Keeping my commitment

Short and sweet blog just so I can say I blogged. 

We have co-op in Panama City today and our end of the semester program is tonight so we will be in PC all day. I'll update tonight or in the morning with pictures from the program. 

We are also doing a fun little project tomorrow and I can't wait to tell you about it! It involves monsters, the kids and some cute pictures. Have I piqued you interest? LOL! I'll share all about it this weekend!

Have a great Friday!

Yum

I blame it all on the weather. It has cooled off and we have been craving heartier, home-cooked dinners. I enjoy cooking and I do cook most nights. But in the hot weather I'm quick to agree to Chinese take-out or running out to any of our plethora of restaurants. Yeah, we have a lot of restaurant choices here!

Anyway, I told you earlier this week about having fried pork chops (BTW - we rarely fry anything. I make these pork chops every 6 weeks or so). Last night we were debating between a roasted chicken and chicken and dumplings. Guess what we chose? I know you'll never guess.

This is what we decided on:

And it was good! Yum! It was also worth the clean-up. And let me tell you, there was a lot of clean-up. I have a large gas cooktop and when there is a mess it means removing the grates, knobs, etc and cleaning all the pieces. Anyway, it was worth it! We also had...

Homemade rolls. These are, by far, the best rolls I have ever had. That has nothing to do with the fact that I make these rolls, I simply follow a recipe. They are absolutely, positively the best rolls I have ever had.

*Bonus - they freeze and thaw well. These thawed and reheated rolls are almost just as good as hot from the oven rolls. But best of the night was...

Elephant ears, palmiers, palm leaf pastries...whatever you may call them. Oh my! They were wonderful! I first had these at a bakery in Spain and I have craved them many times since returning to the States 5 1/2 years ago..

I found a recipe in a magazine this week. They are a bit messy to make but oh so simple.

You only need 3 ingredients:

Frozen puff pastry sheets, thawed (I used Pepperidge Farm, 2 sheets per box)

2 cups of sugar

1/8 tsp kosher salt

You'll also need 2 large baking pans, a rolling pin, and parchment paper.

Mix together the sugar and salt. Sprinkle your work surface with 1 cup of the sugar and salt mixture. Sprinkle 1/2 cup of the mixture on top of the puff pastry. Use a rolling pin and roll out into a 13 inch square, pressing  the sugar/salt into the pastry as you roll.

At this point fold 2 opposite sides halfway to the center. Then, fold each side again with the 2 sides meeting in the middle. Now fold one side over the other. You should have 6 layers folded up.

Cut dough crosswise into 3/8 inch slices. You'll get about 16 slices. Place these on a baking pan covered with parchment paper. Please use the parchment paper. I didn't have any and, not to get ahead of myself but, the caramelized sugar is near impossible to remove from the baking pan. I had to pour boiling water onto the pan and let it sit for a while in order to scrub it off.

Bake at 400 degrees for 6 minutes or until the pastries have started to brown and caramelize on the bottom. Flip the pastries over (Do it fast! If it cools too much that caramelized sugar hardens and they will stick!)

As the first pan is baking prepare the second puff pastry sheet on the other baking pan. You will not use all the sugar mixture.

These are beautiful and oh so delectable! Enjoy!

India

We started studying India this week and I am so excited because I have some great supplements to this study. My Passport to India is a program between Sonlight Curriculum and Mission India. Sonlight is matching any money raised up to $167,000 to support Children's Bible Clubs in India. Here are some fun facts we have learned so far this week:

• India is about 1/3 the size of the United States
• India population is over 1 billion (almost 4 times that of the U.S.)
• Hindu is the major religion
• Hindu has thousands of gods or goddesses they can worship
• Most people in India do not have cars. They travel by rickshaw. 
• There are auto rickshaws, bicycle rickshaws, and hand-pulled rickshaws, the latter are outlawed in all cities except Kolkata (Calcutta)
• Mumbai, India is the 2nd largest city in the world, population 14 million
• In Mumbai there are only 17 toilets for every million people
• 1/3 of the people in Mumbai do not have access to clean water
• Mumbai is the richest city in India yet at least half of the 14 million people live in slums
• One of those slums in Mumbai, Dharavi, is the largest in Asia. 1 million people are crammed into less than 1 square mile

I encourage you to click on the link. Watch a video a day and check out the additional resources for each day. It's quite eye-opening. There is a story each day about a specific child in India. These are especially touching.

I'm getting ahead of myself but this was amazing to me and my small little world. 

Red on the map represents people groups who have not yet heard the Gospel. There are more unreached people groups in this nation than any other place in the world.

I'll be sharing more India facts later this week!

Blogging about not much...

I really don't have anything in particular I want to blog about today. I've always heard that it takes 21 times to create a habit so I'm really trying. I want to test that theory by blogging for 21 days. Then I'll let you know if it's become a daily habit or still something I have to remind and make myself do.

Let's see if I can come up with 10 random thoughts from today...

1. We had a Thanksgiving feast and hayride with our local homeschool group today. It was fun. The kids really enjoyed it.

2. I've been thinking a lot about change lately. Why do we fight change? We dread it with everything in us sometimes. But usually, change is good. We've been through a lot of changes recently and are about to go through more. I think it's the uncertainty that's hard. For me at least. Why can't we just trust that God has our best interest at heart. You know..."For I know the plans...." Why we dread it has been what's in my thoughts more than the changes themselves lately.

3. We've canceled our cable...and we like it. I think with Netflix we are still watching too much tv but we've greatly reduced the monthly expense. The only time we've missed it was during the elections last week and occasionally a football game. But do you have any idea how much you can watch online these days? Most of the time whatever game we want to watch will be on the internet. I know the kids are actually playing more and getting along better.

4. We've been trying to get housework and other chores done around here during the day Monday - Thursday. It so nice not to have to do housework on the weekend or at night. And I cannot tell you how incredibly blessed I feel to be able to get it done during the day. And to get groceries on a weekday morning. I went to Wal-mart Saturday and it is not a place I recommend for the sane on a weekend.

5. Something else about chores. I'm trying to let the kids be independent and do more. It's so hard not to go behind them and refold the clothes. I feel like I have to physically restrain myself from re-doing it. Why is that? Don't tell me it's perfectionism because I don't really want to hear that! ;o)

6. Grace has been sick the last 2 Friday nights. I'm not sure what's up with that or what could be the cause. The first Friday night was a middle-of-the-night, did-not-make-it-to-the-bathroom-in-time, change-bedding, and clean-carpet kind of night. This last Friday she got sick twice in the evening. Both Saturday mornings she was fine. Hmmm...

7. Colin pulled his second tooth on Saturday. As in he was in the kitchen by himself and thought he'd give it a tug and it just came out. He came running to me incredulous. He was so excited. He wants another loose tooth because that one was so fun to pull.

8. Another benefit to no cable...my kids aren't seeing all the commercials for toys and such that we are usually bombarded with this time of year. If I had a dollar for every time I heard "Mom! Come see this commercial!" last year, I'd have Christmas gifts paid for already.

9. My hubby wanted fried pork chops for dinner. They are so messy to make. Flour and oil splatters everywhere. Or is it just me being messy?

10. I can't ever complain about a messy kitchen Whitney always helps clean it after dinner. And I mean immediately after dinner. He can't stand to let it sit even for a little bit. How lucky am I? He's awesome!

Until tomorrow...maybe then I'll even post some pictures!

Date night!

Had a fun night last night...a fun day actually. We went to our regular 12:15 service at church. Great message there, by the way. Had lunch with some great friends. Then we dropped the kids at Wilders World for Kidventures and had 3 1/2 hours for a date!!!

After a late and leisure lunch following church we weren't really hungry so we shopped at Pier Park for an hour or so then hit Margaritaville for appetizers followed by Starbucks for coffee. It was a fun night for us and the kids had a blast too.

Thanks for the date night Northstar!!

We take homeschooling very seriously!

Most weeks we homeschool at home Monday-Thursday and at co-op in Panama City on Friday. Generally school takes about 4 hours, longer if we have an art project or science experiment. Several of our subjects are taught to both kids at once such as Bible, Geography, Science, and Art/Music. Grace just delves further into those subjects. They have their own lessons in grammar, spelling, reading,and math. Colin also takes Spanish and Grace takes sign language. These are their co-op classes, along with zoology. Co-op classes are taught in a classroom setting with other homeschoolers their age.

We certainly do not completely recreate a classroom setting at home but they both have desks and we decorate the walls with a map, their work, and some cutouts from the school supply store.The desks are practical and the decorations are fun. We have lots of friends who homeschool around the kitchen table and that works too. We're blessed that we have a dedicated space for school.

As Whitney nears retirement his work schedule has gotten much lighter, generally just 3 days a week. He's usually home on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Our school schedule can be more lax on those days.It all depends on what Whitney needs to get done. If he is in the garage or working in the yard, we have a normal schedule. If he participates in school...well, it's not always academic. He teaches them things like...

 preparing for battle. Proper equipment and planning is a must. Fully loaded nerf guns, a wolverine claw and head gear. Don't forget that a stealth fighter will conceal his identity, hence the bandana. This is Home Defense 101.

 As important as proper equipment and planning are, equally so are the instinct and ability to execute a battle plan.

All is fair in love and war. It's all fun and games until...


 

someone catches a nerf bullet to the throat. Especially when that someone is Daddy's Little Girl.

It's important that we have a schedule and we take very seriously the responsibility of educating our children. But we think it's also important to take advantage of the flexibility that homeschooling gives us and throw the schedule out for a day of "Daddy School" every once in a while. You never know what you'll learn on those days. He's trying to convince me to go along with teaching them terminal velocity...something about sky diving being involved???

Force Field

What is a force field you might ask? Well, we have decided that irrational fears our children have sometimes need an irrational solution when nothing else seems to work.

In my post about our soccer season I told you about the kid on Colin's soccer team who told him vampires were real. Irrational fears did not start there with Colin. About vampires, yes, but other fears have popped up over the last couple of years. Robbers, bad men, etc.

No amount of rationalizing has worked. It will make him fell better for a time but he takes that reasoning and he will dwell on it for a couple of days...pick it apart...and then decide he needs more. Something else to convince him.

We have a force field. It was purchased at Wal-mart for about $1,000. It turns on by a light switch in the living room. It is basically an electronic force that creates a dome of protection around our home.  Irrational and ridiculous to you and me maybe, but comforting to our kids.

It has taken some convincing a few times. Colin's job each night is to turn on the force field. He is very diligent about this job. Several times he and Grace have wanted to go out and throw rocks at it to "test it out" but so far there have been reasons we weren't able to. "Oh, look it's bedtime" or "It's too dark."

Whitney and the kids have gone out to hit golf balls in the yard several times. When a golf ball will undoubtedly hit a tree in the near woods Whitney's response to the kids is always "Wow! Did you hear that golf ball bounce off the force field?"

You may or may not agree with our approach but hey...it works. They are comforted and we all get a goon night's sleep. Well, most of us do! ;o)