MENU MONDAY - 4/10/17

The zucchini & tomato skillet we'd planned last week ended up being roasted zukes, another meal got bumped to this week because I went to dinner with my cousin while everyone else had Papa Murphy's, and sweet green muffins got moved to this week because Naomi asked to make Barbara's pancakes instead. Such is life. Having a menu in place is so helpful, but it's easy to tweak things as needed.

NEW RECIPES
* tuna casserole - This is an old recipe, but one I'd never posted before.
* beef & mushroom spaghetti sauce - I came up with this to use up some bargain mushrooms.
* coconut oatmeal cookies - Perfectly chewy with just enough crispness to the outside to make them perfect. They're also dairy-free, for those who care about that.

COOKING IN ADVANCE (These are often spontaneous projects, so they'll include things we did at the last minute the previous week and/or plan on doing in the upcoming one.)
* peanut butter and a seasoned mix black and pinto beans in the crockpot, just like we do once or twice every week
* dry roasted almonds

BREAKFAST
* oatmeal with a rotation of the following toppings - brown sugar, cinnamon, milk, homemade peanut butter, maple almond butter, raisins, dried cranberries, fresh or frozen fruit, huh-koe-pee milk, and/or energy mix x4
* doughnuts at church
* egg & veggie scramble
* sweet green muffins 

DINNER
* leftovers (every Sunday so that we can have a day off from cooking)
* beef chowder (crockpot) / toast
* Cuban black beans & coconut rice
* teriyaki chicken salad 
* do-it-all chicken (crockpot) / brown rice / apple & cranberry green salad 
* beans & greens
* chicken veggie stir-fry / brown rice

SNACKS & DESSERTS
* fruits and vegetables
* peanuts and dry roasted almonds
* popcorn with nutritional yeast, regular salt, or seasoned salt (kernels from the WinCo bulk department that get popped in my Lodge Dutch oven, but you can see my thoughts on both the wonderful Dutch oven and the fantastic West Bend Stir Crazy in this post.)
* Nantucket cranberry pie

I love the texture combination in teriyaki chicken salad, versatility of beans & greens, and delicious almond flavor in Nantucket cranberry pie. What is one of your favorite hearty salads? 

Note: Any chicken breasts, 93/7 ground beef, applewood smoked ham, or pork tenderloins in our menus are from Zaycon Fresh. We've been making bulk purchases from them for a while and have been pleased with their products.

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GIRLS' NIGHT OUT

Several weeks ago Naomi and I were invited to a concert. I accepted the invitation, marked the calendar, and gave Tim a heads up ... but I didn't tell Naomi.

This afternoon Silas asked me what "3:30 Kit" meant on the calendar and I told him I was just hanging out with my friend for a while. When Naomi asked me a little later what we were going to be doing I said it was just girl time. She, of course, pointed out that's she's a girl and asked if it was just for adults or if she could come along this time. I agreed to think about letting her come, eventually agreed to grant her request, then snapped a quick picture of ourselves while we waited for Kit to swing by for some allegedly unstructured girl time.

Kit and her friend, Diane, picked us up and Kit asked Naomi how her day had been. Naomi said good. Kit said it was about to get better. Naomi looked at me with a funny expression, then heard Kit tell her we were all going to a Newsboys' Love Riot concert together. The look on Naomi's face was priceless! She was surprised and excited, wondering if I knew and then how long I'd known.

We drove to the venue, had a picnic in the car while it rained and hailed outside, stood in line once the skies cleared, and then found a place to sit. Here we all are before the show.

Naomi took this picture as proof of what concert she was at.

Tim and the boys weren't home when we left and she didn't want her brothers to know where she was yet, but she was excited and wanted to tell someone. So she briefly interrupted Papa's visit with Aunt Judy and Uncle Dean to tell him her big news over the phone.

Then she was given a CD of her own to take home. She's so excited about that! She suggested the CD could be in the picture I'd wanted to get of her and I. But, of course!

Finally, it was Newsboys time. She watched.

She sang.

She clapped. She bounced.

And then we went home ... with a plan in place for how to tell the boys, who were already konked out when we arrived, about our fun evening. Her new CD is waiting in the CD player of our van and we'll turn it on when we head to church in the morning. The boys will probably think the first song is the radio, but at some point will realize they're listening to a CD and ask where it came from. That's when she'll do a little gloating - first that she got to go to the concert, then that she got to stay up later than her two older brothers. Honestly, I think those two things were equally exciting to her tonight.

WHEN GAMES INTERSECT REALITY

I recently mentioned how we've been spending some time on Friday evenings having simple fun at home as a family. Last week we played Apples to Apples Junior and I wound up with this card.

Tim and I just looked at each other and laughed. The kids asked what was so funny. One was convinced it was because green apples, as seen on every card, actually taste a little bitter. They were wrong. The truth, which isn't funny at all, is that I'm bitter. Really bitter. And I have been for a long time.

I'm currently going in for counseling every few weeks because I hit a point where I just couldn't live with myself anymore. Not in suicidal sense, but life was just so miserable for me ... and therefore miserable for everyone I live with. I can't control all of life's circumstances, none of which have changed, but I do have the freedom and responsibility to choose my attitude. I just couldn't figure out how to do that on my own. So I asked for help.

I'm so thankful for people who call out our poor behavior and validate our feelings, speak the truth in such a way that we want to change instead of getting defensive, flip through the Bible on their lap as they share verses to encourage and challenge us, give practical suggestions that prove to be very effective, and clearly care about us as individuals (and our families, if we have them), not just a problem to fix.

It's an understatement to say I'm still a work in progress, but I feel hopeful for the first time in ages. Maybe one day we'll be playing this game and chuckle because I get the "bitter" card, one that obviously doesn't describe me anymore. One day.

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THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for hand-me-downs moving through our family - our kids sharing clothes they've outgrown or won't need with other families we know, people taking clothes we put on the freebie corner in our yard, the kids having fun "shopping" as we periodically go through the bins we keep for upcoming sizes that friends have given us, and bi-annual clothing exchanges for me.

What's something that you're thankful for?

THOUGHTFUL FRIEND, TASTY COOKIES

A couple weeks ago a friend asked for my mailing address. Two days later I came home from church to find a package at my doorstep. I assumed it was from her, but had absolutely no idea what it was.

Opening it up confirmed that she's just as generous as always and still pays attention to details. Inside the box was a 2-pack of silicone baking mats. She'd read my most recent recipe where I mentioned that I don't use parchment paper or silicone mats and spraying cookie sheets works just fine. Then she sent me silicone mats because, in her words, cookie lovers need them.

Not only that, but she knows I don't like to have stuff for the sake of having stuff, prefer things with multiple uses over single use items, and expect everything to earn the space it takes up in our home. So she told me to give them to someone else if I didn't love them enough to keep them.

It took ten days, but I finally got to use them for tonight's dessert. This picture was taken in lousy lighting, but you can see one being put to use.

I'd still be perfectly content spraying cookie sheets, and may still do it sometimes because I can get more cookies on the sheet that way and cleanup isn't hard, but these are super handy! I love that I didn't have to scrub the cookie sheets between batches, since there's still some cookie remnants left behind when I spray the cookie sheets.

Today we used them for a new recipe, coconut oatmeal cookies, pictured above. I love the silicone sheets and the new cookies!

SERMON NOTES

Devon was sitting next to me at church on Sunday and this is what I saw when I looked over at his notebook.

His notes were written in a code that he knows. So funny!

MENU MONDAY - 4/3/17

We ended up having two leftover nights on the last menu and liked both of the new recipes we tried. I call that a successful week.

NEW RECIPES
* pumpkin soup - With a totally different flavor than the pumpkin soup with lentils (yellow bell peppers, ginger, cumin, etc.) we've made before, this soup has the flavor of coconut, maple, cinnamon, and nutmeg and an optional sesame kale garnish. It sounds like an odd combo, but it's delicious!
* apple dijon kale salad - I loved this mix of textures and flavors - chewy and crunchy, sweet and spicy. The only bummer is we harvested the end of last year's kale to make it. Guess it's time to plant more!

COOKING IN ADVANCE (These are often spontaneous projects, so they'll include things we did at the last minute the previous week and/or plan on doing in the upcoming one.)
* a seasoned mix black and pinto beans in the crockpot and peanut butter, just like we do once or twice every week
* seasoned salt

BREAKFAST
* oatmeal with a rotation of the following toppings - brown sugar, cinnamon, milk, homemade peanut butter, maple almond butter, raisins, dried cranberries, fresh or frozen fruit, huh-koe-pee milk, and/or energy mix x4
* doughnuts at church
* egg & veggie scramble
* sweet green muffins

DINNER
* leftovers (every Sunday so that we can have a day off from cooking)
* cumin lime black bean quinoa salad on a bed of spinach
* new recipe / zucchini & tomato skillet
* spiced lentil soup / toast
* do-it-all chicken (crockpot) / brown rice / apple & cranberry green salad
* buffalo slaw / brown rice
* honey baked lentils / brown rice (skipped last week in favor of a second night of leftovers)

SNACKS & DESSERTS
* fruits and vegetables
* peanuts and dry roasted almonds
* popcorn with nutritional yeast, regular salt, or seasoned salt (kernels from the WinCo bulk department that get popped in my Lodge Dutch oven, but you can see my thoughts on both the wonderful Dutch oven and the fantastic West Bend Stir Crazy in this post.)
* new recipe

Let's see, what am I most excited to eat? Homemade seasoned salt is tasty and inexpensive. Buffalo slaw is a family favorite that we now have lots of other people hooked on. Balsamic roasted brussels sprouts are delicious. And I'm pretty sure I'll like the new dessert recipe. 

Which of these recipes appeals to you? Any you've made before?


Note: Any chicken breasts, 93/7 ground beef, applewood smoked ham, or pork tenderloins in our menus are from Zaycon Fresh. We've been making bulk purchases from them for a while and have been pleased with their products.

** This post contains affiliate links and we're grateful when people use them. **