[WolfDreamer]

14 minutes ago, Sylvaa said:

 

So I am participating in Sourcebooks / ALA #readtheyear challenge. I'm currently reading Me and White Supremacy and working through the 28 days. I'm also reading a fiction book called White Tiger. I tend to browse through the library and see what looks like it would be interesting, so there aren't really any titles I have in mind outside of my reading challenge. I'm trying to do at least one non-fiction and one by a non white author each time I go. 

 

That sounds awesome. I started the Book Riot Read Harder Challenge back in January, but I'm kind of dragging my feet on it (meaning I've read some other books not from that list).

[Sylvaa]

Week 1 Update:

 

Man that week did not suck, but could have been better. I hit over my goal of 45 work tomatoes, although that was partly due to a large project I have due every 15th of the month. It's much easier to complete goals when you have a lot of work to support it. I also got all of my house chores completed. It's nice having a clean house. 

 

Saturday night was supposed to be D&D, however one of our group members had some heavy stuff going on with his family, so we decided to do a pizza night. We invited his wife to come along with him and hang out, but she wasn't feeling up to it. Instead, we played Telestrations After Dark, which was hilarious. Yesterday, I did a full English-style Sunday roast (I roasted beef, carrots, and potatoes - although not together, made gravy, Yorkshire pudding, and butterscotch blondies) for the family. It was super fun and tasty. 

 

I hit all 6 of my workouts at the gym last week. The Wednesday one I did at home instead of going to the gym (no one else was scheduled for the early morning class, so I told the instructor if she wanted to text it to me we could both sleep in). The yoga teacher wasn't my favorite (there are two others in the area I have taken classes from that I like better), but it got me up and moving on a Saturday morning. I am slacking on running, but I am working out without freezing. 

 

One thing I haven't been doing great with recently is food. I've actually not been buying enough to get me through meals, so I've been eating super randomly. I've not been hungry and I've been eating things that don't upset my stomach, but my meals have been looking a little rough. I need to prioritize figuring out my full day meal plan, not just knowing what dinner is going to be.

[athousandwords]

15 minutes ago, Sylvaa said:

I hit all 6 of my workouts at the gym last week. The Wednesday one I did at home instead of going to the gym (no one else was scheduled for the early morning class, so I told the instructor if she wanted to text it to me we could both sleep in). The yoga teacher wasn't my favorite (there are two others in the area I have taken classes from that I like better), but it got me up and moving on a Saturday morning. I am slacking on running, but I am working out without freezing. 

 

I feel like running should be seasonal - good weather only! Of course that's me talking after freezing my butt off on Saturday and currently waiting for it to warm up past 40℉ before I go out today.... But honestly, you got in 6 workouts this week!! You're doing great! You're not slacking on running, you're cross-training.

[Waanie]

8 minutes ago, athousandwords said:

I feel like running should be seasonal - good weather only! Of course that's me talking after freezing my butt off on Saturday and currently waiting for it to warm up past 40℉ before I go out today.... 

One of the reasons why I never manage running; the season is like 2 months long in spring, and 1 month in fall . Good job on getting your run in Saturday though .

 

28 minutes ago, Sylvaa said:

Man that week did not suck, but could have been better. I hit over my goal of 45 work tomatoes, although that was partly due to a large project I have due every 15th of the month. It's much easier to complete goals when you have a lot of work to support it. I also got all of my house chores completed. It's nice having a clean house. 

Nicely done!

[Rooks]

1 hour ago, Sylvaa said:

Yorkshire pudding, and butterscotch blondies

 

 

Sounds like a solid week to me. Honestly, I hate meal planning, and I'm so stupid spoiled in that my wife does like 99% of the meals around our house. When I used to try and eat healthy, I'd just either make like an egg monster where I could just eat it all week, or find some reasonable fast food that I wouldn't feel super guilty about eating (most of the time it was Subway which isn't great for you, but it's at least was loaded with veggies). Best of luck in figuring it out!

[Sylvaa]

21 minutes ago, Rooks said:

Honestly, I hate meal planning, and I'm so stupid spoiled in that my wife does like 99% of the meals around our house.

 

TL/DR: food is hard

 

So for dinner, we play what we refer to as "Dinner D&D". Since there are 6 people, we each came up with 20 meal ideas and we roll weekly for them. We determine the meals of the week, then fit them into the days that work best for the family. People can either switch up their ideas whenever they want or we've started making supplemental lists of 20. Once we get to 8, we'll change our dice. Depending on dinners, I'll grab myself something (usually either a bagged salad mix if it's only one day or something to batch cook if the week isn't looking too hot). It's been really nice because it takes a lot less time to meal plan. We will reroll if we've already had a meal recently (burgers got rerolled this week because we just had it last week) and kids can request a meal if they really want something. But it's nice to not have a hassle to try to plan meals.

 

Breakfast for me is usually either oatmeal, overnight oats, or yogurt with granola. Sometimes I'll get fancy and do eggs or something, but I'm pretty lazy in the am. Which really only leaves me lunch. Except lunch ends up being so hard. As a family, we've been trying to work on limiting food waste, so first lunch choice is always leftovers. However, whether or not we have leftovers is very random. Which makes it hard to batch cook (or else we end up with a ridiculous amount of leftovers). So basically, I need to figure out like frozen stuff I can keep on hand and eat when we don't have leftovers OR only batch cook like half a recipe and hope we have leftovers for everyone else so they don't eat my stuff. 

 

This week, I'm making a butternut squash and lentil salad (with no lettuce) because there are a few days I won't eat dinner (Cajun chicken alfredo) and there are a few days I'm not anticipating having any leftovers (like BLT night). I'm safe with that for lunches and dinners because the kids aren't all about that life. 

[athousandwords]

1 hour ago, Sylvaa said:

As a family, we've been trying to work on limiting food waste, so first lunch choice is always leftovers. However, whether or not we have leftovers is very random. Which makes it hard to batch cook (or else we end up with a ridiculous amount of leftovers). So basically, I need to figure out like frozen stuff I can keep on hand and eat when we don't have leftovers OR only batch cook like half a recipe and hope we have leftovers for everyone else so they don't eat my stuff. 

 

We had this problem a lot when my parents lived with us; DH and I both gravitate toward leftovers for lunch too, but making enough to feed 4 adults + 2 kids + leftovers is a lot! Sometimes I'd make a few big meals at the start of the week, like chili or pulled pork or a casserole, so that we'd have some extra lunches for the week - with smaller portioned dinners at night so that we'd get variety without wasting food. Salad is a pretty good go-to; maybe you could make up a bunch of salad-in-a-jar meals at the start of the week and label them as yours? Same with soup - batch cook and freeze or cook a few servings for lunches. Alternately, maybe something like savory oatmeal (on the days you're not having oatmeal for breakfast) or a quick omelet with whatever-is-left-in-the-fridge?

[toracorbat]

1 hour ago, Sylvaa said:

So for dinner, we play what we refer to as "Dinner D&D". Since there are 6 people, we each came up with 20 meal ideas and we roll weekly for them.

Love the idea! This way it's not a one person job to plan all the meals and everyone can have their favourites. I'll probably steal this.

[Waanie]

On 2/21/2022 at 5:53 PM, Sylvaa said:

So for dinner, we play what we refer to as "Dinner D&D". Since there are 6 people, we each came up with 20 meal ideas and we roll weekly for them.

Oh, that's cool. Do you roll a d6 + d20, or just a d20, rotating the lists? 

 

On 2/21/2022 at 5:20 PM, Rooks said:

Honestly, I hate meal planning, and I'm so stupid spoiled in that my wife does like 99% of the meals around our house.

Have you tried just picking up meal plans from the internet? I like this vegan mealplan from pick up limes, as the recipes are legit, the food is relatively varied and healthy, and it is cheap with readily available ingredients. I believe budget bytes also has meal plans, and BBC good food as well. I find coming up with my own meal plan not too hard, so I typically do it myself, but there are plenty of options out there.

[Sylvaa]

On 2/21/2022 at 1:18 PM, athousandwords said:

We had this problem a lot when my parents lived with us; DH and I both gravitate toward leftovers for lunch too, but making enough to feed 4 adults + 2 kids + leftovers is a lot! Sometimes I'd make a few big meals at the start of the week, like chili or pulled pork or a casserole, so that we'd have some extra lunches for the week - with smaller portioned dinners at night so that we'd get variety without wasting food.

 

We don't make any extra for lunches on purpose, although since a lot of recipes feed 4, I'll double them (for our family of 6) and end up with some naturally. What happens more regularly is if kids end up not liking it, they just don't eat it. Alternatively if they really like it, it'll be eaten same day. So some weeks, we end up with all kinds of leftovers and other weeks we don't have any. But I never really know how that will shake out until day of. We do have one night a week dedicated to eating leftovers, so I need to just stop being wishy washy and plan my own lunches.

 

When I do make my own lunches, they are generally well balanced and healthier than our traditional dinner meals (like this week, I'm eating a butternut squash and lentil dish that is super tasty, but definitely not something the kids get behind). So if the kids choose to eat them, I 100% don't complain. I'd prefer they expand their palates and try new things. I will complain if they waste it though.  

 

1 hour ago, Waanie said:

Oh, that's cool. Do you roll a d6 + d20, or just a d20, rotating the lists? 

 

We roll a d6 and d20. Chaotic Neutral for the win!

 

On 2/21/2022 at 1:28 PM, toracorbat said:

Love the idea! This way it's not a one person job to plan all the meals and everyone can have their favourites. I'll probably steal this.

 

It's actually working a lot better than I had hoped when we started. The kids even get involved in the rolling, so they really have no one to blame but themselves.  We will allow for vetoes (situation dependent), but it's been rarely used.

[Shello]

Rolling for dinner is a great idea!  It always adds an element of fun.   I usually batch cook something that will last most of the week and then always have backups that are freezer foods or dependent on pantry staples so I don't buy things that will go bad if we don't get to them and will stick around for whenever I need an option other than ordering pizza.  I like meatless chicken patties and usually have some kind of bun or bread around to make a sandwich, or soups, grilled cheese.  I'm not sure those work with your own restrictions but that's the idea anyway.  

[Sloth the Enduring]

That’s genius.  

[Rooks]

On 2/21/2022 at 10:53 AM, Sylvaa said:

Since there are 6 people, we each came up with 20 meal ideas and we roll weekly for them.

 

I feel like I would struggle to come up with 20 meal ideas. Anytime my wife asks me for a meal idea, she adds a caveat "It can't be burgers and pizza" and suddenly I'm blanking on food I want to eat. It's not like I don't like other things, I just so rarely dive into thinking about WHAT food I want that isn't complete garbage that 20yo me wanted. 

 

But I suppose like anything, the more you do it, the easier it gets. I might propose this idea to my wife and see what she thinks. How old is the youngest person participating in this? I feel like if we got our daughter involved her list of 20 would be a lot of things like Mac & Cheese, Hot Dogs, etc. 

[Shello]

1 hour ago, Rooks said:

I feel like I would struggle to come up with 20 meal ideas.

It's easy to get stuck in a rut for sure.  I'm always checking Pinterest for ideas. My fiancé and I were just discussing meals a few weeks ago.   We've dated 3 years and I have barely made the same thing twice.  There are probably 5 meals I've done again but otherwise it's always been something new.   

[Waanie]

1 hour ago, Rooks said:

I feel like I would struggle to come up with 20 meal ideas.

For me it's going to a website with good recipes, and filling out a few ingredients that I have in the fridge. If you want to come up with meal ideas for "later", you can start with a vegetable and find something with it. For example for carrots, you can go for a carrot tarte tatin, a curry, a stir fry, a lentil-carrot soup, and carrot salad with generic roasted potatoes and meat. Choose a handful of vegetables, find a handful of recipes with each of them, and you have your 20 recipes in no time. You could also start with a starch or protein instead of vegetable, depending on how you eat.

[Sylvaa]

1 hour ago, Rooks said:

feel like I would struggle to come up with 20 meal ideas. Anytime my wife asks me for a meal idea, she adds a caveat "It can't be burgers and pizza" and suddenly I'm blanking on food I want to eat. It's not like I don't like other things, I just so rarely dive into thinking about WHAT food I want that isn't complete garbage that 20yo me wanted. 

 

I've found that timing around when you ask the question is a big part of how successful meal ideas can be. We struggle to figure out what we want to eat if we are hungry or full. I gave the kids about two weeks warning and even now, some kids are still adding things to their menus. The lists also live on Google drive, so everyone can access as they wish. And it makes it really easy as people randomly think of ideas. 

 

1 hour ago, Rooks said:

But I suppose like anything, the more you do it, the easier it gets. I might propose this idea to my wife and see what she thinks. How old is the youngest person participating in this? I feel like if we got our daughter involved her list of 20 would be a lot of things like Mac & Cheese, Hot Dogs, etc. 

 

So youngest is 17, turning 18 in April. But understand that there are definitely different types of Mac and Cheese that are on lists! My kids are now fairly adventurous when it comes to food (and my boys enjoy watching cooking channels on YouTube, so they always come up with different ideas) but also really like their old standbys. 

 

It has 100% been a process with us though. When my husband and I moved in together, he worked a swing shift (until 7 pm) so they were used to being fed by his mother, who does not cook. His two would eat fast food at least 4 - 5 times a week. So getting used to real food was a challenge. Add to that, stomach issues (Crohn's and Colitis) run in my family, so sometimes standbys are necessary. What I'm saying is that you won't get any judgement from me if you end up with PB&J for dinner. 

 

1 hour ago, Shello said:

It's easy to get stuck in a rut for sure.  I'm always checking Pinterest for ideas. My fiancé and I were just discussing meals a few weeks ago.   We've dated 3 years and I have barely made the same thing twice.  There are probably 5 meals I've done again but otherwise it's always been something new.   

 

Your meals always sound so good too! I didn't realize they were that varied! (Also, I'm shocked about the 3 years - it's really been that long?!) 

[Shello]

1 hour ago, Sylvaa said:

Your meals always sound so good too! I didn't realize they were that varied! (Also, I'm shocked about the 3 years - it's really been that long?!) 

Thanks!  The weeks he wasn't over much I typically made some of the usuals that I knew the kids would eat or the usuals that were packed with veggies that DDG doesn't like.   Now that he's moved in I'll have to find a way to work those veggy heavy dishes in.   But the weeks I cooked for him I always wanted to try new things that the kids wouldn't eat and I wouldn't bother making just for myself.   IKR?  Time has flown by!  

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

Hope everything is ok.

[Sylvaa]

2 hours ago, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

Hope everything is ok.

 

I'm good! Just traveled this week for a meeting in Denver and haven't had time to update on NF. I'll be returning home tonight, so I'm planning on update tomorrow.

 

But thanks for looking out for me!

[Sylvaa]

Okay, I said I would update, but then I didn't, so here we go.

 

Last week was a success in terms of home stuff and work stuff; I hit all of my goals. I didn't end up working out daily, but I did get all of my gym workouts in. I'm totally fine with this (and my husband has been working out without me, so it hasn't impacted him at all). 

 

The one thing I didn't complete in February was my monthly chores list. I got more than zero done, but we had a few busy weekends and I never prioritized doing any of those monthly chores. March has a larger list, so I'm going to have to make sure this gets done on a regular basis. I have two books to return to the library tomorrow that I'm still working on finishing, so I'm going to have to do that tonight. 

 

In exciting news, we are scheduled to get our internet and cable hooked up on Tuesday afternoon! So it looks like I'll be done using my hot spot on the regular. 

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

Woohoo for good internet hookup.

[Sylvaa]

Weekly Update:

 

With travel, I decided to not count tomatoes for the first three days of the week. It's a lot of sitting around talking about things and it's really hard to quantify the way I do everything else. So I hit all but one of my goal last week. I probably could have hit it if I tried, I was just not feeling it. In general, I hit my goals Monday / Tuesday without really any issues, it's towards the end of the week that I slow down and not having that beginning of the week jump made it hard to get to what I needed. 

 

This week starts a 3-month challenge at my gym. I joined, more because it was less expensive to do the 3 months than the month-to-month, but also because I'm hoping for a bit more motivation. Working out hasn't ever really been an issue (although I should definitely push myself harder than I do), but eating is always hit or miss. I found a different app / website to use for food, so the husband and I are trying it out. It's got an exercise plan included that my husband may or may not start. On my list for today is finding both my Fitbit and my charger, so start wearing it again. I might try out the PAI stuff to see how that goes. 

 

I did end up finishing all the books I got from the library. I finished the last one Friday night before returning Saturday (no pressure there). I got three more; but one is about gardening, so it's a little bit different. 

 

Also, the baby did not do well with me not being home. He was fine while I was gone, but now that I'm home we go through a, "don't leave me" routine every night, where I have to reassure him that I'll still be here when he wakes up. 

[Shello]

3 hours ago, Sylvaa said:

now that I'm home we go through a, "don't leave me" routine every night, where I have to reassure him that I'll still be here when he wakes up. 

Cute though!  

[athousandwords]

Good luck with the 3-month challenge! I get that feeling of wanting to push harder, but it sounds like you've got the consistency down and that's probably the hardest part - and the healthiest habit in the long run. But hopefully the challenge helps with pushing yourself if that's your goal, and keeps your husband motivated as well.

 

23 hours ago, Sylvaa said:

Also, the baby did not do well with me not being home. He was fine while I was gone, but now that I'm home we go through a, "don't leave me" routine every night, where I have to reassure him that I'll still be here when he wakes up. 

 

We left the kids with their grandparents for 4 days and I expected this when we got back - but they were just like, "eh, you could have stayed longer." 🙄 Kids are brutal.

[WolfDreamer]

Proud of you!