Author: Jeanette

Holidays have begun for us!

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

We usually start the holidays much earlier than everyone else. We usually start in July. Why? Well let me give you the break down.

July~4th of July party, Cailin’s Birthday and then Dakota’s Birthday

August~ Beginning of school

September~ Homeschool begins and Dad’s Birthday

October~ Alissa’s Birthday and Halloween

November~Thanksgiving and Mom’s Birthday

December~Brianna’s Birthday, Christmas, New Year’s

Beginning of January~ Grandma’s Birthday and finally my birthday

So as you can see in my family most of the birthday’s fall right in the major holiday time. And that is why I say my holiday season starts in July because I have to hit the ground running and keep going until I crash on my birthday.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy birthday to my big 13 year old!

 

And Happy 3rd Birthday to my lil man!

 

Lazy Cat Days of Summer

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

Summer is here and so our the long lazy days. Or at least I had hoped. But as usual life has thrown me a curve ball and I had a slew of unexpected events that hampered everything I wanted to do with my kids.

The only one who got to relax was the cat!

 

 

 

 

See she is too lazy to even stand to get a drink!

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here…well I’m not sure but I thought it was funny and strange.

 

 

But I don’t know if its the weather, but I have felt like doing nothing all summer.

The heat has been unbearable. Or we have very high chances of severe storms.

Everytime I tell myself we are getting back on track something happens:

My dad came to stay for almost a month.

Then I was planning 4th of July, then the kids and I all got sick, then I went into planning birthday parties and throw in another round of unexpected houseguest.

And I am still fighting whatever this is that I got, but also wondering if it’s my body saying SLOW DOWN AND RELAX!

I now am preparing for oldest to start high school. And at the last minute Hubby wants her in braces before school starts. Plus my youngest daughter has started Speech Therapy so that is a standing appointment every week.

Then Hubby decides he wants to go to his class reunion in the middle of all this chaos.

UGH…. This momma needs a vacation!

I can’t wait for school to start so we can have a routine again.

Jeanette

Breathe in ~ Breathe out~ Every mom freaks out (Here’s mine)

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

It’s 6:30 on a Sunday morning. And I am up already making my way through my first cup of coffee. I enjoy listening to the birds chirp and the frogs croak as my dogs go in and out of the house. I consider this my quiet relaxing time. Except I am not.

I feel immensely overwhelmed. I feel as if I haven’t done anything fun with my kids since “school” has gotten out. I also feel that I haven’t worked with them on completing their science lessons from last year. I feel like my son doesn’t get enough attention. I never read him books and I haven’t even started potty training. I feel like I should be looking towards next year and I need to get braces for the oldest before she goes into High School. But all I want to do is breathe.

We had an unexpected house guest show up and stay for about 3 weeks. And it just threw off everything in the house. Things slipped and slide into the maybe later department.  And he is not very sociable guest and was kinda depressing. So I feel like it brought the whole house down.

Hubby has been working his butt off. Which is a blessing but I would love if he could spend a little bit of time with us.

In writing all this down I realize that I need to relax. I let little things in life bother me. I let what people say, do and think into my soul and let it eat away at me.

So what if my almost 3 year old isn’t potty trained! There is no law!

So what if I didn’t get to the last worksheet on birds? They learned a lot just ask them!

So what if my house is a mess and the yard isn’t cut? I live in the country its normal out here!

What I am enjoying is hearing my birds and frogs, the bright sunshine that fills the sky, the loud squeals of delight that fill my house at times and the smell of freshly brewed coffee in the morning.

And I need to live for me, my kids and my husband. These years are so precious. I know that and can’t understand why I am getting depressed about my kids being older instead of savoring every moment.

Maybe its in my DNA. I know that can’t be changed (Lord knows I have tried) but I can change who I am and want to be. And that is what I am going to start doing.

Wrapping up our homeschool year (pun intended)

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

I wanted to finish this post a month ago but life got in the way. Anyways better late than never, Huh?

 

My kids have busted their butts these last two months. And they have hit almost every goal I have set for them and I couldn’t be more proud of them. (Beaming Momma moment) Technically they have about 3 weeks left of school and I am trying my hardest to stretch their lessons to last. But I have to say I am having a hard time. So what do you do if you start going a little crazy coming up with ideas. You go crazy and plan a party and a field trip. WHY NOT? The kids have earned it! So that is what we did.

We finished up our project of comparing our Egyptians scrolls and clay tablets. Unfortunately our experiment had opposite results. Our scroll last and our clay tablet just fell apart. Apparently it was the wrong clay and some darn good paper we used. So this was our end result.

Terrible picture, I know.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next we wrapped up our chicken mummy ( HAHA~get it). It has been 6 weeks and we were ready to wrap it up to gross out  show everyone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We also went on a field trip to our local Science Museum where they had a special exhibit about Mummies around the world.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We really liked this exhibit. It is not for the faint of heart I might add. There were a few moments that I had vision of mummies attacking. But I kept a cool head and the kids never knew.

In the end we manage to “wrap up” our mummies unit and the rest of our lessons early so we took two weeks off instead of just one!

Jeanette

 

 

 

Giving freezer cooking a try?

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

Recently two of my favorite blogs did a serious of post on freezer cooking. And just from reading a couple of post I become OCD and decided I had to find out everything I could cook and freeze.  Freezer cooking is basically where you have ready to go meals in your freezer. Waiting for that day of appointments, errands, school pick-ups, followed by little Jimmy’s baseball game and then precious Patty’s dance recital. This could be my family’s answer to our fast food obsession. I mean the least little thing and I am reaching for a take out menu: late afternoon doctor’s appointment, last minute errands, a day full of cleaning the house top to bottom. It needs to stop but the only way is to have a great back up plan.

So during my “research” I found out that someone has a very similar oatmeal recipe that they freeze. PERFECT! I am making oatmeal this week and I will make up a double (or in my family’s case quadruple) batch and try to freeze it.

You freeze it before cooking it, so all you have to do one morning is thaw and bake.

I have in the past froze leftover Lasagna Casserole. And that was great! Just thaw and I added some extra cheese and little extra sauce, then bake.

Most people assume freezer cooking means taking a day and cooking a ton of food. That can work for some people. But for me making an extra batch or taking an hour a day and whipping something up for the freezer would better fit my life right now. This is the perfect activity during my son’s nap time and my girls independent study time.

The important thing to remember is make things easier on yourself, don’t stress yourself out more. The world will do that for you. Make your home life fun and easy.

I will let you know if this works for us. Who knows in a few months, I may ditch it?

Jeanette

 

When your words bite you in the butt

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

This week I have heard my own words come out of my toddler’s mouth and hit me right in the face. The worse part is he is using them in the correct context.

First, Hubby and I were taking advantage of a few spare minutes, while dinner finished up, to cuddle in the recliner. My lil man looked over at me and said “Mommy, you sitting with Daddy?” I said “yup, I’m sitting with Daddy.” He looks my hubby right in the eyes and said “disgusting.”

Then when I was giving my lil man a ton of kisses, he yelled “Stop Mommy, your annoying.”

And then there was the time my youngest daughter was antagonizing her brother, he got so mad that he yelled “I’m tired of this!”

This weekend I thought my aunt was going to die laughing when she was trying to give my baby boy a hug and he looked at her with the look of sarcasm and said “Do you mind?”

These are all things say or have said.

And they have now come to bite me in the butt in the form of my precious two year old.

This is what happens when you wait 10 years between kids. You forget all the things your not suppose to say and do.

Our week in homeschooling~

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

This week has been full of hands on activities. Which my kids have really enjoyed, I think I may continue it for our summer learning camp. We finished up our yearly testing a couple of weeks ago and are now just coasting through the last month of “real” school.

Science~

We are learning about Birds. This has been a very exciting lesson for my girls as we have set up a bird feeder area in our yard. This week we learned about bird wings by doing a dissection of a chicken wing. I just bought a pack of chicken wings from the meat department. The girls got to see all the muscles and tendons. They thought it was interesting to see how the joints worked. This was a favorite in the house. We also learned about the different types of nest and the girls had to try to create their own nest. Needless to say this was a messy activity and required showers afterwards.

History~ 

We are studying World History and have been learning about the Egyptians. Which we have also tied in with Geography and started learning about the country also. Last week we made a replica of the Nile River. We then filled it until the water overflowed to represent the flooding of the Nile. And this is what we got after a week.

We also learned about the types of writing the Egyptians used. The girls made a paper scroll with hieroglyphics on it and a clay tablet using cuneiform writing.

Little Man even had to get in on the fun!

These came out SOOOO good! Proud momma moment!

We also read about mummies and decided to start our 6 week project of making a mummified chicken. The kids really liked this idea.

This is a very lengthy and involved project but it was something we all really wanted to do.

This is day 2.

Earth Day 2012~ a new beginning for us

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

There was a time a few years ago that we were extremely frugal. During the early recession years, my husband’s business barely existed at all. We were barely making it by. Well in the last two years are business has picked back up a little more every year. There was a time when I would see my husband watching TV everyday to now when I barely see him because he is working SO much. Don’t get me wrong I am not complaining!

But with the increase in income has come the decrease in frugality. We buy fast food all the time. We buy little snacks and toys for the kids every time we’re out. I use to be very good about reducing waste but that seems to have stopped also. We are big recyclers around here but that is limited to newspaper, bottles, cans and cardboard, even though we can recycle more.

Grocery shopping use to be extremely tight. I fed a family of 7 for about $400 a month, that was 4 adults and 3 little kids. Now I have 3 adults, 3 teens and a toddler and can’t seem to spend less than $600. I want to get back to homemade and less processed no matter how good of a deal it is.

So beginning Earth Day 2012 our family is making changes!

I am stepping up our recycling to include envelopes, cans and anything else I can recycle.

I am pledging more homemade and less processed.

I am also going to try homemade cleaners to reduce the amount of chemicals in my home.

Reduce energy use. Less drying clothes in the dryer. Less wasting water. Lights out in an empty room (that’s mostly my kids). Open windows on a nice day. And push the air up a few more degrees and set out fans instead.

Less paper plates. I have to admit we use paper plates every day for lunch and sometimes for dinner or breakfast depending on what we are having.

We are also bad about wasting food. I always make too much and then most leftovers get thrown out. I am trying to work on reusing them in other recipes and not throwing out so much.

This is a huge challenge since a lot of this falls on me and with a family of 7 nothing is ever easy but I am ready and really excited to get started!

The price of cereal! Outrageous!!!

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

Yesterday I decided that I wasn’t going to cook. We had leftovers and plenty of things to eat. We little did I know that my kids were going to devourer a brand new box of Frosted Flakes that I just bought yesterday morning!

1 box of cereal + 4 kids= EMPTY

That was $5 they just gobbled up in one meal! I was shocked!

Shocked that my kids eat like they haven’t had a meal all day!

Shocked that my $5 was gone so quickly!

Shocked that I spent $5 on ONE box of Frosted Flakes, which if you ask me is pure sugar!

When I was venting to hubby, he says well use coupons! Seriously did you just say that to me!!! I questioned his sanity at this point, since he tells everyone I am the coupon queen. If looks could kill, Hmph!

I then informed him that a coupon that says a dollar off of 2 or 3, which seems to be the new cereal trend, isn’t saving a whole lot at $5 a box!!!

Even with BOGO sales it is still expensive when a whole box is gone in ONE meal!

Then it made me question why are we buying $5 boxes of sugar? Why am I buying them if they eat it in one sitting? Because if I don’t then I have to listen to complaining! I personally HATE cereal, always have and always will. But my hubby and kids~ obsessed and will eat 3 times a day if I let them.

So that is why I chose to keep buying $5 boxes of sugar.

And will continue to complain when it last 5 seconds after hitting my front door.

And complain about the coupons sucking.

But the prices of cereal are still OUTRAGEOUS!!

 

Recipe~Baked oatmeal

/ Jeanette / Leave a comment

I found this AMAZING oatmeal recipe.  I have been making this for years and it is a no fail recipe. The best part is it is just a basic recipe. You can add extras to turn it into your favorite flavor of package oatmeal. Whatever strikes your mood, I added grated apples to the recipe and it was so good!

Oatmeal~

3 cups of quick cooking oats

1 cup sugar

1 cup milk

1 stick of butter, melted

2 eggs

2 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp vanilla

Sprinkling of Cinnamon to your liking

Any other add ins you would like

Combine all ingredients, including add ins or add them after baking which ever you prefer. Mix well. Pour into a greased 13×9 baking dish. Bake at 350 for 35-45 minutes or until set. Immediately spoon into bowl and add milk.

After I add milk I personally like to warm it up for 15 seconds in the microwave but others in my family don’t. It’s all a preference! Which is what makes this recipe so good!