Re-motivated

Well, it's been forever since I've made a post but the time has come, and I have returned. So here are two easy things I've made recently and then I'll tell you what has been going on.

1. Muffcakes. Pa-muffins. Whatever.

So here's what you do, you make pancake mix (I had some Bisquick so I used that but whatever your batter is will work, I'm sure)  and then you pour it into muffin tins. One Bisquick batch made 12 muffcakes. Then you can just bake them like that, or you can add stuff. I added thawed frozen blueberries, but bacon would be a good idea, or any other fruit, or brown sugar, or whatever. Mmm, bananas? Whatever. Just put it on top, maybe push it down a bit, if you feel creative and like you have extra time you could half fill the holes, put your fun stuff, and then cover it with the rest of the batter and sprinkle some more on top, whatever. They freeze well, stay good in the fridge for several days, basically a no lose situation.

2. Chicken (and probably most meats) with any marinade and any potatoes.

I defrosted 4 chicken thighs and tossed them in the crockpot. Then I washed and cut two small-ish russet potatoes into bite size pieces and threw them in the crockpot, too. Then I threw in about 1/4-1/3 a bottle of Lawry's marinade on top and let it cook. The husband smelled it and was like WHOA, awesome. Then we both tasted it and were like, WHOAAAAA AWESOME!!!!! It was ready after 5 hours but was totally fine after 9, I cooked it on low for a while and then left it on "simmer."


Okay so here are some accompanying thoughts:

You might recall a time when I was extremely domestic and picky about what I fed my family. Well, then I left the country for 3 weeks and came back realizing we had a bit of a budget issue. Once we figured out our food budget for the month, I was like OH CRAP and so we ate grilled cheese sandwiches and PBJ's a lot for a while. Well of course that led to eating out more than necessary which obviously is bad for the budget, right? So finally I was like, OKAY ENOUGH, back to being domestic. However I realized I had to make some choices: I can't fully devote myself to all of the following: God, my husband, my music, my fitness, my house, and my cooking. There must be balance, no one can do 100% to all things or something will suffer. My relationship with God and my husband trump everything, but my house, fitness, and cooking are certainly not disconnected from God and Husband, and my music is my music, it's my calling and my service (not to mention my job) so I certainly can't just totally neglect that. So I worked some things out:

Get up and be with God first thing.

By doing this, all things in my life went better (Matthew 6:33). I had strength and motivation again to be a good care-taker of my husband and household. I desired to be a good steward of money, it wasn't a burden.

Nurture your talent.

I'm ridden with guilt when I don't have make time for my music. Obviously I teach and perform, but what about actively listening and practicing and spending time finding God's path for my music? It's important and it needs SOME time, not all the time, some time. I wrote a long thing about practicing and balance and gave it to my students. Little did they know I was speaking directly to myself as well. Holding them accountable for their practicing impacts my practicing in a positive way.

Make some realistic choices.

At this current time, I am choosing NOT to go fully unprocessed, organic, etc. Sometimes we will eat Velveeta Shells and Cheese. Sometimes (obviously, you read above) I will use Bisquick and Lawry's overly-salted marinades. Sometimes we will have to order a pizza. I will not choose homemade tortillas over sleep or practice time (obviously I wouldn't choose it over time with Husband but I am rarely in a situation where that is the case). I WILL however make wise decisions about how we spend our grocery money and making sure we have portable food. (I commute 3 hours to and from work once day a week and I take food to the Husband 4 nights a week for dinner and send him with lunch three days a week. There are 0 nights a week when he and I sit down to an evening meal together and only one day a week when we have lunch together. We hope to have one morning a week where we can have coffee together…so you see how this is weird.) I have accepted that it is okay when I eat alone to have hummus, celery, and a fried egg and to make something for Husband that grosses me out (hamburger helper, Lord forbid) for me to take him at work. This doesn't mean I think processed food is acceptable or good, it just means I have to buy groceries and not go out to eat all the time, and right now that occasionally means getting Chef Boyardee if they are on sale for $.75/can. It also means printing the Food Lion $X off of $Y spent on produce coupons like it's my job. BUT IT ISN'T MY JOB, I HAVE A JOB, and so I can't do that all the time, AND THAT'S OKAY!!!!

But the crockpot…oh, the crockpot is going to help me. I generally have time to cook, it just isn't at times that make sense. The best solution to that is the crockpot. I can even prepare something the night before, stick the whole pot part in the fridge, take it out when I get up and leave it until it reaches room temperature, and then turn the thing on and leave it so that when I get home from teaching 6 lessons in 3 different locations or whatever, I can rush some over to Husband and then come home and eat some, myself, without having to microwave or whatever. HA! YES!!! So here are two sites I'll be exploring and sharing from:

Crockpot 365

Get Crocked

I am also on Pinterest and have this board for you to see the recipes I've pinned, but I'll generally post the recipes I've actually tried on this blog. 

Blessings!

CPK