After a long hiatus…. HELLO!:)

Hello!! I’m back. Again. It’s been quite a while since I wrote last. Life in general just happens and things take priority. Last year is a blur. The kids are now back in school and I have “retired” from the PTC after 6 looong years of being involved.

Jamie began Jr. High this year (7th grade!) MyMatthew is in 5th and Sare Bear is a 3rd grader:) So far so good. Knock on wood! I am going to start back to school myself end of the month:) I’m excited but really nervous. I will be working toward my HTM degree (Hospitality and Tourism Management). Paul is currently doing his own thing. He was laid off last September. He has been working on things he’s been wanting to do for a while. I think he’s planning on looking for a job at some point. We had a great summer. It was nice that we didn’t have to schedule things around his work. We were able to just up and go when we wanted. I will miss that when he does go back to an office job.

Sarah had to sit out of ballet last year due to her school work just being so out of hand. She would come home with 6-8 pgs of homework at night. It was horrible. We just weren’t able to get homework done and make it to ballet on time twice a week. We are hoping to get her back in this year (and add ice skating) but we want to see how things are going to work out with homework/schoolwork. I am hoping that her teacher will have her more structured than last year’s. Last year, she was in a mixed class. 1st and 2nd graders. This year, it’s just the 3rd grade.

MyMatthew is no longer doing soccer (we are completely out of the soccer organization now). He began swim team last September and is just LOVING it:) It’s unbelievable (to me) how he has progressed in a year. They are on break atm but will be starting up again next month. He’s really looking forward to it.

Jamie is puttering along. He has been so excited about getting to Jr. High:) He gets up and gets excited about going to school. He’s out of the house before school even opens the doors for breakfast:) He really loves getting there, having his blueberry muffins and then going to the library:) Then at lunch, he gets a choice of what he’d like and that is also a huge thing for him:) It’s the little things that make him happy! This Saturday, he’ll start golf again. He hasn’t done it in a while, but he’ll be able to start practicing with the golf team next year and then hopefully play on the team the following year. Yes, it’s going to be another busy year!

Over the last several months, I have discovered Julia Childs. Not really discovered her but really started paying attention to her. I have to say, she is pretty darn cool. I love her shows now. She tickles me because if she messed something up, she had no problem saying it/showing it and just tossing it in the trash and starting all over again! She was very real. I hope to bring yall some of her recipes that I have been making. Some of them are really complicated. I tend to stay away from those, like her Boeuf Bourguignon. However, today, I am going to show yall a recipe that I found at Pioneer Woman. It’s for Ribeye steak with a Burgundy Mushroom sauce. It’s very good. Pretty simple and looks/sounds very impressive:) Enjoy!
OK, HERE’S What You’ll Need:

3 nice Ribeye steaks

1/2 cup butter

1 pound of button mushrooms

4 cloves of garlic

3 green onions cut up

1 1/2 cup of Burgundy (next time I’ll pull back on this a bit. Maybe 1 cup)

Salt and Pepper

1 Tbsp butter

Parsley (chopped up to make it pretty:)

HERE’S Whatcha Do: