This, That, and The Otter...

Do you have any idea how hard it is to cook dinner when all you can think about is sitting down to blog? And does that make me pathetic?

Now that my little monsters... er, I mean monkeys... are occupied with dinner I can do a brain dump.

THIS

It's funny how my husband and I are so different in the kitchen. He can cook, I mean REALLY cook. Anything I want, no matter how fancy it is, he can make it if I ask. I am not so talented in the kitchen. What I make I make rather well, but my repertoir is very limited. The longer we are married though, the better and more varied my profferings become.

There are 2 ways in which I am a genious in the kitchen, and he falls short.

When Super Hubbie cooks, I swear he uses EVERY. SINGLE. DISH. POT. PAN. AND UTENSIL we own. It literally looks like a bomb went off in my kitchen and the thought of cleaning up is enough to reduce a person to tears. I on the other hand use exactly 1 cutting board, 1 knife, 1 spoon, 1 whisk if needed, and no more than 2 or 3 pans. The counters stay clean and there is very little clean up needed. Just load the dishwasher and wash the pots and pans and VOILA! You're done! When the Super Hub cooks however, you eat like a glutton and then it takes 2 days to dig out the kitchen.

The other way that we are different is time. I have this ability to have everything I'm cooking done at the exact same time. Super Hubbie can't do this. When he cooks everything gets done one thing at a time. For example, I made home made taco mac for dinner tonight. My home made cheese sauce, taco meet, and pasta were all finished cooking at the exact same moment. If Super Hubbie had cooked it he would have done it one thing at a time. It must be that whole "guys can't multitask but we girls do it like it's an art" thing.

THAT

I've started school with my 2 home schoolers this week and it is going very well. I haven't started making any actual lesson plans yet, as we have another month before the school year officially starts. I wanted to start early so I could get an idea of how I can best serve ADHD boy as a teacher. I also want to get a head start so we can take a more laid back approach and take days off as needed. I am wanting to incorporate their AWANAs stuff into our curriculumn so I'm trying to get a lot of the Bible curriculumn done.

One of the best parts of my week has been listening to Elijah read out loud from the Bible. He is such a strong reader and he reads with such enthusiasm and uses great inflection. We read the main text from the NLT (New Living Translation) and then they do their book work using the KJV (King James Version) so that they will understand what they are reading but still have the wording that the curriculumn as well as AWANA and Sunday School expect.

It is really interesting seeing how differently their minds work. Emelia works well independantly, but does not easily or quickly grasp new things. Elijah on the other hand must not leave my site or he will never accomplish anything. He, on the other hand, grasps things quickly and easily. Having the big boys around makes it a bit challenging to keep ADHD boy on task, but I've managed to find things for them to do to keep them occupied and out of his hair. I am having run relearning all the stuff they are learning right along with them! I am very much looking forward to Sarah being ready for kindergarten, she is such a sponge and loves to learn. I'm in no hurry though, I'm soooo enjoying this stage and we'll take our time moving on the the next one.

THE OTTER

(If this doesn't make you go "awwwwwww" then you have no soul!)