Quick 5

These 90 degree days?  I'm over it.

1.  Labor Day weekend was lovely and unremarkable.  Lee had the brilliant idea to send Alaina and Joya over to Grammy and Grandad's for a sleepover on Sunday night, so we got to have a quick dinner date and spend Monday morning attacking boxes in the basement without having to worry if Joya was tearing or coloring on something she shouldn't.  Plus the girls love staying at Grammy's, so it was a good day for them too. 

2.  Almost every day this week Joya has declared, "I'm big now!  I go to kindergarten!"  She is growing more and more jealous each day that Alaina gets to go to school.  She also tells me quite often that "I'm 3 now!"  The sad thing is that because of her birthdate she won't start kindergarten for three years.  Maybe starting Cubbies next year will help pacify her.

3.  Speaking of Cubbies, Alaina is the proudest new Sparky you've ever seen.  Sparks scares me a bit, because it seems like it requires way more work than Cubbies did.  It's like moving from preschool to 3rd grade.  Or at least first grade.  I kind of feel like the AWANA program has skipped kindergartners, but maybe it's not that big a deal.  The rest of the kids have moved through the program well enough, so I'm sure Alaina will be fine.

4.  It appears that the Lord has blessed us with a family pack of fresh, grass-fed beef.  Someone has donated a bunch to the church and some of it was offered to us, to which we said, "Yes!"  I don't know the whole story, but it's something about someone who either goes to the church or is connected with the church who owns a ranch and needed to butcher a steer and decided to give away the meat.  I'm not sure you knew this about me, but I LOVE BEEF.  Here's the thing, though.  We are in the Ground Beef with the Occasional Roast phase of life.  Maybe stew once or twice a year.  I have a feeling that this meat we're about to get is high quality stuff.  I'm not sure my culinary skills are deserving of such quality product.  I feel like the Cooking Police might break down my door if I try and bust open a can of cream of soup with any of them.  Which begs the question, what on earth am I going to make with it?  And will I mess it up? 

5.  My Big Boy tomato plant is producing Small tomatoes.  They're tasty little things, but they are little.  So it took five of them to make the BLTs that we had for dinner on Wednesday.  On the bright side, the girls ate those BLTs like they were candy.  I have about a 10% success rate when it comes to whether or not the girls actually like and eat all their dinner each night, so it was nice to have a win.  And it's nice to know that they are normal Americans who can appropriately appreciate a good BLT.

That's a wrap!  Have a good weekend!