Happy Monday!
This week’s dinner started on Sunday with Grilled Halibut Steaks. If you ever wonder how to grill fish, I always suggest starting simple with a little olive oil, salt and pepper to taste, and a squeeze of lemon once it’s done. Let it grill till it flakes easily and you are good to go.
Up this week is a fairly easy menu with crock pot favorites since my better half is traveling part of the time.
Wednesday~ Yogurt Chicken. Got the recipe at the Chobani event for kids this weekend. I’ll share later this week.
Thursday~ CORN~ Clean out refrigerator night!
Friday~ Hot Dogs (Volunteer night for me so it needs to be quick and easy)
Saturday~ Date night at Sweet Basil’s…so good.
What’s on your menu this week?
I love to hear your feedback and comments. Stop by and visit Facebook, Pinterest orTwitter for more conversation! Or get posts delivered via Email or RSS Feed. Thanks!
For more meal planning ideas, check out Plan It, Don’t Panic ebook with tips, tricks and menu plans ready to go. Or Menu Plan Monday with OrgJunkie for hundreds of meal plan ideas.
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For my review of the Sheets check out my original post here.
I love to hear your feedback and comments. Stop by and visit Facebook, Pinterest orTwitter for more conversation! Or get posts delivered via Email or RSS Feed. Thanks!
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As gardening season kicks off, it’s a good time to consider how you can help conserve water in the coming months. The average American household uses 350 gallons of water a day. There are lots of little ways to reduce your consumption, including installing a rain barrel. Depending on the size of your roof, you can collect about a half a gallon of water for every square foot of roof for each 1″ of rainfall.
Last year our rain barrel consisted of a bucket stuck under a gutter downspout. Nothing fancy, but it worked. That is, until the toddler knocked it over. As our plans grow for our garden this year, we realized it was time for a better solution. In comes a real rain barrel. You can find them online, Craigslist or through friends that are moving and want to sell theirs to you for half price. (yippee!) Check in with your town’s DPW and you may find they offer a discount to local providers. If you are handy, you can even make one yourself.
Eventually I would love to upgrade to a oak barrel rain bucketbut in the mean time, the big blue plastic one should work just fine. At least those rainy summer days will give us something fun to watch as the water fills up, and no toddlers can knock this guy down!
I love to hear your feedback and comments. Stop by and visit Facebook, Pinterest orTwitter for more conversation! Or get posts delivered via Email or RSS Feed. Thanks!
The rain has arrived in New England and I’m not sure when we will see the sun again. Time for some hearty meals and the crock pot.
Monday~ Homemade Chicken Nuggets, family favorite! Along with some peas from our local farm stand.
Tuesday~ Pork Chops with Apricot Preserves (didn’t get to this last week as I went to Disney on Ice on Thursday, so fun yet so exhausting with a 3 year old)
Wednesday~ Chicken Piccata, Daddy’s favorite.
Thursday~ Chili in the crock pot (Recipe below)
Friday~ Homemade Pizza
Chili in Crock Pot
1 lb ground beef (85% lean works best for flavor)
1 large onion chopped
2 cloves of garlic chopped
1 green pepper chopped
1 28oz can + one 14 oz can whole tomatoes
1 15 oz can kidney beans, rinsed and drained
2 tablespoons chili powder
1 tablespoon cumin
1 adobo chile chopped (be careful, it’s spicy!) You can find these in the canned good section, they last for awhile in the fridge
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup cocoa powder
~Brown the beef in a sauté pan, drain the fat and transfer beef to crock pot.
~Add balance of ingredients and mix well.
~The cocoa powder helps to tone down the spiciness so it’s more kid friendly, plus it works as a nice binder so it’s not too soupy.
What are you cooking this week?
I love to hear your feedback and comments. Stop by and visit Facebook, Pinterest orTwitter for more conversation! Or get posts delivered via Email or RSS Feed. Thanks!
For more meal planning ideas, check out Plan It, Don’t Panic ebook with tips, tricks and menu plans ready to go. Or Menu Plan Monday with OrgJunkie for hundreds of meal plan ideas.
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Sometime you find a product that is super cute and you are totally happy with it. Other times, you find out a product is made by a cool company and you are even more excited about it. That’s pretty much how I feel about A Lot To Say. This company takes plastic water bottles and turns them into message apparel and accessories, like tee shirts and sheets. They didn’t stop there and chose a no water dye process to make their products. Having worked in corporate retail for over 10 years, I’m aware of how much water it takes to dye fabric and also how damaging the dye can be when it enters the water ecosystem outside of a factory.
Could these sheets be any cuter for a girl’s bedroom? My favorite thing is that these sheets are cute now for a 3 year old, but also appropriate for an older child. Longevity is always a good thing in my book. The sheets are super soft, which was a happy surprise considering they are made from recycled plastic bottles. Check it out on the Today Show!
Please recycle your plastic bottles so A Lot To Say can make more of these fun products. Check out their boutique at Fred Segal if you are in the Santa Monica area. Everything is made in the US (no travel, no fumes) and is under $100. It’s nice to find something green without spending a lot of green. Earth Day may be April 22nd, but there is no reason why we shouldn’t be more considerate of our choices throughout the year.
Want your own set of kids sheets? I have the same set for a Girls Twin Bed to giveaway! Use them in your house or give them as a gift. This is an $80 value! Just leave a comment on this post to be entered and a way to contact you. For extra entries, you can follow Random Recycling on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest, or follow A Lot To Say on Facebook or Twitter. Please leave a separate comment for each entry. That is 6 possible entries to win.
Contest is open until midnight, April 28th. US residents only please. Winner will be notified via email.
Happy Earth Day!!
I love to hear your feedback and comments. Stop by and visit Facebook, Pinterest orTwitter for more conversation! Or get posts delivered via Email or RSS Feed. Thanks!
Disclosure: I received a sample of A Lot To Say sheets to review. This is no way influenced my opinion and the thoughts shared here are my own.
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I am a new fan of e-books. They appeal to my quest for less paper, less clutter in the house. Both on my nightstand and in my kitchen. I have ordered a number of them, including cookbooks, blogging how-tos and of course, fun fiction. Some of my favorites are included in this incredible sale of ebooks, plus others that were on my “to-read” list.
We made Whole Wheat Graham Crackers yesterday which is from Healthy Snacks to Go from Katie Kimball at Kitchen Stewardship. She came out with two new books this year, Smart Sweets and Everything Beans book, both of which are included in this ebook package. I ordered this group of ebooks since I know I’m going to get lots of new recipes to test out by an author I already enjoy.
The Simplify Your Family Life Sale is brought to you in part by Plan to Eat, an online meal planner that makes eating at home simple. Receive an exclusive coupon code on a one-year membership with your purchase!
Important note: This collection will only be available from Monday, April 16th at 8 a.m. EST to Friday, April 20th at 8 a.m. EST . There will be no late sales offered.
Which book are you most looking forward to reading? Mine is How to Have your Cake and Eat it, Too.
I love to hear your feedback and comments. Stop by and visit Facebook, Pinterest orTwitter for more conversation! Or get posts delivered via Email or RSS Feed. Thanks!
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Could the weather be any better?! I love walking around the neighborhood and seeing how far along everyone is with their spring yard work and gardening plans. The crazy warm weather makes me think I should be putting seedlings in the ground, but this is New England so patience is key.
My budding gardener got a new set of toolsfrom her Grammy for Easter. She was so excited to put them to good use and get planting. Get your kids excited about growing things and watch their eyes grow wide.
We set up a variety of containers to plant seeds, which is always a cheaper option than buying a flat of seedlings. The herbs went in first, Basil, Dill and Oregano. The little gardener planted her own pickling cucumbers that she picked out at the garden store.
When it comes to containers for seedlings, there are lots of eco friendly options. I use leftover ones from past seasons and this year I’m trying the egg carton which can go right into the ground. The newspaper cup above is from an old post at Design Sponge but I love how simple it is. Plus it can go right into the ground too. If you have yogurt containers, those will be a perfect size for seedlings but take the plastic off before putting them in the ground.
My husband had fun with the circular saw and whipped together some raised beds. Plus we are getting one big one made from red cedar installed by Soil and Seed. When you choose wood for raised beds, skip the pressure treated ones and opt for red cedar or old wood that is still in good shape. Avoid chemicals in the wood that will eventually seep into your soil and your food.
One of the reasons we choose to get the raised bed installed is that it will also be filled with organic soil. Despite having our own compost, it won’t be enough to fill a 4×8′ bed. I also had a hard time finding organic soil at the big box stores last year. Doable, but we realize that totting little toddlers around to pick up lumber, soil and build the whole thing just doesn’t make sense. We would rather spend the time doing the plantings.
I love the new plant-a-grams from Williams-Sonoma. I’ll be bringing these to the local farm stand to pick out the balance of seedlings to get our garden growing. They also have one for a vegetable garden and a salad garden, yum!
Next step will be getting the raised bed installed and making a plan. Look for that post mid-May! In the meantime, check out Part 1: Getting Organized, and Part 2: What to Plant and When.
What are you looking forward to growing this year? Anything new?
Lots of seafood on deck as the sales were too good to pass up. After doing a major Freezer Organization project last week, I was ready to restock the freezer with some meat deals. Natural ground beef for $3.99, awesome price so I bought 3 lbs. Maybe this will be the year to buy a chest freezer….
Today’s recipe is a made up salsa with pineapple and orange for the grilled swordfish. Tuesday will be dinner out at my Grammy’s new senior living dining area.
Wednesday Chili Mac is a new recipe from Parents Magazine.
Thursday Salmon recipe is from Martha Stewart.
Friday Apricot Porkchops is a favorite and from Every Day Food.
What are you cooking this week?
I love to hear your feedback and comments. Stop by and visit Facebook, Pinterest orTwitter for more conversation! Or get posts delivered via Email or RSS Feed. Thanks! For more meal planning ideas, check out Plan It, Don’t Panic ebook with tips, tricks and menu plans ready to go. Or Menu Plan Monday with OrgJunkie for hundreds of meal plan ideas.
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Trying to figure out what to plant and when is determined but a number of factors. The most important one is location, both in the country and also your garden. You can find a general map on the back of nearly every seed package to get a sense of what zone you live in. (Did you know those maps were just rewritten to account for rising temperature trends…hmmm.) Once you figure out a general time to plant, you also need to decide if you want to get ahead of the game and start your own seeds indoors.
Growing from seed allows for two key things, choosing organic or heirloom seeds and a also major cost savings. One seed packet vs a flat of seedlings will always be a more economical option. However, some things just don’t start well from seeds. A little trial and error comes into play here.
Take inventory of any past packets of seeds before you go shopping. It’s easy to forget you still have spinach seeds from last year and they are still good a year later. This chart is handy for determining how long you can hold on to your seeds.
Seed planting guides are easily found from searching online. The one above is from a favorite site of mine, You Grow Girl. You download the chart from the site and then enter your last frost date into Excel. It then gives a personalized list of dates of what to plant and when. The site has lots of handy tips for beginner gardening and beyond.
Next up will be some seed starting indoors, how I use window boxes for my greens and our plan to get a raised bed installed. And check out Fresh Food from Small Spacesfor a little more inspiration to get your garden growing, no matter how much room you have.
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What’s not to love about Chocolate and Cheesecake and Cookies? Put it all together and you get one rocking cookie. We had these over Easter weekend and they did not disappoint. I also used white whole wheat flour to up the healthy quotient. No one was the wiser 😉
Recipe was adapted from Sister Wisdom.
Combine dry ingredients in one bowl and whisk to combine. In a mixer, blend butter, sugar, egg, cream cheese and vanilla. Slowly add the flour mixture until all incorporated. Stir in the chocolate chips and pecans.
Drop rounded spoonfuls onto a cookie sheet, 12 per sheet.
Bake 10-12 minutes or until golden brown around the edges.
but in the mean time, the big blue plastic one should work just fine. At least those rainy summer days will give us something fun to watch as the water fills up, and no toddlers can knock this guy down!
from her Grammy for Easter. She was so excited to put them to good use and get planting. Get your kids excited about growing things and watch their eyes grow wide.
for a little more inspiration to get your garden growing, no matter how much room you have.
