The Friday Five!

You might have noticed that I dropped our Weekend Makes post a few weeks ago. We'd been putting together that Friday roundup for just about a year and I was getting sick of it! I found that I was identifying a lot of great makes, but we didn't always get around to making many of them. 

But I do really like the idea of having a constant Friday feature and the Weekend Makes was always a popular post. I've also always been surprised at how many views our 12-in-12 posts got, and I haven't done that in awhile either. So I decided to try a little bit of a combo for the next Friday post iteration: The Friday Five. Each Friday I'll share what we're actually: Reading, Playing, Cooking, Making, and Wanting. We'll see how it goes!! 

So here's what's what this week: 

Reading -- I'm reading Notorious RBG: The Life and Times of Ruth Bader Ginsburg (so, so interesting). Together, we're working our way through the first book in the much-anticipated (at least by us) new Norse mythology series from Rick Riordan: Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard, Book 1: The Sword of Summer. We're also busy planning our next big trip: Scotland and Ireland! So everyone has picked one or two topics to research and we're deep into reference books on the countries. 

Playing -- If you follow us on Instagram, you'll know that we've been spending lots of our winter break doing puzzles. We particularly like the White Mountain series featuring layers of various items -- they are difficult, but the kids can still do them with us. And 1,000 pieces is about the right number of pieces for the family at this point. I count that as playing. 

Cooking -- Oy. We've been hosting something nearly every weekend since the beginning of November and eating, and eating, and eating. I can hardly wait to start a new Whole30 on January 2nd (I'm sure I'll be singing a different tune soon). We've been indulging a lot lately, but these slow cooker Salsa Verde Honey Lime Chicken Tacos are pretty healthy and have been a big favorite these past few weeks. 

Making -- There was a good reason we include the Kid Made Modern Crafts Case in pretty much every gift guide we make (including our 2016 Holiday Guide) -- it provides HOURS upon HOURS of crafting for the kids. And it's been in heavy rotation this winter break. The kids have made sculptures, sewed mini stockings for their stuffed animals, created jewelry, and on and on. 

Wanting -- Because we're just on the other side of several gift-intensive holidays, I can happily say that there is not much that the kids want right now. The influx of things into our home always causes me organizational anxiety, though. So I've been spending lots of winter break time making lists of what needs to be purged and organized once the kids are back at school. I'm also determined to create less food waste this year, so I've got my eyes on some refrigerator organizers!