Homemade Macaroni and Cheese

One of my friends was blogging about how unhealthy the fake mac and cheese is, so I wanted to share my homemade macaroni and cheese recipe. We love it and it's super easy to make. Use whole wheat macaroni noodles. For my family I quadruple it.

1 1/4 cups macaroni
2 Tbsp Butter
2 Tbsp Flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1/2 tsp mustard
1/8 tsp pepper
1 cup milk
2 c. cheese, divided
1/4 cup cracker crumbs

Cook macaroni according to package. While it's cooking, melt butter in large bowl in the microwave. Stir in flour, salt, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, and pepper. Heat milk in microwave for 1 minute. Stir into flour mixture and heat for 1 1/2 minutes. Stir and heat for 1 1/2 more minutes. Stir and heat for 1 minute more. (With a quadruple batch, I do 3-5 minutes between stirring.) You'll know it's ready when it starts to thicken up. Add 1 1/2 cups of cheese into the white sauce. Stir until melted. Add in drained macaroni and mix. Top with cracker crumbs and sprinkle with remaining cheese.


This also reheats really good!

Upcoming Big days

We have some fun days coming up in the next little bit with birthdays and the adoptions.
Adam's birthday is Feb 28, Melynda's adoption will be finalized Mar 3, Eli's birthday is March 12 (but we'll celebrate on the 11th) because Melynda's baptism will be on March 12th at 1:00. (I would love to have a good turnout for her, so if you want directions, leave a comment or email me.)
Then Jeanisha's birthday is March 29, and Eli's adoption will be finalized the first week or so of April. Then mid-April, Melynda and Eli will get sealed to us in the temple.

It's amazing to think that this process has taken a little over 2 years from when we started our homestudy. 2 1/2 if you start when we decided now was the time to adopt. There are hard days, but overall it's been mostly good. Stephen is still a little overwhelmed by teenage drama some days, and the testing phase leaves me exhausted some days, but when I look at how far Melynda and Eli have come, it's a miracle.

Groceries Galore

I am amazed at the amount of food that gets consumed around here! Maybe it's because we added two older mouths instead of having it sneak up gradually, but my grocery bill has doubled over the past year. Last night for dinner I made a quadruple batch of German pancakes. That is 24 eggs, plus flour, milk, and butter. It makes 4 9*13 pans. Melynda was babysitting and Stephen got stuck late at jury duty, so it was just me and the 6 younger kids. I thought at first there would be leftovers, but it ended up that I only got one piece. They ate all 4 pans as fast as I could serve it, cut it up, and add syrup. Lincoln alone ate almost 1/2 a pan.

For breakfast, Ryan and Stephen are not here, but if I do fried eggs, they will eat 18-20. If I make something like Enchiladas, it takes at least two pans, plus whatever vegetables or side dishes. When Stephen made pancakes awhile back, he made over 50, and we each got 2. I realize there are 9 people eating, but it still amazes me HOW much food that is. Peanut butter sandwiches for lunch uses 1 1/2- 2 loaves of bread, depending on the size loaf and if Stephen is home.

The other thing that gets devoured are bananas. The rule is that anytime you are still hungry, or want a snack between meals, you can have a banana (or peanut butter sandwich). Bananas are filling and cheap, easy to eat without making a big mess, and good for you. Plus kids eat them for breakfast or with lunch sometimes. I bought 26 lbs. of bananas thinking I would have enough left over for banana bread. Nope, they were gone in under a week.

Just thinking about my food bill when these kids are all teenagers is scary. :) I remember my mother-in-law saying that when her 3 boys left on missions, they saved enough on food to pay for one mission. I believe it!

Pneumonia Miracle

This is from a couple weeks ago, but I never got it posted.

Lincoln is 2, and a generally healthy kid. Last week he came down with the croupy cough and the fever that disappears in the morning. Then all day he would play and run just fine. Friday morning, I woke the kids up to get ready for our homeschool co-op. Lincoln was teasing and laughing as I got him dressed, then went downstairs to eat. He started whimpering in his chair, so his older brother Tyler lifted him out to come upstairs to me. I was in my room and saw him as he came slowly up the stairs. Then in the hallway, he collapsed. Fell completely to the ground. He then tried to crawl towards me, but it was as if his arms had lost their strength.

I hurried and picked him up and laid him on the bed. He curled up in a ball and just lay there whimpering. I felt his head and he was burning with fever (which had NOT been there 15 minutes earlier). I decided to still drop the older 4 kids off at co-op, so I would have only the two little boys to take to the dr.'s office whenever they could fit me in. I wrapped Lincoln in a coat and blanket to take to the van and he was just limp. He couldn't even lift his head up!

We drove the 30 minutes to co-op and he didn't move. I was still waiting to hear back from the nurse. As the other kids were climbing out of the car, he started throwing up. He had only taken a little water that morning anyway, so now I was worried about dehydration as well. Even when he was throwing up, he didn't have the strength to lift up his head. I pulled off the soiled clothes, wrapped him in a blanket and settled him back in his car seat. The nurse called back and said we could be seen at 1:15.

I was sure at this point that he was going to be hospitalized. I suspected RSV and probably a week in the hospital. Unfortunately, we've had plenty of experience with sick kids, and he was acting just like the others did when they ended up in the hospital. I called my husband and told him to arrange to work from home next week, and started mentally planning out what I would have to do to be able to handle a hospital stay on top of everything else right now.

We got back home and I took Lincoln in for a warm bath to clean him up. Then I gave him a sippy of apple juice. Within about 10 minutes, he was a completely different kid. He was back to teasing, running, and playing. He did not act sick in the slightest. But we still had the Dr. appt, so I took him anyway. After the exam and an X-ray, we found out he has a case of pneumonia. He SHOULD be totally sick. He probably SHOULD be in the hospital. But he is acting perfectly healthy. We came home with an antibiotic and instructions to go to the hospital if he gets bad again.

I think Heavenly Father knew that a week long hospital stay was likely more than our family could handle at this point. So I'm very grateful for our pneumonia miracle.