Happenings in this House!

 This was a week of weather!  The beginning of the week was so very hot!  We did a lot of nothing!  On Tuesday night, a huge storm came through - this pictures show the front edge of the storm as it came over top of our house.  I was on "storm watch" since this happened after the rest of the family went to bed.  A cold front finally moved in on Wednesday evening (after another storm!).  Such relief!

 The boys just chilling out.  We watched a lot of cartoons on Monday and Tuesday!!

 On Thursday, both boys got haircuts . . . . and suckers.  Notice those blue lips?? Gotta love blueberry dum-dums :-) 

 Such a cutie!  The boys were in sorry needs of those said haircuts and look so much better now!

 The boys are waiting for Papa!!!  From the time Josh got up on Friday, all I heard was "Papa? Papa?"  I told him Papa would be coming after lunch to which he replied, "Pizza, Papa?" LOL  Both boys were thrilled when Papa and Grandma arrived  - so much so, that I no longer existed!  They actually went home with the grandparents and are there for a nice long weekend!

 Without Kids, we are enjoying some great time together!  On Saturday, we took time to completely clean out the garage.  We also did a few other small projects including scrounging up all of our pop cans so we could turn those in and, if you can believe it, have enough money from that to pick up the last few hinges we need to hang the cabinets in the kitchen (which will get done today or tomorrow!) before heading out on a date night.  We started out with dinner at Red Lobster (which we love plus we even had a gift certificate to help us out a little.)  From there, we drove to Muskegon to visit the beach.  If you know me at all, you know that I love the beach - it is a pipe dream of mine to own a cottage on Lake Michigan . . I will settle for a nice lake even . . .I want to watch the storm come in over the lake . . and see the ice cold frozen water.  I just love it.  We don't get out to the beach often right now so this was just a wonderful thing!  Yes, it was a little chilly but we sat in the sand and just watched the water for awhile before heading to "our" ice cream place at the Campground. 

 :-)  We have a thing about taking pictures  . .. and Darryl makes weird faces so I joined in.  This is one of the "worst" ones LOL

Finally, we ended our night by going to the drive-in!  We LOVE the drive-in movie theatre.  They even still have the old working speakers (or can tune your radio to the station instead.  We saw Mr. Popper's Penguins (which is a cute movie) but mostly just enjoyed being out together.  We very much look forward to taking our boys to the drive-in and building memories with them - Darryl has great memories of going to the drive-in as a kid, dressed in in PJ's and enjoying popcorn. 

So, those are the basics of our week!  Hope you enjoyed your week as much as we did ours!

21 Days of Prayer Challenge - Day 19 - Salvation

Encouragement from Brooke

There is NOTHING my heart yearns for more than my sons' salvations. To quote from the eBook:

"Day after day you will parent, intentionally seeking the heart of your son. But until the King of

kings and Lord of lords turns his heart of stone to a heart of flesh, your son's actions will be

motivated by what is pleasing to him, rather than what is pleasing to the Lord."

p. 15

Everything hinges on this. Oh, we can pray for protection, good friends and influences and positive, fruit-bearing

experiences for our sons along the way. But until their hearts submit to Jesus they will continue to choose

themselves and their own way.

Elyse Fitzpatrick, in her book entitled,

Give Them Grace: Dazzling Your Kids with the Love of Jesus, says

“There is no easy way to say it, but it must be said: parents and churches are not passing on a robust Christian

faith and an accompanying commitment to the church.”

Take a moment today to look long and hard at your parenting. Is it Gospel-centered, or have you allowed the

world's “stinking thinking” to creep into your home?

"Because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God

raised him from the dead, you will be saved." ~Romans 10:9

I have been personally praying for this very thing for my boys since before they were born and it is a constant burdon on my heart.

Today take time to pray the 10 prayers located in the Salvation chapter!

Creative Memory Spotlight - Do you need to shop?

Do you have some things you need to work on your scrapbooking or other paper crafts?  Well, now is the perfect time to shop.  I could really use some last minute orders this month so, if you have been thinking about it . .. go ahead and check out my WEBSITE and order away!!!    There are current sales listed as well as a clearance section!  Call your friends and see if they want to order too - combine your orders and divide the shipping costs!  I was scrapbooking on Friday evening using one of the 11 x 14 Pic Folio Albums shown below . . . .

... and was reminded of how quick they are for whatever you are working on right now!  Or, stock up on some pages, get the page protectors you are in need of or, of course, pick up something brand new! 

Thanks and, as always, I appreciate your orders!

21 Days of Prayer Challenge - Day 18 - Anger

Encouragement from Brooke

So much of the Christian life is a choice. Every day (multiple times a day) we’re presented with a choice

to choose God or choose ourselves. Anger is a perfect example.

You can just feel it coming, can’t you? Anger is an almost total body experience. Muscles get tight. Temples

throb. Jaw clenches. Explosion feels imminent … wooing us into believing we have no choice but to react.

But it’s not true.

We almost always have a choice when it comes to anger. We can choose to embrace it and sin. Or choose to put

it away, and instead choose kindness, self-control, compassion, and love.

"Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice."

~Ephesians 4:31

Today's Challenge - take time to pray the 10 prayeres in the anger chapter for your son(s) today!

Father's Day Brunch Recipes

In my recent post about what I did for Father's Day, I mentioned that I made brunch for all of us on Sunday morning. 

Doesn't that just look yummy? (And yes, that is ketchup you see sitting on that high chair back there !)

Here are all three recipes - all very good and, really, pretty easy to pull off in one morning.

First up was the Ham and Cheese Quiche.  This is a recipe that I've posted it before and it is still one of all time favorites.  It is so simple to make and so very tasty!! 

Next up is the Easy Cheese Danish which I adapted from The Barefoot Contessa on Food Network.

Ingredients

• 8 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 2 extra-large egg yolks, at room temperature
• 2 tablespoons ricotta cheese
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1 tablespoon grated lemon zest (2 lemons)
• 2 sheets (1 box) frozen puff pastry, defrosted
• 1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water, for egg wash

Directions

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper.

Place the cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment and cream them together on low speed until smooth. With the mixer still on low, add the egg yolks, ricotta, vanilla, salt, and lemon zest and mix until just combined. Don't whip!

Unfold 1 sheet of puff pastry onto a lightly floured board and roll it slightly with a floured rolling pin until it's a 10 by 10-inch square. Cut the sheet into quarters with a sharp knife. Place a heaping tablespoon of cheese filling into the middle of each of the 4 squares. Brush the border of each pastry with egg wash and fold 2 opposite corners to the center, brushing and overlapping the corners of each pastry so they firmly stick together. Brush the top of the pastries with egg wash. Place the pastries on the prepared sheet pan. Repeat with the second sheet of puff pastry and refrigerate the filled Danish for 15 minutes.

Bake the pastries for about 20 minutes, rotating the pan once during baking, until puffed and brown. Serve warm.

This are so yummy!  I left the lemon zest out (we are not huge fans of the zest in things) I also made up a quick glaze with powdered sugar and lemon juice to drizzle on top as well. 

Finally, we had some Cheesy Hash browns.  The recipe I used was adapted from a Racheal Ray recipe on Food Network.

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 5 cups shredded frozen hash brown potatoes
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• Freshly grated nutmeg, to taste
• 1 cup extra-sharp white Cheddar crumbles

Directions

Heat a large skillet with extra-virgin olive oil and butter over medium-high heat. Add onions and let soften 2 to 3 minutes. Add potatoes, season with salt and pepper and cook 20 minutes, turning occasionally, until brown and crispy. Season with a little freshly grated nutmeg, to taste, and add cheese. Turn the potatoes and onions with cheese to melt the crumbles and crisp the cheese a bit, about 1 minute. Transfer to serving dish

This recipe worked perfectly.  I just used shredded cheddar in place of the Cheddar crumbles and it worked out fine. 

If you try any of these recipes please let me know if you like them (and don't tell me if you don't LOL) 

21 Days of Prayer Challenge - Day 17 - Self-Control

Today's challenge is to pray the 10 prayers for your sons shared in the chapter on Self-Control. 

Short and sweet today :-) 

Tot School - The week I researched teaching ideas for the fall

Summer is in full swing . . . which means we are just playing a lot.  This past weekend, we went to a local Farm and Tractor Show because I have a 2 year old who loves tractors and had a ton of fun.  Josh would stop in front of a tractor, turn, and smile, waiting for me to take a picture because he likes them so much.  If that isn't good learning, I don't know what is!!  :-) 

As I really start to think about the fall and teaching my Pre-schooler (seriously???) I'm really trying to focus on some main ideas - or maybe it would be better to say, I'm trying to set my own focus on what and how I want to teach my little guy.  One of the key areas on my heart is Bible - how to incorporate daily learning into Bible.  I started digging and came up with some websites and a few blogs I thought I would share.  This doesn't mean I will be doing all of these ideas (or any of them - I'm still early in the process) but a couple of key thoughts keep hitting me.  1) I love literature based ideas and 2) I love easy, simple, ideas that build on each other.  At my boys ages, teaching through the ABC's seems to be the very best idea.  First, Josh is ready for that now (he knows his ABC's) and second, Nate can tag along this year and than be ready next year to get his full lessons. 

One thing that I did early on this past week was to set out a schedule of what to accomplish each week throughout the summer.  This week, my main gaols are:
1. To research the circle time concept; decide how I wanted to do that time in the morning; make a list of needed supplies; get as many of those supplies as possible.
2. Create or "morph" (from someone else) a lesson plan set up for our teaching.
3. Layout a basic overview (very, very basic) of Sept-Dec.

In doing research on Circle Time, I ran across a blog called The Ramblings and Adventures of a S.A.H.M..  and found exactly what I was looking for!  (How exciting when that happens?!?!)   She not only shared what she does for Circle Time (or Calendar Routine) she also gives lots of links for the information she gathered as well.  So, if you start at her blog, and click away, you'll not only get the printables you need, you'll also see other examples of the set up and other ideas of what to use in this time each day.

I feel like I have this task moving along.  I do need to get lots of things printed and I'll probably use Staples or Office Max so they turn out with great color.  I have a Calendar that I used when I taught school previously which will work perfectly :-)  The only other thing I really have to do is decide how to set up my dining room decor for this to fit in!!  (A small house means rooms have many purposes!) 

For the second item on my list, I totally 100% "happened" upon exactly what I needed! 

I post a link every week in this actual post to this very blog but I had never really explored everything she had on her site.  She has a tab that is called Preschool Corner and in that little tab she has a link for Preschool Planning Sheet and Tot School Planning Sheet!!  Seriously??? That is exactly what I needed!

My plan is to use the Preschool Planning Sheet for 32 month old.  He'll be three in October and I think the set up will work well for him.  Looking at the Tot School Planning Sheet really helped me focus how I was going to work with my 19 month old as well.  Using the two separate sheets will allow me to focus on 2-3 three each day for him specifically.  One will always be circle time; 3 days a week he will be part of what I do for Bible.  After that, I'll just have something for him to do related to what his big brother is doing as well.  I really love how just finding that little list of things on a blog I've followed for awhile, solved a problem for me!

My final goal . .. I'm still working on this week :-)  I'll save those links for next week as well as a link to whatever I design for my basic plan. 

Please note, this concept is all new to me.  We are strongly considering homeschooling for our boys for many, many reasons and this is just a great way to do a "trial" run.  Maybe you are also thinking about something like this and what I write, share, post will help you out as well.  I'll share links to all of the ideas I find to use - it is so easy to get overwhelmed with what is available; maybe what I do can help someone else too!

Enjoy :-)