Category — easy

Yep, those are my 3 youngest boys asleep on the floor. Never mind the piles of clothing or junk on the floor or that they each have a perfectly good bed waiting for them.

They are little roamers who sometimes sleep UNDER the beds. I never know where I’m going to find a little body in the middle of the night, to trip over. Sometimes one will be asleep in the doorway or completely in the hall. Why the beds aren’t appealing I don’t know. The thing that cracked me up about last night was that Luke-Xavier has now joined in the fun. Baby no more!

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I wanted to say thank you to all of you who sent recipes for easy and inexpensive meals that can be stretched. I received some GREAT recipes! So far, they’ve been tasty, easy and enjoyed.

Thanks!

Have a great day~

A few years ago (4 or 5) we went “all cellular”. When we looked at our phone bills and what kind of calling we were doing, we decided that we didn’t need a land-line and that we would save $ by just having the cell phones. It took a few months of tweaking everything so that our plan fit our usage, but it’s worked well for us for years. Fast forward to 2007…………..now we have 6 cell phones, 1 for each of the 3 oldest kiddos, 1 for Clay, 1 for me and 1 that is the “home phone”. When I got the bill, due for January, I wanted to fall over. We paid almost $200 for texting, alone! I went to the cell phone store and fixed the plan so that it won’t happen that way, again, but it still leaves me with a HEFTY phone bill, right after Christmas. YIKES!

Now, if you were to ask members of the family, under 30, how to pay for the extra large phone bill, you might get answers involving “magic money” or “the money tree”. Ask Clay or me and you’ll hear this; Well the only place to really pull “extra” from would be the food budget. So, the only way to pay for all those SUPER, important texts that HAD to be made, is to shave off of the food budget. So, yesterday I armed myself with pen and paper and sat down to write out meal plans for the next 14 days. Now, breakfast is easy because you can always have hot cereal or cold cereal and everyone feels like they’ve had a choice. And lunch, well PBnJ for 2 weeks will have to do. It’s the dinner-time plan that’s the most challenging. I was able to come up with 9 dinners, using mostly what is in the cupboards and freezer. Now the really challenging part is picking my brain for the other 5 meals and trying to keep it all under $150. Here’s where I get to revisit the past. (memory sequence………………..)

It’s 1994, we’re living in military housing at Camp Pendleton. We have 3 kiddos (and depending on how far into the year we are, we have one on the way) and we are now living on one income and have one vehicle. I suddenly went from working full time to being a full-time stay-at-home mom. We had sat down with the budget the year before and made the decision that putting 3 kiddos into daycare and buying a second car, for me to continue working, would not pay. So, we decided on complete breast-feeding (I was about to deliver Baby #3), cloth diapers, stick with one car and agree to watch the soon-to-be new baby across the street when that mom went back to work. Whew! But the budget was still VERY tight. I had $300 every month for food. The real kicker was that the budget only allowed for the money on the 15th. I couldn’t use ANY of the money from the 1st paycheck of the month for food. I learned by trial and error, what foods could be successfully frozen and how long things kept in the fridge. BTW-don’t freeze oranges. But, I have to say that we were never hungry and our meals weren’t terribly boring (however, looking at old photos, we were all much thinner). Times were simpler. We couldn’t just jump in the car and run errands or pull into a fast-food restaurant because it was easy. I took walks with the kids and they played, happily with what they had. There are times that I miss the way it was (ok, I don’t REALLY want to have to give up Starbucks or putting exciting new foods into the basket, but the simplicity was nice).

So, I feel confident that I can pull from my memory and whip together a few, well-planned, meals. And a couple of weeks of “light” meals won’t hurt any of us (check the pictures!)

Have some great, simple meal ideas? Share them!

Have a great day~

As you can see JJ’s arm did get cast. This is an update from an earlier post. Luckily he will be able to be seen and get the cast off before he goes back to school. We are learning a lot about having kids who live away from home and the details of things, like Dr. visits. We have to change both Kateri and JJ’s status so that they can easily see a Dr. where they are at school and then change it back again for each summer. Now, that’s all fine and easy sounding, but I am up to my eye-balls in paper work. I’ve even been asked the question, “what do you do”? meaning what line of work am I in that I have so much paper work to do all the time. Nope, no work, just mothering 9 kids and filling out endless papers in quadruplet. It never stops! But here’s a good example of how far behind I can get or how things get put on the back burner;

Luke-Xavier is 20m. old. We found out a while ago that he needed some paper work done to be able to continue seeing the Dr. Well, in order to do the paper work, they needed his birth certificate. I finally went and got it yesterday. It took all of 5 minutes and required no identification (which made me leery!), but it was the fact of taking the drive to the office that had made me keep putting it off. Crazy! Well, now we have the birth certificate and can make the appointment to do the OTHER paper work so that Luke-Xavier can finally go to a Dr. if needed (he has not been sick or this would have probably been done earlier).

I just keep doing things on an “as needed” basis, because the projects and paperwork are endless. If you have been expecting papers from me and they haven’t shown up, now you know why~

Have a great day~

Merry Christmas to everyone! Around here the excitement is building and the kiddos are getting antsy. One or two are wondering if they’re getting coal. This year, we’re doing a few things differently, like getting our tree for Christmas Eve and doing the Christmas letter digitally. In this show, I remember a very military Christmas, way back in 1995.

Thanks for visiting MommyofMany.com and for listening. You can subscribe to the show by clicking the button on the left of the page. You can always email me at Jen@MommyofMany.com, or share your Christmas memories, right here, on the site. I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas! Enjoy!

A few weeks ago, a good friend of mine shared with me that she made MommyofMany.com her home page. I hadn’t even thought of that! So now every time she sits down at the computer she gets the latest blog or show without having to think about it. I thought I’d share the idea. We’ve also made it SUPER easy for you to subscribe to the show in iTunes. Simply click the button at the top, left of the site and voila……everytime a new show is posted you’ll already have it! You can now go to iTunes and find the show and leave a review. I would greatly appreciate it if you were able to take a minute and leave a review there.

Thanks to all of you for visiting and listening! All of your comments and emails are making this a fun and exciting project!

Have a great day~

 The Morning Memo is a tool I’ve used for the last few years to help keep my family organized. It lets everyone know what to expect from the day. It’s been very successful!

Here’s a picture of Lady Kluck and Maid Marian, in case you didn’t get a mental visual of Max’s words.  

This is a lesson I’ve been working on for awhile. It has taken a bit of experimentation and observation. But, I feel pretty confident about it. Bigger kids/teens need positive physical contact. It can change their mood and how they respond. Think about when our kids are little. We are constantly picking them up and kissing them or squeezing their sweet, little bodies. We nurse them and hold them and rock them. Then, suddenly there comes an age where physical contact goes by the wayside. They stop pulling at our arms and stop saying, “hold me”. But, they still need it. They just stop vocalizing it. Think about seeing teens or middle-schoolers and how they greet one another. They usually give each other a hug. Hugging becomes a big part of showing friendship and acceptance. One of my children stopped asking for hugs or being held pretty early on, because they became a “big” sibling at a young age and soon had 2 and 3 younger siblings who were demanding my attention. I started to realize that when this child became grumpy and even mouthy, that I could “love” them out of it. Clay and I started grabbing this particular child, every time they got “poopy” and giving them a big hug and saying something kind or even silly and it made all the difference. But truly, the best example, in our home, has been with one of our teens. This kiddo had become sullen, mouthy and even violent. The times that I could remember to speak softly and give a hug (sometimes under the guise of being silly) instead of yelling back and threatening extra chores, worked out WAY better. I even involved the other kids and would say, “That’s it! Everyone hug” So and So. This always diffused the tense situation. Now, I’m not saying that it’s the solution to all problems (that’s a drink of water) but, it is something to keep in mind on a daily basis and when you just don’t know what to do with your older child or teen. A hug can never hurt and it may even give you the minute you need to think of a solution that doesn’t involve yelling. Do I remember this all the time? Heck no! But, it’s a lesson that I keep revisiting and I’m always more pleased with the result when I DO remember.

So, lesson #4-Big kids need hugs and positive physical contact even though they may not voice it.

Have a great day~

Except for today!  This morning I woke to the soothing sound of the rain and realized how much I missed it.  When I got the kids all bundled (like little marshmallows) and into the car to get to school, I found out that only ONE of my windshield wipers worked.  Who would know?!  It’s been awhile since we needed them.  Luckily it was the driver’s side that worked, so I was able to get the kids to school and then drive to the dealer to have it checked out.  It came down to something being loose.  Whew!  Easy and free fix.  The rest of the day was spent indoors doing “rainy day” things like reading books and watching movies (ok, those were the kids activities.  I still had to fold clothes and wash dishes).  So, the grocery shopping will have to wait for a drier day (surely tomorrow).  

Today’s Dance of the Children was a slow dance.

Good night~ 

As in any house, I use many cleaning products to get the job done.  But there are 3 things that I can not live without.  

1. Mr. Clean Magic Eraser-This product is perfectly named, because it IS magic!  I am able to clean textured wall, appliance handles, porous countertops, and cabinet fronts like I was never able to before.  I discovered the “Magic Eraser” about 3 1/2 years ago while in the commissary.  I had heard of it and decided to give it a try.  So, I bought a 2-pack and tried them on the appliance handles when I got home.  I quickly moved on to the hall walls.  By then I was out of “Magic Erasers” and stopped a neighbor who was on her way to the commissary and gave her $20 to get me as many as she could.  I’ve never looked back!  There have been some emails that have gone around about children getting “burns” on their skin from using the product.  I’m wondering if these are children who have a skin sensitivity to begin with, because my children have all (and I do mean ALL) used the product either to clean an area of the house that they were assigned to, or if it was one of the littler ones, to “clean” along side me and have never had a problem.  So, it’s probably best to be careful if you’re unsure about skin reactions in your own children, but as an adult I can’t say enough about the amazing ability of this product to get rid of deep-down grime!  

2. Shout Color Catchers-Laundry became so much easier after I found out about this product!  I used to sort all the colors in combos like; red and pink, black and dark blue, etc. Of course there were always strange combinations that I wasn’t really sure what to do with .  The Color Catcher takes the fuss out of it all.  You just through a Color Catcher sheet in with your wash (I’ve used 1/2 a sheet on older clothes that I don’t think are going to bleed and have used 2 sheets with new, red items) and it “catches” all the stray dye that is in the water.  The sheets come out in amazing colors!  You can find them on the laundry isle.  I recommend never doing another load of colored laundry without them!  I know I won’t.   

3. Clorox Bleach Pen-I love being able to control exactly where the bleach ends up!  3 of my kiddos wear white, uniform shirts to school.  That means there’s a lot of bleaching that happens.  This product is great for just touching up the exact spot that needs it.  I also use it on the grout in the kitchen counters.  It gets in and cleans out the stains better than anything else I’ve found.  This is definitely not a product that I would let the kiddos use, because it is bleach and could be harmful to their skin, clothing, etc.  But, I am a huge fan.  

Alright, those are 3 amazing things that make it possible for me to feel like the house is liveable.  If you have a great product that you rely on, I’d love to hear about it and give it a try. 

Have a great night~  

Whew!  What a day!  Not only did I stay sick, but Luke-Xavier, Gabi, Maddi and my sister all got sick.  I feel like putting up a quarantine sign.  Clay just went to bed, saying he felt “achy”.   I’m really hoping the JJ and Kateri stay well.  So, with the yuckiness in the house, we decided we didn’t want to follow through on our plans to go to the Island Club.  First of all, we didn’t want to pay for people who couldn’t/weren’t going to eat.  And second of all, it’s Thanksgiving and that means we should be together.  So, in between naps I formulated a dinner plan. I knew that there was Stovetop stuffing and 2 cans of cranberry sauce in the cupboard, as well as a large box of mashed potatoes from Costco.  There were frozen green beans in the freezer and even a frozen apple pie.  So, I made a short shopping list; 2 prebaked chickens, a box of Ritz crackers (for a green bean casserole that we love), whipped cream, vanilla ice cream and sparkling cider.  Dinner took about an hour to throw together and we all gathered around the table.  Those who weren’t eating sipped water or cider and the others enjoyed a decent substitution for “real” Thanksgiving dinner.  And for the first time, no one walked away feeling like they were going to burst.  We went around the table sharing the #1 thing we were each thankful for and then cleaned up and watched a movie.  I wish we all felt better, but all in all, it was a good day.  I hope you each had a great day and that none of you are sick! Good night~ 

LOL! You just never know what you’ll find around here. I want to share the EASY recipe I stumbled on, early this morning.

Dehydrated Baby Carrots:
1 handful of baby carrots
Child’s’ pants with pockets
Clothing dryer

Place handful of baby carrots in the pocket of the child’s pants. Wash pants with a large, colored load of laundry. Put pants and rest of load into dryer. Dry on high temp for 45 minutes. Viola! Dehydrated baby carrots. Enjoy!