The Empty Nest

As I have mentioned before, the nest is empty here. Wally and Theodore are now living on their own.

Wally and Theo long before they left the nest.

This is not the first time that Wally and Theo have been gone. At various times they have both been away at college at the same time. But this time is different. This time I think it's going to take. Wally has a job good enough to support himself and Theo is making plans for when he finishes school that don't involve coming back home.

And what do Ward and I think about this? We're glad because it looks like we've succeeded in raising independent, responsible, contributing members of society. Sometimes we weren't so sure this would happen. Like the time Theo refused to go to school because he thought he already knew it all. Or the time Wally flooded the house with the garden hose. Or the time when Theo started a fire at school during the electricity unit. Or the time Wally wouldn't do his homework because he thought it was too boring. Or the time the teacher called. Or the time the other teacher called. Or the next time another teacher called... But you know what? Just like all of the older and wiser people told us, it will work out. And it did. Thank goodness.

After a few tears on my part, we are adjusting to a quieter house. We're enjoying not having to figure out a schedule with the cars. We like it that now we can keep food in the house. (In case you haven't heard, young males eat a LOT.) We are also trying to keep quiet as Wally and Theo are figuring out things in the big world by themselves. I'm having a hard time with not offering too many opinions (some would call it nagging, I call it being a mother), but I'm working on it.

We know that there are ups and downs to everyone's life and Wally or Theodore may boomerang right back here. But for now both parents and children are enjoying the right of passage that is the empty nest.

In the essence of Full Disclosure, the nest is not really empty if you count our four needy (kneady - get it?) cats. :)

Thankful Sunday--March 9, 2014

I am thankful that days are getting longer.

Even though I lost an hour of sleep last night because of the time change, I am very happy that the days are getting longer.

Food Waste Friday and True Food Confessions--Mar. 7, 2014

It's time for Food Waste Friday, when the Frugalgirl encourages us to post pictures from the previous week of wasted food from our household. This accountability hopefully will help us to be more careful with our food and maybe save some money. Also, I am using this public forum to encourage us to eat out less which includes better meal planning. You can follow how we are doing in this endeavor by reading True Food Confessions. (Thanks to Jo from Simply Being Mum for sponsoring FWF this week.)

This Week's Food Waste 

None. Yea!!

I saved mushrooms and carrots by adding them to some fried rice. I've never made fried rice before, but I'm happy to report that it turned out well. I'll be using this in the future as another way to use up expiring food besides soups and casseroles.

This Week's True Food Confessions

Lili asked a couple of weeks ago how our food preparations have changed now that we have an empty nest. (An empty nest post is coming soon.)

We had leftovers from Shepard's Pie we had this week.

Short Answer:
We cook about the same, but now we have leftovers so we don't have to cook as often.

Long Answer:
When I was thinking about how things have changed, I'd say the biggest change is that we now have leftovers. For the last 20-some years, leftovers have been nonexistent. Or I should say, leftovers never lasted more than 8 hours. I may have gone to bed with leftovers in the fridge, but they would be gone the next morning with nothing left but an empty dish in the sink. Then I thought even further back about how our food habits changed throughout the years.

When we were first married, Ward and I lived in New Orleans. You may have heard that New Orleans is a city with great food and that is very true. It's just not its world famous restaurants. It is a place where a sandwich from a grocery store counter to cheesy fries from corner bar maybe the best you've ever had. At that point in our life, we had no kids and lots of money. That meant a lot of eating out with friends and learning to love turtle soup, shrimp Poboys, and crawfish. When we weren't going out, we worked a lot of overtime. Eating at home was catch as catch can.

The next chapter was when we had Wally and moved to Houston. Three years later, we had Theo. At this point, we both had full-time jobs with overtime. Usually by the time we got home, we were all tired and cranky. The question was did we want to go out to a restaurant where we had to wait for our food with fussy toddlers or did we want to eat at home where we rarely had anything prepared. The restaurants often won out. In Houston we learned to love Tex-Mex food from our frequent trips to the local restaurants. I am not exaggerating when I say there was a Mexican restaurant on every corner in our neighborhood.

As the boys got older, I quit my job and only picked up some occasional part-time work. I did more cooking at home and became a very good grocery shopper as far as getting the most for our money. Sometimes, I would have meals planned for the week or month and sometimes, I didn't. We still enjoyed eating out, but the frequency was less than before. Much of our eating out involved visiting Ward for lunch at his work cafeteria. Afterwards, we would take a walk and feed the ducks at a pond outside his building.

As the boys got still older, they became more and more involved in the food preparations. That might mean making applesauce with all of the neighborhood kids or leaning how to make chili. They were still young enough (preschool and early elementary ages) that they thought this was all fun.

When they both were in elementary school we moved to Maryland where we live now. I continued to involve the boys in more and more of the food preparations.  We would plan menus together as a family and sometimes each family member would plan them for the week or month. We discussed balanced nutrition and cooking times and methods that would fit into the schedules. The whole family read cookbooks to look for easy recipes and food prep was very much a family activity. We started adding a Maryland favorite of Old Bay Seasoning to many of our dishes.

Move ahead a few more years to when the Wally and Theo were in their teens. By this point, they were often in charge of the evening meals. During summer breaks, if they didn't have a job, they would be entirely in charge of suppers. Ward and I had our jobs outside of the house and they had their job inside the house is how we looked at things. I helped with shopping for the food if they were not yet driving. However, they needed to make up the grocery list. I was trying to teach them good life skills as well making sure that they understood the responsibilities of being a part of a family (or any group.) I learned a few things from them as they ran the kitchen. (i.e. Wally loaded the dishwasher more efficiently than I ever had.)

Now we're up to the last few years. This is when I started to worry about eating out too much for both financial and health reasons. I had not magically learned to like cooking, so this was a struggle for me. We ate at home a lot more with simple but nutritious meals. Theo got very interested in cooking at this point because he was getting tired of the same old things we were having. He improved the quality of our meals a lot during this time. However, the novelty eventually wore off for him when he realized how much work was involved with much of what he was interested in eating.

Where do we stand today? How do Wally and Theo cook now that their cooking involves only themselves? Wally is very happy to eat a peanut butter sandwich everyday. He has always loved peanut butter so this is actually a pleasure for him. However, he does cook occasionally when he thinks he should be fitting some vegetables in.  Theo still likes to experiment with flavors and cooks mainly at home. His main motivation for this is to save money. However, sometimes he is so busy with school that he enjoys a takeout pizza. How about here? Ward does not like to cook and does not feel at home in the kitchen. However, he is willing to help with food preparation and clean up. And even more he is willing to eat out. I still struggle with cooking at home most of the time and when I'm tired or stressed, cooking is the last thing I want to do. Planning is key for me to forge ahead during these times.

Has you cooking style changed over the years?

A Second Look--March 5, 2014

Between rain and snow storms, I managed to take a walk around the whole yard this week. I went looking for signs of spring, but mostly I noticed signs of animals. A day after I took this walk, the snow returned. I'm glad I got out when I did.

Here's what I saw this week during a Second Look.

The deer have been spending the winter mostly in the lower part of the yard. However, I expect that to change once our bedding plants start budding and there's a lot of tasty things to eat close to the house.

There are no signs that any of these burrow entrances have been used recently. I guess the groundhogs think it's still too cold to come out.

Most of the snow had melted, but I found these rabbit tracks in some that was left.

The rabbit prints were leading up to this den. We have collected a huge pile sticks that several animals have made their home.

A bigger perspective on our stick pile habitat. There are two major entrances--one below that was in the above picture and one a couple of feet above. I have imagined all kinds of animals living here, but have actually only seen rabbits around.

It wouldn't be a winter walk in the yard without finding a bone. I don't know what this is but my best guess is part of a groundhog skull.

This is another place that an animal/bird has been keeping warm this winter. The bottom of the hole is filled with leaves and grass.

The next day the rain and snow returned and I did most of my looking out the window where I saw a female cardinal, a chickadee, and a male downy woodpecker.

What about this weather we're having?

Don't knock the weather; nine-tenths of the people couldn't start a conversation if it didn't change once in a while.  ~Kin Hubbard

In the US, this winter has set many records for snowfall amounts and colder temperatures. And this has everyone talking. Talking about the crocus that should be here and aren't. Talking about whether school will be closed yet again tomorrow. Talking about overspent budgets on plows and salt. And talking about the smell of baking cookies on one of those unexpected snow days.

To see how different things really are, I thought I'd look to see how what it was like during the beginning of March the last couple of years.

The beginning of March 2014

 

3/3/2014--This was yesterday with 6" of snow and single digit temperatures.

3/1/2014--This is usually the spot where we see the first crocus. So far no sign of them.

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The beginning of March 2013

3/3/2013--At this time last year, we had a few crocus popping up here and there. You can't see them here, but the daffodil leaves were up 6-8"

3/6/2013--But look, a few days later we had snow and freezing rain.

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The beginning of March 2012

3/1/2012--Two years ago on the first day of March, we had daffodils blooming several places in the yard.

3/10/2012--A week later, the maple tree was in bloom. That has not happened yet this year.

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The middle of March 2011

(I didn't have any pictures from the beginning of March.)

3/17/2011--The crocus are in bloom all over the yard. This is the same spot as in the 2014 picture that shows nothing but dirt and leaves.

I'm not sure what all of this proves except maybe the plants agree with the records. It is colder this winter than recent ones. In the meantime, I am enjoying looking at pictures of things to come. (Soon, I hope.)