy fat and full of vitamins.
Avocadosare packed with vitamins C, E, K, and B-6, as well as riboflavin, niacin, folate, pantothenic acid, magnesium, and potassium. They also provide the fats you need such as lutein, beta-carotene, and omega-3 fatty acids. Not only that, avocadosare full ofhealthy, beneficialfats that help keepyoufull and satiated.
That must be why I love avocados so much – it makes me feel satisfied after eating and stops craving. When you give your body what it needs the cravings subside.
Grilled Cheese with Bacon
Bacon is the ultimate food right? Is there anything bacon can’t do? There is bacon ice cream, bacon sprinkled on donuts, chocolate covered bacon – check out my easy recipe, trust me you’ll love it.
And while you’re at it, you might as well try grilled cheese with bacon and avocado together. These two were meant to be…in a sandwich together. 😊
Grilled Cheese with Apricot Jam
I know what you are thinking, ‘she’s crazy!’ I thought it was too when I first heard about it. If you like to try new things, then you have to try this, it like nothing you’ve had before – unless you’ve had this exact sandwich before. Then I’ve got nothing new for ya.
Many years ago, my amazing big brother married into a family that all ate cheese sandwiches with apricot jam in the middle. I resisted for years, until one day I thought, “Here’s this whole group of people who think it taste good, there’s got to be something to it.”
…. It was good!
Apricot Jam cheese sandwiches taste nothing like grilled cheese, it’s a whole new experience. Go in with that mind set and you’ll like it.
Grill the sandwich first, then open it up and put some jam in the middle.
Which Cheeses are the Best for Grilled Cheese?
These were Google‘s top pick when asked, cheeses for the best grilled cheese sandwich. So if you’re wanting to up it a notch for a fancy grilled cheese sandwich style, you may want to try one of these. Feta, goat cheese, havarti, Swiss, Cheddar, Muenster, Provolone and American – all this according to Thrillest.com.
I was a bit surprised to find that my favorite cheese upgrade was not listed – Pepper Jack. If you like a bit of spice you will love this cheese grilled with a few slices of crispy bacon.
I usually just go with plain old Cheddar, because you can’t go wrong there. If I’m not cooking for kids and I have Pepper Jack, it’s the go to. Which isn’t often because my super power, among other things, is to raise little humans into adults and they always need to eat…and they like Cheddar.
I hope you enjoy these grilled cheese sandwich twists, especially grilled cheese and ranch – I think you’ll love it.
Let me know how it goes. Please comment and subscribe for more awesome how – to.
Hi, I’m Natalie. I’m a mother of four, an artist, and a DIYer that loves to reuse, recycle, and refurbish. I like power tools and teaching others how to save money while improving their home.
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