What’s In Your House? Wednesday

Cleaning Products… What do you use? Do you make your own?

Another thing I picked up from the Family Wisdom Conference is one of the Ginger Clean products. {www.gingerclean.com} I bought the All-Purpose Spray.

I really like how it cleans. It is a bit gingery for me, but oh-so much better than a toxic smelling product. I have cleaned a lot of things since I purchased it, and has really worked great. I am going to pick up the window cleaner next time I am out.

It’s great because it is completely earth friendly and it is locally made! They have other products too, like Laundry Detergent and some soft scrub too. Make sure you visit their website to learn more, and they even have a facebook page!

 

Outdoor Challenge::Tuesday & Wednesday

Brandon has been all sorts of boy lately. As he has been booted off the computer, and really isn’t into too much t.v., being outside has been good for him. He doesn’t have much of a chance to be a boy, and do boy things. Since we are a mostly girl family {Ashley, Isabella and I are pretty girly}. I need to remind myself to tell him yes more often, to doing “boy” stuff.

Yesterday, he found some rocks that had fossils, and the like. He cleaned them all up and set up little cleaning and touching stations. Then gave us each a ticket to his little rock presentation, where we could see the differences in the rocks, and wash them up a little. It was fun. Then him and Isabella went outside and dug up part of the driveway in search for more rocks, because I told them to go look for rocks.

Rock Hunting

Today…Brandon wanted to be more boy! He wanted to make a fire. Again I said no. Then I changed my mind. {I have never made a fire before and wanted to try!} So that’s what we are doing now. Well he is tending to it, while I am writing this and making dinner.

Proud little guy.

 

Outdoor Challenge

I am still at it, kinda! Friday we had Isabella’s choir concert, so we didn’t really make it outside. Saturday we did though.

We went downtown to the Celebration of the Young Child event. It was rainy/sunny, and we didn’t have too much time to be down there. But it was fun.

Down at the fountain between Kilwin’s and Pangea’s

Pretty Blossoms in front of the Park Place

Today the kids and I went to Kids Kove after school to play and fly Isabella’s new kite.

Isabella with her new kite

Ashley kicking the soccer ball

Brandon kicking the soccer ball

 

Meal Plan Monday

Alrighty, I skipped last week, because I just didn’t have a plan. It was a chaotic week to start. But we still did pretty good.

This week, Ashley has made up the meal plan. Basically it’s just dinners because the other areas, I have covered.

Monday::Flat Bread Sandwiches

Tuesday::Steak Tacos

Wednesday::Pita’s stuffed with hamburger and cheese (I add a cooked mayo/tomato/black pepper spread on mine)

Thursday::Italian Crescent Casserole

Friday::Home-made Pizza Rolls

Saturday::Chicken with Barbecue sauce, bacon and cheese & Mashed Potatoes

Sunday::Undecided

 

What’s in your house? Wednesday

What kind of things do you use? Why? Where do they come from? How are they made? Are they helpful? Hurtful? A waste? I try to bring the best of what I can into my house. It is a transition, from the way I grew up, to how I am raising my children.

So, what’s in my house? Currently too much. But let us gather here each Wednesday and find out what is good in our house and why.

The first item, is a new item that I have and I am loving. I am a bag addict. But not an expensive purse loving person, no. I love reusable grocery bags. At first, I had lots, and I always forgot them. Now, I have lots and I almost always use them. The times I most forget are when I am at work {you know the plastic-bag-giver-away-mega-store…Target}. I have the bags in my van, but sometimes I just don’t plan on buying anything at work, so I don’t bring one in. If I buy something small, I say no bag, thank you very much. Now I have the perfect solution! My chicobag!

I bought this on Saturday at the Family Wisdom Conference. They were selling them as a fundraiser. And I tell ya, I am so happy I did. It is so easy to toss in my lunch bag in case I need it after work.

On the bottom left side of the first picture, you see that it says rePETe. According to their website {www.chicobag.com} that means that the bag is made of 100% recycled PET  {polyethylene terephthalate} which is the main product used in the production of the plastic drinking bottle. That is for the fabric of the bag, but the drawstring and the little clip are also made of recycled material.

The company is located in USA. It does manufacture its bags in China, which to me is a bummer, even if it is apart of the Fair Labor Association.

I love that it fits right in its own little bag and is super easy to stuff back in. They have a whole array of bags. Different styles and different colors.

 

Outdoor Challenge::Tuesday

Today was an absolutely beautiful day. We didn’t get home until 4:40 because Ashley had tennis today. But as soon as I got home, I went right outside to hang up the laundry. The kids, minus Ashley, followed me right outside.

After I hung the laundry up, and started dinner, I worked on raking the yard.

I got about 2 piles done then we had to take Isabella to choir.

After choir, we went for a nice walk and a little playtime behind the library.

It was another nice night, topped off with small bowls of cookie dough ice cream. Now it’s time for a little more Alice in Wonderland::the book, and off to sleepy land!

 

Outdoor Challenge::Monday

We didn’t spend much time outdoors today. We were trying to catch up from a busy weekend. Though while we were outside we spotted this little guy…

can you spot him in the middle of the picture?

how about now?

We are all a bunch of wimps here, so none of us dared to pick the little guy up!

 

Outdoor Challenge::catching up

Friday and Saturday will be a quick update! I don’t have any pictures to share, as I didn’t really head outside at all.

Brandon and Isabella both had friends over on Friday night. We headed out to Wilderness Crossings, the local bowling alley/laser tag/play area. It was lot’s of fun. We picked up pizza from Little Caesars, and then hung out at our house for a little while. The kids played outside while I got ready for the Family Wisdom Conference and did dishes and cleaned up a little bit.

Saturday morning we got up early and went to the Family Wisdom Conference, {www.familywisdom.org}, where I had a booth selling some reusable sandwich bags {abibags.etsy.com} It was a long day, we were there from 9-4, but the kids were very helpful and well behaved.  We sold quite a bit. Again, I didn’t go outside, but the kids played outside while I was at the booth. Afterwards, we went to the hospital to see my kids’ great-Grandma. Most of the Great-Grandchildren were there so that we could get a picture for their Great Grandma. It was very nice. I went right to Target and had it printed for her. We ate dinner out on Saturday because we didn’t get home until after 7pm.

Sunday was a big day. We left for Grand Rapids about 7am. Our first stop was at the Fredrick Meijer Gardens {www.meijergardens.org}, which we arrived to at 9:30am. Not bad. We went to see the Butterflies are Blooming exhibit. It is so beautiful and fun to see them.

After I took over 200 hundred pictures and spent 3 hours wandering the Gardens, we headed to our next destination…To the Grand Rapids Public Museum. They were having a special bugs exhibit and it was pretty cool.

the 3 stages

BIG bugs

Whale Skeleton

We certainly had a fun time. We will have to take some more adventures this summer. I took just over 400 pictures. I need to sort through them and do something with them!

 

Outdoor Challenge::Thursday

So much for my meal plan. Well, it has given me a base to start at, and I kinda know where I am going with it. But as with most Thursdays, they are a little difficult. Isabella has choir from 6-7 and on normal days we don’t get home from school until a little after 4pm. Add in now that Ashley has started Tennis, which gets done at 4:30. My plan was to make chicken strips for dinner, but I felt miserable with a cold  and with essentially no time or motivation, we opted for something easy….Make-your-own-sandwiches. Turned out to be a good idea.  After we went to choir, I took the kids to get some ice cream or a slush at Bardon’s {YUM} and we headed to Kid’s Kove, a nearby playground. We had lots of fun, hardly anyone was there because it was starting to sprinkle.

Ashley and her ice cream {a hot fudge sundae}

Isabella chose a slushy for her treat

Brandon also chose a slushy

playing at the playground

Ashley swinging

It was a fun night. It was peaceful because no one was there, and the kids could do as they pleased.

 

Outdoor Challenge::Wednesday

Good Morning!

I uploaded my pictures last night, and went to bed before they were done. We had a meeting last night, which was right at dinner time. So, I switched up my meal plan, and made the crockpot chicken yesterday. We had it right when we came home and it was delicious. I just put some boneless skinless chicken, 2 cans of cream of chicken, 2 cans of Rotel tomatoes and a little bit of water, pepper and chili powder then topped of with some cheese, and corn tortillas. It’s a food the kids love, which is great because they don’t always like the same things.

After dinner we voted on where to go for a walk. Which, honestly I don’t know why I ask, because no one ever wants to do the same thing. I wanted to go to the State Hospital again, but I was voted down. Brandon really wanted to go to the playground at the Civic Center::Kid’s Kove, but Ashley didn’t want to. I told them, that I really wanted to be able to do something as a family not me sitting and watching them play. So, I decided we would head to the beach. It was a gorgeous night, in the mid 70′s. The water was freezing, but we weren’t planning on swimming. It was fun. The sunset was beautiful, and they got to put their toes in the freezing water, and see the hundreds of seagulls at the docks. I like these nights with them, and the going for walks, because they are really well behaved for the most part, and they enjoy it.

Running to go see how cold the water is…

The water is REALLY cold!

My son and I

the clear water of the bay

Now, I am really not sure what we did on Tuesday. I will have to ponder that. hmmm. I know Isabella had brownies, and then I don’t know what we did the rest of the night, or even what we ended up eating for dinner.