I have some interesting photos and video but I am not on my phone right now. One day everything will run smoothly… I hope.
So what have we been up to. Well first off I have been trying to learn german in the hope that I can help Max with his schoolwork. So far it is working but who knows how long that will be. So I spend about 30 minutes a day doing that (sometimes more if I have some free time). I am also trying to sew pants for the boys. I don’t know why, but most of the pants you can buy, I think are made out of cottonized (my own word there) tissue paper. There was one pair of pants that I got for Max that didn’t make it to a washing without him putting a hole in the knee. I can purchase heavier denim and make it myself. 😉 However the boys also need other things so I am a bit behind the 8 ball.
I did hear from my oncologists office about my plan with vitamins. It wasn’t the actual doctor who replied to me but it was sent to a pharmacist at the hospital and I got an answer back that looked like it was researched online. Yeah I am not sure that is exactly what I was looking for but at least it doesn’t appear that it will kill me. So that is good. I hope to start that soon.
Nathaniel has more or less caught up with his schooling. He is a couple days behind but that is nothing. I think he will be fine. I have been thinking about his next steps in schooling including possibly teaching him cursive first, before manuscript. This is an interesting idea that is explained here better then I can do it justice. Please tell me your thoughts in the comments.
Tony and I (along with the kids as they should come with us 😉 ) have been trying to go for walks everyday. I didn’t realize that I was so sedentary. So this has been good. Along with this, because we have our new Walmart, I am thinking of ways to help us with our walk and with grocery getting. We have several ways to do this now, but I discovered the limitations of this over the weekend. When we lived in Cambridge, I didn’t have a small child. So little Pookie adds some challenges. I will figure it out though. He likes to walk so that is good.
Last night we decided to take Max to baseball practice. We did this for a few reasons. First Max has yet to try to hit a ball now that he has glasses. He did a bit better with this then he had during the season. Clearly his eyes changed last year and we didn’t catch this. This contributed to his reluctance with the baseball season this year. 🙁 We also think that he should think through everything before he decides not to do baseball (which is where he was leaning). Nathaniel will be doing T ball in the spring. We don’t want Max to have regrets.
Finally I would like to talk about how we have been cooking recently. We have had meal plans and meal plans over the years. And you know what they all lacked? Making things easier for the whole week. Yeah a plan helps with that or this but it doesn’t help with simplicity. I have started planning for simplicity. For instance on Sunday Tony grilled up 4.5 lbs of chicken breasts. He used just garlic salt and pepper on them. That night we had chicken with rice. Last night I decided I would take 2 breasts and turn them into empanatas. I put a bit of olive oil in a pan, half a bag of frozen peas and carrots, chopped chicken, some left over rice, a few baby sweet peppers chopped, some southwest seasoning (really like the McCormick spice blends), garlic salt and pepper. I also threw in a small amount of chicken stock to moisten it up a bit. I then made a 2 pie crust recipe in my food processor (hate doing that but it works). I rolled out the pie crust and used the salad plate from our Fiestaware to cut large circles of pie crust. Then I put in a serving spoonful into each crust, wet the edge with water, and sealed with pressing a fork on the edge. I also poked a few holes on top with the fork. I baked mine at 350 but it should have been 400. For about 20-25 minutes. Worked well. Tonight we still have some filling left and I might throw in some canned beans (if I have them… I think I do) and some corn into the filling. So I can make it again. I could also turn this into a pot pie if I made a gravy. Later in the week I will likely make a stir fry. I could also make pulled chicken sandwiches. I could turn it into a casserole. Any number of things I could make with the one protein. Then next week we could make another protein. To me this is a good way to cook for the week. It also isn’t boring doing something else everyday.