Weekly Menu

Welcome to the week of my Birthday :-)  I love my birthday, to be quite honest.  I feel like I've earned my year and want to celebrate it!  I also start babysitting again this next week so we'll be transitioning back into that routine once again too.

Here's our plan:

Thursday - Spaghetti and Garlic Bread.  Yep, it is grocery shopping day and I have learned that the last thing I feel like doing is cooking after shopping for hours so this is starting to become my "go to" grocery shopping day meal!!

Friday - Tonight's dinner is my birthday dinner with Darryl and the boys . I've learned that I don't want to cook on my "Birthday" but, in order to do that, I have to plan!  We are going to have Steaks on the Grill (Darryl gets to cook!), Baked Potatoes (I love to cook them in the oven so the skins are nice and crisp too - then I dig out the inside and make my own Stuffed Potato Skins YUM!), and Strawberry Pretzel Salad.  I'll be honest - Darryl doesn't like the salad BUT it is my birthday dinner and I love it so I make it every year HA!   I will also make my own birthday cake - Chocolate Turtle Cake :-)  I used to always have Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Frosting with M and M's on top but the Turtle Cake is the best . . Maybe I'll put M and M's on top of THAT!

Saturday - Today IS my birthday :-)  Darryl has plans for us today so I won't be cooking.  My mother-in-law is coming to watch the boys so I'll leave gourmet food for her to cook like Mac and Cheese, Hot Dogs, etc HA!

Sunday - I'll be honest, this is still part of my birthday weekend so the last thing I want to do is cook!!!  So, for lunch today Darryl will grill some Hamburgers for us and we'll have homemade fries.  (Did I mention I picked up the exact Deep Fryer I was looking for - at Walmart off the clearance rack for $19.00?? Sure did!)  For dinner I'm not sure what we will have . . .. I'm guessing pizza :-)

Monday - This is our first day back to babysitting.  I don't really foresee any problems today so it isn't really a big deal but in order to plan ahead a little, I think we'll have Lasagna and Garlic Bread.  I can put the lasagna together throughout the day as needed and have it in the oven in plenty of time

Tuesday - Gymnastics!!!  Taco's are my go to meal on these days because it is ready to go in a moment.  I found a new Avocado "dressing" for Taco's on Pinterest I want to try with these tonight.

Wednesday - I'm tired and I'm just typing this menu!  Breakfast is becoming my "go to" Wednesday night meal.  So Waffles and Sausage will be good for tonight.  Sometimes my husband comes home before practice but I'm never sure until the last minute - this is an easy meal to serve to all of us. 

WHEW!  What's coming up next week?  A friend and I are cooking all of the food for the ladies tea at our church.  I'm thinking that we will be eating very simple meals at home next week because I'll use up all my "cooking desires" on Saturday!! 

Did you notice I didn't pick any recipes from my recipe books I picked out for the month.  It was kind of ironic that I picked a Pressure Cooker to learn how to use after the recent events.  These "busy" weeks tend to take me back to the tried and true recipes that I know how to make quickly :-) 

ABC Wall - well, at the start of the wall

Back in January I posted an idea on my Too Cute Not To Toot post about making an alphabet wall.  The idea comes from jenni bowlin studio inspiration and here is the inspiration photo:

Isn't that just awesome?  My first "job" was figuring out where to do this project.  I finally decided to do it next to the boys growth chart in our only "hallway" in our house.  Here is what mine looks like so far:

Doesn't that look awesome?  Yes, only 4 letters.  This is a slow project for me.  I actually have letters E, F, and G in the house but due to rainy weather have not spray painted them or finished them as of yet.  Even though the letters are fairly inexpensive at only $2.49 each, to buy them all is a good chunk of money.  Instead, I'm buying 3-4 each time I finish the ones I have in hand.

They are super easy to make - I just spray painted them (in brown), traced them onto scrapbook paper and then used modge podge to adhere the scrapbook paper.  To hang them I used command strips and the letters haven't fallen off yet HA!

I will post an update once the wall is complete but it could be a few months :-) 

Too Cute Not To Toot

Last week I shared some ideas for baby gifts . . .well I need to share one more especially since I remembered I DO have a friend expecting AND she is expecting a boy :-)  Check out this super cute idea from Less Than Perfect Life of Bliss.

I have to say that one of the trials joys of living in a small home is constantly finding ways to maintain clutter that is NEEDED.  Papers, mail, ect.  I saw this idea over at Lovely Crafty Home for a command center and am using it as some inspiration :-)

I love Birthdays and am working on creating a birthday board and special birthday decorations and traditions we do every year so when I came across these ideas from Growing a Jeweled Rose I had to share (plus this way I can find them again!)

The Well Ran Dry this week I guess - I've searched and searched and searched for great ideas . . .. I have plenty to keep my busy though so having a "slow" week is actually kind of nice!

Keep Crafty :-)

April Preschool

As I mentioned last week, my kids had plans to go to Papa and Nana's for most of the week so we wouldn't be doing any schooling.  Instead I'm going show you some of my new organization tools.

 First of all, I just want to share again this fabulous Bible.  I had found it recommended on a few blogs for preschoolers and I really love it.  The stories are well written, following Bible "language" as closely as it can.  It also gives simple but fun ideas to do with the kids as you read.  I think it is a great introduction to the Bible.

 Last year, I created some lesson plan pages but . . . I must have deleted them so I started over.  These are 100% created for the way I work our day.  We have three parts to our day.  First, is our true Preschool lessons.  We do that in the morning from 10-11 and I follow the Rising Rock Stars Preschool from 1+1+1=1 pretty closely and then supplement from workbooks I've found or other on-line resources. Second, we have "PE" time.  It is really just a time to be active together.  I find a lot of ideas on Pinterest and have shared them in past posts.  This is something very specific that I do - it has to be planned or it won't get done.  Third, we have Planned Kid Time.  This is when we make a craft related to our theme activity or bake something.  This month (and into May) we are studying plants and flowers so we've planted grass seed and made plant diagrams as our fun activities. 

 This page is a suppliment to my lesson plans - it is actually the break down of our Preschool lessons so I know what worksheets we are doing each day and I also make notes of supplies that I need.  This was easier for me then trying to squeeze it all into the little square above :-)

I also had to find a place to store our weekly supplies.  Since we do our lessons in the dining room, I wanted our weekly stuff stored in that room.  I used to have two full bins of music under the piano but, I cleaned it all out and was able to consolidate into one bin so I could use the other for school

 Every evening, I take time to go through the next days lesson plan and make sure the boys binders are prepared, crafts stuff is ready, and I've done my prep work.  Then everything goes in this bin.  Makes it easy to have everything on hand.

As far as planning, I sit down a week or two before the start of the next month and fill in our calender.  This way I can write in appointments, grocery shopping days and field trips and can then plan lessons better.  From there, I fill out our lesson plans for the next month by scouring Pinterest for ideas :-)  I have two main Pinterest boards that I use.  First, I have a general Homeschool board where I throw all of the ideas I find to use.  There is no rhyme or reason - just ideas.  Second, I create a board for the month, like my April Homeschooling board.  When I'm planning and I find ideas that are actually going into my lesson plans, fit our letters that we are studying or fit the theme we are studying I put them in this board so I can easily find them.  At the end of the month, I will clean the board out, move unused items back to the general board, create a new board for the month and I think I will create a board for "Successful Homeschooling Ideas" so I can find stuff I may want to re-do later.

I keep all of my lesson plans in a binder and also include things like the music for our song of the week, project instructions and other misc items so that I can find them easily both right now and in the future when I go back through these units with Nathan.

Next week we'll be back into the full swing of preschool again.  I'm also beginning work on a Mackinaw City/Island Unit to do with the boys in June to prep them a little for our vacation.  Should be fun!

A Late Sunday Post

I had a post scheduled to go up today - you may have even seen it before I took it down for mulitiple reasons.

1)  It was title something to the effect of "What I'm Singing" because it was a post about the song I was singing today at church but, well, didn't.

2) The You tube video I embedded into the post had disappeared.

3) As referenced above I did not sing today.  Why?  Because at 6:45 this morning I was holding a puke bucket for a kid as he puked from the tips of his toenails.  (it was that bad - poor little guy).  Wasn't going to haul a "freshly" puking kid to church just to sing and the hubby worked today and wasn't going to be able to make it home in time for me to run to church.  So, no singing :-) 

Therefore, I'll save that post for when I REALLY sing that song :-)

The good news?  Said kid got sick one other time (about the time we would have been leaving for church had we gone); then ate lunch this afternoon and is outside playing. 

Should I also mentioned that my dog and I were awake from 3:30-6:30 listening to the neighbors dogs bark and howl in their garage . .. which is "right next to" my bedroom window?  My dog kept "woofing" in response and was driving me nuts too!  So, we are chillin' at home today. 

Enjoy your Sunday and yes, for the record, my kids were sad to miss church because they enjoy it so much! 

I'd like to be a Schedule Person

I like to say that I am a routine driven; that I can write a schedule and stick to it.  In reality, though, I tend to be more "chair driven".  I like to sit and relax.  Some might call that lazy but I call it the ability to relax. The problem is that sometimes I probably relax a little too much :-)   I've had a few months off from babysitting which has allowed freedom for my schedule and I've been taking advantage it.  Such as, not needing to set an alarm (my kids are my alarm) not needing to watch the clock to make sure lunch and snacks are served on time or making sure my kitchen is cleaned up before the 3:00.  :-)  While it has been nice I'm starting to feel the after effects of it - that feeling of not accomplishing much.  I'm also starting to see that as my kids get older, they need a little more structure to make sure that I can help direct them to some things throughout the day.  I don't mind cartoon watching but we working on watching less of it; I don't mind computer games but we are limiting those as well.  Other things, like crafts, schooling, and exercise time all taking planning.  I'm a really good planner but not a great finisher so I'm working on that too.

I figured that now that I'm getting close to "working" again (I.e.babysitting) it was time to implement a schedule of some kind once again.  Even though I put times into this, I'm well aware that with three boys ages 2, 3, and 4 plus a newborn, the times really don't matter.  I only use them as a guideline to help me stay on track throughout the day.

Basic Daily Schedule

6:00-7:00 - (yuck - but I have too!) - Do my Morning Routine (which consists of showering, getting ready for the day, making my bed and having my quiet time.)

7:00-8:00 - Kid time - this is when the munchkin and princess arrive and my kids get up so breakfast and getting kids dressed for the day are all part of this time.  My kids normally eat Pop Tarts or Fruit/Grain bars for breakfast so it is easy :-)

8:00-10:00 - Kids play time/my "work" time.  I have daily routines such as specific cleaning tasks, preschool planning, baking, or making stuff for my lunch for the next week etc. that needs to get done during this time.

10:00-11:00 - Preschool Time (we don't normally do preschool on Friday's - but we do our theme activities  and/or plug in some special activity during this time or on a nice day, we can all go to the park and have a picnic for lunch or take off to the mall to play in the playland or other fun activity that is "easy" to do with pre-school age kids.)

11:00-12:00 - Finish up Preschool activities (if we are doing a special project), do small tasks such as folding laundry, emptying the DW and also fixing lunch.

12:00-1:00 - Lunch time/clean up time/chore time for the boys (this is something new - the boys are going to have 4 basic chores they need to do after lunch such as - brush their teeth, make their beds, put their dishes away, and feed the animals.)

1:00-2:00 - "Gym" time (exercise time).  I want to do a small workout during this time and think the boys will have a fun time doing it with me; plus depending on the weather we can go for a walk or play a game inside or outside.

2:00-3:00 - Planned time for the kids - games, computer time, reading, etc.  (I want to start reading chapter books to the boys so I think we'll start this time with reading each day and then play learning games either computer driven or "floor" driven HA) I would even like to get them things like Army Guys and "teach" them how to play; build with legos and Lincoln Logs and more. Sidwalk chalk and paint, the pool (when it is warm enough), squirt guns, bubbles and more.  Really - this is directed play time to get the boys doing something other than sitting in front of the TV.

3:00-4:00 - Free time - for all of us :-) (This hour of time, for me, allows me to "gear up" for the end of the day which is pretty crazy with tired, hungry kids)

4:00-7:30 - Evening Routine - a lot goes on during this time; The munchkin and princess head home, dinner prep, Darryl comes home, family play time, dinner, bath time and bedtime.

7:30-9:30 - Adult time.  Kids are in bed and Darryl and I just watch our favorite shows and catch up on our computers.

9:30ish - bedtime.  (Well, I'm going to try!!)


There are some weekly things that aren't in the schedule such as grocery shopping and other errands.  I'm not really keen on hauling four kids to the grocery store if I don't have to so I will either shop on Saturday mornings with the boys (crazy, I know) or go in the evening after Darryl gets home - maybe on his 3:00 day or just go on Thursday's since he has ever other Thursday off (I can go during the day on those Thursdays).  We'll see :-) 

Weekends are not planned :-)  On Weekends that Darryl has to work my goal is to get scrapbooking done or plan some fun time with the boys.   The weekends he doesn't work - we try to do something as a family.   The kids get lots of free time :-)

 How's that for a schedule?  It really is similar to what we normally do but it contains more structure then what I do right now. 

Now . . to print this and up it into action!

Food Friday - Pan Fried Pork Chops

Pan Fried Pork Chops
adapted from The Pioneer Woman

  I love "The Pioneer Woman".  Her recipes tend to be more "down home" and I have yet to try one that I haven't liked.  (What I would like more is to have her kitchen. . .or her entire house HA!).  This recipe earned rave reviews from my husband and he has already asked that I make it for his birthday . . . which is not until next February! (He doesn't know that I already have this planned for Father's Day so HE doesn't have to cook!)  I will say that he also loved what I served with it - corn and "homemade"mac and cheese which was just medium shell pasta, cooked per the directions, and then melt a quarter block of Velveeta into the hot noodles.  Soooo yummy! 

 

Ingredients

1 teaspoon seasoned salt, plus more for seasoning
1 teaspoon ground black pepper, plus more for seasoning
8 pork breakfast chops
1 cup all-purpose flour
Cayenne pepper
1/2 cup canola oil
1 tablespoon butter

Directions

Salt and pepper both sides of the pork chops.

Combine the flour and some cayenne, salt and black pepper. Dredge each side of the pork chops in the flour mixture, and then set aside on a plate.

Heat the canola oil over medium to medium-high heat. Add the butter. When the butter is melted and the butter/oil mixture is hot, cook 3 pork chops at a time, 2 to 3 minutes on the first side. Flip and cook until the chops are golden brown on the other side, 1 to 2 minutes (make sure no pink juices remain). Remove to a plate and repeat with the remaining pork chops