Heavenly Homemakers

Encouraging women in homemaking, healthy eating and parenting

Gratituesday: You

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I have written and deleted and re-written this post two or three times…trying to express my gratitude to God and to all of you for what this site has become in the past two years. 

I know what I’m capable of. That’s how I know that God has blessed this site.

And…without you…my friends who read my posts and leave comments and email me and ask questions and encourage me and pray for me…this site would be nothing.

Thank you. 

Your comments make me smile. Your kindness builds me up. Your emails make my day. Your encouragement keeps me going.

This Gratituesday is dedicated to all of you. You are the reason I love what I do.

Thank you with all my heart.
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Please join us this Gratituesday! While Gratituesday comes around every week during the year…this month we’re focussing on being extra thankful! Read about the November Gratitude Challenge here and take part in the joy of praising God for how He has blessed us all! 

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Link up as many Gratitude posts as you’d like each week! Leave as many Grateful comments as you wish! (There are prizes involved!) 

God is so good! I can’t wait for all of us to be able to read how He is working in your lives!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

November Gratitude Challenge!

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November 1st marked the second anniversary of this website! I’m so excited and well…very, very grateful! 

I’m hoping you will help celebrate my 2nd Website Anniversary by taking the Gratitude Challenge with me!

With Thanksgiving coming up we’re in the thankulness mode anyway…right?!

All month I would like to challenge you to look deep into the ways God has blessed you. Write a post on your blog (if you have one!) about what you’re grateful for. Write a grateful post every day if you’d like!

Each Tuesday…Gratituesday, that is…link up any or all of your grateful posts. If you don’t have a blog, then leave a comment (or twelve) sharing what you’re grateful for.

During the entire month of November, each time you link up to my weekly Gratituesday post and/or leave a comment on my Gratituesday post…you will be entered into a drawing for some super fun prizes—A Handmade Prayer Journal—A $25 Gift Certificate to the Heavenly Homemakers Shop—A Stainless Steel Beginners Baking Pack worth $20!

(Does it sound like I’m bribing you to be grateful? Well…maybe prizes are something to be grateful for, huh?)

God is good! Let’s celebrate together!

Psst…if you leave a comment on THIS post…I’ll be so grateful…I just may enter these comments in the drawing as well!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Menu Plan for the Week

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Sunday, November 1
Oatmeal, peaches
Potato soup, carrot sticks, fudgy brownies
Bean and rice bowls, cantaloupe

Monday, November 2
Simple soaked pancakes
Sliced turkey ham, hashbrowns, peas
Chicken tortilla soup, fruit salad

Tuesday, November 3
Sweet potato streusel muffins, bananas
Grilled cheese sandwiches, tomato soup, carrots
Sloppy cornbread, tossed salad

Wednesday, November 4
Fruit and yogurt delight, toast
Salmon patties, stir fried rice and veggies
Lasagna casserole, corn

Thursday, November 5
Blueberry coffee cake, applesauce
Creamy mac and cheese, green beans
Italian roast wraps, fresh pineapple

Friday, November 6  (Matt’s birthday!)
Biscuits and gravy
Black bean taco salad, grapes
Cheesey turkey sausage stromboli, peach cobbler

Saturday, November 7
Chocolate donuts
Hamburger patties, steamed broccoli and cauliflower
Leftovers

Visit Organizing Junkie for more menu planning inspiration!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Grain Mills Pt. 3: What Grains to Use and Where to Find Them

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In this little Grain Mill Series, we’ve talked about whether or not you should buy a grain mill…and if so…which one should you get and where should you get it? Now we’ll talk about which grains to use and where you can find them!

Which Grain to Use:

  • I try to find organic or chemical free grain.
  • My very favorite grain to use is Hard White Organic Wheat. I like it much better than Hard Red Wheat. It has the same nutritional value, but when you use hard white wheat, it hardly seems like you’re eating whole wheat at all! Hard red wheat seems to make my recipes a bit heavier.
  • You can use Soft White Wheat to make pastry flour (for use in cookies and muffins) and Hard White Wheat for yeast breads. BUT I just use my hard white wheat for everything. It’s just simpler…I only have to have one kind of wheat on hand…and it just tastes good.
  • I also love kamut and spelt…but don’t use them as much, usually because they cost a bit more.
  • I grind my own corn into corn meal. This makes the BEST cornbread and cornbread muffins. I love freshly ground corn!
  • You can grind rice and make rice flour if you like. It is actually recommended that you grind a cup or so of rice every few months through your mill just to clean it out! (I’ve GOT to remember to do that!)

Where to Find Good Quality Grains:

  • First check around locally. Check out Local Harvest to find out if there is a good source of grains near you.
  • I almost always order my wheat, corn and rice from Azure Standard. If you live in an area where there is an Azure Standard co-op delivery, I highly recommend purchasing this high quality grain from them. You can still order independently from Azure Standard, but shipping may be high.
  • Tropical Traditions has several varieties of very high quality grains. Watch for “free shipping” days and take advantage!
  • Paula’s Bread sells a few different varieties of grain on her site. She’ll ship it to you, or you can go pick it up if you live near her in Oklahoma.
  • Pleasant Hill Grain happens to be right up the road from me!! I was excited to see the shipping is FREE on orders over $99!!!!
  • Wheat Montana has great prices on wonderful wheat (I used to be able to get their wheat from Wal-mart for a great price). Shipping from their site is pretty pricey.
  • Healthy Food Mall is worth checking into. Their costs are higher for the grain, but shipping seemed more reasonable.
  • Don’t forget Amazon. I’ve never bought grain from them because shipping is high, but I keep checking there to see if there’s a reasonable option.

Grain will last for a long time. If you come upon a good resource for wheat, I say buy a LOT. It will store safely for years without going bad!

Okay everyone with a grain mill!! Share where buy your grain and where you live so that others in your area can learn from you!
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This post is linked to Frugal Fridays.

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Well, Hallelujah!

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All of our boys are involved in a small home school choir right now. For the past several years our  home school group has asked Michelle, a recent college graduate with a music major, to help us teach music to our kids.

Michelle has done a fabulous job teaching our kids about singing, performing, reading notes…it’s wonderful! She’s worked with our kids on both chorus and drama/musical performances and it’s been very impressive!

This year Malachi was old enough to give it a try. He’s only 4 1/2, so it’s a bit of a stretch for him to stay focused for an entire practice, but he LOVES it. 

From the night of the very first practice, Malachi started walking around saying, “Hahyay”…shakes his head…tries again…”Hahlyay”…shakes his head.

Over and over again for days.

He’d sometimes try to work it into the song, “King of Kings and Lord of Lords, Glory Hahyay…” (shakes his head…tries again…)

Eventually he started adding more to the word, “Hah-Yay-Yoo-Lah.” (shakes his head)  Ah, but he was closer.

Then finally. FINALLY. 

One day he was sitting at the kitchen table, “Hahyay…HahLayYooLah…HahYayYooLah…Hah…Lay…Loo…Yah….” He stopped dead still for a moment. Realization dawned in his face then he screamed, “I DID IT!!!!!!  Hah-Lay-Loo-Yah!!! Mama!! I said it! Hah-Lay-Loo-Yah!!!”

Then he started running circles around the house shouting, “Hallelujah!! Hallelujah!!!” Of course the rest of us were just praising God right along with him that he FINALLY had figured out how to say it! “Hallelujah!”

That night, Michelle stopped by to drop off music CDs for the boys to listen to and practice with. When Malachi saw who was standing at the door, he dropped whatever he was doing…RAN to the door…SHOVED his big brothers out of the way and SHOUTED, “Hallelujah!!!!!”

Michelle, bless her heart, opened up her arms with her face lit up and shouted back, “Well, Hallelujah!!!!”

Malachi was fifty feet up in the air. Ah was he beaming!

And so it continues. Randomly throughout the day during all forms of activity, shouts of “Hallelujah! Hallelujah!” are heard. 

The rest of us are joining it. It’s hard not to.

Kinda makes you wonder what all of us could accomplish if we were so determined, and practiced and tried and worked as hard as he did.

Can I get an amen? 

(Hallelujah!)
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This post is linked to Finer Things Fridays.

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Know Your Limits

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Last Tuesday night I fed the YC women’s soccer team a lasagna dinner, then spent 4 1/2 hours at a meeting where a few of my friends and I were working through a painful and difficult situation. I got home just before midnight completely exhausted and emotionally drained.

Wednesday I woke up (after a fitful night’s sleep mixed with sorrow and prayer) and looked ahead at my day. I had a lunch date with my friend who had just lost her house in a fire. Adam and BryAnna were coming for dinner to celebrate her birthday, which meant I needed to make a birthday cake as well as cook the dinner. I was teaching a ladies class at church that night I needed to finish preparing for. Matt was at an away soccer game until 11 that night. 

I knew how tired I was and everything about the day ahead of me seemed completely overwhelming. After praying about my day, I made a decision.

We would take a day off from regular school work.

I knew the small amount energy and strength I had inside of myself. Working through a school day with my boys while my mind was so preoccupied felt like climbing a mountain. 

I knew that if I tried to explain a math concept to anyone or keep everyone quiet while I read through History…my patience would wear thin and I’d have a hard time keeping from being grumpy. My boys do not deserve my grumpiness. 

Never, ever, EVER should I be so busy and caught up in doing “good things” for others and for the church that it wears me out and makes me grumpy at my own family. Never.

Instead, we had a movie morning. Then we baked a birthday cake. Then we made hot dogs (yes, I know my limits and it was a hot dog day!!). I went to lunch with my friend. When I got back, the boys and I read three chapters of our read-aloud. Then the boys read on their own. We frosted the cake. I read through my notes for the ladies class. We started dinner. Adam and BryAnna came over. We had a lovely birthday dinner.

And I was completely calm and peaceful the entire time.

If I would have tried to get through our whole regular school schedule in the middle of everything else…I’d have been a mess by 10:30 a.m. Instead, I enjoyed my boys. I enjoyed my friend at lunch. I enjoyed surprising BryAnna with some of her favorite foods. 

Can I choose to “not have school” EVERY DAY that I feel a little tired or overwhelmed? No way. That would be a big cop-out.

Should I always be so involved with outside ministries that I have nothing left for my family? No way. That would be very wrong. Our families are our number one ministries, which means sometimes we have to say “not this time” to a ministry opportunity.

But when you find yourself waking up to a day that is too full…know your limits. Figure out what you need to cut out, stop, cancel, reschedule or give up so that your family life stays healthy, strong and God filled.

God knows your limits better than you do. Ask Him and listen. 

Disclaimer:  No children, young or old, were academically crippled as a result of this day off of school. The very next day they were all still able to multiply, spell words and write creatively. Just in case you were worried. :)
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This post is linked to Works for me Wednesday.

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Gratituesday: It Took a Fire

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A week and a half ago, my friend Connie was driving by her house and noticed that her street was blocked off and there were fire trucks everywhere. She thought to herself, “Oh dear, something is burning.” It didn’t take long for her to see that it was her own house that was on fire.

Three years ago, Connie lost her husband to cancer, leaving her with five children to raise on her own.

And now this.

A few days later I spoke with Connie at church and invited her family over for lunch. She answered with, “Well, we already have plans today, but maybe just you and I can go out for lunch sometime this week.”

Um, okay. I was up for whatever she needed. We made plans to meet for lunch on Wednesday.

The day our lunch together was to take place, I was prepared to offer strength and encouragement to this woman who had lost so much.

Little did I know that I would be the one to leave the restaurant encouraged, strengthened and built up.

The whole time we were eating and visiting I was thinking to myself, “Why did it take a fire for us to sit down and have this conversation? By not spending much time with Connie before, I’ve been SO missing out.”

What a delightful woman. What a woman of faith. What a woman of strong character. I wanna be like that when I grow up.

I wish it wouldn’t have taken a fire…but I sure am grateful for the chance to get to know Connie better. I love how God brings great things out of the bad.
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What are you grateful for this Gratituesday? Write about it on your blog, then come link up with us here. Don’t have a blog? Be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you’re thankful for!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

A Kid Friendly Meal: Sloppy Cornbread

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You know how some of your kids like some of your meals some of the time…and all of your kids like some of your meals some of the time and none of your kids like some of your meals some of the time?

And the ones some of them like…the others don’t…and the ones the other ones like the first ones don’t?

But you make them ALL eat it anyway because hello, we are not short-order chefs…but really it’s so much nicer when all of the kids like all of the meals all of the time.

I have discovered a meal that all of my kids like all of the time. 

We call it Sloppy Cornbread.

I came up with this recipe because you know how when you have hamburger buns for your sloppy joes in the house some of the time…but not all of the time when you need them…and you don’t have time some of the times to make homemade buns…and the ones from the store are still at the store? That’s what happened to me one time.

But I really wanted to make sloppy joes and while some of the time we eat them without buns, we don’t do that all of the time and I really needed to fill my family up before a soccer game this time. 

And that’s how we came up with Sloppy Cornbread.

To make Sloppy Cornbread you need:

Spread the sloppy joes out into a 9×13 inch baking pan:

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Yum

Spread the cornbread mixture over the top then bake for 2o minutes at 400°. (You can sprinkle cheese on top before baking if you want to!)

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All of us like this all of the time and some of the time there is some leftover but not all of the time because most of the time we eat the entire pan.

You should try it sometime.

:)

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Menu Plan for the Week

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We have had very few days at our house in the past several weeks when I have only fed our family. Almost every day, there have been extra people here to eat. Out of town guests, college students, friends, soccer players. I LOVE it! Feeding people is my favorite hobby!

Do any of the rest of you feel like feeding people is a fun hobby? (Or do some of you feel like it’s a dreaded chore?!)

Here’s our menu this week:

Sunday, October 25
Oatmeal
Chili, veggie tray, Lynn’s no bake cookie bars (these are SO good!)
Popcorn chicken, ranch potato wedges, peas

Monday, October 26
Applesauce bread, bananas
Pizza, apples
Sloppy cornbread, tosssed salad

Tuesday, October 27
Scrambled egg sandwiches, clementines
Chicken and rice stew, cheese muffins
Lamb chops, baked potatoes, green beans

Wednesday, October 28
Simple Sourdough Pancakes
Nachos, grapes
Cheesy chicken and potatoes, carrots

Thursday, October 29
Fried eggs, turkey sausage, hashbrowns
Tuna salad on toast, peaches and cottage cheese
Chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes, gravy, steamed broccoli

Friday, October 30
Breakfast cake, pears
Quesadillas, applesauce
Tacos

Saturday, October 31
Zucchini muffins, apples with dip
Corndog muffins, baby carrots
Hamburgers and homemade fries

If I get a round tuit, I’m hoping to write a marathon of posts in the next few days so that I can get caught up on all the posts I feel behind on. I’ve got a giveaway, a new recipe, more about grain mills, Gratituesday of course, and something like five other posts waiting to be finished and posted. Keep checking back all week to see if I actually get it all done. It all depends on if I get a round tuit. (Yes I know. I already HAVE a round tuit.)  :)
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Check out Organizing Junkie for more menu planning inspiration!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Let’s Talk about Christmas Budgets

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When I mentioned on this post about whether or not WE should get a WE…I told you that WE usually don’t spend $200 on our boys for Christmas. Some of you were curious about what that meant exactly. How much do we spend on each boy, etc?

I decided it would be a great discussion with all of you here.

After giving it some thought, I came to the conclusion that every year has been different…we probably have spent $200 total on our four boys for Christmas. But definitely not on only one gift. I would say that we have probably averaged about $50 per child each year.

We usually get each boy one “bigger” thing each. By “bigger” I’m talking a $10-$25 gift. Especially when they’re little…the “big” gift is usually something as simple as a $10 sing-and-play-back microphone.

THEN…we spend the rest on things they need. Thankfully our boys don’t seem to mind getting socks and jammies for Christmas. It gives them more presents to open…and new jammies are FUN!

(Side note:  Our Christmas spending budget is quite low overall. By buying jammies and such for the kids for Christmas, those costs actually come out of our clothing budget.)

We fill their stockings with things I’ve found on clearance throughout the year, and fun food treats I splurge on through Azure Standard.

Between grandparents and aunts and uncles…our boys have so many presents to open they always feel like they’ve hit the jack-pot (because they have)!

We haven’t felt badly about spending $50 each on the boys at Christmas because seriously…we hardly buy them ANYTHING throughout the year. Anything. We don’t need to. We have more hand-me-down clothes and toys than we know what to do with. What a blessing. So the $50 we spend on each boy seems pretty reasonable. AND it’s SO much fun for Matt and I to decide on a “splurge” type gift for the kids at Christmas since we never buy them during the year!

Now, what we spend on our extended family varies…but we usually try to make our gifts for others if we can (last year’s ideas here and more on this year’s ideas soon).

As far as what Matt and I spend on each other…we are sorta boring that way (and I seem like such an unhappy wife as a result, huh?!). Last year he bought me software that I could use for this website, and I bought him a new tool. And then our gifts were tax write-offs.  Best Christmas presents ever. :)  This year we may not exchange gifts unless we think of something we need. (Maybe I’ll ask for new kitchen towels?)

SO…how about you? I realize that some of you may spend much more on your kids than we do…some of you less. That’s okay with me.  What have you found that works best for your family?

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