BOOKS I FINISHED - JULY 2009

I have been an incredible slacker in the book reading department the last few months. I don't know what my problem is. So, here are the last two books I read.

The Women Who Raised Me: A Memoir, written by by Victoria Rowell

The author was raised in the foster care system her entire life. This book describes her time with the various women who helped to raise and care for her as she overcame all sorts of obstacles to achieve a very successful career. It was neat to see how all these people stepped in to give her the best life possible, despite the cards that were stacked against her. While this book was fine, I would have enjoyed it more if it hadn't been so long.

My Abandonment, written by Peter Rock

Inspired by a true story and written by a local author, this is a novel about a thirteen year old girl and her father, two people who live off the grid, camped out in a local park. It's written from the perspective of the girl and tells about their unconventional life and how it changes when the authorities take them into custody. I really enjoyed this book!

7/30/09 THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for air conditioning units in the windows and fans on the ceiling.

What's one thing that you're thankful for?

GUESS WHO HIT IT OFF?

We had ten people here on Sunday night - the 5 Ws, Granny, Tracy, Cody, Emily, and Hunter. Two of those ten people were side by side for most of the visit. Here's the pictorial evidence.

Within 30 minutes of arriving Hunter was requesting a seat next to Naomi for dinner.

They sat and glided together.

They played with the fancy football together.

They hung and glided together.

They played with the venus fly trap toy together.

They went "bottoms up" together.

They hung out (notice their linked arms) with Tracy together.

I think these two cousins hit it off pretty well on their first meeting! Wouldn't you agree?

THE PROPER WAY TO EAT A CUPCAKE

Evidently 99.9% of the world (that's everyone except me and one person on the Sonlight forums) doesn't know the proper way to eat a cupcake. So, as an act of community service, I'm going to give you a free lesson. Please excuse my multiple chins and lower jaw/cheek layers. There's a reason I stick to blogging instead of pursuing modeling. Please also excuse the umbrella sticking out of my head like a horn. I know it's unprofessional, but I was caught up in the festivities at the time. Plus, you get what you pay for ... and this is a free lesson.

Ready? Here goes. Feel free to click on these photos to enlarge them if that would make this lesson easier for you to comprehend.

Now I'm really starting. Here goes.

1. Remove the wrapper from the cupcake and gently separate the top of the cupcake from the bottom.



2. Turn the cupcake top upside-down and place on the top of the bottom half. This will basically make a cupcake sandwich.



3. Open your mouth and begin consuming the cupcake. Enjoy the fact that your upper lip is not getting slathered in frosting now that you know the proper way to eat a cupcake.

FRIENDS & FAMILY

We had overnight guests twice last week.

Sonja - Sonja, a friend since college, moved to Arkansas two years ago. She was in the area for a few days and spent Monday night with us. We spent that evening decorating and eating beach-themed cupcakes that she brought all the supplies for. She's always got something fun like that up her sleeve. That's why the kids love her so much! Tuesday morning she and I got to go to breakfast all by ourselves. Although she's visited two other times since moving, this was our first chance to hang out without anyone else. Then we came home and headed to the park with the rest of the fam for a while. The kids got to show off their sliding, riding and swinging skills for a while before she headed off to her next stop. It was great to see her and I wish she'd move back from Little Rock!!

Dos amigas. That's "two female friends", in case you no habla espanol.

The Nomes and Aunt Sonja sporting cupcake decorations in their hair.

Hunter - Hunter is my four year old nephew that I hadn't seen in 2 1/2 years. Well, he rolled through town with his mom and siblings yesterday and stayed the night. Granny had never met him, so we brought her over for a couple hours to eat and hang out with us. We scarfed tacos, played outside, ate ice cream bars, and played games all evening. It was fun to see how grown up he's gotten and to visit with the rest of his family. We'll have to make sure we don't wait so long for the next visit!!

Granny (my mom's mom), Hunter (my brother's son) and I pose "Hunter-style" for the camera.

Then we put our tongues back in our mouths. How boring!

If you want to see more pics from either of these visits, then click right here.

JUDY

Roses are red
Elephants are grey
I know someone
Who's sixty-nine today

Her name is Judy
And she's totally great
The reasons?
Well, let me elaborate

If I'm discouraged in marriage
Feel like a bad wife to Tim
She challenges me with ways
That I can bless him

If I'm weary in parenting
And just want to sob
She puts things in perspective
Reminds me it's a long-term job

If I'm generally weepy
And falling apart
She gives me a hug
And speaks from her heart

If I'm talking to someone
And she passes by
She'll squeeze my shoulder
Just to say hi

But it's not just me
Many others are blessed
Far more than she
Could ever have guessed

So I hope on her birthday
The fun doesn't fade
As she kicks off the last year
Of her seventh decade

MENU - SECOND HALF OF JULY 2009

I keep forgetting to post these when I do my shopping trip. Oh well, better late than never. Here's what we're eating these days.

DINNERS
leftovers
tacos x2
sandwiches (new recipe)/fruit/pretzels (freebies)
pinwheels (previously baked & frozen)/fruit salad
sweet & sour meatballs/rice
upside down pizza (I'll double the base and freeze half)/salad
roasted veggie enchilada casserole/beans (previously frozen)
meatloaf (uncooked mixture previously frozen)/rice/salad
garden Italian salad/garlic bread
veggie stir fry/cracked wheat & rice pilaf
burgers/watermelon
chicken broccoli quiche

DESSERTS
ice cream - store bought and homemade

OVERALLS. YOUR THOUGHTS?

Photo from Marshalls Clothing Company.

Becky and I had a date today that consisted of free Coldstone ice cream (she had pink lemonade with raspberries and I had banana caramel crunch) and a stop at the newly opened Goodwill (I'd link you, but they don't even have the website updated yet) by my house. As we browsed the store I told her how I wanted some overalls. Lo and behold, there were two pairs in my size. So I bought one. I can't wait to wear them!

Now, I realize some of you are cringing at the thought of a 33 year old wearing overalls, but I'm ok with that. Frumpy or unflattering? I don't care. They're comfy and I've always loved them. My last pair died a couple years ago, so I'm delighted with the pair I scored for $6.99 today that look brand new!

What do you think about overalls? Fabulous and comfy? Totally tacky? Cute on kids, but not adults? Only for old men on a farm, not for women in their thirties? Give me your thoughts!

7/23/09 THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for all the breaks I've gotten this week - both with girlfriends and alone.

What's one thing that you're thankful for?

BLOOD, WATER, SUGAR & EDUCATIONAL CHOICES

No, the three things aren't related. At least not in this post.

Blood - I've been super tired the last few months. While I realize that being a homeschooling mom of three young kids is a tiring job, I felt like my energy level was lower than usual. I was napping at least once a week, something I never do unless I'm sick (I'm not) or preggo (I'm not), and was waking up most mornings feeling tired. Well, guess what? A little blood draw last week resulted in a note from my FNP in the mail today saying my thyroid and other stuff looks great. It also said that I'm anemic. Who knew? Guess some iron supplements and more iron rich foods are in my immediate future. Hopefully more energy is also on the way!

Water - Silas went to a grade school water war nearly a month ago and I totally forgot to post pics. He actually didn't make it into very many of them, but I'll wrack up "bad mom" points if I don't show them to you. Looking a little confused about who to toss a balloon at (first pic), looking pleased with the Mentos/Coke fountain (first pic, lower right) and looking a little loud during some yelling/singing (fifth pic, lower right near a blonde boy in a black shirt and a boy in an orange shirt). The war was actually on his birthday this year, so I sent 200 cookies (banana spice, at his request) for him to share with the 94 other kids that were there. He had a blast!

Sugar - I bought ten bags of Kraft marshmallows yesterday for a grand total of $4.90. Four bags of mini marshmallows for the next marshmallow gun war and six bags of regular ones for s'mores and rice krispy treats. Fun times ahead!

Educational Choices - I'm thankful to live in a time and place where there are tons of choices in how to educate our children. That's a huge blessing! We are currently homeschooling , but we also put food on our table through the public school system. Makes it hard for people to figure out what box to put us in! Our approach to educational choices is "one kid at a time, one year at at a time". There is no right choice. We just have to make the decision we believe is best for each child and for our family as a whole in each season of life. On that note, let me share two posts with you. My friend Mandi wrote about her reasons for choosing to homeschool and it pretty much sums up our reasons too. Jon Acuff, the brains behind Stuff Christians Like, recently did a post highlighting some stereotypes behind the three choices of homeschool, public school, and private school. It's humorous, but also a good reminder to neither overanalyze your decision nor to judge those who choose differently than you do.

BY REQUEST - CELEBRATING MILESTONES

I received the following e-mail from a reader.

I've been thinking, especially since my daughter was born, that our culture doesn't really have any milestone rituals. Unless I'm missing something, "sweet 16" is just for girls and it means big birthday party, which our family just doesn't do, age 18 means you can buy lottery tickets and age 21 means you can drink. So I know that I want to have a few meaningful milestones celebrated in our family, for instance, when my daughter gets her first period, when my son enters middle school, and then I'm thinking age 18 is a good one too. But I have no idea what to do, and yes, I know we're a long way off from it but it's something I want to really think and pray about and anticipate. I don't mean traditions, we have a lot of those, like father/daughter and mother /son dates, etc. I mean one or two milestones in our children's lives that are celebrated and given some importance. Anyway, I thought it might be neat to see if anyone else has had these thoughts and if they are planning anything like this.

Honestly, I hadn't given the topic much thought. Perhaps the male equivalent of a girl starting her period could be a boy's first shave. I think turning 16 is a big one if the child is getting their license. Driving is a huge responsibility and an eagerly anticipated privilege.

As far as how to celebrate different milestones, I'm hoping some people with experience, whether as the child or the parent, will chime in.

OUR LITTLE VACATION

We got back last night from a fun-filled trip to Medford. I'll give a quick rundown of everything we did, but you can also find lots more pictures in this album and see my dad's detailed blogging about our visit on his blog (he has multiple posts about it, so I'm just linking you to his main page).

WEDNESDAY
* Drive to Roseburg. Meet the Coopers (my friend from high school and her family) and Brian (Tim's friend from college) at a local park while we eat lunch.
* Drive to Medford. Hang at the Wolfer's for a couple hours, then head to the Anders' for a potluck with our old "couples night" crew (us, Wolfers, Anders, Williamsons, Costers - all friends from church)
* Spend the night at the Wolfer's house.

The Coopers and the Weathersbys

Naomi is exhausted from a day of travelling and socializing, but she still manages to position her feet perfectly together for sleeping.

THURSDAY
* Have an awesome breakfast with the Wolfers.
* Drive to Ashland. Tim has an appointment at the office I used to work at, so I chat with some former co-workers for a bit before walking the kids up the road to a playground.
* Drive back to Medford. Spend the afternoon at the McDermott's house.
* Move into my dad's house. Eat dinner and put the kids down an hour early.
* Jessica brings Haydn over for us to meet. Jessica's brother, Josh, is married to my sister, Belinda. Haydn is Jessica's 10 week old baby. A very cute baby, I must say.

Snow cones at the McDermott's.

Hangin' with Haydn.

FRIDAY
* My dad and Debra take all three little Ws to Bear Creek Park for a couple hours in the morning and Ashley is at work for the day. Tim takes advantage of the uninterrupted work time and tries to do some summer school grading. I try to catch up on sleep.
* I have a mini meetup with Deana, a friend from the Sonlight forums. Strawberries and cream frappuccino ... yum!
* We spend the afternoon cooling off from the 100 degree weather by playing in the pool.
* Dean (my dad's brother who I haven't seen in 9 1/2 years) and Judy (my dad's sister who I haven't seen in 5 years) show up a little before dinner and we all hang out for a few hours.

Deana and I get our picture snapped by her husband, a man who was diligently grading school work in the bookstore while she and I sipped deliciously cold beverages from Starbucks.

Devon borrows Uncle Dean's hat.

My dad does a magic trick for Dean, Judy, and our boys.

SATURDAY
* Time for a "brothers only" date. My dad and Dean take Silas and Devon back to the park for a couple hours.
* Debra and Ashley slave away in the kitchen while Tim and I help set up for Dean's surprise party later in the day. Naomi prances around in dress-up heels.
* The whole crew caravans to Wild River and scarfs some delicious pizza. It's still really weird to me that it's not Pizza Deli anymore, even after 15 years, but that's beside the point.
* Naomi goes down for a nap and the rest of us head out to the pool.
* More family members show up between 3:30 and 4:00 to celebrate Dean's birthday with food, swimming, music, and visiting. Naomi wakes up.
* The party wraps up about 9:00.

Tim enjoys blasting Dean with water in the pool.

SUNDAY
* Load 'em up and move 'em out.
* Drive to Ashland. Go to church at Simple Faith and see a bunch of old friends.
* Scarf a less-than-nutritious lunch at Burger King.
* Drive to Beaverton. Tim and Naomi make quesadillas while the boys and I unload and start unpacking. Then Tim takes the kids to a concert (this is the THPRD free concert series, so be sure to catch a performance!)around the corner at a park while I finish unpacking, do a two week grocery shopping trip, and water the garden.
* 8:30pm - Kids hit the sack half an hour late and vacation is officially over.

EATING RAMEN AT 10:00

Random, I know, but it sounded good. And it was good. Here's some more randomness for you.

Vacation - We just got back from a five day trip to Medford. It was wonderful and I'll blog about it tomorrow.

Eggplant - I hate purple rubber. It's absolutely disgusting! My kids know I hate it and have asked me several times over the years to buy some for them to try. I've always declined, as I just can't waste money on such a nasty thing. But I was shopping tonight and they were on sale, so I bought one for the boys to taste. I'm not sure if that makes me a good mom or a bad mom.

Sausage - That's what Silas' pinky looked like for a few days after getting stung early last week. I couldn't decide which picture did the swelling the most justice, so you get both.

The Ugly File - I'm going to be starting an album on our Picasa site in the near future that is going to be a place to put all the ugly pics of the 5 Ws. Figured it will be good for making others laugh and for keeping us humble.

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Turkey - I did a two week shopping trip tonight and noticed the 3 lb package of ground turkey I buy, normally $6.78, had tags for $3.00 off on them. They are still two days away from the "sell/freeze by" date, so I snagged the three that were left. Virtually half-price!! There was nothing wrong with them. The guy said they just had a bunch of new turkey to put out and needed to clear out the last batch. Woo hoo! Meatballs, here I come!!

LINKS I LIKE #5

Just thought I'd share some cool sites with you today. Ready? Here goes!



Africam - This is a cool site I used to check frequently, but I'd forgotten about it until recently. It's live video of an African watering hole. You'll need to register on the site, then access the cameras from the list on the left of the page. The link for Nkorho Pan is the watering hole one. Sometimes nothing is happening, other times tons of animals are there, so just open the page and check it periodically. Be sure to turn your volume on to hear all the critters! Even if you can't see any animals it's still nice to listen to the birds chirping in the background as you do other stuff online.

Cake Wrecks - Oh. my. word! This site can have me gasping for air because I'm laughing so hard. Or doing that creepy, silent, shaking, hyperventilating laugh because I'm reading it late at night and don't want to wake up the whole house. Jen, the author of the blog, posts pictures of professionally decorated cakes that are horrible on at least on level, sometimes multiple levels. The cakes are horrid, she's sarcastic, and the comments are a riot. Check it out ever so often when you need a laugh!

The Chloe Chronicles - This is an online friend I've had the privilege of spending a weekend with in California and an evening with in Portland. She's older than I am and her kids have both left home in the last couple years - one through happy circumstances and the other through difficult circumstances. One of the things that I love about her is that she's so transparent. I think all moms, but particularly Christian moms who tend to justify their prideful attitudes about their "holy" choices, would benefit from reading the first two posts in a series she's doing on how she lost her groove ... and got it back. She talks pretty candidly about being prideful in parenting, marriage, her faith, etc and how she got knocked off the pedestal she'd put herself on. Here is the first post and here is the second post. Just a heads up that she throws out an occasional swear word. I know that may offend some, but I know she loves Jesus, loves her family and that my Bible doesn't have a list of four letter words that are taboo.

Stuff Christians Like - I've mentioned this site before in various posts, but Jon recently had an awesome post on Christians who complain "I'm not being fed" when discussing their church. Good stuff!

7/16/09 THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for old friends.

What's one thing that you're thankful for?

PRAYING FOR OUR KIDS

The following post is one I did for a my friend Mandi almost a year ago. I never posted it on my own blog and a friend's questions tonight about praying for her own kids reminded me of it. So, I thought I'd share it here.

I had to laugh when Mandi asked me to write about praying for our kiddos. After all, it was just last week that I told Tim that I don’t pray for our kids as often as I should. And it was just this morning, an hour before reading Mandi’s e-mail, that I made a point to get up early, for the first time in a long time, to spend some time praying for our kids. So, I’m certainly not writing from the perspective of a mom who has it all together when it comes to praying for her kids. I’m just a mom who desires to do well at mothering, yet keeps things real when I blow it. I desire to spend regular time in prayer for our kids, yet I often fail to do so.

So, what’s the big deal about praying for our kids? What woman really needs one more thing to work on in her quest to be a good mom? Well, I can’t speak for everyone, but I’ll tell you why it matters to me.

1) I need wisdom. I have three kids. Their personalities are different. Their strengths are different. Their struggles are different. Yet, Tim and I have the responsibility of raising each of them to be adults who love Jesus, care for others, work hard, and choose wisely. While the goal for each child is the same, the training is going to vary from child to child.

Proverbs 22:6 says, “Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it”. Many parents read this as “lay down the law and impose your will while your kids are young, and you’re guaranteed to have kids who grow into adults just like you”. If you could pick up the BV (Bethany Version) of the Bible at your local bookstore, then that verse would read “Set biblical and practical goals in parenting, then develop an individualized training plan for each of your children that will help them reach those goals. If you train your children in an individualized way, then they’ll reach the biblical and practical goals you set for them”. Of course, it's important to remember that verse is a proverb, not a promise. Generally speaking, responsible parenting is more likely to produce responsible kids, but each kid makes their own choices.

I realize this post is about prayer, not parenting styles. However, you can bet that if I’m supposed to come up with three variations on parenting, to take each child’s needs into consideration when training that child, then I’m going to need wisdom. Lots of it. And I know just where to get it. James 1:5 says "If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him".

2) I need a good attitude. In the busyness of life, the tackling of the “to do” list, and my desire to spend a day in bed with a stack of good books, it’s easy for me to start viewing the kids as a liability. They become a mouth to feed, a diaper to change, a kid to home school, a meltdown to deal with … interruptions to my day, to my desires, to my plans. They annoy me more quickly and things quickly go downhill.

Philippians 4:4-5 says, “Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as Christ Jesus”. I’ve found that my attitude changes when I take the time to pray for them. The whiner becomes a kid who feels unheard. The bickering boys become kids who need lunch. The fit thrower becomes a kid who needs help dealing with frustration. The kid who keeps touching stuff they shouldn’t becomes one who needs someone to play with. Basically, they become real people with real needs, needs that I’m responsible for meeting, and cease to be an intrusion in my life.

3) It is effective. There are obviously a gazillion practical things we can do as parents, new tactics we can try, and advice we can listen to. Those things aren’t necessarily bad and can be very good. I just need to remember that God is bigger than any new discipline strategy or parenting style. He can change things when nothing else helps. He can change things before we even try to change them on our own. He can give us wisdom and discernment in knowing how to parent our children. James 5:16b says “The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective”. That alone could be the most important reason that I should be praying for my kids. I need to pray proactively, not reactively. Prayer can change them as kids and individuals. Prayer can change me as a mom and as an individual. Prayer can change the relationship we have with each other.

So, that’s why it’s important to me that I spend time praying for my kids. That’s why it’s something I need to be more diligent about. Whether I spend 20 minutes alone before everyone wakes in the morning or whisper a ten second prayer in a moment of chaos and emotion, I must talk with the Lord about my kids.

If you want to be spending more time in prayer for your kids but struggle to know what to pray for, then I’d encourage you to print out this handy list, written by Bob Hostetler. There is something to pray for on each day of the month.

MARSHMALLOW GUN WAR - FIRST EDITION

Wondering why some of these people are laughing hysterically? Do you know which smiling face looked bored out of their gourd in every other picture, yet found something to smile about in this one? What was so funny about this picture? Well, it has to do with Devon. The little stinker shot a marshmallow at the camera right after Tim set the timer and ran to get in the picture. A marshmallow? That's right. A marshmallow.

Saturday night we hosted a potluck with fantastic food and our first attempt at a marshmallow gun war that involved more warriors than just our family members. It was a blast - a traffic stopping, cyclist almost crashing because they were watching us instead of the road, kids turning around in their seats to stare as they drove by, kids squealing with delight, men gloating in their strength and accuracy, everyone smiling type of event! There are more pics right here, in case you want to check them out. We'll be doing another war before summer is out, so local readers should keep their eyes open for an invitation!!

The warriors, in alphabetical order and in no relation to the quantity or intensity of their fighting, were Andrew, Anna, Austin, Bethany, Brian, Brianne, Carol, Devon, Eric, Erin, Kyle, Madeline, Matt, Michael, Naomi, Noah, Noelle, Ron, Rowen, Sachi, Silas, Susan, Tammy, and Tim.

PAUSE

That's the button we just pressed on our pursuit of being foster parents. It's a decision that I'm simultaneously really sad and totally confident about.

Homeschooling the two princes while trying to enjoy the toddler stage of the princess is always time consuming and often exhausting. Randomly throwing infants (we'd only foster babies at this point) into the mix, especially ones that are often higher maintenance than the average baby, would just make life too stressful for me at this point.

If we were expecting a baby of our own in the immediate future, then I'd be excited. A baby who is part of your family is much different to deal with than babies who come to you at various and unexpected times when their worlds are falling apart.

If we weren't homeschooling, then I'd be ready to pursue fostering right now. But we are homeschooling and we're confident about that decision. I don't know how long we'll homeschool, but the early years are the most important to me. While I can foster at any point in my life, I can only homeschool my kids' early years of school while they're still in those early years ... and that's now.

I need to be a good mom to my own kids and desire to be a good mom to foster kids. Right now the needs of my own kids is trumping the desire for foster kids. However, our hearts are still with foster kids, so we'll find a way to bless them without having them live with us. And we'll complete the application process sometime down the road, though I don't know if that will be in a year or five or longer.

If you're thinking "buck up, you can do it, the foster kids need you, other people in similar circumstances manage it", then please keep your thoughts to yourself. I'm pretty sad about this decision. I have to go take down a crib that we were hoping to rest a sweet little person in, a baby who needed someone to love them while their parents got their lives together. I have to tell my boys that we're not fostering anytime soon. I have to acknowledge the limits of what I can do, even if I don't like those limits.

If you're thinking "thank goodness, I thought you had too much on your plate already, glad you changed your mind", then please keep those thoughts to yourself. I'm confident that we're supposed to be working with foster kids. Caring for orphans (and kids who don't have parents to care for them, even temporarily, are orphans, in my opinion) is a biblical command, plus it's where our hearts are. We will find ways to make the lives of foster kids better. Those ways may change over the years, but we're not giving up on those kids, even if we can't house them at this point in time.

Doing the right thing at the wrong time is the wrong thing. So we'll wait for the right time.

MIND YOUR OWN STINKIN' BUSINESS

I have one blog post that consistently gets more views than any other post. It's also one I've been considering doing a re-run of because the issue has been coming up a lot lately. It's about one of my pet peeves, but also about common courtesy. Evidently the whole world didn't read it the first time, so I think it's time to hit a new round of readers. Without further ado, here's QUESTIONS YOU SHOULD NEVER ASK.

On the same topic, Stuff Christians Like, which is a funny site (the posts and the comments) recently had a guest post called "Surviving church as a married couple without kids". It goes perfectly with my post I linked above. The post isn't focused on religious beliefs, so check it out even if you're not a Christian and/or don't go to church.

7/9/09 THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for food and shelter.

What's something you're thankful for?

SOME DAYS ...

... you spend the second day in a row struggling to find a new groove as you homeschool a kindergartner and second grader while parenting a toddler.

... you have a child who refuses to eat what is served to them.

... you remain frustrated by the piles in your bedroom that never seem to go away.

... you have a child who pees in the bathroom sink.

... you have a child who cries about everything.

... your dandelions are out of control again.

... your floor needs to be vacuumed.

... you have a big stack of dirty dishes.


However, on some days ...

... you get laundry caught up.

... you get snuggles while reading to your kids.

... your husband gets to spend the day earning extra money doing something he loves and is good at

... your house smells like crockpot granola.

... you get to enjoy a family having naps or downtime in the afternoon.

... you get to snag more free groceries.

... you get to watch a free movie for the second day in a row.

... you get to play chicken with your kids.

... you have quiet time to read your Bible.


Sometimes all these things happen on the same day.

THE "DRESSING BLESSING" WINNER IS ....

Mary Lou!!

She's got eight bottles of salad dressing coming her way!!

I SHOULD BE SLEEPING

It's late and I should be asleep, but I took a nap this afternoon and I'm not tired. I knew that would happen, but I also knew that not taking a nap would result in a very emotional and grumpy version of me all afternoon and evening. So, what's a girl to do? I opted for the nap.

Since I'm up, I figured I may as well chat with you about some random stuff.

Camp - Signups started last Sunday at church for Kid's Camp and we found out that someone had already paid for Silas to attend. The list of people who knew that his camp money had been stolen was very short. Very, very short. Some of them had offered to pay for camp, but I'd assured them that we'd just pull the money from somewhere else and he'd be good to go. So, I'm guessing one of those people just went straight to the church because they knew we couldn't turn the offer down if it was done that way. Anyway, that short list of people all read this blog, so I just wanted to say thanks, while letting you remain anonymous.

Stupidity - That's what you call it when an adult, someone who has worked in a kitchen for decades, somehow manages to scorch their thumb on a scalding hot crockpot. That's what I did on Thursday. It hurt so bad that I was crying. Crying. Me. The one who has her babies at home without any sort of drugs. Yep, I'm the one who was standing over the sink crying because of the pain of a small burn. Lots of cold water and aspirin later I finally felt better. It blistered and popped on Saturday and now it's almost completely healed. But it really, really hurt!!



A Dressing Blessing - I've got free salad dressing coming out of my ears!! If you're local and want several bottles, then leave a comment. I'll pick a name out of a hat at 9:00 tomorrow night and that person will get a stash of free salad dressing. ETA: Rogue Valley readers who I'll be seeing later this month can enter to win the dressing blessing too!

Bargain Shopping - I was recently asked by a couple people to sit down and explain how I do my bargain shopping. That morphed into a little "class" I taught to four people on Thursday night. I had fun passing along some tips and they've already started doing some of the things I shared with them. Excellent students, wouldn't you say? I've got a list of about 7 or 8 more people who want a class too, so I'm going to try and crank another one or two out in the next few weeks. Looking forward to it!!

Swagbucks - I know some of you have already signed up for this awesome program, but here's a little incentive for those who are dragging their feet. Actually, let me explain what it is for those who have somehow missed my previous posts about it. Swagbucks is a search engine that's powered by Google and Ask. As you do your normal searches, you'll periodically be rewarded with virtual dollars. Those dollars add up and get cashed in for prizes. Plus, if your refer people and they sign up under you, then you earn a buck for every one they earn, up to 100 bucks per person. Awesome, huh? What? You're still not convinced? Well, check out what I got on Friday. A brand new Cuisinart ice cream maker!! I cashed in my bucks for Amazon gift cards, then spent them on this lovely machine, and got free shipping because I spent enough money on my purchase. Got that? I got a free ice cream maker for doing the searches I would have done anyway. Woo hoo!! Ready to sign up now? Don't forget to refer your friends!! And just for the record, I am wearing shorts in this picture.

School - We school year-round, basically following a three weeks on/one week off schedule. Plus, we take a couple extra weeks off in for Christmas in December and again from mid-June til after the 4th of July. That extra time off has come to an end, so we'll be starting school with one kindergartner and one second grader when we get up in the morning. Which means I should probably try to hit the sack, as it's midnight now.

MENU - FIRST HALF OF JULY 2009

Well, we tried some great new recipes in the last rotation, but I've been a slacker and don't have any of them posted yet. Maybe I'll get some done tonight. I'll tell you what. I'll name them here, then link them once I get them posted. So, if they're green, then they're posted. Got it? We tried baked lentils, frozen pie, veggie pizza, and a new quiche. I'll get them posted soon!!

Here's what we've got going on in the first half of July.

DINNERS
leftovers x2
tacos x2
hamburger pinwheels/fruit (never got to this one last time)
stuffed french toast/eggs (never got to this one either)
bbq burgers and hot dogs/watermelon
grilled Hawaiian chicken/tropical salad/coconut rice (just the rice part of this recipe)
rice cooker mac & cheese/hot dogs (potluck contribution)
marinated chicken/biscuit-y bell pepper muffins/salad (never got to this one either)
Italian sausage & bowties/salad
adobo chicken (don't have this one typed up)/rice/salad
napa cabbage salad/garlic bread
tuna couscous salad

DESSERTS
torte (new one we never did last time)
ice cream bars

Good grief! We missed a lot of meals last rotation!! Life has just been crazily busy!!

7/2 THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for my SL friends.

What's one thing you're thankful for?