Congrats to my BIL and SIL on the birth of their little girl Esther Carol! Looking forward to hopefully meeting her in a few weeks.
Almost the end of the month already. We're keeping plenty busy, and time is flying by. Especially when you have 2 kids that hardly give you 2 minutes :P Last week we visited my family, went strawberry picking, I had a good psychologist appt., and we met some new people in our neighborhood (there was a block party one street over). Justin and Rebecca went to a little percussion concert at the library too. In addition to all of the regular stuff. One thing that kept me very busy was dealing with all 20lbs. of strawberries we picked. I froze 3 gallon bag fulls. I dried a couple pints. We ate some fresh. And I made topping for strawberry shortcake. I also made crispy almonds, pecans and walnuts, raisins, mayo, granola, kefir and shortcake. Plus I finally got around to grinding some fresh flour.
This week hopefully won't be quite as crazy. But we'll keep busy I'm sure. Today is church. Monday is Meijer. Tuesday is farmer's market, and there is a MOPS playdate (not sure if we're going yet). Wednesday is Harvest Health, and Justin has worship team. We actually don't have plans for the rest of the week at this point. But I'm thinking I might go to the mall. I have to get a baptism outfit for Abram.
What's on the agenda in the kitchen? Plenty. I want to stock up on more strawberries this week (from the fm, not from picking) so I can freeze and dry more. I want to make fruit leather. I want to make/freeze some strawberry topping. And possibly make some jam. And of course eat some fresh. Not sure about any strawberry baking projects. We'll see what else the market has this week/what produce I need to deal with. Cherries should be starting soon. I would like to make more raisins now that Meijer has organic grapes. I'm also planning to make pesto with the basil and spinach from our garden.
We're working on our summer vacation plans. And I've mostly figured stuff out for baptism. I need to figure out what food I'm bringing to a bridal shower in a couple weeks.
Still working on figuring things out for Abram. I'm thinking most dairy bothers him/increases reflux. But it's still hard to tell. I'll try a smoothie again this week and see how it goes. Overall he's doing well. And having a lot less of an issue with gas when I watch what I eat.
I'll mention a couple health updates, but I think I'm going to save most of it for a separate post since there is quite a bit. I did start my digestive enzymes (I'll update on that later). I have been giving Rebecca probiotics more regularly. And I'm hoping to start the infant probiotics this week. I had a really good appt. with my psychologist...and have no idea if/when I'll be going back :) In her words, "come when you need to...whether it's 6 months, 1 year, 3 years, whatever."
For meals this week I'm trying to keep it simple and eat in season. We have tons of lettuce in the garden, so we'll be eating salads. For breakfasts I'm still trying to stick to soup every day. And I'll be using things out of the freeze for Justin. I need to start using some of that up. My freezer is packed with baked goods. And I need to make room for summer produce. Here's what's on the menu.
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S (church, make beef soup for week)
B - chicken soup, quiche (me), yogurt, strawberries, granola (Justin)
L - beef brisket in cp w/ onions, carrots, peppers, beans, zucchini and snap peas
D - leftover sausage and pepper pizza (Justin), salad w/ misc. toppings (me)
M (boil/peel eggs, Meijer)
B - soup (me), honey whole wheat bagel, fruit (Justin)
D - salad (me), pork chops, potatoes, broccoli (Justin)
T (fm, MOPS, make raisins)
B - soup (me), hard boiled egg, toast (Justin)
D - shredded beef taco rice (using leftover brisket)
W (HH, WT, make pesto, bake bread, soak/dry cashews, make fruit leather, make/freeze strawberry topping)
B - soup (me), sd breakfast cookies, fruit (Justin)
D - pesto pea salad w/ hard boiled egg, bacon, crispy nuts, cheese; parmesan spinach bread, applesauce
Th (prep smoothie (I'll have it for lunch), make strawberry jam, make soup, shopping)
B - soup (me), muffins, smoothie (with coconut milk) (Justin)
D - roast chicken and veggies in cp, rice
F (clean, Target)
B - soup (me), pancake muffins w/ strawberry topping (Justin)
D - egg wraps stuffed w/ chicken, bacon and pesto, beans
S (make 4th of July dessert? cherry crisp?)
B - soup (me), TBD from freezer (Justin)
D - grilled hot dogs, grilled veggies, chips
Using REAL food to heal the mind and body. Trust in God and eat the food. Eet Smakelijk!
Congrats to Ryan and Shannon! I love the name... Esther was my grandma's name. :) Hopefully they'll make it to Abram's baptism so we can get a peek at her!
ReplyDeleteI know, right... where is this summer going?! Seriously, it needs to SLOW down!
Enjoy your relaxing weekend with no plans. And good luck with all your kitchen projects.
I need to figure out what I want to bring to the shower, too... your mom said to bring anything. I might bring the frijole mole dip with veggies. Or maybe a salad. Or maybe just fruit. I haven't given it much thought yet. I figure I'd let your mom know tonight or Wednesday when I pick up Carson... so I better get thinking. :)
Was the beef brisket from the new beef? I haven't used any of the new stuff yet. I'm trying to use up older stuff first... chicken I froze a while ago and the last few remaining cuts of Voogt beef. Maybe next week or the week after we'll get to try the new stuff.
I was thinking of making the pesto pea salad recently. I love it! I'll probably make pesto this week/weekend, so we'll probably have it next week. Yum!
I was thinking of making mud balls for the shower. Simple. Everyone likes them. Finger food. I can't eat them, but everyone else can.
ReplyDeleteThe brisket was still from the Voogt beef. I've never had brisket. Odd cut of meat. Rebecca wouldn't eat it because it was "stringy." She won't touch any food with "strings." It's better for long cooking and then shredding. I'm hoping to make it into shredded taco beef tomorrow. See if it's better that way. I'm still using up a few old things too. I think I have 1 Voogt steak left. Justin said he wants to cook that one the same time as cooking the same cut from our new beef...so he can compare. I think he is still a little upset about the grassfed/cornfed thing and doesn't want to admit that grassfed can be good.
Mmm, we love brisket. We like it sliced very thin, like flank steak... its not stringy that way.
ReplyDeleteSteak might be difficult... at least on the grill. It might be hard to keep the temp on either side in the right range for either steak. Might have to cook them on the stove so you have more control/separate burners. At least, I. Know its hard to regulate different temps on either side of our grill.