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Simpe Weekly Meal Plans and Real Life – December 2

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I hope you had a great Thanksgiving with family and friends. We visited my family and Jim’s, eating two turkey dinners in less than 24 hours. Whew! It was fun and filling!

As soon as we got home, I printed the list for the December Slow Cooker Freezer Meals plan and headed to the grocery. I decided not to brave Walmart, where I usually shop, on black friday. We hit Kroger instead.

Shopping in a store that you aren’t as familiar with is always an experience. It takes a bit longer. It’s hard to shop on auto-pilot they way you can if you know all the aisles well. But the store wasn’t crowded. I’m pretty sure Kroger isn’t high on the list for black Friday shoppers.

On Saturday morning, I prepped all the slow cooker freezer meals and shot the video.  The freezer meals week is actually next week, but the plans can be used in any order you like.  Members get access to the whole month at once.

Simple Weekly Meal Plans

Here’s a sneak peek at this week’s meal plans.  When you join the Weekly Meal Plan list, you get the grocery list and printable recipes with side dishes included.  December includes an awesome gift guide for easy gifts you can whip up in your kitchen that are sure to make everyone happy–even the dog! You can find out more about how to get the meal plans for yourself by clicking here.

Traditional

Slow Cooker

4. Roast w/ red wine, onion, garlic & Italian seasoning

 

Simple Weekly Meal Plans and Real Life – November 25 (Organizing the Pantry and Playing with Pressure Cooking)

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We’ve been working on our kitchen for a few weeks, making a few improvements. We had new countertops, sink and faucet installed. Last weekend, we worked on organizing the pantry, adding full extension slides to two drawers and custom dividers.

The pantry had gotten to be a humongous mess. It seems no matter what I do to it, I have a hard time keeping it organized. Part of the problem is there are just 4 shelves. While I was working on getting it back in shape, I called my Dad and asked him if he could design something that would work better.

Dad is a contractor. He’s designed and remodeled a lot of kitchens over the years. As soon as I told him the pantry needed help, he knew exactly what he could do to fix it. I’m not sure when we’ll get started with the project, but I can’t wait! It’s going to be a huge improvement.

For now, here’s the before and after of the pantry. Not a lot of change, but it is better.

pantrybeforeandafter

 

Jim added full extension slides to our utensil drawers last weekend too.  These make it possible to pull the drawers all the way out, so you can see what’s in the back.  He also made custom dividers.  I love getting in the drawers and easily finding what I need.

drawers

 

I’ve been playing around with my new pressure cooker this week.  I absolutely love it for making rice!  I tried it for potato soup the other day.  It worked great, but I think it would have been just as fast on the stove top.  One of these days, I’ll do a post about pressure cooking.

I tried to get a picture of the steam release.  Steam is hard to capture.  Using the cooker has been fun and easy.  It’s very easy to clean and I’m not even afraid of blowing up the kitchen!

photo-3

Simple Weekly Meal Plans

Here’s a sneak peek at this week’s meal plans.  When you join the Weekly Meal Plan list, you get the grocery list and printable recipes with side dishes included.  November features your easiest Thanksgiving ever, with easy recipes to keep you spending more quality time with your family instead of the kitchen stove.  You can find out more about how to get the meal plans for yourself by clicking here.

Slow Cooker

1. All Day Beef Stew – Oven or Crockpot
2. Your Easiest Thanksgiving Ever: Turkey Breast in the Slow Cooker, plus all the sides
Traditional
  1. Your Easiest Thanksgiving Ever: Turkey Breast in the Slow Cooker, plus all the sides
  2. Italian Beef Sandwiches in the Crockpot
  3. Shrimp Scampi 
  4. Turkey and Dumplings (Use up leftover Turkey!)
  5. Lentil Tacos 
  6. Loaded Baked Potatoes
  7. Easy Apple Crumb Cake

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Simple Weekly Meal Plans and Real Life – November 18

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WeeklyMealPlansandRealLife

This is the week with the Slow Cooker Freezer Meals!  Wahoo!  I’ve got one of them cooking away in my crockpot right now.  Calico Bean Soup for dinner!  I love that I can have 6 or 7 meals stashed away in the freezer with just about an hour of prep time.  So handy!  To find out more about the Weekly Meal Plans and get the grocery list and cooking tips for the freezer meals, click here.  You can also watch a video of me prepping the meals on my YouTube channel.  (The video thing still feels WAY out of my comfort zone!  I’m not sure if I’ll ever get over being embarrassed by them, but I’m forging ahead anyway and sharing it with you.)

This was to be a big week of recipe testing for me.  And I have created/tested several.  Some have been a success.  And some, not so much.  Ah, well.  It’s all part of the process.

I’ll be doing more recipe creation over the weekend.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I’ll have more success than failures.  I do have a fantastic soup recipe I’ll be sharing with you on Tuesday.

Simple Weekly Meal Plans

Here’s a sneak peek at this week’s meal plans.  When you join the Weekly Meal Plan list, you get the grocery list and printable recipes with side dishes included.  November features your easiest Thanksgiving ever, with easy recipes to keep you spending more quality time with your family instead of the kitchen stove.  You can find out more about how to get the meal plans for yourself by clicking here.

Slow Cooker

Traditional

Simple Weekly Meal Plans and Real Life – September 23

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We’re still focusing on freezer meals in the Weekly Meal Plans.  I’ve got a sneak peek at this week’s plans at the bottom of this post.

WeeklyMealPlansandRealLife

 

Last weekend, we celebrated my birthday a little bit early.  We went to the apple orchard on Saturday.  The weather was gorgeous!  Just the right amount of cool to hint at fall, but not enough to feel really cold.  And the sun was shining bright.  We bought a lot of apples, apple cider, apple cider donuts and decided to eat lunch there too.

Our original plan was to go out for lunch on Sunday for my birthday, but we’d spent so much on Saturday I decided to cook instead.  I made a classic pot roast with potatoes and carrots.  I really thought I had already shared the recipe with you, but I can’t find it on my site, so I guess I never posted it.  And I didn’t take any photos on Sunday either.  But soon, I’ll make it again and post it.  It is so good!

Jim made my favorite cake – Mom’s Layer Cake with Fluffy Chocolate Frosting from the Cake Mix Dr. Cookbook.

birthday

 

He did refrain from adding 46 candles to the cake!

Monday night I created the recipe for Popcorn Chicken Parmesan.  It was a hit!  Such an easy way to have a fantastic meal and it only took 15 minutes to make.

Tuesday was my actual birthday.  Isaac had a soccer game, so we ate sandwiches on the sidelines.

Wednesday night I made tostadas.  I was in a hurry, but I was trying to create a new recipe.  My creative juices weren’t flowing well though and we ended up with taco meat on tostada shells.  Super simple and quick.

Wednesday was also the day that my Stitch Fix box came.  This was the first box that I kept everything.

Stitch Fix 8

 

I loved everything they sent this time, but my favorite by far is the jeans.  I still can’t believe they actually fit.  Jean shopping is normally a huge hassle for me.  I have to try on 10-20 pairs before I find one that fits.  They all have a huge gap in the back of the waist.  I hate shopping for any type of pants, because it just takes so long.

But I pulled these from Stitch Fix from the box and they fit perfectly!  I wore them the rest of the day and my kids kept telling me that they really liked them.  That never happens!  It was fun to hear them complement me.  I never would have chosen the color either.  It’s darker than it looks in the picture.  And I had a surprising number of tops that coordinate with the burgundy color.

I’ve already scheduled my next fix and requested more jeans.  You can find out more about how Stitch Fix works here (that’s my affiliate link).  I love using the service, because I really hate to shop.  Stitch Fix is like shopping without actually going shopping.

Thursday night, I felt like a hypocrite.  There were only 2 people going to be home for dinner, with 1 more coming in late.  We’d had a long day of classes and practices.  So I decided we would grab fast food.  I’m not sure why this should make me feel like a hypocrite, since I’ve never claimed that we don’t eat out.  But since I do run a blog called Eat at Home, I always feel funny when I give in to my lazies and hit the drive through.

It’s Friday afternoon as I write this.  We’ve got another soccer game tonight.  I’m debating whether I should make something to eat on the sidelines or make something to have once we get home.  It will be late though and I don’t know that I want to wait that long for dinner.

#DinnerDilemma Twitter Party and Slow Cooker Giveaway

hamilton beach 6 quart slow cooker

 

This Twitter party had to be postponed last week, so we’re going to be having it this Monday 3pm Est.

I love this slow cooker!  Actually, I’ve never used it, I just wanted one for a long time.  I’ll be giving away 2 of them, along with an assortment of Libby’s products to two participants in the #DinnerDilemma Twitter party.

I’d love for you to join us on Monday 9/23 at 3pm EST.  We’re going to be talking about all kinds of things to help get dinner on the table each night, from recipes, to bulk cooking, to side dishes and more.

Be sure to follow @LibbysTable and me, @TiffanyAKing on Twitter.

Simple Weekly Meal Plans

Here’s a sneak peek at this week’s meal plans.  When you join the Weekly Meal Plan list, you get the grocery list and printable recipes with side dishes included.  You can find out more about how to get them for yourself by clicking here.  Now, you get access to a whole month at a time!  And September is our focus on stocking the freezer, including the week where you cook 7+ Slow Cooker Freezer Meals in just 1 hour!

Slow Cooker Plan

3. Slow Cooker Beans for the Freezer aka Refried Beans without the Refry (served in toritalls with cheese as bean & cheese burritos)

Traditional Plan

  1. Chicken Pot Pie
  2. Beef tacos (using beef [prepared like this) 
  3. Ham Caribbean 
  4. Honey Pork Chops 
  5. Chicken Gyros 
  6. Scrambled eggs with muenster cheese and ham 
  7. Frozen Marble Mocha Loaf

Using the Slow Cooker Freezer Meals – Simple Weekly Meal Plans & Real Life

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It’s been about a month since I tested the Slow Cooker Freezer Menu (get a sneak peek at it near the bottom of this post).  I’ve been using those meals slowly, only reaching into the freezer when I know the day is going to be too busy for cooking.

But even though I’m trying not to use them all at once, after this week I only have 1 left!

I may be testing some new slow cooker freezer meals soon.  Those meals have made dinner time so simple and having them stashed away in the freezer is like a bit of insurance against the “crazy days”.

Sunday

Last Sunday, we ate leftovers after church.  There were several different things that needed to be eaten and I decided I didn’t want to cook.  It worked out well, at least for me!

Jim and I also went out on Sunday evening.  There was a free jazz concert at a local historic home that we decided to go to.  Before that though, we stopped by Lowe’s.  I’m wanting to give our kitchen a facelift with new countertops and possibly painted cabinets.

counterprice

 

I snapped this picture so I could remember the prices for laminate.  We also priced quartz and granite and decided it would be more than we want to spend.  And to be honest, I like laminate.

We currently have something called Butternut Granite, I think.  It’s not my favorite.  I like it better than I thought I would (the builder chose it before we bought the house), but I’d like to change it to something different.  If you’ve got a laminate you love, leave me a comment!

Monday

Labor Day meant a day off work for Jim and no school for the rest of us.  We went disc golfing with the boys.  They’ve been playing all summer, but I’d never been.  I’m terrible at throwing the frisbee, but it was fun to watch them.

bacontomatobasilpasta

 

Friends had given us a bunch of tomatoes from their garden the night before.  I decided they needed to be part of a pasta dish.  So I made a quick meal with angel hair pasta, bacon, basil, tomatoes and white wine.  I’ll share the recipe soon!

Tuesday

Our son had a soccer game, so we went to watch.  I used one of the slow cooker freezer meals – Honey Hoisin Chicken.  I shredded the cooked meat and we put it on sandwiches with quick cole slaw and sweet potato fries on the side.  Yum!

Wednesday

I used a bottle of Kung Pao sauce with some chicken tenders, onions and bell peppers.  We ate it over rice.  The bottle of sauce had enough kick that all of our mouths were tingly and burning afterward, but it was good.

Thursday

I made another of our slow cooker freezer meals.  This time it was Maple Apple Pot Roast.  It turned out great!  I served parmesan potatoes too – from a box – and they were delicious!  I hardly ever buy boxed au gratin style potatoes, but they just looked so good.  Everyone loved them.  We also had broccoli.  And I made Peach Pie Squares for dessert.  Recipe coming to the blog soon!

And I repurposed our leftover roast for Friday’s lunch.  I shredded the beef, added a can of black beans and some salsa.  Heated it in the microwave and filled taco shells.  It worked great and would have made a good dinner for a small family.

bunny

 

We had some tiny company on Thursday night.  This little guy and two of his brothers were hanging out in our garden.  They were only about the size of the palm of my hand.  Cute!

Friday

It’s Friday as I write this post and I’m planning to make French toast and ham for dinner.  Fancy, I know. *Update: When I went into the kitchen to make dinner, I realized we were out of milk. So I turned the French bread into French bread pizzas, using the ham for a topping and gathering up anything else I could find.  They turned out great!  But I really do need to hit the grocery!

Simple Weekly Meal Plans

Here’s a sneak peek at this week’s meal plans.  When you join the Weekly Meal Plan list, you get the grocery list and printable recipes with side dishes included.  You can find out more about how to get them for yourself by clicking here.  Now, you get access to a whole month at a time!  And September is our focus on stocking the freezer, including the week where you cook 7+ Slow Cooker Freezer Meals in just 1 hour!

Slow Cooker Plan – this is the freezer meals plan!

1. Taco Soup
2. Mediterranean Chicken in the Slow Cooker (as round steak)
3. Whole Chicken in the Slow Cooker
4. Honey Hoisin Chicken in the Slow Cooker
5. Easy Slow Cooker Pork Carnitas 
6. Maple Apple Chicken in the Slow Cooker (as pot roast)
7. blueberry orange bread 

Traditional Plan

Raspberry Chicken*
Mel’s Diner Chili *
Stromboli
Spaghetti and Meatballs
BBQ Chicken Fajitas* (prepare chicken like this)
Beef Stew
Peanut Butter Fluff Pie