Miss Abby wanted to bake chocolate chip cookies.

But, I didn't want to turn the oven on and heat the house up

and

Nikki and I were in the middle of getting supper made.

So, Abby and Daddy made a quick run to the store to pick up a few things

and

after supper Abby made some yummy chocolate peanut butter sauce to

put over ice cream. 

Yum!!

And a pic of Nikki!!!!

She is usually the one taking all the pics, so we hardly ever get a

pic of Nikki......but, Nat got one yesterday....

and here it is!

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First: The Funny

Yesterday, Miss Abigail and I were watching Martha Speaks on PBS.

It's a cute, entertaining, educational children's show.

Its premise is to teach new words and their meanings.

At the end of the show, they review the words that they've introduced throughout the episode.

After the show was over, I asked Abby what 3 words we learned about.

She replies, "Improbable, foreprobable, and I can't remember the other one."

Of course, I chuckle and remind her that the second word was foreseeable, not foreprobable.

I was still impressed, as she was close in meaning, she just wasn't quite sure what the word was.

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Second:  The Sweet

Even though he teases them quite a bit,

Aaron is a pretty great big brother to the girls.

A bit of background:

When she's in her room,

Miss Rosie likes to plug her mp3 player into a dock,

 so she can listen to her music without ear buds.

Well, the cord that connects her mp3 player to the dock quit working.

She's been pretty  bummed about it, because she listens to alot of music.

I had told her that I would pick one up for her the night we went to Walmart.

Of course, I forgot.

She told us how bummed she was again yesterday.

Aaron asked to see the old cord, so he could see what she was talking about.

Aaron does not listen to any music, so he would have no idea what cord she needed.

Later, he had to walk Natalie up to work.

And, yup, you guessed it :

He came home w/ a brand-new cord for Miss Music herself.

He had stopped at RadioShack and picked one up for her.

A sweet gesture and all was right in Rosie's world again....

for, at least another 15 minutes, lol.~

 It doesn't seem like it should be time yet.

But, it is.  The Back To School Sales have started.

Even homeschoolers make good use of these sales.

Time to stock up and replace old, dried out markers, pens that have disappeared

and, if you have an Alli in your house, you can never have too much glue.

Other necessities:

(Miss Abigail had one of her bad headaches last night. Bob, Nikki and I made a trip to Walmart.

We felt bad for leaving her so we brought her home a little surprise.)

This next pic about sums up what we've all been doing around here.

Sitting around, being lazy, playing the Wii, spending too much time on the computer on Facebook,

......watching Netflix..

In other words:

Alot of nothing!!!!

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 We have 5 cats

(6, if you count the one that lives outside that we feed).....

we feed them all the same....

none of them are fat, except one!!! 

 Gracie Cat~ 

 She was the tiniest, skinniest little thing....

we used to call her Squirrel, cuz she had a tail that looked like it should

be on a squirrel.......

she showed up one winter a couple years ago.....of course, we brought her in.....

she stayed small for so long that we finally took her to the vet, to see if she was healthy.....

Vet said she was, but that she was just going to be a small cat.....um, guess he was wrong!

I've moved:

http://bkyoungfamily.blogspot.com/

It just seemed like time.

I needed something new, something different.

 Look what we woke up to....

Let me tell, there isn't a person in this house who's happy about it.

Yuck.

It's been a good week......the younger girls and I have gotten quite a bit of schoolwork done....We have a small table and chairs set up on the front porch and they like to take their work out there and get it done......

I ordered a bunch of books on early American history from our library, so last night I went through and put them in time-line order and we will begin reading our way through them....

We've also been doing a bit of learning about the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island.......reading books and watching a dvd from Netflix....I'm finding that I enjoy learning right along w/ the girls and there is so much that I don't remember from school, so it's all new to me. 

I love using our Netflix subscription for homeschooling......Yesterday, we watched a National Geographic dvd on Yellowtone National park.....and today, I'm hoping we watch the one on Yosmite National Park.....it's been really nice having Jake's Wii down here, so we can stream them instantly. 

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We've seen my Mom and Dad a few times this week....my Dad has been nice enough to volunteer to tape and mud up the drywall on Jake's ceiling, so he's been here working on that for us....which gives my Mom and I plenty of time to visit.....they will be back today, so he can start sanding and then we will move on to painting......after that is finished, we can get the carpet out of there and replace it....and Jake will finally have his room back......I'm not sure who is looking forward to it more.....me or him????  I'm ready for all his stuff to be back upstairs in his little corner...and he is ready to have his own space to go to in the evenings......

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Last weekend we finally got our garage cleaned out.....Bob made 2 trips to Goodwill, 2 to the scrap yard....and had a dumpster brought in and filled that....it feels great knowing that's done..we got rid of sooooo much stuff........Abby said, "When I found out we were moving and that we were going to have a garage this is how I thought it'd look."  Too funny!!! 

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Here are the two recipes I mentioned in my last post.

I can't remember where I first saw the Oreo/chocolate chip cookie recipe.....It seems to be on alot of different blogs right now....... so I googled it and found this one......Some of the other blogs I saw the recipe on used refridgerated-pre-made dough, but we just made our favorite chocolate chip cookie dough recipe and used that.......

And here is the recipe for our favorite chocolate cake.....the recipe only calls for 2 layers, but I made it in 3 layers and made a double batch of frosting....we had alot of extra frosting though, so not sure I'd double it again......We have been using this recipe for years....and have made it lots and lots of times........it's a favorite with all of us......

We are working our way through Menu Plan 3 and I am going to be posting it here soon....more for me to keep track of our planning and recipes than anything....

We haven't been taking many pics this week.....Nikki is our resident photographer and she is busy w/classes and her internship, so picture taking is down...maybe she will get some this weekend....

Here are a couple pics:

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So, the first week of the new school term has already come and gone.......and for us, Spring Break was pretty disappointing......The first week, the weather was terrible, cold, ice, snow....the 2nd week, we were all sick!  Yup, rotten and miserable.....we had every symptom out there, I think......some had sore throat, fever, body aches, runny nose, stuffed nose, sinus headache....some had the stomach flu w/all it its yuckiness....and the virus lasted for days.....no quick 24 hour bugs here....I guess we can just be thankful that the kids didn't have to walk back and forth either in bad weather, or while feeling under the weather.  We can also be glad that none of them had to miss any classes due to being sick.  Poor Jake was unfortunate enough to catch both viruses.  He was rotten.........and the boy didn't even have his own room to sleep it away in.

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And we've already survived the first week of the new term....which means new schedules for everybody.....and wow, busy schedules they are too.....Everyone's coming and going all day long, all week long.....I'm going to be looking at the schedule on the marker board many times each day, just so I have an idea of who's where.  Nat has 2 jobs, full time classes and an internship this term....Nikki is going full-time and has an internship.....Aaron has full-time classes and starts a job in the tool-room on campus two days a week....and Jake is always coming and going, getting to his classes and walking the girls back and forth when needed.  Thankfully, it's only 10 weeks and it will be over soon enough....then summer will be here, and I will be wishing they were all super-busy again, lol.

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So, even though everyone was sick, I did manage to work up a 2nd menu plan.  It's working out well and making evenings so much nicer....However, it is costing more than I need it too, so I'm going to be working on trying to cut down a bit, if that's possible...Our biggest expense each month is our grocery bill.....and it's a big one, lol.~ I'd really like to cut it back somehow, just gotta figure out where...we already buy the cheapest cuts of meat...and we eat most only chicken or ground beef....Nikki tried some new recipes last week....so we worked them into our menu plan......She mixed up a homemade French dressing that is super yummy.....so, that will be nice to keep mixed up, in the fridge and ready to go on summer salads....She also mixed up a homemade sweet and sour sauce that was pretty good. She tried another new bbq sauce recipe too......We already have some favorite bbq sauces, so since this one wasn't super amazing, I'm not sure we will make it again...And, since I mentioned it, I will try and share our favorite bbq sauce recipes soon....no, we don't have just one that we use exclusively....they each have their own particular uses......but, since I will want to link to the originals, I will have to look them all up and find them before I share them here....but, they are all super good and worth trying.

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And now that it's time for me to work up menu plan #3, here's what we ate this past week:

Menu Plan #2

~Toss Salad w/chicken, homemade French dressing and homemade breadsticks

~Sweet & Sour pork over rice, with rolls

~Chicken Parmesan over spaghetti with garlic bread

~Tater tot casserole and muffins

~Breaded chicken strips in homemade bbq sauce and oven potato wedges

~PW's Spicy Dr. Pepper Shredded Pork on tortillas w/ Spanish Rice and Corn cakes

~Nachos

I also bought the ingredients to make Monkey Bread and a batch

of bacon/cheese muffins but, since everyone was sick, we didn't get to these.

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Here are the pics that were on the camera when I downloaded them this time.....

The one of Aaron w/ the cake is proof that if Mom says she'll make you a chocolate cake, she'll get to it eventually.....

especially if you remind her enough times......and it was super yummy.....

it's a family favorite recipe that we've made many, many times through the years....super good!!!

Abby helped Nikki make chocolate chip cookie dough, so they could wrap the dough around Oreo cookies and bake them.... yummy!!

They were a huge hit...super-rich......but super-delicious!!

And even though, we had sickies, that didn't stop them from enjoying the little bit of decent weather we have had....

even if they were coughing their brains out!!!

And, finally, a sign that Spring is truly on its way.....now, we need to get all the leaves from last fall raked up,

so we can see what wonderful treasures we will have growing in our new backyard.

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