Menu Plan Monday - September 13, 2010

Yes, I'm a few days late with this. Now that we're back from vacation, I can hopefully get in a more regular routine. And now that summer is "over" and we're back to a regular routine, I can get back to my weekly menu planning.

This week:
Monday
Baked Rotini

Tuesday
leftovers or sandwiches

Wednesday
Vegetable Soup, cornbread
Yes, I know it's still hot out during the day, but I've missed our weekly soup nights. If I wait until it gets cooler, who knows how long that will be! So, I start them in September and carry them through March, regardless of the temperature outside.)

Thursday
leftovers or sandwiches

Friday
???
We were on vacation last week and I only picked up some basics at the grocery store when we got back, so it's a boring week. I'm not sure if we'll be getting out to Costco or not. If so, we'll eat out; if not, we'll make do.

Saturday
sandwiches
It's home team night and my main focus will be on our LOTR-themed dessert (for our first night of LOTR discussion).

Sunday
sandwiches
Now that AWAMA is back in full swing, it's back to sandwiches or cereal when we get home on Sunday nights.

Next week will be better, I promise. Not only has soup night started back, but pizza night will resume next week. I'm also wanting to incorporate some new recipes into our week and see if we can find some new favorites.

I'm noodling over what nights I'll be cooking what and will hopefully have that all worked out the next day or so. I do know most Friday and Saturday nights will be leftover nights (and Sunday nights will remain sandwich nights), but I want us to have exciting leftovers - and a lot of variety to choose from.

For more meal plan ideas, check out I'm an Organizing Junkie.

Back to School!

This was our first week of school. Overall things went really well. Monday was a long day for us because it took a while to get everything organized in between subjects. I think we finished up a little before 3:00. Most days we're through around 1:30.

Daily schedule:
9:00 - AWANA
9:15 - language Arts (journaling, spelling, Wordly Wise/vocabulary, grammar)
10:15 - snack/break
10:30 - math
11:30 - science
12:15 - lunch/break
1:00 - history

On Mondays and Wednesdays, we add beginning piano. I spend a few minutes going over a finger exercise or music theory concept, then they take turns practicing.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we'll be adding geography. Jacob has a basic map skills workbook he'll be working from. Caleb has a world geography workbook that we'll use over the course of two years or more. I hope to get started on that next week, after I get our scanner/copier set up. (I want to keep Caleb's workbook for future reference, so we'll be using photocopied pages.)

Fridays are short days. We do AWANA, language arts, and math. Then we go out for lunch, spend some time at the library, run any errands, and stop by ALDI for the next week's groceries.

Jacob had a meltdown a few days this week because he wanted to play instead of do his schoolwork. Both times I sent him to his room until his attitude was better and he was willing to work. The first day (Monday) he cried loudly, trying to distract Caleb from his work and trying to get attention. I warned him that he'd get a spanking if that continued, so he hushed. The second day (Wednesday) he cried again, but not nearly as loudly as before. Hopefully he's seeing that he's got to do his work and that throwing a fit isn't going to get him out of it.

I came up with a way to reinforce positive school behavior, and hopefully it'll work. I call it "School Spirit Stickers". Each day, whoever had the best attitude for school will get a sticker. At the end of the week, whoever has the most stickers will get to choose where we go for lunch on Friday. Of course, there will be limits on where they can choose. If I give them free reign on that, we'll end up at Cici's Pizza every week. Some weeks will have Cici's for a choice; other weeks will have Panera Bread as a choice; most weeks will have McDonald's, Wendy's, and Braum's, though. I may need to come up with a weekly schedule of restaurants so they won't accuse me of rigging the list each week. I should probably have the boys list their favorite restaurants, then divide them evenly each week...

Tuesday we went out to the pool after we finished our work, but we didn't get to stay long at all - maybe 20 minutes. When we left the house, the sky looked fine. But by the time I pulled into the parking lot, we noticed how dark the sky was to our north. I kept a close watch on the weather while the boys played with their new diving rockets. The clouds kept getting darker and rolling in a little faster. Soon the wind picked up, and before long the water in the pool was white-capping. Not long after that, thunder started rumbling, so the boys and I hurried out of the pool. After we got settled in the car, we saw a few bolts of lightning strike in the distance. Not much happened after we got home, just a lot of wind and thunder and hardly any rain.

Yesterday we invited some friends from church to spend the afternoon with us at the neighborhood pool. We spent about two hours out there - the weather was perfect! Tricia and I really enjoyed relaxing in the water or sitting poolside and chatting. The boys had fun swimming after their diving rockets or playing with the pool Frisbee. Some other friends from the neighborhood joined them for a bit. We'd like to have them out again before the pool closes for the season. Thankfully the management has extended the season to late September instead of Labor Day.

All in all, it was a great first week! If only the rest of the school year would go so smoothly...

Menu Plan Monday - August 23, 2010

Yes, I know it's been quite a while since I posted a menu plan. With the boys gone several weeks this summer, and us busy the rest of the time, I didn't have time to post - or really even plan, for that matter.

Now we're back to school and back to staying home, so I can get back into my greatly-missed regular routine. Woohoo!

Here's this week's menu plan:

Monday
Shrimp Tortellini with Broccoli and Garlic Butter Sauce
I had purchased these items on a whim at ALDI, as I'm trying out different things there to see what we like and what we don't. It cost roughly $8.50 for all the ingredients. (I'll have a separate ALDI post later.) Anyway, I just threw this together and it turned out quite delicious. The boys liked it, and Billy took the leftovers for his lunch today.

Tuesday
Black Bean Quesadillas and Southwestern-Style Rice
These quesadillas have become quite the family favorite. I love that they're quick, easy, and healthy. All these ingredients were bought at ALDI, too, but I haven't figured my total cost on them yet.

Wednesday
Southwestern Cornbread Salad
At the last minute, it seems, I've realized what I can do with my leftover beans and corn from the quesadillas. Even having them for leftovers doesn't use them all and I end up throwing some away. This time we'll carry them over to the salad and nothing will go to waste! Why didn't I think of this earlier?

Thursday
Pancakes
This was Caleb's last-minute choice, and I didn't think about sausage or bacon to go with it.

Friday
leftovers - if there are any - or eating out.

Saturday
Dirty Rice (Tony Chachere's brand) and Caesar Salad

Sunday
Hmmm... I didn't plan that far in advance. I usually plan from Saturday through Friday each week since I grocery shop on Friday afternoons (ALDI) and Saturday mornings (Wal-Mart for any produce and remaining items).

For more menu plan ideas, check out I'm an Organizing Junkie.

Still Around

I know my posts have been next to nothing this summer. I haven't given up blogging, nor have I melted into the pavement - though I thought I was going to melt in the library last week. Their A/C was broken. This summer has been sooooo busy I haven't had time to blog.

But now we're back in school and staying home most of the week. Yea!!!

I'll try to catch up on all our summer activities and post some pictures from things that went on, but right now it's time to wake the boys for day 2 of school.

We now return to our regularly scheduled programming.

August 2010 Book List

33. The Martyr's Song by Ted Dekker

Eve, an old florist, sees an unattractive girl at the high school when she goes to make a delivery, and she can see what the girl thinks of herself. She invites her to visit the next day and promises to make her beautiful. Marci, at first angry about the old woman's insinuation, appears on her doorstep and ends up going inside to hear Eve read a horrible but fascinating story about a war, some soldiers, a priest, and another ugly little girl who finds true beauty. As Marci gets drawn into the story, she finds herself as one of the characters and finds beauty as well.

I've never been terribly impressed with Ted Dekker, though I have read a few of his books. I've usually felt a combination of fear and morbid curiosity as I've read them. One of his more psychologically thrilling books (Adam, I believe it was...) had me so uncomfortable, I couldn't get past the first few pages. This one seemed milder, and it was only a little over 100 pages, so I thought it would be "safer". I found this story to be intriguing and horrifying at the same time. In it, Eve says that everyone finds themselves a character in the story, and I found myself identifying with a few of them. I knew Dekker was writing about the beauty of heaven and the love of Christ, but the book didn't really touch me like I had hoped. I think part of it is my bias toward his writing.

I'll definitely give Dekker another try. I'd like to read The Bride Collector before too long. If it's like Boneman's Daughters, I think I'll like it. If it's like House, that he co-wrote with Frank Peretti, I probably will finish it but not like it immensely. If it's like Adam, I won't finish it.

34. Q Is for Quarry by Sue Grafton

Sue Grafton's "alphabet mysteries" are one of my guilty pleasures. When I first started reading them, I read several in a row before moving on to something else. Now I like to read one every few months or so, but there have been so many other things I've wanted to read, I just now got around to it.

This series follows the investigations of Kinsey Milhone, a twice-divorced 30-something private investigator who lives alone in a tiny apartment belonging to Henry, an 80-something retired baker who writes crossword puzzles for fun. Kinsey has been in all sorts of dangerous situations and always comes out on top, though often injured.

In Q Is for Quarry, Kinsey is hired by a retired police officer and his aging friend to investigate a cold case of murder they happened upon some 20 years earlier. As they work together to fill in the missing pieces to the puzzle, they come upon someone who wants the past to remain buried - and will kill again to keep it that way.

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I am finally going to read J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. I'm not sure how long it will take me, but my goal is to finish in September. Is that a little lofty? Maybe October, then.

July 2010 Book List

29. Homer's Odyssey by Gwen Cooper

Gwen was content living with her two cats, Scarlet and Vashti, and when her vet called to ask her to adopt a two-week-old blind kitten, she was pretty sure she was going to decline. Still, she felt she had to see the kitten in question first. As soon as she saw the tiny, black kitten, so willing to love her without reservation, she knew she had to take him in. She named him Homer, after the blind storyteller of The Iliad and The Odyssey.

Her goal in raising Homer was to love him and keep him from harm, but she quickly learned this kitten, though blind, was fearless. He climbed and jumped and played rough, often to the misery of the other two cats. He amazed everyone who met him with his astonishing capacity for love and affection, as well as feats like catching flies in midair and identifying tuna cans in cabinets.

I fell in love with Homer almost immediately and laughed out loud (and shared with Billy) about his escapades. Reading this almost made me want to adopt my own blind kitten.

Gwen Cooper has a blog where she updates readers about Homer and her other cats at Homer's Odyssey.

This was the first ebook I've read. I downloaded it from my library onto a Sony eReader that Billy gave me several weeks ago. I like being able to do that because I can check out certain books without having to go to the library and I can easily take several books with me at once. The only downside to downloading them from the library is that they're only available for 3 weeks, then they're not accessible anymore. There is no renewing. I'd have to download the book again if I didn't finish reading it through the first time, and then there's the possibility that someone else might have downloaded it and I'd have to wait. There aren't unlimited copies of it just because it's on a computer file.

30. Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers

I have to admit, I've been sorely disappointed by Christian fiction. The plots of so many of the books have the same thread, and many of their covers picture women in simple bonnets. I know, you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but seeing that everywhere I turn isn't appealing. Thankfully, the cover of Redeeming Love isn't quite like that.

I read this book primarily because it had come highly recommended by a former student of mine. Several of her friends commented on a Facebook thread that they loved that book as well, many of them saying it was their all-time favorite. That said, I had to give it a try. I figured if I didn't like it, I could always put it down.

Once I started reading it, I couldn't put it down. Rivers retells the biblical account of Hosea and his prostitute wife Gomer, set in the mid-1800s in gold-crazed California. Sarah, aka "Angel" and "Amanda", loses her mother and is sold into prostitution at the tender age of 8. Knowing no other way of life, and having hardened her heart to any kindness shown her, she is caught off guard when Michael Hosea rescues her from her prison - even after she'd rebuffed him and mocked him several times. Determined to make a life of her own, she leaves Michael, only to be trapped into resuming her old way of life. He tracks her down and brings her home, only to be left again.

Much to her disappointment, "Angel" finds herself drawn to Michael and depending on him more and more until she looks to him as her savior. After she leaves him the last time, circumstances cause her to turn toward the Lord as her savior and she finally finds peace and happiness in life.

I've read other books by Rivers and have been impressed with her style. She has several other books out that I haven't read, but I'm more than willing to give them a try.

There's possibly a movie based on the book in the works: Abba Productions: Redeeming Love Movie. I'll be interested to follow this and see how things progress. I think it'd be a wonderful movie with the right leading.

31. Sisters by Danielle Steel

Four sisters in different lifestyles live in various places around the world. Still they find time to come home to be with their family three times a year. The Fourth of July picnic seems to be the biggest family celebration, or maybe that's because Thanksgiving and Christmas are so close together and July seems so far from them. Regardless, they all drop what they're doing and gather at their parents' home to spend some quality time with each other. Without warning disaster strikes, leaving their mother dead and one of the sisters in critical condition.

Their father loses himself in grief and the three other sisters make big sacrifices to live together again for one year to help Annie, their newly blind sister, come to grips with her life.

Several years ago, I couldn't get enough of Danielle Steel; then I burned out and didn't want to read anything else of hers for a long while. Sisters was an okay book to pick back up on. The story was good and brought me to tears a few times, but it's not one of her best. I was disappointed in the way the father was treated by his daughters. And as I read the story from a Christian perspective, I kept coming back to how hopeless the whole scenario was and how it could've been written so differently. Overall, I liked how the sisters are so different in their appearances and their personalities, since I see that in my own family.

Hopefully the next Danielle Steel book I choose will remind me of why I found her books so hard to put down once upon a time.

32. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson

The third and final book of the Millennium trilogy picks up right where the second one (The Girl Who Played with Fire) ended. Lisbeth Salander and her father Zalachenko have both been rushed to a hospital with life-threatening wounds. Mikael Blomkvist is being held at the site of the attempted murders by a bumbling police officer who is more concerned with wielding his power than getting to the bottom of what happened at Karl Axel Bodin's (Zalachenko's) estate.

Thus begins a tale of political espionage, corrupt government police, and the lengths they'll go to to keep themselves a continued state secret. Salander's list of supporters grows ever longer as more and more details of the secret police agency and their cover-up become known.

Just like Larsson's other books, this one was hard to put down. I'll admit there were a few boring parts, filled with details about political history. I tended to skim over them, and apparently didn't miss anything crucial to the story.

There's a rumor that Larsson was writing a fourth book (300+ pages already written) about Salander and Blomkvist before he died of a heart attack. Whether or not that book will be finished and published remains to be seen.