Tuesday's Family Meal - Lasagna!

For the sauce  please see my previous post! For this recipe you will need (in addition to the sauce)

8 uncooked lasagna noodles
15oz ricotta cheese
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
1 TB oregano
2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

Heat you oven to 350.
Cook and drain noodles (as directed on package.)
In a small bowl mix:
 ricotta cheese
 1/4 cup of Parmesan cheese
 oregano

Using a 13x9 ungreased glass baking dish, spread half of the sausage mixture.top will 4 noodles.Sprinkle with half the mozzarella cheese. Repeat  layers ending with mozzarella cheese. Sprinkle the rest of the Parmesan Cheese on top.

Cover a baked for 30 minutes. Then uncover the wonderful Lasagna and back for addition 15 minutes. After you pull it out of the over let it stand for 15 minutes and the ENJOY!!!!

One word about my picture it was taken after half of the Lasagna was gone it is a family favorite here! The leftovers made a great lunch at work!

Monday's Family Dinner- Spaghetti!

For Today and Tomorrow's meal I actually started Sunday making the sauce. A good sauce for Spaghetti and Lasagna take a while to make. I doubled everything because I was using this for 2 meals.

Homemade Sauce:
1lbs Italian Sausage
1lb Ground Turkey meat
1 Clove Garlic (finely chopped)
2 TB spoons Parsley
1 TB spoon Basil
1 teaspoon Sugar
2 cans Whole Tomatoes (Drained)
2 cans Tomato Sauce
1tbl spoon Vodka (optional)


 In a skillet cook the sausage, turkey meat, and garlic until meat  is no longer pink. Drain the meat.

 Transfer to a large pot and add the Parsley, sugar, Basil,Vodka, Tomato Sauce and Whole Tomatoes , breaking up the Tomatoes with a fork or snipping with kitchen scissors.

 Heat to a boil stirring occasionally. Reduce heat and simmer uncover for at least 45 minutes. (I let mine simmer for 3 hours)

That's it for the sauce!

Just cook your spaghetti noodles and add sauce to the top. My family likes meaty sauces that is why I added both Sausage and Turkey Meat.

14 Weeks of organizing your home! Week 1!

I am challenging myself to a 14 week organizing my house. I got the challenge at: http://www.abowlfulloflemons.net/2012/08/home-organization-101-printable.html

I had to take their list and change it a bit because it's January, it's cold, and my garage will be a 2 week Family Task!
Going room by room and getting rid of things we do use or that have expired and cleaning as I go! First take a picture of before and then take a picture after. Use 4 baskets for keep, donate or garage sale, trash,other room. Here is the 14 week list of rooms:

1. Kitchen
2. Pantry
3. Landry Room
4. Bathroom
5. Office
6. Master Closet
7. Master Bedroom
8. My Son's Bedroom
9. Step-son's Closet
10. Dinning Room
11. Living Room
12.My Daughter's Room
13 & 14. Garage

This is not something that can be done in 1 day. So if you choose to do this take baby steps.
 Before I started I went to the Dollar Tree and bought different containers for organizing!
They have a great selection and only a buck who can go wrong!

The 1st day I decided I would clean the top of our fridge (and outside of it too) and use the cabinets that are above the fridge for things we use seasonally. The goal was to get as much stuff off the top of my fridge.

 Day 2 was the microwave area and cabinet under the microwave. I wanted to put my spices in a draw so that they were easier to get to and take all my tupperware and put it in the cabinet under the microwave. After I was done I could see a huge difference and that's when it hit me how great of a thing this 14 week project was!

Day 3 I did all my lower cabinets. Got rid  of baking pans that were way to old and wouldn't clean up.

Day 4 was all the drawers. This was the big test! I had that junk drawer that I just wasn't looking forward into cleaning out. I went through it and thought "do we really need this?" What ended up happening was most of the drawer found it's way to trash.

Day 5 Upper Cabinets. I live in a house from the 1940's it didn't come with a pantry. One of my upper cabinets was being used as part of our pantry. My goal was to get the canned goods out and to be able to used it to hold my baking stuff.
  Also I love, LOVE dishes! I has to go through and put into a garage sale pile dishes I'm not going to use. After I finished I was very happy with the result!

 Day 6 counter tops. It actually got easier and easier to organized as the week went on because I started to think of where I wanted everything and how I wants it to look. I wanted A LOT of stuff off my counter tops. and because I had organized the rest of the kitchen it was completely easy. This was maybe an hour job!

Day 7 Fridge and Freezer. We all need clean out our Fridge's at least once a month. I hadn't done it in 6 months so this was chore. I also did this on a very cold day that made me not very happy! LOL

 After I was done I was amazed I had fallen in love with my kitchen again! I was and am so inspired to head into week 2!

Quote of the Week

I have been writing in a journal and using a quotes I find each week. This weeks quote is:

                                  r

So when I am having a rough day I just remember this and think of how it will make me skillful in what I am doing and not to give up.So many times it's is easier to stop what your doing and walk away. That is when we need to take the time to reflect and find out why something isn't going right. Sometimes it's a matter of changing your perception of what your doing to see things right.

January Time to get Organized!!!

Getting organized! First step for this to happen is putting together my family planner.I searched all over the internet looking for something that would fit my needs for a planner. I did have a planner on my Nexus 7 until it died then I realized I didn't know what was going on or when. That is why I have choosen the old pen and paper method! That is the one reason why most planners fail, they don't work for the person using them. I strongly suggest to take time and look at every page and ask yourself "Will this planner realistically work for me?"
 There are tons of sites that offer free printable sheets. At one point I was even toying with printing a pages at different sites that will work for me. I found a planner that had everything I needed. It was a AHH HAA moment. I was so thrill looking over the pages that were offered. This is where I got my planner at, even the title says it all "My Life Notebook" http://www.bringingcraftyback.net/the-life-notebook/

Now it's all printed in color(something my husband doesn't get he thinks black and white it ok), hole punched and put into my new binder I have been tasked with filling everything out! For the past week I have been using it and it seem to be working great for me!

However there are really cute planner pages for free all over the net! I liked this one as well
that I found here laurathoughts81.blogspot.com


This is another page I thought was great for people workingout.
adayinthelifeandmind.blogspot.com

Something for the Family NEW YEARS!

I came across this yesterday while on Pinterest.

 My thought was "Hey that's a cute idea to do at breakfast this morning." So I quickly printed up the 3 sheets and got them ready for everyone to fill out.
The kids filled their out and put them on the fridge and I put mine in my organizer so I can see it everyday!
Even though New Years has past this would be a great thing to do this weekend with people you love!

Here is the link to the website, ENJOY! http://www.homesweetfirsthome.com/2013/12/2014-goals.html

How to Save Money through the year

                                                          52 Week Challenge


     Saving money in this household can be a challenge. When I came across this website I was intrigued.
http://stuckathomemom.com/52-week-money-challenge/the-52-week-money-challenge-you-game/
 Could this work for my family? Could we stay focus and not touch the money in the jar?The answer is YES we can! This is good lesson in Disciple that I feel we all need.
  
  

 





What's so great about this is it reminds me of "mom's egg money" You know that cash mom hide in the kitchen.
    So come join me in the 52 week money saving challenge!