mmm mmm meal plan

The weather is getting warmer, the grass is getting greener and I want to spend more and more time outside. Luckily my husband bought me some really nice gardening gloves and snippers so I spent the morning cleaning up the plants in the garden and raking the dead grass. I have given up hope of our backyard actually looking like a yard until our puppy grows but this picture will show you why I needed to putter out there to make myself feel bettter.

The stones were covering holes that had been dug...

Now I am back inside devising a menu for this week.As the weather gets warmer I have less and less to desire to cook supper much less try to come up with a supper idea, so getting the week all planned ahead is working great. I love not having to dig into my creative meal idea bank at the end of a long day, it's already done.

So for this week we will be having:

Monday:
Warm Chicken Ranch Wraps and Tomato Soup

Tuesday:
Corn on the cob with Hot German Potato Salad and raw veggies

Wednesday:
Shrimp Scampi Bake over linguine

Thursday:
Refried Bean Enchiladas with tossed salad

Friday:Leftover Buffet

Saturday: Homemade whole wheat pizza with caesar salad (missed it last week)

Sunday:
Mexican Pile-Up(my husband's favourite, basically taco ingredients: seasoned ground beef, beans, rice, lettuce, tomato, green pepper, cheese, salsa and sour cream on top of crushed nacho chips)

For other great meal ideas be sure to visit Organizing Junkie

Fala-full!

Anyone who knows me knows I am NOT a huge fan of meat, anyone who knows Nat knows that he IS a HUGE fan of meat. So to satisfy us both we vary between meat and meatless meals. In my search for interesting and tasty meat alternatives I went to the library and picked up a copy of Moosewood Restaurant Low Fat Favorites cookbook. It has a large selection of vegetarian meals for the adventurous so I decided to make Middle Eastern Canellini Patties, a lower fat alternative to falafel. Beans, rice, veggies and spices smushed into a patty, topped with veggies and some Ranch dressing in pitas...mmm mmm good. Nat the meat lover even approved these so they are now on my keeper list.

Menu Plan Monday

I have recently begun to write out my meal plans in an attempt to cut down on my trips to the grocery store and to be more organized. This is especially helpful when Nat has to work nights. Meal planning is a great way to organize your grocery shopping and to get the most food for your money. Here are our meals for the week:

Monday:
Whole wheat spaghetti with TVP veggie sauce and caesar salad

Tuesday:
Breaded Garlic Dill Fish (Moosewood Restaurant Low Fat Favorites) with roasted zucchini and red peppers

Wednesday:
Ginger Chicken Kabobs with Peanut Sauce with corn and roasted parmesan potatos

Thursday:
Left-over buffet

Friday:
Homemade whole wheat pizza and tossed salad

For more great meal ideas and tips on meal planning visit Organizing Junkie here

roman blind

My first project in our new house was to make blinds. What kind of blinds you ask? well Nat and I both agreed that our favourite is roman blinds so my adventure began with a hunt for a pattern. My mom had a lady make them for her house and they look so great so going through patterns was quite disappointing not being able to find exactly what I wanted. I decided to buy the pattern that was closest to what I was looking for and tweak it. I thought that the sewing room would be a good place to start especially since the old vertical blinds just had to go. After many calls home to my mom to make notes on her blinds this is what I came up with. It's not perfect but I really enjoyed being able to use my sewing machine that I got for Christmas and now I can make improvements for my next blind. We're going shopping this week so I am going to arm myself with paint chips and hopefully find just the right fabrics for my other windows. And no Nat was not involved in choosing this fabric :)

About Me

My name is Naomi and this is my personal blog that I initially began as a way to share my musings and day-to-day life with my friends and family. I have been known to blog about sewing projects, baking/cooking, and most recently my beautiful daughter.

I am a follower of Christ and my relationship with Him takes precedence over everything in my life.

My husband (of nearly 8 years now) and I moved from the east coast to the west coast of Canada in January 2008 and within a month had driven across the country, purchased a house and a dog. Our 2nd dog found us 2 months later on the side of the highway.

Did I mention that with our move I went from being a full-time student of nearly 20 years to a full-time housewife? I have a bachelor of science in applied human nutrition and part of a bachelor's degree in elementary education. My dream is to complete a dietetic internship which would allow me to be a registered dietitian.

Until that opportunity presents itself I have been running our household, working part-time, taking care of our dogs and as of December 2009 and May 2012 our daughters.

I am a cloth diaper-er and I have been exploring ways to live greener frugally.

I also love cupcakes in case you hadn't guessed.

Thanks for stopping by! Please leave me a comment, look me up on twitter or drop me an email naomimorgan at gmail dot com.

just me

Since our other blog, as the title suggests is for Nat and I, I thought I would start a blog of my own. Here I can post some things that are of interest to me but maybe not so much to Nat. Projects, cooking, baking whatever else tickles my fancy will be shared here AND I can make this blog as girly as I want!!!