Goat Wranglers

This is Peter. He has been a very bad goat. He's broken fences, chased his sons and daughters away from their food, and even bucked me once (big mistake, Peter).

This is K. He has some past wrangling experience. Cows, not goats. See, he even has his own lasso. He is after Peter who has once again broken the fence. Boo, Peter!
After much chasing - that involved the entire family running through the yard (3 acres), screaming and cursing Peter's existence - Peter was cornered and caught. Of course, our friend from church pulled into the yard just as this began and was treated to the entire show. You're welcome Cecelia, most circuses charge for their clown show!

K and his trusty assistant little k dragged a now successfully wrangled Peter to the barn where he will be separated from his wives and progeny until I can decide what to do with him.

I decided. After unsuccessful attempts to sell or give him away, Peter now exists on another plane of existence. That plane is called my deep freezer. Gyro, anyone?

Hulu

Meeting Miss Lilah and other stuff, too

This is Miss Lilah. She the new baby of our dear friends, Rachel and Ben. We were privleged to meet her for the first time this last Wednesday. She lives out of state and it was our first chance to see her sweet, baby face. Evie loves babies, as you can see. Spring Break is drawing to a close. The weather has been great and the kids have had a blast playing outside all week long. Today Evie dressed as a cheerleader and Kallie as a dinosaur. They went out to jump on the trampoline and Holdyn was in his room. He came out in his robe with his lightsaber, dressed as a Jedi. Too funny! Even funnier was later I went outside to break up a scwabble between him and Kallie. She had taken the lightsaber from him and he was mad. He says to me, "Mommy, Kallie took the lightsaber and now I'm just a man in a robe!" I guess a Jedi without a lightsaber is, in fact, just a man in a robe. :)

30 meals in a day

My sister, Sara, and I decided it would be worthwhile to have a marathon cooking session and make 30 freezer meals in one day. Her friend Jeni has done this a couple of times and has this neato computer program with menus, recipes, and it even calculates your shopping list for you. Jeni let us use the software and we made our menu, each did our shopping and met at my Mom's for a day of cooking. (We also had 5 kids under 8 in tow and Sara is 8 months pregnant)
At first it was a little intimidating as the kitchen was covered with food, pots, pans, kids, etc. But once we got started and got a few meals done we were on a roll. We started at about 10am and worked all day finishing the last meals and washing the dishes at about 5:30pm. We actually cooked about 15 meals each but since most serve 8 we split them in two ending with 30 meals each.

It was a long day. We had a few mishaps like when I suggested we boil all the pasta and then AFTER cooking read the recipe which said DO NOT BOIL THE MANICOTTI. And then there was the stock pot full of Mexican chicken sauce that spilled all over me. But, we had tons of laughs and a great day. We were exhausted by the end. But, its nice to know that the freezer is stocked with dinner for about a month!

My Dad was nervous as he watched us invade and proceed to destroy my Mom's kitchen. Thankfully, she was at work and we finished and cleaned before she made it home! All the work was worth it and I ended up spending LESS on those 30 meals than I usually spend on 13-15 meals! Woo-Hoo, I'm all about saving money!

I think we will defintely do it again. We've already got plans for improving our strategy. #1 on that list - read the recipes. Always a good idea, no?

All this leads me to a question for you! What money saving food tips, ideas, or recipes do you have? I need to know b/c apparently the word has gotten out a church about our cooking day and now I've been asked to teach a class on cooking healthy foods on a budget! What?! Word obviously spreads fast, we only did this on Tuesday! I haven't even been to church since Sunday. Anyway, any knowledge that you will share with me would be greatly, truly appreciated. Thanks! Love you all!

Spring Break update

Well, it finally arrived and I'm so glad. We've had Spring Break this week and although it started with bad weather over the weekend the sun has finally dried everything out and we have warm, sunny weather. There have been several things going on this week (and a few yet to come) and I'll get to each of those soon! For now, we're enjoying the warm weather and lack of schedule. Sending warm weather and fresh air wishes...

Hurry Spring Break!

There is one more school day until Spring Break. I can hardly wait, not because we have vacation plans, but precisely because we have NO plans. There are a few things I want to get done and some small things we might do but no real plans. YAY! I can't wait.
I feel like that kitten in the "End of the Rope" poster and Spring Break will be my knot. The thing that keeps me hanging on until...until...until I don't know either I can make a longer rope or get stronger and climb back up my rope. Regardless, Spring Break and the lack of busy-ness will keep me going a little bit longer.
Hurry Spring Break, for heavens' sake, HURRY!!!!

A Big Surprise

The kids and I came home from school this afternoon to see that a certain Daddy had perpetrated a BIG surprise for us all...
They've been begging (ok, I've been begging) for a trampoline for about 2 years now.


Daddy's not been very keen on the idea (visions of broken legs, arms, necks). But, he came home from work early today and put this up to surprise us!


As you can see we are really enjoying a lot of "tramp time" uh, ok, never mind that sounded terrible. We are all enjoying a lot of trampolining this afternoon.
Yea sweet Daddies, sunny warm afternoons, and trampolines!!!

Snow Day part 2

Well the snow day for J and the kids might have been very mild, but not for me. I had to go to the hospital Sunday morning to discharge patients. When I went into the hospital it was 5:30 am and sleeting. No sign of snow at all. The above picture is what my car looked like at 10:00 am. It took me 40 minutes to drive in and 1 hour and 30 minutes to drive home. To bad the kids could not have come with me and played in the snow. -K

Snow Day

This is a "snow storm" in Alabama. Church was cancelled, school maybe delayed tomorrow. I know, all you Northern and Mid-Westerners please try not to spew your cocoa on your screen. Oh well, we enjoyed a brief 10 minutes out in the "snow" and then snuggled down for a day of movies and cocoa. 70s predicted for later this week. Ahhhh, winter in Alabama.