(aka my husband did something foolish and injured his toe)

Last weekend it was our turn to teach the Preschooler Bible Class. For one of our activities we made a figure 8 on the floor with tape to demonstrate the unendingness of God’s love. While the kids were coloring their activities sheets my husband thought 1potato should see how far she could jump on the figure 8. She made it about halfway. Another helper also tried and made it just slightly further. I reminisced about how my husband used to be able to jump very far in his youth. I encouraged him to demonstrate his abilities and he willingly did so jumping about 6 feet. Unfortunately, we both forgot that he was wearing steel-toed boots. He jammed his toe into the steel and pain shot through his foot. We were pretty sure he just sprained his toe.

By the time we got home his big toe was very swollen and black and blue. I applied Arnica cream to it and he spent pretty much the rest of the day in bed in severe pain. He also took some ibuprofen which he never takes. The pain and swelling continued for the next couple of days and we applied more of the arnica cream each day. It seemed to be quickly going through the stages of healing but it was still difficult for him to put much weight on it. Thankfully he has a desk job so he was able to stay off of it for the most part.

On Thursday I started worrying that maybe he actually broke his toe instead of just jamming it so I started to do some research. Sudddenly I remembered that PanAway oil from Young Living was used in treating such injuries. It is a combination of Wintergreen (Gaultheria procumbens), helichrysum (Helichrysum italicum), clove (Syzygium aromaticum) and peppermint (Mentha piperita). I felt so dumb for having not thought about that earlier in the week. When he got home I liberaly applied the PanAway to his toe and rubbed it in. Within a few minutes he was able to walk normally again! It is still sore but we have been applying the PanAway at least twice a day since. The swelling is almost all gone and his toe is flesh colored again.

I love essential oils and how wonderfully they work! Now if I can just remember to use them right away!

If you are interested in learning more about essential oils check out:

http://mamakay.com/WordPress/essential-oils/

MamaKay

I got together with another friend whose family is similar sized to ours for a cooking day. A successful cooking day is made possible by spending a couple of days getting ready for the cooking day. We planned out our menu, made the grocery lists, went grocery shopping, did prep work and then finally spent 6 hours together assembling and cooking the meals on the actual cooking day.

Here is a list of what we made:

120 Meatballs
4 9×13 Chicken Stuffing Casseroles
4 9×13 Poor Man’s Casseroles
6 9×13 Sloppy Joe Casseroles
4 Gallons Black Bean Chowder
50 Beef, Bean & Cheese Burritos
40 Calzones

Chicken Tenders — were on the list but we decided to make them up separately since I forgot to thaw out the chicken ahead of time

Spent $332.33 for 56 meals which comes out to $5.93/meal or $0.74/person. (We both have 8 people in our families.) These meals are main dish only in most cases and will require additional sides such as bread, salad, etc…

Prior to cooking day we split up the following list of items to prep:
Cook ground beef
Cook chicken
Make chicken broth
Make bread crumbs
Chop onions
Chop celery
Chop carrots
Cook black beans

On cooking day we tried to be as efficient as possible. Here’s how we worked through the recipes.

1) Started the Calzone Dough
2) Made the mashed potatoes for the Poor Man’s Casserole
3) Made the white sauce to use in the Chicken Stuffing Casserole
4) Boiled the pasta for the Sloppy Joe Casserole
5) Assembled the Sloppy Joe Casseroles
6) Cut up the cooked chicken
7) Prepared the stuffing (from mixes)
8 ) Assembled the Chicken Stuffing Casseroles
9) Assembled the Poor Man’s Casseroles

10) Made the meatballs
11) Flash froze the meatballs
12) Took a break — yeah! look at all we accomplished so far!
13) Made the Black Bean Chowder
14) Assembled the burritos (the whole crew helped with these which resulted in some crazy looking burritos but boy were we done fast with 8 kids helping!)

15) Assembled & baked the calzones (again with all the kids helping)
16) bagged up the meatballs, burritos and calzones
17) bagged up the extra ground beef all cooked & ready to go
18) divided up the food and dishes

19) Cleaned up the mess (well, partly anyways)
20) Rested! Shew! That was a long day but so worth it!

Couple Of Days

Saving Kittens from Terrorists

MamaKay

Cooking Day 11/4/11