{ Groceries, Cleaning and Prepping }

The window is open and a slight chilly breeze is flowing into the bedroom.  I've looked forward to these mornings, all summer long.  Each day the temperatures rose, my mind would tell me to hang tight, that soon the cool crisp mornings and dewy grass would be gracing my sight.

 

And here we are 🍂

 

In about 30 minutes, I need to leave for the gym, but I wanted to come in and start this post, because I know that once I return, it is a bit of a flurry of busyness as I get lunch made, laundry washing, and dinner and dessert prepared for tonight's dinner.  Jasmine and her boyfriend come over every Sunday for Family Dinner, it's a tradition we started after she moved out, and it's a time that we very much enjoy as a family.  We eat, we talk, we catch up on the past week and we play some games.

 

I am hoping though, that between all these chores, I get some time to sit and crochet a bit more.  I can't begin to tell you how much I have loved getting back into my crochet.  My mind is running wildly with so many things I want to make, but as always, blankets have a special place in my heart.  I currently have 3 crochet blankets being worked.  

 

Normally, you would expect a person to finish one, then move onto the next, but for some reason, I work best (in crochet at least), when I have a few going at the same time.  I don't always feel like working on a specific one, so I get 3 to pick from.  It works, for me!

 

Anyway, this post is not about crochet, but rather about sharing my past few days, from grocery shopping to a home tidy up and vegetable and fruit prepping for the week.

 

I was using Walmart pickup for a while, I found it easier and quicker to do, than going into the actual store.  But as time has gone on, I have chose to shop in store again.  Why?  Because I find that with Walmart I never know what I'm getting.  They often tell me things are not available, and when I go into the store immediately after the pickup, it's there.  

 

They substitute things I have not chosen to be substituted, or send me the wrong sizes, or I've been sent 3 of the same thing.  It's a bit of a risk for me when doing my grocery shopping by pickup.  

 

I'm not saying I won't use it again, because I know I will, but I do enjoy shopping at the base commissary, taking my time, and really looking at the products.  So that is what I did this past week.

 

This is the part where I say prices have gone up again, but truly what is the point in repeating something of which we have zero control of?

 

Food is not something we can go without and there really is only so much cutting back or cutting out you can do.  I am so blessed in the sense that I love cooking, love inventing meals and can make do with what is at hand, but even that becomes a bit frustrating.

 

Here's an example.  I used to absolutely love meal planning.  I would pull out my cookbooks and get such joy from looking through recipes and trying new ones, but I can't really do that anymore.  We all know that meats especially are the biggest part of the budget, so I try to cook with minimal meats.  That in turn means meals will eventually start getting a bit boring, and I start drawing blanks as to what I am going to make.

 

That in turn, takes the joy out of something I really enjoying doing.  But alas, we push forward and continue.  Where drawing up a menu would take me one day, now it takes me a couple of days, thinking, rethinking, crossing out, replacing, right up until the morning of grocery shopping.  It's crazy!

 

I am currently making some homemade apple cider vinegar.  It's something I have wanted to try for a long time, and I had quite a few apples that were going bad, so I thought it's now or never.

 

Will it work?  I am not sure.  I hope it does because homemade is always better than store bought, in my opinion.  It will take about 2 months or 3 for it to be fully ready to use, but I am quite excited to see how it turns out.  I'll obviously keep you updated on the progress!

 

After giving the cider vinegar a good stir, I got busy with prepping fruits and vegetables for the week. I know it takes some time and effort to do, but I think the results are worth the hour or so you take to chop and wash and pack everything correctly. 

 

It will be all neatly packed in the fridge and freezer, for meals during the week.

 

I also refill the olive oil jar, beans, pasta etc.  Refill the cookie jar and any other pantry staple.  I love seeing jars in the pantry and kitchen shelf, instead of boxes everywhere.

 

Since I do a lot of Mediterranean inspired meals, there is always an abundance of peppers, but they're not always as cheap as I would like, and unfortunately my pepper plant didn't produce much this year.  Definitely need to have a few pepper plants next spring.  

 

When I go grocery shopping, if I see peppers on sale, I buy them.  I then wash, and chop and place in a ziploc freezer bag to use in meals.  Works wonderfully.

 

I also always have cilantro and parsley in the freezer.  I wash them when I get home from grocery shopping, chop them roughly, and then place both together into a big tupperware container that stays in the freezer.  I add it it to all my meals, soups, stews, salads etc.  No more parsley and cilantro going bad two days after you've bought them.

I keep a tupperware with lettuce leaves too, for quick fresh salads.  I wash them, let them dry completely, then layer the leaves between paper towels.  It stays for at least 2 weeks, though ours don't last that long usually, but they're fresh and crisp.  

Another great way to have crisp lettuce for salads always available.

The time I spend in the kitchen is wonderful.  I love taking care of my home and doing the best I can to ensure that our family has fresh, home cooked healthy meals.

I thank myself during the week, when I have everything prepared to go. 

The never ending laundry mountain was conquered, washed and folded.  Laundry can become overwhelming at times, but I must say I quite enjoy doing laundry.  I don't enjoy putting it away but every other part of the process, I like.

In the meantime, a new book came in from my paperback book swap.  I have been collecting as many as I can from Julie Klassen.  Just loving this author and her sweet books. 

That's it.  I've also been crocheting a ton, started the sweetest granny blanket, and also made my first autumn inspired coaster, need to make 3 more to make a set.  I can't wait to show you though, it is a pumpkin patch, with the most adorable little crocheted pumpkins hugging the coffee mug.  

I'll show you tomorrow in my Happy Homemaker Monday!

I'll leave you now with Sir Elliott, sprawled down on the dining table next to my foam pumpkin.  (it is for a project that I am making this week, which I am hoping to share with you all)

Have a blessed rest of weekend!  I am going to sit down, do a little more crochet and maybe even take a quick nap as I'm exhausted from today's workout.

See you tomorrow 🍂

{ A cozy rainy day in the kitchen }

 

The morning started like any other.  Bright blue skies, and the most gorgeous of yellow and orange leaves on the trees.

I always step out back, and while Kaia does her business, I just look up and admire God's handiwork.  Is there anything more beautiful?  The detail, and the vivid colors that I certainly could never imagine.

 

 

 

I had a home day, which meant, no need to leave the house at all, and for that I was grateful as we had some severe storms coming in, in the afternoon.

Looking at the bright blue sky, you wouldn't know it, but believe me they showed up in force.

I got busy with cleaning the house real quick, then got into the kitchen and continued my baking.  I made Cinnamon bread and Pumpkin Spice bread the day before, and yesterday, I concentrated on making french bread loaves for subs and pizza.  We love french bread pizza and it's even tastier when you make the bread yourself.

 

Some people say they don't have a bread maker, and those that do say they hardly ever use it.  I use mine at least once a week.  I couldn't do without it.

 

 

The recipe I use is supposed to make two loaves, but I split mine into 8, and make smaller ones which are just right for the pizza.  I slice them in half, and that's 16 pizzas for the freezer.  Or, if we want subs then I take 4 of those out and make pizza from the remaining 4 loaves.

Either way, it's delicious bread and so easy to make, especially since the bread maker does all the work, and all I have to do is shape it, let it rise and bake it.  Saves me a lot of time in the kitchen.

As I was busy with the bread, the sky started turning a dark purple, the wind moved in, gorgeous fall leaves started dancing down from the trees, and the pitter patter of rain drops began.

 

I immediately lit candles, opened the back patio door and found a spot on the couch near the big living room windows, to watch the rain.  At one point, it was me, Kaia and Elliott, all watching.  I do love my furry babies.

 

 

We sat for a bit, then I decided to head straight back into the kitchen, to make some Bolinhos de Chuva.  If you're Portuguese you understand what that means, but if you're not, they translate to Rain Cakes.  Basically little donuts, rolled in sugar and cinnamon.  We always make them when it rains.  

 

Just picture a few of these with a hot cup of coffee, on a rainy day.  Yum!!! 

 

The rest of the day was spent on the couch, under the blankets, with my babies, reading, listening to the rain and just enjoying a cozy day at home.

For dinner, I made a delicious pizza.  It was supposed to be a deep dish, but I divided the dough into 2 pizzas, so ended up with not a deep dish, but a delicious pizza nonetheless.  

The recipe was a new one to us, I love copycat recipes, and this was the Uno Pizzeria Chicago Deep Dish Pizza.  I know, I created a faux pas by dividing the dough, but I won't do it next time.  I am going to try the actual deep dish and I'm sure it will be just as delicious as the one I made yesterday.

I do have another deep dish pizza recipe on my food blog, which is equally delicious.  Give it a look.

 

 

I think it was the perfect ending to a rainy Friday.

How did you spend yours?

{ A new range, and an old house issue }

A few weeks ago, I mentioned the issue I was having with my wall double oven, and how I needed to get a new one.  While trying to figure out what to do, we quickly learned that new double ovens are not only super expensive, but they wouldn't even fit the space we have in the kitchen.

See this house was built in 1969.

I won't say the double oven is from back then too, but it IS about 15 years old.  And little.  And they don't make these ovens anymore.  And they also don't make parts for these ovens anymore.  And they also don't make ovens with these dimensions anymore either.  So just an all around pain the behind.

I told hubby, I was fine with getting a range, with a new stove and a new oven.  My old cooktop was not working right either.  For about 2 years, I only really could use one of the burners, and it would turn on to the highest setting, burn really hot, and then never get any lower in heat.  I would have to turn it off completely to get it to turn down, but then it would turn completely off.

You get the picture.  

I don't know how I've managed to cook meals, and sometimes huge meals for get togethers and holidays, on that one single burner.  But I did it.

We went to pick the range, and both decided on the one we wanted.  It even has an air fryer function and a dehydrator function in the oven.  That got my attention.  

We bought it, they had to order it, and then yesterday it got delivered, first thing in the morning.  Before that though, we knew we would have to remove the old cooktop.  Cut into the counters, to make room for the new range.

No biggie, we have family and friends that are contractors and they looked at it and said it wouldn't be hard to do at all.  We were feeling mighty confident.

Until we removed the cooktop and saw what waited beneath.  First of all, hardwired in, no outlet, plug, whatever thingamabob you want to call it.  It meant we Curt would have to rewire it and put in a plug.  I'm thankful for a husband that knows how to do these things.

That was the easy part.  The hard part was cutting through the counters, and dealing with the slapped together pieces of wood that were underneath.

The cuts for the cooktop itself were all off, none were straight.  The wood board underneath was a mess, there were holes and I can't even begin to tell you.  

The feeling of wanting to run away and say "let's just forget the range", became overwhelming at some points.  But we pushed through.  Only to then realize that the plug we had put in wasn't the right plug anyway, because the range needs a 4 prong.  So that had to be rewired in, AGAIN.  During hubby's lunch hour, he zipped home and did it then zipped back to work.

We also need to cut off the bottom piece, because the range can't sit on that.  

Has that been done yet?  Well no, we need a new saw because cutting through the countertops broke off the blade.  So that has to be done this weekend.

I'm thankful and blessed with a huge kitchen, because I have a range (working one at that), just sitting against the counter, in the space it will eventually fit into.  Cooking has been joyful, being able to use an oven again, and having 4 burners at my disposal makes me feel like I'm a Queen in a Castle.  

But I will say, I can't wait to have that range in it's place.

It's quite comical in a way.  I had the air conditioning guys come this morning to switch the filter on the unit and do the usual 6 month maintenance, and their face was quite funny when they say a stove in a very awkward position.  Hahahah

In the meantime, life continues.  There are meal plans to be put together, bread to be baked, meals to be cooked, a home to be cleaned and so forth.

I wouldn't say I have had the best of days.  I am having one of those where I am just so done with everything around me.  Done with the chaos and nonsense of this world.  Done with high prices, and feeling like we're back pinching pennies.

I think we all go through these days, where everything seems to be coming at us, and we don't know which way we're facing anymore.  Tomorrow, will be a better day.

But for today, I'm just gonna let this pity party go on for a few more hours, before I fall asleep.

Mind you, I've had a good cry this afternoon.  Then told myself to stop it, chin up and push forward.  And that is what I'm doing.

Mama said there'd be days like this!

{ Cookbooks and Recipe Binders....Use them }

Over my many years of marriage, I've collected dozens of cookbooks.  Some I got rid of over the years, but most I have kept.  I just can't help it, I have a problem when it comes to cookbooks, they seem to jump into my shopping basket when I walk by and I can't just put them back.

Well maybe it doesn't go down exactly like that, but that's what I tell myself to feel better about the fact that I'm absolutely besotted with cookbooks.  I'm also kind of shallow because I need them to be pretty and have adorable covers, oh and they HAVE to be filled with photographs of what I'm supposed to be cooking cause I need to know what I'm shooting for.

Now, granted, I do have a few with no pictures, well, actually quite a lot with no pictures, so maybe I'm not that big of a snob as I thought I was.  Let's just say that if I have my choice, I prefer pictures, lots of them, preferably one for every recipe.  There!!!

Here's my problem though.....much as I love the cookbooks, a lot of time they tend to be forgotten, just sitting there all sad on the shelf.

If I had to think of the moment that I stopped oohing and aahing over them, I will say that it was when Pinterest and food blogs came about.  I mean, all of a sudden I had the cooking world at my fingertips and with just a few clicks of the keyboard I was slammed with tons of recipes to try.

But I've also found that the more I look online, the less I find what I want.  And maybe I really am a bit of a snob when it comes to cookbooks, because I still find that the best homemade dishes come from the old cookbooks.  Some of the newest recipes seem a bit too froo froo for me.  Just sayin'!!!!

Since I'm all about using what you have and getting back into the hang of things, I thought, why not fall back in love with all my old cookbooks.

So I've given myself the challenge of cooking at least 2 or 3 recipes from the cookbooks, every meal plan that I make. 

I had already made the menu plan for the next two weeks, so I'm going to look through it once more and I'm going to switch out 2 or 3 recipes.  I'm quite excited to do this because I have such good cookbooks, some with inexpensive trusted recipes that I know we will enjoy.

These small cookbooks are one of my treasures from my collection.  You know how big of an Anglophile I am, so I've collected these for a few years.  They are the perfect combination of recipe with a little history behind them, like the one below for Richmond Maids of Honour, which are small tartlets from the time of King Henry VIII.

I can't wait to try these.

So, challenge set for myself and I'm going to see how I do.  I might even do a weekly feature of the cookbook recipe I tried that week, which cookbook, if I liked it or not etc.  What do you think?

And feel free to join me, pick up your cookbooks, look through them, cook from them and let us know how it goes.  I think we'll all be surprised at the yummy recipes we have laying around, and most of them pretty inexpensive too.

Something else I'm working on, is improving my written, printed and cut out recipes.  I've collected quite a few over the years and right now they're all sitting in this folder.  It works ok, but I want something easier, so I grabbed those colored folders which I had sitting around from one of the school years.

I'm going to print out a cover for them, make each one into a specific category and start organizing my recipes.

I was quite surprised to find some of my favorite recipes hidden in that recipe folder.

These are recipes I cut out from Taste of Home magazines, when my Jasmine was about 2 years old, so 16 years ago.  Some are so good, I remember the Chicken Stroganoff, Parmesan Chicken and the Swedish Meatballs.  Brings back some great memories :)

I even have recipes that my great grandma cut out for me, and some handwritten by my grandmother.  For now they're just around, laying here and there so I need to get them put up somewhere safe where I can get to them when I need but also preserving them.  It would be quite sad if I lost those mementos.

Well ladies,  I started this post earlier in the day and then had to stop to help kids with school and do some laundry, it's now just after 5pm and I really need to get dinner started.

Have a wonderful blessed evening :)

{ How I make the most of my Kitchen Appliances }

We've all done it!!!

We see a new kitchen gadget we like and we can't wait to get it.  Maybe it's that George Foreman Grill you've always wanted, or a Rotisserie, or that nifty pasta maker.

I love cooking, I love my kitchen, and over the years either I've bought numerous appliances or I've received them for Christmas or my birthday.  But here's the thing, there is only so much space in our kitchen, so a lot of them end up in the back of cabinets, or tucked away and then unfortunately forgotten.

Out of sight out of mind right?

I'm here to tell you how I keep those appliances in use, without forgetting to use them. 

My cabinets are filled with gadgets and appliances and things I love, but I completely forget about them if I don't have them out on the counters or in plain sight.

So a few years back I decided that I had to come up with some sort of system.  A way to not just let them sit hiding somewhere and never see the light of day, and also to make sure I am getting my money's worth.

Take the George Foreman Grill for example, I love it but I don't have room for it to be out on the counter, and I also don't want my counters looking super cluttered. 

See how it's dirty?  Well that's because I pulled it out earlier to make use of it for the next menu plan and hubby saw it and decided to cook up a steak for his lunch.  He wouldn't have even remembered it existed had he not seen it sitting there on the counter.

So what do I do, what is my trick?

It's very simple.  I menu plan for two weeks at a time, so every two weeks, I look through my cabinets and shelves, pantry etc.....then I pull out one or two appliances for those two weeks.

I try to then plan my menus around them so that I'm getting good use out of them.

As you can see above I have a pasta maker which I haven't used in a while.  I'm going to pull it for next week's rotation so that I can make some homemade Fettucine pasta.

When I'm done, I replace those with something else.  So essentially I'm rotating my kitchen tools every two weeks, using them all and even trying out new recipes because sometimes it makes me go and research something to make.

I keep my breadmaker on top of the fridge, so this week I'm going to pull it down a day or two and make some bread for the freezer.

And I'm not only talking about the big things like the grill, or a breadmaker or crockpots etc.  I'm also referring to the small gadgets that we buy and shove somewhere on a shelf only to be forgotten, until we move.  You know I'm right, I bet you have things hiding in your kitchen you don't even remember buying or receiving as gifts.

The gourmet onion cutter above, right behind the french fry cutter, is something I completely forgot I had until I was looking through the pantry.  The kids and hubby love the blooming onions, so I'm going to pull that one out and use it sometime this week.

This Iced Tea Maker was a gift from my husband many years ago.  I don't use it all the time, but right after I took this picture I thought "what the heck am I thinking?  I've been making iced tea in a pitcher for the past few weeks when I could be using this". 

And that ceramic wok?  Perfect for a nice stir fry or even some yummy sesame noodles.

The hamburger press down below, and the french fry cutter are both coming out for the next two weeks.  And when I took this picture, I saw my breakfast sandwich maker in the background and remembered that I have some sausage that I need to use up, so going to get some English Muffins and make a ton of freezer breakfast sandwiches.

I'm currently planning my next menu, I even asked hubby for help and the first week are all meals he chose on his own.  I'll finish off the next week using items I'm pulling out.

Oh and don't worry about counter space, because as I rotate them, the ones on the counter go in the cabinets and come out again when it's their turn to be used.

I've found that this seems to work for me.  I'm sure there are other ways people make use of their kitchen tools/gadgets/appliances, but this system has been the best for me.

So as you can see, there's no need for you to feel like all your favorite gadgets are not being used, with a little organization and some planning ahead, you'll be happily using all those tools again, in no time. :)