More pictures from our Worm Digging Expedition

A few more

Something Funny

French Phrases

Prépare-toi pour une journée incroyable!
Get ready for an incredible day.
This was the phrase on our French Living Language calendar on Tuesday. I knew we would have a more interesting day than usual. The kids were out of school for a planning day, and Ian had a friend come over for the morning.
He came with a mission-- to find worms for a fishing trip that afternoon. The kids were definitely ready for the challenge, so off we went.

They had a lot of success in this spot.

Even Isabelle got in on the action. She wasn't afraid to pick up any of the worms!

If you zoom in on this picture, you can see some of the worms in the picture. The mission was a success.

Sloppy Joes

The Ultimate Recipe Swap this week is birthday dinners. I decided to combine it with the Frugal Friday post because one of our the kids most requested meals for birthdays also happens to be a frugal meal. Sloppy Joes are one of Ian's favorites, and when he was younger he had a lot of allergies. There were no mixes for sloppy joes that he could eat.
Fortunately, we had a homemade mix that we liked better than the store bought ones anyway. We use ground turkey because Ian couldn't eat beef at first. Now we are just all used to ground turkey. The added benefits are that I can make it with ingredients that I always have on hand, and it is cheaper than buying Manwhich or whatever.

The recipe is adapted from Desperation Dinners
2 pounds ground turkey
1 1/2 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 1/2 teaspoons bottled minced garlic
6 ounces tomato sauce
6 ounces tomato paste

Cook ground turkey. Add the brown sugar, vinegar, Worcestershire sauce and garlic, then stir in tomato sauce and paste and cook 5 minutes more.

I have also added lentils, either pureed or whole with varying levels of success. The kids aren't too thrilled with them, but I try to sneak them in.

For more Birthday Recipies see the Ultimate Recipe Swap.
For more Frugal Ideas see Frugal Fridays.

Restoring Order

This week I decided to clear off my dressers. Although, it is not a big job, it is one that never seems to get done. One problem is that there is just not enough space in our house. My dresser has become the spot to put things that don't really belong anywhere-- you know, just until I figure out where they should go.
(We actually have two dressers in our bedroom that Stephen and I share. They aren't really ours. We are living in a furnished apartment on campus while we are in school.)

And here are the after. You may have noticed that I have empty picture frames sitting on my dressers. I have been meaning to order other pictures to put in them since we moved! It's one of those things that is not really pressing, so it doesn't get done.

There are more posts on Restoring Order on Homespun Heart.

This month, I am also trying to "toss 50 things." I have a good start, and I have some other things in mind. :)

More Pictures from our Field Trip

Friday Field Trip

Stephen and I had a field trip on Friday. It happened to coincide with a "planning day" at the kids school. This is not really surprising as they seem to be out of school constantly for some reason or other. (Yesterday was a holiday and today is another planning day-- added to the 3 days of school they had off unexpectedly the week before for asbestos.)
Our field trip was a treasure hunt in downtown Sherbrooke. We split into teams of 3 students (5 teams total), and we each had a different list. We had to find information on various landmarks, stop complete strangers in the street and ask questions in French, and other things like that.
I wasn't sure how the kids would do, because it was a lot of walking and not much of interest to them. But I think they all just enjoyed being out and about on such a nice spring day.
Just in case you were wondering... my team came in first and Stephen's came in second. There were no prizes, but Isabelle thought it was very important that we beat the boys. (I had Isabelle and Caleb and Stephen had Ian with him.)
After we finished, we were waiting in the area in front of city hall for the other teams. The kids had fun running around, and there were many beautiful tulips that we all enjoyed seeing.

An attempt at a family photo. Next time I will have to have all of the kids tilt there heads to opposite sides. Ian is almost hidden.

Menu Planning Monday

I updated our menu from last week to show how the week turned out.

Sunday- Leftovers from last week

Monday- Mediterranean Crockpot Chicken (Carried over from last week.)
with rice and fresh veggies
(This is in the crock pot right now.)

Tuesday- Leftovers

Wednesday- Sloppy Joes with fresh veggies (We eat a lot of vegetables.)
I'm going to try these hamburger buns if I have time.

Thursday- Moroccan Chicken and Lentils
with fresh veggies and hummus

Friday- Leftovers

Saturday- Pizza and Movie Night

I'm also going to try Cheerios Breakfast Cookies. And I have Pumpkin Bread in the oven. I substitute old-fashioned oats for the nuts.

Organizing Junkie has lots of links to other menu plans, too.

Mother's Day Play

The kids put on a play for me for Mother's Day. Ian and Isabelle were pirates and Caleb was the parrot. They were all so cute.

At the end of the play there was a clue, and I had to go on a treasure hunt.

At the end of the hunt, I found my treasure--- all three children!

Menu Planning Monday

Since we were first married, I have been planning menus. I would sit down for a couple of hours with my cookbooks, the sale papers from the grocery store, and plan out what we would eat for two weeks.
I have gone through different phases where I don't plan for awhile, and then start again. I have also adjusted the system that I use. No longer to I have a couple of hours to plan! Now I keep in mind things I would like to try, and plan based on what is available at the grocery store. I tend to have a list of meals that I will make, but I don't always assign them to certain days. I also try to only cook 3-4 times a week and use lots of left overs. That makes it easier when we have lots of homework (or anything else.)
Now that I am in the afternoon class, I don't get out of class until 4:30 or 5:00. I am trying out a couple of crockpot things so that I don't have to cook when I come in from school. Here is this week:

Sunday- Chicken cooked in the Rotisserie, Hummus, cheese, bread, fresh veggies

Monday- Salsa Chicken and Black Bean Soup with salad and corn bread muffins

Tuesday- left overs

Wednesday- Stephen is grilling beef. We will also have fresh bread, veggies and hummus.

Thursday- left overs

Friday- either Moroccan Chicken and Lentils (light on the chicken, heavy on the lentils) if my neighbors can join us for lunch
or Mediterranean Chicken if they can't.

Saturday- Pizza and Movie night

For more menu ideas see Organizing Junkie.

Edited to add:
The Salsa Chicken and Black Bean Soup was a big hit. (That means that Stephen and I liked it and the kids were all willing to eat a little bit without complaining.) Our neighbors across the hall came over with chili, and we all had chili and soup and a nice time talking together.
Stephen grilled steak on Wednesday. It was very good. We had fresh corn on the cob, veggies and hummus with it. I didn't get any bread made because I was focusing on homeschool stuff.
I forgot we had a field trip on Friday, so I pushed the dinner from Thursday to this week, and we ate leftovers. Pizza night moved to Friday night, and everything else was the same.

Mother's Day Photo

I realized that I didn't get any pictures last Mother's Day. We made time for one quickly before church. Two out of four people are looking at the camera!

Happy Mother's Day

Yesterday, the grocery store in Vermont had an activity for kids to make flowers for their mom's. While I started finding the things on our list, Stephen took the kids to make a bouquet. It's nice to have fresh flowers in the house!

More pictures from Thursday