Dinners

I think we all know what they say about the best laid plans. There have been some rearrangements made to my dinner menus already. Last Saturday I did use the slow cook feature on my 'instant' pot and turned the roast chicken carcass into chicken stock. I cut up the chicken and put almost all of it into the stock and filled up two quart containers for the deep freezer. I figure these can become the basis of a couple of different versions of chicken soup (thinking a white bean and kale and possible a chicken tortilla soup for December).

The last container went into the refrigerator. Youngest son H's girlfriend M was in a cooking/baking mood and brought over a large container of homemade Baked Potato soup and some Hot Chocolate cookies she experimented with. Both items were delicious and it was nice to eat a dinner I didn't prepare myself.
Sunday I pulled the soup stock out the refrigerator. I brought it to a boil and added some egg noodles and this was dinner along with the brioche dinner rolls I'd picked up from Aldi. I love trying the new 'fancy' items my Aldi gets in.
Saturday I as in a baking mood myself and made a pumpkin roll as per a request from youngest son. This was dessert on Sunday.
Monday I made a chicken salad sandwich using the chicken I'd set aside from the roast for this purpose and ate this along with carrots & celery sticks in the car on the way to my night job.
Tuesday I had a hair appointment to touch my color and had enough time afterwards to run through the McD's and get a sandwich and drink off the dollar menu before going in to work.
Wednesday I unexpectedly got asked to stay at aftercare and work. I luckily had some chicken tenders left over from lunch service and paired those with carrots and celery sticks and apple slices, eaten in the car on the way to work.
Tonight I am back on my menu plans making myself some baked tilapia!
Being prepared but also flexible enough to roll with the changes is certainly a stress reducer.

Edited to include the rest of the week:
On Thursday I more or less followed my dinner plan. Tilapia it was but instead of just baking it with lemon I decided to do an old favorite, Horseradish crusted tilapia. I mixed together mayo, horseradish, parsley and bread crumbs and spread it on the fish. Toasted additional breadcrumbs in butter and sprinkled them on top then baked the fish in a 425 degree oven for 12 minutes.


And finally I was asked to work Aftercare today so a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and celery sticks await my drive into the cleaning job later on.

Menus for the rest of November

I've prioritized this because I think if I can organize this one small area of my life it will help with my stress levels. I hope I'm not just being delusional here. I am planning these meals for just myself. The sons' schedules are so erratic and their social lives so full that I can no longer count on them being home for any dinners. We have a whole week off of school the week before Thanksgiving so I will have time to make a real dinner instead of the sandwich-in-the-car meal I plan for when school is in session during that time. I've already volunteered to make the squash and a pie for the holiday spent at my sister's home as is tradition. 

11/11: Homemade chicken soup with drop dumplings (I roasted a small chicken on Thursday and last night made soup stock from the leftover carcass). Brioche rolls.

11/12: Lamb chop, parsley potatoes, peas with savory

11/13: Chicken salad sandwich (using some of the roasted chicken I set aside), baby carrots

11/14: Peanut butter and jelly sandwich, apple slices (eaten in the car between hair appointment and cleaning job)

11/15: Slow cooker swiss steak (put in crockpot before work), steamed rice, green beans

11/16: Baked tilapia with lemon, white and wild rice, salad

11/17: Salad of spring greens, shredded carrots, tomatoes, Kalamata olives, feta cheese, chicken with lemon vinaigrette, roll

11/18: Mini Meatloaf, mashed potatoes, brussels sprouts

11/19: Pork chops, homemade applesauce, rice pilaf, California blend veggies

11/20: Grilled salmon, baked sweet potato, salad

11/21: Country beef stew with veggies, dinner roll

11/22: Spaghetti with marinara sauce, salad

11/23: Thanksgiving Day

11/24: Salad of chopped kale, sliced apples, dried cranberries, blue cheese, pecans, turkey with apple cider dressing, roll

11/25: Mom's macaroni and cheese, salad

11/26:  Chicken paprikash with drop dumplings, green beans

11/27: roast beef and provolone sandwich, celery sticks

11/28: tuna salad sandwich, baby carrots

11/29: Pork adobo over steamed rice, green beans

11/30: Salad of spring greens, shredded carrots, roasted beets, goat cheese, pecans and chicken with poppyseed dressing, roll

So many things

Sometimes I feel as if I am a juggler with one arm and a billion balls in the air. There are just so many things I need to do, want to do, or would like to do and just not enough time. The looming holiday season is not helping.
I then step back and take a deep breath and try to prioritize. But it is hard because I find myself so overwhelmed that nothing gets done. 
Case in point the weekends. With working two-three different jobs from Monday to Friday the weekends quickly get filled up for me. I need to find a way to balance out the week days. Mondays and Tuesdays are a loss. I work my school cafeteria job and then immediately segue into my aftercare job followed by a short drive in the car to my evening cleaning job. The best I can do on those days is remember to take my meds and my vitamins,  make a sandwich to eat in the car for dinner and get plenty of sleep.
My goal is to organize the three hour free time window I have on Wednesdays to Fridays as well as my weekends. All I've been doing so far is using that time to make myself a meal to eat before going in to clean, sometimes unloading and reloading the dishwasher, running the vacuum cleaner, or throwing in a load of laundry while also trying to get in some relaxation in front of the tv or with a book. I've decided to start scheduling myself tasks to complete on these days. But most days? I find myself doing nothing but watching tv. Sigh. So I have come up with this plan:  Wednesdays I will vacuum and clean my bathroom before sitting down. Thursdays: I will complete any errands that may need to be run as well as give the kitchen a quickie clean. Fridays: I will do at least one load of laundry.
And now the weekends. Right now I am in the midst of a plan formulated by some family members who are insisting that despite legal advice to the contrary we clean out my recently deceased sister's home. The whole thing is fairly complicated but to simplify it a group of us as well as the attorney my remaining sister consulted feel that once anyone in the family has taken anything they need or want and we have donated a bunch of stuff as we all agreed to do we should leave the rest and let it be taken over by the bank. She left too many debts for the estate to yield any kind of profit and not a single one of us is legally responsible for any of it. However as in most families there is that one strong minded individual who thinks their plan is better and is vocal enough and forceful enough to get the person who is nominally in charge to go along with it despite themselves. That person is insisting we totally clean out the house (and believe me this is like an episode of hoarders in there) so that their friend can appraise it and see how much it would be worth to sell. Frankly it is in horrible condition. Nothing has been done to the place in years except for filling it up with everything and anything. And the debt owed on it is really going to be more than what it is worth. But here we are spending every Sunday for the last month chucking crap out of the place and it never seems to look like we are making any progress. Seriously. I've seen episodes of Hoarders with less stuff. And now the drama queens are insisting that we finish this project by Thanksgiving because they "can't enjoy" the holiday unless this is done. Whatever. So for the immediate future my Sundays are going to look like this : Church, family brunch, cleaning crap out of this nightmare (ugh), dinner and an evening spent either catching up on work I've brought home or if I am lucky relaxing and doing something I call fun.
This leaves me Saturdays to schedule in anything else relaxing and fun  as well as errands and chores. I feel stressed out just typing that sentence. I've concluded that Saturday mornings I will run any errands followed by cleaning the house. Leaving late afternoons and/or evenings to do fun stuff (fun stuff also includes collapsing in a chair and sleeping in front of the tv). Today I am going to shower and get dressed, run out to the wholesale club to pick up a case of envelopes I need for the cafeteria job, run in to Target for a couple of small items and then return home to clean house. Tonight (or Sunday evening) I may take in a movie. I want to see the new Murder on the Orient Express.
Oh and I still need to get some menus put together because meals have been really hit or miss this last week.
And I am trying to train for walking a 5K on Thanksgiving morning that I registered for. LOL. See what I mean about that juggling act?

Starting Over

It has been 15 months since I last posted. So many things have gone on and changes have been made. Last January I ended up in the hospital following an episode of chest pain. I was checked out, kept overnight and released with orders to get a stress test the following week. I failed that test miserably and ended up back in the hospital where I had a heart catherization. The good news is that my main artery looks fine. The bad news is that something is going on with my heart. After more tests and ruling out a lot of stuff my cardiologist determined that like a lot of other women I have microvascular heart disease (also called Syndrome X) which means the small vessels .off my main artery are clogging. And my cholesterol numbers were ridiculous. And I have unstable angina. So now I am on daily meds for these issues, as well as nitroglycerin for the angina attacks.  It could have been much worse and at my six month checkup my cholesterol was excellent and the meds are doing their job. My doctor was also very pleased with the 62 pound weight loss I had accomplished since starting my job at the hospital.
And that brings me to my other large change. The hospital job was increasingly stressful which led to an uptick in the number of angina attacks I was having (stress can bring them on) resulting in one large attack which left me pondering if this job was worth killing myself over. I sat myself down, did some praying, crunched some numbers and decided that it would be best to find something with less hours and less stress.
I was lucky that within a week I had another position with a different company all lined up. The good news is that it is strictly part time, M-F, no weekends, no holidays. It is still cleaning, but this time offices and mostly I just do detail dusting as well as a few kitchenettes. No pulling trash, no restrooms, no floor work. And since it is a headquarters of a fairly large company, most of the time there are no people to contend with. The bad news is it is less money and no health insurance benefits. But I am a master at belt tightening and am currently looking at insurance options.
In addition to that I have also picked up two three hour shifts at school in the aftercare program. This combination as well as what my son J donates to the household budget as well as the young lady who is renting a room from me throws in means we are doing ok.
Oddly enough I seem to do better with less money. I was wasting money like mad when I worked at the hospital. And I haven't had a single angina attack since changing jobs.
Socially I am enjoying the freedom being unattached has given me. Youngest son H and I have become movie buddies, seeing a ton of stuff over the summer on the $5 movie day as well as splurging on matinee prices. And I added Netflix to our monthly budget and the two of us have enjoyed some binge watching of various shows on that as well. It is so nice to have to time to enjoy this entertainment again. I have also increased the amount of walking I am doing and have signed up for my first ever 5K walk on Thanksgiving Day! The cleaning job and the occasional stroll on the treadmill at home are my training for this!  I had my 40th high school reunion over the summer and had  a wonderful time (spent quality time with my kindergarten BFF too) and reconnected with a high school friend who lives locally and I have seen her a couple of time since then. I am still spending a lot of time with my friend and neighbor V going on antiquing/flea market afternoons (lots of looking  very little buying) as well as just hanging out with a good glass of wine or bottle of water on her front porch in the summer and cozy living room now that the weather has gotten colder.
 I am anticipating the birth of another grandchild in March. Miss E who is already 3 is going to be getting a sibling. As a family we have been blessed beyond belief in that my special needs grandchild B recently had a surgery that is a real game changer for her, allowing her to become far more mobile than she was previously. We have had a couple of weddings, a niece and a nephew both getting married within the last year. And my brother-in-law B who is still fighting cancer continues to be with us all.  Sadly I lost my first sibling this year, my sister E passed away this October. Still struggling with this.
And now for my goals, I am getting back to blogging obviously but also  menu planning and regular grocery shopping with a list and a  budget. With my new job set up I have three days a week where I have a 3 hour break between jobs allowing me to relax a bit at home (or do errands or chores) as well as have a cooked dinner, two days a week I do the aftercare so dinner is a quick sandwich meal in the car on the way to the cleaning gig. And with every weekend off I can plan some great meals for that time. It had gotten to a point where I was eating out almost every meal I wasn't eating at the hospital or school. The occasional meal out is  now the rule. Getting back to basics here is my goal. More time spent with family and friends as well.