Meal Planning {6.5.23} and weekend recap

Happy Monday morning! I hope you had a great weekend! We had some fun in the sun...and rain. 

We decided to play tennis Saturday morning, and of course as soon as we got to the courts, it started POURING. So we were just going to wait out the rain. As the saying goes, if you don't like the weather in Florida, just wait 5 minutes. 

Well, apparently, my girls can't wait 5 minutes, lol, so they decided to play in the rain. It did eventually stop, and I joined them for an hour or so. 

Then, later, they walked back to the park (this is the summer of independence for them - they are loving it!) to play some basketball. Notice now how it's sunny??

The rain kept at bay, so I could go for my nightly walk. I love this time. I take 30 minutest to go for a walk and listen to my audiobook. 

I found a new pair of shorts that I LOVE. I will buying these in all the colors, but I'm currently obsessed with these neon yellow ones!

Morning sunrises, still going strong - there's something about starting your mornings like this. 

and trying out new hairstyles on the girls. My girls have the THICKEST and longest hair ever, and they HATE putting their hair up in ponytails. I just don't get it! So, my thought is if I do fun hairstyles, they'll want to put their hair up. 

Sunday, Autumn had a birthday party for a friend at the North County pool, so naturally the other girls and I hung out too - I swam laps in the lanes, and the girls played around in the lanes. 

We're all a little sunkissed and a little blonder :) 

Ok - so since it's Monday, I'll be doing a weekend recap AND a meal planning post. 

I was doing really good with meal planning, until the school year started, even though I STILL meal planned each month (yes, I do a monthly meal plan, so that I only need to do it every few weeks. It's a game changer!)

I have them planned for "days," but I don't always do them on those days. Sometimes I don't even make them in that week - I just circle them on my monthly menu so I know I can add them to the next month's menu. You'll find the links for the recipes below

 1. Grilled Mahi - We've been using our grill A LOT. The girls used to hate grilled food because it looked "burnt" but they're realizing it's not burnt, it's flavor!

2. Loaded Nachos - A SkinnyTaste recipe. I just love some loaded nachos!

3. Tortilla Encrusted Chicken - Another new SkinnyTaste recipe. I usually really like their recipes. If you try this one, let me know what you think. 

4. Sweet & Sour Shrimp Rice Bowls - This is a new one, but it uses already make salad mix, so I'm always game for a quick and easy recipe

5. Crabcakes - this is such an easy recipe using StoveTop Stuffing. Not the healthiest, in terms of whole foods, but it's always good!

And here's what I prepped for my breakfast this morning

Sweet potato

onion

sausage

paprika

tumeric

S & P

Then each day, I'll sauté spinach and cook an egg to put on top. It's SO GOOD

One of my go-to snacks this week - it's like a pina colada yogurt!

vanilla yogurt (your favorite - this one is my new favorite right now!)

dried pineapple

coconut

cinnamon

walnuts

Unplanned Closet Remodel

So, last Friday (the last day of school), I was out at our school's End of the Year party and Ron called me to tell me that our hallway pantry just collapsed (it's an overflow pantry, since I buy a lot of items in bulk and stock up during BOGO events). Then he sends me these pictures....

yeah....so that's fun. 

and of course, my workout room always gets the shaft whenever we need to store things. So those were fun mornings to workout - among the clutter, which totally gives me anxiety, which is one of the reasons I workout - to NOT have anxiety haha. 

See the irony??

anyway.. this is KIND of what the closet looked like before.

So we hemmed and hawed and totally couldn't make up our minds on what to do. We had things in our cart at Lowes/Home Depot... took it out, put something else in... took it out and put something else in, only to take that out and leave empty handed. lol 

The girls were actually having a fun time during our shopping, despite what this picture looks like. haha!

FINALLY, we came up with a plan. And it was NOTHING like what we had started with.

So Caroline and I got to caulking and painting...

And Ron put in the baseboards (that were 8 years in the waiting) Just the paint job and baseboards made it look so good already!

Now, Ron is a pefectionist, but he's not a builder (I grew up with my dad being a builder, so I feel bad for Ron - because I'm always like "can't you just....." lol He's like, "No, Jen. I can't just whip this up."

But guys... I'm so impressed with what Ron did! This pantry is so beautiful! And I have so much more room than before! 

That open space on the right is for all of our vacuums lol Yes, we have three vacuums.  A carpet cleaner, a regular vacuum, and a battery one that we can do quick daily vacuums. 

I love it! And now I want to make something else! haha!

It's Summer Time!

Well, it's summer time, and that means there's time for me to start blogging again!

I miss this little part of my world when school is in session and the kids are going everywhere under the sun during the week, and weekend.

So, here I am again, almost a year later.

We just finished our first week of summer... so let me do a recap, shall I?

Get ready for a photo dump!

So, we ended our school year (first day picture 👆 and last day picture 👇)

and I packed up my classroom... it was a great year back as a teacher! Not sure if I ever explained it on here, but last year, I quit teaching in the middle of the year. It was terribly hard thing to do, but after the emotional and physical toll it was taking on me, I had to give it up. I had no idea what I was going to do with the rest of my "career" but then a job opportunity presented itself to work at PCCA - so I took a leap of faith. So far, it has been such a great experience and I'm so glad I took that leap!

I'm still getting up early to get in my workout - because that's how I like to start my day. I'm such an early bird and I feel weird if I don't start my day with a workout.

THEN... I get to sit on my front porch with my coffee and watch the sun rise over the lake. It's one of my favorite things about living right where we do. 

So what have we been up to this week?

Well... we've done a project (more on that in another post)

I've done some chores (I'll spare you the pictures of the container after shampooing each room. Oh yes, I did take pictures - because I had to show the girls just how GROSS their rooms were)

But we've also played a lot!

Of course some beach days...

and lots of reading. I feel like Dr. Seuss...

Would you read in a hammock?

Would you read at the beach?

Would you, could you read on the couch?

Would you read in the pool? haha! 

Some lunch time creativity...

I just love to watch their creativity flow...and those beautiful smiles.

And some ice cream at our favorite beachside dive.

We've hit the library a few times, so they decided they wanted to update their library bags. So we went to Michael's and bought some new canvas bags and some puffy paint.

Brooklynn and Caroline have been spending a lot of time donning our sidewalks with some beautiful murals. They'll spend a few hours out there just creating!

We hit up Aquatica one day.

And had picnic lunches on the beach.

Star fishies....

and sea turtle tracks and nests.

Caroline was jumping off the railing hoping to be like Mary Poppins. haha!

We've also tried to spend more time with my grandparents. They just love showing off their great-grandchildren. 

and we spent the morning at a park and ended up having a game of kickball! It was so fun. Our family is slightly competitive, so I love when I get to play against them and their friends. haha

Well, that's kind of our first week in a nutshell. I like to stay busy, so we'll see how long that lasts.