Meal plan for June 6th-12th

You know how there are moments in your life that change your path forward and define parts of your soul?  One of those moments happened to me a few months ago when my friend Angela did something that blew up everything I assumed I knew and thought.

She told me she put garlic salt on her eggs.

And then I tried that shit, and I couldn’t believe I had never thought of that before.  Holy smokes people, give it a sprinkle and redefine your world.

With the weather heating up so quickly (it’s June and my grass is already dead), I knew strawberry season wasn’t going to last long.  I had no desire to pick strawberries.  NONE.  But we eat a crap ton of jam, so it was go time.  I corralled my mother-in-law to go with Troy, Bennett, and myself to watch B.  In the end, she and I did the picking while Troy watched Bennett. She was a strawberry picker in middle school in Portland (as was my mother in Everett) in the 50’s to buy school clothes.  My mother-in-law said that on Sundays, the Portland city pools would let kids with pink hands in for free. 🙂  She far out-picked me, and was usually a half bucket ahead of me at least.  Hey, I was up against a pro! Between the two of us, we picked about 50 pounds.  I paid for 47 pounds, but knowing the growers like I do, I’m fairly certain that nice round amount of $80 had some free berries include.

I came home and cleaned (no easy feat considering the growers use sand in the field) and froze them.  I have no time (or desire) to make jam right now, but frozen berries turn in to jam just as well as fresh ones. Bennett assisted me for a few minutes…

…and then promptly lost his mind after about five minutes.  It was his first time in the back carry position, and he was not impressed.

Last week was end of the year testing for many kiddos, and once again, Jack’s teacher has proven herself to be an amazing example of positive encouragement for the lucky kids in her class.  Each student was assigned a “secret test buddy”, and made a little tent card for their buddy to have on their desks during the testing.  Jack’s little buddy made him this:

I wish she decided to teach second grade next year, third the following, and so on until Jack heads to junior high/middle school.

Given that I am already saving for braces for Jack, Bennett’s recent thumb sucking development is getting a major side eye from me.  Jack was not a thumb sucker, and handed the removal the pacifier like a champ (I took it away at 9 months and said “no more pacifier”. Tricky.) Bennett will take a pacifier, so I keep trying to take his thumb out of his mouth and replace it with the Soothie.  Well, the little butthole has outwitted me, because now he puts his thumb in the hole in the back of the Soothie, pulls it out, and then either wears it on his thumb, or gets it off and sticks his thumb in his mouth.  Le sigh.

Meal plan time!

Monday:: Pasta, asparagus, asparagus and pasta.  How many variations can I serve?  Let’s find out!

Tuesday:: Kebabs, rice, and asparagus.  This didn’t happen last week.  Jack won an award at school for a Pillar of Character, and it came with a free Subway kids meal.  He really wanted to go, so we did, and I remembered why I don’t go to Subway.  Kinda blah.

Wednesday:: Homemade pizza, and you guessed it…asparagus!

Thursday:: Troy’s birthday, and our final baseball game.  In honor of all things Troy, we’ll be partaking of his favorite food before the game – sandwiches. And I’ll make a salad out of some swiss chard I found in the garden.  You know you have had a lot of weeds in the garden beds when you just FIND swiss chard.

Friday:: We’re headed out for Troy’s belated birthday.

Saturday:: My little cousin’s birthday BBQ.  So, he’s technically my cousin’s kid.  In our family, we seem to call those little people our nieces and nephews, because it feels weird to call a baby your cousin.  My Filipino friend Susan said we’re a bunch of Norwegian/German Filipinos because that is totally their jam.

Sunday:: Jack’s end of the season baseball BBQ

What are you having this week?