Speaking of the employment thing, we still haven't found a sitter to manage the after-school time. I'm reamaining optimisti that perhaps we can monkey with our schedules, but am overall anxious about the idea of snow days, early dismissal and delays. keep thinking good thoughts for us, and sending word out to a high school senior wouldn't be amiss, either.
Yesterday afternoon we had a meeting with teachers and administrators at school. All seems to be progressing with Ethan, and we talked about trends more than specific events. Ethan seems to get more anxious the longer-range a goal is, and we identified short-term ways to communicate our expectations with him (two days, one week, etc) as well as identifying other resources that will be helpful (therapy, increased structure at school and in class).
On our weird weekend drive-about, David and I discovered a meat market, conveniently located right next to a stock market. Frankly, if we had the money, I would be advocating going out today (they have a stock sale every Friday, and I'm thinking a rainy Friday would get us the best break on per pound) and buying a yummy-looking steer and taking it home all wrapped up and ready to eat. Of course, we would also need an upright freezer to store it all in, as our over-the-fridge freezer is already stretched with the venison we processed. We are also big fans of bison meat, but the nearby source in Paint Bank has prohibative prices.
As fate would have it, i stumbled across a link to the Buffalo Gal, which aside from having a really cool name also offers a variety of great looking cuts at (more) reasonable prices. Since I'm at the library today, I'm also looking into how to do a raost in a crock pot. I've never made roast beef before, and I'm looking forward to learning how. That and ham and navy bean soup. These are the things the weather has me wanting. Along with peppermint-flavoured hot chocolate, of course.
