Happy New Year Everyone

We spent our New Year's Eve celebrating with our friends and neighbors. We gather at our neighbor's house, about 60 of us, and celebrate with our kids at nine o'clock. Our neighbor is the stickler for time and as you walk in the front door she has posted on the wall, as well as two other places in the house, the itinerary for the evening. Last year she not only had the itinerary posted but she also had all of us 'signed' up for jobs to help out. While we didn't mind helping with the events, we did rib her a bit for being super organized and this year I noticed that she didn't have us assigned to a particular job but just recruited us as needed. So tonight the itinerary went something like this:

5:00 - people arrive buffet dinner and appetizers start

6:30 - Dance Studio back yard

7:00 - Piniatas at front drive

8:45 - Preparations for New Years (pass out champagne, sparkling cider, and noisemakers)

9:00 - New Year's Celebrations

9:30 - Fireworks at corner of street

The kids have a blast and she borrows our outdoor firepit and the adults stand around and drink while the kids play out in the yard. We all bring a food dish and everyone has a great time. What is even better about it is that we are all home by 10:30 and to bed early. What cracks us up is the itinerary. We joke about it but it keeps the party moving and because we are all friends we don't mind.

This year was like the others. The best place to be on New Year's Eve, with friends and family and kids.

Happy new year all! I hope you are surrounded by your family and friends this year.

How to remove wallpaper border

The best way I have found to remove wallpaper border from my walls is to use a hot steam iron. I get it started with warm water from a rag or sponge and then get the iron (yes the same one I use to iron our clothes), plug it in and heat it up to steam then I use a wet rag and place it on the iron and then begin to steam the wallpaper. When it gets nice and hot and wet you start to pull and for the most part it comes off in one big piece.

Okay, not my idea. It was my husband's. Great job hubby! I let him finish the job for me.

Why, you ask am I removing wallpaper border? And, sister, which room am I redoing? It is my bathroom. I was cleaning it and thinking how gross it was and then impulsively began to pull at the border which I was sick of anyway. I did that yesterday and today I painted it with left over sage green from my mom's leftover paint. I have one more coat to do and then the husband will hang a new light fixture that we had from the last time we redid the bath (five years ago).

Pictures will come when it is done!!

Just a few last minute things

I have never been so organized for a trip than this one. The trailer is almost all packed. Food is packed, clothes are packed for the kids and I am almost done packing me. Beds are made, kitchen floor is clean (thanks to my son tonight), and just have a few last minute things to tidy up and get in the trailer. Really we just need to get our toothbrushes that morning, pillows, and the coffee maker and we are set to sail.

I watched a special on Food Network last night about the giant gingerbread house, the lights down main street, and the holiday extras they put into making our experiences "magical". I tell you I took NOTES while watching it! I am WAY more excited than the kids are.

We got them all matching tshirts (well ones for us too) and I am going to give them to everyone the morning we leave so they can wear their Mickey shirts to school that day. I am wearing mine too!! Too fun...

So I have finished addressing our Christmas cards and they are stamped and will go in the mail tomorrow and I packed my address book and will be sending out post cards while we are there. I am hoping that Disney has wifi somewhere and we can use our laptop to up load a few pictures to you all via email. If you want to be on my email list, email me your address if you don't think I have it.

Wow, the adrenaline of excitement is running through my veins right now and I can FEEL it!

And for this trip we got our handy-dandy housesitter to stay here while we are gone. He loves it here because we have a big backyard for his two ginormous German Shepards. Unfortunately he doesn't always find all the land mines in the backyard and the kids find them later, tracking it in the house! Yuck! Oh well, we still love him.

So much to do so little time...

It always happens this time of year. I feel the pressure of making sure I haven't left anyone out and making sure that the house is decorated and somewhat clean. Well this year the pressure is on even harder and because of our impending trip we have had to be ever dilligent about getting things we want to get done done. We have crammed a months worth of work into a two week period.

But I have good news. We are just about done. But just when you think you are done someone drops a bomb on you. So last night my husband and I were out shopping and he mentions that what he REALLY wants for Christmas is a new laptop computer AND he would like the gift presented to him early and not under the tree on Christmas morning. So no buying it off the internet (most likely the cheapest place to get it). So I call up my best friend who works at Circuit City. She says no problem she will help me get a laptop with her discount. Yippee. Now that is efficiency working for me. So I am meeting her today to get the laptop. Word to the wise (or not so wise): unless you have a most fabulous wife who will forgo decorating the last of 6 (count them 6) Christmas trees in the house to run out to get you a last minute gift, don't wait till the last minute.

Our fun filled 8 days in Disney World is coming to a start quickly. The count down is on!! Our advent calendar has quickly become a count down to Disney calendar. The kids are more than excited and there are times it seems that they are floating on the ceiling. We are shopping for snacks and food for the trip today and getting laundry done. Tomorrow is the beginning of packing the trailer.

A month ago I made reservations for where we will be eating during our stay. We have the dining package so all our food for two full meals is included. We will have a 'walk up' meal each day and a "sit down" meal. For the walk up meal we each get an entree, drink, and dessert. For the sit down meal we get an appetizer, entree, drink and dessert. Salad comes with most entrees so it makes it a four course meal. Wow. So all we need to take is food for most breakfasts, one dinner, and snacks. (Oh we get one snack each day per person in the parks also). We are eating with the princesses one night, with Winnie the Pooh and Tigger another night, we are eating at the Grand Floridian (fancy), Wolfgang Puck's Restaurant, and at the 50's Prime Time Cafe, Toy Story Pizza Planet (Woody and Buzz hang out around there), and at the Trail's End Restaurant in our campground.

You know, I think I am more excited than the kids right now!

My Daughters

Today, Allie said that she wasn't having children of her own that she was going to the store where mommies drop off their babies they don't like and she was going to get one of those babies. (Her words not mine). I told her that she would be a great mom and that I thought it was great that she was going to adopt a baby. Caroline came in about then and Allie asked her if she was going to have a baby and Caroline said, "no, I am going to be a bug expert!"

Tenth Anniversary

I knew I loved my husband...and every day I love him just a little bit more. But on Wednesday evening my love grew just a little more than normal. Our anniversary was Thursday but Wednesday evening he gave me an anniversary gift.

An iPod!! Not just the normal one but the "touch" one with the touch screen. It is exactly like the iPhone but it doesn't have the phone capability. OMG!!! I totally love it!!

I am currently downloading my favorite music, internet bookmarks (yes I can surf the net wherever there is wi-fi!), photos and more!

It is the most modern piece of technology in our house and it cost more than our desktop computer did just two months ago.

Boy do I love him.

A Project Finished

Check out my finished project here.

Our Christmas Card

Can't decide which one to send...

Dinner

If this looks good then go to Whitney's Cooking!

Nothing new to post today.

Just more of the same today. Soccer practice in a little while. That will end soon. Fix dinner. Work on gifts for Christmas. Bath and Bed.

Speaking of Christmas it is coming up quickly this year. Part of me says ahh it is far away from now and the other part says oh my, here it is already...

We are decorating early this year and I hope it will get everyone in the family very excited. We have wonderful plans this holiday and the kids and adults alike are counting the days. We will be decorating next weekend if all goes as planned.

We have decided to remodel the living room, dining room and kitchen this year and had the contractor out for an estimate. The estimate came back so much lower than we expected that we can also enclose our porch and make it a sun room at the same time. I can't wait! We won't feel so segmented in our house anymore.

Don't forget to check out Whitney's Cooking! New recipes almost daily...

A cold rainy day and voting

Today is election day and the kids have the day off. It is cold and rainy outside so they can't go out and play. We finally turned the heat on in our house. It is now nice and cozy warm. I just posted some comfort food recipes on Whitney's Cooking. Meatloaf and Mac and Cheese! Yum. I think we are going to have stew tonight for dinner. I am thinking about making it in the slow cooker with yeast rolls.

I don't think many people will be voting today. That is a shame because at least once a year we get to perform one of our fundamental ways of participating in a democratic (representative) government. This is exactly what our forefathers wanted us to do; participate in our governmental process. And now people will allow the weather, rain particularly, to determine whether or not they will vote. They truly take for granted our fragile form of government. Remember all the purple-dyed fingers? They were happy to finally be able to vote. I teared up at their proud faces as they voted for the first time fully in their own decisions. For us, ah a little rain, maybe we won't go to the polls...

My husband voted this morning earlier and he said there were no lines and that many people were running unopposed and there was one seat that no one was running for. I asked him if he wrote his name in and he said no. But if the position looks interesting I may write my name in. We will see what happens. Most of the election is for local and state positions.

Dad's Recipes

I have begun sorting through my father's recipes. I started posting them on my Whitney's Cooking blog. Check it out. So far we have a Potato casserole trio and his world famous spaghetti sauce. PS. Click on the link on the sidebar!!!

Donate Rice

A friend emailed me this link. Click on it and play the vocabulary game and the more you get right the more rice they will donate.

Easy way to improve your vocabulary and help others!

http://www.freerice.com/index.php

Nicholas

Nicholas told me last night that his pirate that I made him looked like Tigger dressed up in a costume. He said the arms and legs looked like Tigger. Too cute! Photo of the pirate is here.

My Ghools!!

My three ghools!

Allie

Nicholas

Caroline

I'm in purple and my neighbor is in black.

A bunch of us gather together and canvas the neighborhood trick-or-treating! We take a cooler with adult beverages in it on a wagon that we pull. The kids run from house to house and we all walk together!

Happy Halloween!

"It's a spooky kinda day..."

Last night I finished the pirate doll for Nicholas and I gave the little guys to my little monsters this morning. Caroline LOVES her ghost, Nicholas his pirate and Alexandra her Pumpkin! Tonight they will dress up and I will take lots of pictures. Their costumes are perfect for them. My orderly/rule follower guy (Nicholas) is a police officer, my "princess"(Alexandra) is Jasmine, and my "superhero" (Caroline) is Violet from the incredibles. Caroline said last night at dinner that she told everyone in the class yesterday what she was going to be for Halloween but they didn't understand her. When she says "Violet" it sounds like "Pirate" with her speech difficulties. So last night she got in her costume and I took a picture of her and printed it out for her to take in to SHOW everyone what she is! She truly is a super hero!

Here is a picture of the pirate I finished for Nicholas!!

Scroll down for pumpkin carving pictures!!

Pumpkin Carving

We carved pumpkins today!!

Wanna see where I work?

Here it is...

This is the view from my desk which sits in the "back" of the classroom by the door. This is looking toward the left and the other is toward the right.

Notice the windows with the bars. The board that I use is a state of the art "Smartboard". It is hooked to my computer and I can project the computer screen up on it by my LCD projector mounted at the ceiling. I can touch the board and control the computer like a touch screen. It is pretty cool and the kids love to come up to the board to use it. I also have a regular white board that is on the right side of the room. The tables are weighted and weight a ton. The chairs are made of a durable plastic and are one piece.

For the most part it is a pretty normal classroom. I can't have too much stuff out sitting around. There is no bulletin board as we can't really use staples. The kids come in to class in small groups of 8-10. They are mixed in age and grade levels so they area all usually taking a different social studies course. I teach about 10 minutes to the whole group and then they begin their individual work, independently. In the first 10 minutes I tend to think of it as similar to Jay Leno's monologue. I stand up in the front and talk for a minute about whatever is on my mind. Recently it has been my frustrations in playing the McDonald's Monopoly game on the Internet. (Windows 98 vs. Vista) Then I instruct about some little topic, many times it is a skill of some sort or we watch CNN Student News for current events. Then they get settled in their books. They each have assignments on the regular white board that I didn't take a picture of. I walk around and help them out or sit with one person and instruct on a specific event in history or a concept.

The weird stuff: I have to flip mentally from Ancient World History to Modern (1500 to present day) World History, American History, and US Government in a flash. I can be helping someone with the definition of a complex civilization or why mummies in Egypt pulled their brains through the nose with an instrument that looks like a fish hook to answering questions about the electoral college, then to the first battles of the American Revolutionary war and back again. I have to count pencils going out and being collected each class period. When a child breaks a pencil lead we have to find the lead that got broken off. I can't use paper clips, real adult scissors, or leave my stapler out on my desk. I can use staples in paper only when absolutely necessary and then I have to be ever vigilant about watching the kids who have staples in their papers. We can only use pencils, not pens, not mechanical pencils. The kids can only use yellow legal pad paper. They can't use regular notebook paper to write on AND I have to give it out one sheet at a time. I have to report every doodle on every paper, book, or table.

A majority of my students go to school intermittently when not locked up with us. Therefore, they often won't get much credit for the work they do in our school. They do get credit for the time they are with us, don't get me wrong but when they go to a new school after they leave us it is up to the new school to decide whether or not to give the kids credit for their work with us. Knowing this, I often will work specifically on lifetime skills that will help them in real life and not require them to memorize massive amounts of bogus info that they won't ever use. I am not stupid and I do realize that most people don't love history like I do and I don't hold it against them.

Oh, did I say I love my job?

Turkey Time

Last year in January, I came across a huge sale on leftover turkeys. They were 16 cents a pound and I decided to get one. The one I chose was 22 lbs and cost something like 4 bucks! Kenneth went through the freezer on Saturday morning and announced that the turkey was still residing in the freezer and suggested that we cook it. So we thawed it out and had it for dinner tonight. Man, the house smells amazing! Just like the holidays!! What a great start to the holiday season.

Here's how I prepared it. I cleaned him out and dried him off. I put him in a Reynolds Turkey Bag and melted a stick of butter, added a teaspoon of minced garlic, several sprigs of fresh thyme, a teaspoon of kosher salt, and a several shakes of pepper. After mixing it all together and letting it cook for a second, I poured the mixture all over the top of the turkey making sure that the thyme sprigs were all on the top. I tied the bag and stuck him in the oven for 3 hours until his button popped. I let him rest before cutting.

If you have never cooked a turkey in a bag you will find that he is juicy and delicious. He isn't dry at all and often when you attempt to move him from the pan to a platter he will completely fall apart. Now that is the sign of a juicy turkey. In the bag there is no more basting every 30 minutes and you don't open it at all while cooking. Now you can't really put more than vegetables in the cavity. If you put stuffing in it you will find that it just turns to mush. So leave the cavity either empty or just put some rough cut vegies in there like carrots, celery and onion.

I served it with red skin mashed potatoes, broccoli, and rolls. I didn't want to make a traditional Thanksgiving dinner because it wasn't Thanksgiving.

Update on "the experiment"

I tried it and the results were average. I put it in the oven on 350 for about 30 minutes. Cakes usually take about 40 minutes to cook so I figured that I would see something in 30 minutes time. 20 minutes into it I couldn't stand it so I checked and it still looked like dry cake mix on top and nothing going on underneath. At 30 minutes nothing had changed and I started searching for some recipes on line similar to this.

One recipe said to take a large can of mixed fruit, a dry cake mix and mix the two together and bake. Mmm... that sounded good and also gave me the idea that it needed to mix together a bit. Another said to mix the cake mix with eggs only and put on top. Eww. Another said to put butter pats on the top. I remembered that one of the guys said to pour some butter on top. So I went in the kitchen, pulled it out of the oven, kinda chunked the mix into the now-hot peaches beneath and I put a half a stick of butter in the microwave and melted it and then poured it on top and stuck it back in the oven for another 20 minutes. When I pulled it out it was looking much better. It was slightly crunchy on top and the cake mix now looked more like baked cake and the peach juice was bubbling all around the edges. I let it cool down a bit and after the kids went to bed I spooned some out and heated it back up in the microwave oven and then scooped some vanilla ice cream on top.

It turned out more like a cobbler than a cake. It was all gooey underneath with moist cake on the top with some crunchies from the butter.

Would I do it again, you ask? Yes, I would if I were serving it hot with ice cream that same night.

So here is the recipe...

One large can of fruit in juice
One box of yellow cake mix
1/2 stick of butter

Pour the fruit and juice in the bottom of a baking dish. Layer the dry cake mix on top evenly. Melt the butter and pour on the top all over. Bake at 350 for 35-45 minutes. You will know when it is done when it looks like cobbler. Let cool slightly before serving with ice cream.