Friday Photos

A look back at the week, Monday through Friday, through photos taken during the week.

Alyssa  and I washed our cars one of the sunny, hot days of the week. This picture cracks me up because I got Donnie's car washing kit out of the garage and promptly only used one cleaner, just the basic car wash soap rather than all of the various car washing accoutrements that he has accumulated. Suffice it to say that Donnie is more fastidious when he washes his car than I am. My only objective is to get the grime off my car, not to make it shine or to do specialty cleaning. 

Far be it from me to suggest that air fried potatoes are tastier than sliced potatoes submerged and cooked in some form of oil; however, these air fried potatoes are a good alternative. Plus they are way cheaper than buying the packaged french fries and way healthier than the aforementioned fried method of making fries. 

I found the recipe here. I've made these fries a few times including two batches this week.  There are a few odd steps like soaking the potatoes in cold water, then submerging them in boiling water for ten minutes, then drying them off, letting them cool and then air frying them. Lots of steps; I find the the trickiest thing is timing their completion with whatever else I'm making. But they are worth it!  The recipe says to peel the potatoes but I leave them on. Saves time and don't they say many of the nutrients are in the skin? Hope so because I have not peeled these when I've made them. 

Speaking of nutritious things, I had eight ripe tomatoes so I made more marinara sauce this week. It's the third batch that I've made. I gave away the second batch so this will be our second time eating it. It's so good and I love the vibrant red color of the tomatoes when they are simmering on the stove.

Unfortunately, cutting the tomatoes is a messy process but it's worth it.

One day a month our school district has a one hour early release and that day was this week. I should say the students get an hour early release once a month. The teachers stay an additional hour and work without students. Subs get to leave when the students do so I always try to sub on an early release day (as do all the subs, 😆). We get paid the same amount on early release days as regular days- we just get to be home sooner. It's the little things...

Like I believe many parts of the country experienced, we had high temperatures through Wednesday and then had a fantastic cool down just in time for fall. I have to say, though, that when I walked out of our church Wednesday evening  after youth group and felt the balmy air, I had a moment where I thought, "Do I really want this to end?" Well, I guess it doesn't matter what I want. Cool air was a comin' no matter what I thought about it. 

About 24 hours apart- Wednesday's temperature in the afternoon and Thursday's.

Jacob came home unexpectedly on Thursday. He needed something for the weekend that he had at home. It was great to see him and spend some time with him. He went with me to the grocery store (for items mostly for him) and to the post office. He talked me into mailing the package I had to mail using a self serve kiosk that was inside the post office. I am an old school, go to the counter type of person with a Luddite's latent fear that machines are more fallible than people. So I was proud of myself for being talked into using the machine. 

We picked up Chipotle on our way home for dinner. Jacob really likes Chipotle and the one near his place has to close sometimes due to staffing issues and Jacob says it is not well run when it is open. 

I almost always get a kids build your own meal at Chipotle. The amount of food fills me up without making me feel too full.