My top menus that satisfy almost ALL of my offspring

Being a working mom, I struggle with meals.  One of the big rules in my household is we eat dinner, sitting down at the table, with REAL plates every single night....even if I don't want to!  99% of our meals are home cooked, from scratch.  This mostly started due to Bubbie and his pervasive food allergies, and then just became the way we do things at the House of Chaos.  So, without further ado, here are the top meals that are in my rotation that can either be made ahead, made quickly, or put in the crock-pot while I am gone.  We only have 3 rules at our family dinners.



1.  We eat what we get and we don't throw a fit.

      - I am NOT a short order cook.  I make every effort to prepare meals they will all at least tolerate.  I am also fair in NOT putting things on plates if it is something that they have a real aversion against (Manudo: No food touching, Bubbie: No onions, Princepessa: No tomatoes, HH: Triple servings of everything).



This is wrong in so many ways...electronics AND
elbows on the table????



2.  NO electronic devices allowed....not even for Mom and Dad.  There is nothing so important that means we have to eat meals while our noses are buried into cell phones, iPods, DS's, TV, etc.  No one is going to DIE if they miss a text, I promise.

3.  Family meals are a good time to practice our manners so if mom is nice enough to take us OUT to dinner one day, we won't look like we have escaped a barn.

Those are the rules, and for the most part the kids and HH don't complain about them.  It works for us, so we all make the effort to be sure we are home and present (both physically and mentally) for our daily together time.

I will try to link to recipes if I have them.  If there is a meal you'd like the recipe for, add a comment and I will post it there.

1. Homemade Mac -n- Cheese, Smoked Sausage baked in the oven with green onions and mushrooms and Steamed Broccoli with lemon.  I SWEAR my kids would eat all of these daily.  I know that I am very lucky that they like veggies, and I hope that by typing this, I have not jinxed myself.
2. Breakfast for dinner:  Eggs (okay, I WILL make eggs to order...some like them scrambled, some like them over easy), Bacon or Sausage, and a fresh fruit salad.  Sometimes I will mix it up with pancakes or French Toast.  Let's face it, kids of working mom's don't have the luxury of really good breakfasts on most days, so it is always a treat to have their favorites as dinner.
3. Crock-Pot Roast, Mashed Potatoes, steamed Green Beans.  My kids, and especially HH are huge carnivores.  They love meat, even if I don't eat as much as they do.  I like the pot-roast because it usually leaves left-overs for HH and my lunches.  If I am especially organized, I will pre-boil the mashed potatoes the night before to make it a faster meal.
4. New Improved Joe's, Sweet Potato Fries, Sliced Apples.  I had to stop using almost all pre-made canned items when Bubbie was younger, so I came up with this recipe for sloppy joe's using no canned sauces and with spinach for extra nutrients.  My kids LOVE it!  I have also served it over pasta ala Cincinnati Chili.
5. Salmon Patties, Rice, and Asparagus.  I make the asparagus in a pan on the top of the stove with a pat of butter, splash of soy sauce, and 1/4 cup of water.  I have a rice cooker, and have found it so worth the investment.  Rice comes out perfect every.single.time.
6. Broiled whole pork tenderloin (just baste with a mixture of stone ground mustard and maple), Vanilla sweet potatoes, and spinach salad with orange/balsamic dressing. I bake the sweet potatoes the night before, and keep the dressing for the salad in a cruet in the fridge at all times. 
7. Tacos, Refried Beans, Spanish rice....need I say more?
8. Pasta with Basalmic Puttenesca Sauce, Garlic Bread, and a Salad.  When I serve this, I try to keep the olives out of Bubbie's serving :). 
9. Pulled Pork (whole pork tenderloin, favorite BBQ sauce, diced onions, cook in crock pot all day, shred with two forks), Cole Slaw, Baked Beans.
10. Chili, Homemade Corn Bread, Salad.  I mix it up by sometimes doing white chili, beanless chili, or traditional red chili.  I like to really spice it up, but keep some extra spices on hand to sprinkle on HH's and mine when the kidlets are around who seem to be opposed to anything spicier than a hot dog some days.

What are some of your go to meals?   How do you save time?  I hate feeling like I am in a rut, and I feel that way frequently in the winter when we do not have as many options for fresh fruits and veggies.

Three legs of a healthy relationship

Warning!  This will not by a typical Momginerd blog with lots of sarcasm and humor, but I do still think it has a lot of good messages to share.

When my relationships start to falter,  I spend a lot of time reflecting on what went wrong and why.  I came up with an analogy to a 3-legged stool that I think are the basics of a healthy, long term, and happy relationship. 



When you just don't
care enough to care

Emotional:  You need to have an emotional connection to your partner.  By this, I mean you need to feel about your partner's happiness, in many ways, more than you do about your own.  If your partner is unhappy, then you will be too.  If your partner is happy then you feel better as well.  When you have an emotional connection with someone it is almost like you are linked metaphysically.  Their emotions have a direct effect on your own.  By having the emotional connection to each other you are more in tune in many ways to the non-verbal cues that they are offering.  When you don't have that connection, you are clueless as to how they feel and it can lead to feelings of apathy towards each other.  When you feel apathetic towards your partner, I think, it is the beginning of the end.  You have lost all emotional connection and you just don't care enough anymore to try and get it back. 

Physical:  Well, this one should be pretty self-explanatory.  You MUST be attracted to your partner.  And by attracted I mean more than just the feelings of lust you have at the beginning of a relationship.  Sure, that is physical and is important, but it really doesn't last if there aren't more things you find are attractive about your partner than the color of their eyes or hair or if they have an incredible body.  To me the physical goes beyond the immediate lust to the little things that makes my partner irresistible to me.  The twinkle in his eye when he gets my jokes.  The smile that he reserves ONLY for me that tells me in one instant I am the woman for him, he loves and adores me despite my numerous flaws.  But, at the end of the day a partner's actual physical appearance from afar isn't the most important thing to me. 

Making divorce with kids involved work....sort of.....

Lately I have been getting a few questions from colleagues and friends as to just how I make my divorce work.  And eventhought Divorce and Making Things Work seems to be dichotomus, I thought I'd share some of the strategies that I have chosen to use and, thankfully, Ex follows along (if only he was so ammendable when we were married!).

1.  Keep the kids first

Whenever I am deciding on a schedule change for the kids, personal decisions relating to my career, vacations, meal planning, etc I ALWAYS think of the kids first.  If this change or decision would add undue stress to their schedules of lives, I just do not do it, or I change my plans.  Even though I am remarried, HH is perfectly clear and understanding that the kids come first, and he, poor soul is a distant 4th.  



2.  Communicate, communicate, communicate




We use ALL these and more to keep
try and keep in touch, it seems.

Ex and I communicate every.single.mother.furking.day.  Seriously!  We either text, phone or email daily updates about the kids at least once a day.  Some days, it seems like I talk to my Ex more than I talk to HH.  I will admit, when we were in the process of getting divorced this communication wasn't always pleasant or positive.  It took time, energy, patience and dedication to strategy #1 for us both to make it work.  I automatically forward every email/text I receive dealing with any of the kids school/social/athletic events.  I will also Text and/or call Ex to REMIND him of events and exactly what is required for said event (special shirt, $$, gear, etc).  It takes a lot of time, energy and patience, but it makes #1 work better...at the end of the day my mantra is "It is for the kids, if they are happy, I am happy."



3.  Agree to disagree

Ex and I definitely have different ideas on raising kids, morals, religion, etc.  If we didn't then we most likely would not be Exes.  We finally came to a point about 6 months after our divorce was finalized that we agreed to disagree.  This means that sometimes he makes decisions I don't agree with (like having a babysitter for the kids almost every weekend he has them), but I do my best to keep my $.02 to myself about his decisions.  He does the same for me, although he has little to complain about since I am so perfect ;-). 

Here is my take on the different types of Adults in America

In America there are many different groups of "Adults."  These can be broken down into distinct categories, each with their own unique features.

  Here is how I see them:






 1.  DINKs (Dual income, no kids): These are the people who have worked hard at their careers and have decided either by choice or circumstance not to have kids.  To those of us with kids, these people live the high life.  They tend to have fancy toys, go on vacations, have no clue about that particular torture other parents call "kid(s) in team sports", or limitations on spending money.  I have some of these friends, and I can honestly say I am jealous of their lifestyle.  When my other parented friends discuss this we always go back to the "Oh well, we can do that when the kids are grown."  The failing I find in that logic is, I will OLD when my kids are grown.  Will I really WANT a camper, boat, big house, huge yard, cottage, etc when I am in my 60's?

2.  Partnered Parents with 1 kid:  I like to call these parents "Practice Parents."  When you have only one child you are really not that inconvenienced.  1 kid is portable and sharable.  Each parent can have equal share (even though most times we know Mom's do most of the work).  If one parent has something they'd like to do, it isn't too big of a deal for the other to keep the child occupied.  It is also easy to hire a babysitter or ask a family member to keep one child.  Start adding complexity to the equation, and your social life ends.  Most of my friends with one child still seem to lead pretty fun lives.  Their facebook pages claim they are going on vacations, many have boats, cottages, etc.  I know when I only had one, I pretty much did everything I wanted to do...I just brought Manudo with me...she was portable like that.

3.  Parents with 2 kids:  These are the justice scale parents.  They either have 1 kid for each hand, or divide the kids up equally between the parents.  Extra lucky are the parents that get one kid of each sex.  Then they can divide by gender and everyone is happy!  It is still somewhat feasible to ask a family member to watch them so you and your partner can have some alone time...just don't do it too often, as that leads to:

Working in a Gender Bending Role.......The Negatives

Last week I focused on the positives of working in a non-traditional career.  Today, I plan on cluing you in to some of the more unpleasant aspects.

1.  No, I am not an expert on ALL things female.  I am sorry, but I do not know why your wife acts the way she does (except perhaps because YOU are a jackhole?) when you complain about why your dinner isn't prepared when you get home.  I have NO idea why she has denied you sex, drives the way she does, asks you the questions she does, or ignores your pleas for her to change.  Please talk to your wife, not me.  Having boobs does not make me an expert on all things female, just sayin'.

2.  The noises.  Working in cubeville with all men leads to overhearing sounds that I give time-outs to for my own son.  Some of the doozies are:  Snorking, the act of sucking snot while clearing your throat resulting in a sound that resembles a Canadian Goose dying.  Farting, no definition required, I am sure.  Burping/belching, this occurs a lot, and loudly, and is usually accompanied by a description of exactly which food led to said expelling of gas and how it tasted "coming back up."  Horking, like snorking, but without the snot sucking....just as gross and usually proceeds the sound of Spitting into the nearest trash can.

3.  The advice.  Just because you happen to have a penis and 10 or more years on me, does not make you the expert on all things dealing with me, my parenting, my marriage, my weight, my diet, my health, how I color my hair, my driving, how I spend my free time, which beverages I like to consume when not working, or what a "smart and pretty lady like you should do next in my career."

I have Reverse Anorexia........

So, on my Facebook page today a friend posted this ad from the Body Shop that was pulled after Barbie, INC threatened them:

 

It made me realize that even though I most likely look like this ad, or perhaps even worse, in my mind, I look more like this (but brunette):