Tuesday, August 14, 2018

I like to go to Trader Joe’s in addition to my regular grocery.  Sometimes I only go twice a month, but there are certain products I like to have on hand.  This trip I am also trying some new to me products and I will give you my thoughts if I have tried it.  I also shop weekly at Kroger and monthly at Costco.  

Freezer:  I think they have some great frozen products.  

Here is what I usually have in my freezer:

broccoli, fries, corn, green beans (haricot vert), orange chicken, Jasmine rice, turkey corn dogs.  I’m trying the cauliflower gnocchi for the first time and I’m trying the soft pretzels for the first time (Excellent – have already tried)

produce:  bananas, potatoes, avocado, lemons, limes – I like all of their produce!

bakery:  Everything bagels

canned:  black beans, green chilies

dairy:  don’t like their string cheese, whipping cream, butter, cheeses

snack:  corn puffs, restaurant style tortilla chips, haven’t tried strawberry cereal bars yet

I tried to take photos of my last trip.  Now, I realize this means nothing to you if you don’t live near a Trader Joe’s!  

Let’s talk about how to meal plan.  I like the idea of themes and I’m going to try to have loose themes this school year.  I might add that my husband wants meat at every meal.  I will also add that I like cooking, meal planning, grocery shopping, and it’s fun for me to try new recipes.  I hate cleaning, though.  We all have our strengths.  If cooking isn’t your thing, that’s o.k.  Most of what I talk about will be loosely referred to as cooking – it is more like heating up many nights!  

Here is a recent and typical meal:

frozen tortilla encrusted tilapia from Costco, mashed red potatoes (homemade – super easy – just boil for about 20 minutes, drain, mash with a masher and add buttermilk, butter, and spices), Trader Joe’s green beans, boxed couscous (didn’t really need but had on hand)

I start dinner around 5:30 every night and we eat around 6:15.  My boys have activities after school but not many evening activities so we can usually eat at home.  We don’t eat out because it takes too much time away from homework and everyone says “my food” (remember I use a lot of shortcuts) is better.

Loose themes for this year:  

Sunday – restaurant leftovers or sandwiches (This past Sunday we had BLTs, frozen                  TJ’s fries, cucumber salad

Monday – pasta

Tuesday – Mexican/ Taco Tuesday but will do different things – Mexican lasagna or                        burrito bowls instead of tacos sometimes      

Wednesday – chicken with 2 sides

Thursday – fish with 2 sides

Friday – order pizza or other takeout

Saturday – go out sometimes/home sometimes

What do you think of the theme approach?  I use themes for each day in my classroom and it’s been really helpful for me and for the students.  Have you heard of decision fatigue?  The more decisions you have to make in a day the more exhausted you are.  Make as many things in your life automatic as you can.  Anyone?  I like this concept and believe that it’s true.  

How to Meal Plan Another Way:

Take some time on Friday night, Saturday morning or afternoon, or Sunday morning to look at the week ahead in your calendar.  You don’t keep a paper calendar, you say?  O.k,, look at your phone, but I would argue that seeing the week laid out on paper is helpful.  You could print out a template to write on.  

What nights do you have to be out of the house at dinnertime?  Make those soup and sandwich nights or something that can be prepared ahead of time like a pasta bake.  If you have time in the mornings, can you go ahead and cook and then just microwave at dinnertime?  Also, when you brown your ground beef for spaghetti, brown more to have in the freezer.  Go ahead and add taco seasoning to some.  

When I was very organized last winter, I had 3 pounds of cooked ground beef and taco meat labeled in my freezer.  Talk about easy!  

You don’t have to cook as many nights as I do.  You can just cook three nights a week and use leftovers.  If you only cook for two people, maybe you could make grilled chicken and use it in two different ways or make a weekly soup to eat a few days.  

I hope this helped someone!

Leave me your best dinner tip in the comments!

Amy

Monday, August 13, 2018

I’m linking up today with My Glittery Heart, Lindsay’s Sweet World, and

The Sirois Family for their Hello Monday link up.  Be sure to check out some more posts over there!

Happy 40th birthday to my baby sister!  I’m the oldest of three girls and I still remember vividly the day she came home from the hospital.  I can’t imagine life without her.  She is a second grade teacher and is spending her day at work and then shuttling her four kids around afterwards!  

Now, today marks my first day back of full time employment since June 4th.  I am going to do my best to keep up with my blog posting, but you will understand if my posts are shorter, no?  

I had a great weekend.  It was the perfect mix of relaxation, fun, and productivity.  Sometimes it’s hard to achieve that balance.  

Friday I made a Trader Joe’s run.  Here are a few of the things that I purchased.  I’m thinking about another TJ’s post.  Check here for my first post I did on shopping at TJ’s.  

After TJ’s, I hung out with my boys, made lunch for them, read a little bit, and watched a bit of tv.  I wanted to take advantage of my last week day off.  

Friday night, we went out on my friend’s boat and headed downtown and across the river to Indiana.  

We parked the boat (we were lucky to get the last spot), walked about three blocks to eat dinner, and came back for an outdoor concert.  

Saturday morning I walked, did cleaning and laundry while hub did some biking and boys hung out.  

In the afternoon, hub and I went to help celebrate a friend’s birthday by doing some of the Urban Bourbon Trail in downtown Louisville.  If you’ve heard of The Bourbon Trail, it is referring to places surrounding Louisville, maybe about forty minutes away. The Urban Trail is relatively new and they are working to revitalize the famous historic Whiskey Row in downtown Louisville.  I don’t know much about bourbon and my hub doesn’t drink at all.  Even so, the history is very interesting and we loved our tour guide at the first one, especially.

We started with The Evan Williams Experience which is part of Heaven Hill Distillery.

The second one we did was Old Forester, which is part of Brown Forman.  We had to hustle about three blocks down to do this tour, which was very different, but still very interesting.  They both cost about $15 a person and you get three tastes of bourbon at the end.  At the first one, we also got a delicious bourbon ball. 

After the second tour, we went across the street to Merle’s Whiskey Kitchen where we had a bourbon slushie and some nachos.  There were three couples and we had a great time.  They were moving on to dinner, but we wanted to spend time with our boys so we headed home.  We really enjoyed the afternoon.  My friend’s husband put the day together and he did a great job.  It’s hard to coordinate this kind of thing and get people together but it was a good reminder that the effort is worth it.  

Our family has a favorite comedian Demetri Martin and you can find some of his shows on Netflix.  He has kind of an academic sense of humor and we started letting our boys watch him around age 13.  We had some dessert and watched a show that was new to us as a family of four.  

Sunday was very low key.  I did some meal prep for the week – my low carb egg casserole and I made kale chips for my son who loves them.  

I finished this book.  It was really good.  Their story is inspiring.  

I also had a chance to run to the library branch that is open on Sunday and grab some easy chick lit books that look good.  I won’t have much time but I like to read a bit in the evenings.  

How was your weekend?  What does your week look like?  Are you still “summering” or is it back to reality?  Have a great week and thanks for reading!

Amy

Friday, August 10, 2018

Happy Friday!  I’m linking up with Narci, Andrea, and Erika today for Friday Favorites!  Check out the other posts here!

1.  This book!  You guys, this might be my favorite of hers.  I have read all but about 10 pages in 24 hours.  Go get it for this weekend!  

2.  I didn’t know lash primer was a thing, but this is great!  I already used this brand of mascara and I love it. This primer helps you use less mascara but you get better results.  Thanks, Olivia of Joyfully Prudent for recommending it on Instastories!  

It it white/pink when you put it on.  

3.  Kelly of Kelly’s Korner told about her lip color in Instastories.  It is Revlon Super Lustrous GoldPearl Plum.  I don’t think the name or sticker color fits it.  It is a shimmery coral in my opinion.  It will be great into fall.  I also bought a clear gloss to put over my lipsticks.  

4.  John B. Crist’s Instagram is hilarious!  I can’t remember where I first heard about him, but I have thoroughly enjoyed his posts and stories.  

That’s it for this week!

What are you up to this weekend?  I’m hoping to have fun on this last weekend of summer, get organized, meal plan, and rest up for a five day work week.  It’s back to reality!

Thanks for stopping by!

Amy 

P.S. – I did a post yesterday on the thredUP Goody box here, and a post on Tuesday about my makeup products and how long my routine takes here.  Check them out!  

Thursday, August 9, 2018

Have you all heard of ThredUP?  It is an online consignment store.  How cool, right?  Not everyone lives in a city of great consignment shops like I do and not everyone has the time it takes to comb through the items.  Besides shopping thredUP.com, you can also order a “clean out” kit which is a prepaid bag to send in your unwanted items to receive credit to shop.  

Even though I can and do frequent consignment shops and talk about it here frequently, I thought I would give it a try and let you all know how it went.  I found out about it through http://www.modernmrsdarcy.com which is a blog mainly about reading and the writer of the blog lives in my city of Louisville.  In addition to writing about books, she has some other posts on things she has learned in a given month, her uniform for getting dressed, interesting, links, etc.  She offered up a link to save on this Goody Box so I ordered mine for only $10.  Normally it is $20.  I was not offered a link and they have no idea who I am, by the way.  So, for $10, they sent me a box of 10 items and I could put the $10 toward anything I kept. It was free shipping and free returns.  Basically, it is Stitch Fix but with consigned clothes.  I might add that they are highly curated consigned clothes because they were in pristine condition.  I don’t use the word “pristine” lightly!  

Here is my cute box – it took exactly a week and a day to arrive from my placing of the order!

Inside the cute box is a list of your items along with the retail value and their price.  I should also mention that when I ordered, I was asked my size, age, style, and shops I like.  I said I like boho chic Anthropologie -ish clothes.  I also said I prefer pants and skirts that are knit and elastic waist and that I didn’t want anything sleeveless. 

Now, I will tell you that in addition to the pristine condition, 3 of the 10 items were new with tags!  But, look at the prices.  I rarely spend more than $12 on an item at my consignment stores.  The prices ranged from 16.99 to 48.99. They also gave you the original retail price.

I think they missed the mark on boho and gave me more of a vintage/feminine feel.  Also, what is up with all of the purple!  

The photos aren’t great but it will give you an idea.  They were wrapped in tissue paper and folded nicely. After I loaded my photos, I realized I forgot to take a picture of the Women’s City Chic Cardigan, so you will see only 9 of the 10 pieces.

I liked these pants below but they were HUGE!  

I hope you can tell what everything is.  I almost kept the last item – Athleta pants – great material but ultimately decided that I would prefer them in black.  

I ended up sending everything back.  It was worth $10 to share it with you, even though I didn’t keep anything. I am extremely picky at this point about what I let into my closet.  I am a fan of Marie Kondo and I’ve learned from my mistakes and I am not going to buy something just because it’s cheap or because it almost works.  

So, do I recommend this to you?  Maybe.  I think it depends on how you feel about someone else picking things out for you and how much you are willing to spend on consigned clothes.  I love the concept and love that people are recycling clothing.  Part of the cost is the shipping and the work of the stylists to curate these items for you.  Also, time is money.  You may think this is worth your time savings.  

Let me know if you try it!

Amy 

Wednesday, August 8, 2018

So, last Thursday I wore this to my professional development workshop.  This is my black Old Navy swing dress and a LulaRoe kimono.  Some people wore jeans or shorts and some people dressed up a little bit more.  This outfit is as comfortable as if you are wearing pajamas, but I think it looks pulled together.  

This is what I wore to the second day on Friday.  I forgot to take a picture in the mirror.   I was equally as comfortable.  I love these pants!  The top is the Target Universal Thread flutter sleeve.  The pants are from Steinmart.  I wore my black Tory Burch wedge flip flops that you can kind of see.  I bought them 5 years ago on sale on Nordstrom.com.  They still look brand new.  

This is what I wore Saturday to run some errands and go to the movies. These are black linen Old Navy shorts, white detailed Old Navy top, and black Birks.   

Monday I set up my classroom so I wore athletic shorts, a t-shirt, and tennis shoes. There is no photographic evidence!  My boys helped their history teacher set up and were rewarded with pizza and then I took them to get their back to school haircut.

Tuesday I put this on to run some errands.  It is just a simple tee from Nordstrom.com and the skirt is a LulaRoe Cassie.  I really love this print – birds and flowers.  I really like some of the LulaRoe line but I don’t plan to add anything to my closet unless it’s from the consignment store.  I love the kimonos, the long vest, the long sweater, the Carly dress (a simple knit that is a little higher in the front than the back – I could do without the tiny chest pocket – why?), the Cassie skirt, and the perfect tee.  I did a post in the spring on my feelings toward LulaRoe and Lipsense that you can find here if you are interested.  

I am also wearing the fake Jack Rogers/Pierre Dumas shoes.  Can I call them “John Rogers”?  I really like them, by the way!

I went to the library, the mailbox store, and to get my back to school pedicure.  

I also wore my new $12 leather earrings from the pop up boutiques on Friday.  

Caution:  I will now be talking about The Bachelorette finale from Monday if you haven’t seen it yet.

I couldn’t watch all of The Bachelorette finale Monday night because it ran too late, but I did finish it Tuesday.  I just wasn’t that invested.  I was fine with either guy.  I thought they were both kind of boring and I thought Becca was, too.  I’m sorry if that sounds harsh.

Maybe the real issue is that I’ve outgrown the show.  No, that can’t be it…

Bring on Bachelor in Paradise, baby!

Here is a bad and awkward photo of my back to school blue/grey pedicure using the new Orly De-Stressed Denim I bought last week.  

I had books that I had requested ready at the library!  

Do you read her blog?  I am definitely not this hardcore frugal, but she has a beautiful writing style and I’ve loved seeing her journey to her farm in Vermont through her blog.  

When you can’t watch Season 4 Poldark yet, you consider reading the series, right?  I was surprised that it was written in 1945.  

I have seen many people post about this book below so I’m excited to read it during this last week of my summer.  Elin Hilderbrand’s books don’t disappoint for fun summer reads.  

What can Rachel Hollis not do?  I currently have her book “Girl, wash your Face”, too.  This is a great cookbook.  I have also checked out her blog – www.thechicsite.com.  She also has two works of fiction – Party Girl and Sweet Girl but my library didn’t have them.  I enjoyed my 3:00 p.m. coffee Tuesday with a squirt of whipped cream for a little bit of fancy.  It is a Dunkin Donut hazelnut k cup.

My top from Amazon came in.  You can find it here.  I think I like it but will probably learn to tie it better as in the product photo from Amazon.  

So, that’s where I’ve been since the week started and those are a few outfits from the last week.  

Thanks for stopping by!  

Amy 

Friday, August 3, 2018

Happy Friday, y’all!  How was your week?  What’s going on this weekend?  I’m not sure what we are doing yet!  

Here are a few of my favorites from this week!

1. Pierre Dumas Rosetta Sandal – I had real Jack Rogers for maybe 4 years that I bought on sale.  I finally gave up on them this summer and donated them.  Seriously, they were the most uncomfortable things ever!  It felt like walking on two boards. I love the look, though, so when All About That Mommy Life blog posted about these, I placed my order.  They are less than $30 and she says they have a cushy footbed.  I will let you know what I think when I get them in.  I love, love, love the cork and gold combo.  I think I might be able to wear them to teach in with dresses, skirts, and pants.

2.  NYX butter gloss – I love my Lipsense, but I don’t always want to “waste” it or maybe I don’t want my lipstick to last that long.  This has a great price at $5ish dollars, great consistency, great smell, and all of the colors are named after desserts.  This is “eclair”.  

3.  I think I’ve talked about this before, but many summer days, I will make a Crystal Light Peach Tea and put it in my reusable Starbucks cup.  It’s so good!

4.  I love buying and giving gifts.  This was for my sister-in-law’s birthday Thursday.

I got her a cute pair of pink readers glasses.

5.  This is what my new polish looks like in the bottle – De-Stressed Denim

6.  Do you all have a pop socket for your phone?  It’s great for propping your phone up or for holding your phone so it doesn’t slip out of your hand.  But, you know what is even better?  The stick on holder for your car – especially when using your GPS.  

7.  Did you all watch Laguna Beach and The Hills?  I did!  I’m enjoying this newest version of Reality Kristin.  She is hard core!  She is a mom, wife, business woman and is not afraid to speak her mind.  

8.  I have no idea what to do with my eyebrows, but I knew I needed to do something.  The sweet girl at Ulta showed me how to use this Benefit product.  It is called “Ka-Brow”.  I love the Benefit product names!  

9.  Here is the second recipe I made for my sister-in-law (same one with the birthday Thursday).  She had a procedure done the day before her birthday and I wanted to bring some food to help her out.  I followed my same tips from Wednesday and I brought her Wednesday’s recipe, as well, (find my recipe for Mexican lasagna here) along with some pretzel rolos from here.  

This recipe is courtesy of Narci from http://www.graceandloveblog.com.  This is the second time I’ve made it and again, I made one for my family, too.  Ours is in the glass dish and the one to take is in the disposable. 

Bacon Alfredo Bake 

-Heat oven to 375

-Make your bacon in the oven – seriously, game changer – takes about 20 minutes.  Use an entire package.

-In a bowl, mix together I jar of alfredo sauce, about a half cup of sour cream, and a cup of mozzarella shredded.  You should be boiling linguine while mixing.  Chop bacon and add to your bowl and then combine the noodles with the sauce.  I used about 3/4 box of linguine.

Spread in pan or pans.  You could do one 13 x 9 or two 8 x 8 pans.  Bake for about 20 minutes in the oven still hot from the bacon.  

Now, you could have two easy and make ahead recipes for the first week of school because you will need them!  Read my back to school post here!

Have a wonderful weekend and thanks for visiting me!

Amy 

Thursday, August 2, 2018

Today’s thoughts are about blogging and I hope to have fellow bloggers and readers chime in!

I have been a faithful blog reader for maybe 6 years.  This has been part of my morning routine and usually I spend about 30 minutes with my first cup of coffee and my favorite bloggers.  They have enriched my life and given me countless tips on books, shows, movies, recipes, products, articles of clothing, ideas for my kids, ideas for holidays, and the list goes on and on.  I used to be a big reader of magazines and I think blogs maybe replaced magazines for me.  I do still read the occasional magazine when I get them for free at the library!  

I have always loved to write but as I was reading these blogs I never thought it was something I could ever do.  I was most daunted by the technology and the photographs. And, as you can tell, I still don’t have the nice tabs or search bars or the professional photographs or the search engine or the social media buttons.  I decided to learn how to use the free WordPress site and see how it went.  I started blogging in April with about 3 times a week of posting and then quickly went to 5 days a week.  I also upgraded to a paid plan when WordPress ran a Mother’s Day special.  That meant I got my own .com address instead of a complicated series that people would have to enter.

http://www.coffeeandcocktailsatthecasa.com is all mine!  Why didn’t I pick a shorter blog name?  I wanted something that spoke to my loves and I don’t think it truly tells people what my blog is about.  I’m o.k. with that.  I love coffee and I love cocktail(s) and I love being home.  

Am I in this for the money?  No.  I don’t make any money and I’m honestly not sure how to go about it.  This is merely a creative outlet for me.  

I decided to post regularly five days a week based on what I learned as a reader.  I like the dependability of set days and a set time.  I schedule my posts for 4:00 a.m. for early birds.  As a reader, I would get frustrated if I continually visited a blog that  rarely had new content without letting readers know that they were taking a break.

I have really enjoyed link-ups and try to participate in as many as I can.  This has brought new blog traffic to me and once I even had 300 readers which was a lot for me!  Link ups are great for readers, too, because you are exposed to new blogs.

I try to start drafts for the week on Sundays and then I add or finish each post after dinner.  It only takes me about 20-30 minutes a post.  The bloggers who do lots of links and lots of photos probably spend hours on each post.  Some may have virtual assistants or employees of their blog.  Whoa!  That is out of my territory!

I respond to every comment that I receive.  Receiving comments is the best! I have been sad before when a blogger doesn’t acknowledge my comment.  It’s hard to type on my ipad which is where I read my blogs, so it takes some effort!  If a blogger uses Disqus for comments, I can’t comment because that system hates me!  Sorry!

Currently my post theme/schedule is:

Monday – Hello Monday with a recap of the weekend

Tuesday – A Tip of some sort

Wednesday – Whereabouts/What I Wore

Thursday – Thoughts on some topic

Friday – Favorites from the week – products, items of clothing, or activities that I did

I originally did Monday meal plans and I may get back to that if I can get more organized.  

I enjoy writing about frugal fashion, trends, recipes, clothing and life hacks, stuff with kids, entertaining, travel, saving money, holidays, gifts, and more.  

What would you like to hear about?  Do you like my daily themes or do you have a suggestion?  Sometimes being this rigid makes it hard to participate in specific link ups, but I like the structure, too.  

I think my favorite posts are here where I talked about graphic tees and kimonos and here where I talked about how to wear white without fear.  

If you stuck with this post this long, you are a VIP reader!  Thank you! I would love your feedback!

Amy 

Wednesday, August 1, 2018

Tomorrow and Friday I’m in an all day professional development and then next week is registration and classroom set up.  Ready or not – here it comes!  I’m looking forward to seeing my work friends but I’m not sure what my attention span will be like!  

On Monday, I had my last Spanish lesson with my young couple.  They touched my heart and told me their Spanish lessons have been the highlight of their summer.  They have been married for one year and they are so cute!  They gave me a sweet card.  It was a really good experience for me.  

We also had an orthodontist appointment and a library run on Monday.  

On Tuesday, I ran to Target for some toiletries and strolled through the school supply aisle.  You guys, it is only July 31 and look at this photo below!  My sister in Indiana did start school today and I know many of the Indiana schools across the river start super early, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen it this picked over before August!  Wow! 

I walked out of Target without buying anything because they didn’t have the toiletries I needed!  That is restraint!  

I also did some cooking Tuesday and I wanted to show you a go-to dish I make to take to people.  This is for my sister-in-law.  I’m taking it to her this afternoon after she has a procedure.  

I call it Mexican Lasagna and I think I started making this from a newspaper clipping about 13 years ago.  I’ve tweaked it a bit.  

Tip:  Always use the aluminum disposable pans you can get from The Dollar Tree.  Don’t stress them out about returning dishes.  

Tip:  Double it and make your family’s dinner as well.  This is what my family had for dinner Tuesday night.  

Mix up in a bowl:  corn (I used frozen and didn’t heat it up), a can of black beans drained,  cooked chicken (I used rotisserie), 3/4 of a jar of salsa (don’t use fresh), a container of sour cream.  

This is my mixture below:  It looks kind of not good, but trust me!  

Just use the jarred stuff – the fresh doesn’t work for this. 

Now cut up a package of flour tortillas.  Or, maybe just cut 3 and see how many more you will need.  These will be your “lasagna noodles”.  I think I use the soft taco size.  

I reserved a little bit of the jarred salsa and put it on the bottom of my 8×8.  The glass is for us at home and the disposable is for my sister-in-law.  

Then, do a layer of the tortilla strips, followed by a couple of spoonfuls of the mixture in the bowl, followed by some shredded cheese.  In the photo below, I forgot the cheese and removed the tortillas and started over.  Oops – not a professional food blogger.

Repeat the layers and end up with just tortilla strips on top, add a little more salsa and a sprinkling of cheese.  Bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes until bubbly.  

Most of the way through the process:  All it needs now is the last layer of tortilla strips, salsa, and cheese.  

When I take it to someone, I usually add a bag of tortilla chips, maybe some guacamole, maybe a pan of brownies.  I know this isn’t the healthiest, most rounded out meal, but people seem to love it.  I made it last fall for a former student who had triplets and whose mother taught with me.  She and her husband said it was their favorite meal from the meal train.  It’s just a nice comfort meal and people usually love Mexican food.  

I write directions on the foil on top:  “Mexican Lasagna – fully cooked.  Cut a square and warm up in microwave”.  This is great for their lunch the next day, too.  It saves really well.  

Variations:  You could do taco meat, you could do corn tortillas, you could add green chiles, Ro-tel, etc.  Also, I have seen it done in a round pan where you don’t cut the tortillas.  I may try that myself.  

Where have you been so far this week?  

What is your go-to recipe to take to someone?  

Let me know if you try this!

Amy