Bonding Time

Jr. Jr. and I planned a hiking trip. It rained. We went for a drive in the rain instead, every once in a while stopping to get pictures... of ourselves... and scenery between windshield wiper wipes.

Jr. Jr. had fun taking pictures as I was driving. 

There was a nice break in the weather so we were able to stop at Bridal Veil Falls Overlook on the way home.

We had some friends greet us when we got home since it was such a wet day.

Ah, bonding time with my nature loving boy.

Dinner Club

Six Sisters' Stuff started a dinner club. All you have to do to join is eat dinner. Yep. You can do more than that but only if you want. They've been doing some contests. They wanted people to post to their Instagram stories about what they have for dinner. People can get ideas from those that Six Sisters repost and for me it's kind of motivation to have side dishes and decent food if I'm going to post about it. But hey, since I usually take pictures of food anyway because of using our celebrating in menu planning, it wasn't that much harder to put them in my Instagram stories.

I was posting fancy things like Instant Pot Swedish Meatballs and Chicken Cordon Bleu Casserole (which Instagram autocorrected to "blue") with homemade French bread and Ritz Cracker Chicken Casserole (from Six Sisters' Stuff), then after leftovers night I got picked and won a gift card. Ha Ha Ha.

Six Sisters' Stuff have also had a few live meetings/videos on Instagram and that's been fun to participate in. I've been getting more ideas for recipes to try and it's a nice break in my day... something for me (I've been getting burned out lately. Sigh).

Their first Dinner Club meeting was on Friday, September 10, which is Swap Ideas Day. How appropriate. We were definitely swapping ideas for the club and dinner ideas. That's where I got the idea for the Ritz Cracker Chicken Casserole.

At the end of the day, the older members of our family swapped ideas about what to watch after the younger boys went to bed.

I didn't put it on my picture with Leftovers Night but I made hot cross buns for dessert that night because September 11 was Hot Cross Bun Day.

Anyway, here are other things I've been posting on my stories for #dinnerclub

 

September 12 was Videos Games Day. People took turns playing video games while the more ambitious of us worked on our parts for our at-home potluck. I made chicken noodle soup with a whole chicken like grandma used to make but I didn't follow her recipe for noodles. I used some of the nokedli Jeremy made to be eaten with the chicken paprikash. It was fun and I love that everyone contributed (even though we chose and prepared for Jet- water to drink). 

September 13 was Kids Take Over The Kitchen Day so I told the kids they were in charge of dinner that night- not fend for yourselves but making dinner for the family. Nichole stepped up. Yay, Nichole.

Lucky had fun with the holiday, too. He wouldn't let me in the kitchen and put up a barricade with a sign, "The kids have taken over the kitchen!!!! Mwa ha ha haaa!!!" Jr. worked on dishes.

I got to relax and have some snuggles with a couple of my kids then later since it was International Chocolate Day and National Peanut Day, we all had Whatchamacallit candy bars. Mmmm.

September 14 was Eat a Hoagie Day. It was also Ants on a Log Day. I had plans to make ants on a log but the celery wasn't any good so we grabbed some fries out of the freezer instead.

September 15 was Double Cheeseburger Day. I made hamburger buns that turned out pretty small so I made hamburger patties to match. Hey, less meat that way when you're doubling up patties. It was also Linguine Day so I used The Food Nanny's recipe for Linguine with Butter and Parmesan Cheese.

September 16 was Cinnamon Raisin Bread Day. I adapted a recipe from The Food Nanny and Jet helped me make the cinnamon raisin bread. He helped out and it wore him out.

The Chicken Tikka Masala recipe was another one from Six Sisters' Stuff. It was so good. I was going to make other Indian foods to go with it but I ran out of time so I threw some other sides together. It worked.

On September 17 Nichole and I discussed "The Count of Monte Cristo" while I made Monte Cristo Sandwiches (recipe from The Food Nanny) on Monte Cristo Day. I love finding reasons (and ways) to celebrate.

 

The posting did slow down a bit after the contests for posting on stories ended but the Six Sisters are still encouraging people to share what they're having for dinner so I still do from time to time. And Dinner Club is still going on.

Acting Weirdos

September 8 was National Actors Day. I commented how funny it would be if I acted dramatic in everything I did that day. It turned out I just acted different ways.

Does it ever bother you in movies when the character in the driver's seat spends so much time looking at or talking to the character in the passenger seat when they should be watching the road? It bugs me. So I decided to act like that myself for the holiday... while the van was in park.

I acted like a bird while filling the bird feeder.

 I acted so many ways that day.

Google told us it was Tim Bergling's 32nd birthday. He is also known as Avicii so I danced while doing dishes to a song by Avicii.

 

I got some other family members in on acting or being dramatic that day. Jeremy sent me some pictures on his birding excursion that day. He asked one of our friends who works at Farmington Bay to be in a picture but that friend took a picture of Jeremy acting like an owl instead.

 

Nichole obliged when I picked her up from school. "Act dramatic, Nichole."

Of course that holiday fit right in with the next day's holiday, Wonderful Weirdos Day on September 9. Wonderful weirdos. That's us.