Fixing Our Finances.

Alas, I have not started on sorting the financial paperwork. For hints and information regarding how long paperwork should be kept, drop by Happy To Be At Home.

Fixing Our Finances.

There is a great challenge to join in with Happy to be at Home and the theme changes each month. Firstly was Clear the Clutter, then Face Time With the Kids and now Fixing our Finances. My aim for the month will be slightly different. I will attempt to clear the backlog of filing that we do not need to keep anymore regarding bills etc.

Face Time with the Kids.

I am so glad I am participating in this challenge. This week the focus is in sharing memories with our children of our childhood.

We have slide nights once a month with husband E's family and when my Dad joins us at the lakehouse, he often brings his slides so that we can see his sea faring days.

We often have slide nights at home and we have a newly developed roll waiting to be watched. Every term holiday I get out our wedding album and the children's albums so that they can page through.

My favourite movie that the children know is "Mary Poppins." We have another special movie for 9 year old son in particular which is the original "Italian Job." Husband E enjoys that one too.

I will be maintaining the Drop Everything And Read and our games' night on Saturdays. Baking on Wednesdays sees two little willing helpers as well.....

Baking Wednesday.

Chocolate brownies (with four year old helper)

370g dark chocolate

250 g butter

1 1/2 cups brown sugar

2 cups plain flour

4 eggs

Melt chocolate and butter over low heat. Remove from heat, put in sugar, eggs and stir. Then add flour. Pour into two slice tins, bake for 40 minutes.

This recipe came from our local primary school's parents' recipe book.

Face Time with the Kids.

The challenge this month is to spend more time with our children. The first week it was recommended that we read together, the second week that we cook together and now the third week that we play games with our children.
Well, every Saturday night is "Games Night" in our house. I must say, we have had some good laughs and learnt some valuable lessons, such as playing for fun and not always being the winner. Saturday nights usually involve our older two, however the younger two are becoming quite adept at "Snap" during the day.

By the way, the Drop Everything and Read (D.E.A.R.) session in the afternoon is going really well. It is nice to do it all together.

Don't forget, the adults have to do it alongside the children. Altogether you see..

Face Time with the Kids.

I am still keeping this challenge in mind. I am continuing along the 'reading to children' line and have another thought that I hope to adopt in the next week: D.E.A.R. That is, Drop Everything And Read. This was something we did in our classrooms a lot when I was a teacher, classes may still have this in practice. I hope we will all sit and read in the afternoon, before needing to do homework. This will also tie in nicely with my goal from last week, of reducing TV in the afternoons. Now that all children are well again, we can begin.

Face Time With the Kids...

I am enjoying working towards a challenge. We have moved on from "Conquering the Clutter" to improving "Face Time With the Kids." I appreciate the list of suggestions and one in particular I can say we regularly enjoy doing: reading books. Sunday nights is long story nights: usually 6 year old daughter's library books and 9 year old son's "Harry Potter." The younger two have stories every night with E and with me before nap time. I do think there is room to improve though....9 year old boy needs to learn to enjoy reading and to choose to take it up as a choice and I should revisit some of 6 year old daughter's beautiful books.

In any case, less worry and just enjoyment reading with them, not so?

Conquer the Clutter

On the weekend I cleared some clutter from the garage. I put skipping ropes and rockets (!) and chalk into some drawers of an old filing cabinet I found on 'chuckout'. Now chuckout is a wonderful Australian tradition that I enjoy. Twice a year our council sets a date that we can put all things we do not need from our houses or garages on the pavement (sidewalk) and anyone can take what they like. Then on the date posted, a truck collects the leftovers. Much of our furniture is from this and husband E has repaired and tidied the items. I shall post some examples later. At any rate, the filing cabinet drawers helped me conquer the clutter in the garage.