On January 10th, we celebrated Penny's homecoming by mom and daughter making a special lunch, which we knew that Daddy would not be fond of. That's because it was fishy! He was at work, so we secretly stunk up the kitchen and ate to our heart's delight, one of our favorite sea food dishes, EEL! That's right! It sounds so much better in Japanese…うなぎ(unagi). It's broiled with a teriyaki sauce. I must admit, this was the first time for me, to personally handle the eel. That was not my favorite part. But, the eating part was delicious! Here we are enjoying our delicacy!
If you look closely at the above photo, you'll notice a grammar book sitting on the recipe holder. You know you're a homeschooling mama when you frequently find books like Grammar and Algebra on your recipe book holder. We have started up our homeschooling again, after a bit of a break while we were in South Dakota. We never really take long breaks. We just spread our homeschooling out. So, we usually do about 2-4 subjects at the most in one day. That gives plenty of time for her mind to process the second language learning and to do other important things like shopping and cooking. Speaking of which, Penny also helped me out making cupcakes for Daddy's (Jay's) birthday.
There's a funny story about the frosting. At first, I tried to make a frosting that was diabetic friendly, since Jay is really trying to watch his sugar and avoid getting diabetes, like some of his family members. But, I wasn't pleased with it, so I started adding things like powdered sugar and milk. Then I thought it should be orange to go with our Broncos theme for his party. However, I could only find red food coloring and no yellow. No problem, I thought. Surely just a few drops will look orange. Oops! It looked PINK. Well, that was not acceptable! Jay wouldn't want pink frosting, especially with a Broncos theme party. What could I do? I was desperate and did not want to go to the store. So, I found peaches in the fridge and blended them up and added them to the frosting. It tasted good and made it peach-colored.
That was on a Friday. We went ahead and froze the cupcakes, because we were going away the next day to Pueblo for a memorial service for our brother-in-law's mom. We met up with Jay's parents, sister, bro-in-law, niece and her baby down there on the 11th. It was a bitter-sweet time of gathering together with family to celebrate Esther's life on earth and share the message of hope beyond the grave if we believe in Jesus and his resurrection power.
That night we headed back to Arvada, because we were singing in the choir the next morning at church. On Sunday afternoon, the 12th, Jay's parents stopped by our house on their way back from Pueblo to Fort Collins to help us celebrate Jay's birthday, a day early. It was a lot of fun! The Broncos theme party must have inspired the Broncos, because that day they played and won their AFC championship game. We're rooting for the Superbowl! Penny helped me make a homemade banner with mostly orange, blue and white colors.
We had the infamous peach frosted cupcakes and the kitty enjoyed the wrapping paper, as usual.
Here's the birthday boy with his gift. As far as his age goes, like he told his kids at school, think of a name of a football team that was also playing a championship game. That is your hint to guess his age. The gift I gave him actually ends up being a gift to me, as well. I didn't purposely plan it that way, but he had been going on for months about how he wished we had better bedside lighting for reading at night. Thus, here are the new lamps that I gave him, which he actually seems to really like…
As we have started back at our busy jobs, lives, schooling, etc., I have noticed certain areas of the household that I've gotten out of control. And I'm feeling a great need to regain control of my life and the clutter. So, I've been in a bit of a cleaning and reorganizing kick, lately. I'm not an excellent blogger, remembering to take all of the amazing before and after pictures, but I do like to read people's blogs whose passion is organizing. They often inspire me to get my life in a little more order. So, the first project I tackled was my pantry. Sorry there are no before pictures. Needless to say, it was overstuffed with things literally falling off of the shelves. I thought, what can I move out, but still have access to somewhere else? Then I got to thinking of those canned goods, which I use fairly frequently and I get annoyed having to traipse all the way to my pantry to retrieve when I'm cooking. You see my pantry is located closer to the bathroom than to the kitchen. Well, I thought, perhaps I can move some of the beautiful china dishes to a different spot, since they are taking up precious cupboard space in the kitchen and we only use those dishes about once or twice a year. So, out to the sunporch china hutch and to the garage they went! Sorry, again, no photos of the china that moved out! But, in the spot where the china used to be, I moved our everyday plates and bowls. It's driving Jay crazy to remember where to find them at breakfast time, but I really like the new spot. They are now closer to the table and to the dishwasher, which makes for an easy project when we empty the dishwasher. They're no longer in the corner where everyone goes to use the microwave, so that frees up the traffic flow. Here's the new spot for the everyday dishes, as well as the George Foreman grill.
And, in their former home, the canned goods now sit, right next to the stove, microwave and counter where I use them frequently.
Now I was ready to get to work at cleaning out the pantry! And I had fun with my label maker, until I ran out of tape for it. Fortunately, I was mostly finished when it ran out. Here are some photos from the final product, without any sight of the mess in between, which my family members had to trip over in order to get through the hallway.
Now, you'll notice that I didn't go out and spend any money on lovely containers that all matched. I'm all about being frugal and using what you have. It doesn't have to be fancy and matching. In fact, you'll notice that I use mismatched plastic containers, cardboard boxes and one of my favorite things to use are those cute Christmas tins that we've received over the years. I figure you might as well find a purpose for those cute containers rather than throwing them away. I house many things like snacks and things in my separate "baking pantry" (a.k.a., broom closet converted into a small pantry). I don't blog as a business or to show how beautiful my lovely home is. It's just to record our real life so we can look back at the memories of our daily lives. Another spot that had gotten out of control was our little "message center". It's the spot for things like phone books and office supplies that we need near the kitchen, but don't want to run all the way downstairs to hunt for in our office. Think of it like a "junk drawer" on top of a shelf in the dining room, with the emphasis on junky. Again, I forgot to take a before picture, because I just suddenly delved in when I could finally stand it no longer one day. I took an idea from someone's blog to harness some of the messy items into boxes, covered with contact paper. I also lassoed loose papers, by putting them all in one folder we happened to have in the basement office. Now, the red color doesn't exactly match our dining room colors, but at least those messy papers are all in one spot for now. Here is the final look…
Now, for my final grand re-organizing project, you'll have to look at the next blog. I actually thought to show the before and after pictures with that one, because I realized what a big project it would be and I wanted anyone who actually looks at the blog to see that our lives has lots of messy in our everyday life. Why would I enjoy organizing so much if I don't make big messes? So, for that one, I'll make a special post so you can see all of the fun I had one morning this January. May your lives also be off to a fresh new start this year!
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