Dear Hubster,
On your 44th birthday today, I wanted to tell you just how very blessed I am to be your wife and lifelong partner. I thank God every day for giving you to me. You are the only man who has ever fought for me and stood by me through good times, trying times and downright ugly times. You have given me so much and forgiven me so much more than I deserve. You make me a better, stronger woman and I am grateful. You are an excellent father and amazing grandfather. I could not have asked for anyone better to spend the rest of my earthly days with.
I believe that God is leading us to something great in the near future and I am excited to be on this journey with you. So, Happy Birthday dear hubster!!
Today and every day, I love you and thank God for you.
Your loving wife,
Melissa
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
H2NOOOOOOOO!!!
It's no secret that I am not a fan of water. There's no taste (and sometimes a nasty aftertaste). Sometimes I enjoy some ice water, but I have to be REALLY thirsty.
As part of our life changes this year, Brian (hubster) and I are always on the lookout for healthy alternatives that are good for us, convenient and taste good. I've read a million different blogs, facebook posts and articles about infused water and naturally flavored water and knew that I had to incorporate something like that to up my intake of water. So, last night I got 3 of my recycled bottles out of the drawer, put a tablespoon of lemon juice and 1.5 tablespoons of honey in the bottom of each one. Then I filled them with warm water (to dissolve the honey) and shook them up like a mad woman. :) Stuck them in the fridge overnight and brought them to work with me this morning (along with my Vi-Shake Smoothie).
As I was getting started on my project for the day, I opened up a bottle of my water and was AMAZED!! It's the yummiest water I've ever had. I've already finished one and am about half-way through the second. I doubt the third one makes it to the end of the day. There are so many health benefits in each bottle and it actually tastes really, really good! I can see this being integrated into every single day - and actually reaching my water intake goals.
So, if you're a water hater like me, give this a try and see if, maybe, it helps you get properly, deliciously hydrated!! Do a Google search to see all the benefits of lemon juice and honey. You might be surprised at just how good they are for you!
Until next time,
In His Love,
~Melissa~
As part of our life changes this year, Brian (hubster) and I are always on the lookout for healthy alternatives that are good for us, convenient and taste good. I've read a million different blogs, facebook posts and articles about infused water and naturally flavored water and knew that I had to incorporate something like that to up my intake of water. So, last night I got 3 of my recycled bottles out of the drawer, put a tablespoon of lemon juice and 1.5 tablespoons of honey in the bottom of each one. Then I filled them with warm water (to dissolve the honey) and shook them up like a mad woman. :) Stuck them in the fridge overnight and brought them to work with me this morning (along with my Vi-Shake Smoothie).
As I was getting started on my project for the day, I opened up a bottle of my water and was AMAZED!! It's the yummiest water I've ever had. I've already finished one and am about half-way through the second. I doubt the third one makes it to the end of the day. There are so many health benefits in each bottle and it actually tastes really, really good! I can see this being integrated into every single day - and actually reaching my water intake goals.
So, if you're a water hater like me, give this a try and see if, maybe, it helps you get properly, deliciously hydrated!! Do a Google search to see all the benefits of lemon juice and honey. You might be surprised at just how good they are for you!
Until next time,
In His Love,
~Melissa~
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
Hey all! You thought I was going to flake on this blog again, didn't you? Well, here I am!! Haha
The past few weeks have been a little trying for me spiritually. My hubster has been off work for a long time with his shoulder injury and it is really taking a toll on him. We've been financially strapped and he's been getting depressed and angry over the lack of improvement in his shoulder. He's still weak, still has pain every minute of every day and still does not have good range of motion back. It breaks my heart to see him so frustrated and down. He feels like he's not providing for his family and is useless. It's so far from the truth, however, yet I cannot get him to see... He's been cleaning the kitchen almost nightly so that I don't have to. He's been doing my laundry (along with his) so that I don't have to. He's been running any errands that we have during the day so that I don't have to. I wish he could see just how valuable all this is to me. I pray for him every day in the hope that he'll get the healing he needs - physically, mentally and spiritually - and get back to enjoying life.
One thing that we recently started is menu planning. With an extremely tight budget and 3 - 6 people to feed on any given night, we had to get creative and frugal. I went on the search for a menu planner that would work for us. There are a BAZILLION decorative and beautiful menu planning boards on Pinterest, but I don't have the time, energy or resources to do that right now. There are printable plans - both free and paid - but I can't personalize or customize it to fit my needs and my family. Then I had a lightbulb moment... "Excel has tons of templates. Maybe they have a menu planner." Guess what?!?! They DO!!!! So I opened the template and saved it as my own, un-merged all the cells so I could list compnents of our menu on separate lines (perfectionism!!!), and started dropping in meals on each day. I added tabs and copied the whole thing over so I could plan for the month all at once (yeah right!! lol). Then, anxiously awaiting sarcastic remarks, I emailed it to my hubster to check out what I was talking about.
While waiting for his response, I found a local farm that sells whole, frozen, organic, free-range chickens for a really great price. I also found a sale on ground beef at our local grocery store. And, while perusing the website of the farmer selling chickens, I discovered a Farmer's Market that was pretty close by too. I shared all of this information with him as well and told him how it would fit into the menu plan and eliminate the need for daily trips to a store to get dinner for one night.
Then, he AGREED to it all!!! He really liked the idea of saving money and staying away from the store as much as possible. So, last Saturday we headed to Greenfield (about a 15 minute drive) and went to the Farmer's Market. We got a chicken, pork steaks, bacon and raw honey. All certified organic and free-range, grass-fed. Next, we stopped at Marsh and got our ground beef - a LOT of it!! And finally, we went to WalMart to get potatoes, spinach, kale, frozen fruit and a few other necessities. We got shakes at Steak n' Shake and headed home. Done in less than 2 hours because we stuck to our plan and we didn't overspend.
Once we got home, I separated the hamburger into 1-lb packages and prepped them for freezing. Then, he put the turkey, that we got with a gift certificate from his employer, into the roaster and "set it and forget it" and we took a nap. A few hours later, we had a 16-lb turkey that was cooked to perfection. Fall-off-the-bone tender. Then, I proceeded to make bacon and eggs for our dinner. We were alone. lol Hubster broke down the turkey and we put the meat and bones - in separate containers - in the fridge for the night. On Sunday I made 5 containers of 4-cups each of turkey stock and we STILL did not eat the turkey. We had nachos for Superbowl dinner. Monday night, we had turkey manhattans (with gravy made from my stock) with zero leftovers!! Then I put the rest of the turkey into 1-lb packages and froze all but one. Yesterday, I put a package of turkey, a package of noodles (from my last stockpile adventure) and 2 containers of stock into the crockpot. PERFECT dinner when I got home from work!!
This menu planning thing is really working out for us. It eases the financial burden, thus my Hubster's stress-level, since we're not making multiple trips to the grocery and I can tell the kid(s) days ahead what's for dinner. It means I have to cook more, but it's totally worth it. And the food is AMAZING! Tonight's dinner is already defrosted and marinating in the fridge for me to cook when I get home. That makes our nights so much less stressful! Bonus... It's Criminal Minds night! Yay!
If you want to check out the farmer I mentioned above, you can do it here. They have beef and pork, too, and plan to add honey in the near future. :)
Until next time...
In His Love,
~Melissa~
The past few weeks have been a little trying for me spiritually. My hubster has been off work for a long time with his shoulder injury and it is really taking a toll on him. We've been financially strapped and he's been getting depressed and angry over the lack of improvement in his shoulder. He's still weak, still has pain every minute of every day and still does not have good range of motion back. It breaks my heart to see him so frustrated and down. He feels like he's not providing for his family and is useless. It's so far from the truth, however, yet I cannot get him to see... He's been cleaning the kitchen almost nightly so that I don't have to. He's been doing my laundry (along with his) so that I don't have to. He's been running any errands that we have during the day so that I don't have to. I wish he could see just how valuable all this is to me. I pray for him every day in the hope that he'll get the healing he needs - physically, mentally and spiritually - and get back to enjoying life.
One thing that we recently started is menu planning. With an extremely tight budget and 3 - 6 people to feed on any given night, we had to get creative and frugal. I went on the search for a menu planner that would work for us. There are a BAZILLION decorative and beautiful menu planning boards on Pinterest, but I don't have the time, energy or resources to do that right now. There are printable plans - both free and paid - but I can't personalize or customize it to fit my needs and my family. Then I had a lightbulb moment... "Excel has tons of templates. Maybe they have a menu planner." Guess what?!?! They DO!!!! So I opened the template and saved it as my own, un-merged all the cells so I could list compnents of our menu on separate lines (perfectionism!!!), and started dropping in meals on each day. I added tabs and copied the whole thing over so I could plan for the month all at once (yeah right!! lol). Then, anxiously awaiting sarcastic remarks, I emailed it to my hubster to check out what I was talking about.
While waiting for his response, I found a local farm that sells whole, frozen, organic, free-range chickens for a really great price. I also found a sale on ground beef at our local grocery store. And, while perusing the website of the farmer selling chickens, I discovered a Farmer's Market that was pretty close by too. I shared all of this information with him as well and told him how it would fit into the menu plan and eliminate the need for daily trips to a store to get dinner for one night.
Then, he AGREED to it all!!! He really liked the idea of saving money and staying away from the store as much as possible. So, last Saturday we headed to Greenfield (about a 15 minute drive) and went to the Farmer's Market. We got a chicken, pork steaks, bacon and raw honey. All certified organic and free-range, grass-fed. Next, we stopped at Marsh and got our ground beef - a LOT of it!! And finally, we went to WalMart to get potatoes, spinach, kale, frozen fruit and a few other necessities. We got shakes at Steak n' Shake and headed home. Done in less than 2 hours because we stuck to our plan and we didn't overspend.
Once we got home, I separated the hamburger into 1-lb packages and prepped them for freezing. Then, he put the turkey, that we got with a gift certificate from his employer, into the roaster and "set it and forget it" and we took a nap. A few hours later, we had a 16-lb turkey that was cooked to perfection. Fall-off-the-bone tender. Then, I proceeded to make bacon and eggs for our dinner. We were alone. lol Hubster broke down the turkey and we put the meat and bones - in separate containers - in the fridge for the night. On Sunday I made 5 containers of 4-cups each of turkey stock and we STILL did not eat the turkey. We had nachos for Superbowl dinner. Monday night, we had turkey manhattans (with gravy made from my stock) with zero leftovers!! Then I put the rest of the turkey into 1-lb packages and froze all but one. Yesterday, I put a package of turkey, a package of noodles (from my last stockpile adventure) and 2 containers of stock into the crockpot. PERFECT dinner when I got home from work!!
This menu planning thing is really working out for us. It eases the financial burden, thus my Hubster's stress-level, since we're not making multiple trips to the grocery and I can tell the kid(s) days ahead what's for dinner. It means I have to cook more, but it's totally worth it. And the food is AMAZING! Tonight's dinner is already defrosted and marinating in the fridge for me to cook when I get home. That makes our nights so much less stressful! Bonus... It's Criminal Minds night! Yay!
If you want to check out the farmer I mentioned above, you can do it here. They have beef and pork, too, and plan to add honey in the near future. :)
Until next time...
In His Love,
~Melissa~
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