Menu Planning Part 1

What are your "Meal Planning Rules"?

Rules? What do you mean by "rules?' Well maybe not rules but guidelines.

Here are some of my rules:

What nights do I need to use the crock pot or have a REALLY REALLY quick supper?
I work 1 evening a week during the supper hour. I prefer to have supper ready when I leave for work so my family can eat when they get home (which is before I get home). This is a good night for the crock pot or casserole dishes.

What meals do I need to have leftovers for lunch?
My husband eats leftovers every day for lunch, except Friday when he usually eats out with people from work. So I need meals that have something for him to eat Sunday through Wednesday evenings. Thursday is when I plan meals, such as fish, that do not lend themselves to be good leftover.

How can I plan meals so we eat out less?
I plan no more than 2 meals per weekend eating out. If we have delivery pizza for supper that counts as 1 meal eating out for the weekend. (We have pizza night almost every Friday night.)

I also plan at least 1 lunch for the weekend so that we have a plan for that meal before its mealtime. This has made a HUGE difference with eating out on weekends. I often have a "plan B" for weekend meals, too.

Coming next time...Ways to help with meal planning.

In a funk...

I'm in a funk. This weather transition to winter I am not doing well with. My online groups are hitting a wrong spot. Did not get to attend MOPS group and the newsletter of the day was not uplifting whatsoever. Have not had much time to talk with my husband - between my work and his increased hours we have not eaten supper together this week. Hopefully tonight. I'm just feeling concerned and alone.

The Day After

I woke up this morning to the news that Barrack Obama will become the new President of the United States in January. I pray for protection for his family during this time. I am concerned for the safety of him, his wife and children, and our country more now than I have been in the last few years.

One benefit I see of Obama winning the position of President - it opens the door for women. How? black men recieved the right to vote before ALL women. Therefore it has been my belief for several years that our country will elecct a black male to the White House before we elect a woman to any position in the White House. Now that we have crossed that bridge maybe in my lifetieme I will see a woman in the White House?

That is my $.02 about the 2008 election.

Dragon Cave

So a message board I post on has discoered this Dragon Cave thing. You adopt baby dragon eggs and care for them till they hatch. Not sure what happens then, maybe they grow up and make new baby dragon eggs to hatch??

So help me out and click here: My Page or here -

How I made a cloak...

Using a piece of string/rope as a compass. Center point is pinned end of rope is loose. White soap used for marking cutting line.



Cutting line for neck. I was not sure if this was to go in the center of the circle or the circle was to radiate out from it. I made the edges radiate from the edge points. The finished cloak is longer in front than back because I did it this way.


Sewing the hood pieces. Note that I used pinking sheers to cut all edges.
The hood piece and cape neck were about 5" different in size. I zig-zaged with a very wide stich over a piece of dental floss (white line in photo below) on the longer piece. Then I pulled on the floss until the pieces were the same length, and pinned before sewing. After finishing I removed the floss and zig-zag basting.
I used a frog clasp, handsewn on , to close the cloak.

Need to get a better finished product photo. This one needs to be turned. Finished cloak.
I still need to wash off the soap lines. Most faded as I worked with the cloak. Big Bird got a HUGE smile on his face when I showed it to him last night....but he was afraid to wear it for long because there were 2 pins holdig on the frog closure, as I ran out of time at nap time to sew on both sides.

Luke Skywalker Episode VI Cloak

Big Bird, my oldest son, decided that he wanted to be Luke Skywalker from Episode VI. He has been talking about what he wants for a few weeks now. Saturday afternoon he described in detail what Luke from Episode VI looks like. I finally got it - and had an idea for what to Google. I found a few ideas for what he wanted...Hey I can do this! We were looking at purchased costumes for another character and modifying to be Luke. All of the Star Wars costumes for purchase this year are from the Clone Wars...and that is just not what we wanted.

Here are the basic directions that I used. .

Cloak Instructions

So what does one need to make Luke Skywalker from Ep.VI? From what I have read/and been told by 5 year old Big Bird these are the essentials.

• Black long sleeve shirt - looking for a mock t-shrt because turtle necks are to small for his BIG head.
  
• Black pants - church pants are black
  
• Black 1 1/2 inch belt - need it
  
• Black boots - need them
  
• Light Saber with a green blade - got it!
• Black Glove - I'm sure we have one lonely black glove around here somewhere!
  
• Black Cape - see below for more info
  

I found the directions for a fleece cape that looked fairly easy. I did not feel the need to have the details be exact like some costume makers - this is a Halloween costume!

Sunday I went to JoAnns and started to search for black fabric. I did not want fleece or flannel - they were suggested fabrics. I was also not in favor of wool because of the itch factor. I started looking at a bottomweight fabric - but I was not 100% sure about it. Then I found some suit fabric - I liked this fabric better because it had a better drape than the bottomweight. So I took it to the cutting table and hoped there would be enough fabric...it was 58" so 3 yards would be enough. Guess what? There was EXACTLY 3 yards, whew.

Now comes the hard part...washing the fabric and finding time to sew.

So today during naptime I decided to make the cape, and not do tomatoes...like I should have done. Was I shocked that in 1 nap time I was able to CUT, SEW and TRIM!

I will put together a tutorial as soon as I have some time to get some pics off the camera.

September 29

Wow Has it really been 6 months since I have posted? Time goes fast! I have been thinking about a meal planning thread - any interest?

I just added a new favorites Gadget - that I am SO excited about. Not so much for my blog right know, but I am excited about it because now I can follow some other cool blogs a lot easier!

Today is my first day as a "full time" in home child care provider. My almost 2 yo is being very silly.