This week's menu -a wee bit late

so I'll throw in next week's menu as a bonus for forgiving me.

Monday: Salad bar -romaine/green leaf lettuces, tomatoes, cukes, olives, peppers, croutons, and whatever else you can find in the fridge.

Tuesday: Crockpot chili w/ corn muffins

Wednesday: beef soft tacos w/ refried beans -using veg leftovers from monday's dinner

Thursday: Beef rice-a-roni -yes. from a box until I master a homemade version

Friday: Homemade buttermilk pancakes -yum and maybe I'll get pictures

Saturday: usually leftovers, but we'll be out of town so either pizza or teriyaki

Sunday: Enchiladas -chicken


Okay, that brings you up to date and here's next weeks' menu too:

Monday: Veggie stir fry with rice

Tuesday: grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup

Wednesday: Rice bowls with broccoli and beef

Thursday: scrambled egg burritos

Friday: homemade pizza pockets

Saturday: leftovers/new dish or recipe

Sunday: Crockpot chicken & potatoes

I actually have two months of menus finished. My goal is to have three months completed at a time, but I lost steam and got bored.

delving into deep sh...

One hell of a way to start a day. Well, I apparently got myself volunteered to help with N's preschool class on a field trip today. No biggie, I've done it before. Then, I realized it was to the Museum & Arts Center. Huh? Why in the... who would do this? The main reason for this particular visit is to see the bones of a local find, a Mastadon. The kids study this week has been on dinosaurs. If two things should never be mixed it would be eight, 3 year olds and a bunch of unguarded old bones. I was sweating serious buckets of sweat, because I was also dragging along the Lu monster.

It started out pretty uneventful, a relatively easy short bus ride into town. The kids held hands in nice chain formation across the street to the Sequim Museum & Arts Center. We walked in and they (the two volunteers) looked surprised that we (me and ms. teacher)were bringing in a gaggle of toddlers, who were still hyped up from that awesome bus ride where they didn't have to ride in carseats. We quickly shuttled them over to the mastadon exhibit. I have to say that I was a little less than impressed by the jaw bone, rib bone, front leg and rear leg bones of this hairy elephant, but it seemed to suffice the children for about three minutes before they were spinning around, screeching, and touching things. And if anyone knows a three year old -they all scatter.

Ms. teacher and I managed to keep our cool and curious fingers from touching shit (for the most part) for the forty minutes we were scheduled to be there. And guess what? Nothing got broke. Well, okay one little turd managed to peel a "No touch" sign off of a model of an old school house and my little monster Lu removed the arm off of the rocking chair -that I quickly stuck back together in such a smooth fashion that no one noticed (I think). There was minimal arguing -and only two mishaps where Lu didn't want to share her big sister's hand, that truly deserved the throw down temper tantrum that ensued. All-in-all not too bad. For the most part, we all survived.

I even received an invite for future field trips, which I quickly turned down and ran for the hills.

It's Wednesday

What?

I'm having a heck of a time getting motivated these last few days. Yesterday I started feeling a little out of whack and I'm not sure what's causing it. Perhaps I'm lacking in one of my vitamin supplements or one of my new medications is causing it. Whatever.

I discovered a new recipe for pancakes that we all just die over. We've eaten them for dinner twice in the last week and at least twice for breakfast. Not to mention that I had a few left over from one of those nights and we froze them for weekday breakfast. Typically, we are a Krusteaz family. I buy the big bags from Costco and every other week we have them for dinner and at least once during a weekend. My family loves pancakes. Well, last weekend the man of the house accidentally picked up a quart of buttermilk instead of 2% - I saw the mistake right off the bat, but he said the color was similar. Anyhow, well when life gives you buttermilk, you make buttermilk pancakes!
I had remembered a few days earlier a post that I had read on The Happy Housewife that I knew we had to try someday. Well that someday had come. Happy's whole wheat pancakes are a hit! We had to alter them up a bit, because half of the kids were gone and I definitely didn't need to make a full batch and I didn't have any whole wheat flour around. Regardless, they were delicious and so easy to make and my husband claims it is why he bought the buttermilk in the first place, no mistake, all intentional. Typical man.
You'll have to enjoy her pictures for now as I haven't had a chance to take any of our own. When I do, I'll add the recipe with it too.


In the past month I've made my cinnamon rolls several times and I think my husband and my ass are hating me for it. They are just good and a seriously awesome reward for being a stay-at-home mom. Don't they look good?

I'm now working on our menu plan for the next three months - the first two months were easy, but now I'm struggling with the last month. It may be a month of rice & noodles :)

Where did February go?

Seriously, I don't know what I've been doing, but I can't believe it's more than half over. We all know I haven't been here.

Last week I went with Zakery on a field trip to the Port Townsend Marine Science Center. Here's what I learned from this. Fifth graders are not my favorite people, especially sixty of them. Two hours on a crowded bus, someone is bound to get sick, and that someone is me. We ended up with the bus nazi -it was frightening, and you don't mess with the bus nazi. Don't delete pictures while a high energy activity is going on -the end result is devasting (yes, I accidentally deleted all my pictures dating back almost a week, and included our super bowl weekend party with our families!).

Yesterday did it in for me. I think I'll be calling my doctor tomorrow to up my happy pills. I've had this annoying reminder that kept popping up on my laptop from Windows, telling me that it needed to update, and it automatically started while I was using it. Needless to say my OS never returned. It's in this awful rotation saying that it encountered an error and will restart in 24 seconds, and then it repeats. The last time I did a back up was well over a month ago and I'm sure my hard drive is shot. Can you say dark days? Yep, I can't access my recipes, my pictures, my bookmarks or favorites! Oh the humanity! My poor daughter is having to share her laptop with me right now, and I'm sure she's gritting her teeth.

I will try to update with our menu's tonight or tomorrow, but there won't be any pictures. Sorry.

Until then you can enjoy a wonderful blog with lots of recipes & pictures -my new favorite to check in on is The Happy Housewife - you won't be disappointed.