That Should Do It

We’re keeping busy.  Today is bread making day, so the kids are excited about that.  They’ve been loving grinding wheat for me, and ask to do it nearly every day.  I’m learning to soak and sprout our wheat first, and I’m using the recipe that uses some ground flax seed for some extra omega-3s in our diet.  I’m using this recipe, and starting to tweak it a bit.  Soaking and sprouting the wheat berries has made a much softer, lighter loaf.

On the other end of the spectrum, we’re doing a science experiment today.  In order to learn the parts of a cell, we’re making some lemon jello (to be the cell) and putting in it all sorts of candy: jelly beans, m&ms, sprinkles, fruit roll ups, smarties…each representing a part of the cell.

So I don’t know if that negates all of the healthy foods I’m trying to get into our bodies, but if anything it will be memorable, and that’s good for the learning department.  Balance in all things, right?  The kids should have fun with that.  Well, all but Elias.  He gets to haul corn with his Daddy in the semi-truck today.  It’s his most favorite thing.

Silje and I got to go out together last night.  I cannot believe how much she has blossomed lately.  Her joy has just been bubbling over, and her desire to serve and learn have been growing right along with her legs and arms which have been aching constantly in growing pains lately.  We went to Perkins together where she talked me out of getting a burger and into some waffles, and we just laughed until our sides hurt, and then ran some errands together.

The little girls still have runny noses, and their noses and cheeks are just chapped like crazy.  They wake up every morning with terribly crusted faces.  I’ve been rubbing coconut oil on them to help soothe the constant wiping, and picked up some Burt’s Bees hand salve last night to see if that might help too.  They’re both starting to look better, and it doesn’t seem to bother them.  It bothers me more than it bothers them, I think.

I cannot believe I’ll be going to Colorado to the Mom Heart Conference in just 2 weeks.  I’m already aching in anticipation of leaving my kiddos.  I always have a really tough time leaving them, but this should be a really fun event, and Knut really thinks I need it.

I mentioned to Silje that my trip was now only 2 weeks away, and she requested that this time I should leave more meals for them than I did last time.  A few years ago, I left Knut with the kids with meals all ready to heat up.  I came back to a perfectly clean house, and clean kids.  Knut was a bit smug saying “I don’t know why you think this is so hard.  This was easy!”  So the next time I left him with the kids, I left only groceries in the fridge, and not ready-to-heat-up meals, so he could get a better picture.  (Hey, at least I didn’t make him do grocery shopping with all the kids!)

Silje is requesting that I don’t do that again.

Knut is actually a fabulous cook, but cooking, and cooking with kids underfoot are two completely different things.  Apparently the stress level of the house went up quite a bit, and peanut butter and jelly was served often.

So I think I’ll be doing some extra meal prep in the next few weeks too.  I think I’ll get some meatballs in the freezer, some chili, and a few more soups.  That should do it.