Monday Morning Musings - A New Way To Eat, A New Way To Clean, A New Way To Garden, A New Way To Read, And A Chinese New Year

One morning last week, I walked into my kitchen to make lunches and what I saw literally took my breath away. I had to stop for a minute and take in one of the most gorgeous sunrises I had ever seen. This picture I took with my phone just does not do it justice. It was magnificent and I was glad I was able to take a minute out of my busy morning to enjoy it and to give thanks to my Heavenly Father for such a beautiful sight.

This is the first normal week of school my kids have had all January long. For some ridiculous reason the first three weeks were all only 4 school days long. And next week is early out week all WEEK long (ridiculous!). The weekend of the 13th was a 4 day weekend. We were having lovely weather for the middle of winter, so Steve took Aubrey down to St. George with him for work. While they were there he taught her how to ride an ATV at the same place he taught Zac and Em when they were Aubrey's age. That same weekend Zac was able to go have an airsoft battle with his friend and Emily and Addy and I hung out with my mom and Lauren and Sam and Teresa who came down from Idaho for the weekend. My mom decided to try and make tamales again. By herself. With Lauren and Addy and Emily. I now have permission to slap her anytime she ever talks about making tamales again. I had to remind her that when we made them at Christmas we had 7 adults and 4 kids helping. And it took all dang day.

We just found out last week that in 2 years our elementary school will switch to year round so they can have different tracks to accommodate the amount of students we will have. I am not too happy about this at all. When my kids were younger, I wanted so bad to have year round school because summers made me so crazy. But now that I will have 2 kids in elementary and 2 who are not, we will not have the same breaks and I am not liking it one single bit. And now that my kids are older, I LOVE summers off from school. We have so much fun together. I will really hate having them in school part of the summer while the rest of us hang out at the pool.

Saturday was such a nice day. It rained all day long, before it started snowing. We spent the day in our pj's and just hung out around the house. We had crepes for breakfast, played games, watched American Idol. It was fun just hanging around the house all day with the family. Except poor Zac who wasn't with us during the first part of the day. He was on a Scout Klondike Campout. I think this is his 4th Klondike and he has fun every time he goes. He is a better scout than I, that's all I can say.

American Idol! It's back on! It's my most fav-O-rite show ever! When we watched the first episode this season, I must admit that during the opening segment, I teared up a little. It's true. I cannot even tell you the amount of excitement I have for this new season.

Last night when we were reading scriptures, the kids (Zac jumped up as soon as I got the camera out) wanted to read in plank position. I wasn't going to let them because I didn't think it was too reverent. But Steve said to let them because that way they couldn't touch each other or look at each other or bother each other in general. So we read scriptures while planking. I must say, it might have been one of the most reverent scripture reading sessions we've had.

Last week at story time at the library they celebrated Chinese New Year. Here is Addy under the dragon tail, parading through the library.

My mother and sister Lauren I have started this fabulous new way of cleaning our houses. We decided that we would go to each others house for one hour every week and work fast and furious cleaning. That way, with the 3 of us cleaning, it's like getting three hours worth of work done in one hour. The first few weeks we are actually doing this 5 days a week to get everything all cleaned out and all the problem areas taken care of so that everything can be nice and tidy and de-cluttered and then we can just come in and do our hour each week and have it all clean. It has been working out fantastically. We have done some pretty major projects that have been hanging over our heads for a while. Like my laundry room. I keep it locked so that no one can ever accidentally come to my house and find that door open and see into the pit of all pits that it was. But now, it is so fantastically clean and organized and loverly that I walk in there about 5 times a day just to stand and take in the beauty.

I have started taking an organic gardening class. It is once a week for 9 weeks, and I have been twice already. I LOVE it! LOVE IT LOVE IT LOVE IT! The lady that teaches it teaches in her home. She has the most remarkable gardens (I've heard tales and seen pictures) and even sells her organic produce to local restaurants. She is the sweetest lady, and in 2 lessons I have already learned so much. Not just about gardening but just about improving your life. It's fabulous. She teaches this class every year and I have already decided I am going next year.

After the gardening class, she has a raw luncheon at her house. This is for people at the class if they want to stay, and for really anyone who wants to come. Everything we eat is raw, and lemmetellyou, I have had some of the most interesting and fascinating and delicious things. I don't even know what half of them are, but they are good. It has just opened my eyes to a new way to eat. Last week we had seed porridge. Seriously. It was a cold soup made out of seeds. And it was good. Everyone that comes brings something raw to share. So far I have been really lame and brought carrots the first week and cucumbers the second. I am going to be brave this week and actually make something. I am making raisin seed balls. We shall see how they turn out.

I have a new favorite food now from this raw lunch. Raw sweet potatoes. Yeah, you heard me. I am a raw sweet potato eatin' fool now. The first week a lady brought peeled sweet potatoes that were sliced thin like chips. And she brought raw almond butter that I found out they now have at our local grocery store. It is in a machine and you turn it on and you watch it grind the almonds right in front of you. We spread the almond butter on the sweet potato chips. Hea-ven! (I typed that in a sing-song voice) I'm so not kidding. I went to the store that very day and bought sweet potatoes and almond butter and fed it to my kids as an after school snack. They loved it too. Then last week a different lady brought a version of one of our families most favorite things Black Bean Corn Salad. We usually eat it with tortilla chips. This lady brought sliced raw sweet potatoes and we used those as chips. Delish. Raw sweet potatoes as chips. That's how we roll around here from now on. You really should give it a try. It is fantastic.