1. My adventures in wheat-free cooking went very well this week! Long-time readers might remember that I started looking for natural ways to control my ulcerative colitis and stumbled across the Wheat Belly Book after hearing about it from a friend. Since I have been going “wheat”free my symptoms have totally cleared up and my eczema went away as a bonus! Now I’m totally sold on this way of eating, but not very experienced with cooking this way.
So sis got me this book for Christmas and I dug into it this week!
I made the shepherd’s pie using cauliflower instead of potatoes and everyone really loved it! The portebella mushroom dish was also very tasty! Looking forward to more successful adventures in wheat-free cooking next week!
2. I am so hard on piano teachers.
- Our first teacher was in her late 70s and was a wonderful teacher, but having students got to be to much for her and she eventually retired.
- Our second teacher was a young man with a family who actually wrote most of his own lesson books! I liked him, but it didn’t seem as if the kids were doing any scales or exercises or any piano literature. He eventually moved into a studio outside of his home and raise his prices out of my price range, so we had to leave the studio.
- Thought I hit the jack pot with the third teacher. He was a young man who came to the house! Figured he would be around for a long time and his prices were reasonable. Alas, he fell in the bathroom and hit his head and died! Very shocking and sad way to end our time with him!
- Found a wonderful woman who opened a studio and was very careful and good with the kids. She offered recitals twice a year and other opportunities to perform. But grandmother hood called and she wanted to spend more time with her grandkids, so she retired.
- Luckily she referred us to a young woman who graduated with a degree in piano performance who was very interested in working as a piano teacher. I thought surely this would be our last move as she was also young and making her living at teaching. She decided the Lord was calling her to something else though and she quit to go pursue a master’s degree right before Christmas.
- Rosie started with a new teacher this summer (as I knew the other teacher was going to move half way through the year). I thought this was going to be a long-time deal too as this mom taught out of her own home and her teaching helped to supplement the family income. Unfortunately her husband just accepted another job out of state and they are going to move by next month.
So that’s six kids- and six different piano teachers over a span of 16 years or so! Luckily, my parish is starting a school for the arts and it is including piano lessons! So Noah and Rosie will be able to start there next Friday. I dearly hope that I can keep this teacher for 10 years until Rosie graduates from high school!
3. Izzy starts the Wilton Cake Course 4 this Sunday. She is soooo looking forward to it and I think it will be good for her to get this final course done. After that, I think we need to start advertising her talents for first communion and baptism cakes- maybe work up some designs to show off. I think this could be such a good little business for her.
4. The kids and I are trying to get through Billy Budd. We’re about 51% of the way through the book – not an easy read! Anyway, in chapter 18 or 19 today, I kept seeing similarities between Billy Budd and Forest Gump! Especially the part where Melville talks about how good sailors don’t really have a lot of independent thought- they mainly do what they are told to be successful. That really reminded me of this scene from Forest Gump.
5. With some of the money we got from selling my dad’s property, Mr. Pete and I bought a 2001 Audi station wagon. It has been a real learning curve riding this little car around instead of the big van! But the nice part is I can drive on a full tank of gas for two weeks instead of one, and even then, a fill up with Premium is only half of what I spent on gas for the van! That is really nice for my pocketbook!
I soft of miss all the room in the van though!
6. Since Noah has been taking this Latin class this year, he keeps telling me how much easier Latin is than English! He has been very diligent with his studies too and gets his homework done as soon as it is assigned. “I don’t want to fail mom!”
Well so far he is averaging around 97% so I think he’ll be fine.
7. If you want to have someone on your facebook feed who can help you navigate the high school years, I recommend Mr. James Parris Stobaugh. Mr. Stobaugh is one of the graders for the SAT and ACT essays so he has plenty of helpful hints and suggestions for getting good scores on those important exams!
