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Because of my husband……

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I have to say that I am the luckiest wife on earth because I have a husband who loves me & adores me as much as I love & adore him.  Because I have a husband who loves & adores me, I was able to make this beautiful shawl.  While  he was away in Germany on a business trip, he took the time to find this beautiful alpaca yarn for me! 

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He also brought me back some beautiful Regia sock yarn and some of the most delicious chocolate! 

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Yes, Milka is available in Walmarts in our area, but let me be clear.  It. Is. Not. The. Same!  The chocolate that comes from Germany is much softer & silkier in texture,and the flavor is smoother than what we have here in America.  

And, no, he didn’t leave the kids out!  He also brought them back some chocolate & real German gummy bears (again, much better than American), as well as some sock yarn for Melia, a messenger bag for Katie, and a hat, flashlight, really cool shirt for Michael.

 

Even though he had a wonderful time in Germany, he was very glad to be home, and we were even more glad to have him home!  God did look out for him and provide some beautiful weather for him on his trip, especially the weekend he got to go to Innsbruck, Austria and visit the Alps.  I’ll have to post some pics of that another time. 

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Menu Plan: 04/30–05/06

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I confess, I’ve been very bad about menu planning the last few months.  When life became chaotic & I never knew when we would get home, I let my menu planning fall to the wayside.  (SIGH)  I know better. When I do this, my grocery budget suffers.  Badly.  As well as our eating out (read: swinging through the drive-thru) goes up.  Thankfully, things are settling down and I am finding more time to fix good homemade meals again.  And we’re all very thankful since we’d rather eat at home than eat out any day. 

 

AND, now that it’s summer-like weather here in good ol’ East Tennessee, it’s time for me to start switching over to my summer cooking routine.  This will be a bit hard through the month of May since we still have Awana and our homeschool co-op classes, but I’m going to do my best to stick to my plan and keep our eating out down to the very bare minimum (hopefully none).  My plan this week will include some of the chicken that I cooked Saturday night in the Crock Pot ™.  I put 5 pounds of chicken breasts into the Crock Pot ™ on Saturday.  I used 4 of them to make homemade chicken salad yesterday morning, which turned out delicious!!  (I’ll try to share the recipe with you later on this week.)  So, my menu plan this week will be using some of that chicken in another meal.  The rest will be divide  & frozen for future quick meals.  I’m also using ingredients that I already have on hand. 

 

Breakfast:

  • Amish Baked Oatmeal with fresh/dried fruit added (made a double batch, which should last us most of the week)
  • Fruit/Yogurt
  • Oatmeal Pancakes
  • Egg Cups (Bacon & eggs baked in the oven in muffin tins)

 

Lunch:

  • Sandwiches on homemade whole wheat bread
  • Leftovers

 

Dinner:

  • Roasted chicken with veggies
  • Homemade Pizza (might do
  • Chicken Alfredo
  • Crock Pot ™ Beef Stew with homemade rolls
  • Chicken Enchiladas with homemade whole wheat tortillas & homemade enchilada sauce
  • Hoagie Sandwiches on homemade whole wheat bread- choice of Ham, Turkey, or homemade chicken salad
  • Spaghetti with sauce & homemade garlic bread

See, I’m keeping things pretty simple around here, but they will be good, home cooked, filling meals that will keep us from eating out!  So, what’s on your menu for the week? Not sure what to fix?  Head on over to Organizing Junkie for more great menu planning ideas!

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Where I’ve been…

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Wow!  I can’t believe it’s been almost 2 months since my last blog post.  To say that life has been crazy busy would be an understatement. With the official coming of spring, it seemed like even our busy lives took on a whole new meaning.  Even with spring break thrown in, it seemed like we never really slowed down.  With that being said, I had decided to allow myself a short hiatus from blogging.  Little did I know that I would “disappear” for almost 2 months.  But, I really needed the break, and I’m so glad that I have the freedom to take that break when I feel that it is necessary. 

So, I’m back! And I hope to be back to making regular blog posts again.  They still may be a bit scattered, but I’m going to shoot for about 3 to 4 a week!  That should be easy enough since I have LOTS to share with you!  There have been some interesting things going on at My Country Haven, so stay tuned to find out what my family & I have been up to!