Ramblings
The last 2 weeks have been quite crazy. Just 4 more days and life should slow down (but only a little). I have spent much of the last 2 weeks at the dialysis clinic with my in-laws learning about peritoneal dialysis. I am truly blessed to be part of dad's care team. Once again, I can see another reason God has taken me on this nursing journey. It has been exhausting, but it has been good.
While going through e-mail the other day, I came across a post on one of the blogs I subscribe to. It was about putting meals in the freezer. Now I have done this before and I love the rewards. However, that initial day cooking and preparing is very long and can be quite expensive. This post mentioned a book and I decided to look it up. It's called, "Don't Panic - Dinner's in the Freezer" and is available on Amazon.com (probably other places as well). I decided to take a look at it and was able to preview a few of the pages. I really liked what I saw. Being the patient person that I am (now no coughing or choking here), I decided I didn't want to wait for the book, so I downloaded it on the Kindle. It is great. The recipes I tried were simpler than when I made freezer dinners in the past. I also like that they encourage you to plan your freezer prep based on what's on sale. Let me just show you how it went today:
1. Chicken breasts and hamburger were on sale (Pork chops were too, but the ones on sale had more fat on them. It was worth the few extra cents per pound to get the leaner chops). Let me insert here that hamburger wasn't really on sale. They ran a 10 minute special because too much had been ground this morning. Isn't it great how God works that out sometimes! After shopping, I now had 3 meats to plan meals around.
2. Pulled into the driveway at 4:40 pm from shopping. Unloaded the car and the kids put away groceries while I cleaned a messy kitchen.
3. We started preparing the food:
Dinner - pork chops, mac-n-cheese, cheddar biscuits (OK, maybe not the healthiest, but delicious!)
Freezer -
Hamburger - 2 meatloafs, 2 bags of meatballs
Pork chops - honey dijon
Chicken - 2 meals of buttermilk herb chicken; 3 meals of Cheesy chicken bundles
Total - the base of 10 meals frozen and ready to thaw and cook.
4. Clean kitchen (including sweep and mop)
Finish at 8:45 and that includes a break to sit down and eat dinner as a family!
Now I must admit that it was so helpful having the kids involved. It saved me a lot of time. However, I could not believe how much we accomplished in 4 hours and 5 minutes. I have to admit, that I think this just may work for us.
My amazing husband hung some shelving in the craft area tonight and I was able to begin clearing surfaces. I now have a little more room and things are better organized. Hopefully, I will soon be posting projects again. Keep watching for Super Supplies Saturday and Terrific Tools Tuesday. Hopefully they will be back soon. With Christmas just around the corner, I've got a lot of crafting to do. Have a great weekend. Hope to post again soon.
While going through e-mail the other day, I came across a post on one of the blogs I subscribe to. It was about putting meals in the freezer. Now I have done this before and I love the rewards. However, that initial day cooking and preparing is very long and can be quite expensive. This post mentioned a book and I decided to look it up. It's called, "Don't Panic - Dinner's in the Freezer" and is available on Amazon.com (probably other places as well). I decided to take a look at it and was able to preview a few of the pages. I really liked what I saw. Being the patient person that I am (now no coughing or choking here), I decided I didn't want to wait for the book, so I downloaded it on the Kindle. It is great. The recipes I tried were simpler than when I made freezer dinners in the past. I also like that they encourage you to plan your freezer prep based on what's on sale. Let me just show you how it went today:
1. Chicken breasts and hamburger were on sale (Pork chops were too, but the ones on sale had more fat on them. It was worth the few extra cents per pound to get the leaner chops). Let me insert here that hamburger wasn't really on sale. They ran a 10 minute special because too much had been ground this morning. Isn't it great how God works that out sometimes! After shopping, I now had 3 meats to plan meals around.
2. Pulled into the driveway at 4:40 pm from shopping. Unloaded the car and the kids put away groceries while I cleaned a messy kitchen.
3. We started preparing the food:
Dinner - pork chops, mac-n-cheese, cheddar biscuits (OK, maybe not the healthiest, but delicious!)
Freezer -
Hamburger - 2 meatloafs, 2 bags of meatballs
Pork chops - honey dijon
Chicken - 2 meals of buttermilk herb chicken; 3 meals of Cheesy chicken bundles
Total - the base of 10 meals frozen and ready to thaw and cook.
4. Clean kitchen (including sweep and mop)
Finish at 8:45 and that includes a break to sit down and eat dinner as a family!
Now I must admit that it was so helpful having the kids involved. It saved me a lot of time. However, I could not believe how much we accomplished in 4 hours and 5 minutes. I have to admit, that I think this just may work for us.
My amazing husband hung some shelving in the craft area tonight and I was able to begin clearing surfaces. I now have a little more room and things are better organized. Hopefully, I will soon be posting projects again. Keep watching for Super Supplies Saturday and Terrific Tools Tuesday. Hopefully they will be back soon. With Christmas just around the corner, I've got a lot of crafting to do. Have a great weekend. Hope to post again soon.
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