Experimenting for Supper Tonight

I'm going to experiment with a couple of new recipes for supper tonight.

On the menu...

Chicken breasts stuffed with spinach, feta (will use mozza for hubby cause he doesn't like feta but I LOVE it!), sundried tomatoes, & onions. I will also roll it in a crumb coating. No recipe for this one...I'm kind of just winging it based off a few different recipe inspirations. Note to self: Write down what I do just in case it actually turns out!

Quinoa Mediterranean Salad: This is my first time making quinoa, and I just cooked it up now for the salad. I'm pretty confident I'm going to love it as it has a wonderfully nutty flavour just by itself. Not sure if it will be hubby's cup of tea, though. We'll see :-) I'm using a recipe for this one.

Mashed Potatoes (because if everything else fails....my husband will think it is a fantastic meal if I make him mashed potatoes. My man could live off of mashed potatoes!

Let you know how it turns out,

Never a Dull Moment!

The last couple of weeks have been so busy around here! We have had all kinds of things going on from cat bites, to sicknesses, to a Hawaiian-themed 30th anniversary! Here's a re-cap of the last week or so. It was pure craziness, I tell ya.

• Elianna gets sick, but thankfully gets over it pretty quickly. Amazing how this time around, we do not need to do all the blood-tests and what-not since she's no longer neutropenic..praise the Lord! 

• Attend a cool family-friendly festival in our neck of the woods. We all had a great time!

• We plan my in-laws Hawaiian-themed 30th anniversary celebration.

• My hubby gets bit by a cat. 

• On Sunday morning (last week), we find out cat bites are nasty and he must go to ER to get shots and see a doctor. I take the kids to church by myself  while hubby sees doctor. Find out cat bites are one of the worst kinds of bites, so it turns out to be a good thing he went in to get checked.

• Somewhere around this time, Nathanael gets sick.

• We begin searching for a new dining table. We find one we like but are unsure of it because it seems it would be difficult to wipe clean (had a textured/grainy surface from the wood on the top). We hum and haw over it for a long time, bring a chair home to test it out, waver back and forth on whether or not to get it, and eventually decide it's not the table for us.

• Elianna spends some quality time with her grandparents while Craig and I get a few projects done around the house. Our couple-time/project-time gets interrupted by a nasty storm that brings hail, rain, funnel clouds, and a power outage. Because of the power outage, our sump pump does not work, so we have to scoop out water from the crawl space thingy by hand until the power comes back on. Thankfully, the power outage does not last long!!

• Nathanael sees his family doctor as he is coughing quite a bit.

• Craig sees his family doctor for a follow up on the cat bite

• Nathanael sees the pediatrician because he is still coughing a lot. He needs an antibiotic because his lungs are not sounding good. Pediatrician says he should stay away from people until we find out what he has. I mention that we have my in-laws 30th anniversary celebration this weekend. Pediatrician says we can go, but people shouldn't get too close to him. 

• We go to the annual parade and then decide to leave immediately after and drive a few hours away to look for a dining table. I think we are plum-crazy for doing this as we only have about 3 hours to find a table and we have 2 cities to stop in. We end up finding a table (solid wood) for half price on a Canada Day long weekend special. I made phone calls to businesses back home. A company closer to us tells us they can price match, so we leave with a table ready to order here back home. I am shocked and amazed we pulled that off. 

• We get home fairly late, and I make a couple salads for the anniversary party on Sunday. We go to bed around 1 a.m.. Craig goes to church the next morning, while I stay home with the kids since we are still unsure about Nathanael. I drive out to my in-laws with the kids, meet hubby there, and spend the afternoon preparing for the anniversary. The Hawaiian theme was SO much fun! My mom-in-law did not know about the Hawaii theme, which is even more fun! I learn how to decorate cupcakes (with a lesson from my talented cake-making sister-in-law!). Nathanael is kind of quarantined in his own room and was not very happy in there. I take the kids home to bed, so my hubby can stay and visit with people at the celebration. 

Never a dull moment! 

5 to 10 Challenge

I know I normally post my 5 to 10 challenge update on Mondays, but I don't really have time today. I have too much to do! :-) I may or may not have time later in the week. Hopefully I will wrap up this series soon. In the mean time, I'm enjoying the summer weather and getting some projects done!

5 to 10 Challenge: Week 4

Last week went fairly well for me. I always seem to struggle most on the weekends when my snacking can get out of hand. I went to bed a bit earlier most nights, but I still have a lot of work to do in that area!  I got in 4 exercise sessions and have been way more water than I used to. I believe at this point my weight loss has plateaued. I haven't seen much change in the past month or so. Most of my pre-pregnancy clothes are fitting again, but I still have a bit of work to do to get back into some of them. I am trying to face the facts that if I want to get past this plateau I'm going to have to stir things up a bit.


On to this weeks tips:

Tip 7: Eat a Healthy Breakfast: I eat breakfast every single morning, but I wasn't always a breakfast girl. I confess my breakfasts are boring and I tend to eat the same thing every.single.day. A piece of toast, yogurt, and coffee. I'm going to try to vary my breakfast a bit this week. Maybe try oatmeal, or eggs one or two days.

Tip 8: Cut Back on After-Supper Snacks: If you're anything like me, I often make my poorest food choices after supper. During the day I'm too busy to snack much, but when I relax in the evenings, often the bag of chips or bowl of ice cream makes its appearance. Try to cut out or cut back on this after-supper snack , or make a healthier choice that is both lower in calories and more nutritious.

5 to 10 Challenge: Week 3

Last week went by so quickly that I think I kind of forgot about this challenge, especially toward the end of the week & the weekend. Oops.
 I did my exercise video 3 times and stayed on track at the beginning of the week, but then I don't know what happened after that. It was a crazy busy week as we tried to finish our kitchen before my hubby had to go back to work. I'm pretty sure all the ordering in of pizza and Chinese food plus a couple trips to McDonald's didn't do me any favours. I did try to exercise moderation and ensure I had my priorities straight, but I struggled with making wise/healthy choices and fitting in exercise.  I didn't lose any weight this week. I think I've kind of plateaued with regard to my weight loss, and although I am fairly okay with where I am right now, if possible I would like to lose the last 10 pounds so I could get back to where I was pre-pregnancy.

Moving on to this week's tips...

5) Pay Attention: Why am I eating this? Am I hungry? Am I just bored?

6) Get to Bed Earlier: Most nights I don't get to bed till around midnight. I'd like to try to sleep a bit better at night (if possible) so I have more energy during the day.


Don't forget about tips  1) Drink Water 
                                  2) Get Moving
                                  3) Moderation & Self-Control
                                  4) Priority Check (Spiritual before Physical)


Feel free to leave a comment about how you are doing!

Kitchen ALMOST done!

We are almost, almost, almost done our kitchen! YAY! We now have the counter top installed (thanks to my father-in-law & hubby), the sink & faucet installed (thanks to our brother-in-law who's a plumber!), and all the cabinets up! The only things left to do are put the shelves in the cabinets, a few little finishing touches, and start getting our life back together. No more dishwashing in the bath tub!

On another positive note, Nathanael slept through the night last night from 11:30 till 6:30 this morning! YES! One week ago he was still getting up like 2-3 times a night, so this is huge for us! Elianna managed to keep herself in her bed last night, too (she had been going through this phase of getting up in the night again for the past week). I got a solid 6 1/2 hours of sleep in a row and I feel like a brand new woman!

Well, lots of work to get done today, and I'm SO SO SO excited to be moving upstairs again and start using my kitchen. Pictures to come once we get it all together in hopefully not too long!

5 to 10 Challenge: Week 2

So how did you all do with Week 1? I have to confess something...I didn't do so great. I lost 0.4 lbs (at best).  Yes, I did drink more water and I got in 4 (not 5 like I had planned) sessions of exercise in. However, I did not exercise much self-control over some of the choices I made. Please don't get me wrong; I don't believe in obsessing over things like food or exercise because it can easily become an idol. That is NOT good. Really not good. I've been there before many, many years ago.

I believe there's a place where one can be exercising self-control and yet not be obsessing over every bite or workout. It's not a sin to eat a piece of cake. On one extreme is the lack of self-control/gluttony , etc. but on the other is making being fit an idol and obsessing over every bite which can become a pride issue or distraction from more important things. My prayer is to find the place where I am neither practising gluttony nor obsessing and making things an idol. It really isn't about the weight or some special number on the scale. It is more about glorifying the Lord in all things including the way I approach the whole issue of health.

Now for a confession. I've had a part in both extremes. I used to struggle with an eating disorder. Used to. A long time ago (middle school age). I saw a counselor about it a few times. Praise the Lord, He rescued me out of that bondage and I have not struggled with that extreme since that time in middle school. I used my control over food as a coping mechanism instead of turning to the Lord with my emotional struggles. It was a way for me to gain a false sense of control when I felt like I could not control anything else going on in my life. Perhaps sometime I will share more of my story with regards to that time in my life and how the Lord rescued me out of that.

May I stress again this is more about moving toward a healthier lifestyle and glorifying the Lord with my choices than it is about weight loss. Here are the 2 things I'd like to work on this week in addition to last week's 2 goals (1. Drink Water and  2. Get Moving)

 3) Moderation & Self-Control: 1 brownie instead of 3 (or 4...or 5..even if they taste SO good!). I'm going to try to keep an honest food journal for this week.

4)  Priority Check: Spiritual "exercise" before physical exercise. Spend time with the Lord in prayer and in His Word before I begin to think about getting some physical exercise.