Heavenly Homemakers

Encouraging women in homemaking, healthy eating and parenting

Appreciate Your Spouse

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Welcome to our first post in this 26 week series, written by my husband Matt and me. We’re excited to be working together on this and in case I haven’t mentioned it lately – my husband is awesome.  ;)

Appreciate Each Other

Show and Tell – Matt’s thoughts

In grade school Show and Tell was when the boys brought cool toys from home and told us about them. I could hardly wait for recess to play with them. The girls brought items that I thought were silly and boring. Obviously, there were differing perspectives involving Show and Tell.

In marriage we need to show and tell our spouse of our appreciation. This isn’t necessarily what I would appreciate my spouse to do for me. We need to crawl into the mind of our beloved by asking, “What could I do for my sweetie that would make him/her feel loved?” If I’m unsure then I need to ask my spouse how he/she would like for me to show and tell my appreciation.

If we aren’t doing this, we take for granted the roles that our spouse plays and the holes that our spouse fills in our life.

We all know Laura enjoys cooking. Bonus for me – she is good at it. Amazingly efficient too. I, on the other hand, measure everything out precisely and find it challenging to prepare more than one item at a time. I sure appreciated Laura’s work and proficiency in the kitchen…meal after meal. How did she know I appreciated it? That’s where I needed to show and tell. Eventually, I learned that she enjoys cooking even more when I express my gratitude for her work and help with the clean-up. She really feels loved and appreciated when I say, “Thanks! That was great,” and then I hop up and start rinsing dishes and/or get our boys going on their clean-up chores. In a healthy marriage, the husband and the wife both seek out ways they can show and tell their appreciation often.

When we practice this, we empower our spouse to continue doing the action or having the attitude that we praised them for. In our case, neither of us enjoy doing our taxes, but Laura thanks me profusely for taking care of that. My motivation for doing our taxes comes directly from her words of appreciation. When I’ve finished I can’t wait to tell her and receive some appreciation.

How Could You Not Appreciate Seeing My New Stuffed Pink Bunny During Show and Tell? – Laura’s Thoughts

You know why I feel appreciated by Matt? Because he’s intentional about showing and telling me what he appreciates. Appreciation doesn’t just happen. I’m not sure any element of a healthy marriage just happens without being intentional. Showing and telling our appreciation takes thought and work – which means we often need to do things we don’t necessarily love doing. What, you think Matt really just loves rinsing dishes? C’mon. But he does the job cheerfully, because he loves and appreciates me. And boy do I appreciate the way he appreciates me. After all, we have a lot of dirty dishes at our house. ;)

Now regarding grade school Show and Tell and the adorable toys I would bring to bore the boys – here’s something else I think we need to appreciate:

God made men and women different – on purpose. Instead of scoffing at our differences, I believe we need to appreciate how God created us to complement one another’s strengths and weaknesses. Then, we need to show and tell our spouse how we appreciate that they are different from us.

I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that Matt can handle doing the taxes when I’d never make it through the first line of instructions without my eyes glazing over. Yep, God knew what He was doing when He made us with differences. 

And now, I believe I will go show my appreciation to Matt by making one of his favorite meals. Which he will then show me his appreciation by rinsing the dishes I dirtied. Ah, the appreciation never stops around here. :) 

What are some ways you can show and tell your spouse you appreciate him/her?

Ladies, we know you’re reading here more often than the guys. ;)  We’d love husbands to read this article as well. Please send the link to your husbands, or if it’s easier, we’ve created a downloadable article for you to quickly print off and share. Print Healthy Marriage Tips A to Z – Appreciate.

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Whole Wheat Blueberry Streusel Muffins (plus a little project announcement)

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blueberry_streusel_muffin

A few months ago when I went to my friend Tracy’s Shelf Reliance party, I ordered a big can of freeze dried blueberries for an excellent price. I love having those blueberries on hand – and they work perfectly in these Blueberry Streusel Muffins.

Blueberry Streusel MuffinsYum

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (I use freshly ground hard or soft white wheat)
1/3 cup sucanat  (you can use brown sugar or honey if you prefer)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 egg
1/4 cup melted butter or coconut oil
3/4 cup milk
3/4 cup blueberries, fresh, frozen or freeze dried

Mix dry ingredients together well. Add egg, butter and milk, stirring until all ingredients are mixed. Gently stir in blueberries. Scoop batter into 12 paper lined muffin tins. Sprinkle with Streusel Topping and bake in a 400° for 20 minutes.

Streusel Topping:

3 T. sucanat or brown sugar
1 T. butter, softened
2 T. chopped nuts (optional)

This is one of those easy recipes that your kids can help you make. I feel like it is super important for you to get your kids into the kitchen with you so that they can learn the basics of cooking.

In fact, you wanna know a little secret? I’m frantically working on a (big) new ebook/curriculum that guides you in depth through teaching your kids to cook. I hope to have this project finished in the next few weeks (months?) so that you can have it when the new school year begins – hopefully?! (UPDATE:  Here it is!)

Anyway – now you know. I’m not sure why I didn’t tell you earlier – it’s too much fun to keep a secret! I’m super excited about this and hope to create a resource that will be helpful to all. I’ve even “borrowed” some little girls to help make the book a little more well rounded. :)

This may be one of the most fun projects I’ve ever worked on – combining two of my favorite things in the world:  kids and cooking. Stay tuned for more information about this book as I get closer to finishing it. And if you hear me squealing at any time during the next few weeks, it’s because I really am having that much fun with this project.

Yeah, that little darling in the above picture is cute enough to make all of us squeal. ;)

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Why I Love Coconut Flour (but not sky diving)

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Between playing with my sourdough starter, making lots of fizzy bubbles with my water kefir and experimenting with all the cool things you can make with coconut flour, I’ve been incredibly adventurous in the kitchen lately. Who needs bungee jumping or sky diving when you can get adventurous with bubbles and coconut flour? Oh, I’m so wild and crazy – just try and keep up with me.

(Hey, did you fall asleep already? Wake up. The post just started. I’m not that boring. Really, I’m adventurous. Just wait until you hear about the mayonnaise experiments I’m gonna write about next week.)

coconutflour

It’s one of my newest loves, coconut flour. Coconut flour is the fiber taken from the coconut meat after coconut oil is extracted from the coconut. How cool are these people to use the whole coconut! It’s hearty, it tastes incredible and it’s full of many nutrients that our bodies need. Since I tend to almost always bake with whole wheat flour – baking with coconut flour offers our family a nice variety and change of pace. Change is good. Our bodies like and need variety.

Coconut flour is also gluten free. Gluten free or not, I encourage you to try coconut flour as a new source of nutrition!

Why Coconut Flour is Good for You

  • It is a great source for natural fiber.
  • It is high in protein.
  • It is low in carbohydrates (not that all carbs are bad, but many of us tend to get too many of carbs – or empty carbs – in many of our baked goods).
  • It has a natural sweetness, which means you don’t need as much sweetener in recipes that include coconut flour.

The complaint I hear most often about Coconut Flour is that it is expensive. Yup. I can’t deny that. The stuff isn’t cheap. However, the more I use coconut flour, the more I realize that while it costs quite a bit more than wheat flour, you use quite a bit less coconut flour in most recipes. So maybe the cost isn’t so bad after all?

For instance, I typically use 3 cups of whole wheat flour to make 24 muffins for my family’s breakfast (I told you we eat a lot of muffins!). However, when I make muffins using coconut flour, I use only 1 cup to make the same 24 muffins. I find that I don’t go through the coconut flour very fast because ultimately, it just doesn’t take as much per recipe.

Coconut Flour is a dry flour – it usually requires a lot of eggs to create a recipe using coconut flour. Well how ’bout that? Now we’ve just added tons more protein because we’ve added more eggs. Have you tried these Basic Coconut Flour Muffins or Coconut Flour Banana Muffins yet? Wow, they’re good – and full of protein and great nutrition because of the coconut flour and eggs.

Where to Buy Coconut Flour

I buy my Coconut Flour either at Tropical Traditions, Azure Standard or through Amazon, depending on who has the best price at the time. Tropical Traditions often runs their Coconut Flour with a Buy One Get One Free sale. I never pay full price – I wait for the sale! I also watch Amazon to see if they have any specials going on. If they have Azukar Coconut Flour in stock, that is by far the best price I’ve ever seen!

I store my Coconut Flour in the freezer and just pull it out as I need it. I’m having fun learning how best to use it and since we love these Coconut Flour Muffins so much, I’m having fun experimenting with other recipes using the same idea. There’s a full page of coconut flour recipes over at Tropical Traditions that I’ve been looking over. Today, I tried their Gluten Free Coconut Flour Chocolate Cake.

?


If I didn’t know this cake was gluten free and made with coconut flour, I wouldn’t have known this cake was gluten free and made with coconut flour. Make sense? My kids didn’t know, so they didn’t know – and they liked it. Make sense? Mmm-hmmm. That means the cake was really good – and nobody knew it wasn’t “normal” but that it was packed with protein and nutrition.

Yep, much healthier than sky diving, these adventures of mine. You should get wild and crazy with me and make bubbles and coconut flour cake. Buckle your seat belt. It’s a wild ride.

{yawn}

Want to share some of the adventurous things you’ve been trying in your kitchen lately?

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Gratituesday: Free Groceries…Twice!

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I never win anything. Now, this could be because I hardly ever sign up for anything, but still. Anytime I’ve entered a raffle or signed up for giveaways on other blogs, my name is never chosen. 

Until recently. And then I won twice – in one week. Wowza.

Here’s how it all went down:  On a fluke, I entered a giveaway at Tammy’s Recipes for a $50 Kroger Grocery Gift Certificate. I really don’t enter giveaways much these days, but if you dangle free groceries in front of my face, it’s hard for me to resist the opportunity. So I entered.

And then I won. Wow. Now I understand how excited all of you are when I draw your name and email you. That was one of the most fun emails to receive, ever!

THEN, just two days later I received a phone call from one of our grocery stores here in town. Every time you make a purchase there and sign your receipt, it goes into a drawing for a $100 gift certificate. I’ve signed my receipts for years and let the boys put them into the “drawing box” as we leave the store. Never figured I’d win, but it never hurts to try – and it was fun for the boys to put the receipts in the box.

Long story longer, you guessed it:  The grocery store was calling to tell me that I had won the drawing that week! $100 of free groceries from our local grocery store!

Do you know how much fun a person can have with $150 of free grocery store gift cards?!?! We don’t have a Kroger store in Nebraska, but they are all over Kansas – so we took our $50 certificate and used in on our way home from visiting family earlier in the month. Here in town, I just used bits and pieces of my $100 card anytime I needed bananas or watermelon or cantaloupe…

Yeah, we spent it mostly on fruits and veggies. FREE fruits and veggies.

It was so much fun. What a blessing to be gifted twice with free groceries!! (Come to think of it – three times – as we had some Whole Foods gift cards saved up to use last week when we went to Omaha, thanks to all of you!)

God does provide, doesn’t he? I pray that we’re always wise with the blessings He gives us and that we’re always willing to be generous and share with others as we’ve been blessed!

What are you thankful for this Gratituesday? Write about it on your blog, then come link up with us here. If you don’t have a blog, be sure to leave a comment letting us know what you’re grateful for!

If you are linking up a blog post for Gratituesday,
please copy and paste the following sentence into your post! Thanks!

Join us for Gratituesday at Heavenly Homemakers!

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My “Bulk” Natracare Order (And Possibly Too Much Information?)

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Well, speaking of buying in bulk and having everything you need on hand so you don’t have to panic and run to the store…let’s just say that this concept isn’t limited to food, my friends. There just so happens to be a bulk order I needed to make today and for some strange reason, I decided you should know about it. You’re welcome, or I’m sorry – depending on how much information you really want to find here at Heavenly Homemakers. ;)

I’ve talked in the past about “healthy punctuation products” and the importance I feel that it is to avoid regular feminine products at the store. Read this post to know more about what I’m talking about. 

I’ve come to LOVE all Natracare Products, finding that they make a world of difference in my “punctuation life“. Many of you have recomended the Diva Cup or Cloth Pads – call me lazy – I just haven’t gone there yet. (Silly, I know.)

Here are my Natracare Products of choice:

  • Natracare Ultra Long Pads with Wings (for heavy days)
  • Natracare Natural Ultra Pads with Wings (for lightish, but not yet panty liner days)
  • Natracare Organic Cotton Panty Liners (for oh good, I’m almost done days)  :)

The biggest reason I order cases of these products (beyond the fact that it saves money) is because I don’t ever, ever want to run out and have to get the regular kind from the store. I could break out into a rash just thinking about it.  {shudder} Regular products practically made me sick. I don’t ever want to use them again ever, ever, ever.

So there you go. In a few days, I’ll be receiving my bulk order of Natracare Products.

This makes me happy, although not nearly as happy as big bulky bags of oats. And I promise not to stand and stare at my box of Natracare Products like I stare at my bulk groceries. ;)

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Why I Buy in Bulk

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Hello my name is Laura and am obsessed with buying food in bulk. I love purchasing large quantities of food at one time – and then staring at it. Staring at bulk groceries makes me happy. Dreaming about all the delicious food I can make with my large food stores gives me a thrill. 

I’m pretty sure (pretty sure?) I am a little weird (only a little weird?) when it comes to my love of food. I know there are people who only give food a thought at the moment they become hungry and they think I’m strange for caring so much about my coconut flakes. They see my pantry and storage room and think I must have some weird phobia about losing our food supply, which must be why I buy up to 500 pounds of wheat at one time. They hear how many tomato plants we have in our garden and wonder if we know that we’ll have tomatoes coming out of our ears.

Yes, we’re aware. We did this last year too. And the year before that. We happen to like having tomatoes coming out of our ears. We think it tickles.

So why do we buy food (or preserve food) in such large quantities?

We do it because it’s practical for our family and saves us a good deal of money. Buying in bulk has made our real, whole food eating choices much more practical and affordable. We are blessed with a good amount of storage space, making the idea possible in the first place. Overall, I have found that purchasing food in bulk makes my kitchen duties much, much easier. Instead of buying a package of pasta every time we need a package of pasta (which is at least once each week), I buy a case of pasta once every two months and forget about it in between. When I need pasta, I go to my storage room and get pasta. 

Maybe I like bulk food so much because I don’t have to think so hard. Yes, that’s why I like it. I may like staring at my food and dreaming about our meals, but I’m not a big fan of thinking so hard every time I need to make a meal. I like buying ahead, buying in bulk, then having the capability to grab whatever food I need out of my storage and getting right to work in my kitchen. It’s all rather lovely.

I also really love that by having a large store of food, I can make bigger quantities of food if we have spur of the moment guests. It’s so nice to be able to say, “Stay for dinner – we have plenty!”

Buying in bulk (and preserving large quantities of food) just works for me. I love it.

During the next few weeks, I’ll share more about how buying in bulk works for our family, more about how we store our bulk, and most importantly, how we afford making bigger bulk purchases. I’m also working hard to put together a reference page sharing what food I always like to have on hand and what my favorite sources are for these items.

I know bulk purchasing doesn’t work for everyone. My intent with these posts isn’t to encourage everyone to buy in bulk. There may be just one of you in your household, making bulk purchasing impractical. Or you may have a small living space and then where are you supposed to store your bulk – on the roof?

So do share. If you buy in bulk, what are your reasons? And if you don’t buy in bulk, what are your reasons?  For all of you who have no interest in bulk food purchases, thank you for putting up with my obsession and embracing my “I smile at big bags of oats” insanity. 

bagofoats6sm.JPG

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Healthy Marriage Tips from A to Z

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I am excited to announce a new feature here at Heavenly Homemakers – Healthy Marriage Tips from A to Z. This is a series of posts that we’ll run once a week for the next 26 weeks, until we work all the way through the alphabet.

What I hope you’ll enjoy about Healthy Marriage Tips from A to Z  is that my husband Matt and I are teaming up to write these posts. They’ll be presented from his perspective and from mine, whether we happen to think the same way about each topic or not. Of course we always agree on every topic. Except for when we don’t. ;)

Our marriage isn’t perfect, but we have been blessed with what we feel is a healthy marriage. This is a gift from God, and we work hard together to keep our marriage healthy. Both Matt and I have a heart to encourage healthy marriage relationships in those around us as well. That is how the idea for this series of posts was born.

Later this week, we’ll be back with the first post of this series – a topic beginning with the letter A. What do you think we’ll start talking about first? Anger – Argue – Aggravate – Aggressive? Um, no. We don’t really plan on giving you tips on Aggravating Your Spouse. We’ve got a much more positive topic in mind.

Avoid? Awful? Against?

You can keep guessing, but I’m not gonna tell you our topic. But it sure is fun thinking of A words that don’t describe a healthy marriage. :)

Aftershock, Awkward, Annoying…

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Menu Plan for the Week

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These were our breakfast muffins this morning, Blueberry Streusel and Chocolate Chocolate Chip
I’ll share the Blueberry Streusel muffin recipe this week!

You know what I just can’t get enough of this time of year? Watermelon. This is the time of year you can typically find me standing at the sink, eating a wedge of watermelon, letting watermelon juice run down my chin. And my neck. And down to my elbow. 

It’s cute. You should try it sometime.

Here is our menu plan for the week, which (surprise, surprise) does include some watermelon:

Sunday, June 12
Chocolate chocolate chip muffins, blueberry streusel muffins, pears
Italian pasta bake, tossed salad, green beans
Grilled cheese sandwiches, watermelon

Monday, June 13
Sourdough English muffins (from Sourdough A to Z eBook), scrambled eggs, pears
Corn dog muffins, peas, cantaloupe
Lasagna casserole, tossed salad, corn

Tuesday, June 14
Whole wheat waffles, blueberries
Chicken veggie quesadillas, fruit salad
Popcorn chicken, ranch potato wedges, steamed carrots and broccoli

Wednesday, June 15
Coconut flour muffins, applesauce
Meat and cheese burritos, strawberry orange smoothies, carrot sticks
Chicken fried steak strips, mashed potatoes, gravy, peas, watermelon

Thursday, June 16
Creamy orange coolers, hashbrowns, fried eggs on toast
Salmon patties, strawberry peach slushie, carrot sticks
Cheesy salsa enchiladas, tossed salad, watermelon

Friday, June 17
Applesauce bread, bananas
Chef salad with homemade dressings, apples
Shepherds pie, peaches with cottage cheese

Saturday, June 18
Whole wheat donuts
Leftovers
Lamb steak, baked potatoes, asparagus

What’s your favorite summer fruit?

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If you haven’t made your free Father’s Day card, be sure and do that before the end of Monday!

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Free Shipping at Tropical Traditions ends Monday night.

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Baking Day (Ugly) Photo Shoot

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We’ve had some unusually cool days this week, so beginning Thursday, once I realized the temps weren’t actually going to even reach 66°, I decided to take advantage and get some baking done. Once those 90 and 100 degree days come back, I’m going to be very thankful I did this (if there are actually any baked goods left by then!).

I always get a little bit tickled at my baking day pictures. They aren’t the prettiest pictures in the world, you know? Take for instance this picture of my big roasting pan of baked potatoes:

Ugly, isn’t it? Does it inspire you to bake potatoes? Eat potatoes? Cut black spots off of potatoes?

Well, anyway, I took that picture to show you that we (as in the boys) scrubbed 26 potatoes and baked them so we can make Homemade Hashbrowns. I LOVE doing this, but certainly don’t love baking potatoes when it’s hot outside. Now we’ve got a nice stash ready for Hashbrowns!

Moving on to the next (ugly?) picture, we have my bowl of bubbling sourdough starter:

Now, deciding whether a picture of sourdough starter is ugly or not depends on whether or not you get a kick out of making sourdough bubbles. The picture itself looks a little strange, but I happen to really appreciate sourdough, which means that I think those bubbles are beautiful. But what do I know? I think armadillos are cute.

I made a batch of Corn Dog Muffins and snapped the picture while the hot dogs were still exposed. Not the most appetizing picture, but the end result is always yummy!

So how about we quickly follow those pictures up with a picture of a big batch of Chocolate Chip Cookies I made to put in the freezer? I’m always needing cookies to take somewhere, so I decided to bake some and stash away to be prepared for later.

It was almost dark when I took the following picture, so the shot looks a little bit yellow. I made a double batch of Honey Whole Wheat Bread, a batch of Whole Wheat Hamburger Buns and a double batch of Pancake and Sausage Muffins.

That should hold us over for a while (in theory).

One last picture – I’m excited to show you my container of Cocoa Butter that I ordered and just received from Mountain Rose Herbs. I want to use them to try a different variety of Homemade Chocolate Chips, and maybe Homemade White Chocolate Chips. Wouldn’t that be fun?

Is it baking weather at your house, or are you more in the mood to sit in a swimming pool while sipping lemonade?

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Our Mini Vacation (Part Two)

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The first day of our mini-vacation was spent at the Durham Museum, Red Mango and our hotel swimming pool. The next day, we headed to the Henry Doorly Zoo, truly one of the best zoos in the U.S. 

I will say that our day at the zoo wasn’t perfect, but that was due to the 101 degree heat that threatened to do us in a time or two, which of course wasn’t the zoo’s fault. And thankfully, there were some lovely air conditioned areas we took full advantage of!

Here we are enjoying the “Desert Dome” (which our oldest said he wished was the “Dessert Dome”, because wouldn’t THAT have been fun!). We saw some really amazing birds, some (not so) cool snakes, and my favorite – a little armadillo that I totally wanted to bring home. Me, the girl who doesn’t want pets. Cutest little armadillo ever, he was. Ran so fast in his little round shell he looked like he was on wheels. Mmm, so adorable.

We only missed a few of the zoo’s great attractions, pumping our legs hard in that heat to make the rounds. We left the Desert Dome and followed our map and we were not a bit disappointed with what we saw.

Isn’t this bear a sweet one? Amazing how sweet they look when they aren’t growling in your face. Kinda sounds like me.  I can be real sweet when I’m not growling in your face. It’s true. Just ask my kids.

We stood and stared at the penquins for a long, long time. Ever read Mr. Popper’s Penquins? Oh, you’ve got to read it. And then stare at some real penquins for a while. They’re fascinating.


We saw the biggest butterfly ever. Except that it was really a chair and Malachi and I sat in it to take a little break from walking. 

Possibly our favorite area (although it truly is hard to say) was the Aquarium. This place is incredible, with glass all around you so that you can see all of the amazing creatures swimming. Yes, sharks swam over us and beside us, as did sting rays and sea horses. We also made friends with a big turtle, that in my opinion, had a lovely personality. I’d never seen one like him before and I named him Fred.

It was hard to walk away from this round “tube” of fish. Again, we stared and stared…

We left the zoo exhausted and fulfilled…with still enough energy to talk all the way to dinner about “Remember the monkey on that rope?” and “Are you sure we can’t go back and get the armadillo?”. Not really. I didn’t really say that. I’d never contemplate something like that. Really.

Dinner was fun at Ci-Ci’s Pizza where we’d printed off a coupon and were able to feed our family for an incredibly low price. What a treat!

Last but not least, we stopped at Whole Foods, because if I can’t have an armadillo, I at least need to have a Whole Foods fix while I’m in Omaha, right? Thanks to those of you who signed up for Shop it to Me, we had accumulated a few Whole Foods gift cards to use.

Can I tell you what a blessing those are to us, and how much we appreciate those of you who take the time to (painlessly) sign up for the Shop it to Me email? It means a lot to us, and provides us with a few gift cards to spend on wholesome groceries for our family. I hope that you too are taking advantage of the Shop it to Me  referral program and telling YOUR family and friends about this so that you can earn gift cards as well!!

Here’s a picture of some of the items we grabbed at Whole Foods. We also got some chicken breasts while we were there, but they were in the freezer at the time of this photo shoot and refused to come out. Stubborn little chickens.  (Should have got me an armadillo instead.)

And there you have it…our Mini Vacation. It was a wonderful getaway and I’m so thankful we were able to do this!

Now you tell me – do you have fun travel plans this summer?  (And if you’re coming through Nebraska, do you think you could bring me an armadillo?)

Just a little reminder, Friday, June 10 is the final day for our Heavenly Homemakers eBook Overload sale!! Read details here!

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