The Week Ahead: Sharing What's Ahead

 

Well hello and welcome to a new year.   While the year is brand new, I tend to change things up a wee bit, just to make it feel as new as it seems to me at the moment.   Truth told it's mostly a lot of the same old things but a little refreshing does a great deal towards improving a familiar meal or a comfortable chair, and a blog.

First I thought I'd reintroduce the retro kitchen photos.  I know that many of you enjoyed seeing them and commenting on what you liked or didn't.  I thought it would be fun to go back to sharing those for a while.  And I'll just go ahead and comment on this one: I love the reverse tile color from one side to the other but honestly doesn't that dining area seem a bit too snug for three?  I'm assuming it's a living/dining room opposite that divided wall but personally I'd like a bit more elbow room at the table, even if there were normally just the two of us.

Also I love the  big sunny windows and the  plants but have you noticed that the divided wall is backed by a big blind?  I think it's a rather neat idea for shutting away the messy kitchen if guests should be visiting.  If left open you'd get a bit more light in the kitchen and that is a must in my book.  I've had plenty of dark and drear windowless, or tiny windowed,  kitchens in my life and I am all for more natural light in my workspace.

Looking at the kitchen, I'm thinking it's just a very small home or even small apartment.  It's neat and tidy and you'd be prone to keep it so with the limited counterspace and the few cabinets. 

Well enough retro kitchen talk.  Do you want to know what to expect from my posts this year?

I have had such good feedback on the Gathering Fragments post and I want to continue that feature but it will no longer be a stand alone feature.  I'll now make it part of The Week Ahead planning post.  I'm going to do what I ought to have done if I'd thought it out and start my week off with a list of fragments gathered and menus/use ideas. And at the end of the week, if I've done something extra I'll share that too.  I'll determine a way to designate them as Gathering Fragments so you can distinguish them just in case you were making notes or keeping a list of ideas handy for your own fragments of food.

The end of the week post will now be titled "Diary of a Homemaker's Week" instead of "The Week Behind".

I'll continue doing a Worth Sharing post.  I love writing those.  I don't know the frequency with which they might appear, certainly once a month, but perhaps more often if I can keep finding inspiration.

I'll share a monthly goals post as I've been doing just before the turn of the month but add in an accountability post at the end of the month.  Not sure how that will be titled, but I'll work it out between now and end of the month.

I thought I'd try to get in a coffee chat twice a month if at all possible, even if one is a shorter post now and then.  I like to just stop and chat and perhaps you do, too?  I think coffee chats and Worth Sharing make me a bit more well rounded as a person and balances out my frugal thinking.  I don't know about you but I can be terribly one-track minded at times and then I wonder why I feel so irritable and whiny.  I'm out of balance!  I've forgotten I'm more than a bean counter!  So let's visit this coming year and try to do it often enough to be women and mothers and wives and not just the kitchen help and purse keeper.

I'd dearly love to do something I've thought would be fun for quite some time and that is to go through my old cookbook and make and share a recipe with you, along with pictures of how my dish turns out.  Again I'm not sure how often I'll do this.  You'd think I'd do it weekly since I cook  20 out of 21 meals at home each week, but I think I need to be reasonable and plan to do it once or twice a month...We'll see how that goes.

I want to share a monthly challenge to do certain things in our homes, little jobs we might be missing that would add to the overall cleanliness and comfort.   I'm set on making this a monthly thing because it takes 21 days to form a new habit...and wouldn't it be wonderful to come to the end of the year with 12 new habits under our belt that have improved our home in some way and upped our homemaking game?

I also want to share a weekly insight, something to make you stop and think.  It might be a personal thing or a homemaking thing or a budget thing but just a little tip of sorts, or moment that made me go "Oh!" and might also inspire you.  I will most likely incorporate that into the Diary of a Homemaker's week post.

And of course, I'll continue to share projects, little devotional moments, etc.    But the main body of the newsletter will be pretty much what it's been with a few tweaks to freshen it.  Consider it all dusted off and wiped down and shining for the New Year!

Now let us get on to the meat of this post: Plans and Meals for the week.

Weekly Plans:  

I always feel I'm at a slight disadvantage since I start work on Sunday but too often I don't post this until late Sunday or Monday.  Never mind.  I have certain tasks I attempt to get round to on Sundays, and while it's not a full day's worth of work, I do try to get my basic cleaning out of the way as much as possible.

I usually strip the bed and bath (and the guest bed and bath too if we've had company).  I might not do the laundry until Monday but at least the bedding and towels are freshened.  I also try to do a quick home keeping routine: empty trash, wipe down counters really well in kitchen and bath, sweep floors, put away things left out over Friday night and Saturday, and just generally make sure things are nice and neat.  I usually accomplish this in about an hour after church since we get back home about 10:30 most Sundays. 

As I said Sunday's are not full on housekeeping days but there's enough of it in there to carry me through the first part of a week if necessary.

Monday I tend to do a little bit more housework, cleaning bathrooms, making beds, picking up, wiping down appliances.  For the cooler months,  I've agreed to give John two hours of time in the yard on Monday as well.  I left a pile of trimmings from the roses and lantana the other day and I need to remove those.  The rest of my time will be spent blowing off porches, picking up whatever branches he trims and hauling them to the brush piles we have in various spots about the yard.    

While I confess to being reluctant to give John that time, Samuel has asked to use my guest/craft room which has a big comfy office chair and a suitable table, as a Monday office space for himself and if I'm out of doors for the most part, I'll be less likely to disturb his concentration and work.   Anticipating this, I cleaned that room on Friday.  I need to make sure, once my menu is planned, that any foods required for Monday's meal prep are in the kitchen and not in my pantry/guest room closet!  

Inspiration Thought:  I should make it a habit to get foods together the day before a menu is going to be prepared anyway.  Hence, Sunday night, I pull out the items needed for Monday evening's meal... 

I've promised myself that I shall work on my recipe files this winter.  I want to gather all my most used recipes into one central notebook instead of having them spread over various cookbooks.  It just doesn't make sense to have to hunt down a recipe I use often enough but can't remember just where it is.  I thought I'd start work on that this week.

I want  to set up a wardrobe for January.  I don't do well with last minute decisions on pulling an outfit together.  I stall and waste time, try things on and toss them and start over again and then get in a panic.  If I have 6 or 7 outfits together and ready to go then I can choose from that section of my closet and know just which necklace, purse, etc. I want to use as well.  Plus it insures I'm wearing more of my wardrobe by planning things out monthly because I set up different outfits each month.  It's sort of a variation on a capsule wardrobe without being so very limited.

As I work my zone areas this month, I mean to declutter and reorganize those spaces and will save deep cleaning tasks for next month unless something is obviously in need of more than a routine cleaning.  This week is Zone 1/Kitchen, Back Entry/Laundry/Kitchen Sitting Area.  It sounds like a lot but it's really not,  it's all basically one room with an ell shape that is our back entry and laundry area.  I'll be sorting out cupboards and drawers and baskets and removing those things I haven't used in the past year.

I'll check the Target sales sheet and see if the Household Cleaning sale is on.  If so, then I'll make out my list, print out my coupon  and go to that store to do my first week of stock ups in that area.

We have some errands to run, too, so I might add shopping to that day.  Banking, mail to go out, etc.

Check my shed for harps for the bedroom lamps.  I bought the right sort of shades for those lamps and am anxious to get the new shades on.  I had spider shades which work for most lamps but the shades have been leaning drunkenly for the past two years and I've had enough.  I'd actually thought I wanted to replace the lamps but in analyzing why I had come to dislike them I realized it was because the shades don't stay on straight.  Putting the right shade on them with the harps, as they were made to have will make a world of difference.  Much cheaper than a pair of new lamps would be, too.

Except for the Zone work,  these are all extra sorts of things, over and above routine housekeeping and meals but any and all of them will make life easier and more pleasant, so I really want to try and get them done.

In The Kitchen:  

Inspiration:  I don't need to buy convenience foods.  I need to plan better for those days when I'm busy or unexpectedly need something that doesn't need a lot of prep work.  I'm thinking this is the time to thaw, cook and season some ground beef for tacos or spaghetti (quick meals) and refreeze it,  or to make smaller casseroles that can cook in less time in the oven or to have a listing of 15-20 minute meals I can make from scratch without resorting to over priced, frozen, preservative and chemical laden foods.  Hmmmm...Maybe a list of quick recipes in the front of my new recipe book would also be a help.

I need to sort out my big freezer.  I've been squeezing things in where they might fit since it was so full after we got our venison, but it's not quite as full now.  I think I can move things about and sort them in a better way so I can find them.  

Gathered Fragments: 

4 mini sub sandwiches

 1 pc Cherry delight 

breakfast sausages, cooked

variety of bread end pieces and crumbs in freezer

partial package of deer sausage

1/4 cup tomato sauce

1 piece of pizza

1/2 cut up orange

applesauce 

2 small Danish rolls

Frozen Waffles

Planned meals: Waffles and Mixed Sausages for breakfast, a Breakfast casserole (using some venison sausage and the bread pieces),and croutons,  Applesauce coffee cake or muffins, fruit salad using orange.

That leaves me with the pizza and danish breakfast rolls.  I'm pretty sure they will be good snacks for John.   

I checked some croutons I'd made and stored.  They were rancid so they went into the trash.  If I'd left off the oil and just dry toasted them, I wouldn't have had to throw them out.

Saturday:  Sub Sandwich*, Tomato Soup*(added in the tomato sauce), Pie*

Sunday: Gramma's Fried Chicken, Sweet Potatoes, Peas, Salad

Monday:  Red Beans and Rice* (using some of the deer sausage), Salad, Corn bread

Tuesday:   Chicken Pot Pie, Cranberry Sauce, Waldorf Salad

Wednesday:  Pot Roast with Vegetables, Peach Cobbler

Thursday:  Stuffed Peppers, Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans, Rolls

Friday:  Cubed Steak, Potatoes au Gratin, Green Salad

I'll cook extra rice on Monday to have ready for the stuffed peppers later in the week.  On Tuesday I'll do a pour over crust for the pot pie.  It's the same recipe I use for cobbler, minus the sugar, so I'll double the recipe, use half on the pot pie and then add sugar to the other half and make the cobbler.

Leisure/Quiet Time: 

I've started my first book for 2021, Louis Lamour's How the West Was Won, which he wrote based on the script for the movie of the same name.  In this case, the movie came first and the book second.  I am enjoying it far more than I thought I might and at the rate I'm reading, will be done with it before the week is out.  I'll set myself up a stack of books to read for January this week.

I'm going to try and commit myself to walk down the driveway and back once a day on the days I haven't walked elsewhere (i.e. when we're out shopping or doing yardwork).  

I'll try to sit on the porch, in the sun, if not walking or working in the yard.  I need the natural Vitamin D.   I'm going to try to get 30 minutes a day of sunshine.  Vitamin D has so many benefits and our over use of sunscreen and avoidance of all sunlight has really cut deeply into autoimmune defenses and calcium absorption.  Vitamin D deficiencies have been linked to cancer, thyroid dysfunction, diabetes, osteoporosis and depression.  Sunshine is free and one of the most natural sources of Vitamin D, besides Fish, like salmon or tuna and sardines are also good sources.  

And one last thing I want to work on is putting my legs up on a wall for 20 minutes a day.  It sounds absolutely foolish but here's the deal.  Way back in the 40's and 50's housewives were urged to lie on a plank or ironing board with one end higher than the other (propped on the sofa usually) and their feet at the higher end.  This drained the lymphatic system and was believed to benefit one's health in a great number of ways.  Well guess what?  A recent study shows that taking twenty minutes a day to rest with legs either propped up against a wall (or at the least with a pile of pillows under the feet raising them higher than the head) benefits digestion, sleep, heart rate and more.   This is something I keep saying I will do for myself but only do when I've been on my feet for hours.  I can say assuredly that I felt better on those days when I took the time to do this simple thing.

Now if you're like me, part of you is wondering how on earth the extra time can be had in a day to do all these 'extras'.  Personally, I'm going to try and get up a little earlier than I've been doing.  I've gotten pretty accustomed to sleeping until 8:30 or later and it's left me feeling harried and hurried.  I think rising at 7:30 isn't that hard a thing to do really.  That and spending  less time on the computer daily should just about give me all the 'extra'  time I need to walk, and soak in the sun.  While I'm out in the sun, I can read or write in my journal or even do a few outdoor tasks as part of my time, so win win.  All in all, I'm only swapping my time from one thing to another, not really adding anything in.    

During the time with my feet up, I mean to close my eyes.  I'm not trying to sleep but if I do then I must need it and if I don't I'll try to use the time as meditation time.  I think it will greatly benefit the anxiety I find myself prone to feeling to have that space in my day.  Personally I'm thinking about 3pm each afternoon is the time best suited to my doing this.  If I worked outside my home, I might use the first 20 minutes after I got home to do this.   I'd also use my lunch break to get both a walk in and the dose of sunlight.