Homemaking 101

Does anyone else feel like it's time for a refresher course on homemaking 101? Maybe we should watch a few seasons of Leave it to Beaver and take notes on how June Cleaver keeps house and has lunch ready for the kids on the way out the door.

I've been doing my leftover for lunch routine with chicken patties and frozen burrito's thrown in for good measure and oh if you remember grab a fruit or a veggie out of the fridge to add to what ever your fancy is for lunch. Lets just say I haven't been at my June Cleaver best.

Isn't  it interesting that in a way this time that is forcing us to look at what we're doing and what's most important to us is gently pushing us back to the June Cleaver times? I know there are a lot of families where both parents have to work or there is just one parent in the home and it's not ideal. I do think however that there are small things that we can do to help us have that happy family. Maybe it doesn't look like improved lunches for home and school or a better cleaning routine. Maybe it just looks like better communication when we are together. Laughing more and realizing that we really do enjoy being together. 

So as my family goes back to school and all the things that go with that I'm committing to find one or two things that will help my family be healthier and happier so that when we look back on 2020 we'll say yeah that was tough but look at what we accomplished and how much we like each other more now than ever! 

So let's put our apron's on so we don't get our clothes messy and get in there and live life to the fullest....one homemade lunch at a time!

Reflecting

I was searching for a card to mail to a niece this morning and ran into a copy of what was on the back of the Christmas card we sent out last year. Here it is ...

"Celebrating the ordinary!

Zach shaved for the first time this year. He’s 16 and going on his first date soon. Zach has also been practicing driving and is pretty good. Zach loves going to Nuames for High School and is doing really well and getting good grades.

Sam is currently in ballroom at both the elementary school and at Davis County Ballroom. Sam (11) likes being in sixth grade and is doing well. He’s a pretty responsible guy and is a library helper.

Josh is still at University Credit Union as the IT manager. They have been really good to us. Josh got to go to scout camp this summer and a couple other camp outs with the young men. He now gets to work with the Elders in Elders quorum as the secretary.

Heather loves volunteering at the school in Sam’s class and with a volunteer reading program. She’s been working on her sewing skills and enjoys the freedom of staying home keeping things going there.

Some of the fun things we did this summer are: Sleeping in Hammocks in the backyard, getting snow cones, making a forge, mini golf, Uncle John and Aunt Lauren’s Wedding, getting JDawgs, building a 3d printer, parades, homemade ice cream, Especially For Youth, RAD Kids, eating at Grannie Annie’s, and lots of family visits! We wish you a year of Celebrating the Ordinary!"

As I was reading the fun things we did last summer it reminded me that it really is the ordinary things that we do that are the things that memories and character are made of. At a time when I've given up on being the cruise director for the summer this little gem gave me hope that all is not lost and that we'll look back on this time a realize all the fun things we did and how we grew into better people.

Here's to Celebrating the Ordinary!

Peas

The Peas are on in the garden! Peas are one of my favorite veggies! I think my love of peas is wrapped up in happy memories.

Every summer my family would pack everyone into the car/minivan/suburban to make the 6 hour drive through Yellowstone National Park to Cody Wyoming. It's a long car drive but the scenery is nice. We'd tell the other cars to "move over pilgrim" and laugh when people would stop on the side of the road to look at one buffalo when our experience was that a little farther down the road the whole herd would be in site. We'd sing to John Denver songs with Dad and complain about who was touching who and really how much farther. We knew we were close when we'd get to the tunnels!  The best part though was when we'd finally pull into the drive a Grandma and Grandpa's house. We'd hop out of the car and give hugs and then head straight for the pea patch. Part of the novelty of picking the peas and eating them in the garden was that you could just throw those pea pods where ever you wanted....as long as they were still in the garden.

You see peas aren't just a nice little green non leafy vegetable, they're a sweet childhood memory wrapped up in each little pod.

The Home Organic Gardener

I've grown a garden for several years now... good thing too that's what I went to school to learn how to do..plant things and take care of them. Some years I have great success and other's not so much. This year I was diligent in planting lettuce early in the spring partly because I needed to see the beauty of the earth growing good things at a time when it seemed the whole world was falling apart... at least it felt that way. Luckily the lettuce grew well and soon it was getting too hot to leave the lettuce in the ground or it would turn bitter and bolt.

Oh how I wanted to just leave the lettuce in. It looked so pretty in the garden box! It also made me look like an awesome gardener but since I was growing lettuce to actually eat it had to be harvested. Armed with my big green plastic bowl, probably from the dollar store, that has a boarder of Santa Clauses around it to put my bounteous harvest in I headed out to the garden!  I bent down to pluck the first lettuce plant out of the ground and as I was pulling it out and putting into my plastic green Santa bowl I noticed that a massive ant and earwig evacuation was taking place on my lettuce! Yuck!

Now the question was do I go on or do I just walk away and pretend like I'm growing ornamental lettuce just for looks. Could I really even eat the lettuce even if I quadruple washed it twenty times over? Would I be afraid that I'd be accidentally feeding me and my family dead ant carcasses every time I made salad? Would this lead to an indoor earwig infestation? Oh get a grip! This is nature!  How many dead ants do you think we've all eaten from lettuce from the store? Actually lets not even think about eating dead ants okay?

Like a good vegetable gardener. I picked all the lettuce... rinsed it three times with the secondary water and twice more after I got it in the house to make sure I got all the germs from the secondary water off the lettuce all the while on the look out for the earwigs that were coming out of no where it seemed. All the while my gallant 16 year old son who is supposed to protect his mother from insects laughs at me. He tells me I can handle this and continues to do what he was doing leaving me, a damsel in distress to figure it out for myself!

So I hear that ants don't taste too bad I just hope I never find one in my salad.

I don't know what to do.

This is the last blog post I need to do for my communications merit badge. I don't know what to do. Once I finish this post I will have one more thing to do. Maybe I will be able to get my parents off my back. (a little) That would be great. I can't wait for that to happen. Then I will be that much closer to my eagle!!!!!!!! I can't wait to get my eagle! It would be great. During our Christmas break, we have been making potatoes look like they could run marathons. I like saying "It would be great." It is great. We have been being the laziest I have ever seen my family be. It is great. It would be great if we could be like this all year. It would be great. (Well, not really.) I can't wait till Christmas!!!!!!

~Zach Marshall, Guest Blogger.

The last Janitors by Tyler Whitesides

     Hello again! I just went to a cool book event for the last Janitors from Tyler Whitesides. He and some of his buddies made some awesome music from just garbage cans, tires, old computers and keyboards, buckets, and toilets. I had a really fun time and got a cool poster that is signed by a Thingamajunk, V, Dez, Marv, and a TP. They had awesome toilet paper launchers. ( I wanted one!)
For all of those Janitors fans, here is the last sentence: Mrs Natcher fainted. Funny, right? The title is Heroes of the Dustbin.

~Zach

My first week at school!

     8/28/15

     Today is my official first weekend from 6th Grade! I can't wait for next week. My teacher is the best teacher in the school! She has taught the class how to use exponents and powers of ten. I can't wait to see what she will teach next. Friday is an early out day so I can play with friends on Fridays and Saturdays. We do rotations to different classrooms. It is very fun!! But, on the bad side, the air conditioning does not work! It's so hot, that my teacher let us take off our shoes!

~Zach