Menu Planning: Solved!

I don't generally have a hard time with menu planning, except that there are only about a month's worth of meals we like and so juggling meals so we only eat them once a month sometimes takes skill.  My posts on menus are here, including our standard 4 week rotation.

Normally I do my planning Monday morning, but because of a Sunday afternoon Costco run, Sean was at the table with me Saturday night when I was making up the menu for the week.  He commented that there must be some online tool to keep your recipes in that would automatically generate a shopping list based on all the ingredients needed - he has some good thoughts, that man!  I'm sure there are a few, but there is one that I'm familiar with, and it's pretty slick.

It's called Plan to Eat, and it's got a place for all your recipes (adding them is even easy!), a drag and drop menu planner, and a grocery store assistant for your mobile.  I first heard about it through Kat at Inspired to Action - I've mentioned her before because of her Prayer Calendar for Mothers that I use every day (via twitter).  She had posted about it in the fall and I had checked it out then; I was impressed, but didn't feel I needed it at the time.  I still don't feel like I have a big need for change in this area, but I have been wondering how I can better organize the recipes we do use, and low and behold, Kat is this week offering a Meal Planning Boot Camp - walking people who want to use the site through it with tutorials and assignments and stuff.  I wanted to let you know about it in case it might be something you are needing to help organize and simplify your life.

The nitty gritty:  Using Plan to Eat costs $4.95 per month or $39 a year, but there is a free one month trial, and there is a coupon for 30% off on Kat's site.  So it's quite reasonable.

Check out Plan to Eat.

Check out the overview for the Meal Planning Boot Camp.  It's only day 2, so you can still jump in without having too much homework to catch up on!

Let me know if you jump on the wagon - I'll add you as a friend over there and check out your recipes.  :)

Latest Obsession

My favorite thing to do online lately is find free journaling cards for my scrapbook.  I'm using the divided page protectors (photos to come sometime soon!) and have seen lots of project life freebies out there, so I've been collecting...  Some are png, so I can open them in Photoshop and add my journaling there, and some are pdf, and I'm just printing them off.  I'm pretty sure I'll use both kinds, but probably the printed ones more often - I'm a grab-the-paper-and-write kind of girl.  Since I am using Photoshop on a regular basis now to make my smaller sized photos (two 3x4's or 4 2x3's saved as a 4x6 is only 19 cents, and can be ordered online from home, as opposed to the 32 cents to do the smaller sizes manually there on the machines. Win-win!), I can open up the files and print them off along with my photos.

Here are some of the files I've saved, along with where I found them, in case you're interested!  They would be great for all kinds of things, too, not just scrapbooking.

This is from This Kalil Life - she's making a free printable each week this year.

 These are part of the 60 free journaling cards from Miss Tiina.

 

These great ones were found on My Sister's Suitcase.

Let's Talk cards from Scrap Tales.

I just printed off six pages from Creativity Prompt - there are lots there to choose from.

Enjoy!

Homemade Christmas

Thought I'd share some of the gifts I made for Christmas and where I found the ideas... maybe you'll get inspired for next year!

I already mentioned Flubber...

For some of the nephews I also made Reindeer Food

Reindeer Food

6 cups Rice Chex cereal

1 bag (12 oz) white vanilla baking chips - couldn't find, used white chocolate 

1/3 cup coarsely chopped peppermint candy canes (14 miniatures)

1 - Crush candy canes in large ziplock bag

2 - Melt chips (plus 1/2 tsp oil) in microwave

3 - Stir all together

...and printed out some Paper Star Wars Characters for them to cut out, tape, and play with.  (Found here.)

I made my brother's kids this tent (following the instructions I found here):

I made some stuff in the kitchen for the siblings - cookies in a jar and popcorn seasoning.

Cheese Lovers Popcorn Seasoning

1/4 cup cheddar cheese powder

1/4 tsp mustard powder

1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

salt & pepper to taste

Indian Popcorn Seasoning

1 tbsp curry powder

2 1/4 tsp ground tumeric

2 1/4 tsp ground ginger

tiny pinch cayenne pepper

Pizza Popcorn Seasoning

3 tbsp grated Parmesan cheese

3 tsp ground dried oregano

1 1/2 dried tomato powder

(The tomato powder is hard to find - I used a Knorr tomato vegetable soup mix and strained out the bits.)

I also made some family dinner conversation starter packages.  I found questions in a couple of different places, put them in a word doc that I'll send you if you're interested, then cut them into little cards and put them in decorated old coffee and tea tins.  I hope they have fun with those.

I also had fun making ornaments. I didn't take pictures of mine, but the inspiration came from these (all found on pinterest):

Another printable I sent to a couple of nieces was one to make this nativity set.  You can find the downloads here for both the colored and color-yourself versions.

I think that's all I made - oh, except for an awesome photo book for Sean about his race car.  That was a winner.  All in all a very satisfactory gift giving Christmas!

Resources to Help You Pray

Kat over at Inspired to Action has a list that I printed off this morning to help me pray with variety.  Do you ever get stuck praying the same things over & over because your kids bug you in the same way over & over?  I'm working on changing me in those areas that bug me, but I'm also aware that using another resource to help direct my prayers is useful.

Here is the Inspired to Action Prayer Calendar for Mothers  The link is at the bottom of her post.

I went looking for this because of a new routine I have of praying for my husband.  I found this list on See Jamie Blog, and keep it in my journal so each day I pray for Sean one thing on the list.  It has a great variety, all Scriptural, and things I don't always think to pray for him.  I thought having a list to pray for Madeline and the other children I try to keep in mind would be a helpful thing.

I hope that these resources are a help to you, too.
(I posted this this morning over on my Prayers for My Children Blog.)

What routines or methods do you use to remember what you want to be praying about?  I've used lists and charts over the years and am always curious about how other people make it work for them.  Thanks for leaving a comment!

10 000 Hours

I experienced a parenting fail again this morning.  A parenting fail is where the kid goes out the door to school and she doesn't have a smile on her face and on this side of the door, I'm thinking, "Why?  Why do I lack patience?  Why do I frustrate her and why do I let her frustrate me?  When will I learn???"

This happens too often for my liking, but thankfully, not as often as it used to.  And the negative effects didn't even last too long, amazingly, because I remembered something I read recently.  It was the "when will I learn" question that did it - that gave me the answer.  10 000 Hours.  That's the answer.  If you want to be good at something (like managing mornings with children??), it takes lots of practice and hard work.

I read this quote in Michael Hyatt's post on Why Real Creativity Requires Significant Work: "In his book, Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell talks about the “10,000-Hour Rule.” The basic idea is that success in any field is, to a large extent, the result of practicing a specific task for 10,000 hours—or more." That has stuck with me all week, and rather than being a downer and causing me to think that I'll never get there, it has proven to be a motivation.  Keep trying, keep practicing.  Yes, I'll fail, but then I get a clean slate to try again.  To keep working on it, whatever the 'it' of the moment is.

I hope this encourages you.  Lots of what we do in life is hard work - keep at it.  Keep working hard at the things that are worth doing well...

Ever Feel Blue?

I just read a good post from Michael Hyatt about things to do to get yourself out of a funk & thought it was worth sharing.  Hyatt is the Chairman & Chief Executive Officer of Thomas Nelson Publishers, and blogs almost daily with lots of quality stuff.

I hope you find this helpful, but really, I'm posting it here just so I can find it again when I need it.

Family Day, How We Love You.

You made it alright that I had to work on Saturday.
You made Sunday into another Saturday (minus the work).
You made it ok to stay up a little late on Sunday.  We didn't, because we were still so tired, but we could have.
You gave us another sleep in day.
You gave us time to experiment with breakfast.  Yummy smoothies.
You gave us a chance to go to the church for Lattes & Bouncy Castles... good visiting.
You gave us a weekday to go out for lunch.
You gave us hours to do work around the house and time to play and time to browse around online...
Family day, you are fabulous and we appreciate you.

M's off to bed now, and Sean will be home soon from golfing (yes, indoor).  That means soon we'll be pressing play and working out, but I think I have a few minutes to share some online finds.

This video caught my eye and imagination - color is a wonderful thing.

I love this scraproom transformation (it belongs to Donna Downey).  The 'before' would be amazing, but I love the brightness and colorfulness of the 'after'.

 

I downloaded a couple of quotes to print off from Becky Higgins' blog.  Wise words.  You can head there for the stories behind them.

 

Oh, and I did a bit of online shopping over the weekend!  I figured if Sean can order stuff online all the time, I shouldn't be shy about it, either.  :)   I like shopping for scrapbooking stuff in person, so I can see the whole thing and the textures and details, but there is nowhere to shop around here, and shipping is less than travelling!  Especially if you're shopping somewhere like Crafty Steals, where stuff is 50% off or more.  Thrifty, that's me.  I'm sure I'll be letting you know when the package at the door has MY name on it for a change!

I think that's all for now.  I'll save the photo of how M did my hair for another day...

Leave a comment - I would love to know what special or fun things you did today.

Homemade Christmas

Christmas is wonderful - celebrating what Jesus did for us by being born a human, and getting to see family.

The gift giving side of Christmas is not high on my priority list; my love languages are more in line with physical touch, words of affirmation and quality time; gifts is at the very bottom.  (A hug and sitting around the living room?  Perfect.)

I do enjoy giving gifts when I can come up with something homemade and perfect (it's hard being a perfectionist)!  I love being excited for someone to open the gift from me because I put thought and effort into it, rather than being half apologetic because I couldn't think of something better.  (It's also true that I think too much.)

I also like a simple life, and am trying hard to come up with ideas of things I can make without getting frazzeled by 'the list'.

Today I thought I would share with you my strategy for this year:  the in-ter-net.  I just googled 'gifts to make' and got a great idea for the boys.  I found something online a couple of weeks ago that I just had to make for K, and bought enough supplies to make some to sell at my craft sales.  I found something for just about everyone on my list; now I just have to get making!

I do recognize that not everyone appreciates homemade, and don't worry, I would rather spend money on something someone will actually use than give them something I made that will be junk in their home.  I am as concerned about usefulness as well as being frugal.  :)

I'm not intending to go on a big rant here; I don't want you thinking that you have to give me something homemade or I won't appreciate it.  I would be happy to open anything, because I know it comes from someone who cared enough to think of me.  I would be very happy with a mixed CD or baking or a family photo for my wall.  I would be honored to know that someone gave a donation to a charity (water projects or education in Africa?) in my name.  I would laugh if we got money to go towards our kitchen renos...

Here are a few sites to check out:
Advent Conspiracy -  be sure to check out the video.  Our preaching series for Advent is going to be on the four themes laid out in AC - Worship Fully, Spend Less, Give More, Love All.  I'm very excited to see if our church grasps the idea.
How About Orange - fun stuff on this one.  I like the printables.
Instructables - "Homemade gifts are the best" is what they say!
whip up - I like that most of these blogs have a list of blogs on the side so you could get lost in crafty-blogginess for a good long time.
Craftster
Craft Gossip

At Thanksgiving, playing the family trivia game I made for Christmas last year.

I would love to hear your thoughts on Christmas gifts, family traditions, or sites where you find inspiration.

True Blue Fan in Green

Today is my brother's birthday - Happy Birthday, Clayton!

It's also Grey Cup Sunday, and I have a photo for you:

Madeline is a Winnipeg born, Regina raised girl. It's a mixed marriage, where Manitoba blue and Saskatchewan green would be more hotly debated if we actually cared any about football. I don't. Sorry. Sean watches the last few games of the season (but he's doing it with the laptop on his lap, on the motorsports forums or playing poker.) Madeline is pretty into it today, though. Her favorite team is the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, and I think that's partly because she watches a lot of sports with Grandpa, and she cheers for whoever is playing against the team he's cheering for. It's developed a competitiveness and Bomber loyalty in her. She does say, though, that the Saskatchewan Roughriders are her second favorite team. And while this is only the first or second time she's worn that shirt she got for Christmas last year, she's cheering hardcore for the Riders today.


(That's her new Winnie the Pooh bear she's been saving up for and bought just today.)

********************

Sean cooked supper tonight. I started getting it out and he came in and took over, saying, "I haven't cooked for you yet this weekend."
"Do you cook for me every weekend?" I asked.
"I try to. I know you appreciate it when I do." What a sweetheart, hey? He's never said it's something he's wanting to do for me - he just does it. One more reason I love him.

********************

It's been a creative and productive day today.  I did a bunch of work on my paper - I still have a ways to go tonight on that, but I've made a big dent.  I also sewed some magic bag insides and finished a little book I was making.  Madeline had her cousin Mataya over this afternoon for a few hours - Mataya brought her scrapbooking stuff along and they disappeared into my 'studio' and each made a page.  With their own stuff.  And no parental supervision.  That's crazy.  And pretty cool.

Here are some shots of that little book.  I found the idea and tutorial at this site, if you want to make your own.  

 

I'm going to give it away as a birthday present to our 'adopted' youth.  We've got an Adopt A Youth program at church this year, and Jada-Rae is our youth.  She turns 15 tomorrow and of course I wasn't on the ball enough to have something ready to give her at church today, but taking this over tomorrow should be pretty special, I'm hoping.  We haven't done too much together yet, but she's coming to babysit M while we go to Sean's work Christmas party on Thursday, and then I think Friday we'll do something all together.

Good Advice

Good Idea...

I found this little something on (in)courage the other day and thought I'd share:

Fall in Love in Four Minutes A Day
It only takes four minutes a day to move into a deeper heart place. It only takes four minutes a day to connect in soul intimacy; to breathe in oxygen for the other half of my heart. Don’t and I too begin to suffocate, the death heave. I wish someone had told me in the beginning.
Four Fixations
Four times a day think on love. When I leave the marriage bed, leave the front door, when I return to front door, return to marriage bed. These are the four critical archways of time in our day. Touch or whisper a sweet nothing when passing through these gate points, and we walk into hours of closeness. Forever love fixates like fresh love.
Four Embraces
Four times a day, wrap up in husband. Embrace fully and hold each other's eyes. That’s all. Repeat four times daily. The one flesh breathes best when the skin pores are close; connected.
Four Affirmations
Four times during the day, thank him. For working faithfully to provide, for hanging up his towel, for putting gas in the van, for making this heart skip a wild beat. Look for the ways to thank him and watch how moves closer.

Links to Cool Things

Hey, friends!
Here are a few links that I've been collecting to share with you:

The Uniform Project - Something to watch that will inspire you.

Operation Nice - Something to read that will inspire you.

The Breathing Earth - Something to make you think about the world.

Bomomo - Something to play around with.

Stormtrooper a Day - Something just for laughs.

Have fun!

Trippy Test

Found this link on another blog: it's a test to see how well you can see color. I got 8; lower is better with 0 being perfect.

COLOR HUE TEST

**********************************

I was playing around to see how I could schedule this post to show up tomorrow (and if you know, let me know, as I haven't found it yet) and I stumbled on the 'compose' button beside the 'edit html' button on the create post page. WHY have I not noticed this before??? On this page I can do bullet points, change the font and size and color of the font, I can justify... Crazy. Funny what makes me happy. Why have I not noticed this in all these YEARS of blogging?

*********************************

Where do I find all these other blogs that have all these cool links that I send you to? Well, in an attempt to increase visitors to my blog (what? It's true...) and because sometimes I have stuff that people might actually want to read, and because I like to check out all their blogs, once I post, I go to SIStv, my online scrapbooking community (where I am ranked a "fashion plate" for my 321 layouts, posts and comments) and I find the thread in the forums that says "Friday bloggers?" or something like that, and I leave a note and a link to here so they can come visit. And then I go check out the others that have been updated. And then I come back here to share the cool stuff they've found.

mojo missing...

We had a great turn out this morning at scrapbooking at the church.

8 scrapbookers and 4 babysitters and 7 kids and 3 babies. Ah, spring break.

And I got pretty much nothing done. I would get a picture out, find a paper that worked for the background, then sit and stare till I put it away for another day. I did that for three pages before I got one that I actually worked on. That one's not finished either, but at least it's mostly there. One of these days I'll have to get some creativity flowing somehow and get them done. It's supposed to be a fun outlet, so I rarely make myself get stuff done, but it has been a long while. I bet if my studio was sunnier I'd be down there more.

So - watch this space - there MAY be more layouts posted someday. Don't hold your breath, though.

And let me send you off to have a laugh or two at Cake Wrecks.

A Fun Find

I just had some fun playing around on a site that I saw on someone else's blog... Here's some photos I did - check out BeFunky.com to do your own. That last one is of our niece Raelene - this was taken new year's day. She's healing from her burns really well, I hear - we are looking forward to seeing her for ourselves tomorrow.

On Twilight...

No, I haven't read the books.
A month or so ago Sean and I had a date night and took in the movie - I wasn't expecting much, but we both enjoyed it - Sean said, "When does the next one come out??" I think he's just being a boy and waiting for the vampire vs warewolves part...

Anyway, about 3 weeks ago I read a great blog post by Kayla Aimee that addressed the Twilight thing and why people are so addicted. Please check it out here. She has some good stuff to say.

And then let me know what you think!

Watch This

and then show your kids, if you think they're old enough. M and I had a good conversation after I showed her and asked, "What can we do?"



I saw this on Anne Jackson's blog, which I've been following for a couple of weeks now. She had a good post the next day, too about the 'shock value' of showing poverty like this. I hope by passing it on to you, it spurs you on to something - in my heart right now is 'how do we grow kids to know God's heart?' so talking to M about this was what I did.

burnout??

I just came across a new blog called FlowerDust.net (through Bring The Rain, which is a tearjerker, but worth the visit!). Anne Jackson is an author with a book coming out right away called "Mad Church Disease: Overcoming the Burnout Epidemic". Looks like it may be a really good read, according to the review of it I read on Bring The Rain.

And she is giving away some Bible study software, so if you are a pastor (or just a studier!) check it out and enter!

Have you ever thought I was blond? Yeah, me neither.

Cans for Comments... Check out this blog and leave a comment - Courtney is donating one can of food for each comment left on her blog this weekend. I saw that on Kayla's blog and she said she's matching each can that Courtney buys. What fabulous ideas. And these are girls who actually have readers on their blogs. lol.

Christmas Festivities... We went to Sean's work Christmas party last night. Each year they go to the small business Christmas party that the center of the arts puts on - good food, sketchy comedian, terrible sounding music with not many people on the dance floor. At least I know a few people a little better now that this is my third one.

The kid's Christmas piano recital was this week - she did not too bad - was the only one who didn't take their book up with them! The residents at the senior's home where they usually have it were sick, so it was at the church instead (her teacher goes to the same church as us) and so she got to play the big shiny black grand piano up on stage there. She's done that once before at the year end recital in June. That was Tuesday, and Wednesday her Girl Guide group went carolling at a senior's apartment. Tomorrow her choir at church is singing with the adult choir in both morning services and their children's concert is in the evening. They had a rehearsal for those this morning, and we had to pick her up early from the birthday party sleepover for that - and she missed swimming... three things at once. And neither Sean nor I had anything today. Other than brunch and a little Christmas shopping while she was busy. Then Wednesday is the school "Winter Concert." One week full of Christmas pagentry and goodness. Grandpa and two sets of aunts and uncles and two cousins came to the piano deal, and the Ward Grandparents are going to make it to the church one. Nice to have the Aitkens in town and sharing church and school concerts now!

Wish List... This is too funny. I read it and laughed the first time, then when I picked it up again this week (to carry shopping with me) I laughed and thought "I have to put this on my blog!" I should explain so it doesn't just seem pathetic - M is 9, and I think very bright, but she is in French Immersion, and they have yet to spend time in school on much English spelling. So here in all it's phonetic goodness, is my daughter's wish list:

1. Barbie make your own Lip gloss
2. 2008 cristamas doll
3. skip it
4. Biskut my fur real friend
5. tummbuls my rollover pup fur real friend
6. Webkinz
7. chees strings
8. fruit gushers
9. Epets (stuff yes you get it.)
10. Tamagishie
11. Littelest pet shop
12. fish
13. Odissy
14. Books
15. cds
16. slypers
17. cd holder
18. cloths
19. Barbies
20. polly pokets
21. Ponnies
22. money
23. calenders
24. shoes
25. paints
26. paper (Rysikled)
27. comik's
28. camira
29. sterio
30. fabrik
31. work serch
32. sadoku
33. markers
34. purs
35. Tikets for Ann of green gabils The musikl at the globle theater
36. more money!

And just for the record, she was not encouraged to write up a list... it might be the first time she's done this. I have to admit though that I have found it helpful! (If you find this helpful also, email me and I'll let you know what I've already got checked off!) She saw an ad in the paper telling kids to write to Santa there and that he'd write back. So she did, and got her reply yesterday. She commented that he didn't even use her name, so she's pretty sure it was photocopied and all the kids got the same one. She doesn't even believe in Santa.

New Look... One last note for tonight - I finally went and got something done with my hair. I was ready for it about 3 weeks ago. It's chopped off - it had gotten quite long - and it's darker underneath, and quite a bit lighter on top. I won't say blond, but I think you're in for a shock when I come for Christmas!! I'm still a little shocked when ever I see my reflection. I won't say I love it, but I am very happy with a change. I'll probably change it up again in a couple of months. Maybe I'll take a picture tomorrow and post it for you. And speaking of pictures, we got M's back (retakes again) so you'll get yours (if you're family!) when we see you next.

Good night, and may you have a blessed restful holy Sabbath tomorrow.

Advent Conspiracy and other stuff.

First, check out this video. Really.



Powerful, hey? So what 'cha going to do about it???

**********

I was surfing blogs on SIS to find one with tunes so I can add some to mine, and I saw a couple of girls had done this quiz and said the results were amazing. So I took it, and they are quite accurate. And you can post your results on your blog... but I'm not sure I know you well enough to post that. That would be some good vulnerability there, but nope, sorry.

But do try it yourself!! The COLOR QUIZ...

It's been a good Saturday - Sean and I spent the whole day together, doing nothing and taking M with the social life to swimming this morning, a swimming birthday party this afternoon, and a bowling birthday party this evening. I asked her if she knew what it said to me that she gets asked to all these birthday parties (there's another one next weekend, too...) She said, "That's I'm a nice person and a good friend and they like having me around?" Bingo.

I've been playing in my room (sorry, STUDIO!) today, trying to figure out how to rearrange it. I've also been working on magnets to sell (just got an order for 6 sets from Janet at work) and the most amazing Christmas gift ever (hopefully!), but I've been tidying and tossing stuff and moving stuff too, so I can get rid of the extra bookshelf and see if I can make better use of my space. I have a feeling that this will be a long process.

So this most amazing Christmas gift? I can't wait till it's done and I can photograph it to share with you after the holidays. I think it's cool, and I've been working on it all year. Little cost money wise, but big cost time wise. The best kind of gift, I think.