Menu Plan Monday is Back!

The winds of change are blowing around here at Heritage Schoolhouse.  Next week my daughter will begin her sophomore year of high school, my son is going into junior high, I am starting back to work after staying home for fifteen years, and my son will begin playing on a competitive soccer team that will require travel most weekends.  Whew!   It is going to take awhile to adjust to our new routines.  I know one thing that I can do to make the transition smoother is for me to get back into the habit of routine menu planning.  When my children were little, and during the years we home schooled, I almost always menu planned, but after the kids started back to public school three years ago, I gradually stopped planning.  Mostly due to the fact that I had much less pressure to know what was for dinner each night.  I had the luxury of waiting until the last minute as well as the opportunity to stop by the store when I was in town after dropping the kids off at school or before I picked them up.  This year, after working all day and picking the kids up from school, stopping by the store around 5:00 pm will probably not be too high on my list of favorite activities!  I need to have a weekly plan and get my shopping done once a week. So, therefore, Menu Plan Monday is back!  I hope you get inspired to get your menus planned in advance, too, and if you have any favorite weeknight meals that your family loves, feel free to tell me about them in the comments.   

Menu Plan
August 19th-25th

Sunday

out to eat

Monday

fettuccine alfredo, lettuce and tomato salad, rosemary rolls    

Tuesday

hamburgers, spicy potato wedges, baked beans

Wednesday

mexican lasagna, chuy's jalapeño ranch dip, tortilla chips

Thursday

old fashioned chicken and dumplings, lettuce and tomato salad, brownies

Friday

poppyseed chicken, buttered corn, lettuce and tomato salad, dinner rolls

Saturday

out of town

August 10th - National S'mores Day!

Yummy!  Campfire s'mores 

and summertime just go together!

This year for S'mores Day I was stocked up.

Plenty of graham crackers, marshmallows and chocolate...

Plus we tried cool, refreshing s'mores parfaits.

Just layer chocolate pudding, graham crackers, 

marshmallow cream and top with marshmallows.

Want to start the day off right?

How 'bout s'mores for breakfast?

Why not?!

Try S'mores Muffins.

S'mores in a Jar

are fun, too!

Happy S'mores Day!

Can I have s'more? :-)

Teen Room ReDo! :-)

My teen daughter's room had gotten a little out of control since we moved into this house two years ago.  And when I say a little I am being nice. ;-)  Let's just say tidiness, cleanliness and organization are not as dear to her little heart as they are to mine and leave it at that.  

Did you know that one of the best ways to force ;-) reorganization and cleanliness is to paint??  Yep!  On Saturday afternoon, while my daughter was at the mall with a friend, I had had enough. I just flat out decided to stage an intervention. ;-) I knew she would never get her room looking good without a fresh start.  So...I took EV-ER-Y-THING out of her room and moved it into our living area.  And, I mean everything - off the walls, out of the closet, everything. Boy was she surprised when she got home!  On Sunday afternoon my husband painted her room "tree branch" brown - her choice.  It matches most of the rest of the house.  And I went shopping for some new bedding and curtains.  She requested white sheets and a white comforter and black curtains.   I got the t-shirt style sheets.  SO soft - she loves them.  (The curtains are the black-out kind that makes her room really dark and they will keep her room cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter as well.  This morning she had to wake up early to go to her babysitting job and she said it was so hard to get up because her room was black as night!  She also said that she had slept better last night than she has in a long time!)  She and I then spent ALL DAY yesterday wiping down her furniture, rearranging it as we put it back in her room, and going through everything before we put it back.  Nothing went back in her room that wasn't useful, beautiful or sentimental.  (We had several bags of trash and several bags to give away when we were done.)  I, of course, was in my element  sorting and purging.  My daughter not so much ;-) but she persevered.  She wanted to be finished!

I present to you, her new room.  We still have a few decorative items she'd like to get and we're searching pinterest for some cool things to do.  But, for now everything has a place and everything is in it's place.  Ahh!  Her "vision" for her room is for it to be peaceful and "earthy" so that's what we'll be looking to do.  I'm just glad it's clean and healthy again.  It was definitely worth a few days of work. :-)

This is all we have left.  A few bags of mementos, hair things, and jewelry that we have sorted and just need to decide how to display and/or store in her room.  She is enjoying her room so much already that I think even my messy girl might keep things a little more tidy!  I am hoping that we have set her up to be successful.  Here's to hoping. :-)