Meal Plan Monday--Summer Edition

 

I've talked about the joys of making a plan and the elation of making a list.  But I have to admit, summer meal plans are tricky for me, even though concocting a weekly meal plan is usually one of my favorite games!  In general, I think that it's beneficial and makes sense to take an inventory of your pantry and freezer towards the end of a week, make a general plan, and have the supplies and plan ready to go by Sunday or Monday.

But summer is so hot.  And normal routines and schedules are put on the back burner (where my mashed potatoes should be!).  There are baseball games to go to and pools to stay in until sunset.  Who wants to call everyone away from the fun at 5:30 to pull a meal together?

Despite the heat and lack of motivation, there are some wonderful things about summer eating that we need to focus on:  fresh produce and grills!  So to stay on task and inspired, I've given myself a rough outline of what a week's worth of meals should look like in the summer:

1.  Serious grilling.

2. A form of taco.

3. A form of pizza.

4. Silly grilling.

5. A form of breakfast.

6. A meal that uses up ingredients (most likely from Serious Grilling day).

A quick breakdown:

Serious grilling will most likely involve a wonderful cut of meat you've found on sale: rack of ribs, pork loin, london broil, or whole chicken.  Just add two sides or so. The beauty of this meal is that not only are you feeding the family some high quality delicious food, you will most likely have leftovers.

Taco dinner can change every week, but it gives you a jumping off point.  Traditional beef tacos, carnitas, fish tacos, shrimp quesadillas...there are so many variations on this simple theme to keep dinners interesting without spending a ton of time or money.

Pizza dinner works in very much the same way.  The possibilities are endless.  I keep a pizza dough from Trader Joe's in the freezer most of the time, and when we have random ingredients in the fridge you've got your pizza theme.  Bacon cheeseburger pizza, spinach and mushroom pizza.  Plus you can change it up by grilling pizza one night, making mini English muffin pizzas, or a French bread pizza.

Silly grilling is not really silly at all!  But it is a safe and easy bet, if not the healthiest choice.  Think burgers, hot dogs, kielbasa, grilled chicken for sandwiches or salads.  Less hands on than Serious Grilling, usually faster to hit the table as well.  Pair with a pasta salad and fresh tomato slices, and you're done.

A form of breakfast.  In the winter, so many cozy meals can be served as "breakfast for dinner".  In the summer, it is just too hot for breakfast casseroles and such.  But poached eggs over asparagus...wonderful!  A quiche with local produce is a fast and easy meal too.  Pioneer Woman's Migas recipe will make use of the corn tortillas left over from Some Form of Taco night.  Ah, I love it when a meal plan comes together!

Finally, Make Use of Ingredients night.  Just a few examples:  if you serve a Beer Butt Chicken on Sunday, then you can debone the chicken and make Chicken Divan or Chicken Salad.  It's so much tastier with grilled or smoked meat.  If you serve a pork loin over the weekend, then make Cuban sandwiches with the leftover slices.  A perfectly cooked flat-iron steak makes great steak sandwiches or a version of a black-and-bleu salad later in the week.  You get the idea...

I only outlined 6 of my "form of..." meals since I figured you may be able to reinvent your leftovers more than once, you may get to eat out one evening, or maybe you take turns collaborating meals with family and friends.  This week's meal plan in the Vortex turned out pretty well.  It looks like this:

Skirt steak, baked rice with mushrooms and onions, roasted parmesan asparagus. (Serious grilling)

Meatballs subs (I made this recipe and served it over vermicelli a couple of weeks ago.  The rest went in the freezer to have subs.  Homemade meatball subs make me so happy.  It's almost too hot for a hot sandwich, but I'll sacrifice just this once.  I guess this qualifies as "Make Use of Ingredients" night.)

Traditional tacos.  I'm taking the easy uninteresting way out this week.  I'll get fancy next week.

Steak sandwiches with a spinach salad to use up the rest of the sub rolls and that gorgeous steak from last night. (Another Make Use of Ingredients night).

Spinach and bacon quiche. (Form of breakfast).

Nacho night!  This should be a form of pizza night, and usually Fridays are. But when we have traditional ol' regular tacos, I usually have enough left over to make a tray of loaded nachos (or a taco salad if you want to take a healthier route. I choose nachos.)
. 

I still have Form of Pizza and Silly Grilling to consider for my 7th night!  Oh, it does feel good to not have to think about dinner anymore this week.

Happy heat of the summer cooking!

Living Intentionally

I think, once given an opportunity to just be for a little while, that it becomes apparent what you and your family as a whole is all about.  As it relates to the blog, I've found myself wondering what in the world to post next.  When I think about it that way, I end up with a brain full of whirling ideas...egg recipes, party ideas, places in my town I want to showcase, decorating, and tons of anectdotal shenanigans.  When they start whirling, I end up with little time or energy to focus on any of them.

But I have a favorite new author that has helped me change the way I think about living, in general.  Just to give a quick blurb, Tsh Oxenreider (not a typo...it's Tsh, pronounced Tish) has a blog and some wonderful books that focus on the the art of simplifying.  One of the best things about her is that she focuses more on the word "intention" than "simple".  Simple can sound boring.  Intention conveys a lot more.

Understanding that one thing makes me have a focus for not only what I want to blog, but how I want to be and how our family best spends our life together.  To put it basically, we try to live with the space and the items we already have (swap rooms when it makes sense, use family pieces in whatever way works best for our space...).  We enjoy our own neighborhood and the surrounding areas to foster important relationships with friends family that helps us understand our roots in this area, but at the same time we allow time and money for traveling to enjoy music we love and have adventures outside of our own local niche.  And we strive to use our own hands as much as possible to improve our home, cook our meals, and create new things to enhance the little world we live in.

To me, that's the magic. Using our ideas and hands and friends to make things happen.  Every lifetime needs a little bit of magic.  I intend to provide that.

That being said, perhaps not every idea here will be original, but if I post something it will be important to one of the ways we choose to be intentional in our day to day.  Stay tuned!

Lacy Lavender Oatmeal Cookies

 I don't in any way consider myself to be an accomplished baker, but it is nice having homemade cookies in the cookie jar. And we like cooking and baking with Homey as much as possible to work on fractions and measures and to keep her comfortable working with kitchen equipment.  She's becoming quite the sous chef!  She and I decided to make this oatmeal cookie this week.

This is a great summer cookie. It's light and lacy, with the unexpected hint of lavender just to be different.  It's a more sophisticated take on the basic oatmeal cookie, but the kids love these too.

I like to stick to the tried and true cookie recipes on sites Better Homes and Gardens, as I remind you all again that I really don't bake.  This basic oatmeal cookie is consistently successful and a great base for variations.  Add raisins if you're into that kind of thing.  Gross.  Or add chocolate chips for a great afternoon snack for the Littles.

 I guarantee you'll have most of the basics on hand:  sugars (white and brown), baking soda and powder, quick oats, 1 1/2 sticks of butter, cinnamon and vanilla.


To keep things light and summery, we're going to add lavender. (Bonus points for the chipped grimy fingernails...you're only 8 once,right?)  I found this at Target, so I imagine you can get it at any grocery store with a decent selection of spices.

Follow the basic recipe, omitting the cloves and adding 1 teaspoon of lavender.  My batches took about 9-10 minutes, so just start watching them after around 8 minutes in case your oven is hotter than mine.  The edges need to begin to brown or else the lovely laciness will turn into lovely crumbles.

Not that that's ever happened to me.  Just trying to set you up to succeed.

The lavender makes you want to pull out fancy, frilly plates and invite ladies to lunch.  So good! Enjoy! And I'd love more ideas for embellishing the very basics in baking.  Let's just keep it very basic.

Off to repaint Homey's fingernails! :)

Summer!!

I quickly snapped this photo of the "poster wall" in Homey's room (a rather new development that I have a love-hate relationship with ;) ). I happen to be a huge fan of Frozen; I don't even get tired of the songs!  And I think Olaf is completely on to something here...

I have absolutely always loved the idea of summer.  Long days, lightning bugs, ocean waves...all of these things point directly to family and freedom.

As a mother, though, it's been one of my more difficult seasons.  I'm so glad for my daughter to have a much deserved break from school.  I'm so glad that the neighborhood comes alive with grills lit and cooking, children playing, and friends hanging out at a more leisurely pace.  But working full time takes a little bit of that summer joy away.  Maybe not for the children, but as a mother, for me, it does.  When a mom works full time, you still have to get the kiddo up at an early hour, and maybe even drive further than you would for school for day camp.  Plus, I'm just missing out on seeing or being a part of all the fun she's having.  A lot of moms do it and do it well, but it's never settled well with me.

So when my company was sold and my position eliminated a couple weeks ago, I do have to say that I thought of Olaf.  Oh I've always loved the idea of summer!!

Being in between jobs...careers even, is not necessarily ideal, but the timing to regroup could not be better for the mother in me.  And the blogger in me.  I don't have an exact plan.  I'm not sure I need one quite yet. The one thing that has resonated in my head ever since "the transition" is Psalm 46:10 "Be still and and know that I am God."  He doesn't want me to worry.  He wants me to trust His plan.  Because it's way better than anything I could think up.


So for right now, how about let's be a mom and blogger. I'll be still and listen for the next step.

It's hot as all get out down in South Carolina, so I'm looking forward to some really good air conditioned blogging time in the heat of the day.  The rest of the time, I'll be trying out some projects or recipes that I've been meaning to get my hands on, tweaking my blogging skills, and playing with my Little.  Homey and I have a lot of things we want to do with our time together...might make for some entertaining anecdotes.  I can almost guarantee it will.

Happy Summer!!

#Weekend10, or, maybe 6...

I heard about the Weekend 10 project through a friend of a friend who's an amazing photographer.  It's a great idea!  Pick up your camera...your DSLR, your point and shoot, your iPhone.  Just pick it up and take pictures. Usually for me that's an easy game.  I take tons of pictures.  I try to shoot well, but I'm no photographer.

Even still, I'm game for posting the best shots I got from the weekend:

Taken after swimming in the evening, but the blur factor reminds me that time flies when you have a Little.  How is she already so big, so strong, so able?! 

My magnolia.  Just a quick snap while walking down my driveway. 

I wish you could smell it!

Playing with my Meg.  My shadow looks like a clothespin doll.  Whatever...

Emilie the Cat eating Meg's birthday dinner.

Megsy, my Birthday Girl.

Decorate-A-Doormat

Sometimes things around this house just need a "well, that's better!" moment. 

I'm all about adding a little quirky and fun into whatever real grown-up living is supposed to be about.  This isn't rocket science or creative brilliance, necessarily.  It's just taking a fun idea and actually doing it.  Or displaying Nanoblox on the piano.  Or decorating with flying pigs.  We'll get to some of those things later, I promise.

Today, we're just working with a typical doormat.  A two dollar plain grass-woven doormat from IKEA.  In five minutes, you can personalize it however you want. I just wanted something very understated, small, and sweet.  Grab a permanent marker; it's all you'll need!

I will say that writing on these mats is not totally easy.  First of all, it's permanent.  That's what has kept me from pulling the trigger on this quick project.  Sure, I can go get another $2 doormat, but IKEA is an hour and a half from here, and I can't find the same type mat locally (mostly due to my inner agoraphobia, aka I don't like to shop.  I'm sure a similar mat is out there somewhere in my town...).

After getting over the "I might mess up!" anxiety, I just grabbed the marker and gave Homey the camera.  I had a quick plan for "I might mess up!" and decided I'd just create some sort of border with the marker to cover up a mistake. Having an "I might mess up!" plan might just light the fire to actually try a project you're hesitant about.  Trust me.

Here's the quick and simple info:

Decide what to write.  I decided on something genius like "hello".  That's awesome, right?

Space it out on the mat.  I used the "air writing" method, very similar to air guitar to those that are familiar.  If a stencil feels easier, then by all means, give it a try.

Ok, just do it.  Write the word already.  Like I said, it's not super easy to just flow over the grass matting, but go slow and steady.  Go back and fill in.  Sink the marker down as needed to get low spots.  That's all!

Photo creds to my homey Homey.

Front Porchin' It

The porch.

 To me, both of my porches are more of a living room than my actual living room ever will be.  I don't sit on my own couch very often.  Usually I am on one of my porches. I've even actually managed to turn the word porch into a verb somehow.  I do weird things like that sometimes.

It's why we ended up here, in our perfectly weird house.  Upon driving up to see yet another house with our realtor, I remember saying enthusiastically "Can we buy it?!  Can I have it?!" before even walking inside.  The front porch just spoke to me.

This brings us to right this second, seven years later, when I'm still sitting on the front porch, typing.  Because it's just my favorite place here. 

Here's why I need to be on the porch. It gives me sunshine and fresh air. I can therapeutically sweat out the cares of the day in the late afternoon sun here.  It affords me both the ability to be at home and interact with the outside world.  New neighbors, old neighbors.  If it's not between November and February here, we're all out for one reason or another.  Yards to weed, bikes to ride, cartwheels to turn, neighborhood blocks to be run (do I really have to run today??).  There's a chance to catch up with someone a few doors down, return a dish from a recipe someone shared, or just throw a hand up to wave at someone passing by.

Since I spend so much time here, on my trusty porch, I finally felt like it really needed to be treated like a room instead of an afterthought.

The bare bones version is this:  my awesome porch swing and my vintage bouncy chair.

It's okay like this.  The swing itself is freakin' fantastic.  It has cup holders!  But the space as a whole was just deserving a little more love considering how much we use it.

Like the rest of this house...the front porch is wonky.  It's not symmetrical, nothing quite fits where you want it to.  But regardless...we'll just figure it out!  Ready? Let's go.

So much better!  I anchored the sitting area with a $30 outdoor rug from Target.  It defines the space, and adds the first layer of softness and texture to the hard brick and wood of the porch.  I also added some pillows, almost for free!  The middle pillow is an Etsy find, and I made the other two out of a $7 drop cloth (with tons of fabric to spare).  I hand painted our house number and a graphic ginko leaf to add a little personality.  They actually wash pretty well!

For form and function purposes, I added an existing white melamine tray to the end table.  It adds contrast in texture and color, plus it adds a great sturdy surface for drinks and snacks.

Also "free-ish" is the throw on the back on the swing.  It's actually a swim suit cover from Old Navy.  I'll just grab it when I need it but leave it here in the meantime.  Makes a great picnic or play blanket for all the time we spend in the yard!

The other end of the looks way more alive and lovely with some container plants and a vintage plant stand.  I'm not allowed to touch the plants, as they'll die upon contact.  But I really do enjoy them as long as someone else is taking care of them.  Thanks JMom!  I love that we planted out the old mailbox.  Since they discontinued mail delivery to the door a few years ago, I figured it would make a great repurposed planter.

Now, it's time to go porch it and see what's going on in the Vortex.