I have developed a plan. What's new, right? I have always struggled between liking to have freezer meals on hand and going overboard and not using them. Here's my new plan. I am going to plan that Tuesdays, which are Zach's day to go to basketball, are going to be freezer meal nights. Once a week I will make a double batch of something, pasta, fried rice, etc. and freeze it. I will keep one spare freezer meal in the freezer beyond the Tuesday meal and every Tuesday I will use up the oldest of the two meals, replacing the extra one when necessary. This will give me two "outs" during the week if I need it and will automatically ensure that meals don't stay in the freezer for too long. I am using one meal tonight and I have some fried rice in the freezer.

We made another reading nook today, this time in the odd space in the kids' hallway. I took the mattress extender from the toddler bed, which we aren't using, and put a pretty quilt over it. We added some pillows with pillowcases I embroidered a while back and a wooden box turned on its side for a bookshelf. The kids stocked it with some books my dad's friend gave us, mostly Winnie-the-Pooh and Beatrix Potter. It is a huge hit. The big girls want to sew some buntings to go over it for decoration. I have plenty of scrap fabric for that.