Meal Plan Monday

{image from here}

Planning this week was hard for me. Not sure why that is, but this is what I came with:

Monday:

pasta with pesto

grilled chicken

salad

(roll over from last week)

Tuesday:

chicken strips

green beans

Wednesday:

fajitas

Thursday:

leftovers

Friday:

pizza

salad

Saturday/Sunday:

chili

(I know it's not quite chili season, but the cooler weather has thrown a craving on me.)

I'd love to hear any plans/ideas you have. I'm in need of some inspiration.

End of the Week Links

A few of the things I found interesting this week:

I love a good home tour, and this charming farmhouse didn't disappoint. The island and the green door in the kitchen was enough for me!

These boots! I know I don't need them, but I really, really want them. Good thing they are way out of the reasonable price range to actually purchase them. Do let me know if you find a budget-friendly alternative. Thanks, Anne, for pointing them out to me!

This great article really hit home. The part about striving for Excellence, rather than Perfection resonated quite loudly for me.

This coffee cake will be made. The Pioneer Woman said, "It's not cake you eat with your morning coffee. It's how you get your morning coffee. And it's delicious!" I was directed over there by Liv who tried the recipe and gave it rave reviews.

Have you checked out Lovely Clusters yet? Rachel has put together the prettiest place to help navigate through the etsy world. And if you look closely you'll see a few PS custom paper goods and some other friendly faces. Makes me so happy to pull up the pages and see my things clustered in with all the lovely offerings.

I confirmed the bucket filling book that I was talking about yesterday, and was given the title of another one they read. These are the two books that we'll be adding to our library: How Full Is Your Bucket? and Have You Filled A Bucket Today?.

I like this:

And this makes me pretty darn happy:

{both images from this awesome site}

Thanks so much for hanging out with me this week!

Have an absolutely wonderful weekend!

How Full Is Your Bucket?

{cool vintage bucket}

Take a listen to this little story that happened after school yesterday... My daughter emerges from the bathroom saying that she has a surprise for me. I'm thinking, "A surprise? In the bathroom? Oh dear." I reluctantly go in and check. This sweet child has gone and put away the bulk pack of toilet paper I had left in the hallway. She's completed the chore I had put off by dispersing it to both of the bathroom storage drawers. I'm seriously floored, as she is not the tidiest child by nature. She's just beaming and says, "I filled your bucket. And I filled mine too." I look at her all puzzled. She explains by saying that if you're a "bucket-filler", you choose to make other people happy. And if you do that you fill your own bucket with happiness in return. On the other hand, if you are a "bucket-tipper" you make other people sad, and it ends up emptying your own bucket too. I'm sitting there flabbergasted with this tidbit of wisdom, but manage to ask where she came up with this theory. She said her teacher read them a book. Wow. I love her teacher. I am so going to be using this analogy in the future. Now let's go fill some buckets!

I've not yet confirmed it, but this appears to be the book that my daughter's class read.

Sounds like a good one!

**UPDATE: They did indeed read this book, along with this one: How Full Is Your Bucket?**

Spending Hiatus: Dreaded Confessions

{image}

Okay, so here goes my spending hiatus disclosure: From Target, I got two shirts, yoga pants, and some superfluous tops to add to my daughter's school clothes stash. Oh, and I also bought these sandals from Dillard's (although I'm still deliberating on whether I will keep them). Did I mention that we got a Flip Video? Yeah, that too. Seriously, we must have had spending-hiatus-amnesia.

The problem here isn't really the purchases as much as it is my frame of mind. I've been hearing the words "Oh, I need that" slipping out of my mouth all too often, when I clearly don't need anything of the sorts. I miss the simpleness of not spending. Don't get me wrong: I am so thankful to be in the tricky situation of having some money to budget. I just need to grab ahold of the budget reins and get this wagon back on the right trail. It's a slippery slope, folks. I need to regain my footing.

On a way brighter note, I'm featured on The Lovely List today! Brandy is compiling post upon post of the truly lovely blogs that I could seriously sit and read on all day long. And then she goes and features me? I'm not really sure what to say, but I'm not going to question it. I'm just going to continue feeling all lovely inside. Do pop over there to say hello. Leave a blog-you-find-lovely suggestion in your comment to help her perpetuate this site she's creating, and be sure to tell her I said to say hello and thanks! To make it all the lovelier, Brandy is giving away an awesome cruiser bike to everyone who leaves their lovely thoughts. Mighty lovely, eh?

Have a lovely day!

Favorite Quotes

This is one of my favorite quotes as of late. I read it. I loved it. I want to live it. I'm over at Kotori today sharing some more of my new favorite quotations. Check out this Tuesday's Top 5! What is your favorite quote?

Monday Meal Plan & School Lunches

I packed my first of many school lunches this year (and dropped my sweet daughter off at 1st grade: Sniff). It was a pb&j, watermelon, some pirate's booty, and a thermos of V8-Fusion. Not very creative, I know, but I am confident she'll eat it, and that makes me feel all good. School lunches are tricky for me. There's so much to think about: I want it to be healthy, I want her to eat it, I don't want her to long for the kid's lunch who's sitting next to her, I don't want to waste food, and on and on. I usually pack some combination of the following:

main: sandwich/yogurt/ham & cheese rolls

fruit: watermelon/cantaloupe/grapes/berries

treat: pop-tart/grahams/chips/applesauce/granola bar

It really doesn't vary much from that. I'll be exploring some more options this year. I've got these bookmarked to help me in my creativity: Parents healthy lunches, Amazing Moms tricks and tips, Lunchbox Builder, Thrifty Fun Lunch ideas Family Fun idea links, and of course, Flickr has a whole group dedicated to Laptop lunches to give me some visual ideas. It has to fit the above criteria though. Any ideas to share?

Oh, and our menu for the week:

Monday:

cheeseburgers (over lap from last week)

grilled corn on the cob

Tuesday:

Quesadillas

Wednesday:

out to dinner

Thursday/Friday:

pesto pasta and grilled chicken

Saturday:

egg, sausage, cheese taquitos

fruit salad

Sunday:

cheese tortilini

salad

Happy Monday! Hope your week is off to a grand start!

End of the Week Links: a home tour, tutorials, & more!

Some good stuff to share:

This home tour I found via Make Room For Living has so many neat architectural finds in it that it's got me hankering for another flea market trip. Would you believe it's a mobile home?!

Check out this neat tutorial from Jennifer at Hope Studios: Ruffled Tank. I so need to learn how to sew.

Here's an awesome shelving idea. I'm pretty sure this could be constructed, with a bit of time spent collecting, for very little money. So cool.

A new blog discovery: The Lovely List... It's a lovely blog dedicated to lovely blogs. So much goodness to be found over there.

She's at it again. Emily's put together another tutorial for us: How To: Dewy Make-up. I've been sporting the dewy look as of late.

And a huge thank you to Kind Over Matter for featuring my family rules this week. You're awesome! Thanks also to Lory at The Sunshine Studio for having me visit for an interview and a giveaway!!

{Thanks Just Be Splendid for posting such a great sentiment!}

Have a good weekend!

Crafty Recycling Project

I stumbled upon this project and have been saving it to try it on my own, but I just couldn't wait to share it with you. Check out this super cute basket made from newspapers:

Here's the supply list (I love that he included a cup of coffee... a must, I think.):

Check out the complete instructions, along with how he was inspired to try it. I'll post up my efforts when I do it... Do let me know if you try it. I'd love to see those baskets!

Attempting To Be Intentional

Okay, so it's the talk of the town around here: School is starting in less than a week. There seem to be two schools of thought on this. One is I'm- so-sad-summer-is-over-and-I-have-to-send-my-kids-off-to-school-so-soon, and the other is I-can't-wait-until-the-kids-are-back-in-school.

I'm straddling the fence on this one. While I really do hate to have to share my daughter with the school for most of our day (7 flipping hours!), I have to admit that I'm wearing a bit thin over here. It's beginning to feel a lot like the days just after Christmas. The magical glow of the season seems to fade for us just after Santa leaves the scene. It's about this time the the kids start acting all too entitled, and those formally cheery decorations are beginning to drive me batty. The atmosphere around here right now is scarily getting to feel somewhat reminiscent of this.

My daughter has been rolling out of bed asking, "what are we going to do today?" before her feet even hit the ground. At the beginning of the summer this same question was met with my enthusiasm for all the possibilities. Well, folks, that enthusiasm is wavering. I'm finding myself somewhat annoyed (sad, but kinda true). My effort to combat this potential downward spiral was to have my gal make a list of the things she'd like to do during her last week of summer vacation. I got the idea from here, here and here. (I think I'll try to do this with the kids at the beginning of summer next year.) I was surprised by how simple and doable her suggestions all were. This plan rejuvenated us all and we're definitely more excited and intentional with our few remaining days.

Here's our progress:

How are you holding up as the summer is nearing its end?

Oh, what about my spending hiatus, you ask? Yeah, Target got me and I came home with $75 worth of clothing for myself. Tags still on. Deliberating as to what to keep and what to take back. Full disclosure next week.

Doin' a Little Giveaway...

Hop over here to enter a little giveaway I'm sponsoring. It's for a coordinating set of 10 little bird notecards, along with 10 coordinating gift tags/calling cards, and 10 stickers from Perfect Sentiment. While you're over there, check out Lory's lovely blog. Thanks so much for taking a look over there!

Monday Meal Plan

{spinach, strawberries, toasted sliced almonds, Brianna's Poppyseed dressing:

A salad the kids will even eat!}

This is our plan for our week:

Monday:

chicken Caesar salad

(easy version: romaine, rotisserie chicken, and Newman's Own Caesar dressing)

Tuesday:

chicken/cheese/tomato paninis

Wednesday/Thursday:

Soft Tacos

(One day might be taco salad depending on lettuce and meat situation.)

Friday/Saturday:

Hamburgers grilled out

Sunday:

grilled chicken

strawberry salad

Any plans? Do share!

In Need of a Time Out!

Raise your hand if you're in desperate need of a vacation. Me too! I know I promised last week that I'd be back with some fabulous End of the Week links this week, but it's just not so. What is going on with this month? Things are crazy busy and I just wasn't mentally prepared for that. So what I'm doing for at least a moment or two is pretending I'm parked here, with something cold and frosty in one hand and a fresh magazine in my other. Aaaahhhhh....

{lovely image via here}

Hope your weekend is splendid, with at least a little bit of time to kick back and relax.

(in)courage-ment

I found such a nice spot in blogland recently and they posed a question: What encourages you? I thought about it and decided to share. It's nothing grand or clever or funny, but these five things urge me on:

My incredibly supportive husband.

My kids and my impact on their bright, shiny futures.

Girlfriends and their ever present love.

Kind, seemingly random acts of niceness.

Coffee.

(I know the last one on the list is so not on the level of the others, but it's true and I'm owning it.

It's particularly encouraging when experienced sitting with my hubby first thing in the morning.)

What encourages you? Check out incourage.me for daily doses of (in)courage-ment from some amazing ladies.

Spending Hiatus: Wanting More

A little spending hiatus update: I spent a little bit of money this week. While most purchases can be truthfully rationalized, the act of spending money this week taught me something about myself: I love shopping.

{button can be found here}

After taking inventory of my daughter's closet, we did some back-to-school shopping. My little gal picked out a backpack, lunch box, 2 pair of shoes, and a few clothing items. The shopping trip was not for myself, and yet I still felt somewhat satisfied by the experience. I say somewhat because it also left me wanting more. Sounds like an addiction now, doesn't it?

I get a little high off of the whole shopping/buying process. I've heard of it before, this emotional attachment to shopping. I think this is something I need to work on a bit more. I know the regular budget meetings are going to help keep me in check. If not, it might just turn into a snowball effect. I went from absolutely no shopping to a little shopping to wanting even more shopping. Definitely time to do some self-reflecting. I think I'll go back and reread some of my earlier thoughts on enjoying the simplification process and some words that inspired me. It could prove helpful to keep me in check.

How's it going for you?

A Save-The-Day Dessert Recipe

No, that's not a mis-shaped ball of Cheese Whiz. If you use your imagination, you might be able to make out a (somewhat deflated) basketball. It was my attempt at making my ball-obsessed son's birthday extra-special. I knew I shouldn't have attempted it. While I completely appreciate (and am now in awe of) a pretty dessert, I just don't have the ability, patience or desire to complete it myself. I had big plans of making a baseball cake too and possibly little football cupcakes to go along with this "basketball" cake. (I must have been delusional.) When it became very clear that those would not be happening, I went with another dessert option to feed our guests:

So yummy. So simple. Just my style.

Oh, and here's a little excerpt of a conversation that could have been overheard in my kitchen during the "cake" decorating process:

Me: Wow. That Ruth (my sweet friend who loaned me the ball pan and had just made a brilliant bowling ball cake for her daughter) is amazing!

Daughter: Mommy, I'm sure there are things that you can do that Ruth can't do.

Me: I don't know...

Daughter: I love you anyway.

Me: You are so sweet. Here, have some frosting.

Daughter: Mommy, it's kinda looking like a basketball. Sort of.

Me: You really are so sweet. Sure, you can have some more frosting.

Daughter: I feel like a dog, licking up all this icing.

Me: Oh dear.

Daughter: Mommy, you know, you might be a little too embarrassed to let people see your cake.

I just laughed (possibly somewhat hysterically) because, you know, sometimes it's good to just embrace your shortcomings. I accept that I'm not gifted in this area, and I am okay with it. Plus we have some mighty fine bakeries around town.

Monday Meal Planning

We had a fairly unhealthy week/weekend and I swear my kids' behavior was a bit indicative of it by Sunday. Our week was a busy one and with all the activity we didn't get around to all of our planned meals and ate a few on the run. We're going to try to keep it balanced this week and hopefully get everyone feeling more balanced as well. So with some carry over from last week, here's this week:

Monday/Tuesday:

pork tenderloin

honey glazed carrots

salad

Wednesday:

salad trio: Caesar salad/mixed fruit/pasta salad

Thursday:

spaghetti

steamed broccoli

Friday:

leftovers (spaghetti & salads)

Saturday:

out

Sunday:

Fish Tacos

I would love to hear what you're thinking for your week!

{This isn't a picture of the exact pasta salad we'll be having, but it's the closest I could find.

I need to snap a photo of ours for future reference!}

Happy Weekend To You!

This first week of August just about did me in. For some reason, I've felt busy and underprepared most days. I've got some blog catching up to do for sure, so I'll be doing some reading from my favorite blogs on Sunday as I catch my breath. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. Thank you for your sweet birthday wishes for my 2(!) year old. Here's a quote that I read this week (via whimsicalities) that I wanted to pass along (Can you tell I've been doing some thinking on my parenting style as of late? It's a learning process...):

I'll be back with some great links next week. Promise.

Happy FRIDAY to you!

My Little Man is 2!

Oh, how we prayed for you, and waited ever so impatiently for you.

You were loved before we ever met you. We had no idea

how madly in love we'd fall when you arrived.

You are a sweet, lovable, beautiful mess.

Everyday with you is an adventure and a blessing.

I am so thankful to be your mommy. I love you sweet boy.

Happy Birthday to you!

Side note: Every time I think of my son's birth I feel the need to pass along a tidbit of our journey to him to whomever might be listening. Quick version: We had some fertility issues while trying to conceive and through lots of bumps and prayer we arrived at an acupuncturist who specializes in women's fertility. I truly believe that her treatment is what allowed me to have my sweet baby. If you are on a similar journey looking for answers, I recommend reading The Infertility Cure by Randine Lewis to see if this might be helpful for you as well. Feel free to email me too. Struggling with fertility issues sucks.

Spending Hiatus: Flea Market Confessions

I passed a major spending hiatus test and then failed on another.

My success: Resisting the 30% off coupon for The Gap (and friends) this past weekend. While I have a mighty full shopping cart over there, the credit card stayed nice and safe inside my wallet. Spending Hiatus lesson: DO NOT save your cc info online. It makes it way too easy to click on 'purchase now'. Had I have had my cc info readily available, I'm not so sure I'd have passed this test. With that being said, I'm mighty proud of myself for holding off on these purchases until we've had another budget meeting .

My failure: Going to a Flea Market and an Estate Sale with cash in hand. I accompanied a pregnant friend to a big once a month flea market just outside of town to help her pick up a few last things before the baby is born. I allotted myself $20 to spend knowing that I'd find a treasure or two that wouldn't blow the bank, but pulsed out $40 just in case. I made it home from the flea market with a bit of cash left, but then my dad called to say he was going to an estate sale near me. Of course, I had to tag along. Who could resist a vintage, mustard-colored, lazy-susan-type contraption at 70% off prices? Surely not me.

There is one little success in the midst of me spending money that I surely shouldn't have: When I saw that cool vintage dish thing, I snatched it up and just about squealed, "Oh, I need this!" My sweet daughter retorted, "Mom, you don't need that. You want it.". The little gal is learning... Let's hope I don't go blowing it.

Oh, but just check out some of my finds:

{soon-to-be crate to corral balls, after a bit of wire brush attention,

a pair of diamond-shaped frames that I have plans to scrap the middle, paint, & hang,

I'm not really sure what that iron thing is, but it's now a change holder next to our keys,

and the sweet lazy-susan that's been used everyday since its purchase.}

Although none of this could be categorized in the need department (as my daughter can so kindly point out), I do love it all. Do you have any fun purchases to share?

Wardrobe Consultation Winner:

The random number generator picked the very first comment... That means Lindsey is one lucky gal! She'll be getting a personal Good Look For Less consultation. I'm looking forward to seeing what Jill puts together for her. Thank you so much to everyone who entered and to Jill for sponsoring this giveaway. (The above outfits are among some of my favorites that Jill has put together for various GLFL clients.)

Monday Meal Planning

Here's our week... I'm looking forward to this one:

Monday:

Chicken Club Salad

Tuesday:

BLTs

Wednesday/Friday:

pork tenderloin

carrots

salad

Thursday:

Out

Saturday:

pizza & cake

(to celebrate little guys' birthday)

Sunday:

soft tacos

How about you?

{Be sure to enter to win the wardrobe consultation giveaway. All you have to do is leave a comment to be in it... I'll be drawing for it tonight. Oh, and hop over to TGLFL blog to see what Jill threw together for my sister. Another awesome job by Jill! I sure wish Amy and I still shared closets!}