What a Life!

Would you believe this was Ben’s favorite exhibit at the Lowry Park Zoo? Yes, construction equipment working on the update of one of the zoo’s exhibits. Steve tired of holding him like that long before he tired of watching.

Speaking of odd things, here is a list of my daily goals that seem to keep me on track. I feel so much better when I get the basics done. In fact, last night I was thinking that cooking a good meal makes me feel more pampered than getting my hair or nails done. And it’s something I need to do anyway. Here are some of the highlights of good things I try to do daily that make me feel really good when I’ve done them.

• Cook something. It may be something like bread or chicken broth that is just something that it needs to be done. Or it may be cooking a meal from scratch (vs. eating leftovers). One thing a day is my goal, and that seems to be working well.
• One load of laundry. Wash. Dry. And fold. Those three steps do not need to all be related to the same load (yes, I am quite loose with my expectations). But all three need to be done at some point. Again, seems to work well for me.
• Do something domestic. This may be paying bills, doing extra tidying in one room, planning our menu, or running errands. But one thing a day seems to help me keep on top of things without making me feel like I’ve devoted my entire life to homemaking.
• When the boys wake up, dress them and feed them breakfast as soon as possible. This relates to Ben, mostly. He’ll get up and head downstairs directly, and at 10:00 he will still be in his pajamas and not had a bite to eat yet. Then, of course, he isn’t hungry at noon for lunch and the day just unravels from there. Very simple, very effective – when I stick to this one.
• Same thing for myself when it comes to showering, dressing, putting on makeup and making my bed. Tidying the house in the morning just sets a tone for the day that makes such a difference. Ben also makes his own bed every day (though I still straighten it after him – he’ll get better at it as he gets older).
• Read a story to the boys once a day. Right now we’re reading Charlotte’s Web. Usually I do this soon after breakfast. Eventually I want to spend at least a half hour reading aloud to them out of books above their reading level on a daily basis. (Daily basis means at least four days a week, in my world.) This would also be laying the groundwork for a daily routine with homeschooling. One thing a day sets a routine that can be built upon.
• As it gets warmer, I’ll be implementing the go outside every day routine. Ideally, we’ll go for a walk. Also, ideally, the boys will spend time playing outside. Saturday with our high of 68 gave me a taste of how wonderful this will be when I can do it again.
• One final thing I want to do regularly is reading for myself. Mainly literature. Blogs don’t count. I bought the Well-Educated Mind and have found this book very insightful. In fact, I think it should be required reading for every high school student. There are all these snooty literary books on my bookshelf downstairs that make me look smart (the real reason why I keep them around, but I would never tell Steve that) but that I didn’t really read as well as I could have. Some of them are books I was assigned to read, most of them are books I had heard of as great literary works that I just wanted to read so I would know what they were about. Armed with what I’ve learned about how to read in the Well-Educated Mind, I am now going back through and really reading them this time. I have so many jewels on my bookshelf downstairs. Currently on my nightstand – Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.

Finally, one last weird thing, something that has nothing to do with pictures or daily activities. It completely baffles my husband – he just can’t wrap his mind around it.

Recently, in my menu planning efforts, I started plugging weekly routines into our menu. When we go to church on Saturday night (which is when I play the piano), the service starts at 5:30 so eating before church would be too early. But by the time we return home around 6:45, there is precious little time to feed everyone, then bathe the boys and get them to bed on time. I need a meal that I can just set on the table when we get home.

Enter: Potato salad and baked beans. This meal, along with homemade pickles and kuchen or cinnamon rolls was the Friday night tradition when I grew up. I love potato salad. I always make enough so there are leftovers, and I enjoy them immensely.

But here’s what my husband just can’t understand: Every week, when I make potato salad, I use a different recipe. I don’t have just one recipe that is My Potato Salad. My husband just doesn’t get that.

But…but there are so many good ways to make potato salad. I love all of them, and I enjoy trying new ways too. Seriously. Here are some of the highlights:

• I love recipes where you cook the potatoes, cool them enough to handle them, and then pour a marinade over them that flavors them as they cool in the refrigerator. I have two recipes like this, one where you pour olive oil, cider vinegar and some seasonings over it and one where you brown bacon and pour the drippings over the potatoes. Yum.
• After the potatoes (and marinade) have cooled, you add other ingredients – onions, pickles, cucumber, adjust the seasonings, and so forth. Then you add dressing – generally mayonnaise, sometimes a little sour cream as well.
• I also make recipes where you cool the potatoes and then cut them up and add stuff to them. That is how my mother (and my two grandmothers) made the potato salad I grew up with.
• Another version includes the basics – potatoes, boiled eggs, and mayonnaise along with key ingredient: Lawry’s salt. No other seasonings. Really, really good.
• I never put mustard in my potato salad, and I do not eat yellow potato salad when people serve it. Yuck.
• Also, no Miracle Whip. Miracle Whip is slightly sweet. Mayonnaise is tangy. Kraft Mayonnaise is my favorite. The others are not found in my refrigerator. Again, yuck.

Is this as strange as my husband thinks it is? I mean, why stick with one potato salad recipe when there are so many good ones out there to choose from?

Enough about my weird ways of doing things.

This post is a modified response to Julie’s 10 Weird Things. If you want to be tagged, consider yourself tagged.