Fun finds « Clan Grant

Music Monday- AR Rahman

06 Jun 2010 Leave a Comment

by ewegrant in Fun finds, Random, Soap Box, Tunes, Uncategorized

Allah Rakha Rahman is an Indian Tamil film composer, record composer, record producer, musician and singer. That is about all I know of him other than I like his musical compositions. He often uses other artist in his work and so the compilation I own of his stuff is really diverse.

This is the album that I own:

You can listen to samples of this album on itunes and probably other places as well. Check it out, maybe Indian music is totally your thing!

More on Summit VI

03 May 2010 1 Comment

by ewegrant in Adoption, Do Good, Ethiopia, Family, Fun finds, Fun Internet Stuff, God, Random, Soap Box, Uncategorized

So as I said in a previous post Summit is a yearly conference and this year it was in Minnesota which living in Chicago makes it practically in my backyard or an 8 hour drive away. I was blessed to be in great company for the drive so the 8 hours flew by, the time flew faster on the way to MN but the drive home was more effected by my sheer exhaustion and the exhaustion of my car mates. I wish I had a picture of our car trip up to MN and back because we had some good times but alas I did not have my camera with me. Although if you go to There’s glitter in my coffee you will meet my good friend Elizabeth who was one of the lovely people I went to the conference with. Actually it was a facebook post that Elizabeth made that alerted me to Summit, Thanks Elizabeth, you’re hilarious and awesome even if you can’t read a map! Hehe!

Ok, so on to the conference stuff. This conference is over two days and is absolutely packed with sessions to educate you on all aspects orphan care from the U.S. foster system to Global orphan care and the stuff in between. I can only tell you about my journey through the conference but I think that you will get a pretty good idea of what a typical experience would be from what I did.

Each morning from 8:30-10:30 was the general session in which corporate worship began in the large sanctuary of the church, there were also a few speakers during this time. Each evening there was also a corporate session in which we heard a speaker and participated in worship of some kind. Thursday night Steven Curtis Chapman preformed and Friday the worship band from Bethlehem Baptist Church led worship.

Breakout sessions:

I attended 6 breakout sessions and 1 lunch time session over the two-day conference, here are the breakout sessions that I attended:

Church based orphan ministry 101- Overview- This is the session you take if you want to start an orphan ministry in your church, it was really good and if you purchase the book Launching an orphan ministry in your church you will basically have all of the information and more that was presented in this session.
Church-based orphan ministry 201- Global orphan care- This session was great the guy who lead is the president of Orphan Outreach. There was so much information presented and a lot of it was really practical information for starting a ministry in a foreign country. There were a lot of things about this presentation that Americans need to hear about having relationships with the people we are trying to help. I am not quite at a point that I would be starting an orphanage or ministry abroad but it really opened my eyes to wanting to work with organizations that have people already on the ground and that really know the organizations they are working with.
Engaging Church Leadership- This was an essential session if you are desiring to start your own orphan care ministry. I learned a lot about how to approach the leadership in our church, things to do and NOT to do. Loved this session and Daniel Bennett who presented it is a pastor so his perspective was really valuable.
Implementing a Balanced Orphan Care and Adoption Ministry in our Church- This was another session that was packed with information. Bethany Christian Services were the ones that did this session and the videos that you can see on the link I gave are given by the same man who did the session. The site is packed with information and links to help get a ministry started.
How Does it Work? Models of Global Orphan Ministry Based in US Churches- In this session we got to hear from a panel of pastors and ministry leaders that apart of churches or ministries that are doing global orphan care. It was really informative and really a treat to hear from Pastor Sudaker from India. I really appreciated hearing his view on short-term missions to India and whether they are helpful or not he told us they are!
The Truth About Orphan Care: Are We Doing More Harm than Good? This session was given by Vision Trust, and was really informative and eye-opening. I walked away from this session which happened to be my last session feeling like I had a much better understanding of the pitfalls of not fully understanding the culture that you are working within. The goal is to help these countries and to equip them to help themselves and often times that is just not happening. I really loved this session and how thought-provoking it was.

In one area of the host church there was an area set up for ministries to have informational tables. I collected a huge amount of information and took home a lot of business cards to build up my contact list. Some of the ministries that were there were:

Of these featured speakers I would say that Stephanie Fast was really awesome as was Mary Beth Chapman. John Piper was really great too and gave a thought-provoking sermon. All of the people who spoke during Summit were wonderful and on fire for orphans which was really inspiring.

I can’t wait to go to Summit 8 next year, I have already started saving for Brian and I to make the trip together to where every it is going to be. The conference was awesome and it was a huge blessing to be able to share two days with people who are advocating for orphans locally and globally and are really, really passionate about Gods call to …care for the fatherless…

25 things…

11 Jan 2010 Leave a Comment

by ewegrant in Family, Fun finds, Kids, Random, Soap Box, Uncategorized

you probably did not know about me.

My favorite color is green.
I am afraid of heights.
I have 7 siblings.
Ewan was born by c-section.
My bag of waters broke with Anwen while I was in a Target store.
In my youth I collected stamps.
I broke the long jump record for my high school- I was a junior.
For a really long time I wanted to become an archeologist, I was in college when I changed my mind, thats how long.
The McLeod clan of which I am apart of has a castle in Scotland that is still inhabited by our clan chief.
I had severe carpel tunnel while I was pregnant with Ewan- it was awful:(.
I believe in random acts of kindness.
I have moved over 25 times.
I have lived in 7 different states- some more than once.
I have been to Scotland 3 times, and I can’t wait to go again.
I have asthma and have since I was two years old.
I make jewelry.
My favorite drink is single malt scotch.
My favorite movie director is Tim Burton.
Brian and I have been together for 15 years.
My dream home is a straw bale house or the ranch from the original Parent Trap (furnished please:))
I want to raise chickens and sheep.
I love vintage 50′s furniture.
I was 26 years old before I owned a cell phone:)
I was the secretary of my high school’s African-American club, for at least one year.
I am a wimp when it comes to staying up late:(

New routines for a new year

09 Jan 2010 2 Comments

by ewegrant in Family, Food, Fun finds, Kids, Random, Recipes, Soap Box, Uncategorized

Routine is not a strong point for me, I have to work really hard to form new habits and to stick with them. The funny thing about this is that I love being organized and being in a routine, the hard part for me is getting there. I have known for sometime that the larger my family grows the more routine I need in my life- for myself and my children. I have been planning new ways to organize my life for some time and now that we are in a new year it is time to start implementing my plans.

Some of the things below were started in 2009 but in a sort of testing phase. The meal calendar is one thing that I am continually changing to meet our needs, I have been in the “testing”phase with this for a while. Here are a few of the things that I am doing to form routine and get my life organized.

Family meetings:

Every Saturday morning while the kids watch cartoons Brian and I have a family meeting. We talk about what is going on in the coming week and we also talk about what we need to do over the weekend. We check our calendars against each others and make sure that we are both on the same page about how the week is planned out. Saturday morning works really well for us because I am awake and ready to plan the next week. When we were trying to do family meetings during the week in the evening it was not working at all. I could not stay awake- whoops!

Meal planning:

Saturday mornings I sit down at my dining room table with a cup of tea and a stack of cookbooks and I plan out our meals for the week. I usually have two meals that are no brainers, for example- tacos and pizza, two meals that are slow cooker meals and the rest are your standard preparation type meals. Once I figure out what meals I want to make I write all of the ingredients I will need to buy for the meals on my meal calendar. My meal calendar also doubles as my shopping list for the week, this is very handy. When I shop this way I think that I spend less and what I get does not go to waste. There is also something nice about looking at my meal calendar while I am shopping and knowing what each day looks like.

This is my meal calendar- if you click on the image you will see a larger version- feel free to print it if you like.

How I fill in my meal calendar:

For breakfast I just write in all the things that we use to make breakfast each week, I do plan breakfast but it is more basic than my planning for dinner. Breakfast might say- juice, eggs, fruit.

For snack and lunch I do the same thing as breakfast. I since I am using it as my grocery list I write down all the things we eat as snack or have for lunch and that is how I know what to get at the store, and what to make during the week.

Dinner is where my real planning takes place. For each day I write the meal I am making at the top of the dinner section. Under the meal I write everything I need to buy for the recipe, sometimes it is an entire recipe. When I am done figuring out the meals for the week I can easily make changes to what day something is going to get made since I have the ingredients I need for everything on the calendar.

I know that this may seem like a crude way to do meals but so far it has done wonders for my evenings. I love knowing what to expect and when I make slow cooker meals I do the prep work in the morning so my evening is free.

*If you have a better system or know of a better meal calendar please share what you know with us.*

Chore Calendar:

Once I am sure about what the weeks meals are going to be and when they are going to be cooked I write them on my cute calendar hanging in my kitchen. I also write on my kitchen calendar what chores need to be done each day.

Monday- Bathroom, and Ewan helps me with collecting the garbage from all the garbage cans.

Tuesday- Dusting

Weds.- Laundry ( Brian does that):)

Thurs.- Wash floors

Friday- Vacuum

And everyday I sweep, on top of the other chores I am doing.

I started this in 2009 but was not very organized about it. The problem was that I never wrote the stuff down, I just had it in my head- which did not work.

Personal Planner:

Last year I started using a planner in the form of an appointment book- I used to be a PDA user. I found that writing things down stuck in my brain better than typing them out- and I like being able to look at a whole week or month at one time. This is the planner I am using this year:

This planner has tear-out grocery lists and meal lists for each week and it has a lot of space for your to-do list each week as well. The only down side I see to this planner so far is that you cannot look at a full month. I like that feature in planners but I think that I will be able to manage without it at least for this year. So far I really like my new planner- and it is pretty cute too:)

Hopefully these changes in my life will help things feel calmer and more organized. If not you’ll know about it because I will be writing about the changes I make;)

Re-adopt

05 Jan 2010 2 Comments

by ewegrant in Adoption, Family, Fun finds, Fun Internet Stuff, Kids, Pictures, Random, Soap Box, Uncategorized

On Dec. 23 Brian and I took the crew downtown for a very special occasion, Esuyawkal’s court date for his re-adoption. We had to be at the court-house at 8 am- which was difficult, but we made it. My Mom, Dad and my sister Toni met us there to share in the special occasion.

Here is the crew minus Brian and I:

We waited in a room with lots of toys and talked with our lawyer for a while. She then left to go and file some paperwork and we went to the Sheriffs office so that Esuyawkal could officially served his court summons. It was really cute- They actually have to touch you with the summons for you to have been officially served, I thought that was interesting. Esu make it very easy for the deputy by reaching out and grabbing his summons:)

Here is the happy father and his baby boy! We were able to take some pictures while we waited to see the judge. Seeing the judge was pretty cool, albeit brief. We literally stood in front of the judge for about 2 minutes, she asked us some questions that our lawyer told us how to answer and then she congratulated us and bid us farewell. It was short but sweet:)

After our trip to the courthouse we decided that since we were already downtown we would stay a little while and take in some Christmas sights. We visited the Marshall Fields Christmas windows which were cute but not as good as they used to be (Marshall Fields was bought by Macy’s:(). The kids also got to see a cute puppet show that was put on by a traveling puppeteer. We then visited the Christkindle market that is in Daley Plaza every year, we did not stay long since the weather was really nasty. After our outside adventures we were off to the Lego store, Ewan especially was really looking forward to this. The Lego store is pretty cool, the things you can do with Legos- who knew:).

Anwen watching the puppet show, you can see that the stage is attached to a bike. Pretty neat!

Esu is sitting next to the little old Lego lady:)

Ewan is cozying up to the Lego guy on the bench.

Our court date and our adventure afterward were the perfect way to kick off our Christmas holiday!

My favorite kitchen gear

18 Dec 2009 Leave a Comment

by ewegrant in Family, Food, Fun finds, Gluten Free Living, Random, Soap Box, Uncategorized

Last night I was standing in my kitchen cooking dinner and asking myself the question- What are my favorite kitchen items, what do I love to use the most in my kitchen? Here is what I came up with:

Cast Iron Skillet

My set of three cast iron skillet’s are not fancy and they were not expensive but they are awesome! My largest skillet is 10″ and it sits on my stove top, all the time. I don’t even bother putting it away anymore because I use it so much. When I first started using cast iron all my foods stuck to the skillet and it was quite frustrating but I seasoned it again and decided that it needed more use to become really well seasoned and now it is better than non-stick. My food cooks more evenly and does not stick and cast iron does not cause cancer at least not yet.

Mortar and Pestle

My mortar and pestle is probably the thing in my kitchen that provide me the most enjoyment when I am using it. I love the experience of using a mortar and pestle, working the food by hand, in a way that has been done for a really long time. I have two mortar and pestles one that is small and one that I can easily make a batch of guacamole in. The smaller one is good for herbs and spices, the larger one is good for, well, larger things:)

Vintage Le Creuset cookware

My Le Creuset cookware is vintage and was purchased on Ebay by my dear husband one year for Mothers Day. Mine is lemon yellow and came with a large dutch oven, two sauce pans, and two skillet’s. I love my Le Creuset, and it loves me!

It does not stick to my food.
It is easy to clean off even after having been hot and boiling with food for a long time.
It cooks my food evenly and faster than less sturdy cookware.
It does not have that nasty non-stick stuff on it, so I can use any utensil I want in it:).

New Le Creuset cookware is expensive but used is not so bad and even if it is more than you would normally spend it is really worth the money, you will be handing it down to your kids kids:)

Serrated peeler

I don’t know why I love this I just do. I guess it is because things that used to be hard to peel are not hard to peel anymore. I can peel fruit with relative ease and even peeling potatoes is easier. It is a small pleasure to own this gadget.

Wustof Knives

This was the knife that rocked my world! I was given this knife as a gift from my cousin and his wife for Christmas one year. I had never own really good knives so I had not known what I was missing out on, the this knife changed everything. I know have 4 Wustof knives- yes I am collecting them slowly as they are really expensive. Cooking with good knives is an amazing thing- It makes cooking easier and way more fun. If you are cooking a lot it is worth the money to get good knives even if it is only one a year;)

Electric Hot Water Kettle

For years I had a conventional hot water kettle and I liked it and it served its purpose but because the water took a while to boil I did not use it very often. I use my electric hot water kettle everyday and least a few times, we heat water for oatmeal in the morning, tea and coffee. Anytime we need boiling water this is what we use, it is very handy and time-saving.

Wooden spatula

I use wooden spoons and spatulas every time I cook, and they are something that I feel I can never have too many of. Brian thinks I am nutty when I get excited about a wooden spoon or spatula but thats ok, I am ok with being a little nutty about somethings:)

Rice Maker

The rice maker is a recent addition to my kitchen and I am glad to have it! Since I cannot eat gluten, rice is a popular dish in my house and having the rice maker makes it easy as 1-2-3. My rice maker can make 20 cups of rice and it will make all different kinds of rice as well with different settings for brown and white. It will also steam veggies, I have not done that yet but if I ever wanted to apparently it will do it for me. I really loathed making rice on the stove because it would never cook fast enough and it always boiled over. The rice maker makes my life easier if only in this one small way, with 5 people to cook for I will take what ease I can get.

Your six year old…

10 Dec 2009 2 Comments

by ewegrant in Books, Childrearing, Family, Fun finds, Kids, Random, Soap Box, Uncategorized

Have you ever read this series of books- Your 1-year-old, two-year-old, three-year-old, etc.

I have several times, for several different ages. Of all of the books that I have read these books are the most helpful when it comes to understanding where your child is developmentally at what ever age you are reading about. I really love these books and when I start feeling like I have no idea what to do for my children I get one of these books out from the library and everything starts to become clearer.

I recent picked up Your six-year-old, Loving and Defiant, as Ewan is now six and has been having a difficult time. There are a lot of things that have been happening lately that are not “normal” for Ewan but as it turns out are “normal” for six-year olds. The section in these books called Characteristics of the age is my favorite section and where I find the most useful information. The author does a really good job at explaining the ups and downs of the age, and why certain behaviors crop up. She also gives some good advice on how to help your child through the rough developmental times in their life.

I find it so wonderful when I open up a book about children and read something that describes my child exactly I guess I like feeling like I am not the only one with a cranky, hard to please, ambivalent, pushy 6-year-old:) My Ewan is totally loving and sweet and also a little defiant and it is nice to know that it is totally normal for his age.

It is easy to start thinking that a little misbehavior is a glimpse into your child future, I know that sometimes I feel like that, but that usually because I am in the beginning of a developmental change and haven’t quite caught on yet that my child is changing. Sometimes I go weeks not understanding why I don’t feel like I know my child. I know my oldest is 6 you would think that I would have caught on by now- but sometimes the changes happen slowly, they just sort of sneak up on you.

There are lots of sections in these books, some I find to be good while others I don’t find that useful. There is a section in the back that talks about what kind of birthday party to have for a child of the age you are reading about. While I have not really used that section I think that it is neat that she writes about that subject.

And now here is a picture of my 6-year-old whom I love all the way to the moon and back:)

This photo was taken by my friend Mary Karen- I love it!

Nifty links cont.

06 Dec 2009 Leave a Comment

by ewegrant in ECO, Fun finds, Kids, Pictures, Random, Soap Box, Uncategorized

Ok, so I was spending some time on Esty this morning and just had to share some of the sellers I came across. These are some of my favorites- click on the pictures and you will be magically taken to the Esty shop selling these awesome finds;)