The Blessing Of Food Network

I'm at a point in my life where I'd like to perfect my cooking skills. I confess, now that our family enjoys watching the Food Network station, one can't help but want to try out some of their delicious recipes!!!

I also feel a sense of pride after I've fixed something that would or could have been easily bought from a store. It's like it was made by MY HANDS and I know what I put in it. I don't know. It could be me, but it's a joy to be cooking my own dishes from scratch.

Today, is Monday and it's a day that is set aside for my daughter Nelly to be my special helper for the day. Since it's her day, she'll be helping me fix waffles. We ran out of pancake syrup, so I'm going to try and fix my own syrup. We'll be having STRAWBERRY WAFFLES. So, I'll make a STRAWBERRY SYRUP to go with it. Here's how I'll make the waffles:

2 cups of regular pancake mix
1/3 cup of vegetable oil
1/3 cup of thawed packaged strawberries with sugar

For the syrup:
2 cups of white sugar
1/2 cup of brown sugar
1 cup of water
1/3 cup of strawberry ice cream topping (that we've had in the fridge for a while now)

So, we'll see how it turns out. But, the most exciting thing about fixing this is that I'll be fixing this with my daughter. You see, I've been feeling the Lord nudging me to start having the kids in the kitchen with me for quite some time. I've tried it many times before and I confess, it hasn't been so pleasant. I guess because I've had all 5 kids in there with me, too much excitement from them, and just plan MADNESS happening in there!!! (laughing)

Food network station has also been used to let me see the benefits of including your children in the kitchen too. I've seen the hosts have their children or grandchildren on their shows. I've also enjoyed listening to their stories of being in the kitchen with their parent and how being with them had inspired them in some way and just seeing their faces glow as they share their story about that moment being in there with them. I know it's television and that they got to do that. But, I believe some of those stories are true and I want my kids to have that kind of memories of being in the kitchen with me. So, knowing and feeling that, I've got to die to myself and began to learn how to cook with my kiddos. I look forward to the blessing that will come from it.

Dear Lord, thank You for tugging at my heart about having the kids in the kitchen with me. May this time today with Nelly be a blessing. In Your name, Amen.