Pinterest Monday ~ Food Glorious Food

I’m now linking up to Tina’s meme Piquing my Pinterest which is run on Sunday’s, however I’ll still be posting my pins on Monday as I’m already doing Sunday Selections, and linking up the following Sunday…double the fun!
This week I am starting the 1 Million Kilo Challenge. No I’m not planning on losing a million kilos (even though it sometimes feels like I have that much to lose). By using their menu plan and (trying to) following their exercise regime over the next ten weeks I hope to get some of my Moving More, Eating Well happening…. but more of that later in my MMEW post on the 10th Feb (ish). Anyhoo, a lot of people have been saying in the forums that they think a lot of the food will be wasted as the quantities consumed is far less than the quantity you buy. That reminded me of some pins I had on my “Food Stuffs” board.

** All images are linked to their original source. Just click on them for more details **

Spring onions in a bottle in the freezer! I have done this yesterday. It will be interesting to see how long they last.

Salad in a Jar! I’ve not tried this yet but I can see how it would be quick if to make these to take to work. Some people have tried this by including other veges but they don’t seem to stay as fresh longer term.

This looks like a great catering idea rather than having one big platter and pots of dip. (I’d be real classy and use plastic cups so I wouldn’t have to wash up!)

I try to have at least one cup a day.

Gotta burn that fat!

This looks yum but I’d have to remove the waffles being on the no wheat, no gluten thing…. so I guess that makes it a fruit salad.

Now I have tried this recipe and it is so delish! Well it does have nutella in it so of course it is. I’m not sure how healthy it really is though. Maybe as an occasional treat. (The ice block thing didn’t work for me so it’s probably best in a container)

For more yummy goodness of the not so healthy variety and nutella droolings check out my Food Stuffs board on Pinterest.

** All images are linked to their original source. Just click on them for more details **

Sam x

{Do} Weekly Planner – Finally! and it only took 15 minutes

I am late posting my weekly planner but it’s still Monday in some parts of the world so I’m not stressing about it. So no further delays…. here ’tis.

1) Menu Planning

DH and Grace continue to use my “Household Planner” I created (using free printables from The Peaceful Mom) to check what ingredients are needed for the next weeks shop. Love that! Then of course we still update our menu plan which is on the Fridge for all to see.

Here is this weeks menu…

Monday ~ Vegetable Stew (recipe – Changing Habits 21 Day weight loss program)

Tuesday ~ Baked Sweet Chicken (recipe – Changing Habits 21 Day weight loss program)

Wednesday ~ Vege Burgers and Salad

Thursday ~ Roast Chicken and Salad (store bought due to work hours)

Friday ~ Leftover Chicken and Greek Salad in Pita Pockets (Grace is cooking)

Saturday ~ Steak and Salad – time to get the BBQ going.

Sunday ~ Honey & Oregano Roast Lamb and Vegetables

I’m linking this menu plan up with Kat from the Organised Housewife.

2) Organize – My Daily Routine

While working on my Household Planner I decided to note down “what things are important to me” (other than family-time of course) and how much time is reasonable to allocate to each considering I work full time. None of this is set in concrete. As we know things always pop unexpected. Here is what I came up with anyway:

1. an organized and clean house

• 7 hrs/week (1 hr/day Mon-Wed, 2hrs each Sat-Sun)

2. time to play in my craft room

• 7 hrs/week (1 hr/day Mon-Wed, 2hrs each Sat-Sun)

3. time for bloggy things

• 5 hrs/week

4. much needed gardening

• 3 hrs/week

5. computer time – something I currently spend way too much time on

• 2 hrs/week

This week  I’m going to test this out and see if it’s doable. Thursday and Friday are my days free of all the above.

3) Declutter Our House

Now the big one. I finally got to those kitchen cupboards I’ve been putting off for weeks. And yes it only took me 15 minutes to do! Here’s a couple of snapshots.

plastic container drawer - before

after - I moved them all to a container with a divider in it so lids are all on one side

I didn’t get a before of the saucepans but if you can imagine all the baking trays shoved in on top of them then you get the general idea.

all the baking trays are now in the drawer the plastic containers used to be in

all my pots and pans now in easy reach

This week  I’m moving into the dining room and will declutter the buffet. It has a number of Christmas items in there so it will be good to take stock to start preparing.

Here’s what I’ve tossed/donated so far:
1. Broken sandwich toaster
2. Old magazines
3. Cleaned out the cupboard under the stairs so we had space to store Christmas tree & decorations
4. Had light fittings installed (that were in the cupboard under the stairs for a year!) and discarded the boxes…  Hub wanted to keep the old light fittings but I put a stop to that
5. Sorted arts & crafts, threw out one bag trash
6. Re-arranged DD12′s room, threw out 4 bags trash
7. 1 bag DD12′s clothes to charity
8. 1 box DD12′s figurines and toys to charity
9. Cleaned out bathroom cupboard and threw out old make-up, lotions and potions
10. Organized jewelry and got rid of broken useless pieces
11. Sorted the Warranties and Manuals file. Threw out old manuals and expired warranties.
12. Attacked the filing tray. Filled the shredder twice.
13. Sorted through my old dress patterns and threw out the ones I know will never ever come back in fashion
14. Sorted through all my fabric stash which had been stored away for years. Threw out those bits that were unable to be used.
15. De-cluttered my Google Reader
16. Unsubscribed to emails I don’t follow or read
17. Old TV
18. Old microwave
19. Bike frame
20. Cardboard boxes
21. 2 bags of food from pantry/fridge/freezer tossed, 1 box given away
22. 3 bags of sheets from the linen cupboard
23. old broken plastic containers

I’ll check back here next Monday with an update on my progress (hopefully) and a new set of goals.

{Do} Weekly Planner – Accidental Clean Up

Welcome to my weekly planner where I share my Menu Plan, any Organization I wish to do, and my Decluttering intentions. I really didn’t want to do anything last week but as it turns out we did get some things fixed up around the home.

My menu plan is linked up with Kat from the Organised Housewife.

1) Menu Planning

OMG! DH and Grace updated the Menu Planner this week before they went grocery shopping! I have 4 weeks of menu’s in a folder which they used. They even checked the recipes in the meals from recipe books to check the ingredients required.

Here is this weeks menu…

Monday ~ Chicken Kebabs & Salad
Tuesday ~ Vegetable Stew
Wednesday ~ Out for Dinner (for our 15th Anniversary)
Thursday ~ Roast Chicken and Salad (store bought due to work hours)

Friday ~ Leftover Chicken and Pasta Alfredo
Saturday ~ Mexican – Grace is cooking
Sunday ~ Chicken Parmigiana, Potato and Salad

2) Organize – My Daily Routine

I need to get back into my daily routine and start exercising again.

This week  My rowing machine arrived (purchased with those reward points thingies…. thought I may as well cash them in!), so I am going to start off with 15 mins a day and gradually build up from there. I may even watch a bit of Dr Who while I’m rowing away.

3) Declutter Our House

Our dishwasher broke down a couple of months ago. We finally saved up to purchase a new one (thank you mr tax man). This meant that I inadvertently had to clean out the cupboards under the kitchen sink. Win/Win!

This week  I will finally sort the rest of the kitchen cupboards, especially the saucepans and plastic containers.

Here’s what I’ve tossed/donated so far:

1. Broken sandwich toaster
2. Old magazines

3. Cleaned out the cupboard under the stairs so we had space to store Christmas tree & decorations
4. Had light fittings installed (that were in the cupboard under the stairs for a year!) and discarded the boxes…  Hub wanted to keep the old light fittings but I put a stop to that

5. Sorted arts & crafts, threw out one bag trash
6. Re-arranged DD12′s room, threw out 4 bags trash
7. 1 bag DD12′s clothes to charity
8. 1 box DD12′s figurines and toys to charity

9. Cleaned out bathroom cupboard and threw out old make-up, lotions and potions
10. Organized jewelry and got rid of broken useless pieces

11. Sorted the Warranties and Manuals file. Threw out old manuals and expired warranties.
12. Attacked the filing tray. Filled the shredder twice.

13. Sorted through my old dress patterns and threw out the ones I know will never ever come back in fashion
14. Sorted through all my fabric stash which had been stored away for years. Threw out those bits that were unable to be used.
15. De-cluttered my Google Reader
16. Unsubscribed to emails I don’t follow or read
17. Old TV
18. Old microwave
19. Bike frame
20. Cardboard boxes
21. 2 bags of food from pantry/fridge/freezer tossed, 1 box given away
22. 3 bags of sheets from the linen cupboard
23. 1 bag of stuff from under the kitchen sink
24. 1 broken down old dishwasher

I’ll check back here next Monday with an update on my progress (hopefully) and a new set of goals.