Menu Plan Monday: Oct 26th~31st

I know you may be saying, "oh look, Lora's menu planning again...", but I love doing this post every week. I don't know how I ever survived before menu planning. If, for some reason, I don't get my plan made by Monday--or, heaven forbid, not at all--its a very bad thing. My whole week is off. So if you've never tried menu planning, I highly recommend it.

In the past I've shared some of my frustrations with my kiddos *picky-ness*. I am still searching my recipes each week for dishes that everybody will eat (since I refuse to be a short-order cook!). This week I was very plesantly surprised at the kiddos' response to one of mine and Vince's fave comfort foods: pot pie! I had some roasted turkey in the freezer and thought that would be a great way to use it. The recipe I use is from Among Friends: Just a Matter of Thyme. I've been using it for years, its so easy and good. I've made more complicated and fancier pot pies, but this one is just a classic.

Chicken Pot Pie
1 whole chicken, cooked and deboned
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 can mixed vegetables, drained
1 cup chicken broth
1 recipe for double crust pie crust
*****
Dice the chicken into bite-sized pieces. Mix with the soup, vegetables and broth. Heat and stir until smooth. This may be done in the microwave or on the stovetop. Pour mixture into a 9" unbaked pie shell. Top with another 9" unbaked pie shell. Bake at 350F for 35-45 minutes or until crust is light brown. Serves 4-6.

Easy Homemade Pie Crust
2 cups flour
8 Tbls. shortening
8 Tbls. water
dash of salt
*****
Cut the shortening into the flour until it resembles crumbs. Next add in the water and salt; mix well and shape into a dough ball. Divide in half, roll out each half and there you have your two pie shells.

So here's what's cooking this week:
Monday: Mac-n-cheese with mixed veggies
Tuesday: Baked chicken, baked potatoes, veggie
Wednesday: my favorite potato soup
Thursday: Pumpkin Carving Dinner~
white chili, cornbread, cookies, cinnamon apple cider
Friday: Homeschool Co-op Potluck~
pigs-in-blankets
Saturday: Stromboli

This post is linked to Menu Plan Monday at I'm an Organizing Junkie.

The Making of an Egyptian Death Mask

We are learning all about the ancient world this year with Story of the World I and loving it! We've been learning a lot about Egypt, of course, which is completely fascinating. Most recently we have studied the New Kingdom of Egypt, which includes the story of King Tut. So we decided making an Egyptian death mask in the style of King Tut's would be a fun project. First since it was too cold at the time to paper mache in the garage (it probably would have frozen instead of dried-ha) and it was too messy to do it in the house, we decided to pick up a couple of cheap craft masks at Hobby Lobby. Next we cut out cardboard shapes to complete the shape of the death mask, attaching them with hot glue. Vince even put a little detail on the *beard* with the hot glue per The Princess' request. Then the kiddos started to paint them with this metallic gold tempera paint. It worked okay for the cardboard, but would not coat the plastic of the mask. We thought maybe a second coat ...

Door Hanger Chore Charts

My kids have had a chore chart for a while. It's one of those magnetic boards and they share it. However, it's not by their rooms and often they (and I) forget to update it. Plus it's a little bulky. When I saw the concept of a door hanger chore chart on Pinterest, I loved it! It was compact, right there were the kiddos could see it coming out and going into their rooms, and it costs almost nothing to make. I headed over to one of my favorite stores: Hobby Lobby, of course. They have these little wooden door hangers for .79. I also grabbed a couple of packets of decorative buttons for $1.99 each. I already had the clothes pins and the paint so those cost me nothing. I began by painting the door hangers (I used tempera paints because that's what I had). Then I grabbed a fine point Sharpie and the clothes pins and started writing chores on them, making sure to write them correctly so they will ...

Making Notebooks

Recently I tried out a new craft idea~and it was SO much fun!! And extremely frugal, too. That's always a bonus, right? So here we go: 1. Take your basic composition notebook (purchased at the back-to-school sales for .99 each). 2. Go to your craft supplies and get your Mod Podge ready, along with a good paintbrush. 3. Look through all those scrapbook papers you've been randomly collecting and choose some. 3. After choosing your paper for the cover of your book and trimming it to fit, start *painting* the cover with the glue. Next, give the back of your paper a good coat of glue, too. (I left the binding uncovered so that I could use a contrasting paper there later on). 4. Glue it on! Remember to smooth out any air bubbles under the paper. 5. Flip the cover open and make a few cuts on the corners so that they will fold over nice and neat, then add a little more glue to the edges of the inside cover and a little more to the paper edges. 6. Fold them over and press...

my blessed life

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