Freeze-Ahead Week:

This week has been all about getting ahead on meal planning! After my post last week, I decided to get cooking. I'm still not at 100%, so I've been a little slow, but i feel I've made some progress. Mom was awesome and took me to the store over the weekend so I could buy supplies for this week. She even got a good deal on a couple of roasts and left one at my house so I wouldn't have to do any heavy cooking for a night!

So far my freezer is packed with:

•2 bags of baked/chopped chicken breasts

•1/2 of a yummy cooked roast (thanks mom!!!)

•BBQ pulled pork (great for sandwiches

•2 bags of chicken enchilada soup

•frozen bananas, blueberries, blackberries and strawberries.

•yogurt cubes (I froze them using a mini muffin tin)

Now, originally I was going to measure out individual smoothie servings with different fruit combinations to make quick grab bags. But somewhere between the green freak in me and having a good case of the "can't want to's," I decided not to. It doesn't take a lot of time to throw whatever fruit you want in the blender with some yogurt, milk and honey. Not to mention all the little snack bags you would have to use! This is a huge waste of money, let alone the environment (yeah, my green side won this battle)!

Hopefully all this prep & cooking will make it easier when neither one of us feel like cooking. At that point all we have to do is reach in the freezer, defrost and VOILA!!! Dinner is served!

~Melissa~

Blog Block!

I've been so cooped up in the house lately! My normal doctor didn't want to help me, let alone look at me! He just wanted to send me to an orthopedic doctor with out even seeing me! Ridiculous! So my friend Brian, uh hmm, Dr. Brian (who just happens to be a physical therapist), gave me an exercise to do. It's called a prone press push up, and it's awesome! It immediately started helping! YAY! The downside is he told me I can't bend over for 6 weeks! So yesterday when I made cookies I was constantly calling Tim over to help me put them in the oven, and then to take them out. They were delicious (lemon cake cookies!) He has been an amazing husband with all of this! But I know he's past ready for me to be up and moving around!

Til later,

~Melissa~

P.S.- I can't wait to get out of the house!!!

Playing with Cans...

Ok, who out there knows anything about canning??? Anyone? This girl has been wanting to try her hand at it for a while. Now I'm not wanting to go all end of the world crazy by hoarding a ton of jars of preserved in my basement! Instead I'd see if I could be successful at canning some jams/preserves, soups, sauces etc.

But there's something somewhere between the boiling of the water and making sure the seals work that make me nervous about the whole experience. And yes, I know there are quite a few books out there that would be helpful. One day, I might even get around to them, along with getting the special cages and, of course, the jars!

Right now though, I'm just throwing it out there that I wanna learn! So anyone out there with any advice or tips/tricks they'd be willing to share... Speak up!!!

Til later,

~Melissa~

P.S.- sorry for the short post. We're on day 5 of being in bed. Any of my physical therapy friends have thoughts on how to get me better please let me know!