A Mother's Ramblings

I cheated and made this menu last week, at the same time as I was making last weeks menu. I'm not sure why, but it seemed making a meal plan for two weeks was easier than making one for one week! It meant it was easier to buy ingredients for things like lunches over the two weeks, but also I was able to buy larger packs of some veggies and fruits (frozen) because I knew that we'd use them over the two weeks... Plus Tops is coming round on the whole side salad thing! Anyway, Tops and I have really enjoyed this last week of meals, Dan Jon never complains about food (unless it is carb free or Beef that he doesn't enjoy the texture of) and Flyfour just hasn't been here enough to complain!

Last week I spoke with the Dietician about the families diet and if there were any changes that could be made as Dan Jon's cholesterol is raised. It was agreed that we have a pretty good balanced diet and didn't need to add or change anything.... but I used the time to speak with the professional about some changes that Flyfour, Top Ender and I have been talking about in order to help the entire family lose a little weight. The dietician agreed that everything seemed good with our "diet" plan and so said we could go ahead! The good news is that it isn't really that different to what our current diet is, we're just making sure there are extra veggies at each meal, eating a Salad with each meal and thanks to Top Ender that we have enough calories left to enjoy some sweet treats too.

I always love a food challenge month as it makes meal planning so easy. Top Ender helped me come up with some great meals for some of the nights this month, but with having limited (well not really that limited) ingredients to pick from it means there isn't a whole of lot of options to pick from but I am trying to pick some meals that mean I'm stretching the palates of my family... they are not so keen on this!

I've been thinking a lot over the last month or so about saying no to God. It started when a friend and I were chatting about how we knew what to do with our lives. The friend had been certain that there was a position at a school that he was right for. The School was lovely, the staff he had met were terrific, the interview went amazingly and to top it all off it was a near-perfect distance away from his home. He didn't get the job. Instead, he found himself accepting a role in another school. A school that he now realises is even better than the one he'd fallen in love with, he has developed deep friendships with the staff that he works with and has been able to share his faith with several of them and it's again a near-perfect distance away from his home. We'd been chatting about how sometimes God says No to us, and how sometimes it is because the plan is better than we could imagine and we just need to hold on, and of course, me being contrary it got me to think

Our food challenge starts this coming Monday and thanks to the lovely Top Ender sitting with me and helping me plan a few meals, I've managed to come up with not only this week's meals but meals for the entire month of February! Here are the meals for this week.

I had everything ready last week to post, and for some reason just didn't get around to posting. This did mean I had no clue what we were supposed to be eating each night, did accidentally not eat two of the meals I'd purchased ingredients for and now have so little space in the fridge and freezer that everyone has been reminded that lunches should be "typical" lunches and not something we'd have for an evening meal! Honestly, whilst I do kinda love the lockdown lifestyle (I could live with never seeing anyone), I do miss the bit where the children (and husband) don't eat us out of house and home and only leave the "healthy" ingredients in the fridge untouched...

Every February I plan a food challenge. I'm well aware that the rest of the family merely tolerate these adventures, but the point is that it gets us out of a rut with regards to the food we are eating, it helps us to be more mindful and it also encourages some of the family (cough Top Ender and Flyfour cough) to try something a little out of their comfort zone. Okay, so at times a LOT out of their comfort zone.

It was the middle of the night and Flyfour and I were laying in bed, wide awake and giggling under the covers. I'm sure we aren't the only couple who are often awake together at 3am. For us, it's normally because one of us has gone to check on Dan Jon and has finally come back to bed after an hour of lows, and as we climb back into the warm sanctuary that we call bed, we accidentally disturb the slumber of the other. A short conversation might follow, where we confirm what DJ's blood sugars were, or more often a muttered "need more snooze" but for some reason this pariticular night we were both wide awake.

Recently someone gave me a compliment, although to my ears it wasn't really a compliment. "Who knew you'd be so good at what you're doing!" I wanted to reply back that the people that hired me to do my current job had. They hadn't just decided that it was easier to give me the role than to hire one of the other people who had applied. That they had listened to what I had said during the interview, had looked at my experience and thought about the ideas I had shared and realised I was a good choice... even though I'm still not sure I believe that.

It's Top Ender's 17th Birthday today and I've tried to think of something to tell you about her, that I haven't already told you before. I mean, you already know she is kind and caring, funny and beautiful. You know she is smart and courageous and loving and giving. I'm not sure there is anything I haven't told you about her. So instead, I will say Happy Birthday Top Ender.

A new year, a new start and I really need to think what our February challenge is going to be. We did joke about an alphabet challenge but I'm not sure I can pull that one off! You might notice a lot of veggie meals on the menu this week... hopefully, the family won't notice and moan but I'm fed up of eating meat so everyone can live my preferred diet this week!

I've been thinking about resolutions a lot since September. To me, it's September that is the start of the year, thanks to years of British Schooling, my own children being in the Britsh school system and of course now working in a School. September is when the new notepads come out, when I start taking stock of what I have (or haven't!) achieved, thinking about what I want to achieve and having a little bit of a trial run before I actually set my goals for the year in January. I've come up with a few things that I want to achieve in 2021, I'm not sure if they are really resolutions they are more a mix of short and long term goals but I know that these four areas that I'm focusing my efforts in are the areas which will help me to be the me that I want to be, that they will smooth off my rough edges (or maybe give me some!) and help me to be better.

Flyfour and I started thinking together about our word of the year a couple of weeks back. One of our evening walks was peppered with one or the other of us suddenly exclaiming a word and then continuing on with whatever conversation we were having and pretty soon it spilt over into us just shouting random words at each other waiting for the others approval or a reason as to why that word wasn't any good. We knew what we wanted our word to mean.

I told you back in September that I was lucky to get a new job as PA to the Principal and Marketing Manager at a local High School and well, it turns out that it's my dream job. I actually feel a bit guilty because it doesn't feel like work, I mean not guilty enough to refuse my pay at the end of the month, but enough to mean that I log into my work emails far too often at the weekends and late evenings and get told off far too much for working when I should be relaxing. I could give you one of the usual stories that I give those that ask. It doesn't take me five minutes to check all my email accounts  It doesn't actually feel like work I like to be busy Everyone else in my home is on an electronic device but they aren't really the truth.

As I'm sure is the way, over the last twenty years of marriage, both Flyfour and I have had many friends and co-workers, who for one reason or another we haven't kept in touch with and to be fair they also haven't kept in touch with us! These are people who meant a lot to us, at one point in our lives. People that we shared meals with and had inside jokes with. We went to each other's weddings, to mutual friends weddings, we celebrated births and new jobs and then just one day you realise they aren't a part of your life any more.

Christmas was different this year, but also exactly the same as it always has been. I woke up super early and sat as close to under the tree as I could, reading my book before retreating back upstairs to the warm bed, where I promise I didn't stick my cold feet on Flyfour in an attempt to wake him up because I was bored and didn't want to read more of my book. It didn't work. Eventually, Flyfour did wake up and we woke the children up with breakfast (Pigs in blankets in rolls) and opened our Stockings together, before getting dressed and going downstairs to open the gifts under the tree.

On Christmas Eve, the people delivering the Advent tags to me made themselves known. I was right in my guess in whom they were but they asked to remain anonymous because the gift tags each day were not about them, not about the mystery of whom they were but about the love they were given with. Love of the Saviour. Love of the season. Love of service to their fellow man. Love of Scripture and knowledge and understanding.

It's that magical week where nobody knows what day it is, what time it is or if they are more potato than human. The good news for me is that Flyfour is home this week, so as long as we both know what we are supposed to be eating, we'll make sure we eat at some point! The bad news is that does mean other than Saturday we may end up eating a variety of meals not on this meal plan/not in the right order. It's okay though because who cares! We don't know what day it is! We don't know if it's day or night! And if all else fails, there's always toast and chocolates and leftover cookies from Christmas.

Christmas Day is one of my most favourite days of the year and even though this year we aren't spending it how we normally do, I wanted to jump online and wish you all a very merry Christmas. We are lucky that we will be together as a family of four, and will be placing calls to our loved ones that we won't be able to see today, as we're in tier 4, but even if we weren't we'd made the choice to stay home to keep our loved ones safe. Please take time today to reach out to those you know who may be alone, or who may be feeling down or who just come to mind. We hope that today and the next year bring you as much joy as you bring to us, as much love as you give to others and all the things that your heart desires. With love from all of us here at A Mother's Ramblings x

I can't believe that it is already Christmas Eve. I honestly feel like this year has just got started and somehow we're here at the end of it. Advent has been different for us this year, not because of all the things that the pandemic has brought about but the children are getting older and so their ideas of Christmas fun has changed.