Things are coming together

Well, nervous as I am, things seem to be coming together. My procedure is set for Monday afternoon. It will be fine, it's just never fun facing this kind of thing.

I feel as though I have left my colleagues in a good place with what I accomplished this week at work. At home, I'm caught up on laundry and almost caught up on the dishes (and I still have all day tomorrow).

I have a meal plan made up that is full of easy options that my husband will have no problem pulling together himself until I'm back in the saddle.

I've done a little extra decluttering and cleaning this week, not as much as I should in a 'normal' week, but this week was not normal.

I'm even all caught up recording our receipts in my budgeting system and we have cash on hand to cover the ridiculous parking fees at the hospital.

All that's really left to do is to pack. I've been thinking about it a little and I believe I have a good idea of the bare essentials that I want to bring. I'll take care of that tomorrow.

Praying for peace and a speedy recovery.

Thank you for joining me on my journey as a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

Please comment or send your questions to me on the Homemaking Diva Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/HomemakingDiva

Thinking About Christmas?

First off, I have to tell you, yes, in my opinion, it is still way too early for Christmas decorations and music. But, now is the perfect time to plan!

It's mid-November, craft shows are in high gear and we're starting to get into make-ahead season. Now is the time to set aside some extra time and some extra money (if you haven't already) to make sure that Christmas doesn't surprise you.

I encourage you to spend some time thinking about what you are going to do this year. Just ask yourself some questions and write down the answers:

• Who is on your gift list?
• How much money do you plan on spending on gifts?
• What might you get for each person?
• Are there any crafts you need to get going on?
• How many get-togethers do you want to go to?
• Are you hosting any of these get-togethers?
• What goodies are you going to bake?
• What baking can be made ahead?
• And don't forget your family traditions!

November is a great time to get started on crafts and baking. A friend of mine has a craft show every year with her mother and one or two other vendors. I always go and usually get all my stocking-stuffers there.

My sister and I bake together, and we had our first session on Saturday. It was extra fun this year because now my seven-year-old niece is old enough to help (not just busy-work 'help' but actually help). We make our list, pick our dates and split the groceries. It's always a lot of fun.

If you start planning now, you can beat the rush and avoid the malls on crazy December Saturdays. If you can swing it, try going on a weekday-day during November to get a head start on your gift buying.

Thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

Please comment or send your questions to me on the Homemaking Diva Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/HomemakingDiva or by email at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Countdown to the Holidays! Chow Down

Christmas is coming, Christmas is coming!

We all have extra shopping to do in December, let's help ease the burden and chow down! I challenge you to do less (regular) grocery shopping in December. Eat what you have, go 'freezer diving', get creative, and save some money!

I have the habit of putting  leftover sauce into the freezer. Plus I usually stock up on the meat that's on sale for half price at my store. I know I have another half a bag of black beans, plus a few 'cans' in the freezer. And I REALLY need to finish that box of rice I bought... too long ago.

Is your food storage in a similar state? Will you accept the Challenge?

Chow Down Challenge:

1. Wait as long as possible to go grocery shopping this month and buy as little as possible. (I'm talking about regular grocery shopping, not Christmas Dinner.)
2. Use up what you already have. Get creative. Dig to the bottom of the freezer and the back of the pantry.
3. Save some money.

Thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

Please comment or send your questions to me on the Homemaking Diva Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/HomemakingDiva or by email at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Countdown to the Holidays! - Use it or Lose it!

OK Canadians!

If you still have turkey dinner leftovers in your fridge, this is your warning. You want to finish up what you can for dinner tonight and then freeze or throw out the rest. Tomorrow is officially cootie-ville! :)

I had turkey dinner leftovers for lunch, and we'll be having some more for dinner. I've asked my husband to 'do' the turkey today (get the meat off the bones) and I'll be starting bone broth in the crock cooker when he's done and chopping the meat and freezing in baggies for other meals.

Thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

Please comment or send your questions to me on the Homemaking Diva Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/HomemakingDiva or by email at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Countdown to the Holidays - Are you Ready?

Well, tomorrow is Turkey Day for me. Doing what I can now to make tomorrow easier.

I made the marshmallow salad (family tradition, NEEDS to be made 1 day ahead) and the white bean dip (from Saving Dinner, CAN be made a day ahead), I also chopped up a large cucumber, carrot, some celery, and a yellow bell pepper, and put them in a large zipplerware (ziploc + tupperware = zipplerware) container covered in water in the fridge. They're for dipping in the white bean dip, I'll fish them out with a slotted spoon tomorrow :)

That's three things ready and done. I also washed all the dishes and did a 15 minute tidy. Now I can relax, play with my sewing stuff, read, and hang out with my husband. (Which are great things to do on a holiday weekend!)

Tomorrow, I'm making the garlic smashed red potatoes in the morning, and having them on keep warm in my crock cooker all day (with a little butter over the top). Plus I'll cut my bread for stuffing before we leave to pick up my in-laws.

Sometime around noon will be time to preheat the oven, make the stuffing, and prep the bird. When the turkey's halfway done (or so) I'll make the pumpkin pie and pop it in the oven, too.

Gravy and the green beans are the only things that'll need to be done last-minute and they're both pretty easy.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

Please comment or send your questions to me on the Homemaking Diva Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/HomemakingDiva or by email at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Countdown to the Holidays! - Thanksgiving Prep

Hello everyone!

Since I'm making Turkey Dinner for my in-laws on Monday, I'm trying to spread my prep work out so I'm just doing a little each day.

Today I turned my turkey over (hoping this will help it thaw more evenly) in the fridge. I went over my recipes again and pulled out the rest of the ingredients I needed out of the freezer so they will be thawed in time.

I got out my turkey roasting pan (which I pretty much only use for Thanksgiving and Christmas) and washed it along with the rest of the dishes. DH put the dishwasher on for me, and I'm having my normal laundry day.

I'll also have a '15 minute tidy' later on, to baby-step the whole 'cleaning the house for company' thing. It's not too bad, just needs some touch ups. :)

It's cool and rainy today, maybe I'll do some baking, too. We'll see.

Are you getting ready for the big day?

Thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

Please comment or send your questions to me on the Homemaking Diva Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/HomemakingDiva or by email at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Coundown to the Holidays! Getting it Together

Well, they DID actually have turkeys in stock yesterday morning, yay! So now I have two. One is defrosting in my fridge for Thanksgiving and the other is waiting patiently in my chest freezer for Christmas.

If you're cooking a turkey this year, it's time to get it thawing :) And  while you're putting the turkey in the fridge, you might want to clean it out. Not clean-wash, clean-declutter. Well, you can clean-wash if you want to. I'll be cleaning out my fridge today to make room for Thanksgiving.


While I was in town yesterday I also picked up bread at Westons - so much cheaper than the grocery store. They bake the name-brand bread and deliver to the grocery stores. What the stores don't sell the day of, gets returned, and I can get one-day-older bread at the Westons thrift store for less than half price! I was nice and grabbed two squished loaves as part of my purchase - they can be for stuffing.

Today is Thanksgiving grocery day for me. I'm going to look at my Thanksgiving Planner and pull the recipes for the dishes I picked. Then I'll check the fridge, freezers and pantry for what I already have and make a grocery list for what I don't, then it's off the the store! Shouldn't be too much. I already did a 'normal' grocery trip. This is just holiday 'touch-up'.



Thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

Please comment or send your questions to me on the Homemaking Diva Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/HomemakingDiva or by email at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Countdown to the Holidays! Planning for Sanity

Thanksgiving is going to be here soon, so I'm doing my best to be prepared. Hopefully by the time you read this, I will have purchased my turkeys. I am bound and determined to find some at a good price, so I will be going to Walmart for a THIRD time, first thing at opening this morning (I'm writing this last night). You'd think Walmart would realize that they should stock up on items that are on at a really good price; I mean, if you keep running out of the turkeys that are on sale, maybe you should start ordering MORE?? Maybe?

Sorry. Rant over :)

I did sit down and finalize my Thanksgiving menu and update my planner page.

• White Bean Dip and Veggies
• Turkey
• Stuffing
• Gravy
• Garlicky Smashed Red Potatoes
• Nutmeg Green Beans
• Marshmallow Salad (family tradition)
• Pumpkin Pie with Whipped Cream

I've got the basics covered and a bit of my weird upbringing thrown in. The plan is to make the dip, chop the veggies, and make the marshmallow salad on Sunday. And the pumpkin pie can be baking somewhere around when the turkey's half done.

My favorite trick (and one you'll love too!) is to make the mashed potatoes (whatever kind you like at your place) EARLY. Then put it in the crock cooker with a little butter over the top on 'keep warm' until dinnertime. One less thing to do later. Just be sure to test run your crock pot first (you can make a potato chowder if you want afterwards) you don't want scorched potatoes on the big day! I got that tip from Leanne Ely who got it from Flylady.

I've got a few things to do each day from Thursday to Monday (including tidying the house in babysteps) so I'm not doing everything at once. Sounds like a plan to me!

Thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Countdown to the Holidays! The Turkey Hunt

 It's October! Can you believe it? Neither can I! But it is, nonetheless.

October is time to officially kick off your holiday planning. And I'm not just talking about Christmas. There's Thanksgiving (and even Halloween) thrown into the mix, too. (Plus Hanukkah, or whatever else you celebrate at the end of the year.)

Head's up, Canadians! You have just one week until Thanksgiving! Turkeys are on sale, pick one up ASAP. Ninety-nine cents a pound for a frozen turkey is a good price. If you can afford it, pick up two and you have Christmas dinner handled also! That's my plan. I'm heading to town tonight. There are two stores that have turkeys on for ninety-seven cents a pound, so I'm picking up two turkeys. One for Thanksgiving and one for Christmas.

Later this week, I'll do the rest of the groceries. But I don't want to be going to 7 grocery stores the last weekday before Christmas hunting for turkeys EVER again! (That's what happened last year - boo!)

I like to keep my holiday meals simple and make up a 5-day plan (or so) I just recycle and tweak the last one, most of the time. I spread the meal prep and house cleaning over 5 days and then I only have a little bit to do each day. That'll be the job for tomorrow.

Thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

 Please comment here or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Homemaking Diva Routines Two

More work in the kitchen! How are your dishes doing? I hope you're doing well and aren't too overwhelmed. Next step: Having food ready to cook.

Now, I work for Saving Dinner, so I do have a bias with them, but they ARE really good in and of themselves, and I am NOT getting paid to promote them here :) So if you don't know WHAT to make for dinner, we sell all kinds of plans for you that give you the recipes and the categorized shopping lists to make life just that much easier :) But that's only part of what I'm talking about today.

Today what I really want to talk to you about is setting up routines to get your food planned, into the house, and out of the freezer.

Planning meals: This doesn't have to be complicated. Look at what's on sale (to keep it simple, try sticking to just one store), think about what you and yours like to eat, and see what matches. And don't forget to check what's already in your cupboards, fridge and freezer. Think breakfast, lunch, and dinner. List a few things, see what you need to buy, and make your list. If you're just starting out, you can do just a couple days, I like to do a week at a time.

Grocery shopping: You've made your list, you've checked it twice, it's time to head to the store. The. Store. Singular. That's right. Actually, you can do whatever you want, I don't have any Homemaking Diva Police (yet) to come and fine you if you go to multiple stores, but hear me out. Every store has a sale every week, most stores will have everything on sale at different times. I do all of my grocery shopping at one store, yes chicken is on sale at another store this week and I eat chicken, but chicken was on sale at my store a couple weeks ago and it will be on sale at my store again. To me, multiple stores are not worth the hassle. Plus, since I only go to the one store, I made my grocery list to fit my store, so I know which aisle everything is in, plus I'm familiar with my store, so I can get in and out quickly.

Today and Tomorrow, Everyday: Remember my chicken sale example? Well, chicken was on sale a couple weeks ago at my store, and I bought it then... actually I stocked up. And that means that if I want to eat chicken THIS week, I have to thaw it out because it's in the freezer. So, everyday need to think about what's for dinner today and what's for dinner tomorrow. When I think about today I consider if there's any extra prep work that needs to be done early (marinating, crock cooker), and I need to pull meat out of the freezer for tomorrow.

You routines to build:
Everyday, think about what's for dinner today, and do any preparations you need to. And have meat in the fridge for tomorrow's dinner so it's not frozen when you need it.
Weekly, plan your meals, make your list, and go shopping!

Thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Love,
Valerie :D

Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Christmas is Coming! But First: Company and Carpet :)

Confused by that title? :D Let me explain.

First of all 'Christmas is coming' - not very difficult to comprehend. I know many of you are groaning: 'But it was just Halloween, gimme some time!' Please don't get upset, I agree with you! It drives me crazy that there's Christmas stuff in all the stores already and personally, I refuse to decorate one iota before December 1st.

But! NOW is the time to plan and prepare! Flylady's Holiday Cruising Missions are in full swing, and the organizing sites are bursting with time-saving ideas. What's a Holiday Cruising Mission? Well, simplest way to put it is Flylady sends out one mission per weekday, starting mid-October, and she helps us to baby-step our way through preparing for Christmas. There's a fun little game behind it where you're pretending you're going on a cruise December 1st-21st and you HAVE to get everything done ahead of time. It's a great system, keeping you on track, one baby-step at a time.

While I'm not exactly following the Cruising Missions, I am baby-stepping my way through Christmas.

My sister and I do our baking together, and we've already planned what we're making, who's bringing which ingredients and supplies, and when we're making each recipe. This is our third year doing it, so we have it down to a science, I have a simple spreadsheet with recipe names across the top and ingredients down the side and the amounts of each ingredient per recipe in the middle with columns on the end for totals and initials (who's bringing what). We mostly make our same traditional goodies each year, so all I had to do this year was pull up last year's spreadsheet, do a 'save as' and make some minor tweaks. We're making 7 recipes, plus icing over 3 days together and we already did one day. We have fun and get it done, and THAT'S the Flylady way :D

I pulled out my Holiday Control Journal (a free printable from Flylady.net) and I have all my little notes from the last few years. I don't use it quite how Flylady set it up, but I do have everything together. I added a non-Christmas section, and that's where I have my sheet of paper that lists how many kids we had for Halloween each year, so I have a good idea of how much candy to pick up. I also have my Thanksgiving meal planners in there - one page checklists of what order to make each dish, how far ahead... Sound like a lot of work? Saving Dinner just posted theirs and you know it's gonna be fool-proof :D

So I'm starting to THINK about Christmas now, plan a bit here and there, I've picked up a few things already. I got all the stocking stuffers already - a friend of mine had a craft sale with all kinds of pretty and useful and yummy things :D A word of caution: If you're picking up gifts ahead of time and hiding them, be sure to either note where they are (put a reminder in your phone's calendar to ding at you on, say, December 12th, and then you can wrap the gifts and put them under the tree) or keep them all in the same place. I have a spot in my house that I usually hide DH's gifts, and he hasn't found it yet, not that he's been looking. So I know where things are, because they wouldn't be anywhere else :)

ANYWAYS, what was the rest of the title? Oh yes! 'Company and Carpet' right.

So I'm having overnight guests on Saturday. They said they'd get here around 8pm and they're visiting someone else on Sunday before they go home, so I'm figuring a snack Saturday night plus breakfast Sunday morning. I'm keeping it simple, but fancy at the same time. Old bananas were reduced drastically a while back and they called to me, so I brought them home and made two loaves of banana bread. We ate one, but I froze the other, so there's my Saturday night snack :D

Also, I wanted to do something fun for breakfast. I have a cookbook that was a fundraiser for the hospital I bought at a concert and recently I've been trying some of the recipes. And guess what?? The chocolate crepes recipe (which is sooo good - oh yeah, I'm making that today, too for post-night shift 'breakfast' - see my post on shifting) it says to make the batter 1-24 hours ahead of time! (I actually didn't notice that the first time I made it, and didn't care the second time... whatever) So I can make the batter and the whipped cream to go with it (I do Dream Whip: packet + milk + vanilla = DONE) sometime on Saturday before they arrive and then breakfast will be a snap!

Really, I've let the housework slide a bit too much, so having company coming is a great deadline to get myself into gear. And THEN once I've tidied everything up, it's so simple to maintain and I can have a stress free Christmas!

Carpet: My last post was all about how I'd finished painting DH's office. Well, the carpet guy is coming on Friday, so I need to tear the old carpet out (it's cheaper if I do it, once I get into it, I'll decide if it's worth the $35 savings :D it's probably easier than you think). So not only do I have to prepare for company, I have to make space for the carpet guy. But that ALSO means that we can start setting up DH's office :D and then my 'Joyous Snowball' will start rolling down the hill!



Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Have great day!

Valerie :D

Losing It With Leanne Challenge Day 21 - Weigh in, Good Progress

February 1, 2011

I'm really having fun doing the Losing It With Leanne program!  The food is great and varied, I'm not hungry, I'm getting good nutrients in, I'm moving, and I'm losing weight! But not just losing weight, I'm getting healthier and making good choices.

I've been getting busier and busier all the time, so I haven't posted much, and honestly, I have missed a few workouts, but! I'm not giving up and I'm doing well!

I got on the wii and I am making progress. My BMI is down to 26.43 (from original 27.18) and my weight is down 2.1kg total (4.62 pounds). I'm three weeks in and I'm approaching my goal of losing 3 kg (6.6 pounds) very well.

On the wii today, I set up the 'my routine' to use the yoga and strength training exercises that I do the most. I think there are 7 moves and it's about 11 minutes. This is going to be my warm up, and then I'll go on to other things. This week I'm going to try to do some of JJ Virgin's "bursting" a few times. We'll see how that goes :D

So anyway, thank you for joining me, and I hope I can help you! It really is fun to be a Homemaking Diva!!

Please comment or send your questions to me at homemakingdiva@hotmail.com

Have great day!

Valerie :D

Losing It With Leanne Challenge Day 1

Jan 12, 2011

Losing It With Leanne Challenge Day 1 :D
First of all, I'm sorry I haven't posted in a while... I got a job at Saving Dinner of all places (after I was fawning all over them here) and I got busy, and distracted... Typical SHE ;)

So I'm back, and Saving Dinner is doing a Losing It With Leanne challenge right now! In fact, the whole staff is doing the challenge right along with everyone else!

So anyways. I ordered my protein powder a week ago, and it's not here yet, but I'm done waiting! (I'm in Canada, and I ordered from the States to get the specific one that Leanne recommended, so it's nobody's fault it's not here yet.)

Today, I sat down with my grocery list, Losing It With Leanne volume 1 (well, I have the whole thing printed off in my binder, but I'm starting at the beginning), and my Saving Dinner recipes that I already had printed out. I flipped through the Body Clutter menus that I had and picked dishes based on what sounded good and what meat I either had or was on sale. (That's how I usually shop, except I'm not always in the BC recipes.) I picked 6 recipes that look SOOO yummy even though they're good for me ;) and noted what I needed to get to make them (mostly produce, you'd be amazed at how little time I needed to spend in the middle of the store).
Sirloin tip roasts were on sale this week for half price, so I bought 3! You'll love this trick: they were on for $2.00 a pound and I had 2 beef recipes, one called for 2 pounds and the other for 3/4 pounds... So I looked for a roast that was as close to $5.75 as I could find :D Actually, I ended up buying three roasts and froze 2!
After I did my mains, I went through the rest of the daily eating plan and picked my options. There are 7 breakfast options in the LWL plan and 6 lunches, and I didn't want to buy for ALL of them at once, so I picked - again, based on what I had and what's good. Now I have most of the stuff for the breakfasts and stuff for 4 lunch options plus the soup! And I added some stuff to the list for my DH, he's not officially going on the plan with me, but I'm not cooking separate dinners for us. I jut told him that the recipes look good in and of themselves and he's fine with that. But I did get him 'regular' cereal and Black Forest ham for sandwiches, because he likes that.
That's the great part about the Losing It With Leanne plan, it's not all that different from regular eating, we just really need to make the healthier choices (low fat, not full fat dairy products, lots of veggies, less carbs (not no carbs, less carbs), and watch our portion sizes. It's more regimented for the people on the plan, but it's not the type of plan that turns you into a short order cook because your family "won't" eat it.
When my grocery list was done it was almost 50% produce, with a LOT of stuff around the outside of the store, and I only had to go down 4 centre aisles and that was for: Picante sauce, Kashi (and regular cereal for DH), bay leafs, tuna, white beans, and diced tomatoes. In my opinion, that's a pretty good list! And the best part was, I got to the cereal aisle and Kashi was ON SALE!! I love it when I'm going to buy something anyways and it's on sale! :D I really didn't spend any more than usual, especially considering how much nutrition was in my cart, plus I was buying 3 roasts instead of just the one I needed. So it cost about the same as normal with a little extra for all the meat, but that is normal :D
OK, so that's groceries... Got home, put everything away, had my 'mid-afternoon snack' of Kashi and then did all my measurements, then went downstairs and got on the wii fit to weigh myself. Today my BMI is 27.18 the wii wants me to aim for 22. It's a little high, but it has been slowly but surely coming down with me making good choices and learning by osmosis while working at Saving Dinner. I set my goal to lose 3 kg (6.6 pounds) in the 4 weeks of the main plan. I think that's doable. I've been slowly losing weight already, but now I'm going to be putting an effort into it!
I even did my circuit on the wii and burned a glass of coke and then some! (I have a list of about 8 of the activities that I 'always' do.) And I even hit a new high score in boxing, guess I'm not that rusty after all. I'm gonna plan to stay active through the duration of the Challenge, no easy task in the winter when you work from the computer ;) But I ran through my circuit today in 28 minutes, and I repeated some activities, so I should be OK. Plus, I'm committing to all of you and putting this our in cyberspace so I will be held accountable!
Dinner tonight from a past Body Clutter Menu-Mailer was Autumn Apple Chicken with acorn squash. What an easy and yummy recipe! I asked DH and he's all for us having it again someday (although apparently he's not a squash fan).
Hope to see you here more often as well as on the Losing It With Leanne facebook page!