No Guilt Laundry System

This week I was listening to a podcast about mom guilt. I have a major problem with this sometimes. But what she said was so freeing: "I don't do guilt. Do your best and forget the rest." I think this needs to be my new mantra!! When I heard this saying, I thought immediately about my laundry system. This system definitely isn't for everyone, but it is one of the best guilt saving systems I have.

Now to realize how far I've come, you need to know how I was in college.  I would wear the clothes I had as long as I could, and would proceed to go out and buy new underwear just to procrastinate the job. Any one else ever done that? When I couldn't put it off any longer, I had an amazing friend who truly found excitement in crisply folded shirts and pants, and I would pay her to do my laundry for me. She only charged me $5!! Who could pass that up?!!

So you can imagine now, with the large family that I have, I am a laundry disaster! To be serious, I have improved a ton. I've learned that I do have some laundry strengths. I am really good at making sure the clothes are clean, but really terrible at folding them at putting them away. For years, we had this huge pile of clean clothes on the floor of our laundry room. And since I have a walk through laundry room that goes out to the garage, this meant the definition of clean laundry was relative. It was constantly being stepped on by us going in and out of the house, or we would all be angrily tearing through it to look for the one missing soccer sock or band shirt. (I think my old friend is twitching right now!!) Plus it was always hard when it came to the folding. There were so many different piles because there are so many people in our home. It was confusing for the kids or anyone else that was trying to help because they didn't know which clothing belonged to which person. After pondering on this for a long time, inspiration finally hit, and the laundry hallway was born!!

 I decided I needed a basket for each person (I do share one with my husband), and then one other basket for towels/bedding/etc. When the laundry came out of the dryer, instead of piling it all in one basket (or the floor- if we're being real!!) with the items all mixed together, I quickly sorted them into their individual baskets. This has been such a game changer. With such a large family, I do a few loads of laundry every day, but I'm no longer at its mercy. The kids now know where all their clean things are. Most of them can fold their own basket of clothes and put them away. Or if I have someone helping me fold clothes, they actually know what drawer to put it in when they are finished. And the days (or weeks) that get really crazy and the laundry doesn't get folded, they can have a holding place that isn't bothering me. The laundry digging still happens, but it's on a much smaller scale. I can even WALK through the hallway without stepping on loose clothes- WHAT!?!! Amazing, I know!! And if I have a child that is acting out and needs to do some family service, or wants to earn some money or extra technology time- it's really easy to have them go grab a basket of laundry. 

I do have to confess, when life gets really hectic, there are sometimes "holding baskets" of washed clothes that need to be sorted. But it's not happening all the time and easily sorted. We've had this system for years, and it's actually stuck. 

Above the laundry baskets on the wall has become the kids' command center. So tune in next time, if you're interested in the details of how we set that up. If nothing else, I hope this makes you feel better about how organized you are in your laundry- because I really don't think there is anyone out there worse at laundry than me!!

Finding solace in a nature walk

It's been one of those full days. Full of the wonderful, the mundane, the busy, the exhausting. I am a mother of 7 children. I love it. Some days I feel the pull in a million different directions more than others. Today was one of those days. Three soccer games, grocery shopping date with my husband, my baby and toddler sick with fevers and coughs, potty accidents, hockey games and dances for my teenagers, and all the normal mom cooking and household duties. (How can so many different things happen in such a small amount of time?!!) Bedtime was half way done and I just needed a breather before our nightly reading of Harry Potter. I scooped up my fevered baby and took a nice quiet walk around these beautiful ponds. Originally I was going to put in my headphones to enjoy a podcast, but then I thought how I just needed a quiet moment in nature. The sound of the water and crickets, the gentle fall breeze after a warm humid day, the sights of birds and turtles, it was just the healing my hurried heart needed. My life is physically taxing and joyous, emotionally and mentally challenging, hard and crazy, but I love it. I'm grateful for moments like this where I can just take a quick breath to be grateful for the beautiful things the Lord has given me. I'm grateful for my family, thankful for whatever type of health we are blessed with at the moment, and dazzled by this miraculous earth God has made for me to live in.

Fun Halloween Boxes

I love the holiday boxes at Dollar Tree. I'm always a sucker for them on Valentines day, and when I saw these for Halloween, I couldn't pass them up. I had all these visions of putting surprises in the boxes each morning the month leading up to Halloween, and the kids squealing with delight when they discovered them. And then real life hit. It took me a week just to remember to show the kids the boxes and have them each choose one. Then, they spotted the prizes, and my excitement went out the window. So we came up with something else. 

When the kids are showing a lot of kindness, obedience, or getting their chores done, they get to pick a prize out of the box. One of my kids suggested we should roll some dice a long with it to see how many prizes they could pick out. Well.....why not?!!  

Happy Halloween!!

Baked Rigatoni

This is the first dinner I ever learned to make. I learned this recipe in my middle school Home Economics class. I've put my own twist on it, and really enjoy dressing it up. But on nights when I need something fast for my family, or that I can take to a sick friend, this is a great one to pull out of my hat with very little effort.

Anyone can make this! 

4 ingredients:

Rigatoni noodles (Cook them first!!)

Your favorite Spaghetti Sauce

Cottage (or Ricotta) Cheese

Mozzarella Cheese (shredded)

If you really wanted to get fancy and cut down on calories, or make this gluten free, you could use zoodles or spaghetti squash instead of the pasta. Sometimes I add spinach, ground turkey or sausage to mix it up. Use your imagination- any veggie addition would be delicious!

Mix everything together- just reserve about 1/3 of the mozzarella to sprinkle on top.

Now at this point you can either stick it in the fridge to stick in the oven later, or go ahead and preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. Bake covered for 15 minutes, and then uncovered for 15 minutes.

Then dish up and serve. I served mine tonight with a big pile of steamed broccoli seasoned with garlic salt and pepper. 

Now that the children's belly's are full- they should be happy to do the dishes for you. Ok, maybe that's a topic for another post.

This is one of the recipes referred to on the Healthy Dinner Plan post.

Healthy dinner plan to balance out the Halloween treats

For me it seems like Halloween is just the beginning of the huge junk eating marathon that goes on through the holidays. It makes me feel heavier just thinking about it.  This past week I was reading an article about SAT test prep and how you never get a good night sleep the night before the test. (Stay with me here- I really am getting to a point!) To combat this problem, the family in the article said they make sure they back log good sleep before the test. So for the week before the test, they go to bed early every night. That way when they don't sleep the night before the test, their bodies will have had enough rest to be able to handle a night that was a little short. I thought this would be an amazing idea to use the week before school starts, the week before Christmas, or a vacation.  Then I thought how great this would be if I used this in my eating as well. So I am making a plan of healthy food options to eat for the week before Halloween to gear up for a day of junk. I think this would be great for Thanksgiving and other holidays as well.  If I take the time to plan out healthy meals, I'm so much better at sticking with it.   This is how I menu plan:

(click on the menu to print)

I usually plan two weeks in advance. I also like to take a peek at the weekly grocery circulars to see what items might be on sale so I can cut down on costs. Once I've looked at what might be on sale, I start plugging things into my menu plan. I try to "roll over" my leftovers as much as possible to save on prep time and food waste. For example:

I look at my calendar and see I have a little extra time to do some grilling on Saturday. So I grill enough chicken on Saturday to use in our chicken pitas, but also enough to use for our stir fry on Sunday and chicken tortilla soup on Monday. If I've really hit a great chicken sale, I'll grill even more to pop into my freezer for other times (I grill it and slice it first).

Another example would be my beef or pork roast. Sunday I know I will be out of the house in the afternoon for church, so I put the roast in the crockpot for a quick dinner when I get home. My family isn't a huge fan of veggies and roast mixed together to cook in the pot (SAD! Because I love it!), so I will do baked potatoes and broccoli on the side. This actually works out great because I can set my oven to "time bake" on the potatoes and they are fine sitting in the cold oven until it turns on. Then I only need to steam the broccoli which is super quick. I can also use this to my advantage when I want to use leftover baked potatoes for potato cheese soup the next night (crock pot potatoes wouldn't be quite as tasty). I can also plan to use the extra beef for my tacos on the night after the soup.

Once you  have your menu plan filled out, then make your grocery list below. If you're going to different stores, you can arrange them by store as well (Costco on top, Sprouts on the bottom, etc.). I also give myself a break on Fridays. This is usually the night we plan to go out or order in because I am too exhausted to think about another meal. There are often times I switch the days around that we are eating certain things due to crazy schedules or food cravings. I'm not always great about keeping track of paper, so I usually take a picture of my grocery list with my phone when I'm finished.

Hopefully this will be a great trick for us to enjoy the treats on Halloween and not feel guilty about it because we will be filled up with nutritious food for a week before it hits. 

Here is a link to the Baked Rigatoni recipe- quick and easy crowd pleaser to follow up a busy day. I plan to use it the day after Halloween.

The Dandelion Jar

It seemed like every time we went on a walk, the kids would run up to me with shining faces and dandelions in their hands. They'd thrust them in my face, puffed up with pride that they had just given me the perfect gift. Then when we would get home, the kids would rush to get a jar of water to try to keep the flower alive. Their little hearts sure the water would revive the struggling flower and be as bright and sunny as they were when growing in the neighbor's lawn. It was always a huge heartbreak when the little weed would wilt into nothing.

When this kept happening, to keep the tears at bay, I'd hold on to them for awhile and then "accidentally" let the wind blow them away or sneak them in my pocket to be thrown away when the children weren't looking. Well, that's the thing about children. They're ALWAYS looking. Always watching to see what our actions are going to be that speak louder than any words we can say. By disregarding their gifts, I was teaching them what they had to offer wasn't good enough. I wanted my children to grow up to have big, huge, open hearts, and also to be gracious gift receivers.

Then one day, when there were quite a lot of wild flowers that had been gathered, we decided to put them into a special vase (without water). This way I could turn it into a collection and honor the treasures they were giving me. The vase started out small, but through the years has grown in size and in variety of contents. I even found myself gathering small items for our jar. Special times like when we went to San Francisco to lay my grandparents' ashes to rest in the bay, I grabbed some colorful rocks from the beach. Or when vacationing in Florida, we brought home some shells we'd scavenged. It's gone from something that started a little silly and scrawny, to something I think is beautiful and wonderful.

Ok, now we've got the natural items figured out. Now what do we do with the paper love??!! HELP!!

Hope in Nevada Skies

One of the things I miss the most about living in Nevada are the incredible skies. 

My heart has felt like it's been filled with a load of bricks today. I have family that lives in Las Vegas and some that were at the concert and survived the shootings last night. I can't explain how relieved I was to hear they are now safe.  I can't imagine the long healing road they will have after experiencing something so horrific. One thing I do know is, looking towards those beautiful heavens is the surest way to peace and comfort. 

We are praying for everyone affected by this very hateful act. May our love for each other and God's love for us, pull all through it.