2013 in review

I cannot believe it is already January 2nd, 2014! What the heck happened to 2013? I did not blog much at all in 2013 and definitely would like to change that in 2014. Way back I had mentioned doing a recipe review and share on here and actually did a few times but then eventually it became a regular "let us talk about what has happened" sort of deal. I like the idea of both, and I also know myself so I have decided that one of my goals for 2014(I'm not setting new resolutions, I always do, and I always fail)is to blog once a month, at the end of the month. I want to both journal what we've done that month AND share and critique a recipe(maybe more)I've tried with the men during that month. Once monthly sounds completely doable, once weekly, well, it does not. :)

We didn't venture out of Colorado at all during 2013. We did make it up to Denver once, for the marathon back in October. I'd like to spend a weekend up there a time or two again this year. Maybe take in a game when the Braves come to town. Our plan is most definitely heading to KS to the Auburn game against K-ST. I believe it is the last Saturday in September, but I could get wrong. It's an easy day trip for us, so we'd be heading out on Friday, going to the game Saturday and heading home Sunday, possibly Monday and stopping to visit with some old friends we've known since living in Ipswich, England on Sunday. They live in Nebraska. We have several places we want to visit and we know we can't do them all this year. I suppose we'll just have to make up our minds. A trip to Disney is way, way past due, so that is something we want to do, but we also want to finally take that Christmas vacation up to northern MN. Kevin & I both really want to visit New England in October as well. All of this plus we both want to go to NYC for the Thanksgiving parade one year and wouldn't mind being in Times Square for New Year's Eve one year. While we love Disney, we have been 5 times, and have not done any of the other places so we will most likely choose one of the places we've NOT been. I must say that right now I'm heavily leaning toward the autumn New England trip, but that could change. :)

We never got the house painted during 2013. Yes, we were lazy, and yes, we've decided to spend the extra $1500($800 to do it yourself)to have it professionally done. We are moving a long quite nicely in our plan to move up north within the next two years and having the house painted professionally we feel might very well help in selling. We aren't against renting, but we'd rather sell. We do not have a specific area picked out, we only know in the Denver area. I personally absolutely love Golden, but the house prices are ridiculous!

Football was obviously a wonderful, wonderful thing this season. :) We are so proud of Auburn! After going 3-9 in 2012 I do not believe there is a person on this planet that would have dreamed we'd be sitting at 12-1 and playing in the national championship game on Monday evening. What a magical season. We're not really Broncos fans but we like Peyton Manning, and look at Cam taking the Panthers to the playoffs!

The holiday season came and went and we aren't quite sure what happened. It seems like we put out fall decorations and Halloween came and we went to sleep and woke up and it was Thanksgiving then blinked twice and Christmas was over. Not sure how that happened.

We are looking forward to this year. Happy New Year to all of you!

Lack of blogging

I definitely don't blog much and reading some early posts don't really talk about food and or recipes much, either. What can I say? I'm a busy stay-at-home-mom and housewife and homeschool teacher. The words "free time" aren't in my vocabulary, at least right now. I admit this summer I have had some free time but I managed to spend it painting our laundry room a different color. It took longer than I'd hoped, but it's finally finished. Kevin took a week off the week of my birthday and that was nice. He was sick early on but was feeling okay by mid-week. We ate really well that week. Pizza, quiche, TX Roadhouse, Village Inn, Cracker Barrel. We went to Garden of the Gods which was fun albeit very hot. We didn't stay long but decided to go back when it's cooler. Kevin redid our patio and it looks so much better now. We do plan to paint the exterior of the house in October. It's due and we want a different color, so it works out. We start back to school on September 3rd. I need to start looking at our first month in the next couple of weeks. We plan to see the balloon lift off on the 31st and then head up to Denver for the remaining weekend. We'll head back home on Labor Day. Our last summer adventure. Avery will camp at Camp Bow Wow. :)

For now we're just enjoying the rest of summer before autumn begins and all the hectic goings on begin, Halloween, Thanksgiving etc. We're also eagerly although cautiously awaiting college football season to begin.

Here's hoping you all are enjoying the remaining part of your summer.

It is June 18th and I cannot believe I have not blogged since April! Have I/we been that busy? I'm not sure I recall May in any great detail. There was Memorial Day weekend of course, that was nice. We smoked some beef and pork and grilled some dogs and burgers and I made homemade ice cream and key lime pie.

After finally deciding on A Beka for 7th-12th grade for Jason and after doing 3ish weeks of 6th grade(from them)it crossed my mind that he needed to get on the A Beka schedule. They begin right around Labor Day and end right before Memorial Day. We certainly are not used to this as we've been taking July off, December off, plus a week for Thanksgiving and a week in March. We are taking the entire summer off. We will start back up when they do the beginning of September. We will have most of Thanksgiving week off as they have it off and two weeks for Christmas and then a week in the spring.

Speaking of summer vacation, it's been nice, really nice in most ways. I am finished putting primer in the downstairs laundry room/bathroom and am ready to start painting. Once I'm done in there I hope to tackle our front room. Not changing it's color, really, just touching up and redoing the border. I've finished a book and started another which is nice. Jason just finished book 3 of the Harry Potter series and is starting book 4. We're sleeping til 8:00ish which is wonderful! I think Avery enjoys having more attention and having me not tell her no, we're in the middle of school right now.

Pretty sure everyone knows of the fire/fires going on in our state. Thankfully one is 100% contained and the one in our back yard so to speak is at 85% containment.

Hopefully we will be going to Larkspur one weekend soon to check out the festival there. July 4th is of course coming up as well and we have tickets to a ballgame. We do plan to make it up to the Denver Zoo one Saturday as well. No plans for any major events, such as travel. Just things inside our state this year.

Now it's time for some afternoon reading. I choose to pretend that there is no laundry to be done....:)

Sore throats and cold wind....

We woke up this morning still not feeling well. Kevin actually woke up around 5:00/5:30 after being up til midnight. Yucky coughs tend to not be condusive to sleep. We've added low grade fever to the mix today as well. We decided to stay home from church today and rest and try to recover from whatever it is we have. I decided to try mixing up a few various slush recipes to get a single serving recipe that would be pts friendly and possibly help soothe a burning throat. It wasn't the best idea I've ever had, although it wasn't bad, wasn't terribly high pts and did feel alright on my throat. If I copy it down here, I'll have it in two places so that hopefully I won't lose it. :)

Strawberry-banana slush:

1/2 cup(it was actually that  plus maybe 2TBS)chopped strawberries
1/3 of a banana(I put it in the freezer for half an hour to get really cold)
1TBS Country Time Pink Lemonade powder(I really could have used 1/2TBS)
enough ice to make it slushy material. Blend in blender til well, slushy.
2TBS water

If you had frozen berries and froze the banana, you would most likely need no ice but would want the water still. I am going to try a TBS of honey, I *think* next time and also play around with the fruit. Pineapple would be great with strawberries. I plan to use watermelon and strawberries, another combo taste I like. Yes, strawberries are my all time favorite fruit. :)

Just trying out various color schemes for the blog. Not a lot going on to speak of in the CO Lidh home this evening. It is Kevin's birthday and I made him yummy cupcakes from skinnytaste.com. Pineapple bliss cupcakes and they are actually pretty good. Well, if you like pineapple that is seeing how there is a 20oz crushed can in the cake part and 1/2 cup in the icing. :) He liked them and that really is all that matters, although I will mention that both Michael & Jason appeared to like them as well. :) He wanted steak so I had purchased some bacon wrapped filets to grill. Unfortunately the day became a bit too breezy to grill so we ordered online and picked up from Outback. He got an iPad mini for his birthday.

He and I both have some sort of sore throat/cough kinda thing going on which has made us both tired and not totally feeling the whole birthday thing, but he had a good day so I'm happy about that.

I can't believe that I will be starting 6th grade officially with Jason on Monday morning. I'm pretty excited about it, not gonna lie. I'm hoping he is at least *some*what excited. :) I've been looking through all the books and seeing what we'll be covering the first month or so. I suppose he is a tad excited though because he's starting in April and his peers in public school won't start until the 2nd week of August. We'll be 3 months into it at that point(we take the month of July off).

Avery amuses me greatly with her boyfriend, Blackjack next door. Actually, he amuses me, too. If he goes out and she isn't out he'll run to the fence between our homes and bark toward our house. :) She will find us and wimper and whine and run around until we let her out back. Then they run up and down the fence growling and barking at each other. Silly puppies.

We were hoping to spend Memorial Day weekend in Boulder but it is looking like we probably aren't. The hotels with availability are either crazy, stupid expensive, or look like places you would rather not stay. It is a popular and very busy weekend there. I really should have planned earlier on going and made reservations then. Live and learn, right?

And while it is only 8:30, I didn't sleep all that great last night, neither did Kevin, so coupled with not feeling well today, it's about time to hit dreamland.

Life lately according to our life. :)

It is so hard to believe that it is March already. I truly don't know what happened to January or February and in fact I am not totally convinced they even happened! February was a fairly relaxed and easy going month for us. We celebrated Michael's 21st(WHAT!?) birthday on the 6th. Chocolate cake and Red Lobster. Kevin and I had an overnight date night on the 14th, our first since our anniversary last year. We really enjoyed dinner and walking in the cold and snow with no constant interuptions from a very talkative young man named Jason.

Now March is here and that means loads of birthdays. Uncle Pat, Papa Tom, Grandpa, Chris, and Jason. Whew. The 14th of course is a shared birthday between Chris and Jason. Still amazes people when we tell them that we had two boys born on March 14th, 14 years apart. :) Jason will be 11 this week and if Michael turning 21 wasn't enough, Chris is turning 25. 25! I will have a 25 year old son. Did I mention he's turning 25? ;)

I am spending this month reviewing mostly what we've learned in 5th grade as next month we're heading into middle school. Hard to believe Jason was in 2nd grade when we started and April 1st he begins 6th grade. Wow. Crazy wow.

Speaking of birthdays, he is getting a cake of course and wants Italian for his birthday dinner. I of course cannot complain with this. :) We are also going bowling which should be a hoot.

We'll end our month with Easter wondering how an entire year went by. Last Easter we celebrated with Miss Sable here waiting to join Chris and Michelle in HI. This year we have Miss Avery to celebrate with. Probably going to do the 7:00 Sunday morning church service. Our church will have 4 identical services Easter Sunday. Not sure yet, as we tend to never make it to early ones, but rather end up at the 11:15 one. :)

Next month will bring Kevin's birthday and looking ahead to May a possible trip to Chicago, and Mother's Day not to mention the beginning of summer and Memorial Day weekend. Kevin has mentioned wanting to do the run in Boulder that day so we might end up spending a long weekend up there. Who knows?

For now, lunch is over and it is in fact time to get back to school for the afternoon.

Daily schedule

I read an article on a homeschool site that said to actually jot down a typical day in our home. First I thought, and rightfully so, that we don't have a "typical" day. Most days are different. But, I figured it couldn't hurt and I can go back at a later date and look at this and most likely chuckle. :)

 8:00:maybe I should put the "ish" beside it, wake up
 8:05:COFFEE
 8:10:start to look at my/our day and ponder how much will actually get done
 8:30:breakfast for Jason
 8:35-9:00:listen to Jason babble about different things and smile because he gets so
               excited about everything
 9:01:decide I too, should probably eat said breakfast
 9:02:start my breakfast, check email, chat with Kevin, play with Avery, think how I 
       really should be starting laundry
 9:30:Meander upstairs and gather dirty clothes
 9:40:shower, dress
10:00: start laundry and decide if I REALLY want to do dishes
10:01:NO, so look at the days school lessons
10:30:art project of some sort, different things, not always what you might consider
          art
11:00:get laundry out and dry it
11:10:see what time it is and wonder if we can get any school in prior to lunch
11:15:decide no, and think about lunch
11:20:listen to Jason babble more and watch him play with Avery
11:30:start preparing whatever it is I've decided is lunch this day
12:00-1:00:lunch
1:00:math, whatever we're currently doing, right now, Teaching Textbooks.
1:30:spelling which includes him spelling out loud this week's words and some sort
        of activity/worksheet, sometimes fitting some good dictionary skill building into
        it
2:00:language arts/phonics, whatever we're currently doing
2:20:reading and some sort of reading comp
2:45:some days it is history, some days science, some days geography.
3:15:music most days, sometimes other things
3:45:finish up anything, any paper etc that didn't get finished earlier in the day or 
        perhaps week
4:00-4:15:done for the day with actual proper school
4:15-4:30:listen to Jason babble and play with Avery
4:30:remember the laundry that got washed and dried but not taken out and folded :)
4:45-5:00:think "OH MY GOSH" I need to look at dinner, Kevin will be home in an hour 
               or less!!
5:-6:00:make dinner, unload dishwasher that hopefully got loaded and washed earlier
6:00-6:30:dinner time, always at the table
6:30-6:45:clean kitchen and unload and load dishwasher
6:45-7:00:make sure everything has been done and I've made Kevin's lunch for the
               next day
7:00:watch and listen to Jason babbling to Kevin
7-9:30:depends, sometimes, okay,usually, that is tv time and he gets to play video
           games, age appropriate
9:30:time to get ready for bed
10:00:bed

No, not every single day is exactly like this day, but it's close. No, we don't have a "proper" "public school" day. Yes, my son is learning more than you could imagine and   yes, he is socialized. :) I'm pretty tired after all this typing and only one cup of coffee so far this morning, so it's time for this Mama to get off here and do some of the things on this daily schedule!