I almost stopped at the Value Village thrift store yesterday, but ended up not going. That was a good thing. Today, I called my friend Stephanie for a totally different reason, and she told me that Value Village was doing a half off sale today. As soon as Stephen got home from work, I headed up there.

It was crazy – I got SO many clothes today! I went looking for the guys, and did pretty well for all of them. Some of the prices I don’t remember exactly, but here’s a list of what came home with me:

For Stephen:
4 polo shirts (brands like Nautica and Chaps for about $2.50 each)
2 pairs of khakis ($2.25 for one and $4.50 for the other pair)

Me:
Two sleeveless tops ($.75 and $1.25) – great for layering. The $.75 one is 100% silk!
3 pairs of “fun” socks. I have a thing for funky socks, lol. ($.30 and $.40 a pair)

S:
1 Duck Head vest ($1)
3 polos (Baby Gap – it looks brand new – paid $1 for it)
Most important – a new-to-him John Deere t-shirt ($.50) LOL!

C:
3 t-shirts
1 long-sleeved dress shirt (about $1)
2 pairs dress pants (Old Navy and Children’s Place – $1 each)
1 pair Carter’s sweat pants – brand new, never worn (also $1)
1 long-sleeved romper/play outfit (one piece, shirt and pants – Children’s Place, $1.25)

Overall I spent $32.01 and some change. It was a real blessing to be able to go. I keep a running list of our clothing needs in my Palm and it’s nice to be able to take so many of those needs off the list.

We had so many leftovers last week that a lot of our meals got pushed to this week.

28 Sunday – venison cubed steak, brown rice, green beans

29 Monday – tacos and wheat tortilla recipe

30 Tuesday – rubber chicken (one of Leanne Ely’s recipes I found years ago via FlyLady’s emails)

1 Wednesday – soup with broth from Tuesday’s chicken – maybe broccoli cheese

2 Thursday – meatballs and mashed sweet potatoes

3 Friday – pizza (white flour crust recipe, whole wheat crust recipe, low-carb crust recipe).

4 Saturday – hot dogs

You can read more menu plans over at I’m an Organizing Junkie.

I received an email this week asking me if I would design a bracelet for a woman dealing with breast cancer. October is Breast Cancer Awareness month, so I thought that was good timing. Here is what the finished bracelet looks like.

(click to view the bracelet in the store)

My best friend is an oncology nurse, and this is what she has to say about breast cancer:

It is a great time to remind women that monthly self breast exams, doctor physicals and yearly mammograms are excellent at early detection, and early detection often means a much less invasive treatment option as well as increasing the chances of remission. As always it is a good time to remember those we have lost to the disease!

We made a train the other day to help S learn blends in phonics. I let him help me make it – and we had an absolute blast. We used card stock – regular printer card stock for the background and scrapbooking card stock for the train itself.

The curriculum suggested using sticky notes on the train with each letter printed on it. I had already made up some 3×5 alphabet flash cards with letters on them, so we used those in the train cars. When we glued each car down, we only glued three of the sides so that there would be a pocket for the letter card to fit into.

The letter flashcards are blank 3×5 cards with manuscript letters on one side and cursive on the other. They’re just cards I made in Word and printed up myself.

Each car is on a separate sheet of card stock. The train is shortened easily, and it will be easy to store too. I was going to use posterboard, but the only piece I found in the closet was too banged up to use. This turned out nicer than the posterboard would have anyway. :O)

It turned out really well. It uses S’s favorite colors, and he loves trains, so he likes it. I’m hoping to be able to use it for years to come too.

This is what it looks like with all five vowel cards lined up. We don’t use all five at once, but here they all are together:

Theme:

This week I want to invite you to take a moment and post a Summer Photo Essay memoir. Starting from around the official date of Summer to this past week – just give a basic summary of your summer as I know someone of you are photoholics! Haha! Make sure you jot down your memoirs about each photo so everyone can read about your summer. You can do the essay however you want. You can journal a lot of just caption the photo! Can’t wait to see what you all do!

I had an interesting time putting this together. At first, I thought I had deleted two months’ worth of pictures from my hard drive! Then I realized that our digital camera broke and I just didn’t take that many pictures this summer.

We stayed home for the most part. We didn’t do much out of the ordinary, but it was still a wonderful summer. Lots of staying home and enjoying each other.

That said, here are a few of the pictures from this summer:

C and I at our church’s 4th of July fellowship

S playing with sparklers at the party

Saphena – our youngest goat that was born here

Making stromboli together

Brothers playing together

My great grandmother used to make sugar cookies that she simply called “white cookies.” They’re a moist cookie made with sour cream and nutmeg. Ever since I bought all that sour cream last week, I’ve been thinking of making these cookies. Today, I broke down and made them. I made a few revisions though – substituted half of the white flour for wheat, and a cup of the sugar for Splenda. They tasted great! Next time I make them, I’d like to try making them with 100% Splenda and all wheat flour.

If only I’d remembered the coffee with the cookies. It was good right after eating the cookies though. This is my favorite teacup. And just for the record – I didn’t eat that whole plate of cookies! LOL!

Here’s the recipe the way I made it today. The original recipe is at the bottom.

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White Cookies (Reduced Sugar and using Wheat Flour)
Makes 24 cookies

1/2 cup sugar
1 cup splenda granular
1 egg
1 cup sour cream
1/4 cup shortening
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour

Cream together sugar and egg, add sour cream and shortening, beating well after each addition. Stir in dry ingredients.

Place dough on floured board, and roll dough out to an inch thickness (mine were closer to 1/2 inch, and still baked up nice and fluffy). Cut out cookies.

Bake at 400 for 10 minutes, or until edges have barely begun to brown.

Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 95 Calories; 5g Fat (41.9% calories from fat); 2g Protein; 12g Carbohydrate; 1g Dietary Fiber; 13mg Cholesterol; 81mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1/2 Grain(Starch); 0 Lean Meat; 0 Non-Fat Milk; 1 Fat; 1/2 Other Carbohydrates.

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White Cookies (the way my grandma and her mom made them)

1 1/2 cups sugar
1 egg
1 cup sour cream
1/4 cup shortening
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
2 cups all-purpose flour

Cream together sugar and egg, add sour cream and shortening, beating well after each addition. Stir in dry ingredients.

Place dough on floured board, and roll dough out to an inch thickness. Cut out cookies. Grandma always used a drinking glass.

Bake at 400 for 10 minutes, or until edges have barely begun to brown.

Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 129 Calories; 4g Fat (30.8% calories from fat); 2g Protein; 21g Carbohydrate; trace Dietary Fiber; 13mg Cholesterol; 81mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1/2 Grain(Starch); 0 Lean Meat; 0 Non-Fat Milk; 1 Fat; 1 Other Carbohydrates.

What a praise. Stephen drives 300 to 500 miles a week for work. As of today, he had already driven 400 miles. That was before he left for work this morning. He needed to get gas today.

I called Stephen on his cell a while after he left to let him know which account to use for gas. I had just gotten off the phone with him when his boss called. I told him Stephen had already left, but that he should be able to reach him on his cell.

Then Stephen called me back. His boss had called to tell him to stay home because of gas prices. Since he’d left two hours earlier though, he told him he’d meet him somewhere and fill his car up with gas.

I was floored.

Then – his boss ended up following him home so that he could gas up my van too. He would have – except every single gas station in our town is out of gas (I cannot wait for this gas shortage to be over with).

I’m not disappointed about not having gas in my van – I didn’t have plans for the next day or so anyway. I am extremely humbled that he would think to consider my van.

God is so good. I love seeing how He provides in ways I never expect!

The neighbor lady brought S a blue-tailed skink that she caught while she was working in her yard. This is what S had to say about it:

It jumped out of the bucket about 5 minutes after I took the video. Go figure.

I just put S to bed not 5 minutes ago. Then he came right back out of his room.

“I need to brush my teeth, Mommy. Or else they’ll fall out into my bed and make a mess.”

This has nothing to do with today’s dentist appointment, lol. Really.

He has a chart on the back of his door of things he needs to do when he gets up in the morning and right before he goes to bed. Brushing his teeth is indeed on his before-bed list.

I can hear noises coming from his bathroom, but no running water yet. I still think he’s stalling.

This week is a strange one with menu planning. It’s a cross between eating what we already have and eating low carb/South Beach friendly. Hey – when God provides you with food, you don’t complain if it’s not whole wheat or low carb!

21 Sunday – church fellowship – I brought venison and brown rice (think chicken and rice) and green beans. Then a bunch of food got sent home with us. We’ll be eating the leftovers for lunches this week.

22 Monday – leftover Chinese chicken from the school for the guys – something soft for me. I’m hoping to be able to eat some of that Chinese later though. Hopefully there’ll still be some Chinese left when the numbness leaves.

23 Tuesday – chicken noodle soup (crockpot)

24 Wednesday – tossed salads with chicken breast

25 Thursday – beef and pepper stir fry (using venison) over brown rice

26 Friday – pizza (white flour crust recipe, whole wheat crust recipe, low-carb crust recipe).

27 Saturday – meatballs and mashed sweet potatoes

Our family favorite for this week is the pizza. We LOVE homemade pizza! We usually top it with whatever toppings are in the house, but some of our favorites are mushrooms (everyone’s favorite), ham, pepperoni, sausage, and green peppers. I LOVED the low carb pizza crust recipe, so I will at least make that for me Friday night. I might make it for the whole family, but I’m not sure about that yet.

You can read more menu plans over at I’m an Organizing Junkie.