Getting Back To Routine

Looks like things are getting back to routine now. I think (hope) we are past the below freezing temperatures and our school routine is returning. I have never written about the weather more, than I have the last couple weeks. Everything feels like a fresh start, especially with today's warmer weather, it's 29 degrees. It's the beginning of the second semester, so for Jordan that means a new schedule. Basketball is over (with the exception of one snow day makeup game) which will free up 3 nights a week.

We made a "human snowflake".
Our friends at Homeschool Camper
did this a couple weeks ago.

We are relishing in the "warm" temps, Jordan and I started up our one-on-one walks after school again today. During basketball season this time spent together was replaced with practices and games. I feel like we lose some of our connection during basketball, I love having this time to just to talk with him. This is a small window of time that he doesn't have to share mom with his brothers. Mostly we talk about his day and what's going on with him. During our walks I get to hear his views on different subjects and we discuss things that are happening in the news. I cherish this time with just Jordan, as he often feels his thoughts aren't heard when his brothers are around. I get to focus on Jordan and what's important to him, without interruptions. Our walks aren't serious mother/son talks, although sometimes that happens. We walk, talk, joke, and try edging each other off the sidewalk. It's just an hour a day that I'm more friend than Mom. Usually on our walks I learn things about Jordan I don't think he would have shared with me otherwise.


We "cheated" and looked up his new schedule on the school site last night. His team sports has been replaced with gym/health and he has a couple different teacher this time. He had a teacher last semester he really got along with, until he allowed the others kids to taint his views on the teacher. This time around he has that teacher for two classes. Personally I'm glad, I think the teacher is a fair teacher. He worked with Jordan when his grades started slipping and was good about keeping me informed when Jordan was slacking off. Jordan and I talked (during our walk) about making his own judgment of the teacher regardless of how the other kids feel. I had expressed my feeling toward the Common Core Curriculum with this teacher and he agreed that Jordan could do his lessons the way we have been doing them as long as he could explain how he came upon his answers and he would not lose points for it. It's my hope that Jordan will focus on the class and not his buddies thoughts of the teacher. I know, easier said than done for a teenager, when you're buddies opinions mean a lot to you.

Having a more freed up schedule without basketball, we have returned to our supplement math and reading after school. We had tried to keep it in place the last couple months, but with everyone's busy schedules it became too stressful for all of us and we felt very rushed. The younger boys scouting events are slowing down a bit too as we approach their "bridging over". The amount of activities to be completed has shorten drastically. We all welcomed the return of our online lessons and one-on-one work time with mom.

With so much time recently spent away from school (and maybe partly the beginning of a new semester) the younger boys are very excited to be back in school and have been working diligently to keep their assignment and grades up.



While excited to be back in school, they couldn't wait to get released today. I promised them some outside time. We had a small detour before they headed out into the snow, they didn't mind much. Both of their glasses came in today. Once home they couldn't get their snow clothes on fast enough. We're pushing dinner back a bit so they can stay out until it gets dark. We have not been outside to just play in almost 3 weeks. They really needed this time to run and play (and burn off some energy). Looks like we might get to head back outside again tomorrow too. With cabin fever almost creeping into our house, I'm very grateful for this outside time.

Baby, It's Cold Outside

The current temperature outside,
 at the time I'm writing this post.
Brrr!!

I know that everyone has been experiencing colder than average temperatures, but it has been beyond frigid around here. So cold that we have been out of milk for two days and I refuse to bundle everyone one for a quick run to the store to get some. School has been canceled so often that it's starting to feel like an extended winter break, not that I'm complaining. Cabin fever hasn't really set in at my house yet, but I think we're getting close.

My kids miss being outside for our usual snow fun. So much so that they are even asking to go out to shovel snow, anyone's snow as long as they can get outside. I'm a bit of a fanatic about clear walkways  and I haven't even been trying to keep up with the snow, it's too cold. To help keep the boys from going stir crazy we have been trying to keep busy.

We have done some of snow themed Winter Bucket List activities while staying nice and warm inside the house. I have even loosened the reins on electronic time. While they aren't allowed to sit and stare mindlessly at any screens all day long, we have been rotating computer, video games, and TV time. To help expel some of the energy that has been building up we have been playing games that involve moving our whole bodies; like Xbox Ultimate Sports on the Kinects and hide and seek in the dark. While are new neighbors are not fully moved in the boys have been running through our house playing ninjas and the Nerf guns had come out.

We have also been spending a lot of time reading and Jordan has been helping me make some Granny Squares out of extra yarn for a blanket I have been slowly putting together. (I think getting him crocheting the other day helped spark his interest in the craft.)  Also we have been working our way through some home videos on VHS we borrowed for Papa. I'm loving going down memory lane and the boys are getting a kick out of the 80's hair and clothes styles. Watching their faces has been fun as they get to see uncles when they actually had more hair, and the "Duck Dynasty" beard Papa use to have. It has been a great opportunity to share with them parts of my childhood and how close our family was, as well as pass on knowledge of family members that had gone to Heaven before my boys were born.

I know that all the snow/cold days has some parents ready to pull out there hair, but I have been loving the "extra" time I have been getting to spend with my favorite kiddos. Yes, I love getting a break from them while they are at school, but I love having them with me even more. I can always enjoy quiet time after they are all grown and moved out of my house. To me I guess it's a matter of how you see all the snow/cold days, you can dread having your kids cooped up inside or see it as a blessing- time you would of had not otherwise had to enjoy spending together.

We have inadvertently completed some of our bucket list items just by hanging out and having fun. However we're not counting the dance parties, mom VS kids on video games, or board game day towards our list just yet. We're saving those so we can do them again later, as they happened to just be something we did.

I know Jordan is looking forward to going back to school as he still has a midterm to do and his last basketball game. Seems the semester is at an end, he can't wait to see what his new schedule will look like and which electives he'll get. While typing this I received an email that the boys will have another day off. He'll have to wait at least one more day to get back to school.

Snowmen and Penguins For This Week's Bucket List Update (and Link-up)

Our Winter Bucket List is still moving along a little bit slower pace this week, but we still marked off another two item from our list. Last week we started growing our icicle candy as they take a 5-7 day s to grow. We were off to rocky start as half of our icicles weren't growing. We tried re-saturating our solution, but it didn't seem to help much. We'll restart them this week, hopefully with more  success.

With the freezing temperatures and even more snow coming down we continued with more of our snow themed activities while staying toasty warm in the house. We completed our popcorn snowmen. Those were a lot of fun to make and more difficult than we could have thought to get them to stay standing. We used mini chocolate chips for eyes, an orange Tic Tac for the nose, pretzel sticks for the arms, and a marshmallow for a hat. Our scarves made from fruit leather did not cooperate either, Jordan used a toothpick to get his to stay. Toothpicks were also used behind some of our snowmen to help keep them from looking like they were melting. While we were playing with our food we also made some snowmen using marshmallows and used mini Reese's peanut butter cups for a hat. They enjoyed snacking on the snowmen as much as making them.

We were the most successful with our pop bottle penguins though. We used 12 ounce root beer bottles. Cutting the tops off of three and the bottle 1/4 of another three. We were going to glue hem, but they seemed to stay put rather well. First everyone painted the white bellies of their penguins and after letting them dry, painted the rest of the bottles black. We saved painting the faces for last. While we were waiting for the pain to dry Jordan and I crocheted scarves and hats for them. Joey and Jacob tried to crochet their own, but just weren't getting it. Everyone dug though my extra yarn for which color they wanted. We were even able to "attach' the hat and scarves without using any glue (except for the one hat I made a little to big). Jordan and I kept the hats really simple with making a couple rows and turning them into tubes, tying the tops closed with a rubber band. These turned out so much cuter that I had envisioned.

Also we are still very slowly working our way through our coloring book (very slowly). You'd think being cooped up in the house they'd be more willing to color a couple pages, it just doesn't seem to have the appeal that Lego do.

Menu Plan Monday

I'm trying again to link-up with Organizing Junkie for their Menu Plan Monday.



Sunday: Pizza, bread sticks, and salad

Monday: Chicken fajitas, mixed peppers, shredded cheese, corn, Spanish rice

Tuesday: Soup (tomato & veggie) and sandwiches, and block cheese slices (Jacob cooks)

Wednesday: French dip sandwiches, green beans, and carrot coins

Thursday:  Spinach pie and corn bread (Joey cooks)

Friday:  Ranch Chicken, chicken and broccoli  rice, and green beans (Jordan cooks)

Saturday:  English roast, mashed potatoes, gravy and peas.

A pretty basic menu again this week.  I aim for a rotation of poultry, beef, and meatless every week.

Family Of Four With "Four-eyes"

Today was a planned day off of school for Joey and Jacob, and Jordan was to have a half day for the end of the term. They all ended up having the day off school again due to extreme temperatures. We stayed hunkered down in the house with the exception of an eye doctor appointment for the two younger boys.

Joey has needed reading glasses for the past two years. Jacob recently has been complaining about seeing "colored dots". We weren't sure if the "dots" were a vision issue or if it was from migraines caused by his CVS. Turns out that it's kind of both, Jacob has been having migraines (thankfully without really noticing and without any to much pain). Also he needs to have readers, which will help improve his reading fluency. We'll be able to pick them up in few days.

Joey eyes are about ready to "switch" , currently he'll still need the readers, but soon will need glasses for distance instead. He hasn't been wearing his glasses as he should because he broke them and shortly after getting them fixed the arm fell off. He'll be receiving his new plastic glasses within a couple days. I think the plastic ones hold up better with children.

I went to the same doctor a week ago and was surprised to hear "You're eyes aren't too bad. They're about average for someone in their 40's.", I'm barely into my 30's! I'm suppose to wear mine for distance and when I drive. Honestly I don't wear them like I should, the glare off oncoming traffic makes it more difficult to drive. Then I got some more bad news; I'm on my way to needing bifocals. I was in need of some readers, but have to still (actually) wear my old pair for driving. I was able to pick up my glasses during the boys' appointments.

We all have almost matching glasses. We have all opted for plastic this time around. Jordan has full black , Joey ordered dark gray, Jacob is  getting black with a hint of blue, and mine are black with pink.

Jordan is the only one who didn't have his eyes rechecked, but will getting them done in the very near future.

Morning At the Museum

Yesterday was a no school day for us, with it being MLK Day. With all the extreme cold days and snow days were all starting to get cabin fever. Over the weekend Grandma came across an article for free admission to The Henry Ford Museum. Although we had a couple things we needed to get done we thought we could squeeze in some museum time also. In order to get everyone where they needed to be, we had to get an early start (no sleeping in on our day off). We managed to get  to the museum five minutes before it open. Added bonus for getting there so early is you pretty much have the whole place to yourself, you know it will get crowded when everyone can get in for free.
We have been to this museum a couple times in the past. The last time was about two years ago. I try not to visit each museum too often, as the boys grow tired of seeing the same things and we lose some of the of the excitement of learning about history.


We started at one end with looking at the presidential cars and worked our way across the building. After the presidential cars we moved on to the older cars in different style (when did a 1984 minivan become an "old car"?) After working our way through the assortment of cars we made our way to the trains. There were a couple we could walk into and a cool train set they had set up and a couple of the trains had cameras on the fronts of them so you could see things from "the engineers" point of view.

We visited the plane exhibit were the boys really like listening to the recorded stories of  a few didn't pilots. We did some hands-on paper airplane designing and took them to the "flying strip" to try them out. I was pleased that the kids were really into listening and reading all the signs to everything, instead of just walking around looking at everything.












We also looked at the different styles of bicycles, houses, and household items from different times in history. Is a VHS player really old enough to be considered history, we still use ours? We walked through a favorite house of mine when we were there, The Dymaxion House. It has to be the use of household space ever. I love walking through there; it is futuristic looking (think "The Jetsons") and yet could work as a functional house.




 Then we made our way to the main attraction, the Avatar exhibit. This was really neat! The boys were able to compare their sizes to that of an Avatar in the movie. We were able to try our hands at "graphically designing" different plants into some movie scenes. I think one of our favorites at this exhibit was actually getting to be part of the interactive video. We were giving prompts as to where to walk and what hand motions to use while in basically a green screen box. After we were done with our 30 seconds of being an actor the museum emailed us our videos. Jordan's video malfunctioned some the animation didn't match up at all with the motions he had made.

We covered just about everything we wanted to see. Considering we only had two hours to see everything and still make it to our next appointment, I think we did fairly well.

After the museum we stopped by the Grandparents to grab the last bit a laundry that hadn't been dried in time last night as well as our cat, Otis. We took Otis down to have a kitty play date with Gracie seems they became good friends within the short time she stayed with us. Went we getting ready to leave Otis took off down into the basement and hid. 30+ minutes later, we decided to leave him there. "Maybe Otis wanted his turn to stay the night at Grandma's" was Joe's thought.  I thought I would be able to scoop up the cat and the laundry and be on our way. Not what happened, Otis hears the keys in the door and tears off the basement before I could snag him. Due to being in a time crunch, I grabbed the laundry and left. (My parents were surprised to see Otis still there when they got home from work).

On the way home we grabbed a drive thru lunch and managed to pull into the parking lot at the doctors with 5 minutes to spare. I figured it was time for a follow up with Jacob's doctor since they had not requested to see us after his scope. Also I wanted to let her know that I took him off the medication the GI prescribed. I'm really glad I made the appointment, the GI hadn't sent her and information about Jacob's scope back in September. I'm not one to change my kids prescriptions without seeing their doctor first, but his really was doing more harm than good. Jacob has had some rapid weight gain from is medicine. which is one of the side effects. He went from a boys size 7 to a boys size 8 Husky and those were snug on him. His poor little belly was bloated and distended most of the time and he had gained about 20 pounds. Thankfully the doctor agreed that taking him off the medicine was a good move. He is only taking ginger root once daily and that seems to work for him. Actually we're going to take another look at his diagnoses. With or without the medication we had taken away he has t been getting sick. While he did/does have some symptoms of CVS (Cyclic Vomiting Syndrome) he is no effected as severely as most children (or adults).

After the doctors, it was a quick stop home to put the laundry away, a snack before heading across town for Jordan's basketball practice.

While we gave a an extra day to sleep in, we had a fun filled day and got a lot accomplished.

Planning A-Head, So I don't Feel Like I'm Loosing My Mind

My first time linking up with Organizing Junkie for Menu Planning Monday. We have been in the same 29 menu idea rut for a little bit (like the past 7 years). I use to be really good about preplanning our menu and somehow I slip away from it. Life is so much easier when I can at least have a game plan for what we'll be having for dinner on days when things are so hectic I can't seem to remember what day it is. Here's to a new attempt of remaining organized :)

Sunday- First time trying Shepherd's Pie (it did not go over well with the boys)

Monday- Steak sandwiches with peppers & onion and cheese slices -Jordan's day to cook

Tuesday- Marinated chicken, stuffing, zucchini and yellow squash, and applesauce -Jacob's day to cook

Wednesday- Bean (refried and black beans) and Cheese quesadillas, Mexican rice, and corn (we use to add chicken in them, but one day I was rushing and forgot to toss it in. My kiddos enjoy this version just as much) - Joey's day to cook

Thursday- (scout night, so ha to be a quick and easy meal) Breakfast for dinner. Eggs, turkey bacon, toast, and fresh fruit.

Friday- Cornflake coated chicken, homemade potato fries, broccoli florets (great Gluten free meal)

Saturday- This week we'll be Grandma's, so your guess is as good as mine :)

*To help my boys learn to cook, each of them (ages 7, 9, and 13) either makes the complete meal by themselves (supervised of coarse) or with mom guiding them.

Thank you to our dear friends at Homeschool Camper for introducing us to this page :)