Heavenly Homemakers

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Big Family Food and Fun: September 17-23, 2023

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Ready for Big Family Food and Fun: September 17-23?

During the past few weeks, God has filled up our Castle with additional housemates. Amazing! You can read the details about this here. We filled our final third floor room last Sunday. :) :) There are 16 of us living in our house now, but I’m only counting 15 in our “who ate the food” fun because the baby is still mostly drinking formula and figuring out purees. :)

Our five housemates sometimes eat with us and sometimes eat on their own depending on schedules, needs, work, and outside plans. Meanwhile, anyone who drops by to hang out with our older boys or anyone who comes over for any reason is welcome to eat here too.

So I always make a large evening meal, knowing that we’ll be feeding anywhere from 11 to 20 people. There’s always enough and if there’s too much: LEFTOVERS!!

Leftovers for Lunch

It’s pretty chill at lunchtime here, and there’s always this and that in the fridge that needs to be eaten up. So almost every day for lunch, everyone fends for themselves (well, Matt and I feed the littles, of course). This is easy, helpful, and a great way to keep from wasting food.

Here’s a silly photo of Anna and Brayden. Anna was wearing one of our housemate’s glasses and was so very proud.

Here’s what our week looked like!

Food and Fun: September 17-23, 2023

Sunday morning I set out the tail end of last week’s goodies for breakfast: Snickerdoodle Bites, Peanut Butter Honey Bread, and Pumpkin Donuts. I love finishing off tidbits to clear out space and to avoid waste!

We had a big day planned that day! After church we were going to eat lunch (at the church building) and then drive two minutes to an Apple Orchard. We invited another family plus several young adults to join us. Altogether, there were 28 of us. I love things like this!

Saturday night I had baked a double batch of these brownies to go with our lunch.

I put 14 Brats and 24 Hotdogs on our smoker before church. While they were cooking, we put together other lunch items to take with us: watermelon, grapes, chips, carrots, and water.

We put the cooked Brats and Dogs into crockpots and plugged them in once we got to church so they’d stay warm. After church, we quickly set out a buffet and enjoyed our meal together.

The Apple Orchard opened at 1:00, and it really was just two minutes away from the church building. So off we went to enjoy picking apples together!

This outing was everything I hoped it would be, with our huge crew enjoying the sunshine, time together, and apple picking!

Eva captured this photo of Kelsey and Acacia. I can’t stop staring at it.

We were way past naptime when we wrapped up, but we were able to get a photo with all 15 of our family members. It’s so rare and wonderful for all of us to coordinate schedules and be together like this.

Naps were extra good that afternoon. :)

Somehow I had managed to throw Easy Crock Pot Fajitas into our Instant Pot that morning so they slow cooked all day and made dinner super easy. I had never used our Instant Pot as a slow cooker, but both of our Crock Pots were full of Brats and Dogs that morning so I attempted it. It worked!

The meat (organic, grass fed fajita meat provided by one of the gals living with us right now) was absolutely incredible.

Malachi built this Fajita Burrito Masterpiece:

Monday morning I baked a double batch of Pumpkin Muffins (minus the chocolate chips). This made 24 muffins, and by the end of the day we were down to 6. I love watching food disappear! I made sausage links to enjoy with the muffins. Plus I got out our Pampered Chef apple-peeler-corer-slicer to cut apple rings for the kids.

After we got Brayden and Kiya to school, Keith and I headed to the Food Distribution site to help set up for Tuesday’s food giveaway. This is SUCH good one-on-one time for us and he loves being a helper!

I’m not sure that this is what Ms. Kathleen had it mind when she asked us to put the snacks out on the table. If you can’t build a tower of muffins, what even is the point? (Truly, Keith couldn’t see any other way to display these. I had to sneak in later to re-adjust the table.) ;)

Lunch was leftovers. :) Dinner was simple and delicious! I made Ham and Cheese Melts on buns they sent home with us that morning when we were setting up food. I had Colby jack, pepper jack, and Havarti cheese slices so I made an assortment with these sandwiches.

We enjoyed them with corn on the cob, spaghetti squash (cooked like this), watermelon, and peas.

After dinner, I sliced more of the apples we’d picked at the orchard and we ate them with Caramel Apple Dip. I hadn’t made that dip since last fall, so it tasted extra good!

Matt borrowed our neighbor’s leaf blower and Keith helped him clean up the parking lot area in our back yard. Keith takes every job very seriously. And I’m not sure if you can tell, but he’s wearing a spiderman hat someone had made just for him. It didn’t come off of his head for the entire day. :)

Tuesday morning we loaded up the kids and headed to Costco. My goal was to get stocked up on basic baking ingredients – which I did. But I also bought frozen pizza because I like having it on hand. AND, the strawberries and raspberries were still priced really low. So I got 2 containers of raspberries and 16 more pounds of strawberries. I’m out of control. :)

Raspberries make a great snack, but they taste better when you first put one on each finger. :)

That afternoon, Brayden, Kiya, and I went to help with the weekly Food Distribution. We got home at 5:30 tired, hungry, and in a hurry because Brayden had a piano lesson with Justus at 6:00. Thankfully, Malachi had baked chicken for sandwiches and Elias had build sandwiches and already fed the little ones. The rest of us grabbed ours and I didn’t even care about adding fruits and veggies because it was a bit hectic as we transitioned back home. :)

Wednesday morning I made Eggs in a Nest for breakfast with strawberries and Whipped Cream.

For a mid-morning snack, I cut more strawberries into what was left of the whipped cream. Keith, Anna, Acacia, and Josie helped me eat it. :)

We were preparing for a huge meal on Sunday in which we were planning to feed around 50 York University choir members. So during naptime, I went to Aldi to get a few things we needed for our family and a few things we needed for the choir meal.

It was the final evening the Lincoln Zoo was going to be open in the evening before next spring, so we took advantage and headed to the zoo that night.

I had packed hotdogs for us to eat there, along with fruit cups, carrots and ranch, and cold drinks. One of our new housemates joined us. Of course, the littles all love her and it appears that she’s never going to be allowed to eat a meal with our family without a child on her lap. :)

Thursday was a very full day. Matt was gone all day in York, I had two meetings scheduled, and some of our kids had extra behavior issues that needed to be dealt with. And that was just before 8:15am.

I sent our school kids off (one of them still in tears) with our neighbor who was gracious to walk them to school for me because I had already started my morning that was full of meetings for our littles. Case workers came, someone from our Early Development Network came – it was good and necessary but exhausting.

Why am I sharing this? Because while I love food and sharing food and all the fun that we have, it’s all mixed in with some very real life, very big challenges too. I think that’s why I love sharing about the rest of it so much. It reminds me of all the goodness God gives and all the fun we have each day. :)

So back to the food and fun…

I’ve been getting bags of organic pears at Aldi and they are perfect right now! They are small, making them great to hand out as snacks. Here’s Josie, looking as sweet as can be with her tasty pear.

One of our housemates provided us with a farm-raised chicken and I tried my hand at smoking it. I rubbed it down with Redmond’s Seasoning Salt and smoked it on low heat for the entire afternoon. Meanwhile, I made Mashed Potatoes in the Crock Pot and just before time to eat, I steamed broccoli. I love meals like this!

We had all those strawberries, so I had no choice but to make Strawberry Shortcake for our dessert after dinner.

No one complained about this choice of desserts.

I was continuing to prep to feed the York University Singers on Sunday so when I baked the shortcake, I also used oven space to make a double batch of Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars.

That evening, I also stirred together an extra large Easy Breakfast Casserole. Then on Friday morning I slid it into the oven to bake while I had my God time. When the kids got up, the casserole was ready and we ate it with strawberries and shortcake. (The cake is about as sweet as muffins, so I figured it would be a perfect side plus fun for the kids to feel like they were eating cake for breakfast!)

I got a little bit too ambitious and made a batch of Peanut Butter Honey Granola. (I wanted to make the most of the hot oven, plus I always like to try and get ahead.) It mostly worked out, but with trying to get kids fed and off to school I let it stay in the oven a little bit too long. It’s extra toasted. :)

That afternoon, I cooked seven pounds of hamburger meat in my Instant Pot like this. Then I turned it into two huge pots of Chili for Sunday.

As I finished that up, all kinds of crazy hit the house as we had some friends from out of state who were in a hurry but needed a place to shower. Yep, come on over! Meanwhile I was getting ready to have a rare night out at an Adoptive Moms Support Group (life giving and needed!!). We ate a super simple meal, taking full advantage of our air fryer to enjoy “French Fry Friday.” Tonight it was fries with nuggets.

Saturday morning we ate good ol’ cereal as we were getting other food items made.

The kids washed the remaining apples we’d picked on Sunday at the apple orchard. I cut them and cooked them down to make applesauce. (I used this quick method.)

It made a huge bowlful that we can eat all next week!

We had been invited to a party to watch the Husker football game that afternoon and had been asked to bring dessert. We made Chocolate Cupcakes with hidden spinach. The spinach was then perhaps counteracted by the candy pumpkins I put on top, but aren’t they cute?? :)

I also made a big bowl full of Strawberry Fluff to take to the party to share.

We ate leftovers for lunch with Caesar salad. As we were wrapping up, our neighbor John brought over this huge bucket of apples! They were from a tree on his family’s property and hadn’t been sprayed. The remind me of our apple picking days at our favorite orchard closer to York. We enjoyed bags and buckets of those apples year after year and eventually became friends with the Claytons, owners of the orchard. We miss this! How grateful we were to receive this bucket from our new friend in Lincoln.


After an early nap, we loaded up and headed over to our Husker Game Party. During half-time, we all headed outside to enjoy a pinata the host had set up for all the kids.

Go, Kiya, go!

The kids definitely didn’t care about football, ha. They actually only barely cared about the food. But they had been talking non-stop about how we’d been invited to swim while we were there. So finally we got them all ready, with the help of Justus and Kelsey, and let them have what will probably be one last outdoor swim of the season.

Knowing that they’d hardly eaten before that and that they’d be starving after time in the pool, I quickly made a late dinner plan for when we got home. Indeed, joy turned to hungry melt-down as we left the party. We gave them all a handful of peanuts that we had in the van (phew!) and I hurried to make a pile of French toast with sausage when we got home before bed. You’ve never seen such small children put away so much food at one time. :) :) :)

And that was our week!

P.S. Total grocery spending so far in September: $1100 and we are VERY stocked up on basics right now.

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Big Family Food and Fun: September 10-16, 2023

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Fall is in the air for sure, and we are loving it! Care to see take a look at the food and fun our big family enjoyed last week?

How did we go from 11 to 14?? Read about that here.

Big Family Food and Fun: September 10-16, 2023

In preparation for the new week, on Saturday afternoon during naptime I made a double batch of Banana Bread and quadruple batch of Zucchini Bread/Muffins.

Sunday morning, I packaged up three of the loaves of bread to give (along with a package of diapers) as gifts at a baby shower that was being hosted after church that day for three new babies. I then froze some of the Zucchini Muffins and put the additional loaf of Zucchini Bread and Muffins into our glass containers to enjoy for breakfasts this week.

There was a “young adult” lunch being hosted after church also, and we were asked to provide salad for the group.

Sunday evening, we smoked marinated Chicken Thighs, made Cheesecake Parfait to go with all the strawberries I’d picked up on sale, and steamed green beans. We’d been gifted a big bag of rolls after Sunday’s lunch at church, so we buttered and toasted them to round out our meal.

Asa ad Eva joined us, plus we caught our neighbor John working in his flower garden and he came over and ate with us too. :)

Monday morning after we got Brayden and Kiya off to school, Keith and I headed to the Food Distribution site I shared about here. He and I had a lovely time working together with the other volunteers to set up food for the Tuesday distribution day.

We got home around 11 and had an early lunch/snack outside before Keith and Anna got picked up by the bus for pre-school. We finished off this Bean and Cheese Salsa Dip from the fridge with some chips and grapes.

Monday afternoon during naptime I made a triple batch of Snickerdoodle Bites to have on hand for snacks as needed. It is so helpful to have these available to give to the littles when they need something to hold them over until mealtime.

For dinner that night, we made a huge pile of pancakes with sausage, eggs, strawberries, applesauce, syrup, and whipped cream. This kind of meal always goes over well and it tastes so good at dinnertime! However, I don’t make it often because it’s a bit of a high maintenance meal when fixing plates of firsts, seconds, and thirds according to preference for each kid. (Some want peanut butter, applesauce, syrup and whipped cream on their pancakes. Some want just butter and syrup. And oh yeah, whipped cream please. Some want…) :)

For breakfast on Tuesday, I made 8-cups worth of oatmeal and set out berries to add to bowls if desired.

The problem with having bathrooms in every bedroom

As some of the kids were eating, I began to wonder where Anna and Josie had gone. Suddenly water started pouring through this kitchen light. Ohmygoodness. The two missing girls were running the water in their sink and flooding the bathroom, which came through to the kitchen. Ack.

Matt took care of the water mess in their bathroom while I took care of the water mess in the kitchen (I needed to mop anyway. Heh.)

Look how sweet and innocent she looks just minutes later as she reads a Bible to her baby. :)

We’ve stopped being surprised by the insanity that happens regularly at our house. We are surviving. The kids are learning (hopefully). And seriously, I got my floor mopped (and cabinets wiped down).

We walked Brayden and Kiya to school, then loaded up the other five and went to Menards. Sometimes they run in four different directions in the parking lot. Sometimes they do this:

Like little angel babies.
People in the parking lot were all like, “awwww, aren’t your kids so sweet?
Are they always so well behaved???”
Matt and I start to sob.
Just kidding. I held it together and handed Matt a tissue.
Just kidding. There was no time to cry or hand out tissues. The kids had started to run amok.

We did Matt’s Menards thing, then loaded up again to burn off some energy at a park before Keith and Anna got picked up at home by the bus for preschool. We snacked on cheese, crackers, and grapes while we were there.

Keith had packed his scooter and helmet into the van to enjoy at the park because he’s practically an adult now.

That afternoon after school, Brayden, Kiya, and I went to the Food Distribution to help hand out food to people in the community. This was only our second week doing this and we still have a lot to learn about how it all works. But we are being kindly trained, and aside from knowing how this helps people, the best thing I’m seeing is how good this is for Brayden and Kiya.

A little side encouragement: Find ways for your kids to serve, to look beyond themselves, and to care for others. Serve with them. Let them serve with you. Make this a high priority.

At the end of the day, we came home with many wonderful items that will help stretch our food budget. (As I shared here, I learned last week that volunteers are able to take food home also, as long as there is plenty.) We got several packages of greens, apples, milk, breads and buns, and mineral water.

We didn’t get home until 5:40 and Matt, Elias, and Malachi had been holding down the fort with the rest of the gang. I’d put Creamy Layered Enchiladas into the crock pot before leaving for the afternoon so that dinner would be ready when I got home. I’m not sure where I went wrong, but they only turned out sort of so-so. We ate them, but we didn’t give them a high rating this time like we usually do.

It’s possible that we didn’t really care about dinner anyway because there was too much excitement going on outside! Our neighbor, John, grows an incredible flower garden in his yard that we all get to enjoy. He was honored that night to be featured by an organization showcasing his flowers, so dozens of people were coming over and walking through.

Not only that, but John is very talented with his harmonica and voice, so he was offering musical entertainment while people enjoyed his flowers. We didn’t need an outing that night. The “outing” was right across the street!

John insisted that we all come over for the treats he had laid out, but we waited until the event was almost over so that we didn’t add chaos to his big night. The kids were spoiled with sweets and juice while we listened to more of John’s music and visited with more of our neighbors. We are finding that God landed us in a fantastic neighborhood and we continue to be grateful.

Wednesday morning, I cut some of the huge loves of wheat bread we’d received from the Food Distribution, toasted it, and smothered it with peanut butter and honey. I cut it into chunks and we enjoyed it with applesauce.

Of the 16-pounds of strawberries I bought on Saturday, we were down to 6-pounds and they were getting a bit squishy. So I cut them onto cookie sheets and froze them for smoothies.

Later, after they were frozen, I transferred them to gallon-sized freezer bags.

Wednesday’s big Azure Standard pick-up

As you know, I’ve been involved with Azure Standard in York for years. This is the first month I put in an order for the Lincoln drop. We came home with a very large supply of food because I hadn’t ordered for many months and needed to stock up on several Azure favorites. (Here’s a list of what I like to order from Azure.) I was blessed to have some referral credit to help pay for this haul (thank you!).

We got organic whole wheat pastry flour, yogurt, frozen corn, green beans, and peas, frozen hashbrowns, several varieties of canned fruit, and some boxes of Einkorn cookies as a special treat.

The hashbrowns came in a huge frozen brick so I transferred them to gallon-sized freezer bags – 8 in all! Our freezers are full and we are well stocked up. Very thankful!

For dinner that night we made a bunch of burgers on our smoker. Keith helped me load the smoker with pellets, taking his job very seriously.

Then we packed up our burgers and took them to one of our favorite parks for a picnic with grapes, pineapple, and yep, a salad like this. As good as this meal was, no one cared much about eating because they were too excited to ride their bikes and scooters on the trails. :)

Even little Josie got in on the action. She was the only one I could snap a photo of because everyone else took off so fast!

Thursday morning we made a bunch of Breakfast Sandwiches like this. We warmed them in our air fryer to enjoy then froze the few leftovers.

After we took the kids to school, Matt and I loaded up the five littles and headed to Walmart to pick up some WIC items, pull-ups, and diapers. We got home in time for a meeting with our Case Worker for BabyBoy#11. Then the bus came to pick up Keith and Anna. Phew, it was quite a morning!

I was excited to find cases of tomato sauce on clearance at Walmart. They were so cheap I bought five cases! It’s almost Chili season after all. :)

Matt had made plans with Elias and Malachi to stay with the remaining three little ones so that he could take me to lunch. So sweet! Here’s the most (un)impressive picture of our meal.

For dinner that night, we had Crock Pot Taco Pasta with salad, pineapple, and watermelon. We ate outside, then went for a walk before bedtime.

For breakfast on Friday morning, we ate Yogurt with Granola and berries.

Matt went to work in York that day so Malachi helped me get the kids to school, then we took the youngest five to the zoo.

I loved seeing how Acacia was looking up at her bigger brother here. :)

We stopped for a snack/lunch before loading everyone up to get home in time to meet Keith and Anna’s school bus.

For dinner that night, we pulled everything random out of the fridge to clear it out. No one really ate a balanced meal, but at least we didn’t waste food.

After dinner, I mixed up a double batch of these Pumpkin Donuts. I brought the kids in one at time (well, I tried – it was hard for all the little ones to wait their turn) to help me cut out the donuts as I rolled out the dough. We cut them into apple shapes to celebrate the coming of Fall.

While my hands were covered in flour, Acacia grabbed my phone from my back pocket and snapped dozens of pictures of our kitchen floor. But she also go this burry photo of me cleaning up after our donut mess. Ha!

Saturday morning, we fried the Pumpkin Donuts in coconut oil on the griddle then drizzled a little bit of glaze over each one.

We ate them with scrambled eggs and blueberries.

Then we headed out for what ended up being three full hours of fun.

First, we went to a library story time that was a special “Sensory Story Time.” It had been recommended to us by a specialist because several of our kids have sensory issues and can become overstimulated. We were VERY impressed with the program and hope to go regularly. (Those are weighted puppies the kids are holding.)

When that ended, we headed outside to a Community Garden Party (which happened to be just outside this very library). There were several tables set out with activities and everyone got to choose an apple.

They got to watch some fun plant-themed science experiments.

Then we got to tour the garden with scavenger hunt papers where the kids tried to locate various veggies, flowers, and insects. It was all SO MUCH FUN. We couldn’t believe that they all lasted the entire morning, but we didn’t load up to head home until well past lunchtime.

The apples had only held them off for a short while so we had some very hungry children when we got home. Therefore, there are no pictures to prove my ridiculous lunch. But the minute we got home, I simply grabbed every last leftover from the fridge to fill their hungry bellies. We ate a very weird combination of buttered pancakes, green beans, grapes, and chips with white queso. :) :) :) No one complained – they were all too hungry!

We spent the afternoon getting our final third floor room ready for the renter who was planning to move in that evening. So I took the night off for dinner, baking several frozen pizzas. We ate it with salad and clementines.

Just for fun: The floor in this suite was a gross mess when we moved in. Matt took from nasty to this…

Then this…

Then this…

And the final look is this:

There’s another space in the room large enough for a queen sized bed and night stand. Plus there’s a full bathroom attached to the room (as there is with all of the rooms we’ve rented out). I explained a bit more about our plans for renting out our third floor suites here. As of Saturday night, the rooms are full of wonderful people and we are thankful!

We are only just beginning to learn what God has planned for this Castle He gave us. We thank Him constantly for His provision.

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Big Family Food and Fun: September 3-9, 2023

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This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

We added a few extras to our home this week. What?!?! Yep, our Big Family Food and Fun just got bigger. (And “funner.”)

Our household grew this week

I mentioned here that Matt was getting the suites in our third floor ready to rent out. We thought these rooms wouldn’t be filled yet for several months, but God had other, better plans. We thought we’d just rent out two of the rooms and keep the other one open. But God had other, better plans.

He worked out the details and all of a sudden, all three rooms are full! (Well, one person hasn’t moved in yet but she’s got her spot reserved and will move in next week.) We are so thankful for who God brought into our home. It’s all working out to be a win-win!

UPDATE as of 9-17-23: We currently have two of the rooms occupied by sweet single gals and one room filled with a mama and her two young children. :)

Our arrangement with our renters is that they have no obligation to eat meals with us but that they are more than welcome to eat with us if they would like. We love having our table full, and now extra full. :)

So there’s our household update. :) Now on to our Food and Fun from last week:

Food and Fun September 3-9, 2023

Sunday morning I set out three varieties of bagels I had picked up at Aldi. We toasted them in our air fryer and spread on cream cheese, enjoying bowls of applesauce on the side.

When I had breakfast set out and went in to see what kind of bagels each kid wanted toasted, I found Kiya reading a book to Anna and BabyBoy#11. Kiya LOVES to read and is becoming very good at it. :)

On our way home from church I ran into Sam’s and grabbed two rotisserie chickens for our lunch. Of course, I can’t just run in and get chicken. I grabbed a few other things we needed: applesauce, peanut butter, yogurt, spring mix, and tortilla chips. I threw them all into the messy back of our van and we headed home for lunch.

While I was putting together the sides to go with our chicken, we set out the Peanut Butter Cup Whipped Cream and animal crackers I had made for dessert. The littles saw it and started treating it like an appetizer. Good grief. ;)

To go with our rotisserie chickens, I had made baked potatoes in the crock pot, Caesar salad (mixes from Aldi), watermelon, cantaloupe, and Hawaiian rolls. It was such a simple but delicious lunch!

We invested in an espresso machine a few weeks ago and Elias is our local barista. He made us all iced lattes to enjoy once we got all the littles down for naps/rest time. BLISS.

That evening, we were blessed to go back to our friends’ house to enjoy their pool. Of course, we were so busy having fun (and keeping children safe in the water) that I didn’t get many pictures. Here are the girls when we “made them” get out of the water to eat.

Ms. Barbara and Mr. Steven had put together a most wonderful dinner of BLT Salad, grapes, peanut butter and jelly sandwich makings, chips, and cookies. We felt so loved and spoiled. Then back into the water we all went!

They sent us home with a huge bag of homemade waffles which we enjoyed for breakfast the next morning with applesauce, syrup, and peanut butter.

We had been given a lot of garden tomatoes, zucchini, onions, and squash and I needed to cook them before they went bad. I washed and chopped everything and put it into a pot to cook into a sauce.

Mid-morning Brayden, Kiya, Keith, and I went to help at a church that offers a weekly food distribution. They did a great helping Ms. Kathleen with any job she gave us to do. (More details about this below.)

We got home and pulled leftover rotisserie chicken out of the fridge for lunch. The kids sat at the picnic table outside and ate chicken with dips plus oranges slices, carrots, and cucumbers. Then I got out cold grapes and spoonfuls of peanut butter to finish off our meal.

We kept the kids outside after lunch to wear them out before naptime. It got hot so I pulled out frozen Go-gurts for a treat to cool them off.

It was too hot to bake, but I needed some extra fillers for lunchboxes, so during naptime I baked a double batch of these Peanut Butter Snack Bars to individually wrap, freeze, and add to lunches as needed.

That afternoon I finished simmering the sauce I had started that morning and blended it up. I chopped up a few grilled burgers we had leftover from last week and added it to the sauce to make it meaty.

Meanwhile, I prepped two garden fresh spaghetti squash we’d received and cooked them in our Instant Pot. I also boiled a pound of regular spaghetti noodles and warmed up some leftover Cream Cheese Corn from last week. I wasn’t sure how the kids would do with this meal because the sauce was different than they are used to. But they all gobbled this up – and the littlest kids loved the spaghetti squash!

I had promised the kids that they could have leftover Peanut Butter Cup Whipped Cream and crackers if they ate a good dinner (again, because I didn’t know if they’d eat the veggie-filled sauce and spaghetti squash) and indeed, they all ate a good dinner and were rewarded with their special treat!

Since it was a hot night, we set up the sprinkler for the kids to play in before bedtime.

Justus and Kelsey had come over to do their laundry so it was extra great to have them for a few hours that evening.

Tuesday morning we ate toasted bagels with fruit and got Brayden and Kiya off to school. Then Matt and I loaded up the five littlest and headed to a library story hour that was featuring a special Heavy Equipment Experience. The parking lot was full of all kinds of trucks and “worker vehicles.” It was Keith’s dream come true!

That afternoon, I went to Walmart to pick up formula and baby food for BabyBoy#11. Then right after school, Brayden, Kiya, and I went back to the church food distribution.

Community Food Distribution

Allow me to explain more about what I learned this week and what this is. A few weeks ago while we were at a fun Literacy Festival with our kids, we stopped at a booth and I learned about FoodNet. This is an organization in Lincoln that receives donations from local grocery stores, bakeries, and restaurants who give food that they can’t sell but don’t want to throw away. There are multiple distribution sites all through the city all week long who give this food to people in the community.

After hearing about it, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. Matt and I have such little spare time, yet this was something I felt God leading me to check into more. (I’m not sure if you know this about me, ha, but I love food and feeding people.) I researched it and prayed about it and God prompted me to involve our kids in this. This was a way we could serve with them and help them look beyond themselves.

I called one of the distribution sites and we arranged for the kids and I to go there on Monday since they had the day off of school. (Bless Matt and the boys for keeping the littlest four at home while we did this.) Monday is the day they receive a lot of the food and get it sorted and bagged. The kids loved helping with this, and so did I!

Then on Tuesday, right after school we went back to help distribute the food. Brayden and Kiya were put in charge of handing out treats to people as they came through the line. I was put in charge of handing out bunches of bananas, melons, and grapes. We loved every minute of it! Hopefully we can make this a part of our weekly routine if we can make arrangements for everyone at home. (Tuesday, Malachi was Matt’s side kick to help make it happen.)

What we didn’t know is that volunteers get to take food too, as long as there is plenty. The goal is that no food gets wasted and thrown away! So we ended up coming home with a huge box plus two bags full of food. We got a variety of breads, croissants, bagels, and English muffins plus bananas that I can turn into smoothies or banana bread. You can see some of it below. We also got broccoli, apples, peaches, a sweet pepper, and some salad fixins. Oh, and some sweet treats that the other volunteers were happy to give Brayden and Kiya. :) What a fun and unexpected bonus to help us feed our family and others!

We arrived home with our goodies around 5:30 and it was a bit nuts in our kitchen. ;) Before I left, I had put Cheesy Hashbrown Casserole into the crock pot (using the rest of the leftover rotisserie chicken from Sunday) so it was hot and ready to eat when we got home. We’d received a Caesar salad pack at the food distribution so I threw it together and that was dinner that night. (Along with a treat of some frosted cookies the kids were given as a “thank you” for helping that they shared with everyone at home.)

Phew. What a crazy lot of fun that day was. :)

Wednesday morning we took advantage of the croissants we’d been given the day before. I scrambled eggs with cheese and cooked bacon to make Croissant-wiches. Wow, they were good!

I had tuna salad in the fridge so I used more croissants to make tuna sandwiches for the kids to take to school for lunch.

Then I took a few minutes to open and break the over-ripe bananas we’d been given. I put them into freezer bags and into the freezer to use later for smoothies.

Dinner that night was in part compliments of one of our newest “tenants.” Everyone renting from us is a wonderful fit and some are even willing to make us a huge pot of the best mac and cheese!

We enjoyed the mac and cheese with smoked sausage and stir-fried veggies before heading to the zoo for about an hour before bedtime. We saw the red panda (he’s not always out so it’s always super exciting when we see him!), giraffes, and a few other animal friends. Then we enjoyed the free cookies they were handing out to zoo members before heading home for the night. :)

I have a confession

I wanted to make oatmeal on Thursday morning…and I couldn’t remember how. :) :) :) :) :)

I mean, I knew to boil water and then add oats, but for the life of me I couldn’t remember the ratio of water to oats. And I didn’t know how long it would take to cook. Has it been a full summer much, Laura?? Why yes, thank you. It has.

Anyway, on Thursday I googled how to make oatmeal. (Yes I know there are directions on the package but I buy in bulk and had transferred my oats from my package.) In case you need to know this: 2:1. Two cups of water for every one cup of oats. You are very welcome.

So we had our oatmeal and I stirred in baby fruit puree (that I have in abundance because we get it from WIC thanks to BabyBoy#11). And the kids gobbled it up!

Our morning outing after we got the two older littles to school was to walk to a park we hadn’t checked out yet. It was a perfect toddler/preschool sized park.

It was all good except that there are no potties there and someone (it wasn’t me) peed on the slide.

We decided to head home, but we did go ahead and eat the snack I’d packed so that those in our crowd with wet pants didn’t also become hangry.

We had juice, cheese/crackers, and applesauce. Aside from the pee, it was a lovely outing.

Lunch was leftovers. For dinner that night I went to a bit more “trouble” than I usually do because I had a bunch of over-shredded-weird-texture chicken in the freezer that I didn’t know what to do with (but couldn’t stand to waste). It had been in our freezer for many months and I needed to use it!

This week, I remembered this Chicken Patty Sandwich recipe, which calls for ground chicken. My weird chicken wasn’t exactly what the recipe calls for, but whatever. This is how we adapt recipes, use what we have, and avoid wasting food.

I made four pounds worth of these sandwiches, plus a blender full of these smoothies.

This was a very high maintenance meal, plus it made a huge mess, so I won’t likely make these very often. But the sandwiches did taste very good and we have leftovers so we’re getting two meals from one mess. :)

After we cleaned up, we loaded kids into the van and headed to one of our favorite parks to get the last of the ants out of our pants before bedtime.

Friday morning, Matt headed to York to work so Malachi was my side-kick for the first few hours of the day and then Elias took his spot when Malachi had to leave. Malachi and I decided to see if we could manage walking to “The Mill,” a coffee shop that is 0.8 miles from our house.

It turned out to be a lovely walk, and we were all very proud of ourselves for making it happen. (Keith especially, because he did great on his bike.) I stayed outside the shop with the babes while Malachi and Keith went in for a coffee. Then I took the girls in to potty before heading home. Because guess what?

This big 3-year-old is learning how to use a big girl potty. She is very proud, as she should be!

Lunch was leftovers – which is becoming pretty normal around here.

For dinner we had French Fry Friday! We used the rest of the croissants we’d been given earlier in the week to make delicious BLTs. I air fried our French fries, and sliced up oranges. It was a great way to wrap up our school week!

Saturday morning we ate scrambled cheesy eggs with yogurt, granola, and blueberries.

Impromptu Shopping Trip

Mid-morning we dropped Brayden, Kiya, and Keith at a park for a birthday party. Knowing we needed to pick them up an hour and a half later, we decided to take the youngest four to pick up a few groceries.

Ha, “a few groceries.”

I filled a cart at Costco, because I picked up some staples and then saw that berries were SUPER on sale. Strawberries were just $2.89 for 2 pounds!! Organic raspberries were only $2.29 for 12-ounces. I got four packs of raspberries and 8 packs (two flats) of strawberries. So now we have 16-pounds of strawberries, hahaha. The price and quality was too good to pass up!

We loaded the littles back into the van and headed to Aldi where I grabbed milk, salsa, cottage cheese, and salad kits for a lunch after church the next day. I also bought 6-pounds of grass-fed ground beef, breaking my meat price point. (It costs 4.99/pound.) I decided that I’ll stock up on “regular” ground beef if I find a sale, but when I can afford it, I’ll buy the good stuff. There’s a very big difference in quality for just $1.50/pound difference. We eat less beef overall now, so I can mostly buy meat at this price point and “allow” myself to buy better hamburger meat when I can.

Besides strawberries and raspberries, salad, meat, and milk, we also came home with potatoes, almond butter, avocado mash, olives, peach cups for lunches, chips, sausage, frozen fruit for smoothies, bananas brats, tuna, grapes, pancake mix, hotdogs, tea, and a few other goodies. I’m wondering if this will be our final watermelon of the season?? Sniff.

So far in September, I’ve spent $419. We are very well stocked up on everything we need and I am thankful for the abundance.

For dinner that night we ate leftovers from the fridge before rushing out the door so we wouldn’t miss Art in the Garden, a special feature that day at Sunken Gardens. We got there just as it was ending so we were thankful we could still see what it was like, with all kinds of art booths set up throughout the garden.

When we got home, I had promised the kids we would enjoy a special treat with some of our fresh strawberries. We had been given an angel food cake at the Food Distribution on Tuesday so I cut up strawbrries, whipped some cream, and it was all so delicious after our walk!

Keith wanted to help and took his job of adding strawberries to each plate very seriously.

And that’s a wrap!

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Big Family Food and Fun: August 27-September 2, 2023

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Our Big Family Food and Fun this week included weekend company, a birthday celebration, and a church party…

Big Family Food and Fun: August 27-September 2, 2023

Sunday morning as I was getting the three little girls dressed, they suddenly started to be twirly and dancy and huggy. I started snapping pictures and they started posing and I got so many cute and giggly photos!

Breakfast that morning – before they were dressed so that we didn’t destroy clean outfits – was leftover goodies I’d made last week: Banana Bread and Chewy Granola Bars.

We planned to stay at church for lunch that day, so I packed up grapes, nacho dip/chips, and brownies to share. (I also took a loaf of banana bread I’d made in hopes that our friend who just had a new baby might be there. She was there! New Baby is precious, and I stuck the loaf of bread into her stroller for her to take home and enjoy.)

Lunch that day was a crazy fun Parking Lot Party after church. There were 150+ who stuck around after church to eat, visit, and play.

We’d taken our Shaved Ice Machine and Elias filled cup after cup for everyone at the party. Take a look below at the precious baby in the yellow dress standing by her brother’s leg. She stood there for the longest time, just being with him while he worked. Josie sure does love her brother. :)

That evening we met up with friends at a park. I packed a picnic (cheese, crackers, mandarin oranges, pistachios, and juice) but only got one picture the entire night! We were having too much fun visiting and playing.

Monday morning we ate more of the same (I had made a HUGE batch of the granola bars), plus apples with this special cheese.

Lunch was leftover 3-Cheese Spaghetti. Dinner was a dish I’d made ahead of time here. I dumped it into the crock pot at lunch time, turned it on low, and it was bubbly at dinnertime. We ate it as a chip dip with watermelon.

Tuesday morning Brayden had tests at school so he informed me that he needed “good sleep and a good breakfast.” I made cheese eggs and sausage (while an unnamed toddler was tantruming on the floor – part of her typical morning routine as we try to help her learn to regulate her emotions).

I got out strawberries and Orange Muffins that I had frozen and thawed.

After we walked Brayden and Kiya to school, we came home and did some cleaning. Anna and Josie “helped” by getting a hand broom and dust pan. The effectively spread around everything I’d swept up and made me do the work twice. ;) But I love that they want to help and that they are learning.

Meanwhile, Matt was upstairs using a power sander in one of our third floor suites that we are getting ready to rent out.

Elias and Malachi helped me with the five littlest all morning since Matt was upstairs working. I actually got quite a bit done in the kitchen that morning since the two guys were chasing kids for me. I made these 3-Ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies (multiplying the recipe x6) so that we can eat some now and have cookies in the freezer to use as needed later.

At lunchtime, I cleaned leftovers out of the fridge for all of us to eat. Unfortunately, I left the corn cooking too long and all the water steamed off so the bottoms got blackened. The kids were not impressed. ;)

I had to take BabyBoy#11 to a doctor appointment that afternoon, so before we left I put everything for this recipe into a crock pot (I even managed to plug it in AND turn it on. Go me.)

That evening I plated and bagged all the cookies I had made so now we have four bags of frozen 3-Ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies ready to pull out and use as needed.

Wednesday was a bit of a blur. But for dinner that night I made two griddles full of grilled ham and cheese sandwiches with an air fryer full of French fries. I also made a bowl full of Strawberry Fluff which the kids loved.

After we got the kitchen cleaned up that night, we drove to the zoo and walked around the garden they feature just outside the zoo. We hadn’t had a chance to do that yet so it was extra special to do this just before bedtime.

Thursday morning after we walked Brayden and Kiya to school, we loaded up the youngest five kids and headed to Aldi. Phew, we filled two carts and that was just with children, ha. Somehow we managed to also put food into our carts, getting our Aldi favorites: whole milk yogurt, whole milk cottage cheese, whole milk, three varieties of bagels, hoagie buns, apple juice, pear cups in 100% juice, and three varieties of cheese slices.

I don’t always like to buy produce at Aldi, but they had really good prices that day and the quality looked better than usual. I bought bananas, cantaloupe, watermelon, pears, two varieties of organic apples, grapes, blueberries, and four bags of salad mixes. I also found a 5-pound roast for $1.99/pound so I grabbed it. Chips were on sale for $0.99/bag so I got six bags.

This is what it looks like when the Coppingers “run into Aldi for a few things.”

I ended August with a whopping $1,780 grocery spending total – more than I’ve ever spent that I can remember. I’d feel bad about it except that I don’t – not even a little bit. We went under budget for several months in a row before this month and we had a lot of extra food needs this month. God provides, we make the wisest choices that we can, and we feed a lot of people. Praise God for His provision!

—> This is the grocery budget number I shoot for, but as always, I realize that I may need to make adjustments and increase the number. Stay tuned. <—

It felt so good to have so much fresh fruit on hand again!

I snapped this photo of the third floor room Matt’s been working on all week. Here’s the floor, half-way finished. So gorgeous!

Thursday afternoon our sweet friends, Steven and Barbara, dropped off two lovely loaves of banana bread for us – all sliced and ready to eat!

It was Acacia’s birthday so I put 12 burgers on the grill plus 14 brats.

I made a birthday cake, poking holes into it and pouring pudding into the holes, then topping it with whipped cream. The only thing I made from scratch was the whipped cream. Boxed cake mix and pudding mix for the win this time. :)

She may have turned three, but she’s already mother hen to this baby chick as we try to help him gain strength to sit on his own.

Some of our big kids were able to join us for dinner so I set out a spread of brats and burgers, chips, and fruit.

She figured out how to blow out the candles. :)

Keith was so excited to hand Acacia her gift – a little purse I’d found on clearance for $3.00. She loved it and has been carrying it around everywhere!

Friday morning we enjoyed Ms. Barbara’s banana bread with yogurt and blueberries.

After we got the kids off to school, Matt and Elias headed to York to work and Malachi helped me take the kids to Costco. I didn’t need to shop, I just needed customer service as I had noticed that the last time I was there they rang up four cases of diapers when, in fact, I had only purchased three. Since it was a $45 discrepancy, I felt it was worth getting credit back. Thus, going to Costco became our morning outing. :)

The boys started to get restless so Malachi walked around with Keith and BabyBoy#11 while I got the bill figured out with Customer Service.

Then we had a special treat of Costco Pizza. It was mostly a mess (like, a 12-15 wet wipes to clean up the pizza sauce mess). But it was fun for everyone and $6 took care of that day’s lunch!

As we were loading everyone back into the cart to head out to the van, Little-Mama-Acacia started to rub BabyBoy#11’s back. Goodness, the sweetness.

That night Malachi threw Sam’s Orange Chicken into the air fryer, and I got out cold watermelon and two bags of salad mix from Aldi. It was easy and hit the spot!

When Matt and Elias arrived back at home, they had our former foster son, age 4, with them to spend the weekend. Everyone was overjoyed to be back together!

The kids played and played outside that evening. I thought they might need a little something to eat to fill their bellies before bed, so I took grapes and cheese outside. They all thought that was a good plan. :)

Some dear friends arrived Friday night to visit for the weekend! For breakfast on Saturday, I set out banana bread and muffins, yogurt, blueberries, bananas, and made sausage and tator tots. Brayden had requested hashbrowns but I was out so we decided that tator tots were the same thing. ;)

The kids asked to play cards that morning, and this was the result. Ugh.

We packed up a big picnic for lunch and headed out to the Splash Park for one last hoorah before it closed for the season.

I wasn’t sure I had enough lunch meat left in my packages, so I threw together a container of tuna salad real quickly.

I smoked two pork loin for dinner that evening and served them with green beans, watermelon, buttered and toasted hoagies leftover from lunch, and Cream Cheese Corn. Meals like these are my favorite!!

After dinner, we took our friends on a walk to our beloved Sunken Gardens. Aww, there’s our Kellie with her baby boy. We became friends with Kellie and Ben while they were students at YU. They spent a lot of time at our house during those days and became a part of our family. Now here they are with a baby of their own. It was amazing to have a weekend with them!

Here we are in September, heading from summer into fall. We’re going to soak up every last bit of nice weather while it’s here!

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3 Big Fat Costco Essentials

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During one of my last grocery shopping trips, I realized that I rely on 3 big fat Costco essentials. I can’t ever run out of these!

Indeed, I’m talking about actual fat. Healthy fats that cost less at Costco and are essentials at my house.

My 3 Big Fat Costco Essentials

Here they are, in no particular order. Ah, phooey. Who am I kidding? Of course they are in order. Butter is my favorite, hands down.

1. Butter

Now that we have such a large household, I find that we go through butter very quickly. We bake with it often and spread it on all of our muffins and breads.

Costco butter comes in a 4-pound-pack and currently costs just $2.87/pound. I haven’t found it for this low anywhere else I’ve shopped. I usually buy two 4-packs each time I shop (once or twice each month) so that I always have a couple pounds in my fridge and extras to grab from my freezer.

What do I make with butter?

Well, how long do you have?! These are some of our very favorites:

  1. Homemade Graham Crackers
  2. Sweet and Simple Butter Cookies
  3. Garlic Butter Shrimp
  4. Stick-of-Butter Rice is incredible and worth a huge mention (though I have recently admitted that I sometimes skip the butter in this recipe in an effort to save money, ha)
  5. Easy {Low} Sugar Cookies
  6. Low Sugar Lemon Melt-Away Cookies
  7. Low Sugar Almond Melt-Away Cookies
  8. Low Sugar Orange Melt-Away Cookies
  9. Low Sugar Lime Melt-Away Cookies
  10. Easy Butterscotch Bars
  11. And then slather butter over any of these muffins and bread recipes

2. Coconut Oil

Coconut oil has been a staple at our house since I discovered its wonderful health benefits in 2005. We use it on our skin and in our recipes.

I love this 2.48 L tub from Costco for just $14.89. What an inexpensive way to get a lot of healthy fat into our diet!

What do I make with Coconut Oil?

These recipes are such good treats and made with this wonderful, healthy fat.

  1. Pumpkin Breakfast Cake
  2. Carrot Cake
  3. Easy Applesauce Cake
  4. Blueberry Shortcake with Cream Topping
  5. Chocolate Chocolate Chip Muffins
  6. Dark Chocolate Almond Granola
  7. Granola ~ 5-Minute Stop-Top Version
  8. Lemon Bread
  9. Whole Wheat Waffles
  10. Dark Chocolate Almond Granola
  11. Coconut Flour Muffins
  12. Coconut Fudge Bars
  13. Chewy Granola Bars
  14. Low Sugar Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake
  15. Low Sugar Carrot Cake
  16. Low Sugar Super Moist Chocolate Cake
  17. No Bake Cookie Cups 
  18. Fat Bombs
  19. Honey Sweetened No-Bake Cookies
  20. Just about all 40 of these awesome Muffin Recipes

3. Olive Oil

I use olive oil for cooking more than I do for baking, and this Organic Kirkland Olive Oil from Costco is my favorite. It is only $14.79 for a 2 Liter bottle and it lasts a long time, even at my house!

What do I make with Olive Oil?

Here are some of our olive oil favorites:

  1. Cake in a Crock Pot (you can hide spinach in this!)
  2. Seasoned Potato Wedges
  3. Bacon Chicken Pasta
  4. Easy Veggie Stir-Fry
  5. Homemade Pita Bread
  6. Roasted Asparagus
  7. BLT Chopped Salad
  8. Simple Three Cheese Spaghetti
  9. Crock Pot Shredded Ranch Chicken
  10. Simple Cheesy Baked Chicken
  11. Homemade Italian Salad Dressing

Extra Fats

Beyond these healthy cooking and baking fats, we love full fat sour cream, cottage cheese, whole milk, 4% milk fat yogurt, meat, avocados, nuts, nut butters, and cheese.

What are your favorite healthy fats?

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That Time I Didn’t Buy Any Produce at Costco

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What?? I didn’t buy any produce at Costco? How did that happen?

I guess I didn’t need any that day. This is bizarre because I have a terrible time keeping up with fresh produce at our house. We eat fresh greens like crazy (well, we drink them, actually) and we go through fresh veggies and fruit by the ton.

Bananas, berries, grapes, apples, pears, carrots, cucumbers, peppers, salad mixes, spinach, spring mix, kiwi, melon, broccoli, potatoes, oranges  – I always get so much produce that I could almost fill an entire Costco cart with produce every time I go. But then there was…

That Time I Didn’t Buy Any Produce at Costco

Last week, I went into Costco, loaded an orange flat cart with items, and not one of those items was from the fresh produce section. Did I just get a couple of items that day? HAHAHA. No, I wish. My cart looked like this, and I got what I went in for and then some.

I mainly went in for cases of diapers, toilet paper, and other non-food items. But then I kept finding food staples on sale because so much is discounted right now during Back-to-School season. Knowing that I didn’t need most of those items now, but that I could buy them at a discount and freeze them for later – I kept piling up more onto my cart.

Did this make me go over my grocery budget this month? Oh yes it did. But will it save me in the long run? Absolutely it will. Plus, it feels really good to be so stocked up right now. This frees me to focus more on helping our kids as they transition into our new school routine. (Our kids’ past trauma makes every transition more intense. Gimme that frozen pizza.)

So hooray. I’m all stocked up!

Except for the produce.

I already had a lot of fresh produce at our house at the time of this particular shopping trip, so I didn’t think twice. Until two days later when – well of course. We’ve eaten up almost all of our fresh produce. (We do have a beautiful abundance of wonderful tomatoes and squash from friends’ and neighbors’ gardens!)

Looks like I’ll be heading back soon, making my August grocery bill even larger. As of today, I’ve hit a whopping $1553 for the month. (This is the grocery budget we shoot for with 11 people at our house.) I’ve gone way over, but there are other months I’ve been under, so it all evens out. Also? We need to eat. I have to buy food. And I strive to be wise with every purchase. :)

Stay tuned for our final August budget number – and to see what my next cart full of produce looks like!

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Big Family Food and Fun: August 20-26, 2023

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Our big family food and fun this week revolved around our new school routine and extremely hot temperatures.

First, let’s all be blessed to see these two amazing brothers in the matching outfits I found on clearance at Sam’s. Sweet score!

And now onto the food and fun!

Big Family Food and Fun: August 20-26, 2023

Now, if you recall, last week I forgot to plug in the crockpot when I made dinner to leave for Asa, Eva, Elias, and Malachi to feed all the littles when Matt and I went out for our anniversary. So this week, while making a big Sunday Lunch for guests, I was very intentional about plugging in not one but three crock pots. There, my job is done. Lunch will be perfect. I sent this picture to Eva to show that I’d learned from my mistake.

But alas, when we arrived home from church to finish lunch prep, there sat my smallest crock pot. It had been plugged in. But had its owner turned it on? No she had not.

Well shucks. Can’t win ’em all I guess. Lunch that day was a big Nacho Bar, and the cold crock pot was fully cooked taco meat that was supposed to be warm by the time we got home. Nothing a skillet can’t fix in five minutes, right?!

I forgot to take pictures of our fully set out Nacho Bar with it’s chicken, beef, cheese, tomatoes, cilantro, salsa, sour cream, spinach, and chips. It was a tasty lunch! And here’s a picture of the mess after lunch.

Humidity and temps were high that day (and all week) so dinner that night was leftover burgers from last week, rewarmed on the stove plus bowls of cottage cheese with pineapple.

We ate outside, not because the weather was pleasant, but because the kids were all wet. Matt had set up our little pools and a sprinkler for them. We let them all just get wet in their clothes instead of changing to swimsuits. My laundry pile is big enough as it is. :)

Monday morning I made a griddle full of Eggs in a Nest. These are a favorite of our kids! Except for this particular day, two of my kids declared that they didn’t like them. Ugh. I guess these don’t taste good on Mondays?? (Meanwhile, Kiya ate three of them. No one can predict who will eat what.)

I made Beanie Weanies and packed it in Brayden and Kiya’s thermoses for lunch. I left the remainder of the mixture in the pan to rewarm for the four littles at home for lunch.

For dinner that night, I made simple quesadillas with leftover chicken, cheese, and spinach.

We ate them with grapes and we ate in shifts. Everyone was hot and tired after a big, hot day at school. I finished making the quesadillas but then I needed to feed the baby so I just threw food out on the table and let everyone come eat as they realized it was ready. :)

After everyone ate, Matt got the sprinkler set up again so everyone could cool down.

After they played for a while, I brought out some Go-gurts I had frozen. Now, not only were the kids wet and covered in dirt and grass, they were also sticky. Meh, no biggie. We hosed them all down before heading in for the night. :)

Tuesday morning, we ate yogurt and granola before school. After we delivered Brayden and Kiya to the school door, Matt and I walked back with the five littlest and made a plan to find some kind of air conditioned play place so that we could get the kids out of the house. It was 106 degrees that day, but we were going stir crazy. I packed a snack of animal crackers, cheese sticks, and grapes and we loaded up and headed out.

We checked out a fun play place at a church north of town. It’s open to the public all day long. Very cool!

The kids loved running around and playing! Then we sat them down to “snack” on what sort of become their lunch. (Keith and Anna’s bus picks them up for preschool a little after noon, so we feed them early.)

Once we were home and got Keith and Anna sent off to school, Acacia, Josie, and BabyBoy#11 played in the living room while Matt and I dug into the fridge for leftovers for our own lunch. We’ve been given lots of lovely fresh garden produce from church friends and neighbors, and the tomatoes right now are amazing! I warmed up a leftover burger from last week and cut it up with a fresh tomato. Of course we also had our smoothies. ;)

The thought of cooking was not pleasant since it was 106 that day, so I made Chicken Salad Sandwiches with spinach. I cut up a cold watermelon and that was a very refreshing side dish!

After we ate, we took the kids for a surprise treat. We needed another indoor, air-conditioned outing so we found a McDonald’s with an actual Play Place (remember how we tried this before and got let down?!).

We especially loved the cool interactive light table!

Matt downloaded the McD’s app to see what deals we could get. He paid for two cups of ice cream to share and got a free large fry. The kids LOVED this! This amount was perfect for our littles to share, and I think he spent about $5 for everything. And phew, we made it through another hot night with the kids.

Wednesday morning I made eggs, sausage, and toasted buttered bagels for breakfast. Matt headed to York to work on our properties and Elias became my side-kick for the day.

We got Brayden and Kiya to school. Then while Elias stayed in the house with BabyBoy#11, I (bravely or ridiculously?!) took all four of the others outside to “help” me wash our van. It needed a good scrub and getting wet on this super hot day sounded like a good idea.

Keith (age 4) was put in charge of the hose. The girls got washrags to help me scrub. It actually all went quite well for about half and hour. We were all drenched (thank you, Keith) and the van wasn’t perfect but looked better than it did. So we decided it was a win.

We hosed everyone off, changed into dry clothes, drank lots of water, and ate leftover quesadillas cold out of the fridge. Then we put on shoes and went to the library to play with their learning toys. Why did we do this? Air. Conditioning. Plus toys that are different from the toys at our house.

BabyBoy#11 isn’t yet sitting up but this was a good spot to practice.

Three out of five kids melted down before we got all the toys picked up at the library. “Librarian Diane” was absolutely beautiful in how she came and helped. She magically got all three little girls on board to help her pick up blocks while Elias and I dealt unsuccessfully with Keith who was beyond tired. We made it home and tucked all five in for naps. (Preschool was canceled because of the extreme heat. Good timing as these kids needed make-up naps after their big transition into school.)

Dinner that night was straight from the freezer because Mama was tired. I threw nuggets and fries into the air fryer and made a blender full of these smoothies so the kids could drink some spinach with their processed food. ;)

For breakfast Thursday morning, I made this recipe for Chewy Granola Bars x5. These were a huge hit (though we had to eat them in bowls with spoons because I didn’t make them in time to refrigerate/harden them).

Later in the day, after the bars had been in the fridge for several hours, I cut and transferred them to a Pyrex dish for easy-to-grab breakfasts and snacks.

We spent a good part of our morning with one of our Early Development specialists. Our littlest kids, ages 0-3, are serviced by this team for early intervention so that we can get ahead of some of their extra needs. This has been such a gift for our family. Today Keith, Anna, Acacia, and Josie all hovered around the specialist, Bridgette, who had captured their attention with a game. I snuck this picture of them all because they were all being so sweet and fun!

Right after this meeting ended, I had to run off to the elementary school for yet another meeting for another of our kids. As much as we loved our homeschooling years and are prayerfully open to homeschooling again if God leads us to do it, we are so very thankful for all of the necessary resources that the public schools offer for our family to meet our needs right now. We were so cared for in York and we are now being very well cared for in Lincoln.

I got home in time for lunch, frying leftover baked potatoes and serving it with Sunday’s leftover nacho dip and taco meat. I also got out grapes for the kids to squish all over everything eat to their hearts’ content.

The kids are all home from school by 4:00 or a little after, and we sit at the table to get homework done right away so we can get it over with. :/

I’ve found that everyone is super hungry by 4:30 and snacks aren’t going to cut it. So at this point, I’m making very early dinners and then giving everyone a small snack around 6:30 before we start getting ready for bed.

That night I had planned to make a simple meal of this 3-Cheese Spaghetti. But while looking in my freezer for parmesan cheese to go with the recipe, I came across a package of shrimp. Ah, that would be good with the noodles! So I turned the 3-Cheese Spaghetti over to Elias and I made Garlic Butter Shrimp, which was a pretty exciting addition to our meal! I grabbed out bacon crumbles for people to stir into their cheesy spaghetti if they preferred that instead of shrimp, plus made buttered peas and got out watermelon.

Dinner was over by 5:00, haha, so while I worked on dishes, I sent Brayden out to set up the sprinkler for everyone. Today was supposed to be the last of the 106 degree weather, and we knew water was the only way to make it through.

I had corn on the cob in the fridge that we’d bought over the weekend at the farmer’s market and I was concerned that it would go bad if we didn’t get it prepped to eat soon. So after they’d played in the water for a while and cooled off, I took the corn out and had everyone help me get it shucked.

Not understanding that the corn needed to be cooked, Josie and Acacia got excited and helped themselves. ;)

The kids went back to their water play, a neighbor stopped by for a visit, and I somehow managed to give Brayden a much-needed hair cut before we headed in for the night.

Friday morning we had cereal and some of the  Chewy Granola Bars I had made the day before. Brayden had to be at school early because he gets to take part in a Ukulele Ensemble – so fun! Lunch was PB&J, which I always forget to add to our menu and always wonder why I don’t make them more often. But then again, the girls get super messy when eating them so…

Dinner was extra fun because some dear friends came and joined us for the evening. We made the corn on the cob plus a big pot of Stir Fry. (We’ve been so blessed with friends sharing their garden produce with us!)

We’d picked up a cantaloupe at the Farmer’s Market and it was extra sweet.

Breakfast on Saturday morning was French Toast made like this – always a hit!

The temps had finally cooled down, so I took advantage by doing some much-needed (or much-wanted, ha) baking. I thawed all the bananas I’d stashed in our freezer and made this Banana Bread/Muffin recipe x4. I also baked a quadruple batch of these Brownies to share at a church fellowship lunch.

We had big plans for an outing that morning, but the plans got derailed by some immediate issues Matt needed to work on at our Castle. It’s such a fabulous place, but it is a historic home, so the age of the house brings with it some issues. Good thing Matt’s so handy!

The change of plans did not set well with our kids, so while Matt was dealing with house issues, I was dealing with behavior issues. Blech. I’m so thankful for God’s provision for us. I have to rely on Him constantly.

Three hours of exhaustion later, and an hour later than planned, we were able to load up and get out the door. Matt and I were both a bit frazzled, but the outing needed to happen so that the kids had a change of scenery. We went to a super cool “Wordstock” literacy event at a park – everything revolved around reading and books.

There were games on the lawn, and of course, everyone got to take home a new book.

They also all got a balloon. Somehow we managed to get all the balloons home without one blowing away or popping?!?!

I had cooked – wait – I had burned some hotdogs in a big pot before we left (who burns hotdogs??). It sort of worked to hide the black parts by putting them burnt-side down. ;)

We ate them at the park after enjoying Wordstock.

Naptime/Rest time was a welcome event for the parents after a morning with extra needs. :) That afternoon, Matt and I worked together to finish that morning’s house issue project while the kids rested and napped.

Oh, but were they napping??? Or were they just dangerously quiet?

Ah, the face of “innocence.”

I used a pizza kit I had picked up at Costco, along with some sausage I had browned to make pizza that night.

I had browned three pounds of sausage, because why just cook what you need for one meal when you can dirty the same amount of dishes and get extra food cooked for the future?

We bathed the three little girls (Anna’s marker turned the water blue), jammied them up, then took a walk to the Sunken Gardens before bedtime.

We got everyone to bed (after making sure all the markers and pens were properly hidden from toddlers and preschoolers). What a week! God is good and faithful. Hope your week was a good one!

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Big Family Food and Fun: August 13-19, 2023

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The kids headed back to school this week so our Big Family Food and Fun needed to be extra nourishing (and easy) as we settled into a new routine. Here’s what we ate all week…

Big Family Food and Fun August 13-19, 2023

Sunday was our anniversary so Matt and I worked it out with Asa, Eva, Elias, and Malachi to stay with all the kids so that we could have a few hours to ourselves. It had been way too long since we’d been able to go out on a date!

Before we headed out, we warmed up leftovers for all of us to eat for lunch after church.

Then I threw two big packs of hotdogs into the crock pot to heat up during the afternoon so that all anyone would have to do at dinner time was to fix plates. This was a GREAT IDEA except that apparently I was a bit too eager to head out the door and forgot one very important step.

Elias sent me this photo when they discovered an unplugged crock pot at dinner time. Ooooooops. Sorry guys.

It was just hotdogs, so they just transferred them to a pot to heat them and dinner was saved.

Meanwhile, Matt and I had discovered a really cool park and had spent a few hours walking its trails and having actual uninterrupted conversations – woot! We decided we MUST bring the family back to this park because it was perfect for all ages (playground, disc golf, biking trails, basketball, and on and on!)

At dinnertime, Matt wasn’t super hungry – and I was hungry but can’t eat a large portion – so we split a burger and fries at Five Guys. Happy Anniversary to us!

Monday morning was Brayden and Kiya’s first day of school so I made them scrambled eggs with spinach to get them off to a good start.

Here’s to fourth grade and second grade!

That morning after dropping off those two, while wrangling the littlest five, we met for two hours with teams of preschool classroom teachers, special ed teachers, and educational specialists working through IEPs our two of our kids. It was long and intense, but necessary.

Afterward, I made five boxes of mac and cheese so that we could enjoy it for lunch and then have leftovers to pack in school lunches. Remember my trick? I stir the littlest kids’ mac and cheese into bowls of frozen peas so that it cools off their noodles and gives them an automatic veggie too.

Brayden and Kiya had an early-out that day so after hearing all about their first day of school we laid them down for an hour of rest time in an effort to keep them from becoming overtired as they transitioned to a new school routine.

That evening we met up with Asa/Eva and Justus/Kelsey at the park that Matt and I had discovered the day before. I baked two bags of chicken strips before heading out and packed up a variety of dips to enjoy with them. I also packed several bags of salad that we made at the park like this. I LOVE this trick.

And I packed buns, clementines, strawberries, a variety of drinks, and Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars.

This ended up being such a fun meal!!! Some of us ate chicken with dips like regular chicken strips. Some of us used the buns to make chicken sandwiches. Some of us chopped the chicken into our salad. Everyone had fun making their plate in whatever way sounded good. If you haven’t tried this make-a-salad-at-a-picnic trick, do it. It’s effortless and fun!

It’s almost impossible to get everyone in one picture but here’s 11 of our 15. :)

The best part of the evening was that we were able to let our 3, 4, 7, and 9 year-olds ride their bikes on one of the trails that was a simple loop around the playground. THEY LOVED THIS SO MUCH and their smiles were huge the entire time. Meanwhile, we put the littlest three babes into the strollers for a walk on the trails. The weather was perfect and the night was magical. We praise God for moments like these.

For breakfast Tuesday morning I made a big pot of Warm Vanilla Soother. I hadn’t made this since last winter so it was a fun treat for the kids and filled their bellies well before school.

I threw some ham into a skillet to warm up to go with it.

Meanwhile, since we didn’t have to leave for school until a little after 8:30, I mixed up these “Hidden Spinach” Cupcakes to bake while the kids ate.

Then I blended up these smoothies for Matt and me. (I do this every other day forever and ever amen, but I don’t always take pictures to show you because I don’t want to bore you with my boring smoothie of boredom. I do actually think it tastes good and it helps keep us healthy so…) :)

Matt and Elias headed to York to work on our properties that day so Malachi and I loaded the kids into strollers and walked the kids to school.

Everyone was happy to play outside for a while when we got home.

Then we set out bananas and a random selection of muffins and breads leftover from last week for them to enjoy for a breakfast picnic in our backyard.

Midway through the morning the kids were “all starting to eat each other” which is my way of saying that everyone was getting grumpy and no one was having fun anymore. This happens every day around 10:30am. So we gathered picnic food, loaded everyone up, and headed to a park nearby to play in the sand.

Keith made “the biggest pile ever” in the sand with his excavator.

Malachi pushed his sisters (<— a precious phrase I’m still not used to) on the swings and I hung out with BabyBoy#11.

We made our way to a picnic table, and of course, by the time we got all five kids over there, Keith and Anna had to go pee. And of course, the bathrooms were all the way on the other side of the park, ha. Malachi started handing out lunch while I took kids to go potty. (Dare I mention that the reason Anna is wearing a jacket in the heat is because when we got to the park and took her jacket off so she could play, we realized she’d never put a shirt on that morning. Oy. This is better than the time we were at the zoo play-place and realized she had failed to put on undies. Good grief.)

Anyhoo, lunch was leftover hotdogs I’d warmed up before we left plus applesauce pouches, yogurt, juice, and a spinach cupcake from the batch I’d baked that morning.

For dinner that night I mixed up a big bowl of Tuna Salad for sandwiches. I had found fresh pineapple on sale, and I knew Brayden would be so excited about it! I finally managed to get them cut up that night. :)

I put fruit in bowls for the kids then took a tray of sandwiches outside for them to eat while they played. (We were watching for Daddy and Elias to get home after working in York all day.)

Since it had just been Malachi and me at home all day with the kids, I got very behind on everything. Here’s what the kitchen looked like at bedtime, and I was too tired to do anything about it.

I did take the time to baggie up the Cupcakes I’d made earlier so that I could freeze them for school lunches. Then I went to bed. :)

I woke up refreshed on Wednesday and made Eggs in a Nest for the kids (in my dirty kitchen).

We got the big kids off to school then Matt and I loaded the littlest five into the van to meet Mandy, someone from our Heavenly Homemakers community. She was kind enough to hand down some baby items we needed for BabyBoy#11. It was great to meet you, Mandy and we appreciate your gifts so much!

Since we were on the north side of town, we headed to Menards to get some things Matt needed for our house. Three kids in one cart, two kids in another, here we go…

Ah, but wait. We got inside and found these amazing carts. PERFECTION!!! We unloaded and reloaded kids into these —>

Menards wins the prize for having these for the kids!

After Menards, we loaded back up and headed to Sam’s. Matt stayed in the van and handed out snacks to the kids while I hurried through the store to get what we needed. Total grocery spending so far in August: $1150. Yep, I’ll be going over budget this month. No worries. We need to eat and we’ve shared food with lots of guests. Plus I went under budget for several months in a row before we moved so I guess I’m just making up for it now. :)

Lunch was leftovers that day. Then I finally had a few minutes to get some dishes done!!!

After lunch, I loaded up a couple of the kids for a doctor appointment while Matt put the littlest kids down for a nap. Once I got home, I made an early dinner of burgers on our smoker. We ate then headed to the zoo to ride the train.

It was a lovely evening and someone was sweet enough to take a picture of all of us on the train car.

We met back up with Daddy and BabyBoy#11 then headed to see the birds in the Aviary. It’s not always open so it was a treat to be able to walk through! Then we found some benches to sit and eat bags of popcorn Matt had made for everyone along with cold juice pouches I’d packed. We headed home in time to get to bed for the night!

The next morning I warmed up the Hashbrown and Egg Nests I had made last week and frozen for an easy breakfast. We ate them with yogurt and granola.

As always, I was feeling like I needed to get ahead on food in some way and I had in mind to bake muffins. But it got hot early in the day so I made two no-bake breakfast/snack foods instead. BabyBoy#11 was napping and Matt had the four other littlest outside so I was able to make Peanut Butter Honey Rice Krispie Bars and No-Bake Cookie Cups. <—They turned out weird because of all things, I ran out of coconut oil. But they were still good.

Again, trying to get ahead so that I’m not constantly scrambling, while the kids ate an early lunch I worked on dinner prep. Keith saw me peeling carrots and wanted a turn. I couldn’t turn him down. (So much for using his carrot for dinner though. He finished peeling it then promptly ate the entire thing.) :)

We threw all the kids into the tub to get cleaned up for Keith and Anna’s first day of pre-school!

And then there were only three babies at home for the rest of the afternoon, whoa!!!!

Before their naps, I got dinner finished up so that I could try to work all afternoon. I smoked chicken legs and put them into a crock pot to stay warm. I also washed potatoes and put them into the crock pot for Mashed Potatoes. I baked a big pan of brownies for a special treat to celebrate everyone’s big day (Keith and Anna’s first day; Brayden and Kiya’s first full day of school). When the babies went down for a nap, I got myself a cup of coffee and a brownie and enjoyed the bit of silence. :)

When Brayden and Kiya got home, we sat at the table to do their homework and watch for Keith and Anna’s bus. They hopped off the bus with excitement. Then Anna, who is used to an afternoon nap, decided that she had held herself up as long as she possibly could. Thank you and goodnight.

I’m so glad I planned the evening the way I had. Dinner was almost ready from earlier prep, and kids were tired and hungry. I had stir-fried the already-prepped veggies and mashed the potatoes that were in the crock pot. We enjoyed a fantastic meal with brownies and ice cream to top it off before heading in for an early bedtime.

Is it Friday yet?

Friday morning for breakfast we enjoyed the Peanut Butter Honey Rice Krispie Bars and No-Bake Cookie Cups I had made the day before. Lunch was leftovers again before sending Keith and Anna onto the bus for Day 2 of Pre-School. We had big plans to do nothing that night after our full week of transitioning back into a school routine. This included “take advantage of the 50% off pizza deal” plus “use the rest of the gift card” we’d been given so just like that, I had the night off. :)

Strangely enough, knowing that I didn’t have to worry about dinner prep made me want to take advantage of the extra time I’d just been given. With school starting and needing to keep up with several new schedules, getting ahead a little bit sounded marvelous to me.

So I took advantage of the night off from cooking to do a little bit of cooking. (It all made sense to me, and now I feel better.)

I made a batch of these Orange Muffins (I left out the poppyseeds because while they are fun, what exactly is their purpose??)

I thawed some cooked meat our friend Phyllis had gifted us with when she came to visit last week and used it to make some meals for next week. It was SO NICE to simply stir the prepped meat into casseroles! I made an extra large Pork and Hashbrown Casserole to bake for an upcoming Sunday Lunch. (I used this recipe, subbing cooked pork for the ham.)

I then stirred some of the cooked chicken she gave us into a container with black beans, corn, Rotel, cheese, and sour cream. I’ll bake this and we’ll enjoy it as a chip dip!

It felt so good to have these extra dishes completed and put into the fridge or freezer for upcoming meals! Then Elias arrived home with our pizzas. The kids (and their parents) were so excited about this treat! We grabbed paper plates and enjoyed our pizza outside in the shade.

Then Matt set up a movie in the living room so everyone could have fun but REST in the evening after our full week. Notice how well the toddlers “rest” while watching a movie…

Meanwhile, I took advantage of everyone being in the living room with Daddy (even BabyBoy#11 was hanging out and playing on his mat for a good long while) and I got to the bottom of some laundry baskets!! Woot! This is a very big deal and it rarely happens.

Saturday morning, we relaxed and ate “whatever the kids wanted” which was their choice of Peanut Butter Honey Rice Krispie Bars, No-Bake Cookie Cups, and Orange Muffins (<— I’d frozen half of what I’d baked for another time). Plus they chose a fruit to go with their breakfast – bananas and blueberries.

We did some cleaning that morning – Brayden and Kiya are getting pretty good at sweeping effectively. And the dining room needed a sweep and a mop very badly! Mid-morning, we loaded up and went to the Farmer’s Market to walk around. We got some sweet corn and a cantaloupe, but that’s all because the heat was making the kids grumpy. We stopped to feed BabyBoy#11 and Matt handed out animal crackers to the preschoolers and toddlers before we headed back to our van.

Brayden, Kiya, and Keith found some benches to play on while the baby ate. They can start a game of make-believe on the spot!

By the time we got home it was already super hot, so I made these smoothies to cool everyone off and to load them up with spinach. :) Everyone guzzled their smoothie down and some even asked for seconds. It was a perfect choice for this hot day.

Meanwhile I warmed up some shredded pork Phyllis had provided (some of the meat I referred to earlier in this post), poured barbecue sauce on top, then turned them into Barbecue Pork Melts in our air fryer. So delicious!

After naps and rest time, that evening we loaded up and went to cool off at our favorite Splash Park. I packed a cold dinner for us to eat there between splashes. We ate crackers, cheese, turkey and ham roll-ups, a bag of picnic salad, applesauce, and juice.

It was miserably hot that evening and all of the available picnic tables were in direct sun, so no one ate much. The cold water of the splash pads was a big hit though, so for the kids’ sake we were glad we’d made the trek out there.

We made our way home and got all the kids through a shower before bedtime. This upcoming week is supposed to be very hot so Matt and I are going to have to get creative in keeping everyone busy without letting us all melt. Stay tuned!

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Big Family Food and Fun: August 6-12, 2023

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It was our last week before school starts and we made the most of it!

It all began last Sunday

Getting everyone off to church (or anywhere) is quite a production. But the there’s this sweetness as we were brushing hair and putting on dresses…

We are so blessed to begin each week by hosting whoever God brings to our home for Sunday lunch. Now that we are more settled after our move, we are able to prepare a big meal and fill the house. There were 26 of us this particular Sunday. Our kitchen was full, our dining room spilled over into our living room, and I felt so cared for by God that He would give us this gift.

Big Family Food and Fun

I had made brunch foods for this Sunday Lunch: This Egg Casserole (multiplied to include 36 eggs and 3-pounds of sausage), Chocolate Chip Cheesecake Muffins, Raspberry Oatmeal Bars (made with blueberry jelly instead because that’s what I had in the fridge), strawberries, grapes, and raw veggies.

Remember how I said that I’ve decided to save money by skipping the butter in my Stick of Butter Rice?? (<— it tastes the same with or without it, so…) Well, look how much butter it takes to make this small pan of Raspberry Oatmeal Bars. Hahaha, I will never skimp on the butter in this one, and it’s WORTH IT. These are incredible. Because of the butter. :)

So many dear friends joined us for our Sunday meal, and our friend Cindy brought her delicious Mac and Cheese and Cowboy Caviar (similar to this recipe) with chips to share with everyone.

 

 

We rested in the afternoon after our guests left, and for dinner that evening I made this Creamy Mac and Cheese. Then I warmed up leftover taco meat and opened a can of tuna. What??? Ah, but I had a method to my madness. Whoever wanted to add tuna to their mac and cheese turned their meal into Tuna Casserole. But whoever added taco meat to their mac and cheese turned their meal into Cheeseburger Mac. We ate this with buttered peas and watermelon.

That night the weather was beautiful so we headed out for a walk. We heard live music nearby so we decided to follow our ears to see where they took us!

How fun! There was a church nearby who was hosting a free event for the community. There was live music, a lady making balloon creations for the kids, and Kona Ice. We enjoyed the music and had fun with our balloon creations.

Monday morning I had to take two of our girls to an appointment so I threw bananas, yogurt tubes, and leftover bars onto the table for breakfast.

Late morning Elias made three frozen Costco pizzas and we loaded all the kids into the van to eat at the zoo. (Matt had gone to York for the day.)

We enjoyed our pizza along with peach cups and juice, then we let the kids play in a big play area next to the spider monkeys before heading home for naps.

That night we joined two of our neighbor families for a super fun meal of hotdogs and smores.

Ah, and water balloons!!

We are so very thankful that God provided us with such a wonderful neighborhood full of wonderful people to do life with. We all need this.

In York on Monday, Matt got 10 dozen eggs from our neighbors. It feels good to be stocked up again!

Tuesday morning I mixed up a double recipe of Bran Muffins. Plus I made a double batch of Applesauce Bread and “baked” them in my crock pots. It sort of worked. The outside became a bit overdone while we waited for the middle to finish baking. Then it fell apart as I was taking it out of the crocks. But it still tasted good!

I packed crumbly pieces into a container to take to the zoo for another picnic.

Malachi hadn’t been to the zoo with us yet since so much of the summer he had been away for work and camps. So we were all excited to show him all we’d discovered all summer. We decided that our extra zoo fun for today would be to feed the giraffes.

On our way to have lunch with the flamingos (we love flamingos, plus there’s a perfect picnic table right by them!), we stopped to show Malachi the penguins.

It was well past lunchtime by then and Acacia decided she couldn’t wait. Before I realized it, she had pulled out the Apple Bread – and spilled all of it onto the cement. Then of course all the little girls rushed over to eat off the ground. Yuck. I hated to waste it but we scooped it up into the trash and decided to make our way to the table to actually feed everyone finally.

Lunch that day was crackers with cheese, turkey, and ham plus applesauce or peach cups, dried blueberries, and juice. But no apple bread, ha.

For dinner that night, a new friend joined us and we ate Costco’s tortelloni with sauce and steamed broccoli.

Wednesday morning we ate more of the Bran Muffins, which I cut in half, buttered, and warmed in the air fryer. They are so good this way!

For lunch I made Hashbrown and Egg Nests with ham included. These went over very well!! I made extras on purpose so we could warm them up for quick breakfasts next week before school.

Matt was in York again that day, so Malachi went with me to the mall so the kids could run off some energy in the play area there before naptime.

Justus and Kelsey joined us for dinner that night. I smoked two pork loin, warmed up leftover green beans and broccoli, stir fried some squash and zucchini, and made several boxes of mac and cheese.

I had also baked a cake that afternoon – and of course I had snuck in a bunch of spinach. This was a fun treat for dessert!

Our dear friend Phyllis came to visit us Thursday morning. We showed her around the Castle, took her on a walk to show her the Sunken Gardens, then came home and made grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch.

The way she pours love into our kid is priceless.

By the way, being able to make make grilled cheese or pancakes on this amazing griddle built into our stove is sooooo nice! Also, I used Havarti cheese slices from Costco. WOW. That cheese is a game changer for sandwiches.

Meanwhile, would you believe? Our friend Barbara had read in an email I sent out earlier in the week about our Great Apple Bread Spill at the zoo. She secretly made us a large loaf to replace what we lost and her hubby dropped it off that morning while we were gone. What precious friends. I told our kids: remember this, guys. We can offer special gifts of love to others too. :) :) :)

After we got the kids down for naps and rest time, I ran out the door to get groceries and a few last minute needed school clothes items. I got a lot of produce at Costco (plus jeans for the kids that I found marked down!).

Then I went to Aldi to get yogurt, milk, buns, and rolls.

When I got home, we worked together to unload groceries (which sounds much sweeter than it actually was – after I’ve been gone the kids usually go a little crazy when I get back, oy). Matt had baked frozen pizzas and I made smoothies to go with it so we could have a quick dinner (which sounds much sweeter than it was because the little girls spilled their smoothies and turned dinner into a huge mess, oy).

We cleaned up and rushed out the door for a Walk to School Night so the kids could meet their teachers and see their classrooms. It had been an extra crazy hour of putting away groceries and feeding everyone (and cleaning up smoothie spills) so we were VERY happy that right before we left, Kelsey texted to see if we wanted her help getting to the school that night. YES PLEASE.

Getting ready for company

Friday morning we enjoyed Barbara’s Apple Bread before getting our house ready for our first overnight guests at the Castle!

The family we were getting ready to host is a family of 8, so all of our meals were about to become extra large! I got out this huge bag of chicken thighs and dumped marinade right into the bag so I could smoke it that night for our dinner.

I also baked a double batch of Chocolate Chip Muffins for Saturday’s breakfast.

And made a huge pan of brownies. :)

When the kids started to get squirrely, we packed a picnic, put on their swimsuits, and headed to the splash park.

I had air fried a big box of Taquitos (from Sam’s) for our picnic that day. It worked great! We ate them with clementines, yogurt, and cookies.

During naptime, our friends arrived!!!!! This family is incredibly dear to us. Since the girls were napping, we wasted no time getting out cards to play our mutually favorite game of Nertz. I was ridiculously rusty as I haven’t played in years. So I got a terrible score but it sure was fun!

We smoked the marinated chicken at dinnertime, cut up watermelon and brownies…

….made steamed green beans, buttered corn, and oh yeah. I had washed and thrown a bunch of potatoes into a crock pot before leaving for the Splash Park so that they could bake and be ready for dinner.

Our table was full and it was perfect.

After dinner, we took our friends on a walk to the Sunken Gardens so they could enjoy the beauty with us.

We are a large parade when just our family goes, but adding the Brocks must have been quite a show as we walked from our house to the garden. There were 19 of us out with our strollers, wagon, and kids/adults on foot. :)

We had popsicles when we got back because we had earned them. :) Then we got all the kids showered and to bed, quite the ordeal!!

When I woke up the next morning I was planning in my head how I would take advantage of the extra hands available to give my kitchen floor a much-needed sweep and mop. But look what I woke up to!!!! A beautifully clean kitchen with scrubbed floors. SO SWEET. Thank you, Brocks!!

I set out a breakfast buffet of sausage, bacon, muffins, bread, fruit, Cream Cheese Fruit Dip, and yogurt. It was simple and good.

After breakfast, we packed a sub sandwich lunch and headed out to the zoo for a few hours.

Here are 17 of us (Kelsey joined us too but was the one taking the picture). :)

We found our favorite picnic tables by the flamingos to enjoy our sandwiches, chips, fruit, juice, and brownies. We were our own zoo at the zoo, but it was so great to be together.

We made it home by 1:45 and got the four littlest down for naps. The rest of us cleaned up and got ready to go to a wedding – and from that point on, I got no pictures. Boo. The wedding was for our long-time friend Jacob and his bride Sarah, and it was beautiful.

TODAY is mine and Matt’s 29th anniversary. :) I love going to weddings as a reminder of where we came from, so the timing is perfect. Here’s to a brand new week and a Christ-focused new year of our marriage!

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Big Family Food and Fun: July 30-August 5, 2023

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What does our Big Family Food and Fun look like as July ends and August begins?

Before we dive into the week, here are a few more photos that Kelsey took during last week’s surprise birthday party. She was intentional about getting pictures with me in them, since I am usually taking the pictures and therefore not in them. :)

Friends kept showing up to surprise me all day long. Amazing!

The chip and dip buffet:

I had a hard time winding down that night! What a fantastic day!

Big Family Food and Fun: July 30-August 5, 2023

And now for the new week!

Sunday for lunch I tried Pizza Chicken in the crock pot (usually I make it in the oven). It sort of worked??!? I made 8-pounds of chicken thighs at once, so the middle chicken pieces didn’t get thoroughly cooked while we were at church. We ate what was ready and I finished cooking the under-done pieces in a skillet while we ate the rest. We had green beans, corn, bread/butter, and No-Bake Cookies with our Pizza Chicken.

Sunday evening we were invited to swim at our friends’ house and have dinner with them. We had THE BEST TIME!!!!

There were plenty of adults and teens to help with our littles so they got to have fun in the pool too. Then we ate a delicious feast of Sloppy Joes on homemade slider buns, baked beans, grapes, cucumbers, watermelon, salad, pickles, chips, and Peanut Butter Rice Krispie Treats. We felt so spoiled!


Monday morning we enjoyed Pumpkin Bread and Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread – both made by friends who gifted them to us. So good!

Here’s how Josie felt about it her chocolate bread breakfast. ;)

We needed to go to the bank to both set up an account and to get some paperwork signed/notarized. So  we figured out a way to do it without taking seven babies into the bank, yikes! I packed grapes, animal crackers, and water or juice for everyone and we headed out.

First we stopped at a park to wear them out a little bit. Then we loaded them back into the van and headed to the bank where I stayed with them and handed out snacks while Matt went in to get our account set up. After wayyyyyy to long (it couldn’t be helped), Matt came out and stayed with the kids while I ran in to do my part. We are thankful that the bank people worked with us and that we could get this necessary business done!

Meanwhile, it was past lunchtime because the bank needs took much longer than we anticipated. So I texted Malachi to throw Chicken Strips into the air fryer so we’d have food right away when we got home. At 12:50, we finally made it back and gave them chicken and canned fruit while I warmed up peas to complete the meal. Naptime didn’t happen until almost 2:00 that day but we sure were thankful to finally have our bank account set up and paperwork taken care of!

Dinner that night was Breakfast – pancakes, scrambled cheese eggs, sausage, bacon, blueberries, and applesauce. This is one of our favorite meals! And having a griddle on my stove is INCREDIBLE. I cranked out a huge amount of pancakes in a very short amount of time. Amazing!

The weather was beautiful that evening so we took another walk to the Sunken Gardens before bedtime.

We finished the Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread on Tuesday morning, plus I got out our apple-peeler-corer-slicer and made apple spirals for the kids. (This is actually faster than slicing them and the kids love it!) They ate the apples with our favorite “caramel cheese” so breakfast seemed like a real treat!

Matt kept all the kids occupied outside of the kitchen after breakfast because after eating chocolate bread – I desperately needed to sweep and mop. Then we packed a lunch and headed to the zoo for our morning outing. I used the rest of our leftover smoked chicken from last week to make Chicken-Ranch-Spinach Melts.

We weren’t sure how this would work since these are hot sandwiches. But I packed our cold side dishes and drinks in one cooler with ice. Then I packed the hot sandwiches in a separate insulated lunch bag. I toasted the sandwiches in our air fryer at 10:30 and at noon when we ate at the park, the sandwiches were still hot. Amazing! Now we know!

Flamingos are our favorite. Watch the video here to learn why.

Each time we go to the zoo (we have a membership and we live six blocks away so we can go as often as we are able), we choose something different to “feature” for the kids so that every trip is special. This time it was the Dino Dig. We chose a table by the digging area so that the kids could play and then eat when they were ready. The hot sandwiches were a hit, plus we had applesauce, chips and salsa, and juice.

We headed home and put littles down for a nap then I headed to Costco. I underestimated how long my shopping would take – and how many carts I would fill. Phew. Every time I’m buying food or clothes I’m struck by the reality of how many kids I have. You’d think I’d be used to it by now, haha.

I needed many basics, plus I was getting items for our kids’ lunchboxes for first couple of weeks back to school. Plus I needed diapers, and the yogurt was on sale, and….

I was an hour later than planned getting home. Matt had fed the kids leftovers for dinner but it didn’t matter. They were screaming and extra needy anyway. We somehow unloaded all the groceries while holding very loud children.

All said and done, I spent $653 for Costco groceries and we are well stocked up, at least for a few days before we run out of fresh produce again. :)

Wednesday morning Matt and and Elias headed to York to work on our houses there. Malachi was my side-kick all day, helping me with littles. I had an at-home 9:00 meeting for our littlest kids. Then at 10:30 we decided that a fun morning outing would be McDonald’s Play Place. Malachi’s app told us that we could buy nuggets for a good deal so I told the kids that everyone would have a fun snack of 2 chicken nuggets each and that we’d play and come home and bake pizzas.

Good idea, Mom.

Except – do McDonald’s Play Places not exist anymore??? It’s a been a long time since I’ve looked for one. My phone told me there was a Play Place so we drove to that location. But in fact, there was no Play Place. Moving on to Plan B…

Malachi still grabbed nuggets, we handed everyone their tiny 2-nugget snack to eat in their car seats, and we headed to the Scheels to enjoy their Play Place. Phew.

Oh but did I mention that our wagon broke while we were in there?! Good grief.

The kids had a great time playing, Malachi grabbed himself some frisbee golf discs, and we headed home – much later than intended. Too late to bake pizzas before having screaming children who had become hangry.

Soooo, when we got home I told the kids to wash hands, get a drink of water, and meet me at the table for fun sliced apples. We scooped out peanut butter for them to eat with their apples, I found leftover pancakes to warm up with butter, and that was lunch. THEN IT WAS NAPTIME, thank you Jesus.

Oh wait. It was not naptime. I had missed the fact that the three little girls had been taking turns smearing their peanut butter in each others’ hair. Oh no they hadn’t. Oh yes they had. I took them to the sink at stuck their head under the water to clean their hair the best I could. And then it was naptime. Wet hair and all.

That afternoon I experienced something new…

Grocery Delivery

After yesterday’s crazy Costco shopping trip I decided to see how I could make grocery shopping easier to meet our family’s needs. So I put in an Aldi order and took advantage of a Free Delivery deal.

Having my groceries delivered to my door? AWESOME. But will I do it again? I’m not sure. Probably not??

While shopping, I noticed that Aldi’s online prices were all higher than in-store prices. This is the case for both pick-up and delivery. With the high volume of items I need to buy, it will not be worth it to pay the extra amount per every item. Anyone have experience with Aldi pick-up or delivery? Any tips for how to save? Or should I skip it and just shop in the store somehow each week?

Is it still only Wednesday?

Thank goodness for afternoon rest times. I enjoyed some down-time (sitting with my feet up  and uploading pictures of all of our food, hehe) then got ready for company. I was so excited about this because friends from York were coming for dinner. Kelsey happened to be free to join us and I’m not sure if you know this, but she is a professional watermelon-cutter-upper. That’s always her job when she comes. ;)

There were 22 of us for dinner that night and it was magical. We smoked two different kinds of brats and ate them with salad, watermelon, grapes, oranges, carrots, chips, No-Bake Cookies, and Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars. (<— awww, I wrote this when Asa was only 15.) We enjoyed our visit so much!!

I was visiting with our guests, the bigger littles were playing outside with their kids and our neighbors, and it was getting close to bedtime. Kelsey grabbed the three little girls and gave them a bath to get the rest of the peanut butter out of their hair. Bless. Then Kelsey, along with guests Julie and Emma put them girls down for the night. This was such a precious scene as they said goodnight and headed to bed…

Thursday was my big birthday. :) Just like the day before, I had meetings all morning for our little ones (The Early Childhood Development team is highly involved with our kids ages 0-3 because they are all at high risk and need early intervention. We met with them frequently in York and now we are getting set up with our new team in Lincoln. Lots of meetings later, we are almost ready to roll!)

While I was in our living room filling out paperwork and answering questions, Matt and the kids made a picnic lunch for us. They made Chicken Salad and put it on croissants for sandwiches, plus packed applesauce and chips. I had splurged on Kirkland’s Organic Chocolate Milk for a special treat for picnics but none of the kids enjoyed them very much. A bummer, but now I know not to buy them again. :)

After we ate, the kids ran around the park and attempted to climb a tree.

After naps, they put together a special show for me for my birthday, hahaha.

Elias cooked and perfectly seasoned the shaved beef steak I had gotten in our Aldi delivery, then everyone else worked together to put together a buffet for Steak Nachos for my birthday dinner. All the Bigs were able to join so all 15 of us were together – just what I wanted for my birthday!

My nacho bowl was so delicious!! Cilantro, white queso, seasoned steak, corn, black beans, garden tomatoes, and chips. It was a perfect birthday meal.

Ah, but then there was cheesecake!!

After we ate, we headed outside to hang out.

Kelsey taught me how to play Cornhole. Super fun!

It was a great birthday!

Friday morning we ate cereal and bananas, then headed to a bookstore that was featuring a Reptile Storytime.

We ended up being there with several families from church which was a fun surprise! Most of our kids were brave enough to pet the snakes. :)

Since we were already out and about, we found a park that we hadn’t tried out yet and ate the rest of the Chicken Salad on croissants and No Bake Cookies with juice and clementines. But oooops. This park didn’t have bathrooms, which is a no-go with this many kids! We cut our picnic short and came home so that we could make a mess of food all over our kitchen floor. I mean, so that some of the kids could potty while we finished lunch in our kitchen. :)

For dinner that night I decided that I wanted NO DIRTY DISHES (or drama), so I threw a bunch of chicken nuggets into the air fryer and made these smoothies. Disposable plastic cups with fun straws for the win!

Malachi had made himself a pizza for lunch and the cardboard circle was still on the counter. So that became my fancy serving tray for the nuggets. Nice, eh? The kids ate outside while playing because the weather was wonderful.

Meanwhile, Justus had been coming back and forth all day working with our smoker to made his delicious ribs for some buddies that night. Brayden was his side-kick, which is good beyond what I can express. Our little kids need our bigger kids pouring into them like this. Thank you, God, for moving us to Lincoln so that we could be together in these ways. We all need this.

Acacia gave up on her straw and went all in, drinking her smoothie like a big girl.

Plan B again

If we’ve learned anything we’ve learned that we can make plans, but they almost always need to change.

Saturday morning we had plans to go to Walmart to get a few school supplies and some of our WIC items for the month, especially formula for BabyBoy#11. But, the roofers we’d been waiting on for over a month to come do repairs FINALLY came that morning. So Matt needed to spend time with them, pushing back our plans.

By 11am we were finally able to get out the door, and we decided we needed to work our plans out differently. I put together a snack of animal crackers, applesauce pouches, and cheese sticks and we made our way to the store. All the kids stayed in the the van with Matt and he handed out snacks while I ran into Walmart and hurried as fast as I could to get everything we needed. It wasn’t a very fun outing for the kids, but at least the necessary shopping got done.

I forgot to take any pictures, sorry! I got formula, cereal, juice, cheese, yogurt, frozen hashbrowns, spring mix, spinach, grapes, pears, bananas, strawberries, plus a few packs of glue sticks, crayons, and pencils. Matt and the kids were hanging in there in the van, bless. We unloaded groceries as fast as we could when we got home then quickly warmed up leftover brats and served them with watermelon before naptime.

We made fresh green beans from our friends’ garden that night plus corn on the cob. I put a bunch of Burritos from our freezer into the air fryer to heat up while the veggies cooked and that was dinner. (By the way, make these burritos to have on hand for nights you don’t feel like or have time for cooking. They are so great!)

This was my view of dinner from the corner of the room where I sat feeding BabyBoy#11.

We just have one more week before school starts. We are both excited and sad that summer break ends and a school year begins. When do your kids start their school year again?

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