Present Moment Happiness, Be Proactive, Baked Onions – HBHW Newsletter

May 26th, 2010

Editorial

It seems like last week just went zipping by!  I was happily busy with new projects as well as enjoying my family.   I’m taking my own advice and trying to enjoy each and every moment we spend together.  Time is fleeting,  as we all know.

The rhubarb has gone to seed, which is fine.  We’ve certainly had our fill.  When we get hungry for rhubarb pie again, I’ll just reach in the freezer.  It’s like anything we eat – when we have a bumper crop, we enjoy it for a while, then we have to freeze it and walk away.  But, we’ll be happy to get a taste of rhubarb once again, a few months down the road.  We’re on to blueberries now!

Our inspirational quote and story are about appreciation for the present.  Each moment we live should be our happiest moment.  Please take a moment to read and reflect on both the quote and the story and see if you can gain perspective about the most important times in your life.

The featured article this week is somewhat on the same topic as our inspirational quote and story.  It’s hard to live each moment happily enjoying our family and friends when we keep having to bob-and-weave while life throws us punches.  Wouldn’t it be nice if we didn’t have to “react” to every stress thrown our way?  What if we were in charge of our situation because we were “proactive” instead?  Please take a few minutes to read the article and see if this makes sense in your life.

Those are my thoughts this week. As always, I welcome your comments and suggestions. Feel free to email me at susanne@hillbillyhousewife.com

Warm Regards,

Susanne – The Hillbilly Housewife

Inspirational Quote

The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, not to worry about the future, or not to anticipate troubles, but to live in the present moment wisely and earnestly.
~Buddha~

Sponsor

First Virtual Parenting Retreat

Yesterday I had a chance to talk at Ellen Braun’s First Virtual Parenting Retreat. I talked for about an hour about time savers in the kitchen. It was a fun and exciting call with lots of great questions and feedback.

You can still register to listen in to some of the other presenters today and tomorrow free of charge. If you would like access to all recordings and bonuses you can do so as well… if you decide to upgrade your free membership to a VIP one that gives you recordings etc, use coupon code savetendollars to save $10.

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To learn more about the Parenting Retreat and to find out how you can listen to the remaining sessions and get access to all recordings and bonuses, please visit:
http://www.hillbillyhousewife.com/parenting-retreat

News From The HBHW Club

What? You haven’t heard about the Hillbilly Housewife Club? It’s a members only forum packed full of great information, resources, and friendly chit chat about the things we are all interested in – fun, frugal living. Come Join Us And See What All The Chatter Is About!

FREE RESOURCE  – STARTING A CRAFT BLOG FOR FUN AND PROFIT.

As I mentioned last week, one of our Club members has successfully started her own crafting blog.  In less than one week’s time, she created a beautiful little blog and has already been seeing results!

Victoria has been crafting adorable soft-sculpted baby dolls for many years and selling her creations on Etsy.  Now, with the input from many of our friends at the Club, Victoria has been encouraged to create a whole line of clothes to go with her dolls (think Barbie), as well as quilts and doll furniture (courtesy of her handy husband).

If you want to take a look at Victoria’s new blog and check out her adorable baby dolls, click on the link to her site here:  OoooohBabyDolls

Can you picture yourself working from home, making money doing something you like to do – like crafting?

If so, you’ll want to join us at the HBHW Club and check out this valuable resource,  STARTING A CRAFT BLOG FOR FUN AND PROFIT.

Written by successful stay-at-home entrepreneur and author, Nicole Dean, this informative resource sells as an ebook for around $15, but as a Club member, you get it FREE with your membership. That’s right! Your membership in the Club has already paid for itself when you open this FREE resource and put it to work for you! Talk about a return-on-investment!

Even if you don’t know the first thing about a blog, this resource will give you the information and tools you need to get your Crafting Blog up and running – and making money!

At the Club, you’ll not only get this FREE resource valued at around $15, you’ll also have a sounding board to help you brainstorm ideas about your new Crafting Blog.

Along with this valuable resource, STARTING A CRAFT BLOG FOR FUN AND PROFIT, Club members also receive two audios plus a bonus resource from Nicole about time management, which will be very valuable when you start your Craft Blog!

This resource is available to all my readers as an ebook by clicking on the link here. For around $15 you can get the information and tools you need to start your own Craft Blog For Fun And Profit.

Or… Join the HBHW Club now and the resource is FREE with your membership! This valuable resource will be yours, PLUS the benefits of having a forum for sharing ideas about everything from making money at home to getting out of debt to frugal tips, and much, much more.

This is a tremendous opportunity to finally start making money at home doing something you like… crafting and talking about crafting! Join the Club, get the resource for FREE, and start making money at home.

Not sure about joining the Club right now? You can still take advantage of Nicole Dean’s expertise in the field of money making at home. If you have a love for crafting, and talking about crafting, you’ll want to explore creating your own Craft Blog For Fun And Profit .

You don’t want to miss this or any of our informative and valuable resources. Join the HBHW Club and grab your FREE resource today!

As a special to you, the HBHW newsletter subscriber, you can join for only $10 per month. Click on this link for all the details: http://www.hillbillyhousewifeclub.com/special.html

Still not sure about joining the HBHW Club? How about if I make it real easy. I’ll let you try it out for just a dollar for the first 7 days.

How will you benefit from joining the HBHW Club with this offer? As an example, for just that one dollar you’ll have 7 days of access to over 400 great frugal recipes that are tried and true, with a new recipe every day. You’ll also have 7 days to ask your most puzzling frugal homemaking questions – and even get answers!

Join us now and enjoy 7 days of frugal fun. Click on the link here and come aboard! http://www.hillbillyhousewifeclub.com/special.html

Now, let’s just take a peek at what’s been going on at the HBHW Club Forum.

A Bumper Crop Of Blueberries And Apricots had one of our friends at the Club jumping for joy, but scrambling for ideas!  We chimed in with methods for freezing the fruit as well as some ideas for tasty treats.  When you’ve got around 50 pounds of fruit to deal with, it’s nice to have a few suggestions of how to use it all up.  There’s nothing worse than wasting such a bounty!

Medicinal Uses For Herbs came up in our discussion about planting an herb garden.  One of our friends at the Club listed 15 herbs and their uses in healing what ails us.  Did you know that you can brew tea using catnip?  Yes, catnip is not just for those silly kitty toys!  Make a tea using catnip to relieve colds or fevers, and to help relieve headaches and upset stomachs.  It also has a mild sedative effect which can be used to soothe stress before bedtime.  Who knew?  Grow a little pot of catnip and see if your kitty will be willing to share it with you.

My Walking Challenge has gotten more challenging.  We’ve been sick in our house and it seems many of our friends at the Club have had their share of reasons (excuses?) to not go out on their walk.  Well, hot weather and rain really are reasons not to walk.  But, we all know we have to get back in the habit of walking every day, right?  Although, we are doing other things for exercise when we can’t walk – like floor exercises – so we’re not totally ignoring our challenge.  With the gentle nudge of our friends, we get back on track, eventually!

Healthy Diets Often Involve Adding Foods as well as eliminating food.  Many of our friends at the Club have found that adding certain foods, like oatmeal and nuts, can actually help you lose weight.  Good nutrition isn’t all about cutting out the bad food, it’s about a well balanced diet.  We can eliminate the cookies, cake, chips and soft drinks, but until we add the healthy foods into our diet, we aren’t really eating a healthy diet.

Along with healthy and well fed families, we are discussing topics that include frugal tips for cleaning and cooking.  Homesteading and gardening are popular topics, as well.  If something has to do with keeping our homes and families happy, we’ll discuss it!

How would you like to join the conversation? As a Club member, you’ll be able to share your opinions, frugal tips, and ideas on topics most important to your life.

Why don’t you join us so you can get in on the conversation. I look forward to chatting with you in the member area.

Click the following link and try The HBHW Club for only $1. We’d love to have you come join us! http://www.hillbillyhousewifeclub.com/special.html

When you join us at the HBHW Club, you’ll want to be sure to take a stroll through the resources available free to Club members only. Popular resources include:

• Frugal Gardening
• Simple Summer Cooking
• Frugal Family Summer Fun
• Pantry Cooking
• Freezer/Pantry Challenge & Meal Planning
• Cleaning With Vinegar And Baking Soda
• Setting Up A Family Budget
• Getting Out Of Debt For Good
• Utility Bill Savings
• Meal Planning Guide – Simple Step-by-Step Method

Let me know what you think of the resources and if there are any topics we should explore further. As a Club member, your opinion is highly valued because it’s YOUR Club!

Join The Hillbilly Housewife Club for Just a Dollar

I’d like to share one of the recipes that was posted on the HBHW Club this past week.

Stuffed Baked Onions

• 4 large Vidalia onions (or other sweet variety)

• 1/4 cup butter
• 1  1/2 cup stuffing style bread crumbs
• 1 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
• 1/2 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
• 1/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese for topping

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and spray a shallow baking dish with cooking spray.

Take skins off onions and place in large pot.  Cover onions with water and add 1 teaspoon salt to water.  Put pot over medium high heat until water just reaches boiling, then turn down and simmer slowly for 20 minutes.

Remove onions to cutting board and carefully scoop out the middle of the onion, (retaining onion you remove), being sure you leave a good solid outer layer.  The onion should stand on its own and be solid, like a bowl.  Set these onion “bowls” into a shallow baking dish.

In a large skillet, melt the butter and add the cut out portions of the onion, chopping into small pieces.  Saute until onion is tender.  Add the bread crumbs, Worcestershire, and Parmesan, cooking over low heat until bread crumbs are moistened and Parmesan cheese melts.

Spoon this mixture into onion “bowls” and top evenly with the 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, and put in preheated 350 degree oven, uncovered, for 30 to 40 minutes or until filling starts to brown.

Listed here is a sampling of recent recipes added, making a total of more than 400 recipes currently available to our Club members.

• Busy Day Rice Onion Bake
• Tallerini
• Deluxe Broccoli Onion Bake
• Curried Rice Onion Skillet

We welcome recipe submissions from our friends at the Club and are always happy to see what’s cooking in your kitchen.  Our aim is to have six recipes posted each week.  That’s a lot of recipes!

Featured Articles

We all have days, weeks, even months where we just keep spinning our wheels trying to catch up with all the things that are thrown at us during each busy day.  We feel as if we just keep reacting by ducking and dodging out of the way.

What would happen if we quit “reacting” and started being “proactive” instead?

Click the link below to see if you can change how you deal with all the stresses of everyday life:

Live A Proactive Life

Healthy Hillbilly Housewife

Here’s what’s new on the healthy hillbilly housewife section. You can also go straight to http://www.healthy.hillbillyhousewife.com

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Frugal Tips

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Do you have a tip to share? Fill out the submit a frugal tip form and I’ll be glad to add it to the site and share your tip in an upcoming edition of the newsletter.

Recipes

Here are some of the most recent recipes that have been added to the HBHW site. Enjoy!

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Do you have a recipe you would like to share? Click here to send it to me and I’ll be happy to add it to the website.

I’m Looking For:

This section is all about you. If you are looking for a particular recipe or a tip on how to do something, submit it here and I will post it in an upcoming newsletter. I’ll give you my input and other readers of the newsletter will have the opportunity to share their recipes and tips as well. So take a moment to post your questions and of course if you have a tip or idea for any question posted in this section feel free to leave a comment under the appropriate post.

I’m Looking For Requests
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I’m Looking For Responses
Below you will find some of the recent responses to the “I’m Looking For” Requests. You may also want to go directly to this section and browse through all the recent submissions and replies. To do so, click on “I’m Looking for” here, and start looking through them.
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Inspirational Story

The Best Time Of My Life
~Author Unknown~

It was June 15, and in two days I would be turning thirty. I was insecure about entering a new decade of my life and feared that my best years were now behind me.

My daily routine included going to the gym for a workout before going to work. Every morning I would see my friend Nicholas at the gym. He was seventy-nine years old and in terrific shape. As I greeted Nicholas on this particular day, he noticed I wasn’t full of my usual vitality and asked if there was anything wrong. I told him I was feeling anxious about turning thirty. I wondered how I would look back on my life once I reached Nicholas’s age, so I asked him, “What was the best time of your life?”

Without hesitation, Nicholas replied, “Well, Joe, this is my philosophical answer to your philosophical question:

“When I was a child in Austria and everything was taken care of for me and I was nurtured by my parents, that was the best time of my life.

“When I was going to school and learning the things I know today, that was the best time of my life.

“When I got my first job and had responsibilities and got paid for my efforts, that was the best time of my life.

“When I met my wife and fell in love, that was the best time of my life.

“The Second World War came, and my wife and I had to flee Austria to save our lives. When we were together and safe on a ship bound for North America, that was the best time of my life.

“When we came to Canada and started a family, that was the best time of my life.

“When I was a young father, watching my children grow up, that was the best time of my life.

“And now, Joe, I am seventy-nine years old. I have my health, I feel good and I am in love with my wife just as I was when we first met. This is the best time of my life.”

Final Thought

That’s it for this edition of the Hillbilly Housewife Newsletter. I hope you’ve had as much fun reading it as I had creating it for you. I also hope that you have found the information helpful and useful. And by all means feel free to forward the newsletter to family and friends or even better, encourage them to subscribe to it.

Do you have a question, a tip, a recipe or a story you’d like to share with us? Email it to me and I’ll include it in a future issue. Can’t wait to see what you have to say.

Warm Wishes,

Susanne – The Hillbilly Housewife