I don't know how Wednesday night church surprises me every week, but it just seems to sneak up on me. This evening was no exception so we were rushing around trying to get everyone clean before we left. That led to me putting Ryan in my shower while the littles took their baths in the boys' bathroom.


I was in the other bathroom when I heard Ryan moaning and whining in pain, "Owwwww, ohhhhh, this soap hurts." I assumed he'd gotten shampoo in his eyes and I rushed in there to help him rinse it out. That's when I saw the "soap" he was rubbing directly onto his body.

I've told him and told him to use a washcloth!!

Kroger

I do not care how cheap the chicken is at Kroger. I am not going back in there until they do away with those cars screwed on to the front of the shopping carts!! It seems ingenious at first! I really liked the idea. But, like a lot of good ideas, it doesn't actually work in real life.

As soon as we walk in the store, Matthew makes a bee-line for that car. "Oh great," I think, "That'll keep him happy while I stock up on chicken and buy some ridiculously overpriced dog treats." Evan squeezes in the car with Matthew. That's your first clue that this is not going to be a fun trip! LOL

First off, if you've never driven a car/shopping cart, you should know that they're HARD to steer. They're long and the wheels don't turn right. You can NOT make a 90 turn and trying to go around an end cap from one aisle to the next usually results in some display being toppled.

So, while I'm fighting this massive cart, Matthew is fighting with his brother. Evan is crammed in the car like a sardine and Matthew is hitting him. I'm not sure why. I never saw Evan do anything to him but Matthew is not the type of kid to hit without provocation.

I quickly loaded up 20 lbs of boneless chicken tenderloins and rushed to the register. The register aisles are just wide enough to get the car through them. It doesn't work unless you're going straight into the aisle. You can't be angled even a slight little bit. Did I mention that the car carts are long, hard to steer, and not aligned very well?

I'm glad my freezer is full of chicken b/c I'm not going back to Kroger... at least until we run out of chicken and they have another good sale!

Sugar Shock

Wow! There's a lot of candy in my house. We've had church parties and trick-or-treating and we still have another fall party next week. Matthew is especially overwhelmed with the amount of candy. He loves candy so he's miserable that he can't eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

I imagine there are a lot of houses overflowing with candy at this time of year. So, here's a few ideas that we've used to get rid of it quick!

1. Share!! We trick or treated in SIL's neighborhood so SIL and her teenage kids were invited to share the wealth. They picked out what they wanted and we had less candy to cart home.
2. Eat! I let the kids eat as much as they could stuff down their greedy little throats when we finished trick or treating. I also let them eat lots the following couple of days. It's just once a year.
3. Hide!!! I instantly picked out all the M&Ms and put them in the freezer. They're yummy when frozen and also make great add-ins when baking cookies. I also took all the Reese's and Chewy Sweettarts for my secret stash.
4. Hoard! (This doesn't actually get rid of the candy, but it does keep the kids from overdosing.) Pick out the stuff you can use for other purposes. We usually have some candy in Christmas stockings so I put up a few things that we can save until then. No sense buying candy later when I have way more than I can use now!
5. Donate!!! It's been four days since trick-or-treat. The kids have eaten more candy than they should have. The rest of it is going to church with me tomorrow. I'll put it my Sunday School classroom and use it to bribe, er, I mean reward the kids for months to come. Your church may appreciate a similar donation or let Dad take a big bag to share at work. You could also put it in with a food pantry donation.

Leftovers

Is it wrong to be anticipating tomorrow's lunch as you clean up tonight's dinner? My favorite lunch of all time is whatever we had for dinner last night. :) Leftovers, they're easy to fix, taste better than sandwiches, healthier than frozen stuff, and very filling!

Here's a great way to fit all those leftovers in the fridge.

If you don't mind fighting with a roll of plastic wrap, it works fine for a single bowl. But we had tacos last night! I had bowls of meat, lettuce, tomatoes, and sauce. The pink bowl on top has a lid. That saves on plastic wrap and makes things easy to stack. But what about all those bowls without lids? I don't want to transfer them to tupperware and have twice the dishes! So I just use a little trick of my Mom's. Plates placed on top of the bowls work as lids to keep the food fresh AND allow you to stack the bowls so they'll all fit in the fridge! You can't do that with plastic wrap!