A Heavenly Home in the making...

Several weeks ago, when I was getting ready to do my visiting teaching, I read the message and it just didn't seem to resonate with me as the exact direction I needed to take with the sisters I was visiting.  I did some research, explored some of my favorite minds, and stumbled on a speech that, when reading, I had the overwhelming impression that it was a talk that would perfectly fit with my sisters.

But more importantly, it really stuck with me.  I read it through and went immediately back to the front page and started again.  Some excerpts...

"The nearer we get to God, the more easily our spirits are touched by refined and beautiful things....one of the purposes of our earthly probation is to become like them in every conceivable way so that we may be comfortable in the presence of heavenly parentage"

"President David O. McKay was inclined to awaken at 4:00 a.m., skim read up to two books each day, and then commence his labors at 6:00 a.m. He could quote 1,000 poems from memory. We knew that whenever he stood at the pulpit. He referred to the grand masters of literature as the “minor prophets.” He was a living embodiment of the scriptural admonition to “seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom"

 

"Dear daughters of God, you are the crown jewels of all of His creations. There has never been a sunset, symphony, or work of art as lovely as you. May you catch the vision that you are destined to be a refined and regal queen, honored by an uncountable posterity, worlds without end."

"...your Father in Heaven, has sent you away from His presence to have experiences you would not have had in your heavenly home—all in preparation for the conferral of a kingdom. He doesn’t want you to lose your vision. You are children of an exalted being. You are foreordained to preside as kings and queens. You will live in a home and environment of infinite refinement and beauty, as reflected in the language, literature, art, music, and order of heaven."

 You can find this whole talk here. 

I don't want to SEE the Wizard - I want to BE the Wizard

Sometimes, in my life, I feel like one of the characters in the Wizard of Oz.  No, not the munchkins - I was taller than them by the time I saw the movie.  In elementary.

One of the things that I have always found interesting about those characters is they are parts of a whole.  Obviously their inabilities are exaggerated to make them endearing characters, but they seem to just be one thing.  I mean no one ever compliments the lion for his ability to be empathetic for a friend, or the tinman's bravery and willingness to start chopping at people who threaten his friends or the scarecrow's ability to lighten the situation with his humorous antics.  But they are all off to see the wizard with the desire to have ONE thing.  Not to be complete or whole, but because they are longing for one thing.

Sometimes, I feel like those characters.  I feel like I go through phases where I'm trying to be awesome at one thing, and then a few weeks later another and so on.  And sometimes I even feel a little crabby like the witch. So what did the wizard have that I want?

Proper perspective and sheer determination.  

So, some life-balancing goals.  

Some of you may have noticed that I put a pounds lost button on my blog.  I have lost that just by changing my diet with MyFitnessPal, but I really have 15 to go before I would be okay with my weight and some serious toning and muscle building to even really be happy after that.  I found a program called Couch to 5k (c25k) that I'm embarking on and biking on my crappy decade old mtn bike on non-running days.  But more than that, my commitment to be fit has me trying to find reasons to ride my bike more often and to more places. And this journey so far as me wanting to buy clothes that aren't primarily black anymore, being happy about the person I see in the mirror each day and beating myself up less.  All good things, right?

Obviously during the summer, I have more time (and desire...and eye power...and alertness) to read lots, but then often, during the school year, I will let that slump off a bit.  I require my Honors English kids to read 70 pages a week.  That's ten a night - surely I can fit that in.

I set time aside in my daily schedule to write and have three different ideas I'm toying around with right now, so the writer's block will not work here. And I can really find 15 minutes.  I'm trying to write 500 words a day but making sure I get the 15 minutes for now.

Because of Bountiful Baskets, we have been having fun eating at home more, but then this last week, that crapped out big time.  The kids like helping me, seeing and trying the food we get is like a weekly Christmas and when Charlotte posts yummy recipes like this, I really have no excuse, right?

I decided that it was pointless to just make goals on December 31 and then check a year later to see what happened.  The beginning of the school year seems like a good time to see what I can do to get all five elements of my life - physical, mental, spiritual, emotional and financial - more balanced.

I'm off to become the Wizard...kindof.

To Save My Sanity

I like to consider myself a patient person.  Afterall, I teach teenagers for a living.  I have three kids.  I have been married for almost eleven years.  I'm the oldest of five children.  I'm the primary second counselor.  I taught piano (and may start again) for eleven years before I got my teaching job.


All of these areas require patience and while it may be accompanied by frustration, I still can usually work through it.


However, there are few things that can drive me absolutely crazy faster than when I ask my kids to do something and they say okay. Then, fifteen minutes later when I go to check on progress, they are rockin' out to their tunes, but the beds aren't made, clothes aren't put away, brushes aren't in drawers, water hasn't even been turned on to clean the bathroom, five pairs of  underwear are on the floor, they are buried under the blankets that are supposed to be on their beds...well, you get the idea.  And then...

I turn into a yeller. 

I don't like being a yeller.  And then when I go back five minutes later and see the same scene depicted above, I just lose my mind and contemplate if it would be easier for me to run away or get rid of my kids.  

I know - bad mom.  

So, because I'm tired of being a bad mom, for the last week I have been researching homeschooling families.  Especially LARGE homeschooling families.  Seven to eight kids minimum.

Did I lose you?

See, the way I figure is that homeschooling families and both parent working families have lots in common.  There are things that are trying to be accomplished that seem impossible.  Homeschooling families are teaching their children, all of different ages and abilities, running a home, often have a dad working at home or on a farm, and managing all of it with grace and calmness most of the time.  

That's my goal.  

So, with that in mind, I've taken the ideas from Managers of their Homes (MOTH) as shared here and Managers of their Chores.

Here's how it should work.  

Everyone has a daily schedule.  Please note this is VERY flexible because we will have games and things that will require things to be adjustable, but I like the idea that there is a basic idea.  You can see the schedule here.  Obviously this is for during the school year but if it proves successful, I will modify it for next summer.


Each morning the kids have chores that need to be accomplished PRIOR to 8:00 am.  These are things like get dressed, make bed, brush teeth, comb hair and then each child has a part of the dishwasher to unload, Will feeds the pets, Ellie cleans off the counter in the bathroom and Catie cleans up the bathroom floor.  Then the evening chores they have are things like homework, piano/violin, get backpack ready for next day, daily assignment, dinner assignment, bedtime routine.  I asked the kids if they would rather have an area they are in charge of once a week or once a day and they wanted to do daily. 


So how will all this minimized the mom yelling syndrome?  Enter Daddy Dollars to create a system that the kids are excited about and should required NO yelling from me.

The kids can earn three of these IF they have their morning chores done by 8:00 am and they can earn another five if they have their evening chores done by 8:00 pm.  If they don't, they don't get part later.  It is all or nothing.  Then, when they want to go bowling, or get a snowcone, or whatever, they can redeem these for that award. If they don't have enough for whatever someone else gets to do, guess what.  Life is tough.  I like this because then there isn't money going back and forth and it is recyclable :)


I'm not quite done with everything for this to launch yet - hoping to have it completed today.  I'm buying each child a clipboard that matches their art stations and will tape a small money sized manila envelope and their morning and evening responsibilities to the board.  Then it is all in one place.  There will also be a Mom/Dad clipboard with a master list of who has what responsibilities and the Dad Dollars. 


I think it's going to work.  I'm really hoping it's going to work.  Because I can't keep doing everything for everyone.  I turn into the meanest mom on the planet, which is frustrating and exhausting and full of all kinds of self inflicted guilt trips. 


I'll keep you posted.

Bountiful Peaches and Strawberries

I had plenty of strawberries and peaches left over from last week's Bountiful Basket and we got more today. So I needed a way to get rid of them faster than we had been doing. After a quick google search, I found this...


The recipe can be found here.

Celebrating and Refocusing

I'm not sure this is new news at this point as Enoch texted everyone in his phone and I posted it on Facebook, but I successfully defended my Master's thesis and will be graduating a week from tomorrow. I've had so many people ask me if I'm thrilled and on a high.

The answer?

No.

I'm tired, exhausted, lacking motivation and wanting to have a lazy day. I think I'll probably hit that high next week during the celebrations, etc. but I'm really just worn out for now. Super glad to be done and moving on to other things, don't get me wrong. But I've been pushing pretty hard for the last year and a half and I think it finally caught up with me :)

With that being done, I'm hoping that now this can turn back into a blog about something besides books. I still plan on reading and posting all my reviews, and summer's coming up so it will probably pick up the pace a bit. But I really, really want to bake.

I'm planning on making these VERY soon, want to make some scrabble cookies like these but maybe not quite on the scale that she did. I am Baker has the best recipe and tutorials for making amazing looking cookies that I just have to try out.

My girls REALLY want to do more baking as well, and in my dream land, I would buy some of these

but maybe I'll just visit my neighbor's fabric shop and break out my sewing machine and make some myself.

In other words, I'm getting domestic about my life and am super excited :)

Yea for Food and People and Blogs

Today as I was perusing the blogs, I came across a recipe for a beautiful braided Garlic Herb Bread.

The thing I really liked about it was that I could come home after school and get it made, let it rise and have delicious hot bread for dinner. Intrigued? For the recipe, click here.*

Then, I was reading Charlotte's blog and she posted about her discovery of leftover ham, which she turned into this delicious and practical soup (it's at the bottom of the post). EPIPHANY!!! I had a ziploc bag in my fridge of ham that I needed to either get used or frozen. The weather outside is quite cold, I had this inspiration to cook this bread and the soup sounded like a perfect match. So, because of wonderful people who talk about delicious food on their blogs for all to enjoy, my family was served this tonight.
The best thing about all of this was it was all made from things I have in my house all the time anyway (almost)**

*If you are NOT using instant yeast, don't forget to mix the yeast with the water first eventhough the recipe says different.

**I didn't have any dill but the bread was still delicious and I didn't put the corn in the soup.

Making it a Habit

Some of you may have noticed the changes in this blog, especially the addition of the food links on the left hand side of the blog. I have been searching them out and finding ones that are for "real people" like me instead of those people who have nothing better to do than shop for things like eight different kinds of cheese and recognize them by texture and flavor or make their own ravioli from scratch, etc.

Here's the thing. I have this weakness for just grabbing something to eat when I'm stressed or tired or just don't want to cook. I think part of this has been because I've been rotating the same entrees for years and I need something new, but again, easy. It doesn't even necessarily need to be quick if I can crockpot the main time consuming thing.

The time has come, however, for this decision to be made.

This family will not eat out for 30 days.

I'm sure there are many of you who are thinking, really? Is that really that hard?

YES!

I guess part of the inspiration for this is from seeing Julie and Julia. Don't even think that I'm going to work through Julia Child's cookbook. Hello, I DO NOT have that kind of time, skill or ambition at this point.

But the catch with this goal is I really, really, really want to try to do it without making the same thing twice. Of course, I have the advantage that I don't cook our main meal on Sundays- we rotate between our parents (I know, tough life, right?) And I'm hoping, now that it looks my Saturdays are looking less full, that I can try that whole make things ahead and put them in the freezer thing.

I guess this techinically started on Saturday when I had some a few apples that someone gave me for free. I dried most of them, but still had some left over that weren't really good to do much with and weren't going to last long enough to be eaten. Then I remembered seeing a recipe for Gooey Apple Bread. It's one of those cake breads, but sometimes that's okay with me. I did the regular loaves, double the recipe and halved the oil by adding applesauce. I think it is delicious.

(BTW, don't plan on me necessarily posting pictures of everything...I'll try to remember but no guarantees...)

I will link or type up the recipes and am more than open to any suggestions.

Here's to personal development, edification and all that. May I not lose my sanity in my efforts to develop this habit.

Wish me luck!!!

Maid, I mean, Mom Helpers

There are a few products that just make my life happier when I'm eternally working on getting and keeping my house clean. I have a couple of things that are constantly stifling my efforts. First, I have kids. Enough said. Second, I live in Enoch, where the wind blows all the time. Third, on the south side of my house, the direction the wind blows during the summer, there is about 3-5 miles between me and the next structure - just dirt between. I truly believe that I could sit and watch the dust gather on my furniture. Nevertheless, here are a few of my maid/mom/sanity helpers.

1. The Downy Ball. Many of you may have seen the commercials when this product first came out. It releases the fabric softener into the rinse cycle. You don't have to listen or tune in your ESP or anything. Here's the thing. I have only been using this product for just over six months and I didn't know that sweatshirts could get that "new sweatshirt" feel back after it was lost. Static cling gone, softness back, easy, easy, easy.

2. Pledge Mulit-surface Cleanser. This is a really great product. I used to try to clean the TV and stereo/VCR/DVR and then try to clean the wood surfaces without getting that cleaner on the electronics, etc or reverse the product and somehow I always ended up with a weird residue on something. And then, the next day...dust growing all over everything. With this product I really can clean many different surfaces (not mirrors or windows though...a little streaky) and the best part? It really does repell part of the dust that is battling for permanent residence. I have the wipes too but I don't care for them as much.

3. The newest member of this club is the windex outdoor window cleaner. There are few things I love more than really clean windows, and quite honestly, the whole move the ladder around and negotiate the ground to get steady ground, move it if you have a big window, etc, getting the outside clean is a huge task. This new product is fabulous. My mother-in-law bought it first and was happy so I decided to give it a go. I really does what it says it's going to do. My windows are clean, they aren't streaky and it only took about 20 minutes to get all my windows done. Lots better than the couple of hours it probably would have taken me. And my windows look just like a HDTV screen. Fabulous.

So, there are some of my favorite things that make day to day life around my house better. When you get a sec, if there is a product that you just love, please, share in the comment section. Every little bit helps, you know?