Foody Friday

Hi!

We are back in winter-wonderland-mode!  We had a blizzard on Tuesday, so school, work and pretty much everything was closed down.  It continued thru Tuesday night, so there was no school or work (for me) on Wednesday.  

Tuesday, during the storm, the kids got all bundled up to go outside.  They even put on their swimming goggles to protect their eyes from the blowing snow!

So, here's what we ate this week.

• Fri- K fixed Enchiladas
• Sat-Frozen Pizza (for C's "party")
• Sun- Oriental Chicken Soup (from roast chicken) with Udon Noodles
• Mon- Falafels (All About Vegetarian Cooking, pg 44). I made these the night before and K fried them up.  K also picked up some Tabouleh in town, and I made Hummus.  Everybody liked this meal.
• Tues-Storm Day- Fish Tacos with Cod (Baked with a rub of oil, chili powder, cumin, garlic powder)  Cabbage/Carrot Coleslaw (made with rice wine vinegar and sunflower oil). This was another meal everybody liked.
• Wed- Storm Day #2- Chicken Fingers, Frozen Red Lentils, Steamed Cauliflower with cheese sauce made by K
• Thurs- Whole Wheat Spaghettini with Stir Fried Cabbage, Corn, Carrots, garlic.  Tossed with Soy Sauce and Sesame Oil. Topped with Sesame Seeds and Chili Sauce for the adults.

Today is a day off from school for the kids.  It's a Professional Development (PD) Day for the teachers.  I took off work because I had scheduled the kids' annual physicals for today (before I started working at the library.)  C is having a friend over this afternoon.

Have a great weekend! :-)

Weekend Update

Hi!

Our weekend was nice!  K went to Charlottetown on Saturday for a Hackathon.  He had a good time. C had planned a "party" for Saturday night and invited 3 girls to spend the night.  One called to cancel because she was sick, and another went home early because of home-sickness, so it ended up being just one girl for the night.  N had gone to town to spend the night at his grandparents'.  There was a storm Saturday night, that turned out to be mostly icy rain and not too much accumulation of snow.  (I felt bad for the mom who decided to drive in that weather to pick up her daughter!)

Sunday I took C into town and picked up N for their swimming lessons. 

Before January ends, I thought I'd post some pics of the pretty table I set for our New Years' Day lunch.

I'd made some candle holders out of Birch branches for the center of the table.

 In case your wondering, that thing on the right of the table is K's morse code machine that he built using a raspberry pi.

I also made initial place cards with thinly sliced birch!  I used a brown sharpie for the letters, so it kinda looks like it was"burnt" into the wood.

Here are some pics of the back room after Christmas.

It still looks like this!

That's all the the updates for now!

Have a great week! :-)

TGIF- Update Post

Hi!

You may have noticed in my last post, that K and I were both working Friday night.  Well, it's true, I have a new job!  I'm a casual library assistant.  This means I'll be filling in at 4 nearby libraries when someone needs time off. I started with my training on Monday, Jan 12 and then went to work in a library in Alberton (35 min. away) on Tuesday.  The librarian there is taking a 6 month leave of absence.  She trained me for a week and on Monday, Jan 19 I started on my own!  I'll be working there until they hire someone "permanent". So far, I really like it!  The library is open 4 days a week, so I'm continuing with my tutoring at the Elementary School 2 days a week.

I also got trained at the Summerside Library yesterday.  Here's a picture of me with my library badge on.

The Summerside Library has different procedures from the branch libraries so I had to train there for a day. The Alberton Library is a branch library where I work alone but the Summerside Library is bigger and there are always at least 2 people there.  

Since I'm filling in in Alberton "full-time" (there are actually only 21.5 hours that I'm working), I pretty much know my schedule. I work till 5:00 two days a week so I'll be fixing a lot of meals in the slowcooker.  Every other week, K has to take C and her friend to dance so N is doing the cooking on those nights.  I work 2 nights where I'll have to miss dinner so K is doing the cooking on those nights.

K is also busy at work, doing a project upgrading computers, so he had to work Friday night last week, all day Saturday and all day Sunday (hence the pizza 2 nights in a row!).

The kids have started their swimming lessons on Sundays.  I like taking them because it's so warm by the indoor pool.  It's like a little mini-vacation!  Plus the kids have 2 different times for their lessons, C goes first for 30 minutes, then N goes for 50 minutes.  This gives me time to visit one-on-one with each kid while the other is in a lesson.

So, I guess our home projects will be slowing down a bit. After C's room we haven't done anything.  The front room is still waiting, although we did do some drywall work a few weekends ago, so the window wall is all done.

The hidden closet wall has drywall.

See how I placed the 3 "locker" doors against the wall on the left?  And a stray piece of drywall where the bench will go?

The wall to the left of the door is also done, with the switches even put in!

K installed an automatic light sensor so the light comes on automatically when you come in, from the outside or the hallway. After getting it set up the right way, it seems to be working really well. Above the light switches is a timer switch for a heater cord under our front steps.

Ok, I have to get ready for work (!) now!  

Have a wonderful weekend! :-)

Feed Me Friday

Hi!

Here's what we ate last week.

• Fri- C went to grandparents', N went to BBall game in C'town, K & I were working
• Sat- Frozen Pizza
• Sun- Hawaiian Pizza from Michael's (yes, pizza 2 days in a row!)
• Mon- Slow Cooker Adobo Chicken -similar to this recipe, but I made it in the slow cooker and topped it with bok choy during the last 30 minutes of cooking. I really like the sauce and bok choy, but nobody else really liked it. :-(
• Tues- K fixed Hamburgers
• Wed- N fixed Frozen Pasta with sauce
• Thurs- What a Crock Fish Chowder (from the book, Eat Cheap but Eat Well pg166).  This was good, but the kids didn't like it.

Have a great weekend! :-)

Tasty Thursday

Hi!

What a busy week!  I'm going to start shopping on Fridays so I think I'll move my weekly menu posts to that day.  But here's what we've eaten this past week.

• Thurs- Chicken, Shanghai Mix (Brussel Sprouts, Bok Choi, Snowpeas, Carrots, Hoisin Sauce) Rice
• Fri- Pizza
• Sat- Thai Red Curry with Sole and Veggies, Rice, Chicken Fingers for kids
• Sun- Dinner at In-laws- Duck, Chicken fingers (again!) for kids, Potatoes, Carrots, Turnip, Cheesy Cabbage & Broccoli
• Mon- Stew in Slow Cooker (prepped by K on Sunday)
• Tues-Curried Kidney Bean Burritos (Cooking Light Magazine)
• Wed- Hot dog Mac and Cheese (cooked by K & N), Raw carrots and Sugar Snap peas
• Thurs- Leftovers-  N's going to Pokemon and may eat dinner out and K has a meeting in Ctown tonight so it's probably just C and me.  We have a lot of leftovers so I think we'll eat those up.

That's all for now! Enjoy the rest of your day!

:-)

Tuesday- Finished Girl's Room

Mornin!

We finally got that storm that was supposed to come on Friday.  It just came later than expected! 

We had a nice weekend.  With no school on Friday, we were able to get a lot of work done on C's room.  

In order to paint, we moved a lot of stuff into the kitchen.  It stayed like this for 2 days.

The room is getting ready to be painted.

C's taking down the stuff from her bulletin board so we can paint the trim white.

Only one more little spot of pink to paint! 

Here's how the room looks now.  C got rid of the top bunk, which went back into N's room.  (We dismantled the full size bed from N's room and put the mattress in the trailer, until we can figure out what to do with it.) The heart table that C and her friend painted got a coat of wax to help protect it. C only had to buy the blue blanket.  She used some money she got for Christmas.

Here it is Before.

Here's the bulletin board corner. We primed the outside of the shelves with High Hiding primer and did one coat of the Semi-gloss White paint, but you can still sorta see the window outlines where I drew then on with Sharpies. The desk top got sanded and finished in two coats of Semi-gloss white paint.  We'll see how it holds up. The secretary insert is on top of the desk.

Before

The ceiling is all finished.  I did one coat of primer mixed with flat white paint.  It covered fairly well, but still has a bit of a pink tint.  It was a lot of work and made me never want to paint a ceiling again!

Before

The closet corner.  The colorful curtain still goes with the new paint color.  The little shelf below the mirror also got a coat of wax. 

Before

It seems a lot fresher now and not so crowded.  And C likes it so I'm glad about that!

Have a good week! :-)

TGIF- Changes in the Girl's Room

I've been waiting for Thursday and Friday all week.  Yesterday, I had to run a bunch of errands and today I was looking forward to being home alone, but there,s a "storm" so the kids are home!  It stayed cold this week so we weren't able to get out skating again.  Not sure how much snow we're going to get (not much so far) so the path we made on the pond might be ok for the weekend.

C has been wanting to do her room over for a while, so we're finally doing it this weekend.  She decided to paint her room blue-y-green. We mixed two paints that I got from the ReStore so long ago and came up with the bottom color.  

I brought some paint swatches home from Canadian Tire and we chose Flowing Breeze in the CIL paint line.  I like their Real-Life paint with primer (and it was on sale) so I bought a gallon of it in Matte finish.

  

Since her ceiling is painted pink and won't go with the new color, it has to be re-done too.  As much as I'd like to put a little color on it, I think I'll keep it white so when the room gets painted again, the ceiling can just stay white. I finally got around to fixing the ceiling corner with drywall mud.  

The desk will get a new coat of paint of the top.  It's got a lot of pen marks on it.

(It's white, but doesn't it look pink in this photo?)

I'll have to paint all the trim which is also pink. I bought white CIL Real Life Latex paint in Semi-gloss.  This is the same paint as the door. This would be a good time to finish the closet (behind the curtain), but I'm just gonna leave it...It still needs to be taped, mudded and primed. C's dresser is in the closet and the drawers are purple so that needs to be re-done too.

The "bulletin board" is white washed, but the trim will have to be painted white.  We took the roof off the doll house.  I have to cut down the back part.  C is going to change it into shelves and it will get painted white.

We have to do a lot of filling in holes in the wall and ceiling!

Because most of the little furniture was light purple, it has to be repainted.  This includes a heart table,

  a shelf with heart cutout,

 and her name letters.

 C and her friend painted the table and shelf last weekend.  They used  the lighter color of the ReStore paint to do these.  The letters still need to be painted. They also re-did the top of the ombre stool stool.

This is the inside part of the secretary.  Since I keep books in there, C is going to use this on top of her desk.  We painted it with Primer and 2 coats of white CIL Semi-gloss paint + primer. 

We may get the room done this weekend, but it sure is a lot of work!  I want C to help with it so she she's all the work that goes into it!

Enjoy your weekend!  :-)

Tasty Thursday

Hi!

Here's our fixin's for the week.

• Thurs-  New Year's Day- For Lunch- Cajun Black Eyed Peas, Frizzled Cabbage, Cheesy Grits
• Fri- Meat Pie from Bakery, Salad
• Sat- Home-made Pizza with Anchovies
• Sun- (More) Meat Pie, Mac & Cheese, Salad
• Mon- Whole Roasted Chicken (leftovers used for lunches) Japonica Rice, Spinach
• Tues- Haystacks with canned romano beans
• Wed- Frozen Pasta filled with spinach and cheese, Basil Sauce- some with hamburger

:-)

Monday Musings- Ice Skating on the Pond

Hi!

It's back to work and school for everyone!  We had a great break, although it seems like it went by too fast.

New Year's Eve was pretty uneventful.  We went for dinner at the in-laws and the kids spent the night.  C actually spent the night at an in-town friend's house and N stayed at his grandparents'.  But something N ate New Year's Eve didn't agree with him and he woke up sick around 2am.  K and I came home and went to bed at the usual time, without any fanfare.

This weekend, it got super cold so the pond was frozen enough to skate on.  We checked on Friday, but the ice was just over 3 inches thick.  It needs to be at least 4 inches for skating.  Saturday, it was plenty thick enough, but too cold for skating.  The ice was so smooth.

But, the wind chill was around Neg 33 C (Neg 27F)!

Sunday, it warmed up to around Neg 5 C (27F) and snowed!  About 5 inches.  This meant the ice was good, but it needed to be shoveled.  And shoveling an ice rink by hand is hard work!  Luckily the ice was so smooth underneath the snow and the snow itself was so fluffy and powdery that it wasn't too bad!  We (I) ended up shoveling a path.  

Here are the kids putting their skates on.

Here's the path.

We're all working on clearing it.

Here's me after so much shoveling!

After a bit, we came home...

 It seemed like the weather had cleared in the afternoon so we went back down to shovel the last bit of snow off the path. But, freezing rain had started!  We were able to shovel the snow, but as soon as it was cleared off, the formerly smooth-as-glass ice turned bumpy from the rain!  So, we didn't skate long.  Now it's warmed up to around freezing and we're supposed to get some flash freezing tonight.  Hopefully, it will have melted a bit and can re-freeze the path so it'll be good smooth skating again! 

Have a great week!  Stay warm! :-)

Tasty Monday

Hi!

Happy New Year!!!!  I forgot to post this on New Year's Day.

Here's what we've eaten during the Christmas Break.

• Thursday- Christmas Dinner- Turkey, Stuffing, Sweet Potatoes, Potatoes, Turnips, Carrots & Green Beans
• Fri- Leftover Perogies, Cabbage Rolls
• Sat- Tortilla Pizzas, Creamy Organic Tomato Soup
• Sun- Morrocan Salmon, Red Lentils with Cumin Seeds (World Vegetarian, pg 68)
• Mon- Sushi, Miso Soup
• Tues- Kale, Spinach, Chard Salad with Craisins and Cornbread Croutons, Warmed Honey Mustard Dressing (from Dole) and (frozen cooked) Chicken, Sweet Potatoes, Pan-fried Polenta (this is the first time I've seen packaged polenta in Summerside- haven't had it in a while!), Roasted Broccoli & Olives.  This was a meal K and I enjoyed, but the kids didn't like it too much.  However, once C finally tried the broccoli, she decided she liked it!
• Wed- Dinner at In-laws- Duck (from a farm down the street from us- C is friends with the granddaughter of owner!), Tilapia, Potatoes, Sweet Potatoes, Green Bean Casserole, Turnip and Mexican Cake with pineapple & coconut for dessert

:-)