Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Menu Planning Monday...

...or Tuesday...I am a little behind in my menu planning this week.  Yesterday I made roast beef open faced sandwiches and mashed potatoes and corn.  It was a yummy dinner.  My brother stopped by and ate with us.  We found out yesterday that he passed his nursing state board exam that he took on Saturday...so proud of him!  So here goes for the rest of the week, then I will update on everything we have been up to this week:

Tuesday-Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ Chicken sliders on homemade rolls, fresh fruit salad (We ended up having these on buns from Braum's, and cottage cheese, salad and cantaloupe as sides instead!)
Wednesday-Pork Chops, Twice Baked Potatoes, Salad (thinking of having a rice dish on the side instead, it's been too hot to heat up the oven twice!)
Thursday-Eat Out or Eat-At-The-Game night! (Can-Opener for high school football-the big kids and Kris will probably go!)
Friday-"Daddy-Grilled" Burgers, Pasta Salad, Veggie Sticks, and Deviled Eggs (We ended up not having burgers last week!)
Saturday-Italian Roast Beef Sandwiches and a big salad
Sunday-Grilled Cheese Sandwiches, Creamy Tomato Tortellini Soup

For lunches, Claire and I usually have leftovers, or scrambled egg sandwiches, or cheese quesadillas and some kind of fruit.  The big kids take their lunches to school. Speaking of school, Katie and Asher are both doing great and love SCHOOL!  This mama couldn't be happier about that.  I miss them both so much, but they love being out and about, and both come home happy and tired!  Asher sometimes voluntarily goes to lay on his bed with his "milk cup" for a few minutes when he gets home...bless his heart!

Usually this time of year I start itching for fall, but I feel a *little* bit differently this year.  Our August has been so mild and nice that I am not completely tired of summer yet.  I love looking out the back patio doors to green grass, green leaves on the trees, and lots of sunshine streaming in.  My red rocking chairs are looking pretty out there too!  I think our move kind of broke up the monotony of the "dog days" of summer for me and I am thankful for that.  I'm sure that the very first time temperatures drop below 60 degrees I will be just as crazy about fall as I usually am! Can't wait!

Wednesday, August 21, 2013

First Day of School, 2013!

Katie and Asher started school this week!  Asher started kindergarten!  This mama did ok for the drop off in the morning, but when we went to pick him up and he was so happy to see us and tell us about his day...mama lost it and couldn't stop crying!  I missed his sweet smiles and kisses so much!  But he loved it...he had a great first day of school! And he was happy to report he stayed on "Moose" status for the day...which means he did great!



Katie and I have been sick since Saturday with some kind of weird summer cold virus, so she had to miss her first day of school and visit the doctor's office instead. She has also been having some pretty big anxieties about going to public middle school, so this morning was a little tough on her (and mama and daddy!)  I was so happy when we got into the building and were greeted by one of the teachers that we had met.  She was so positive and welcoming to Katie!  We had talked to her during enrollment about Katie's fears of going to a public school when she had gone to a Christian school for so long and she had been so comforting and encouraging...we were so thankful that God put her in that place especially for this morning.  She looked at Katie's schedule and told her about several more of her teachers who were really strong Christians...so I could tell Katie was comforted by that.  She is in band, choir, and art, math, science, language, and computers.  I can't wait to hear how her day was!


So now it's just little Claire and I here at home...and I'm almost not sure what to do! It's been a while since I've only had one kiddo at home!  We are doing good though...so far just having our milk cup/coffee and donuts and hanging out!
 
 


Monday, August 19, 2013

Last day of summer break and Menu Planning Monday!



Katie, Claire, and Asher enjoying the water park last week!
 

Today is the last official day of summer break. Katie starts 8th grade and Asher starts Kindergarten tomorrow morning!  It's hard to believe they are growing up so fast.  It seems like yesterday we were just a little family of three sending Katie off to Kindergarten, and now there are five of us, with the middle kiddo heading to school too.  It will just be little Claire and I home by ourselves during the day.  I think she will really miss the big kids but hopefully she will enjoy some "mama" time too.

We have Asher's "meet the teacher" meeting at 4 today, and I thought we might take a little trip downtown for Cherry Berry as summer's last "hoorah" sometime today.  I think I am going to try and make homemade cinnamon rolls for tomorrow's breakfast, and Claire and I are going to make a special treat for the kids when they come home from their first day of school. 

I wanted to try and start a menu plan with school starting.  During the summer things are just kind of unscheduled and super relaxed, but I think with their busy school schedules it would really help our budget and my sanity to have a "plan"...so here is our dinner menu for the week:

Monday-BBQ Pork Chops, Mixed Veggies, Rice
Tuesday-Slow Cooker Spaghetti and Meatballs, Garlic Twists, and Corn
Wednesday-Chicken and Rice Casserole and Salad
Thursday-Chicken Fajitas, Mexican Rice, Lettuce, Cheese, etc.
Friday-Grilled Burgers, Homemade potato salad,  and chips
Saturday-Leftover buffet (Daddy back to work)
Sunday-Kid's Choice/Kids in the Kitchen

I am going to try and remember to do this each week and link up with these ladies:

Organizing Junkie's Menu Plan Monday
The Diary of a Real Housewife's Monday Meal Plan

Sunday, August 18, 2013

We're home again...

I haven't posted in a while...because we moved...again.  We were not able to sell our home and Kris and I have been having the feeling for quite a while that the Lord wanted us to move back.  Our house had been on the market since November 2012, and we had many people look, lowered the price $10,000, but zero offers.  We had just put in new flooring throughout most of the house, and had updated so many things...but no offers. We feel like there must be a reason for us to come home...now we are anxiously waiting to know what God has planned for us here.  Kris is commuting for a while, but had an interview in the local store just last week.  I know there is a plan for his work too.  Our move was so amazing...our Impact church family helped pack us up the giant U-Haul, and in the same afternoon, our church family here helped us unload it...I tell you...God was in the details...we are so blessed.

The kids have adjusted beautifully to the move.  They are just content to be home.  In fact, we drove in the driveway after following the above mentioned giant U-Haul for 2 hours, and Claire shouted from the back seat, "Home! Home!"  We have been working on getting the kids enrolled, school physicals done, and unpacking boxes one by one.  There are so many things about this home that we forgot that we loved so much.  I love being able to hear the kid's conversations because they aren't 2000 square feet away...and being able to do laundry and fold it and put it away all on one floor...and not rationing the amount of times I can adjust the décor on our walls because of too many nail holes (ha, ha!).  It's simple things...like the way you can hear the peacocks from the park from our backyard, and the way all of the trees in our yard shield and shade us...so thankful for those things.  We love this home, and if houses could talk, I think ours would say that it loves us too.  We are so happy to be home again!