Friday bullets, November 22, 2019

I'm spent. It's been a couple of week since I did everything that is in my weekly schedule. I'm out of practice!

• We will have 28 for Thanksgiving dinner. This morning some of the older children and I sorted out exactly how we will seat everyone. We have figured out a way, though 28 does seem to be our comfortable maximum. If we needed to add another person we could, it would just require a little more ingenuity. Because there's always room for one more, you know.
• Someone asked me for my baked apple pancake recipe. I can't fine the one I printed out years ago and use, but this one is pretty darn close. Apple Oven Pancake
• It's been a fun week of school. I say that tongue-in-cheek because it wasn't. One child was learning distance-rate-time problems, another child was learning long division, and everyone was learning about direct objects and how to diagram them. It seems some things just are not fun to learn.
• P. has been riding Java most of the week. She is such a different horse from when we first brought her home. She is calmer, more sure of herself, and much more willing to move. P. had her cantering with very little effort and even got her to go into the forest preserve by herself. These are all significant changes.
• For teatime we are reading The Soul of an Octopus by Sy Montgomery. We are enjoying it, and all agree octopuses are odd and amazing creatures.
• D. had made bread from the sour dough starter my brother and sister-in-law gave us, and it turned out really well. He has some more waiting to be made into bread tomorrow. I love children who can bake.
• My mom continues to do really well.
• I am looking forward to a week where all I have to do is to get ready for Thanksgiving. It seems positively relaxing.
• Working around all the work schedules of various children makes it tricky to plan holiday family activities. I think we have a plan, though it took some doing and involves people coming late.
• Here is an interesting article about how horseback riding improves children's cognition.
• Remember how we were awash in eggs and I had so many I didn't know what to do with them all? That was so last summer. Now, we get just a few a day. I would like to request a happy medium in egg production. K. may have to cut back on the number of eggs he fixes himself in the morning.
• Everyone continues to enjoy our co-op. People were very relieved to hear that I planned on participating again next year.
• So that pork and sweet pepper stir-fry that I was trying for dinner tonight? Bland. Bland. Bland. I should have looked to see where I got the recipe from before I finished making it. It was from Better Homes and Gardens, which in my experience has decent but somewhat bland recipes. What it really needed was a good spoonful of garlic-chili sauce added to it. I'll be making a note on the recipe to remind myself of this for the next time I make it.

And with that, I'm going to close and head to bed. Have a good weekend!