Monthly Archives: September 2012

menu plan Monday

I was watching the Emmys when I wrote this. Forgive me if it goes astray.

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This was the first weekend in awhile that we haven’t been out of town for one reason or another. It was so nice just to spend some time at home! Last night we welcomed Fall with an apple pork roast. It was the first Pioneer Woman recipe I’ve made, and oh my I guess now I can see what all the fuss is about. The pork was tender and flavorful, and even Poppy enjoyed it!

For our menu plan this week I tried to shop the pantry as much as possible, even if it didn’t make for a terribly exciting week in dinner.

Except for Velveeta night, of course. Velveeta night is party night.

Monday Sweet & Sour Meatballs

This is a great ’50s throwback recipe. I always feel like I should wear a flirty apron and meet Rockford at the door with his house slippers and a cocktail when we have sweet & sour meatballs.

Tuesday: Velveeta Helper

This week we’re trying the cheeseburger version, and it would be the last box of Velveeta Helper in the house if I hadn’t found more at the cheap grocery on Saturday. And so there will be more Velveeta in my future. Oh yes there will.

Wednesday: Baked chicken strips and mac ‘n’ cheese

This was also the kids’ choice meal last week, and we ended up doing something else instead. Luckily the kids were happy to choose it again this week.

Thursday: Sweet potato risotto

I love risotto. It isn’t terribly tough to make, either, but I tend to forget about it when it’s menu-making time. I found a bag of arborio rice when I cleaned the pantry out on Saturday, so risotto it is!

Friday: Pizza

The good people at Big Green Egg still haven’t surprised me with a brand new grill, so we’ll probably be dining with Papa John again on Friday.
Homeschool

The one where I think about getting an iPad

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This is exactly what it would’ve looked like if we’d done the “Story of the World” Celtic war axe craft.

The kids spent Monday at my in-laws’ house this week while Rockford and I were on our way home from pretending to be young and hip for a few days. So we only had four days of school this week. We still managed to do almost everything I’d planned, though. Maybe we should just move to a four-day, year-round school week.

I’ve been entertaining the idea of saving up for an iPad for school (and, who am I kidding?, for Facebook, Twitter and Kingdom Rush), so Rockford left his work iPad home yesterday so we could explore some educational apps. I downloaded trial versions of the Bob Books app and Rocket Math as well as the full version of Stack the States. The kids liked them all, but I haven’t had a chance to give them an in-depth look yet.

The main factor that’s kept me from actively wanting an iPad is that I think the kids would spend their days asking to use it all the time. And that is precisely what happened yesterday. It might just be the novelty of the thing, but they do the same thing with my computer and the phone so I suspect it would be an ongoing issue.

Reading

Pete seems to have had a little breakthrough on the reading front this week. He wanted to move on to the next book in his Bob Books set, so I told him we would if he could read all the way through book 6 with no help. Which he did, and then he read all the way through the new-to-him book 7 with no help, too! I’m going to see if he’ll try “Green Eggs and Ham” next week.

Poppy read 3 or 4 “Magic Tree House” books this week, and she also read an American Girl book. I thought she’d enjoy them, but sometimes she just doesn’t want to consider things I suggest. Imagine that. Rockford brought “Meet Addy” home from the library for her, though, and she read it in one sitting. Hmph.

History

We’re still doing some review stuff in volume two of “Story of the World” this week. This week’s crafty project was to make a Celtic war axe using a wrapping paper tube and some other cardboard & sundries, but I didn’t have a wrapping paper tube that wasn’t, you know, covered in wrapping paper. So it seems I’ve already gone back to my old, no-craft-doing ways in history. Maybe next week won’t require a wrapping paper tube.

Math

In addition (ha!) to their usual McRuffy lessons, we downloaded Rocket Math for the iPad. I’d like to find an app that allows an administrator to set up the user account, so a second-grader couldn’t play solely on the easiest setting just to rack up points for a sweeter rocket. Hypothetically, I mean.

Pop Quiz

Do your kids use an iPad in their schooling? (Home or otherwise?) How do you deal with the Gimme Gimme Gimme aspect of it? And do you have any must-have education apps?

Social Media

I was sure I’d read more internet this week

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One thing that caught my eye this week

Casting My Vote at Thoughtful Pop was featuring on Five Star Friday last week, so there’s a good chance you’ve already read it. I love what he says and how he says it so much, though, that I wanted to share it here anyway.

Regardless of which side wins, the wars will continue, the bankers will profit, the corporations will grow and the people will be left behind. … But there is at least one big difference that I can see. One side has made it very clear that a vote for them is a vote against women. That side is standing proudly and proclaiming women’s bodies are not entirely their own and something to be legislated against. … Theirs is not a world to which I would choose to subject my daughters.

Regular reads

  • I’ve been reading Jenn Mattern’s Breed ’em and Weep for a billion years. Jenn is a powerful writer who has had a vicious last few years, emotionally and financially. If I were in charge of all the things, she’d be a fabulously wealthy author. Because she writes like this:

    For her part, she loved you without worrying whether you would die and leave her, or whether she would die and leave you. She understood that this dying thing and this living thing are nothing to take personally. She understood that the only way to manage in this life, truly, is to make an afterschool snack for a lovesick granddaughter, and leave the rest to sort itself out.

    I’m in charge of hardly any of the things, sadly, so I’ll just have to keeping hoping good things for Jenn.

  • Natalie Dee writes a web comic, and she gets me. She really, really gets me.
  • Heidi at 101 Cookbooks makes lots of things I’m pretty sure I’ll never make, like rose petal granola and something called black sesame otsu. She takes gorgeous pictures of the food, though, and the way she writes makes me want to hang out in her kitchen.