Loaded Baked Potato Soup & Bread Bowls

 LOADED BAKED POTATO SOUP

 
Ingredients

• 8 potatoes (white, baking, russet or a combination of the three)
• 1/2 diced onion 
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup butter
• 2/3 cup flour
• 6 cup milk
• 1 cup chopped green onion
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 12 slices cooked & crumbled bacon
• 4 oz. cheddar cheese
• 4 oz. American cheese
• 2 oz. Mexican cheese
• 8 oz sour cream

Directions

1. Bake potatoes in a preheated 425* oven for 45mins. - 1 hour. Scoop out the insides of the cooked potato, set it aside and discard the skin.
2. Caramelize onions in brown sugar with 1 cup water.
3. Melt butter in Rock Crok Dutch Oven over medium heat. Stir in the flour to make a roux. Cook 1 minute, stirring constantly. Gradually pour in the milk, 1 cup at a time while stirring constantly until all the milk has been added. Add the caramelized onions (and drippings). Continue to stir until the mixture starts to get thick. 
4. Add the potatoes, green onions, salt, pepper, bacon, cheddar cheese and American cheese. Stir well and continue to heat for 15 minutes, allowing the flavors to blend. Stirring well, mix in the sour cream until well blended with the soup. Serve immediately, adding a bit of Mexican cheese to each serving. 

BREAD BOWLS

 

Ingredients

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
•  1 tbspn any sweet rub or seasoning 
• 1 tsp quick rising yeast
• 1 tsp salt 
• 1 1/2 up water
• 2 tbsp oil

1. Mix flour, sweet rub, salt, yeast and add water. Add 2 tbps of oil. Dough will be sticky. 
2. Cover bowl in plastic wrap and let sit 6-10 hours until dough rises.
3. Place dough on floured surface, fold two-three times and cut into small (fist size) balls. 
4. Boil 2 cups water in a glass container. Place 1 dough ball inside the Mini Baker  uncovered. Place both containers side by side in a cold oven. Let dough rise 1 hour or until doubled in size.
5. Carefully remove glass water container from oven and place top on baker. Return baker to oven preheated to 450*. 
6. Bake 15-20 minutes with lid. Remove lid and bake an additional 10-15 minutes or until golden brown.
7. Remove from oven and allow to cool.
8. Repeat steps 4-7 until all dough balls are made. Allowing each to cool at least 20 minutes before creating bread bowl.

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Back at it, After Baby

get going again

According to your level of fitness and strength and how you feel after giving birth, you could give yourself a training break (not counting short walks with the baby) of at least about 2 weeks AND most normally closer to 6-8 weeks.

Start with longer walks with the baby outside when you feel like it. I started with 30 minute walks, 10 days after giving birth, plus some short sets of light squats and careful stretching and mild yoga.

After that: slowly build up your stamina and physical condition.

Take the baby with you whenever you can. They love going places. And they’re asleep most of the time anyway during the first few months when they’re not eating. 

in the gym

I found that I could easily do these exercises from the gym in my home and it’s actually most of the stuff I used to do before.

• Farmers walks (Go light! Your abs are still stretched out and they need time to recover.)
• Squats (I could do these with stitches, but you might want to skip these at the start)
• Deadlifts
• Lunges
• Step-ups
• Cross trainer (heaviest setting)
• Shoulder press
• Dips
• (Modified) light Turkish get-ups

outside

No gym? No excuse: go do some exercise in the park or in your own yard.

Make your initial walks longer as the days go by to increase your stamina. Babies love being outside, and it’s good for them too.

Have fun: find a fallen tree trunk and try log walking for balance, log squatting, backflips (haha)… all fun. As an added bonus, this stuff will make you feel like you’re 10 again.

Other exercises:

• Stroller lunges (or just lunges)
• Step-ups on a handy park bench or stable non-slippery log
• Interval short pram sprints (preferably without launching your baby)
• Squats (using pram for assistance if necessary)
• Park bench push-ups
• Park bench dips
• Park bench plank
• Stretches (careful)

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Releasing Toxins through Yoga...

IF you break a sweat, YOU BET you'll reap benefits!

SWEAT releases toxins! Common sense theory: an ashtanga vinyasa practice opens up with 10 sun salutes building heat leading to sweat, many of the asana block blood flow to body parts, organs and glands. Your heart rate is up, pressure builds, then blood vessels dilate upon release of the pose. Toxins are easily removed in a natural washing process.
It improves overall sense of well-being, flexibility and joint mobility, strength endurance and functional strength, core strength, coordination and balance, bone density, reduces stress levels and increases ability to relax and unwind, and potential eight loss trough caloric expenditure and increased muscle tissue.

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Summer for the First Grader

English

Language arts lessons are organized into a series of chapters that introduce and cover:

• 1. Consonants & Short Vowels - Teaches the relationship of sounds to letters of the alphabet. Exercises build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders learn to identify the sight and sound of each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  2. Digraphs & Vowels - Teaches the sounds and letters of the consonant digraphs ck, sh, th; the long vowel digraph ea; and the r-controlled vowel ar. Exercises build phonological awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  3. Digraphs & Long Vowels - Teaches the sounds and letters of the consonant digraphs ng, ch, and the long vowel a. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  4. R-controlled Vowels, Digraph & Soft C - Teaches the sounds and letters of the r-controlled vowels er, ir, and ur; the consonant digraph wh, and the soft sound of the consonant c. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  5. Long Vowels, Suffixes & Plurals - Teaches the sounds and letters of CVCe words i_e and o_e; the suffixes ed and ing; and plurals s and es. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  6. Soft G and R-controlled Vowels - Teaches the sounds and letters of the r-controlled vowels or and ore and the soft sound of the consonant g. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  7. Long, Variant & Vowel Digraphs - Teaches the sounds and letters of CVCe words a_e, e_e, i_e, o_e, and u_e; the variant vowel all; and the vowel digraphs ai and ay. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  8. Long Vowels - Teaches the sounds and letters of the vowel pair ee; the long sound of i with the igh spelling; and the long sound of e with the y spelling. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  9. Long Vowels & Vowel Digraphs - Teaches the sight and sound of the consonant y and it’s vowel digraph ie; and the long o sound of vowel digraphs oa and ow. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  10. Variant Vowels and Diphthongs - Teaches the sounds and letters of the short sound of the variant vowel oo as in book; and the diphthongs ow and ou. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  11. Variant Vowels - Teaches the sounds and letters of the long sound of the variant vowel oo as in spoon; and the variant vowels ue and ew. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  12. Variant Vowels, Contractions, Diphthongs & Compound Words - Teaches the sounds and letters of the variant vowel aw; contractions; the diphthongs oy and oi; and compound words. Activities build phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading skills. First graders will identify each and demonstrate knowledge of high frequency words. An interactive “think and respond” story will build sight word vocabulary, sound-spelling skills and reading comprehension.
  13. Reading Comprehension, Vocabulary & Fluency - Students will learn new vocabulary, read a leveled story and demonstrate comprehension by recalling details. First graders develop fluency through a series of vocabulary, reading comprehension and writing activities that incorporate discovery learning and direct instruction.
  Nouns
• Verbs
• Other parts of speech (pronouns, adjectives, adverbs)
• Spelling
• Blends
• Word Families
• Complete sentences
• Punctuation
• Capitalization
• Alphabetizing

             Activities :

1. Silly Sentences
2. Animal Messages

Mathematics

Math lessons are organized into a variety of chapters that introduce and cover:

• 1. Number Sense - First grade "Number Sense" teaches how to read, compare, match, and define whole numbers. Lessons also cover counting numbers by twos and fives and even vs odd numbers.
  2. Fractions - First grade "Fractions" teaches the difference between equal and unequal parts. Fractions divided by halves, thirds and fourths are introduced in lessons such as "The Art of Fractions" (below).
  3. Operations - First grade "Operations" starts with math vocabulary. It distinguishes the difference between addition and subtraction, and teaches first graders about place value. Lessons move into addition and subtraction of one and two digit numbers and gives problem solving strategy. Operations ends with lessons on estimation.
  4. Money - First grade "Money" teaches about coin values, how to count money, and how to add and subtract it.
  5. Patterns - First grade "Patterns" teaches students how to identify, sort and classify things by common patterns or attributes. Students learn to identify patterns on a "hundreds chart" and then apply those patterns to skip counting by 2s, 5s, and 10s.
  6. Algebra - First grade "Algebra" introduces students to algebraic symbols and the commutative property of addition. Lessons also teach number sentences, equal vs unequal, greater than vs less than and solving for unknown numbers.
  7. Shapes - First grade "Shapes" teaches about two and three-dimensional shapes. Lessons cover straight vs curved lines, open vs closed shapes and planes vs solid objects. Students are introduced to special shapes, such as hexagons, trapezoids, and rhombi and are asked to describe and compare them in the lessons.
  8. Positions - First grade "Positions" introduces basic geometry and spatial relationships. Students learn how to identify, locate and move objects according to directional (left, right, up, down) and positional (top, middle, inside) instruction. First graders are introduced to the number line, as well.
  9. Using Shapes - First grade "Shapes" teaches congruent shapes and symmetry. Students learn to match congruent shapes and identify lines of symmetry in two dimensional shapes.
  10. Spatial Sense - First grade "Spatial Sense" teaches how to build and calculate perimeter and area of two dimensional shapes. It teaches how to recognize geometric shapes around s, and how to use one shape to build another.
  11. Time - First grade "Time" introduces different ways that time is classified, such as calendar time and clock time. Students learn about digital vs analog time telling.
  12. Length - First grade "Length" teaches how to use, compare and measure length. Students will choose the appropriate tool and use it to measure different metrics.
  13. Weight - First grade "Weight" teaches different attributes of weight. Students will estimate, compare and measure different objects.
  14. Capacity - First grade "Capacity" teaches how to measure, compare and estimate capacity. It shows students how to identify the best unit and will ask them to place objects in order according to capacity.
  15. Temperature - First grade "Temperature" teaches how to measure temperatures. Lessons introduce fahrenheit and show students how to read a thermometer and compare different readings.
  16. Graphing - First grade "Graphing" reinforces the 'Patterns" chapter by asking students to sort objects. They then learn to create a tally table and record information in pictographs and bar graphs.
  17. Using Data - First grade "Using Data" teaches the basics of statistics, showing students how to compare and make predictions based on the data that they organized into graphs.
  18. Probability - First grade "Probability" teaches the basics of probability. It teaches the difference between principles of certainty, impossibility, likely and least likely. First graders are prompted to identify the differences.
• Number Sequence
• Addition
• Money (coins)
• Fractions
• Odd/Even
• Reverse Counting
• Counting Forward
• Place Value
• Measurements (weight, length, temperature, time)

Activities:

1. Number Fix-up Mix-up
2. Grocer
3. Coin Caper
4. Fair Shares
5. Pizza Please
6. Greater or Less 

Science/Social Skills

1. Pollution 2. Oceans 3. Weather 4. The Sun 5. Planets 6. Constellations 7. Native Americans 8. Early America 9. America Grows 10. Plants 11. Biomes

12. Vertebrates & Invertebrates 13. Farm Animals 14. Mammals 15. Marine Animals 16. Seasons seasons 17. Cultural Holidays 18. Safety 19. Neighborhoods 20. Jobs in your Neighborhood 21. Travel 22. Values

• Space
• Directions

1. Living and Nonliving Things - Students will learn how to distinguish between living and nonliving things by exploring habitats, basic needs, features, and life cycles. Lessons will focus on the classification of animals into scientific categories, with a feature on amphibians.
2. Earth Science - Students will be shown how to use graphic organizers to show weather patterns and identify seasons. Lessons also cover thunderstorms and the water cycle.
3. Contributions to Science - Jane Goodall is featured as a contributor to science, allowing children to explore her experience working with chimpanzees in Africa.
4. The Surface of the Earth - Students learn about the solid materials making up the Earth.

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The world is a different place

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious nonsense about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning.... Uphill... Barefoot with newspaper wrapped around their feet JUST to stay warm... 

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way, I was going to lay a bunch of that on my kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it! 

But now that I have a couple kids and I see how REALLY different the world has become and IS becoming... 

I mean, when I was a kid we barely had the Internet. We had dial-up and ONLY when I was in high school! If we wanted to know something before that, we had to go to the"Big Book of Everything" or grab an encyclopedia!

Child Protective Services didn't care if our parents beat us. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick our butt if necessary.. they certainly had no problem telling us what's what! 

There was no 24 hour cartoon channels! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning.

And our parents told us to stay outside and play... all day long. Oh, no, no electronics to soothe and comfort. And if you came back inside... you were doing chores! Otherwise you were outside, running a muck ANYWHERE in town, (WITHOUT SUPPLYING YOUR PARENTS WITH A SPECIFIC ADDRESS, PHONE NUMBER OR DIRECTIONS) until the street lights came on! 

And car seats - oh, please! Mom threw you in the back seat and you hung on. If you were lucky, you got the "safety arm" across the chest at the last moment if she had to stop suddenly, and if your head hit the dashboard, well that was your fault for calling "shot gun" in the first place!

The little things seem weird, humorous even. But, the fact is, the world today is a scary place today, MUCH different from the world I grew up in.

Now, I fear my children will be safe if they leave my home and attend school for fear of bullies or violence or kid-napping. I fear a war will break out on our own turf any moment. I fear the education they receive will not prepare them for the world. I fear that we don't know where our country is headed or how much longer it will last. The world we live in now, is a VERY different, VERY scary place.

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