Optimism of a 9 year old

The acorn was planted yesterday.

Going to the bank

I took Mom to the bank to drop off a deposit this morning. I love drive-thru banking. Send bits of paper in a tube . . .

. . . and get an envelope of money back.

Kind of a neat system, huh?

Do I make the dinner listed in my menu plan?

Usually. Sometimes Monday dinner was hard to follow through with if I was working and didn't have all the ingredients on hand. I've been making sure I have everything for the Monday meal in my pantry and I'm better at staying on track. Plus dh looks at the menu from work and I want to make sure what is listed is at least usually what he can look forward to (?) when he gets home. Maybe not tonight. He doesn't like squash and you can see lovely chunks of butternut squash in the slow cooker there.

Meal Plan Sunday

Monday: Slow cooker chicken and winter vegetables

Tuesday: Hamburger/mashed potato casserole, corn

Wednesday: Chicken fajita melts

[This was very tasty and everyone really liked it. I used Jack cheese instead of pepper Jack because that is what I had on hand.]

Breakfast: Homemade pancakes from the freezer

Thursday: Taquitos from the freezer, rice

Friday: French bread (or traditional crust, not sure which) pizza

Afternoon snack

My backyard. Lucky, aren't I?

Bountiful Baskets again finally

Due to how Thanksgiving and Christmas fell this year, my bi-weekly produce co-op has been just once every four weeks for a couple of months. Lately the offerings have been a little slim, but considering it's winter, I thought the basket was indeed bountiful this time. I'll be back in two weeks!

The box contained:
Lettuce
Spinach
Radishes
Broccoli
Tomatoes
Avocados
Onions

Grapes
Bananas
Apples
Blackberries
Tangerines
Asian pears

How I made flour today

It's Friday--pizza night of course. I'm serving more healthful foods these days, partly because of the diet I'm on. (Yeah, the whole family gets in on it.) In order to make sure our flour is fresh, I buy only one 5 lb bag at a time, which means I run out now and then. No problem, because I have hard winter wheat in a 25 lb bag in my food storage, so I can just mill whatever I want whenever I need it. Since the mill sounds like a really loud vaccuum cleaner, I always mill my wheat outside in the carport. The temperature was 75F (24C) today, so no problem to do that!

Activity Day for Girls

It's my turn today to prepare and present a lesson and activity for the 8-11 year old girls. Happily, I already had an idea from a Family Home Evening lesson I gave a couple of years ago. :-)

We are going to talk about New Year's resolutions and make something to remind us about the resolutions we make. It'll be a little party hat with resolutions on the streamers. It's about the size for a teddy bear to wear.

Booking It in 2012

I started reading along with Life As Mom last year and read several of the books on the 2011 list. I'll try for more this year.

Here’s the reading schedule for the new year:

January - One Bite at a Time by Tsh Oxenreider

February – The Money Saving Mom’s Budget by Crystal Paine (release January 2012)

March – A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller

April – The Dirty Life: A Memoir of Farming, Food, and Love by Kristin Kimball

May – Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day by Winifred Watson

June – All in Good Time by Tara Kuczykowski and Mandi Ehman (release January 2012)

July - Desserts in Jars by Shaina Olmanson (release May 2012)

August - The Hobbit by JRR Tolkein (movie to be released in December 2012)

September – Kisses from Katie by Katie Davis

October - Not Your Mother’s Make Ahead and Freeze Cookbook by Yours Truly (release Sept 2012)

November – Les Miserables by Victor Hugo (movie to be released in December 2012)

December - Happier at Home by Gretchen Rubin (release Sept 2012)

This post originated with Life As Mom .

American kitchens

From nbc.com:

The average American kitchen always has ...

1. Yogurt
2. Eggs
3. Cheddar cheese
4. Soy sauce
5. Solid pack pumpkin

But never has ...

1. Acai berry juice
2. Fresh artichokes
3. Fresh turnips
4. Mincemeat in any form -- can, jar or package
5. Almonds

I have mincemeat and almonds, as well as all the items on the first list. I've never purchased acai berry juice or turnips, although I always buy a dinner's worth of artichokes when they are in season.