Menu Plan Monday

It’s time for Menu Plan Monday again.

Our family does not eat eggs, dairy, nuts, or mushrooms due to allergies.

I am only including my breakfast and dinner this week because we usually just wing our lunches.

Here are my breakfasts (with fruit):

• Monday –  Leftovers from yesterday morning
• Tuesday – muffins
• Wednesday – breakfast skillet (onions, bacon, peppers, potatoes)
• Thursday – oatmeal
• Friday- Baking Powder Biscuits and pepperoni
• Saturday – pancakes
• Sunday – pancakes

Here are my dinners for this week (with vegetables):

• Monday – beef stew pie with Biscuit Topping
• Tuesday – pizza night
• Wednesday – pasta
• Thursday – leftovers
• Friday – roast beef dinner with all the fixings
• Saturday – pork roast with all the fixings
• Sunday – shepherds pie

This is my third week to link up with Menu Plan Monday. I am really enjoying it. We grocery shop once a month. I am already working on next month’s menu ideas and grocery list. Everyone is loving the pizza night. Most of us like the roast beef dinners (one kid doesn’t). Those things will definitely be on next month’s menu. We will continue rotating the pork and chicken. We have all decided that we would like to try cola chicken (I am looking for a recipe). I have already decided that Mexican needs to be added to the list and possibly Chinese just to give us more variety.

If you have any creative ideas that would feed 9 people and fit our allergy requirements (mentioned above), I would love to hear from you.

So what are you eating this week?

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My Absolutely Must Do Everyday List

This blog post has been rolling around in my head for a few days and I have been wanting to write it, but kept getting distracted by other things.

I have tried those home management systems where you do something on a rotating weekly schedule… they don’t work for me. I have tried daily schedules and weekly plans to no avail. I am perfectly willing to admit that it is probably all my fault. I struggle with follow through and distraction (can anyone else relate to this?). I have five kids, I have a lot of little distractions everyday. Throw Autism, ADHD, and 2 year old twins into the mix and you never know quite what you will end up with on any given day.

In thinking about this, I decided that I needed a system where I can do the same thing everyday (whenever I find a spare moment – not at a specific time). I have finally figured out that I am a visual person. I decided that I needed something that was visual and in my face. This way, I can keep moving forward on my day even when I am distracted by life. Everyday there are things that absolutely must get done, but there are also loads of things that distract me and cause me to forget the everyday things (does this happen to you?).

I was trying to decide how best to approach my problem and came up with a solution that I am going to try. I thought that if I created a list of everything that needs to be done everyday and put it up somewhere in the house so that I can look at, that might help. We’ll see.

I thought I would share my idea with you, in case some of you struggle in this area also.

Here is “My Absolutely Must Do Everyday List”:

• read my bible
• pray
• have a quiet time
• make my bed
• shower
• brush my teeth
• wash my face
• brush my hair
• get dressed
• have my morning coffee time with Jonah
• drink eight glasses of water
• remind the kids to drink their water today
• make breakfast
• meal prep for the rest of the day
• wash the breakfast dishes
• help the kids make their beds
• help the kids get clean clothes on
• help the kids brush their teeth
• help the kids wash their faces
• tidy the entry way
• tidy the kitchen – sweep and mop the floor
• tidy the living room – vacuum
• tidy the upstairs hallway
• tidy the bathroom – wipe down the counter – empty the garbage – replace the toilet paper
• 27 Fling Boogie (Flylady)
• laundry – start – finish – fold – put away at least one load
• make lunch
• wash the lunch dishes
• read our science books
• read our history books
• Elisha’s Math
• Elisha’s Language Arts
• Moses’ Math
• Moses’ Language Arts
• Malachi’s Math
• Malachi’s Language Arts
• play with the twins
• make dinner
• wash the dinner dishes
• tie some heart strings
• hug each child
• look each child in the eyes
• love on each child (head pats, back rubs, snuggles)
• hold each child (that will still let me)
• read to the children
• pray with all the kids
• have my evening coffee time with Jonah
• check the menu plan for tomorrow
• write emails
• write blog posts
• work on downloads
• read (from a book on the back of the toilet)
• listen to some music
• pray for each child
• pray for Jonah

This list is subject to change as I see how it all works out. I may add to it, or take away from it as needed.

Along the same lines, I am creating “My Absolutely Must Do Every Week List” and “My Absolutely Must Do Every Month List.” I will share those posts when they are ready.

I would love to know what you do for home management, please share.

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Menu Planning

Grocery day is coming up at our house. We always shop for the month, but I have been pretty bored with the food we have been eating lately. I decided to have a family meeting and see if we could come up with some creative ideas of things to eat.

Let me just say here that we have some food issues in our house. We were gluten free, casein free for almost 2 years due to ADHD, Autism, and Aspergers  in our family. The diet was amazing and helped immensely. Last summer we reintroduced gluten and casein to see how everyone would do. The boys did fine on the gluten, but reacted horribly to the casein. Out went the casein again!

Around the same time, we also discovered our daughter’s allergies. Hosanna is allergic to all forms of dairy and goat’s milk, eggs, and peanuts (we avoid ALL nuts). We have an EpiPen for emergencies, but have never had to use it.

Our eating has been quite an adventure over the last couple of years. It has been stressful at times reading labels. Grocery shopping takes forever when you have to read every label.

We cook mostly from scratch (it is cheaper, healthier, and way more fun). I love cooking and being creative. I especially love baking. I want all of my kids to learn how to cook meals and make baked goods.

Now that you have a little background about our food history, let me share with you about our family meeting this morning. First we discussed foods we each liked. Then we came up with a weekly rotation of foods to make for each meal.

It is my job now to make it work within our budget (that’s the fun part). I plan on doing this by gathering all of my recipes ahead of time and writing out a detailed grocery list. Then I will be shopping the warehouse store and any good sales. We really only have three stores to shop at and fliers can be viewed on-line at two of the stores.

Just for reference: For most meals we are feeding 9 people – dad, mom, 5 children (9, 8, 6, 20 months, 20 months), and grandma and grandpa.

Here is our list for breakfast (with fruit):

• Sunday – pancakes
• Monday – muffins
• Tuesday - breakfast skillet
• Wednesday – oatmeal
• Thursday – biscuits with pepperoni
• Friday – sausage and hash browns
• Saturday – pancakes

Lunch will be soup (mostly homemade) and sandwiches with veggies on the side. We will keep this fresh by making biscuits, cornbread, wraps, pitas, etc to change up the bread. I might make a weekly list for soups and sandwiches, but I think we are doing good for now.

Here is our list for dinners (with veggies):

• Sunday – hamburgers
• Monday – pot pie (chicken pot pie, shepherd’s pie, etc)
• Tuesday – pizza or calzones (with no cheese)
• Wednesday – pasta
• Thursday – perogies
• Friday – roast dinner (with all the fixings)
• Saturday – chicken or pork with rice

Snacks will include the following:

• veggies
• fruit
• popcorn (from scratch)
• cookies (from scratch)
• ice tea (from scratch)
• lemonade (from scratch)

I would love to hear what your family does for menu planning and cooking.

Please share links to your favorite recipes and resources.

NOTE: I have added a Large Family Recipes page to my website.

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My Homeschool Binder

I promised that I would share photos of my homeschool binder…

I discussed my homeschooling binder in a previous post – My Homeschool Binder – and I finally took some pictures. These pictures were taken a few weeks ago – before the big bedroom move around – and the photos were just on the camera waiting to be downloaded onto my computer.

You might also be interested in this post – When School Is Going Well – as I talk more about My Homeschool Binder and our new system.

The homeschool binder is working for us and making everything that much simpler. I need one binder for the whole family, every subject is in there.

Here is a picture tour of My Homeschool Binder:

Here is the binder. It is fun lime green colored one that I picked up for 50 cents at the Salvation Army in the summer of 2009. It has a matching blue binder buddy that has become my new idea notebook. I outgrew the other one because I have too many ideas. Does anyone want any ideas? I’d be happy to share.

When I started using the binder, I had the pencil case inside, but now the binder is very full and it doesn’t fit anymore. I still keep it handy though and loaded with everything we need – pencils, pens, a mini ruler, a sharpener, scissors, etc.

I cut one of our Saxon Math hundred number charts up the sides so that it would slip into the front flap of the binder. We were pulling the chart out for activities quite often and it just made sense to have it handy.

I have the tabs all labeled according to the order of our day (the ideal day, of course). Bible, Language Arts, Math, History, Science, Art, and Read Alouds.

Here is a closer look (above – and – below).

Each section has a chart for Term 2 (because that is the term we are in). I guess I will have to make another chart for Term 3 when we get closer.

This is the first page of our Term 2 chart for Bible. It has been great to be able to pull out the binder and see what we need to read. We finished Genesis early and then moved on to reading James and now we are reading Acts. It has been refreshing to read the New Testament with the kids after spending so much time in the Old Testament.

This is the first page (of two pages) of Malachi’s Language Arts. We are taking Language Arts slow because he needs more time to practice.  It’s not clicking yet, but I expect it will very soon (no worries here).

This is the first page (of two pages) of Moses’ Language Arts. Readers, workbooks, writing topics, etc. It’s all listed here.

This is the first page (of two pages) of Elisha’s Language Arts. Readers, workbooks, writing topics, etc. but also Grammar Ace and English From The Roots Up.

I cut up a file folder to make two dividers (see one in the picture above). This worked great so everyone now has their own Language Arts section. I did the Language Arts sections and the Math sections by order of age (it was just easier that way).

I repeated the process for Math (only with a different color).

We usually do Math before Language Arts, but I have not changed the order in my binder yet. The boys all seem to be able to focus better on Language Arts if we have done Math first.

Here is our Sonlight History Core 1 with Story of the World 1 added in. We do History and Core readings at lunch time.

Here is our Sonlight Science 1. We do Science readings at lunch time too. We are considering alternating the weeks – History one week and then Science the next. I think it might be easier to focus. We’ll see.

One thing that I really like about this system is that I can pull out some paper and work on anything that needs working on right there. Moses needed to review his 3+ one day because he had misplaced them in his memory.

For Malachi, I was able to whip out a sheet of paper and review his numbers. He put stickers over the numbers as he identified them. Here, he could not identify 12, 13, 14, 15. I am happy to say that he can now count to twenty, despite being unable to remember the number thirteen most of the time.

Malachi has been worked really hard to learn his alphabet, but still has a few letters that he can’t remember consistently. On this sheet (above) he was to put a sticker on the letter that I called out. He only missed a few letters.

We printed out many of his lessons as we went through them. The visual aid really helps him (so do manipulatives).

A few things that I love about My Homeschool Binder:

• I have more one on one time with the children.
• The school work is in one Teacher’s Manual.
• School is always ready to go.
• The completed work is all in one spot and ready for portfolio time.
• I only plan once a term and photocopy once a week (although, I tweak as needed).
• My oldest can look at his sections and know what he needs to do.
• My husband can look at the Bible, History, Science, and Read Alouds, and know what to read.
• We can school anywhere as long as I have my binder and any related books we need (listed in said binder).

One thing that I will change when I am typing out Term 3 (which is way too quickly approaching) is to type out the page numbers “1, 2, 3, 4, 5″ rather than “1-5″ because then we can circle or somehow mark each page as we complete it.

Whew! I didn’t mean to make this post so long. I wanted to give everyone a really good visual of how I use my binder.

If anyone has any comments or questions, I would love to hear them.

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Homeschool4free: Curriculum Planning and Organizing

Today I created a Curriculum Planning and Organizing page and added it to the Homeschool4free section.

Here are my favorite websites on this topic:

Donna Young

This website has an amazing selection homeschool planning pages. I have been coming here for years. I love her website.

Highland Hitcho Forms

This website has an excellent collection of forms for use in homeschooling.

Homeschool Forms

This website has a very large collection of forms available for printing.

Homeschool Helper Online

This website has a small collection of forms for use when you are homeschooling.

Homeschool Tracker

This website offers a software download of Homeschool Tracker that enables you to plan and organize your homeschool. They have a free version (which is very good) and a pro version.

Do you have any websites or blogs that you use when you are planning your homeschooling?

Do you have any great resources for homeschool forms?

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