A week into January I hosted a lovely wine and chocolate girl’s night while the men went camping. We got so carried away with conversation that we never even made it to our chick flick. The guys came home from camping with lots of stories, including how they saved a baby goat! They named him Cedric and carried him to the rangers. How awesome is that!
Jon's
back and sciatica pain are back to normal now, thank the Lord. We got a memory foam mattress topper and a
contoured pillow. Those, plus the stretching, plus the chiropractor, helped
little by little.
Not
long into January we got back to normal life.
No visitors, no trips, no holidays, no more crippling back and sciatica
pain; just normal life. We got busy and
back into the motion of homeschooling, house cleaning, exercising, cooking, and
working. And we finally got into full swing on the weekends. Jon was working on
finishing the kids loft beds and their room.
I’ve been keeping busy on the weekends cleaning out, organizing, and
purging even more of our belongings. Now
every time I walk into my bedroom, I breathe a deep breath of relief, because
there are no longer piles of boxes lining every wall. And every time I walk into the kids’ room I
smile to see their cute new beds! Their
room finally looks like a real room. Not
a work in progress with mattresses on the floor. We are happily tired. It feels so good to be making visible progress.
The
boys had so much fun sleeping in their new beds the first week! I'm really glad
Ben didn't fall off; he's such a wiggly sleeper. He ends up in all kinds of
positions. Even with the guard rail, I was kind of worried. Xena now has to deal with being handled more,
which is so not her preference. We lift
her up to put her on the top bunk with the kids at night and lift her down in
the mornings. We alternate who she
sleeps with each night. She loves
sleeping with the kids, but she hates being “handled.”
Every
morning I get Caleb started with his math lesson. Then I sit on the couch with Ben for his
reading, phonics, and language arts lessons.
The instant it’s Ben’s turn to read something to me, he has to arrange,
rearrange, and yet again, rearrange his pillows to maximum comfort. Then he remembers he doesn’t have his special
blue blanket, so he gets up to get it. Then
he has to get comfortable again. Then
the stretchies come. Oh boy, does he get
the stretchies! Then the yawns start in. Then a page or two might get read before it
all starts again. It’s maddening and
hilarious, all at the same time. I finally
wised up and now I give him a few minutes before we start to get it all out of
his system. This drastically cuts down
on all the wiggles, stretchies, and yawns!
Caleb
is getting more comfortable with math.
He was struggling for awhile there.
But it’s clicking now. Yea! Ben is flying with reading. It was just at the beginning of kindergarten
this school year that he was even introduced to a majority of the letter names
and sounds. He’s got all those down and
is reading through beginner reader books easily. It amazes me how different the reading
experience has been for both of my boys.
Caleb took much longer to comprehend the abstract ideas, which is what
words are. Ben just soaks it all in and
it sticks so quickly and easily for him.
Caleb always excelled at building, 3D thinking, and concrete ideas. It is so enjoyable to watch my boys grow and
develop!
We
are having a lot of new experiences here in Texas
The
storm passed through pretty quickly though. I am very thankful I didn't have to
haul myself, my kiddos, and my dog through the storm on foot since our car
battery died that morning. I’m also thankful the tornadoes didn't come into our
area after all. Jon jumped the car battery
when he got home from work. It’s kind of
funny that of all the days for the car battery to die, it does so on tornado
day. After the intensity of the storm
passed, the boys ran around outside with their rain boots and umbrellas. They loved it! I heard excitement and laughter with each
flash of lightening and boom of thunder!
I
found myself a little happy spot one weekend, the Brazos County Master
Gardeners Agrilife Extension site with demonstration gardens. It has a decent
sized demonstration garden with lots of different raised planter beds, a
butterfly garden, a rose garden, a composting teaching area, and lots of trees.
Another day I chatted with another shopper at the local produce
market, the Farm Patch. She is a
professional gardener who is on a local radio gardening program. She gave me so many tips about gardening in
this climate and so much more! I am just
that much more excited to get my garden going here. So far, I’ve planted a variety pepper seeds
in my kitchen window. I had ordered some fun varieties in the mail. I was
trying to figure out which species was the yellow chili I found easily in California , that I can’t buy in grocery stores here in Texas anaheim
Our
new espresso machine arrived and is working great! I’ve decided to only use it on the weekends
to watch my calorie intake. Then I’ll
have a yummy latte to look forward to on our busy working weekends. Getting the bathroom in the extra little
trailer house in better repair is next on the list for our working weekends. We
are looking forward to getting rental income.
It won’t be much, but it will really help!
I’ve
been a busy girl in the kitchen. I
really enjoying trying new things; it keeps me interested. I got my pasta roller attachment for my
Kitchenaid. It was so fun to use. I’ve made homemade ravioli with two kinds of
pasta dough and two kinds of filling. It was all yummy, but some was better
than the rest. I love my new kitchenaid pasta roller! I love discovering how to make meals we love
and recipes that I deem “keeper recipes.”
I
attempted to recreate my favorite breakfast dish from Ruby's Diner, Huevos
Rancheros. My version is Huevos
Rancheros sans Huevos. I would always order it without egg and with turkey
sausage instead. And I intentionally use the French for "without" and
Spanish for the rest. That's the way I say it.
It turned out delicious! I think
what most excited me about the recipe was how I made ground turkey into tasty
breakfast sausage. Yum!
I
also attempted a knock-off Cinnabon recipe.
It turned out unbelievably delicious!
Here's the recipe http://allrecipes.com/recipe/clone-of-a-cinnabon/. I did a few things different and made a few
mistakes. I must have been distracted
that night. I think my "mistakes"
made it even better! It was amazing! I
(intentionally) used a packet of regular yeast (not bread machine yeast), which
is 1/4 less tsp than you're supposes to have, but it was fine. I put the warm
milk, sugar, & yeast in bread machine & let sit for 10 minutes so the
yeast was all foamy. Then I added the rest of the wet dough ingredients, then
the dry. I used butter instead of margarine. I accidentally added the 2 1/2
tablespoons of cinnamon & 1/3 cup of softened butter to the dough mix, not
realizing that it was supposed to be for the filling. Of course I still made
the filling. Definitely double the frosting!!!
That night I also made chicken fried steak, bacon, and eggs. Evilly
delicious! I ate very small portions, but Jon gave himself a food coma.
Another
evening I attempted making Chuy's Chicka Chicka Boom Boom enchiladas. This is
my favorite meal from a restaurant we discovered here in Texas
In
case you were wondering, Jon’s beer making was a big success! He is enjoying his homebrewed double stout
beer. Now we have to get some to Aaron
since he spent the day with Jon brewing it up.
Random
Ben Antic:
Ben
was dramatically "being dizzy" in the living room one morning. I
couldn't help but think that it looked very much like a dance Mia Michaels
would have choreographed on So You Think You Can Dance. Seriously.
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