Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Scrubbing and Washing

Last week I posted about monthly cleaning I was doing. Well this week I continued the monthly cleaning check list. I did something that was easy and I tackled a huge project for me.
Easy- Washing the Shower Curtain

I mean really it's easy the only hard part of it is taking the shower curtain down and putting it back up. I love my shower curtain. I found it a couple of years ago at Big Lots for $2.00. We have a clear, plastic shower curtain behind it that we replace every 6 months. NOW that is a a chore, cause I'm not dealing with 1 curtain but 2. Plus I have the cheap O rings. Next time we replace the liner I'm buying open hooks for our curtains!!

Hard: Cleaning the inside of the fridge.
Now normally it would be easy, However, the wonderful hubby wanted a window A/C unit in the window beside the fridge. The door will not open all the way so I called the Tetras King of house, the hubby, to remove the drawers for me. Plus at the bottom under the drawer someone had spill something and it was yucky!
 The fridge was a mess!

Yes I did grab our cooler to add the thing from the door. And I love how the jelly is leaning!
I filled my sink up with Hot Water and added a few drops of soap, 2 cups of vinegar and 1/4 cup of baking soda and started cleaning like a fool!
It took an hour and the cleaning solution I used worked AWESOME! Stuff was coming up fast with my sponge. 




Happy Donna with her Clean Fridge! 
I didn't get to the pantry. That will be next week along with cleaning the oven, the outside of the fridge, the baseboards, and vacuuming the furniture. I found this lint brush for my couch I can't wait to try out! Whew thank goodness I'm going to have help next weekend!



Monday, September 28, 2015

Monday's Menu Sept 26 - Oct 2

Wow last weeks menu only had 1 failed recipe! I am so grateful for that. That is one thing I stress about cooking DON'T BE PUT OFF BY ONE MEAL!

I have had my fair shares of "What is that?" meals. The one my kids love, wait LOVE to bring up is the very first time I cooked fished. I did not know that lemon juice cooked fish! Long story short the fish were rubbery, horrible and my kids band me from making any fish dishes for YEARS! (I have redeemed myself with seafood dishes) So if a meal turns out bad just chalk it up to experience and continue to cook other meals.You will get better and you will grow from the failures.
So from that 1 failed recipe I have learned from it. Crock pots due need liquids with your chicken.
This weeks menu has 3 new recipes.

Saturday:

Lunch: Date Lunch with Hubby

Dinner: Oven Baked Hot Dogs
This is a great meal. It's super quick and super yummy! I didn't get pictire because I was so hungry when it was dinner time!
Oven Hot Dogs
Inspired by intheweb.worldpress.com
8 hot dogs
8 hot dog buns
1 can of chili
cheddar cheese
mayonnaise or Mustard
mustard

Line inside of hot dog buns with mayonnaise and sweet relish. Evenly add mustard. Fill with hot dogs and squish into a 13×9″ baking pan.

Top hot dogs with chili, cheese, and diced onion. Cover with aluminum foil and bake at 350F for 45 minutes.

Sunday:

Lunch:Fried Chicken (I bought at the grocery store pre made in their deli)
Dinner:Slow Cooker Honey Garlic Chicken and Veggies
This is 1 of the new recipes. As I type this up I can smell it cooking. Smells SO GOOD!

Monday:

Lunch: Slow Cooker Jambalaya
I cooked this meal Sunday in my small crock pot. 
Dinner: Chicken Yakisoda
This is the 2nd of the new recipes. Wish me Luck!

Tuesday:

Lunch: Chicken Burrito Bowls
This is one of my favorite lunches! I can't wait to share with you. I cooked the Chicken Sunday morning so Monday night all I had to do it add everything together.

Dinner: Oven Baked Tacos
One of my Hubby's favorite meals!

Wednesday:

Lunch:Soup (Kroger's has this awesome Broccoli Cheese soup)

Dinner: Chicken Fajitas
Again a family favorite

Thursday:

Lunch: Chicken Enchilada Soup
This is a quick meal to cook.  I cooked the Chicken Sunday morning so Wednesday night all I had to do it add everything together.

Dinner: Left Overs

Friday:

Lunch: Left Overs or a sandwich

Dinner: Crock Pot Buffalo Wings
This is the last of the new recipes. I am super excited about this one

As always I will be updating this post with the recipes and pictures on Wednesday and Saturday of next week.

Sunday, September 27, 2015

Who is Never in the kitchen?

I wanted to share with you who I am. It's hard to put into words so I'm going to show you through pictures.

























Last of the Month Grocery Haul

Hello Beautiful People!

 It's another week of my grocery haul. This week due to tons of running around hubby and I planned I didn't get to take a picture of everything. I ran into the house and put all the groceries away and then we went out to run the rest of our errands.

Last week I told you that I had spend 246.00 out of my 350.00 monthly grocery budget. Well I am so happy and thrilled to say my grocery trip this week was 84.25 making my total for the monthly budget $330.25!!! WOOHOOO! So I was under 19.75!!!

Why did I spend 84.25? Well I stocked out laundry soup, yogurt and I bought 20.00 worth of chicken wings, plus this weeks menu called for a lot of fresh veggies.

Going to the grocery store with a plan is a great way to save money. I can't begin to tell you how much money my family has saved over the years by doing this. Not only do I save money but I also save time. So I have a challenge for you! For the month of October make a grocery list before going to the store, stick to that list and let me know how you like it, if you saved money and time.
This chart breaks it down for you.
Plus this website has some awesome ideas


Friday, September 25, 2015

Hooray for being Beautiful with a Brown Bag!

I am truly grateful that I have the ability to purchase these boxes. I love being about to try things out before I make a purchase for a full size bottle only to find that it was not for me.
Ipsy and Birchbox are a month subscription that come with 5 things to test out. The each cost 10.00. When you sign up you do take a test so that you get types of products that match your skin tone.


My Ipsy bag

Each month Ipsy had a different bag that everything comes in. I love this months bag! The color is so beautiful!Let's open it up and see what I got!!


Ipsy NYX  is actually full size eye shadow YAY!! I love,love love the colors.
ClariSEA Sea salt solution rapid detox charcoal exfoliate for my face. I actually cannot wait to try this out.
Formula X nail polish in the color of Ignite. I have gotten a Formula X nail polish from Ipsy before and loved it! This will be a perfect color for my toes at Christmas time.
First Aid Beauty's Ultra Repair Cream. I love creams, I am extremely happy!
treStique Lip Crayon in the color of  Nantucket Nude. Great color and it glides on smoothly and the picture below shows that it is great for my skin tone.



Now for
My Birchbox

Birchbox comes in decorated box. Each month they have a theme for their boxes.

I Love the outside of the You're Beautiful Box


And the unwrapping has begun!
The card inside states that "This month we are celebrating you, our amazing subscribers"
Aww wow thank you Birchbox!
What was in it:
Wilma Schumann Skin Care. This was Hydrating Collagen Eye Pads. 
I wanted to try these for my amazing eyes
dr. brandt pores no more cleanser.
YES! I'm almost out of cleanser.. Score!
RUSK Elixir Mist for hair.
This is new I have no idea what it does, but I'm gonna find out!
Whish Shave Crave Shaving Cream
ok I have already tried this the night I got it. I needed to shave my amazing legs OMG! It was great PLUS my whole bathroom smelt like a blueberry. LOVE IT!
I saved this for last because the day before I got this box someone at work told me I would look good in Red lipstick. I laughed about, Me, Red lipstick HAHAHA. Well the universe is telling me something because the last item is ModelCo Lipstick in the color of Stiletto (REALLY RED) So I will pucker up and try the red lipstick.


I really enjoyed both boxes and I loved sharing them with you. I actually can not wait to try everything and let you wonderful people know how everything works!


Thursday, September 24, 2015

Smelling the Flowers

 This last weekend we had plans to go to the Plano Hot Air Balloon Festival. The hubby and I planned to take the kids out there at 6 p.m. when the balloons were to take off. Then the rain came. It rained until 1 p.m. and then it became stinky and hot and well just nasty! So we both looked at each other and said "Nope!"
So we both decided to make this weekend a non-busy weekend. For me my weekends are usually jammed packed so for me to take it easy it abnormal. My wonderful hubby even talked me into buying a game for my computer. So I played for a about an hour and I had fun.
I often forget to stop and smell the flowers.This was a great weekend.

I did get my cleaning done and some cooking done. I also sat down, opened up Excel and started to teach myself how to make a spread sheet. There is still a lot for me to learn.

A couple of weekends ago I shared with you that I went around and got everyone's sizes for clothes. I did this because I'm about to do the fall/winter clothes. I sat at my little desk and made a spread sheet of what clothes everyone needs.

I even put what stores I will be visiting. 
I will first visit all the resale shops before I go to the big box stores.

It was wonderful spending time with the kids and hubby and not running around the house rushing to get everything done.

Tuesday, September 22, 2015

Cleaning my Washer


In a perfect world my house would be spotless and organize, I dream about it however I realize this is real world and I am a working mom. Even though I have teenagers that could do a lot of the work, I feel as a mom I need to lead by example.
Now  there are just some area's of your home that needs to be cleaned once a month. (Yay only once a month!)This week I am going to be cleaning 1 thing on my monthly cleaning list. Sometimes it's something quick like washing your shower curtain and sometimes it a project that you sigh at and make yourself do like cleaning baseboards. (can you tell what cleaning I am not looking forward to?)
So I added to my calendar each week what I will will be completing each monthly task I will most like add the easy ones to my daily routine while tackling the harder ones on the weekend.
Last week I cleaned my top loader washer. I know it's not a HUGE cleaning job but it needed to be done.

So I used a pin I had found on Pintrest. I really never thought about cleaning the inside of my washer until I found this pin.
http://www.onegoodthingbyjillee.com/2012/04/how-to-clean-your-top-loader-washing.html

I followed the directions that were given to the T.

When the washer was completed I was disappointed. It wasn't completely clean. Hummm Ok... Round 2. This time while the bleach water was filling up the washer I took a sponge and scrubbed places I saw that was dirty.
The 2nd time worked. 
Where my finger is was a dark line. When I started cleaning it I noticed it was stuck on so I scrubbed and scrubbed.If you look at the top picture you can see the dark line.

This picture is the outcome of cleaning my washer

Next week for my monthly cleaning check list I will be washing my shower curtain and cleaning the inside of my fridge. I also will be re-organizing my "closet", the pantry, and the wonderful hubby will be cleaning the air vents and the coils behind the fridge.
I can't wait to share with you the homemade cleaning products I am going to make this week!





Monday, September 21, 2015

Monday's Menu

This week’s menu one has 1 lunch and 1 dinner recipe I have never tried. Everything else on the menu is family favorites. Sunday morning I got up early and made all but 1 of our lunches. (That would be the sandwiches) By doing this I am freeing up time every evening after work to spend time with my family.

Saturday:

Lunch: Left overs we still had the meat from the French Dip Sandwiches. I threw the meat into tortillas and added some cheese. It was really good and all the left overs are gone now.

Dinner: Spicy Beef and Spinach Burritos

This meal was really good and quick to make.Plus all the kids got some veggies.


Time: 20 minutes
What you need:
10 Flour tortillas
1 ¼ LB Ground beef
1 Package of spinach
1 Cup Salsa
1 Can black beans
½ Cup Shredded cheese
2 Cloves of garlic
1 Tablespoon chili powder
½ teaspoon cumin

Steps:
1.       Preheat oven to 350
2.       Wrap tortillas in aluminum foil and warm in the oven for 10 minutes
3.       In a skillet, and beef and garlic and cook until no longer pink. Drain off any excess fat.
4.       Add spinach, salsa, black beans, chili powder and cumin. Stir and mix well and cook for 5 minutes.
5.       Remove from heat and stir in cheese.
6.       Place ½ cup of beef mixture in the center of each tortilla. Fold into a burrito and serve. 

Sunday: 

    Lunch: Sandwiches I'm going to be completing a big errand so it will be a quick lunch for us.

    Dinner: I am making a Leftover night for tonight. Leftovers are any TV dinner I have purchased or soups that we have. This is a quick way for me to help clean out my "Over-stock"

Monday:

      Lunch: Bean and Cheese Burritos.
 (These are awesome to make, I make a dozen and freeze them until they are ready to be eaten)

     DinnerBroccoli Beef Stir-fry with white rice. 
  I am going to make enough rice for tomorrow’s meal as well. I am using the marked down meat I got last weekend.


What you need:

           2 1/2 Tablespoon cornstarch, divided   
           1/4 teaspoon table salt   
       3/4 pound uncooked lean trimmed sirloin beef, thinly sliced against the grain   
       2 teaspoon canola oil   
       1 cup  chicken broth, divided   
       5 cups uncooked broccoli, florets
       1 Tablespoon ginger
       2 teaspoon minced garlic   
       1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
       1/4 cup water   
       1/4 cup sodium soy sauce   

S      Steps:


  1. On a plate, combine 2 tablespoons cornstarch and salt; add beef and toss to coat.
  2. Heat oil in a large nonstick wok or large deep skillet over medium-high heat. Add beef and stir-fry until lightly browned and cooked through, about 4 minutes; transfer to a bowl with a slotted spoon. 
     
  3. Add 1/2 cup broth to same pan; stir to loosen any bits on food on bottom of pan. Add broccoli; cover and cook, tossing occasionally and sprinkling with a tablespoon water if needed, until broccoli is almost crisp-tender, about 3 minutes. Uncover pan and add ginger, garlic and red pepper flakes; stir-fry until fragrant, about 1 minute.
  4. In a cup,     stir together water, soy sauce, remaining 1/2 cup broth and remaining 1/2 tablespoon cornstarch until blended
  5. In a cup, stir together water, soy sauce, remaining 1/2 cup broth and remaining 1/2 tablespoon cornstarch until blended; stir into pan.Reduce heat to medium-low and bring to a simmer; simmer until slightly thickened, about 1 minute.
  6. Return beef and accumulated juices to pan; toss to coat and Serve
I add rice to the bottom of the bowl.








Tuesday:

      Lunch: Crock Pot Chicken Caesar Wrap
(This is the new recipe for lunch) WOW! These were awesome!!


Slow Cooker Chicken Caesar Salad Wraps



Time: 4 hours
What you need:
2 pounds boneless skinless chicken thighs or breasts
2 cups chicken broth
½ - 1 cup Caesar dressing
½ cup shredded Parmesan cheese
½ teaspoon ground pepper
2 cups shredded romaine lettuce
Tortillas

Steps:
Place the chicken in a 3-4 quart slow cooker with chicken broth, cook on low heat for 4-6 hours.
Remove the chicken from the slow cooker using a slotted spoon and drain the broth from the slow cooker. Place the chicken on a cutting board and shred the chicken, discarding any fat.
Place the chicken back in the slow cooker and pour the dressing, Parmesan cheese, and pepper over the top. Stir until mixed evenly. cook on high heat for 30 minutes or until mixture is hot.

Spoon ⅓ cup of the chicken mixture onto each tortilla. Top with extra shredded Parmesan cheese, lettuc

      Dinner: Baked Sweet & Sour Chicken with Fried Rice. 
  This is a favorite in this family.
Sweet and Sour Chicken



Time : 1 hour 30 minutes
What you need:
3-4 boneless chicken breasts
1 cup cornstarch
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup canola oil
3/4 cup sugar
4 Tablespoons ketchup
1/2 cup distilled white vinegar
1 Tablespoon soy sauce
1 teaspoon garlic salt
Steps:
Start by preheating your oven to 325° degrees. Rinse your chicken breasts in water and then cut into cubes. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Dip chicken into the cornstarch to coat, then dip into the eggs.
Heat 1/4 cup oil in a large skillet and pan-fry chicken pieces just until slightly browned but not cooked through. Place chicken in a 9×13-inch greased baking dish.

Mix all of your sweet and sour sauce ingredients in a bowl with a whisk. Pour evenly over the chicken. Bake chicken for one hour, uncovered. Stir chicken after 30 minutes of cooking

Wednesday:

     Lunch: Pasta Salad with Chicken.
   I had bought a couple of boxes of Suddenly Salad earlier this summer for 1.00 each. It’s a great lunch.

       Dinner: We are going to do not 1 but 2 leftover nights. If I don't have any leftovers this night  then I'll make Eggs and Sausage

 Thursday:

   Lunch: Good Old Fashion Sandwiches and Chips.
 (Remember that free bag of Cheetos I got last week? I got to put it to use)
   Dinner: Crock Pot Baked Potatoes and Lloyd's BBQ meat.

   Friday:

    Lunch: Leftovers
    Dinner: Crock Pot Black Bean Chicken


(this is a new recipe for dinner) No sides there are veggies in the dish.
Ok I had a feeling about this dish when I started to prepare it. It called for:

    2 cans black beans
    16 ounces jarred salsa
    1/2 cup brown rice (uncooked)
    1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts
    No real liquids. When I got home I had to add chicken broth because even on low the chicken was DRY!!! This was ok at best, I really won't make it again.


I will be updating the menu with the recipes and pictures through the week!