Canning and The Goodest in the World

That's what Collin thought of the bread we made tonight. Allie thought it was scrumptious and delicious, Kevin thought it was fun to make bread (he watched). It was my first attempt to make wheat bread on my own, from freshly ground wheat -- ground with my mother in law's wheat grinder that she kindly let me use along with a lesson on breadmaking one Sunday afternoon (now that I am thinking about it, I really just invited myself over for that - lucky she's a good sport). Anyway, I was amazed at how fast it went and it was pretty easy to do. Now I know what my pro-breadmaker friends mean when they say, "it's not hard at all, you just kinda have to get the feel for it." I was pretty pleased with the results. The kids were great helpers, including Maddie.

While the bread was rising, we did our FHE and introduced the kids to their new allowance and job chart. They each get their allowance equal to their age at the beginning of the month. They are expected to pay tithing and save some. I am also getting them little notebooks to write down what they spent their money on. The allowance is not tied to chores, they are expected however to do every one of their daily, weekend, and "training" jobs. There are some special chores they could do for some extra money (big jobs), but they are expected to take care of their own room, their schoolwork, and also help out the family without getting paid - it's just a part of life in our home. If they don't do their work and I or Kevin end up doing them, then they pay us back for our services.

So for example, both Allie and Collin are expected to make their beds, pick up after themselves, practice piano, do homework/read a book (Collin). and take care of their bedtime routines on time. Then they also get to do 3 jobs on the weekends/as needed. They chose their specialties - e.g. Collin volunteered to be our vacuum/mop boy and glass door cleaner, Allie is our mirror girl and duster). Then they also get to learn new skills every so often - right now Allie is getting trained to how to load a dishwasher and handwashing dishes so she can wash dishes without help, and Collin is training to be in charge of putting away and sorting silverware. All the information I used is from the book called "Parenting Breakthrough" by Merillee Boyack. I love that book!

Today I also canned some pinto beans with Mindy, a really good friend of mine. It was fun as always, and makes the time go fast!