Here’s our Big Family Food and Fun: November 1-7, 2026 post!
Big Family Food and Fun: November 1-7, 2026
Sunday started off nice and early – or late – or whatever you call the morning hours after our clocks get switched and the kids get up whenever their bodies tell them to. ;) We ate our Breakfast Cookie Bars as we got ready for church that morning.
Lolli and Pop got to enjoy both granddaughters during worship that morning!! You can see here that Hopelyn and the time change didn’t mix well.
We had a sweet crowd of 23 for lunch that day. As we put the final touches on the food in the kitchen, Asa, Arrow, and our friend Calvin played some air hockey.
Some visited and fed babies in the living room.
And others played volleyball in our entry way. So fantastic!
We had a fun spread of White Chicken Chili for lunch with Ham and Cheese Sliders, Fried Chicken, Fruit, and Chips.
Clara found a grape in the shape of a heart!
I got to have some fun Phoebe time! I was holding her when I took one of our girls to the potty. So we were having some fun with the bathroom mirror! She is sooo sweet!
Eventually, she fell asleep in my arms, which was a cuddly delight. But I was nice enough to share her with Pop.
Matt and I enjoyed Community Group time that afternoon. Then I made Mac and Cheese for dinner and offered peas or carrots and leftover hotdogs. (Some of our kids won’t eat mac and cheese, some won’t eat hot dogs, and some won’t eat either one. Feeding this crew has become harder, and we keep pushing through learning about ARFID and how to best feed kids with these needs!)
Josie was struggling to regulate her emotions so I took her to the couch to read books in hopes that it would help (it did!). Anna joined us and soon took over reading. She is very excited to figure out sounding out words and was able to read a lot of Put Me in the Zoo with us!
We ended the night around our fire pit before heading in to get ready for bed.
On Monday morning, I baked a pan of Bread Pudding that I’d had tucked away. It was a fun change of pace for breakfast.
It was raining that morning. So when Emma came over, instead of going to Holmes Lake like we prefer to do, Matt and I walked for over an hour at the mall. Christmas decorations are going up!
That afternoon, I set up a crafting area in our sun room and enjoyed a relaxing few hours listening to praise music and getting some projects done for our Coppinger Kitchen and Crafts business. It was such a restful afternoon!
I had slow cooked Hawaiian Beef Roast and Cheesy Potatoes all afternoon. At dinner time, I fried slices of Zucchini and baked Vanilla Pumpkin Muffins to go with our dinner. Everyone ate whatever fruit I had left in the house that looked good to them.
On Tuesday morning, Keith and Bonus Buddy decided to dress fancy for school. No reason, just because. :)
A couple weeks ago, I took advantage of the “if you have a Sam’s Premium Membership you can join Wal-Mart+ for free” offer. This has been so helpful and time saving having groceries delivered to our door! I will still need to hit Aldi and Costco once or twice a month. And I’ll still want to go into Sam’s and Wal-Mart from time to time to take advantage of markdowns and clearance. But shopping online and having food brought to our porch? That’s hard to beat.
I never remember to take pictures of our groceries because I’m always too focused on getting it put away and moving on to the next need. But here’s a picture of crumbs on my countertop along with the last of our shredded cheese and produce still to be put away. (Not pictured: milk, bananas, spring mix, spinach, oranges, pasta sauce, lasagna noodles, and cottage cheese)
During homeschool time that afternoon, Brayden did some school work then helped me with a project for Coppinger Kitchen and Crafts.
Brayden, Kiya, Keith, and Acacia went to Tuesday Food Distribution with me that day. It was a rough one that day, leaving me worn out from hard parenting by the time we were finished. But we made it. :)
I had a huge Pork Loin in the freezer that was taking up an awkward amount of space, so it was good to get that out of there for our dinner that night. I attempted to smoke it all afternoon, but it was raining and our smoker didn’t like that. So we finished it off in the oven and got it a little bit too dry. Barbecue sauce to the rescue! We ate it with grapes, green beans, and rice.
Our housemate, Erik, had offered for the boys to play his ukulele. This motivated them to hurry up and get their homework done that night. I captured this moment of sweetness, that was very much surrounded by some not-so-sweetness because homework isn’t fun.
But was it worth it so that they could play ukulele? Yup.
On Wednesday, I was able to get quite a bit of baking done. We had a fridge full of leftovers, so instead of making dinner, we just warmed up whatever we each wanted. Then I dirtied a bunch of dishes to make lots of other food instead! ;)
The kids were thrilled that I made a Spinach Cake. I was thrilled that they ate spinach.
Brayden spent his homeschool afternoon with our friend, Paula. They worked together to make the cutest creatures out of pinecones!
Auggie helped me make a batch of Chocolate Banana Blender Muffins.
Malorie and I had had a fun and successful week with Coppinger Kitchen and Crafts so I baked 13 mini Applesauce Bread loaves to package and deliver the next day.
On Thursday, after we got the kids to school, Malorie came over. She and I worked together to package up the food we’d sold during the week. It was so much fun!
Justus dropped off Hopelyn and Arrow. They played together so sweetly all morning!
Hopelyn went with us to pick up kids after school. Everyone is always so happy to see her when she comes with us!
Keith insisted on being the one to push her stroller home.
I set out some craft supplies for the kids to work with. This always makes a big mess – but messes like these are great! They stay focused and get creative. That’s nothing a broom can’t handle.
We warmed up White Chicken Chili or Cheesy Ham and Potato Soup for dinner.
Acacia has been asking for “Red Soup” so she helped make this for herself.
Brayden had a Choir Concert that night. We hate that we can’t all go to things like this together right now. With ABA therapy plus having so many littles who would have a hard time sitting through a concert, we divided and conquered. Matt took Kiya, Keith, and Bonus Buddy with him and I stayed home with the youngest four kids.
Brayden has the BEST support system, with three of our dear friends from church going to watch his concert. We are so thankful for these people!
On Friday, Kiya helped me put together two huge Lasagnas for Sunday Lunch.
Matt took Anna to an appointment that morning, and Auggie and I went to Costco. He got kicked out of the cart and had to ride on the side after all the food took over!
After school that day, Acacia helped me make a Strawberry Peach Cobbler for Daddy’s birthday. While she did this, I put together a pan of Nutella Oat Bars.
I baked them both at the same time, and the results were pretty great!
Meanwhile, I made Matt one of his favorite meals: Biscuits and Gravy! I’d gotten several bags of biscuits at Food Distribution on Tuesday, which saved me the “trouble” of making biscuits. I made Sausage Gravy, plus cooked lots of sausage links for those who don’t like gravy. Then I scrambled about 20 eggs. This meal was a big hit!
On Saturday morning, we took four kids to the library for Sensory Storytime.
Meanwhile, Kiya, Keith, Bonus Buddy, and Anna were privileged to serve with our church Kid’s Ministry at Orphan Grain Train. We loved that they got to do this!!
Then, it was party time! All of our kids were all able to be together to celebrate Matt’s birthday!
We all wanted to take turns holding Phoebe. She was a very good sport!
Matt’s lunch request was Pasta Alfredo with Andouille Sausage and Garlic Butter Shrimp. I steamed Broccoli to go with it, plus we had Grapes. It was a great meal!
Matt put Cajun seasoning on his, and it was all he hoped it would be when he thought of this meal idea for his birthday.
One of my favorite parts of having all of us together is hearing our older boys’ banter and laughter. These guys are all so much fun!! The gals they’ve chosen put up with us well, and join the fun too. I am so grateful!
After lunch, the kids played outside and the babies napped. We adults played The Game of Things and had lots of great laughs!
As we wrapped up the afternoon, Arrow went outside with Uncle Malachi. :)
We had a simple meal of Sandwiches and Chips for dinner that night, then bath time and bedtime.
And that was our week!
