cooking class

With Nathan in Kansas most of the time for work, he's basically living out of his truck and having to eat fast food meals all the time.  When he comes home we like to have good home-cooked meals so he can enjoy being at home and having food that he misses.  The last time that he came in town he had a request... MEATLOAF, MASHED POTATOES, and ASPARAGUS!  What a manly meal!  I love that my lumberjack likes my cooking! :)


Nathan has called my mom Mrs. Hen since he was in middle school, and my mom has always made a mean meatloaf.  With some help from my friend Sarah, I spruced it up a little.  And it was great!  I put them in muffin tins so the leftovers would be easier to put into the fridge.  Here's the recipe!

Mrs. Hen's Meatloaf

1 lb. hamburger meat

1/2 sleeve of Saltine crackers

1 egg

dash of seasoning salt

1/4 onion (chopped)

1/4 bell pepper (chopped)

**Instead of using the crackers, I bought a box of Stove Top stuffing and made it according to the directions on the box.  Instead of the egg, I added a cup of water to the mix so it wouldn't dry out and to help it all stick together. Thanks Sarah for the Stove Top idea!  It adds TONS of great flavor!

Mix all of the ingredients together.  Put into muffin tins and bake at 350 until golden brown!  Top them with ketchup then serve!

I love mashed potatoes, but I really love LOADED MASHED POTATOES!  Here's the recipe...

Loaded Mashed Potatoes

4 medium potatoes

chives/green onions (chopped)

bacon

3 Tbsp. butter

garlic to taste

salt to tast

4 oz. cream cheese

Wash and cube the potatoes.  Cook them in boiling water until tender.  Drain then Mash!  While the potatoes are boiling, cook the bacon and chop into small pieces.  Bacon makes everything better!  Mix the mashed potatoes with the green onions, bacon, butter, garlic, salt, and cream cheese.  The cream cheese is the secret ingredient.  It makes it taste AMAZING!

 

 

Nathan is a vegetable loving man!  He loves squash, zucchini, asparagus...anything!  When he said that he wanted Asparagus, I was thrilled because that's one of my favorite things!  I just saute the asparagus with olive oil, salt, and garlic powder.  I added a few onions in the mix to give us a little more!

I love cooking and Nathan was a happy camper!  I love when he's home so I can make him some good home-cooked meals. Gotta keep my Lumberjack fed well.  :)

school's out for the SUMMER!!! ....almost

School is almost out for summer! HALLELUJAH!!!   The kids are ready...the teachers are ready...summer is waiting just days away!  With the end of the year, comes end of the year exams.  For my math exam, the kids have to review over pretty much every topic that we've covered August thru May.  Instead of just sitting in class and listening to me babble on, I wanted to do something different!  I had an idea about using QR codes to create a scavenger hunt.  I went to talk to my good 'ol technology GURU Aimee and told her about my plan.  She's helped me and all of Sunnyvale throughout the year with all of our technology shortcomings and we LOVE her!  :)

I wanted my kids to be engaged and actually enjoy their review.  It took awhile to get it all put together and some planning to get each piece to work correctly, but it turned out GREAT and the kids LOVED it!

I came up with all of the questions that I wanted to use for the review first.  Then I went to the website, http://qrcode.kaywa.com/ to create all of the QR codes.  Most of the problems I typed into the website and it created a QR code.  However, some of the problems I wanted to give the kids needed images. Unfortunately you can't upload images...or at least I couldn't figure out how to do it on this generator.  For the problems that I wanted to add a little more to... I would write a question and then tell them to refer to a specific image in the Diagram packet that I gave them.  In the Diagram packet, I had 8 pictures or problems that they had to use to find the answer for that question.

I split the kids into groups of 5-7.  Each group had specific people in charge of tasks.  One person had the job of writing down the finalized answer for the group.  Another student was in charge of making sure that had the correct diagram when needed.  One kid was designated as the QR scanner.  (I took the kids iPhones the day before and downloaded the free app i-nigma for them to have a QR code reader on their phone.) All of the students in the group were responsible for helping each other to get the answer.  At the end of the scavenger hunt, the kids graded each other and had to give an explanation of why they were giving their classmate the grade.  It's always interesting when you see how brutally honest they are.  Some of the responses I got were..."I'm giving him a 100, because she knows how to do all of the math and he was a great leader for our group!" ....and.... "I'm giving her a 73, because she wasn't on task on a few problems and she was kinda mean to us on one question when we didn't all agree."   hahahaha!  Oh 7th graders....gotta love them!

After I had made up 27 questions, created 27 QR codes, drew 8 diagrams, made 12 copies of the diagram packet, passed out 70 pieces of scratch work paper, came up with 27 different locations to hang the codes, and come up with 27 different little riddles for clues to get them to the next code...I walked around and enjoyed the kids as they searched all over the school and sprawled out in the hallways to answer questions about solving equations, finding the slope of graphs, and solving Pythagorean Theorem.  Would it have been TONS easier to just stand at the front of the room and talk and do examples?  YES!  But watching them get excited about math...that's why I love what I do!

 

SOLVING THEIR PROBLEMS IN THE HALLWAYS!

 

QR CODES SPREAD THROUGHOUT THE SCHOOL!

WORKING HARD ON THE PROBLEMS!

our finished products!

My kids worked so hard all week on their Dilation Projects.  

They turned out GREAT!  

Here are a few of them! 

i should've been a art teacher....

This week in class we've been talking about dilations.  The actual definition of dilation is...a transformation in which a figure is enlarged or reduced using a scale factor.  We've made some great pictures this week in class! The kids have worked so hard.  

In Math Lab, we did dilation drawings where we reduced the image by 1/2.  In my Regular Math classes, we enlarged the images by 3.

Here are my little artists from Math Lab.

They reduced their image using a 1cm grid and transferred it to graph paper!

 

Here are the BIG projects!  My Regular Math kids worked all week.  They used a image and made a 1cm grid over it.  We wanted to enlarge our image 3 times as big, so we made a 3cm grid on poster board.  They turned out GREAT!!!

                       

 

    

I'll upload the finished products at the end of the week!

when the husbands away, the wife....redecorates!

With Nathan traveling so much for work...I have to keep myself busy or I get depressed. haha

I've been making to-do lists of everything that needs to be done around the house.  

To either get the house ready to sell, or to just spruce it up!

For those of you who know me well...I love to-do lists!  This list that I've made is the mother of all lists!

The first room I wanted to tackle was our 1/2 bath.  It's tiny and I knew I could knock it out quick.

Before, it was cute...but plain.  It had minimal decorations and just the flat builder grade paint in it.

We needed to get as much done for as cheap as possible, and I'm always doing DIY things, so I set off to the store.  I bought 1 gallon of WalMart ColorPlace paint in "Canyon."  

Then I headed to Lowe's...  Did you know if you want to buy a pre-made shelf they run anywhere from $20-$100 each!  And they're cheap junk...not even real wood!  So instead I went to the lumber section and got a 2x8x10 board and had them cut it into 3 equal parts for $6!  (They cut it for free!)  I picked up the wall mount brackets there also.  I raided my garage to find some leftover wedding decorations to put in the bathroom for decor.  I found a antique tinted wine bottle, a frame, a hurricane vase, and a OLD wooden shudder.  At Ross, I picked up the candle, Love sign, and the hand towels.  For everything, we spent...$52!!! 

I love it now!!!  It's a tiny bathroom, so I couldn't do too much to it...but it's perfect now!

Especially for only spending $52, we have a completely different bathroom now.  

I still want to add a little more to the curtain that's in there...but for now, I'm happy!

One room down...a million more to go!

Wedding bells!

I'm married!!!
I'll be posting pictures and wedding details soon...but for now...NO MORE WEDDING PLANNING!  WooHoo! I just want to stay at home with Nathan and not even say the word planning. haha  Our day was everything I ever dreamed about.  During our honeymoon, I kept telling Nathan...it was perfect!

In the mean time, enjoy my friend Savannah's blog about our wedding!  She took awesome pictures!!
http://www.savannahsmiled.com/2013/03/nk-wedding-day.html
I'll post pictures of the big day as soon as I get them!


love, the bride...aka the wife now :)

sew...i need a new hobby

I'm fairly crafty.  I make, DIY, fix, etc. all the time...

I've "dabbled" in sewing, but not too much. 
After running across this website

 http://chicenvelopements.wordpress.com/tutorials/

...I want to buy a sewing machine and start sewing like I'm working in a textile factory!

After we get done with the wedding and the honeymoon, Nathan will be rocking a new outfit everyday! haha  Off to Goodwill, to find me some clothes to mend!