A Week of Pretending to be Mom

I had always thought it would be fun to prepare dinner for a day.  And I did once or twice.  But those were simple meals, like "brinner" or Hamburger Helper.  So I decided to make REAL dinners for a whole week.  Starting Sunday, I will make dinner every night, ending on Saturday.  (This will actually be easier to accomplish because both of my brothers will leave to Boy Scout Camp on Sunday, so I will only need to prepare meals for three people instead of five.)  Today I put together my plan.  I used these two cookbooks to get the recipes:

The first thing I did was decide what I wanted to make over the course of the week.  I ended up with these:



Sunday:

   Sandi's Chicken Salad

Monday:

   Meat Loaf

Tuesday:

   BLT Soup

Wednesday:

 Greek Salad

Thursday:

   Beefy Cream Cheese Roll-Up

Friday:

   Curried-Basil Chicken

Saturday:

   Crustless Chicken Pot Pie

Afterwards, I combined all of the ingredients so I would know exactly how much of something I would need.  (As it turns out, 4 of the 7 recipes required Green Bell Peppers!)  I then went through our kitchen with my mom and crossed off anything we already had. 

(Sorry, you probably can't see what any of that says...) 

Then, I put the remaining ingredients into a much neater list, and put the name of the meal(s) that required that ingredient next to it.

Most of the ingredients we still needed were vegetables, so I couldn't buy them all at once or they would spoil.  To solve that problem, I put all the ingredients in order from when I need to buy them, according to the day I will make the meal.

I completed my first day of shopping today, and bought everything on the list except for the bean sprouts, which I couldn't find.  I spent a total of $22.79.  It helps that we already had a lot of chicken in the freezer, so I didn't have to buy any of that.

I will make my first meal on Sunday.  Can't wait!

(And to all the moms reading this:  I know that cooking isn't the only thing you are responsible for.  You still have all that other fun stuff like cleaning and dropping kids off at school and birthday parties.  So I'm really not pretending to be Mom.  I'm just cooking for a week.  :)

It's Not (entirely) My Fault!

Yes, I know.  It has been almost 4 months since I have blogged.  And for the first half month I didn't blog, I was being just plain lazy.  I didn't want to write any blog posts.  So I didn't.  But around the middle of May, our computer broke down, and didn't repair itself.  We sent our computer out to a church friend to fix it, but so far, that hasn't happened.  We could never figure out the real problem.  It is still being worked on, so right now we are borrowing a laptop from another church friend.  It will get the work done until our computer decides to wake up from it's deep sleep.  (Not having a working computer was a real pain during the school year.  All my homework was to be done on the computer - even study tools for the finals were online!)

As you have probably guessed, I am done with school for the year.  We got out almost two weeks ago.  It hasn't really sunk in that school is over yet, because I am still working my butt off - all day, every day.  A lot of my friends' (and familys') birthdays are around this time of year, so I have been struggling to finish their presents.  4 of my friends are having their birthdays around this time, so I made them each a small gift.  For three of them, I made a small little purse and card.  I stupidly forgot to take a picture of one of them, but here are the others. 

                                    

I also forgot to take a picture of the cards I made that went with these two purses, but I do have a picture of the card I made for my other friend, (the one that I didn't get a picture of the actual present.)

So that is 3 out of 4.  The last present I made was for my friend who loves acting and mostly producing.  During the school year, she put together kind of a drama club, which she called the Perpetual Motion Pictures.  There, she and several other kids would make movies and short films during lunch period.  I didn't think that a purse really fit her personality, so I struggled to find something she might actually use.  My mom was looking through a quilting magazine, when she spotted a picture of the Three Little Pig Puppets.  She, jokingly, asked if she would like these.  To her surprise, I shouted, "YES!  Those are PERFECT!!!"  I know my friend doesn't usually use puppets, but they fit in the general category.

The magazine wanted me to buy a pattern for 13 bucks, but by looking at the picture, I knew I wouldn't need a pattern.  I drew out an outline and used felt to make the basic pig bodies.  (I got my artisitic dad to design the wolf for me.)  I made the first pig, and added a little bow. 

I then realized that I could make special changes to give the pigs different personalities.  The second pig was a nerd.  Duct taped glasses and buttoned down shirt.

I was trying to come up with an idea for the third pig, when my dad drew a picture of a pig with an Elvis hairdo.  I loved it!  My dad helped me to come up with a pattern for the hair, and then we worked on the outfit.  A huge V-Neck and collar with gold everywhere.  Then for the final touch, we added a little chest hair.  This was definitley the hardest one, but also, the best, I think.

This project wasn't very hard, but it was really fun.  I loved the final product so much, that I was seriously thinking about keeping the puppets.  This resulted in 3 pigs, 1 wolf, and a carrying case.

I didn't keep the puppets, however, I did start a new set for myself.  Oh, and here's the card that went with the puppets.

So, I am now done with making presents, for now.  But, I am having a sleepover party tomorrow to celebrate my birthday, which means lots of straightening up the house.  I worked on that pretty much all day today, so now I am almost ready for that.  But I'm not done yet.  Every summer, I have to complete a summer reading program to turn in next year.  So far I only have one book done.  I really need to read more! 
Speaking of reading, in these past 4 months, I started and finished the Twilight series.  I had always believed that Twilight was a really stupid series, but I was wrong.  The only reason I agreed to reading Twilight was because the only way I could get my friend, Katie, to read the Hunger Games, was if I read Twilight.  So I did - and I loved it!  It was far more interesting than I ever thought it could be.  As soon as I was done, I just HAD to see the movies.  I LOVED Twilight - I thought they did a really good job putting that one together.  But New Moon was awful.  I was groaning along side my dad, who wouldn't for one second believe how good a series Twilight was.  Eclipse was pretty good, but Breaking Dawn part 1 was TERRIBLE.  A whole bunch of scenes were in the movie, that were NEVER in the book.  I won't go into details about all the things they got wrong, as I wouldn't want to bore those who haven't read the books.  (But you really SHOULD read the books.  wink, wink. nod, nod.)  Even though I hated part 1, I am still really looking forward to seeing part 2.  Hopefully it's way better than it's first half.

I don't want this post to be TOO long, but I'm sorry I kept you guys waiting.  Hopefully I'll be able to stay caught up in the future.

Monogramming

  Over Spring Break, I wanted to make a small gift for each of my friends at school.  It had to be something simple, but something new - something that I hadn't done before.  My mom suggested making pillows, but I had already done that too much.  So, I decided to make pillows, but monogram their first initial on the front of the pillow.  It was easy enough, and the results turned out pretty cool.  I used my mom's embroidery machine, which made the job very quick and easy.  I'd say the hardest part was picking out the perfect fabric for each person.

(Hopefully Katie and Chris don't read this before Tuesday...)

I Don't Know Whether To Laugh or Cry

The Cat Hotel

Imagine walking in a door, and the first thing you smell is cat litter and salmon flavored cat treats.  Not very delightful, is it?  Well, that was the way our house was just a few hours ago.  Litter box on the right, and food on the left.  So today we decided to solve that problem.  First, we bought a secretary desk from Salvation Army.

We decided to keep the litter box and food in the desk - not right next to the door, but on the landing on the top floor.  To keep a litter box in the desk, there would have to be some sort of hole for the cats to get in.  So that's what my dad and I worked on today.  We put on our painting clothes, (even though we weren't painting...) and cut a little hole on the side of the desk where the litter box would be laying inside.

Here's the hole.

And now our construction job was complete!  Using the wood that came from the hole we cut out, we made a plaque.

On the other side of the plaque we made a little sign for when the cats are busy eating.

And here are the Grand Opening pictures of the Cat Hotel.

Our manager about to cut the ribbon.  (Er... the pipe cleaner.)

Messing up while cutting the "ribbon."

And it's cut!

Now, I'll give you a tour of our Cat Hotel.

The Dining Hall.

The Bathroom.

The Rooftop/Bedroom.

The Kitchen.

And here are some pictures of our satisfied customers.

                                                  "And yes, as a matter of fact, I AM a cat."

More Random Pictures.

Sammy and Theodora actually have to eat on two separate levels because when they aren't, they will push each other's bowls off the edge so they can have the whole area to themselves.

Nom, nom, nom.

Relaxing on the rooftop.

"You're so heavy!"

Oh Yeah...

Forgot to say this, but we're not moving anymore.  The reason we were planning to move in the first place was that my dad's boss was going to resign from work, and dad wanted to take her place.  But to do that, we would have to live in Manassas Park.  (That's where dad works.)  Suddenly something came up, and my dad's boss decided not to resign anymore.  So that meant that we wouldn't have to move anymore.  It was kind of depressing - not being able to move anymore.  We worked really hard.  But it was also a relief.  No more people coming to examine our house anymore.  I am also very glad that we found out about my dad's boss not moving anymore on the day that we did; because the next day, we got two offers for our house.  If we hadn't known about the job being taken away, we would've moved for no reason at all - living in a new county with no new benefits.  OK, so there's our little moving experience in a nutshell for ya.

Best Friday EVER!!!

As you might have noticed from the title, this is the best Friday EVER!!!  You know how when you're having a bad day, one bad thing happens, then something else bad happens, and it just keeps going downhill from there?  Well, today everything just went uphill.


This morning I finished packing my lunch and getting all ready for school early, so I had a little bit of extra time.  I spent that time enjoying a nice big cup of black coffee.  I was all relaxed and the coffee just tasted really good.  (Recently my language arts teacher had us write an "Happiness Is..." poem, and one of my metaphors was, "Happiness Is... a warm mug of black coffee." :)


Then, in 3rd period Spanish, our teacher decided to spend the class period singing songs in Spanish.  We sang "Waka Waka" by Shakira (Spanish version).  It was so much fun that we decided to make a video of us all singing Waka Waka, so we did.  Everybody went up to the front of the classroom (except me which I really regret) and we turned on the music and sang and danced while two of the members from the Geek Squad filmed.  Even though I stayed in my seat, I still ended up in the video...  It was so much fun!  And even though I didn't go up to the front of the room, I still sang along.


After 3rd period, we all went to lunch.  We were all still talking about the Shakira video, when all the Life Learners (autistic kids) came in, all of them wearing sunglasses and waving their arms around - one of the teachers holding a boom box on their shoulder.  They were all making motions for us to get up and dance with them, so  a couple of kids ran over.  They turned on the music and walked around the cafeteria looking like they were having a lot of fun.  I was still upset that I didn't get up and be in the video, so I convinced my friends to come with me and we ran over to the group and danced marching around the border of the cafeteria and in the lunch line.  Every couple seconds another group of kids would run over to the back of the line.  Pretty soon we were all yelling and dancing and IT WAS SO MUCH FUN!!!

After lunch, we all had to actually do our school work, so I headed to 5th period math.  I had to retake a quiz, and I was really worried.  When I started the quiz, I realized that the retake quiz was the same quiz that I didn't do so well on.  I was so relieved!  I had been studying the old quiz, so now I knew all the answers!  I finished the quiz really fast, but I felt really confident about how I'd done.  I am sure that I got 100%.  I won't know until after Spring Break, but I was just so surprised at the easiness of the quiz.

In the middle of math class, the bell rang for 7th period which for me is Physical Education.  Our P.E. unit right now really hasn't been my favorite until today.  Badminton and Tennis.  Last P.E. class I could NOT serve AT ALL.  I have always been terrible at Badminton.  But today I partnered up with my friend Zoe and we practiced serves.  Every single time I hit the birdie, it would sell over the net gracefully, landing right where I wanted.  I was so happy!  It was like I had learned overnight!

After P.E., I had history.  I went into history very worried about a quiz we were supposed to have today.  Sarah, who sat across from me was freaking out as well.  When she asked our teacher how many questions the quiz had, he replied 300 short answer questions, each a paragraph in length.  (Ha,ha.)  When we were finally able to get him to tell us the truth, he said there was no quiz today.  His first period class hadn't gotten to it, so he didn't think it would be fair for us to have to take it.  Yay!!!

And to make things even better, I found that I got a 100% on my Spanish Family Tree.  I hadn't gotten ANYTHING wrong, on the presentation, poster, or paragraphs about my family.  It turns out there was only a couple of people who got 100%, and I was one of them!  Also, on Wednesday we took our unit test on the Pythagorean theorem and our class average was a 95.7%.  This meant that our class would get to wear jeans our first Friday back from Spring Break.  (Since we have uniforms at our school, whenever a class gets an average of 94% or more, they get to wear jeans that Friday).

This day has been so amazing and I'm so happy that I have a God who cares for me and planned this all out - just so that I could have a great day.

(And to top this all off, we are having Turtle Creme Pie for dessert to celebrate the start of Spring Break).

Donate Rice!

Hey guys!  My friend just sent me a link to a website where you simply answer questions.  For every question you answer right, you donate 10 grains of rice to hungry kids with no food.  There are also different categories in which the questions are placed.  I like the vocabulary section best.  :)  This is so easy!!!  I already donated 600 grains of rice in 3 MINUTES!!!  DO THIS!!!  It's not hard.

http://freerice.com/#/english-vocabulary/3904

Kitchen Transformation

We are moving!!! 

And to move, you have to make your house look all pretty and empty.  So that's what we did!  We cleaned and cleaned, and organized and organized, and threw away stuff and threw away stuff, until our house looked empty and clean.  We even took down my loft bunk bed and replaced it with a day bed to make my room look bigger.  So, all in all, WE WORKED HARD. 
And today we finished another big job.  THE KITCHEN.  First, we ripped up the ugly flooring in the hallway and the kitchen, and painted the kitchen a cream-ish color.  Then, we painted all the cabinets in the kitchen an off-white color.  After that, we put down new flooring in the kitchen and hallway.  And finally, we put down new counter tops.  And now, we are DONE with the kitchen!  I'm so happy!!!  Have a look! :)