Works-For-Me Wednesday: Meals from leftovers

Posted on January 2, 2008 by Barbara Harper

Some years ago someone gave me this list for “Planover Recipe Ideas” — meal ideas that can be made from leftovers. I don’t know who made up the original list. But this contains several ideas of possible dishes you could make with leftover meats or potatoes from another meal. In some cases there might be just enough leftover to use some of these for lunch ideas for a couple of people, but in some cases you might have enough for a whole meal. You could also plan to make extra meat or potatoes and use the “planned leftovers” for some of the following. The list is just as I received it — I don’t have measurements or proportions. I think for many of these you could just “wing it” — for others you could search for a more specific recipe.
Roast Beef:

Hot Beef Sandwiches (meat slices with gravy over French bread)
Beef Salad Sandwiches (diced beef, celery, low-fat mayonnaise)
Beef slices in Pita Bread ( tomatoes, alfalfa sprouts, or romaine)
Beef and Peas on Baked Potatoes (beef, gravy, peas, tomato sauce)
Chili Con Carne on Rice (Beef, chili hot beans, tomato, onions)
Enchiladas (diced beef, shredded cheese in corn tortillas topped with tomato sauce and enchilada sauce mixture)
Beef Stir Fry (slivers of beef, gravy, soy sauce, sliced vegetables)
Beef Chunks and Gravy Over Noodles or Rice
Beef Barbeque with Potatoes (barbeque sauce and onions)
Beef Stew (beef, potatoes, carrots, green beans, tomatoes)
Beef Stroganoff (beef chunks, sour cream, onions, mushrooms, cream of mushroom soup)
Beef Hash (diced beef, potatoes, carrots, peas, ketchup)

Chicken:

Chicken Salad (diced chicken, salad dressing, pineapple, almonds)
Hot Chicken Salad (diced chicken, celery, nuts, salad dressing)
Chicken Almond Curry on Rice (slivered chicken, almonds, pimento, white sauce, dash of curry spice)
Creamy Chicken (chicken, sour cream, onions, white sauce)
Pepper Chicken on Rice (chicken, green peppers, onions, gravy)
Chicken Stir Fry (chicken, gravy, soy sauce, sliced vegetables)
Mexican Chicken (layer chicken, cheese, corn tortillas with sauce of onions, tomato sauce, cream of chicken soup, and chili)
Chicken Paprika (chicken, onion, broth, paprika, sour cream)
Chicken Bog (chicken, broth, rice, pepper, polska kielbasa)
Chicken and Dumplins (chicken, gravy, dumplins)
Enchiladas (shredded chicken, shredded cheese in corn tortillas topped with tomato sauce and enchilada sauce mixture)
Broiled Oriental Chicken (chicken, soy sauce, garlic salt, pepper)
Teriyaki Chicken (chicken, soy sauce, sugar, onions, broth)
Chicken Pie (diced chicken, gravy, peas, carrots, pie crust)
Chicken Barbeque (chicken, barbeque sauce)

Ham:

Ham Omelet (eggs, diced ham, onions, cheese, vegetables)
Ham Salad (diced ham, celery or relish, salad dressing)
Split Pea Soup (split peas, ham chunks, water, grated carrots)
Pinto Beans (pinto beans, ham chunks, water, garlic salt)
Quiche (pie shell, evaporated milk, diced ham, eggs, Swiss cheese, cooked chopped broccoli)
Pasta Salad (diced ham, pasta, green pepper, Italian dressing)
Swedish Rolls (rolls with ham slices and Swiss cheese topped with mixture of melted butter, mustard, onion flakes and Worcestershire sauce)
Chicken Cordon Bleu (roll ham slice with Swiss cheese slice in raw chicken breast, then dip in egg mixture and coat with bread crumb mix. Drizzle with melted butter; bake)
Ham Croquettes (chopped ham, thick white sauce, onion, chilled, formed into cones while rolling in bread crumbs)
Ham Patties (chopped ham, bread crumbs, onion, milk, egg)

Hamburger:

Spaghetti (hamburger, spaghetti sauce, spaghetti noodles)
Lasagna (hamburger, spaghetti sauce, pureed tomatoes, lasagna noodles, mozzarella cheese, ricotta cheese, Parmesan, egg — cover with plastic wrap and bake in microwave for 22 minutes)
Chili (hamburger, chili hot beans, onion, chili, catsup)
Sloppy Joes (hamburger, catsup, Worcestershire, mustard)
Stuffed Peppers (hamburger rice, tomato sauce, cheese)
Tamale Pie (hamburger, sliced canned tamales, torn corn tortillas, whole corn kernels, cheese)
Hamburger Stew (hamburger, water, potatoes, tomatoes, celery, car- rots, rosemary, thyme, onions, corn, green beans)
Hamburger Macaroni and Cheese (hamburger, mac & cheese)
Hungarian Goulash (hamburger, macaroni, tomato sauce, cheese)
Baked Bean Savory (hamburger, baked beans, sage, ketchup)
Haystacks (hamburger and baked beans placed on rice and corn chips, topped with cheese, lettuce, green pepper, and onion)
Hamburger Maindish (hamburger, cream cheese, ketchup, cream of mushroom soup, topped with biscuits)

Baked Potatoes:

Country Fried Potatoes (slice and fry on sprayed skillet)
Potato Salad (potatoes, eggs, celery, salad dressing)
Broiled Potato Wedges (wedged potatoes, oil spray, herbs)
Twice Baked Potatoes (potatoes, cheese or sour cream, herbs)
Spanish Omelet (eggs with diced potato, onion, cooked bacon)
German Potato Salad (potatoes, green pepper, onion, cooked bacon, vinegar dressing)

See more workable ideas at Rocks In My Dryer.

Works-For-Me Wednesday: What Do I Fix?

Posted on December 5, 2007 by Barbara Harper

Shannon’s “Works For Me Wednesday” today is a themed one, asking for quick, easy meal ideas for “those nights” — like when you’re not feeling well, or errands took longer than expected and you have something to attend at church or for school that night, or you get back from baseball practice late and everyone starving, etc. I am really looking forward to getting a lot of ideas today!

I try to keep a couple of quickie meals in the freezer for those times. One is Banquet chicken nuggets and chicken tenders and Ore-Ida frozen french fries (I like the Pixie Crinkles best, but we try different kinds for variety). Pop them in the oven for about 10 minutes while you rustle up a vegetable side dish, and you’re set. I also love Contessa brand chicken fried rice — add a little oil and microwave (or stir-fry) long enough to heat through. Wonderful!

But frozen stuff can be expensive and take up a lot of room in your freezer plus increase your sodium intake exponentially. So we can’t do that too often. Though I’d have chicken fried rice once a week if I could.

Other quickie staples are:

Grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup
Tuna sandwiches and some other kind of soup
Wraps: tortillas with a squirt of honey mustard, topped with a slice of ham, turkey, and provolone and a little lettuce or baby spinach leaves, then rolled up.
English muffins sliced in half, spread with Miracle Whip (or your favorite condiment), topped with tuna which has been drained and mixed with a little Miracle Whip (plus anything else you might want to add) and cheese (we like to do a few each with different kinds of cheeses. We always have American and cheddar and sometimes Swiss, provolone, or Monterrey Jack). Bake in about a 350 oven until cheese melts, serve with tomato soup or macaroni and cheese or carrot sticks or whatever
English muffins sliced in half, spread with pizza sauce or spaghetti sauce, topped with pepperoni and provolone or mozzarella cheese, baked until cheese is melted and edges of muffin are slightly brown. (I don’t usually have pizza sauce or spaghetti sauce in hand, but I open a can of tomato sauce and add [right in the can] minced onion, garlic powder, oregano, basil, and Parmesan cheese and stir, and it works just fine. I prefer it, in fact, to the jars of sauce).
Canned crescent roll dough unrolled and separated into wedges with pepperoni and provolone or mozzarella placed on the wide end; roll up, bake until browned, serve with pizza/spaghetti sauce or ranch dressing for dipping.
Breakfast for dinner: scrambled eggs are pretty quick. I add ham lunch meat to mine and sprinkle with shredded cheddar cheese when it’s done.
My kids like hot dogs cut up into tomato sauce and warmed through, served with macaroni and cheese and a vegetable.
Fully cooked link sausage links (like kielbasa or other varieties) cut up into barbecue sauce, heated through, served with macaroni and cheese and green beans. Though I like the bottled barbecue sauce on other things, it seems a little strong or harsh for this, so I make up my own with 1 cup ketchup, 1/2 cup vinegar, minced onion, 2 Tbs Worcestershire sauce, 1 Tbs mustard, and garlic powder: mix together, add sausage, and the sauce will thicken as it cooks.

I have a friend who sometimes will brown 5 lbs. of ground beef all at one time with onion and then separate it into five portions and freeze it. Having the meat browned is half the battle: just thaw for a few minutes in the microwave (if you’re making something like a soup or casserole. you probably could just thaw it enough to break it up and let the rest of it warm through in the dish you’re cooking).

My very first works-for-me-Wednesday entry (and one of my most often searched-for posts) was about chicken tenderloins. Love those things because you can take them straight from the freezer to the oven or microwave. Several ideas for using them are here and here.

Tuna is one of those things that no one gets real excited about, but the family does enjoy it when they do eat it and it does stop hunger. 🙂 Here are my quickest tuna meals:

Quick Tuna Casserole

2 1/2 cups Minute Rice
1 can tuna, drained
1 can cream of chicken soup
Shredded cheddar cheese

Prepare rice with 2 1/2 cups water according to package directions. Mix in tuna and soup, top with cheddar cheese, and microwave for 3-4 minutes.

Tuna Tetrazzini

1 pkg. (7-8 oz.) angel-hair pasta, cooked
1/4 c. (1/2 a stick) butter or margarine
1/4 c. all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. pepper
1 c. chicken broth or 1 c. boiling water + 1 tsp. chicken bouillon
1 c. milk
1 T. snipped parsley (optional)
1- 1 1/2 tsp. minced onion
1 small can tuna, drained
Grated Parmesan cheese

Melt margarine in a glass casserole dish in microwave (about 1 minute). Add flour, salt, and pepper; blend well. Add broth and milk gradually, stirring constantly. Cook uncovered in microwave 4-5 minutes on high, or until thickened; stir after 2 minutes, then every minute (a wire whisk works great to make sauce smooth). Add onion, parsley, and tuna to sauce; mix well. Mix in cooked pasta. Heat uncovered in microwave 3 minutes on high. Stir mixture well and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese. Microwave uncovered on high 3-5 minutes. Makes 6-8 servings.

I’m one of those weird people who actually likes spam (the food, not the junk). I sometime like to cut it in slices and fry it, then make a sandwich with it. This casserole is a comfort food from my childhood:

Spam Casserole

1 can Spam or Treet
1/2 box rotini (or other) noodles
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 can cheddar cheese soup
Margarine

Cut spam into cubes and brown in melted margarine while noodles are cooking. Drain noodles, add soups and spam and stir well: Heat through.

And here’s another fairly quick favorite:

Country-Style Eggs

4 slices bacon
2 Tbs margarine
6 ounces frozen hash browns
1/4 cup chopped onion (or about a tablespoon minced onion)
6 eggs
1/4 cup milk
1/2 teaspoon salt
Dash pepper
1 cup (4 ounces) shredded cheddar cheese

Fry or microwave bacon: crumble and set aside. Put margarine, potatoes and onion into an 8-ounce round glass cake dish or pie plate. Cook uncovered in microwave on high 6 minutes or until vegetables are tender, stirring once. Mix eggs, milk, salt and pepper. Flatten potato mixture and pour egg mixture over the top. Cover with waxed paper and microwave 6-7 minutes at medium-high or until egg mixture is almost set, stirring once. Sprinkle bacon and cheese over egg mixture: microwave uncovered 1 minute at medium-high or until cheese just starts to melt. Remove from micrwave oven and ket stand 5 minutes. Cut into wedges. Makes 4-6 servings.

Optional: you can add 1/4 cup or so of chopped green pepper to cook with the potatoes and onion mixture, though why anyone would want to do that, I don’t know… 🙂

I’m hungry already. I’m going to be drooling by the time I read the other posts…

Missionary Christmas Gifts

Posted on November 21, 2007 by Barbara Harper

Since I have mentioned our church’s missionary Christmas gift project, I’ve had some questions about it, so I thought I would explain it a little more. But I want to say at the outset I would also love to hear what you or your church does, and I would also love to hear from missionaries about what things have been helpful and even not so helpful that individuals or churches have done for them.

Whatever you do for missionaries or servicemen or anyone overseas, contact them first. It is all too easy to be a burden rather than a blessing with packages. We have had some missionaries for whom the duties they would have to pay on packages would make receiving any kind of package prohibitive. Others can tell you particular designations to put on the customs forms that would cause the least problems or duties for them. In some countries there is a degree of corruption in the mailing system, and missionaries can alert you to wording on the customs form that would not draw undue attention. Some missionaries have people come over from the States regularly and would rather you send a package to those people who will then bring it when they come — this not only saves on shipping but is more secure. And most countries have lists of prohibited items. The United States Postal Service web site has an Index of Countries which you can click on to find specific prohibited lists and other details, like package size restrictions, for each country.

I also want to say that when I mention problems or frustrations, it’s not meant as whining or complaining. I just want to be realistic for anyone who might be contemplating doing this. Anything we do in this life, even as a ministry, will have it problems.

As it stands now, what we usually do is e-mail our missionaries in the summer to ask for gift ideas for their family members and ministry and any particular mailing instructions. We also ask for ages of children, sizes, color preferences, etc. We try to give them a reasonable time frame, knowing that they are busy and that some have only limited e-mail access (of course, for those with no e-mail or unreliable e-mail, you can always write them a note). The very first time we explained a little bit more about what we were doing, but most of our missionaries are familiar with it now.

Then I take all the responses and make a master list and make copies to give out to folks at church. I also make a master sign-up list which stays on the back table at church. As people peruse the lists, they sign up for the things they want to buy, and a designated box is placed for people to turn the items in as they buy them. We usually do this over the whole month of September. Then in our October ladies meeting we wrap and label the gifts, then over the next few weeks I package and mail them.

The lady from whom I got this idea would put the gift ideas on 3 x 5 cards and alphabetize them by missionary name, then set up a little table in the church lobby so that people could come to her, tell her who they wanted to provide a gift for, and she would give them a card and note who had what card on a list. That worked fine for that church, but for me, I personally would like to see the whole list before deciding what to buy. I’ve learned over the years that some people buy for particular people, but some people buy preferred things. One lady used to buy tennis balls and golf balls every year because we would have some of those on several missionary lists: another lady who was a nurse liked to buy anything of a medical nature, etc. Some people prefer to donate money, and I use that for gifts that haven’t been signed up for or to “fill in” (for instance, if one child in a family gets socks and another has two toys, I try to find a toy to balance it out).

Another lady mentioned putting the gift ideas on paper ornaments on a Christmas tree in the lobby to make it a real “Christmas in September” (or July or whenever you do it). Though I really like this idea, I’d be afraid of some of the ornaments being accidentally knocked off or blown off or taken off by little kids, etc.

I ask for the items to be turned in unwrapped for a couple of reasons. I don’t want to over-manage, but sometimes people do get the wrong thing or the wrong size or title. Sometimes the gift isn’t quite appropriate: someone recently turned in an item for a one year old that was better suited to an infant. Sometimes people turn things in in big gift boxes that are bigger than the postal size restrictions, so we have to repackage them.

One of the problems that I encounter is timing. Sometimes the missionaries don’t respond in time (many are great about answering right away, and some travel and don’t see my message for a while, but some, just like us, don’t “get around to it.” When I do hear from them after I have made the master list, I can either buy their gifts with designated money, or often someone at church will come to me near the end of our endeavor to ask if anything is still needed, and I can give them ideas from those late entries.) And sometimes church folks don’t get things turned in on time, so it can take a while to tie up all the loose ends.

Another problem is that some missionaries will have people sign up for a lot of items, and others will have few to none. Part of this has to do with accessibility: people easily sign up for things they can get at the grocery store or Wal-Mart. They also tend not to sign up for anything over about the $20 range. Some families don’t mind spending $25-50, but they don’t want to spend that all on one thing. Many missionaries send us a variety of ideas and tell us they don’t expect everything on the list but just want to give a variety, which is excellent. We do ask the missionaries to designate on their lists if there is anything they prefer more that another on those lists, but only one has ever done that. So sometimes we end up with one missionary family with two boxes full of smaller grocery store items and another who only listed maybe one idea per person, but those items were harder to find or a little more expensive, and those missionaries don’t get signed up for at all, though the totals of the items on their list are about the same. I do try to emphasize to the folks at church that it would be better to have one gift per person than many gifts for one and none for another. At this point we take care of that with designated money or funds from our ladies’ budget, but I am trying to figure out a better way to handle it. I don’t at all begrudge the one family the two boxes of stuff, especially the items that I know they can’t get in their country — but I don’t want another family to have little.

Some churches deal with this by buying the same items for every missionary family, so they all get the same packages. But I would really rather personalize it with things that they truly want and can use. One missionary friend was telling me that those kinds of packages almost always contain toiletries, and though they appreciate the intent and the thought, they’re almost overrun with toiletries. So I think a generic package that would be meaningful might be hard to do unless it is something personal or homemade. Another church I know sends $25 per person for each missionary family member (usually to their mission board, but check with the mission board or missionary first to find out what’s best for that individual family), and that’s fine, too. But it is fun for them to get packages in the mail, and even with cash, there are items that some can’t get in their country that we’re happy to send.

Despite some of the problems mentioned, this is a joy to do, and we have heard from our missionary families that it is a blessing. I don’t know if there is an ideal or problem-free way to handle gift-giving overseas.

This is the first year that we are mailing things without benefit of what used to be called “surface mail,” the slowest but cheapest mailing rate (one person said things sent by surface mail went via boat, train, or llama. 🙂 ) The post office did away with it because they felt senders were more interested in speed and reliability than a low cost factor. When I first heard this earlier in the year, I consulted our pastor and church business manager to see if we should do anything differently. They said to just do things the same way this year and we’d evaluate before doing anything next year. It will probably cost us easily twice the shipping fees as in previous years. We want to be generous and be a blessing to our missionaries, but we want to be good stewards, too, so we may have to do something different next year, like put an emphasis on just sending things they can’t get in their country or sending one item per person or something else in the future. I’m not quite sure yet what we will do.

Some general tips for sending overseas mail:

— Though it is nicer to send things in gift boxes, when you’re sending a lot you have to compress everything down to the smallest and lightest packaging that you can.

— Anything liquid — lotion, shampoo, etc. — need to be put in a sealable bag and have some packaging material around it to absorb it if it should spill.

— Things with strong odors (soaps, candles) need to be put into sealable bags and placed away from food items in the shipping box.

— Anything breakable needs to be wrapped with packaging material to cushion it.

— There might be some things, like books, that can be ordered online and (and sometimes even gift-wrapped) and shipped directly to the person.

More mailing tips are here.

This wasn’t originally intended as a “Works For Me Wednesday” post, but then I decided it would work for that, too. You can find more tips, or add your own, at Rocks In My Dryer.

Works-For-Me Wednesday: Two quick and easy cookie recipes

Posted on November 14, 2007 by Barbara Harper

Sometimes a child forgets to tell us he needs to bring cookies for something at school or church until the last minute, or sometimes our schedule just gets out of control and we’re short on time to bring cookies for a church fellowship or get-together with friends, or sometimes we just want a little homemade sweetness but we don’t have (or want to spend) a lot of time preparing it. These are a couple of my favorite quick, easy, simple cookie recipes.

Double Delicious Cookie Bars

(Note: These contain peanut butter chips, but they can be omitted and additional chocolate chips used instead if you’re taking this somewhere where someone might have peanut allergies)

1/2 c. margarine or butter
1 1/2 c. graham cracker crumbs
1 14-oz. can sweetened condensed milk
1 12-oz. pkg. semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 c. peanut butter chips
1 c. semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 1/2 tsp. shortening

Preheat oven to 350 (325 for glass dish). In a 9 x 13-inch pan, melt margarine in oven. Sprinkle crumbs evenly over margarine. Pour sweetened condensed milk evenly over crumbs. Top with 12-ounce packages chocolate chips and peanut butter chips; press down firmly. Bake 25-30 minutes or until lightly browned. Melt 1 cup chocolate chips and shortening; drizzle over bars. Cut into bars when cool. Store loosely covered at room temperature.

Peanut Butter Kiss Cookies

These are a pared-down version of the originals but taste every bit as good. My son’s girlfriend got this recipe in one of her classes.

1 c. peanut butter
1 c. sugar
1 egg
Hershey’s Kisses

Thoroughly mix together peanut butter, sugar, and egg. Drop by teaspoonful or roll into 1 inch balls onto ungreased baking sheet. Bake at 350 for about 10-11 minutes, until slightly browned. Immediately place an unwrapped Hershey’s Kiss in the center of each cookie and press down. Let sit on pan for a minute or two, then remove from pan. Let cool before storing. Makes 24-26.

For more wonderful, workable tips, go to Rocks In My Dryer.

Works-For-Me Wednesday: “Backwards” Day

Posted on November 7, 2007 by Barbara Harper

Today’s edition of WFMW is another “backward” day in which we ask a question of readers rather than supplying our own tip.

My question of the day: how do you reduce static electricity, especially in hair?

I must be the most statically electrical person I know. Even taking my jacket off this morning jolted me. And with today being the first day we turned the heat on, it’s only going to get worse.

I know Shannon mentioned on a previous WFMW that she sprayed Static Guard on her brush and that helped. But I usually use a comb when styling my hair, and the Static Guard didn’t seem to do anything. I had also read that you could rub a dryer sheet over your hair. That actually does work. But then I smell like a dryer sheet. And it doesn’t last.

I know that spraying static guard on your legs can help keep your hemline from sticking, and even rubbing a bit of lotion on my legs will do the same. But, again, it doesn’t last long.

So, short of keeping a can of Static Cling or a dryer sheet on hand and applying several times a day, do you have any other ideas?

If you have a question you’d like some help with or you have some answers you might be able to give others, see today’s WFMW post at Rocks In My Dryer.

Works-For-Me Wednesday: Autumn mini cookie cutters

Posted on October 17, 2007 by Barbara Harper

I found these cute little cookie cutters at W*l-Mart yesterday for just a few dollars. We’re not really into sugar cookies much, though I can picture these with cinnamon and red, yellow, and orange colored sprinkled sugar. But I thought they’d be neat for cutting decorative venting holes for pie crusts.

Maybe they’ve been around for ages, but I just discovered them.

Michael’s had them, too, and though I don’t remember the prices I think they were a little more there. But then Michael’s usually has a 40% off coupon in Sunday’s paper.

As always on Wednesdays, you can find scores of great tips at Rocks In My Dryer.

Works-For-Me Wednesday: Sometimes it’s best to leave children alone

Posted on October 10, 2007 by Barbara Harper

I want to be cautious with the thoughts I wanted to share today, because they could so easily be misunderstood.

The Bible teaches it is the parents’ responsibility to train their children. Deuteronomy 6 speaks of teaching the word and ways of the Lord; many verses in Proverbs give instructions about discipline; Ephesians 6:4 tells parents to bring children up “in the nurture and admonition of the Lord,” and there are other passages as well. Usually, especially in this day and time, if parents make errors in discipline it’s along the lines of not disciplining or training enough, at least in my own experience of 23 years as a parent and what I have seen in others, especially in the trends over the last 30 years. (I do want to write a post about that some day. I know I’ve said that before — I even started to one day but realizedI needed to wait until I had time to deal with it as carefully and thoughtfully as possible.)

But sometimes conscientious parents (and teachers) err on the other side of the scale, that of disciplining too much, of nagging a child constantly, of seeing every little thing as A Really Big Deal and a Major Character Issue. The same verse in Ephesians that tells us to bring children up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord tells us not to provoke them to wrath. That doesn’t mean that our training will never make a child angry — most anyone will deal with some anger when not getting his or her way. But sometimes our parenting style in itself can result in an angry child rather than a godly, obedient one, or lead to discouragement, rigidity, an over-nervousness, or even outright rebellion in children.

This concept of over-disciplining first dawned on me when I read an excellent book several years ago titled Hints On Child Training by Henry Clay Trumbull, who wrote it 1890 when he was 66 years old. Mr. Trumbull is known as a pioneer of the Sunday School movement and is an ancestor (great-grandfather, I believe) of Elisabeth Elliot. Here are just a few excerpts from the chapter “Letting Alone as a Means of Child Training.”

Not doing is always as important, in its time and place, as doing; and this truth is as applicable in the realm of child training as elsewhere. Child training is a necessity, but there is danger of overdoing in the line of child training. The neglect of child training is a great evil. Overdoing in the training of a child may be a greater evil. Both evils ought to be avoided…

Peculiarly is it the case that young parents who are exceptionally conscientious, and exceptionally desirous of being wise and faithful in the discharge of their parental duties, are liable to err in the direction of overdoing in the training of their children. It is not that they are lacking in love and tenderness toward their little ones, or that they are naturally inclined to severity as disciplinarian; but it is that their mistaken view of the methods and limitations of wise child training impels them to an injudicious course of watchful strictness with their children, even while that course runs counter to their affections and desires as parents….

There are many parents who seem to suppose that their chief work in the training of a child is to be incessantly commanding and prohibiting; telling the child to do this or to do that, and not to do this, that, or the other. But this nagging a child is not training a child; on the contrary, it is destructive of all training on the part of him who is addicted to it. It is not the driver who is training a horse, but one who is neither trained nor can train, who is all the time “yanking” at the reins, or “thrapping” them up or down. Neither parent or driver, in such a case, can do as much in the direction of training by doing incessantly, as by letting alone judiciously. “Don’t always be don’t-ing” is a bit of counsel to parents that can hardly be emphasized to strongly. Don’t always be directing, is a companion precept to this…

Of course, there must be explicit commanding and explicit prohibiting in the process of child training; but there must also be a large measure of wise letting alone. When to prohibit and when to command, in this process, are questions that demand wisdom, thought, and character; and more wisdom, more thought, and more character, are needful in deciding the question when to let the child alone. The training of a child must go on incessantly; but a large share of the time it will best go on by the operation of influences, inspirations, and inducements, in the direction of a right standard held persistently before the child, without anything being said on the subject to the child at every step in his course of progress.

Thank God we can ask Him for wisdom: we surely need it!

This post is already too long, but a couple more thoughts I wanted to share are these: one of those times when it’s possible to overdo discipline is when we mistake a child’s immaturity and childishness for a discipline problem. Also, though we know our children are sinners and need correcting and training, a watching-like-a-hawk expectancy, just waiting for them to take a wrong step, can be very discouraging to them. Once when I was in college, one of the rules was that girls could not walk alone on certain areas of campus after dark, for safety reasons. I was coming from the bookstore or snack shop one night, looking for someone to walk to another area of campus with, when I spied my dormitory supervisor heading the way I needed to go. As I came down the steps to ask her if I could walk with her, she said, “You’d better not be about to walk away from here alone.” I can’t tell you how deflating and discouraging that was, to be trying to do the right thing and to feel smacked down, as it were, by someone’s expectation (with no good reason) that I was going to do the wrong thing. Yet we can take that same attitude with our children sometimes. We need wisdom and grace and the attitude of coming alongside them to encourage them to do right rather than standing over them with a stick just waiting for them to step out of line so we can correct them. I think if we meditate on how our heavenly Father handles us, that will go a long way in balancing discipline and grace in our parenting (or teaching or employing).

By the way, the book I mentioned is an excellent resource. Looking through it today made me want to read it all over again. A few other chapters are “Denying a Child Wisely,” “Training a Child to Self-Control,” “Training a Child Not to Tease,” “Training a Child’s Faith,” “Scolding Is Never in Order,” “Dealing Tenderly With a Child’s Fears.” Two of my other favorite books on parenting are James Dobson’s Dare to Discipline and Elisabeth Elliot’s The Shaping of a Christian Family.

For more Works For Me Wednesday tips, see Rocks In My Dryer.

Works-For-Me Wednesday: Backwards Day, #2

Posted on October 3, 2007 by Barbara Harper

I had already posted a question for this week’s Backwards Day version of WFMW below, then much later on I remembered something else I had wanted to ask about, so I thought since it was a different topic I’d make it a different post rather than adding on to the previous one.

Someone e-mailed me this week asking if I knew of any Christian resources for dealing with menopause, particularly the problems resulting from lack of sleep and from depression. I don’t, but since this is something I will likely be dealing with in the next few years, I’d like to have some good resources on hand, too.

Know of any?

Again, to take this opportunity to ask for tips from the blogosphere, go to Shannon’s at Rocks In My Dryer.

Works-For-Me Wednesday: Backwards Day

Posted on October 2, 2007 by Barbara Harper

There’s a twist to this week’s WFMW: we’re to ask for advice or tips rather than give any.

I know there are probably a few dozen things I could ask about, but there are only two that come to mind now that are current needs:

1) How do you get fingerprints and grime off walls without harming the latex paint? 409 and the Magic Eraser haven’t worked.

2) What ideas do you have for quick lunches or dinners? For instance, one of ours is to spread pizza sauce or Prego (or, most likely, I’ll sprinkle basil, oregano, minced onion, garlic powder, and Parmesan cheese into tomato sauce and use that) on English muffin halves, add a few slices of pepperoni, sprinkle with mozzarella or provolone, and bake til cheese melts. But I need some more ideas!

To ask questions of your own, or to see if you have answers for anyone else’s questions, go to Rocks In My Dryer.

Works-For-Me Wednesday: Making small fonts readable

Posted on September 26, 2007 by Barbara Harper

There are some blogs which have a font that is small in size, or the coloring of the text against the background makes it hard to read. I just recently read that you can make the print size bigger on a web site you’re reading by pressing Control and the key with the + and = on it. It’s helped me immensely!

That may be old news to more technologically savvy people out there, but it was new to me. 🙂

WFMW can be found most Wednesdays at Rocks In My Dryer.

The first WFMW of the month is usually a themed one, and Shannon has put a twist on the theme for next week: it will be Backwards Day. We’re to ask for specific tips in whatever area we have a question about or need help with instead of giving one. Should be interesting!