When I was on the board of my HOA, we were set up to use Venmo, asking that the homeowner cover the transaction fee.

My family is still in full lockdown, and Kroger has been the only store within an hour's drive that offers curbside pickup (except for Food City, but they didn't carry enough of the foods we eat, even before the pandemic). I know Ingles had been trialing curbside pickup in a few stores somewhere, but I 'd been checking every few months and they don't offer it at my store yet. I just checked their website and it looks like the second closest Ingles does have curbside pickup finally! Thanks for prompting me to recheck!

I'm doing Kroger curbside pickup in eastern TN, as well as Kroger shipping orders (for rice, cereal, and other shelf stable goods). They have been out of organic chicken for a month. There's no whole chickens, rotisserie, or frozen chicken either. I've run through my back supply of frozen chicken. I am now buying most of my meat from Market Wagon. There's a local farmer on there that processes chickens on their farm, but it's 50% more than Kroger's usual price. If my husband didn't need a high protein diet (health issue, not just preference), this would be the time to switch back to being a vegetarian. Produce has been a gamble for several months, which is why I started using Market Wagon in the first place. There's not a lot of variety over the winter months, but at least if it's listed on the Market Wagon website, I definitely receive it that week. I haven't seen a tub of yogurt in over 6 months. I can't even order egg-free chocolate ice cream. In the last couple weeks, I haven't been able to get almond butter or refried beans. That may be related to NY resolution diets? The list of out of stock items seems to get longer each week, but for most items if I order it again the next week, it will be back in stock. It has been key to diversify where I spend my grocery money in order to keep us all fed. Food allergies make it harder. I've been spending a lot more hours in the kitchen to make up for the things I haven't been able to get. If more Covid variants pop up before the end of the school year, I think I'll start canning this summer, so we have more food options for next winter.

Seven day menu is done. Wed D chicken southwest salad, garlic baguettes Thurs L cottage cheese, fresh fruit, English muffins Thurs D lemon garlic chicken, pasta, side salad Fri L chicken salad sandwiches, fruit cup Fri D sloppy joes, chocolate pudding Sat L wienies and beans, malt loaf served with honey butter Sat D teriyaki chicken, rice or ramen, frozen Asian vegetables Sun L doughnut muffins, sausage patties or eggs, fruit Sun D apricot glazed chicken, baked potato, green beans Mon L leftovers, fruit cup Mon D tater tot casserole, veg Tues L beef jerky, chocolate almond butter on toast, fruit cup (we have a large box of fruit cups that expire next month) Tues D spaghetti-ohs with meatballs (making a double batch to freeze for an easy meal later)

Today we had malted waffles, sausage, eggs, and mandarins for lunch. It was 72 degrees here and a big storm was moving through, so I took a break from cooking and we just had leftovers for dinner (stroganoff, spaghetti, kringle, etc.). https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/240590/easy-malted-waffles/ I currently have ingredients for: corned beef, buttermilk soda bread, green smoothies (I had a craving for St Patty's Day food) chili, crackers apple walnut oatmeal ham, multigrain muffins, bananas pizza, salad chicken BLT, chips Tomorrow I'm going to work on a 7 day menu, so I can get curbside pickup on Tuesday.

I am! We're in lockdown still, so we're not currently open to in-person events. My kids are a little older and I've only been homeschooling in TN for a couple years, but we homeschooled for 6 years in Georgia before that. It is really hard to find other homeschooling families IRL that prioritize academics.

My MIL says she is "reluctantly" moving in with us in March. It did not go well the last time we lived under the same roof, so having a private place to discuss issues sounds fabulous.

In the morning, I'm going to put away the Christmas decorations. Then I'm going to bake a Kringle. The actual meals for the day are simple, so we can enjoy the time with each other. We have a bottle of sparkling grape juice to toast the new year. We play board games all evening while we wait for midnight. If the girls run off at some point, I'll work on the painting I've almost finished. Once it hits midnight, we watch tv until the surrounding fireworks stop (about 2am here). Then I grab a few hours sleep before the next day begins.

I have two columns on my weekly menu plan. On the left is all my lunches and dinners for that week. On the right, throughout the week whenever anyone in the family craves a meal, they write it down. I also write down in the right column any new recipes I want to try. Usually, by the day I do the weekly menu planning, half the meals have already been suggested (and I find the other half by googling [month of the year] senior menu). The rest of the family helps contribute to the menu planning without me holding everyone hostage when I'm ready to sit down and figure out what to serve on each day. They all know that if they don't write something down each week, I will end up serving Mexican food for half the week. lol Last month, I started buying produce from Market Wagon. Even with the delivery fee, I spend less on organic produce than at the grocer. When I buy a vegetable variety box (or CSA share, starting in the spring), we get a wider variety of vegetables and it's one less dish I have to plan with my weekly menu. If you have a black thumb like me (I am good at many things, but not gardening!), getting farm produce delivered is more affordable than you would think. An added bonus is that I'm finally able to get milk in glass bottles again. Each week when I get my delivery (with text notification!), they pick up the totes with the empty and rinsed glass bottles and the ice packs. Now that both my girls are doing their own laundry, I bought laundry hampers that only hold one load of laundry. It makes it very obvious when there is a full load of laundry to do. This keeps me accountable to actually get the laundry done before it piles up to a level I can't get done in a single day. When I never have more than three loads a day, I can use eating times (breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner) to swap out laundry. The laundry room is next to the kitchen, and most of our homeschooling day is upstairs now, so this method actually gets my laundry done. With laundry getting done more frequently, I've needed fewer articles of clothing. It's taken some getting used to having less variety in my wardrobe, but I have enjoyed doing less clothes shopping.

Fluxx games are pretty fast. If you like Monty Python, I think Monty Python Fluxx is the best one. Scattergories Categories is a great spinoff of the Scattergories game.

Christmas Eve Breakfast: apple walnut oatmeal Christmas Eve Lunch: chicken lo mein with kohlrabi, bok choi, and snow peas Christmas Eve Dinner: Costoletta chicken, mashed potatoes, veg Christmas Breakfast: sausage, hash browns, scrambled eggs, english muffin w/butter and jam, sliced tomato, cocoa (our kids have always slept in on Christmas morning, so we wake them up with the hot breakfast, around 8-9am) Christmas Lunch: leftovers Christmas Dinner: baked tacos We like to spend less time in the kitchen on Christmas, so our fancier meals are always a few days before. On the 20th, I'm baking a fougasse, served with smoked sausage, Boursin cheese, hummus, and an assortment of fresh vegetables. ETA: Fougasse with garlic Boursin is the best bread/cheese pairing I've ever had, plus it's easier to make than breadsticks. I served the raw veg (broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, and radish) while the fougasse was baking, so we filled up on veg before delving into the fougasse. This was a great holiday meal!

We got a boombox for our 12yo girl, so she could listen to the radio or a cd while making art. This would also be great for audiobooks. She also loves to spend time with her daddy (who loves to make models), so she's getting a joint gift with him: a miniature room made from a flatpack https://www.amazon.com/dp/B099RVXWPH Otherwise, it was all art stuff, books, video games, etc.

Sandwich it between two rolls of patterned duct tape.

chicken tetrazzini cavatini chicken melt with avocado, sweet potato chips meatball soup, tomato bread chicken, honey wheat bread, root vegetable soup (carrots and parsnips, with leftover pumpkin and spaghetti squash) taco salad spinach chicken calzone We just started getting farm veg delivered from Market Wagon, so our menu planning is now more about pairing protein and carb, and finding out what the veg will be later (we never know what will be in the vegetable variety pack/CSA). It's been fun to try new things, like turnip fries and roasting the pumpkin to make pumpkin muffins. We got some pak choy this week, and normally I'd use it in a stir fry, but we don't have other stir fry veg to go with it. I'm trying to decide if I can just chop it up fine and put it in the tetrazzini, or maybe just blend it into the root vegetable soup? ETA: I added the diced pak choy to the tetrazzini in place of the onion. The flavor seemed the same, and it added a nice crunch to the dish. Everyone served themselves seconds, so I guess that was an acceptable substitution.

Mapmaking ties into his interests of art, travel, and woodworking (cut shape in wood and burn details): https://www.amazon.com/Fantasy-Making-step-step-worldbuilders/dp/1981766197 https://www.amazon.com/Art-Map-Illustration-step-step/dp/1633224848

The family all pitched in to get all the dishes made, and my husband brought out a humidifier, and even though it normally doesn't help, it did today. 🤷‍♀️ I was mostly pain-free by the time we sat down to eat dinner (my head hurt less than my broken foot anyway). I am glad everyone's day ended up better than it started.

If the stove doesn't work out, you could probably cook some of the food on a bbq. Five - ten years from now, this day will make a great story. I woke up with a migraine. I had some tylenol and herbal tea, but that's only holding the pain at a level where I don't crawl back in bed. I started the rolls, but warned the family they may have to take over the cooking today. My teenager was so alarmed at this idea. lol I'm just glad I made all the new-to-me recipes yesterday.

I just finished making my first baklava. I am glad it had to be done the day before, as I had no idea it would take a full hour to do all the layers. Next up is the chocolate pie. I have the shortbread crust chilling. Once that is blind baked (I finally get to use my new pie weights!) and cooled, I will make the filling from scratch. I also made honey mustard chicken, pretzels, and baked okra for lunch. My husband has offered to make burgers for dinner so I won't have to spend the whole day in the kitchen. 🥰 I still need to write down my timeline for tomorrow. This year, I am determined to make sure my girls can see the process of planning it out, so I will probably do that immediately after dinner, since they'll both be downstairs then anyway. I did my final grocery curbside pickup Monday night. I don't plan to get more groceries until the 30th or 1st, so hopefully the store will be restocked by then. They had no: milk, chicken, bacon, refried beans, asparagus, green onions, tomato soup, or butter.

Watch for secondary infections. I know someone who got a fungal infection secondary to hand foot and mouth. The skin on the hands peeled for weeks (nearly two months) before the person finally went to a doc and got it diagnosed.

This year we bought (and wrapped this morning, to be opened at the start of Christmas break): The Captain Is Dead Firefly Fluxx Munchkin: Shakespeare edition Pandemic is awesome. Everyone who has played it with us has immediately bought their own copy. Another family favorite is The Totally Insane Card Game (like Uno, but so much more).

My 7th grader had an abrupt change in attitude with math this year, and it took me a few weeks to figure it out. If she hasn't finished math by 2pm, she will end up in tears. For her, it is not related to the material or difficulty level. Her hormone levels apparently shift by time of day. She now starts her day with math. If she needs a break between problems, she'll do another subject, but then go right back to math. This simple change has made everything SO much better. FWIW, her father and I also did better with math in school when it was the first subject of the day.

We have a lot of food allergies too, and it feels like we're always in a rut. My latest menu planning hack is to google month of the year senior menu (i.e. "November senior menu"). I can't utilize 90% of the stuff on the menus, but if I look at 5 pages of google results, I can usually plan a (heavily modified) week's menu, plus have some extra ideas for the following week. The recipes tend to be more seasonal, which I prefer over a strict rotating menu. As a bonus, senior menus often include sides, veg, and desserts, so it gives me more ideas to vary the non-entree parts of the meal. Each week at the bottom of my menu, I write down which page number of google results to start at for the next week (at least until a new month starts).

I have an Ikea desk with Alex drawers and love it! I only put the drawers on one side, and used table legs on the other to make sure I had plenty of leg room. I chose the butcher block top. Because it's modular, it's very easy to move (between rooms or across states). I kept all my office supplies in there, plus items confiscated from the children (they never look behind the labelmaker, lol). My husband is currently working from home, so he took over my desk this last year, and I miss it.

Upside Down Magic anything by Ben Hatke Wayside School Mrs. Piggle Wiggle Babysitters Club Danny Dunn (mostly out of print, but the first few books have been reprinted, so hopefully more will be released soon)

If making fruitcake sounds intimidating, try making a cookie version. Pre-cinnamon allergy, I made something that was basically fruitcake cookies. https://www.imperialsugar.com/recipes/jojo-s-fruitcake-cookies I just used a tub of the mixed candied fruit (found on your holiday baking aisle) for all the fruits listed. Or you can take any mincemeat cookie recipe and add the candied fruit to it. https://yesterdish.com/2014/01/30/mincemeat-cookies/ My husband claims those cookies are what makes him feel like it's the holiday season.