The Food Pyramid

Since I have been on such a mission to feed the kids healthier foods, I decided that they needed to be involved in the change. I have always given them choices as to what they want to eat at meals. Now I need to get them to choose better! So I printed the food pyramid and I found a weekly chart that they can cross off what they eat daily in each of the groups. We went over the chart together and talked about each of the groups and what was in them. I was pleasantly surprised when the both told me what groups the needed to eat more of! Of course they need to eat more veggies, and they know it! They each picked out what veggies they wanted for tomorrow and are happy and excited to do it! Tyler picked carrots and tomatoes. He likes these, so it should be a great way to start. Henry picked carrots and tomatoes. He likes carrots, tomatoes not so much! But we will start with that!

cooking and other homemade things

I have always loved to cook. I am sure that my passion for cooking came from my grandmother who was an amazing cook. Many times I have wished that she would have still been cooking when I was old enough to want to learn everything she knew! Back in the day moms did everything and did not complain or think that it was too hard. If my grandmothers stayed home and got everything done, then I can too! I have a very old edition of Better Homes and Gardens cook book that was my grandmothers. They used to cook everything from scratch. The food was amazing. That got me thinking about what my family eats and what can I do to make it better for them. I decided that I was going to try to make everything that we eat out of a can or box from scratch. Yes, a bit overwhelming, but not that hard either! I started with canned soup. Just about ever meal I make has some form of canned soup. I found a great site that had a super easy recipe for cream of anything soup. Great! I made the cream of chicken and cream of mushroom versions. Very easy, not a lot of money to make them and it makes a lot! Now I just want to try to find one that is a little healthier! This is definitely healthier than the canned one, but I just want less of the heavy cream! Henry loves sweets! So, what can I do to let him still have what he likes, but just make it better for him! We tried a recipe for homemade poptarts. They were awesome! And so easy to make. I was surprised at home much they really tasted like the poptarts out of a box! I can make up a big batch and freeze them. I also found a recipe for homemade gummys. They are basically just jello and my kids eat them up! So much better than packaged gummy bears and these don't get stuck in your teeth! Another plus! I have also made: white bread cinnamon bread-I usually make these into muffin size rolls instead of a big loaf refried beans taco seasoning graham crackers ketchup Cooking from scratch is not as hard as I thought! And the kids love helping me. Teaching my kids how to cook has been so much fun. After we make something, Henry always wants to take whatever it is to Yaya and Papaw! Today we are making cinnamon bread and poptarts for our breakfasts this week.

changes...some HUGE, some small!

So as usual, I have not posted in here in forever! (so that usually means this will be lengthy!) I have been feeling like everything is out if control lately, and that has been bothering me. The move is coming way too fast, only 6 weeks and I will have packers here! That leads me to all of the things that I would like to get done before then!
We always do a big clean out before we move. It is one of the best parts about moving...we are forced to do it! We have so much clutter and junk around here it is crazy!! Not only are we in a smaller house with very little storage, but we just have too much stuff! My biggest hurdle is TOYS, TOYS, TOYS!!! We just have too many! It is overwhelming to the kids and to me! I signed up to do a consignment sale in April. My plan is to try to sell as much of it as I can. But the tagging is time consuming, so I have now decided to sell the bigger things and take the rest to goodwill! It will go much faster to just get it out of the house! Evelyn's clothes for the sale are about half tagged. I need to get it all done!! Once I have all of that done, I know I will feel so much better and lighter!

I need to get the entire family more organized. As it is now, there is no real schedule for getting the basic things done-laundry, dishes, general cleaning, etc. I feel that the boys are plenty old enough to be helping out around here is a bigger way. Now, they are responsible for unloading the silverware in the dishwasher and Tyler has to bring down their laundry basket when I need to wash their clothes. It occurred to me after a conversation with a friend that they need/can be responsible for a whole lot more! I do WAY to much for them and that is not teaching them anything other than to be lazy and mommy will do everything!! So I am going to have them do more things around here. Nothing huge, and we will start slowly be adding one thing to each of them for a few weeks till the have about 5 things each. I am starting with getting dressed! They are both capable of getting themselves dressed for school. So why am I still doing it for them?! We are going to pick out our clothes after bath each night, and they are responsible for making sure that they are dressed before it is time to go to school. Oh, and I am not calling them chores! I think that chores sounds negative!! So we are calling them responsibilities!

I need to get myself on a schedule as well! I have cut out a lot of my useless in the car time. I am home much more now. I need to have a daily list of things that need to be done. If I do a few things a day, then the weekends are not so heavy with "chores"! I am sure my mother is going to read this and say, finally, after 31 years she gets it!! Yes, I have been resistant to admitting that I need to change too!! But I finally get it now, better late than never!

In dealing with some behavior things with Tyler, I have realized that I have not been teaching them lately. I have just expected them to know how to act and behave. One of the things that I love most about staying home with my kids is that I get to teach them how to be helpful and how to act in situations. But somehow I have forgotten that I still need to teach, even though they are getting older. They dont know what talking back is, so when I tell them not to talk back, they have no idea what I am asking them not to do! I need to get back to showing and teaching the kids that they are important. We have all gotten into a rut when it comes to daily family time. I just tell the boys to go play, instead of going with them to play. I think that when I change my ways, a lot of the negative behavior will change as well.