I filmed our experience at the Japanese Grill. It was like a food show, with fire and flashing lights. The kids ate all their food.
Archive for the ‘Family Life’ Category
Japanese Grill
Friday, January 28th, 2011What to Eat with Tomato Soup
Thursday, January 27th, 2011
If you are wondering what to eat with tomato soup, you have come to the right place. A super easy meal that even a child can make is tomato soup. Choose your favorite soup from a can, and your child can dump the contents into the pot and stir it. To serve with the soup, Saltine crackers are an obvious choice. Freshly baked bread is another idea.
At the boarding school I attended when I was a girl, they also served cheese slices and popcorn, of all things. The popcorn tastes great in the soup, if you fish it out immediately after it shrinks in the soup. My daughter laughed the first time she saw the popcorn shrivelling in her soup!
Well, a few months ago I discovered another side dish or “accessory” for tomato soup: cheese crackers. Oh, yum!
To sum up, then, you need to get these yummy things to dunk into your soup:
- Saltine crackers
- freshly baked bread
- cheese slices (try different kinds of cheese)
- popcorn
- cheese crackers
My kids had a ball dunking these things into their steaming tomato soup. All of it was gobbled up, which is a delight to any mother. My children had no problem wondering what to eat with tomato soup, since there were so many choices available!
The Psychology Behind Exercise
Tuesday, January 25th, 2011
A year ago when I lost ten pounds, the only reason I lost the weight was to look good for my husband. If you are losing weight for the sake of another person and not for your own good, you might unwittingly become resentful. Thankfully I nipped it in the bud, but I saw it coming. I’m telling you my story as a warning, so that it doesn’t happen to you.
After a long homeschool day, the last thing we mothers want to do is to go to the gym, especially when it’s dinnertime. But you can’t exercise on a full stomach, and you shouldn’t really exercise later in the evening if you expect to go to sleep. So the only time to fit in going to the gym is immediately after your husband gets home from work.
I had to eat a small snack, and I prepared dinner. My husband came home to a nice dinner that he ate with the children. (I warmed mine up later when I came home from the gym.) As soon as he arrived home, we passed each other like two ships in the night. A quick kiss, and off I went. I already had my running shoes on before he got home.
The seconds ticked by on the treadmill. I would watch the numbers go up, wishing the time would go faster. Sometimes the music was so loud it gave me a headache. Some guy on the treadmill next to me tried to pick up on me. I angrily looked away and ignored him. He kept pestering me, and I almost switched treadmills. I wore the ugliest, frumpiest clothes on purpose, and couldn’t he see I had a wedding ring? It just made me mad.
Tick, tick, tick. Sometimes I would do spurts to run faster until I thought I couldn’t bear another step, and I would make it slower again. Sweat trickled into my eyes. I hate sweating. It makes me feel sticky and disgusting, especially that time of month. I suddenly got upset that I even needed to do this. Why do guys care so much about women’s looks? And I know that my husband loves me no matter what size I am, but there is a difference in his eyes when I look really good. There just is. God made them that way I suppose. But for some reason I was mad. I thought of all the hours being flushed down the toilet, running on this stupid treadmill.
When I got home, my husband had been taking care of the kids. Whenever your husband takes care of the kids, he subconsciously thinks you owe him a favor for giving you a break. Really? Excuse me, but I did not just have a break. If he had watched the kids while I went out to spend time with other women, I would have come home happy and refreshed, and oddly, I wouldn’t care if he thought I owed him, because I would have something to give. I would have felt refreshed and happy. Not depleted, sticky, sweaty, and like I had just forced myself to do something I hated for his sake.
I don’t know if I ever even told my husband any of this. I would come home and go straight to the shower, and ask God to give me energy for my husband, because I had given my all at the gym, and I had nothing left. But “my all” at the gym was for my husband, so he had already gotten it. And now he expected me to be pleased that he had watched the kids. I wanted to cry.
I recognized the sin of resentment, and I threw it out. I reached upward to God, and He gave me strength. After a shower, I actually felt better. Maybe it was the positive effects of exercise. Supernaturally I was able to enjoy my husband during the evening, and he never even knew about my struggle.
However, a year later when I gained back the weight, I just didn’t have the oomph to lose it again. I just didn’t feel like it. I know, that makes me a lousy wife, but I was juggling so many things that I just didn’t want to add something I hated.
Look, girls, I hate exercising just as badly as you do. I want to give up just the same. So if I can do this, so can you. Your husband will be pleased. Your husband chose you from all the other women on the face of the earth, and he works his butt off just to help you stay home so you can homeschool your kids. He is a treasure. He loves you. Go ahead and give him a present of a better you.
And don’t just do it for him, or resentment will rear its ugly head. You have to do it for you. I hate to admit this, but I actually feel better after I’ve exercised. Write a list of all the benefits of exercise, and post it up somewhere so that you can see it.
Think of it this way: if you are carting around a ten-pound sack of flour all day, wouldn’t you be tired? Drop the sack of flour, for you own sake.
Exercise Videos
Monday, January 24th, 2011
Just because you’re home all day with your kids doesn’t mean you can’t exercise. Yes, homeschool moms can exercise, and they don’t need to wait for their husbands to watch the kids.
I’m looking out the window at the snow falling, and I know that the streets are icy. If I were to run around the block, I would slip and fall and end up in an emergency room for a cracked bone or something. So how do you exercise when the sun isn’t shining and you have no gym membership? The best answer is to get some exercise videos.
Groan. Yeah, I hear you. Look, even if you are dirt poor and don’t have any money, go to Goodwill, to the video section. There are bazillions of exercise videos to choose from, and they are usually only 99 cents. So you have no excuse. Choose several, because you’ll notice that some are more irritating than others. Like the curly-headed guy from the 80’s, you know which one, that has you “Sweating to the Oldies.” I thought I would like it because I liked the music. But I was so irritated by him that I didn’t even get through the video once. His mannerisms were effeminate.
I was given a box of videos by a friend, and I thought I would try all the exercise videos to see which one I liked. I didn’t like any of them! The yoga didn’t even raise my heart rate, and the positions were impossible. (I’m not flexible whatsoever.) Boxing isn’t my style, either. Maybe I’m just not coordinated.
I forgot about an exercise video I had tucked away in a drawer. This was a video I had gotten at Goodwill years ago, when I had a new baby and wanted to lose the baby fat. The video came highly recommended by three women from my church. It’s “Cindy Crawford: Shape Your Body Workout.” (The copyright is 1992, so you should be able to find that one used.) I haven’t done this one in years, but I remember it being good enough to keep. Maybe I’ll do that one when I can’t handle Jillian’s, which is the one I’m doing now.
Yes, I broke down and actually bought a brand, spankin’ new exercise video. It cost $10 at Walmart. It’s called “No More Trouble Zones” by Jillian Michaels from “The Biggest Loser.” The DVD says, “Eliminate Love Handles, Muffin Tops, and Wobbly Arms for Good!” Okay.
I don’t know why I love this video. It’s impossibly hard. I can’t really do it. But I tell myself, “I’m going to just pretend I’m doing it. I’ll modify it.” If anybody were watching me, they would tell you I was a wimp and I wasn’t really doing it. But they would be wrong. My muscles were burning during the one-hour workout, and the next day my whole body was hurting. (The box says the workout is 40 minutes, but that’s false. I’m telling you straight up; expect it to be an hour.) I shoo my kids down the stairs. If you’re more mature than I am, you can have your kids exercising with you. It’s way too embarrassing for me, and I have to be alone or I can’t concentrate. (Besides, my older two sons are 10 and 9, and Jillian and the other two girls are dressed too skimpy. To me, it’s just a motivation, because I want to look that good, so I’m not offended by their skimpy clothes, as long as I’m the only one in the room.)
Doing the exercise video during the month of December (a total of three times) was a comedy show. I kept banging into the Christmas tree by accident. Once I knocked an ornament clean off the tree, and it went flying through the air, crashing against the fireplace. I’m not making this up. This workout was dangerous, I thought. Multiple times I collapsed to the floor while doing the floor exercises. I’ve never been able to do push-ups, not even from my knees. I’m a wimp, I tell you.
The two women who are standing behind Jillian have smiles plastered on their faces, like they are actually enjoying the exercise. I envisioned enormous people trying to do the same exercises behind those women. I saw them losing their balance, falling, or looking with incredulity, “You want me to do what?!” I smiled to myself as I envisioned this funny workout.
The workout includes 3-pound hand weights, which I got at… drum roll please… Goodwill. My hands were so sweaty that I almost threw the weight straight through the television set. I gripped them harder.
But for some reason I like Jillian, so her workouts are okay, as long as I can clock in the time. She says, “Don’t quit on me now. Think of all the reasons you’re doing this.” And at the end, she says, “This workout is no joke. Don’t undo all the work you’ve done here by not eating right. I make big promises, and I deliver on those promises if you put in the work.” I love her. I don’t care if her workout is impossible. Maybe next month I’ll be able to do more. But after a month with Jillian, my husband has noticed that my belly is flatter. He just up and told me so. I’ve purposely eaten less food. I drink a lot more water. And I don’t snack in the evenings as much. I’ve lost 6 pounds so far, and it’s not even the end of January. (Granted, part of that weight loss was due to sickness, but I’ll take it!)
