This week's menu...

...After a long weekend, the last thing I want to do is menu planning....  but here goes nothing...

...this week's menu...

Monday: chicken legs, corn and grilled zucchini/yellow squash

Tuesday: mini meatloaves with veggies and (leftover) potato salad (Kitty Gramma's - YUM)

Wednesday: buffalo chicken pasta and veggies

Thursday: leftovers

Friday: pizza night (my birthday!)

Saturday: go out?

Sunday: leftovers (or soup and salad)

What's on your menu this week?

This week's menu...

Keepin' it short and to the point this week...

...this week's menu...

Monday: buffalo chicken pasta and veggies

Tuesday: wild rice chowder (like the quinoa chowder, but made with rice blend instead of quinoa...  Costco didn't have any un-cooked quinoa ::sad face::) and salad

Wednesday: lemon chicken thighs with veggies

Thursday: pasta with Gramma's sauce

Friday:  Pizza night

Saturday: BBQ???

Sunday: leftovers (or picante chicken and rice)

What's on your menu this week?

Attempting to organize my home, my family and my life...

...well, I've been putting off this post for awhile...  Back in January, my New Year's resolution was a general "being a better me."  Overall, I'm pretty happy with the progress I've made.  However, I understand that life continues to change and I will continue to grow.

My health goals aren't quite what I had hoped for.  I haven't been doing cardio like I should, but I did lose those 11 lbs. since January, and I've only gained 1 lb. back...  so, not too bad, I guess.  Plus, yoga has become a part of my lifestyle at this point, which is ahhhmazing.  I love it!

Anyhoo, this post is supposed to be about organizing.  I've found a few ladies on YouTube who give great organizing tips...  there's Malitose79 (who also has her new channel, Organized Clutterbug), The Green Apple Home, Do It On a Dime, At Home With Nikki, Mridu Parikh and my current favorite, Home Organizing.  Lots of these ladies have blogs/websites to accompany their organizing channels (http://clutterbug.me/ is Malitose79's site, which has lots of great printables that I'd like to try out).

I just signed up for Alejandra's (from Home Organizing) "FREE 7-day 'Get Organized' Video Series" from her site alejandra.tv (look on the upper right side of the "start here" page).  When you sign up, you get a free video with an organizing tip every day for 7 days...  I watched the first one today, I'll do the "homework" today and will be sharing more on it soon.  My plan is to do a post for each of the videos...  I figure this might help to hold me accountable.  ::fingers crossed::

I've already gotten a lot of work done organizing the home with the tips that all of these ladies have shared...  I keep forgetting to take before pictures, but there will be a post soon with the current state of my kids' rooms in the very near future (I don't know that I would have wanted to show you the "before" pics, they were sooo bad!!!).

Check out these ladies' videos and sites and let me know what you think!

How do you control the chaos and clutter in your life?

This week's menu... and my Mother's Day...

Oh man, oh man...  I feel like I'm always just so tired whenever I sit down to write my menu posts...  it probably has something to do with the level of disarray that my house is always in after my kids have been home for the weekend.  This week even more so:

The kids "cooked" Kitty Gramma and me Mother's Day breakfast...  which was reallysupersweet, but not entirely edible.  They told me that I was to sleep in -which meant waking up at 7:30 and laying in bed, listening the the crashing noises coming from the kitchen for an hour or so-  I had laid down a few round rules last night, informing them that they were not to use the stove/oven or knives (with the exception of butter knives for spreading, not cutting) without an adult's supervision.  Well, apparently, I failed to make the blender and the microwave off-limits as well...  I came upstairs to a "smoothie" made of "melted chocolate chips, peanut butter, milk and ice" (yucky), half a toasted bagel with cream cheese (yum, but not enough) and "coffee" (which was part of a caramel Nescafe Memento packet diluted in hot water- mine was too weak, my mom's too strong).  Oh, we were also given an appetizer of walnuts and M&Ms...  it's the thought that counts, right?  That's what I told the kids.
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Getting my hands dirty...

...in the garden, yo!

The exhaustion is worth it.

I think.

Seven hours in the garden on Sunday.  Another two or so (I think) on Monday and two on Tuesday...  more to come, too!  The way I see it, this is getting me back on track with my health (which I've totally been slacking on, but thankfully haven't gained much more than a pound or two back ::knocks on wood::)...  I'm even back to yoga (which I've put off for about a month--  BAD, Kassy!) to help work out the tightness that the yard work has left me with.

I'm not doing all of this on my own, though...  last year, my garden was...  well, pretty sad.  I mean, we had lots of tomatoes, some potatoes and TONS of Swiss chard, but not much more than that.  This year my friend, Nikki, has come to my rescue in many ways.  She has helped with the planning, the purchasing, the planting...  heck, it's her garden this year too!!!
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This week's menu...

Oh, yawn...  I thought weekends were supposed to give you a chance to relax/recover from the rest of the week......  so why am I always so tired on Mondays?  I spent the weekend planning then planting our backyard garden with a friend (post coming soon-ish...  along with the organizing stuff).  Ugh, I'm so tired from it!!!  I guess this is a reminder that I need to get back on track with my exercise...

Anyway, menu planning is a little more of a challenge this week; I'm not sure when I'll make it to the store for various reasons...  kids meetings, concerts, etc.  So, I'm pretty much working out of the pantry and fridge/freezers this week...  good thing I've stocked up over the past couple of weeks, huh?

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