Recently my bread has been turning out a flat little rectangle that is twice as wide as it is tall. I was getting sick of having miniature sandwiches! Yesterday, my bread was so pretty I had to take a picture of it and post it. Yeah for normal-shaped bread!

Homeschooling

Thanks to Carrie and Ms. Tee who commented on my first post about my past. They both found it interesting that I was homeschooled, so I thought I'd talk about that in a little more detail.

My sister and I both loved being homeschooled. Now, I’m not naïve; I do realize that homeschooling is not for everyone. Just in our case, it worked out quite well!

We would do our schoolwork in the mornings (usually), and then have the whole afternoon for fun stuff. I remember learning fractions by helping my mom double or half recipes. I remember my mom countless times telling me to look up a word in the dictionary to figure out how to spell it or what it meant. (By the way, that fostered a lifelong love of the dictionary and using words correctly, even though it drove me crazy at the time!)

A normal week would look like this:

Sunday – church
Monday – homeschool band (when we were a little older)
Tuesday – swimming lessons, in season
Wednesday – evening church
Thursday – co-op with other homeschooled families

Friday and Saturday were let free for impromptu playtimes with friends or special trips downtown or whatnot. You can see that we didn’t suffer from social deprivation in any way!

I loved the days when we’d be going somewhere in the morning, like band or co-op, and we'd pull up to a stoplight next to a school bus full of kids. We would always laugh because they would look at us like, “Why aren’t you in school?” And we were in school!

Homeschooling taught me how to really learn. When I started public school in 9th grade, my natural sciences teacher would keep saying to the students, “You all learned this in 6th grade; why don’t you remember any of it?!” I sat in my seat and thought to myself, “I never learned this specific information before, yet I’m acing (literally) every test!”

Homeschooling gave me a love for learning as well. Even today, I love to study new subjects or go more in depth in my favorite subjects (music, theology, ancient languages, science, etc.).

(I could talk about this forever and ever, so I’d better call it quits here, since I need to finish up making dinner.)

If you are considering homeschooling with your children, I would heartily recommend it!

About Me

Since Tim and I had tomato soup and grilled cheese for dinner, and since we're planning on eating from the cupboard all week, I thought I'd share a little bit about myself.

I'm the youngest of two girls. My older sister is two years, eight days, and a few minutes older than me. I grew up in the Minneapolis area (Minnesota), and actually didn't mind the snow.

Now, one of my cousin (who was just visiting last weekend) has a memory like an elephant. She can tell you vivid details from each year of life. She'll say something like, "I loved playing kickball in second grade, but I didn't like it as much in third grade.." I don't have as specific of memories, and I really don't have as good of a timeline in my head.

My sister and I were homeschooled until highschool; I think that's why the grades all run together in my memory. I really loved being homeschooled. I think it's a great way to go! I could go on and on about it, but I won't do that right here and now. (I may do it some point, though.)

When I was young, I enjoyed reading and playing make believe with my sister. We had so much fun pretending to live on a farm and ride horses. We'd also pretended to be on space ships, and built forts, and played with dolls and Lincoln logs and legos. Oh, what fun we had!

Because we were homeschooled, we did a ton of fun stuff! We were in a homeschool band, went on field trips with other homeschooling families, went to the nature center, and had a weekly co-op meeting. We made wonderful friends, many of whom are still our good friends today.

I was blessed to have such a good childhood. I'll tell you more about my older childhood years later this week.

Let me know if you have a specific question about me that you'd like me to answer!

Saturday Breakfast

Here's what we had for breakfast this morning.





There's nothing on it, no sauce or dressing or whatnot. Just fruit. Sometimes simple is gooooood!

Mac 'n' Cheese - Finally

I've finally come up with a Macaroni and Cheese recipe that I like! After having two failed attempts, I'm glad I stuck with it.

2 Tablespoons butter

2 Tablespoons rice flour

1 cup milk

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon nutmeg

1/8 teaspoon ground mustard

16 oz. Velveeta, cubed

16 oz. uncooked rice pasta

Prepare the rice pasta as directed on the package. Will that is cooking, melt the butter in a sauce pan or stock pot. Once it's completely melted, add the rice flour little by little while whisking to create a roux.

Then whisk in the milk. Once it's blended with the roux, add the seasonings. Then add the cheese and stir constantly until it's melted.

When the pasta is fully cooked, add it to the cheese sauce, and there you go!

Yummy!

CVS Money Saving Trip

Eating gluten free can be expensive. I love it when I can save money on non-food products, so I have more dollars left for food!

Here's the deal that I got today at CVS that definitely helped stretch our food/consumables budget this week.

What I Got

CVS vitamin E oil - 0.78 (on clearance)
2 Oral-B Indicator toothbrushes - 3.98
Revlon mascara - 6.49
Advil Children's - 5.79
Advil PM - 5.29
CVS sunblock - 1.99
Hefty ultra-flex garbage bags - 6.49

Coupons I Used

2.00 off CVS skincare product
1.00 off 2 Oral-B toothbrushes
1.00 off Revlon
1.00 off Advil PM (CVS store coupon)
2 - 2.00 off Advil products (manu. coupon)
19.97 in Extra Care Bucks

How Much I Spent and Got Back

I spent $2.25 out of pocket and got $12.79 in ECBs back.

I normally wouldn't be able to get garbage bags for $2.25, let alone all that other fun stuff, too!

I usually go to Money Saving Mom to find CVS deals, but I put this one together all by myself! (I'm beaming with pride!)