Fall meal planning update

I'm still mostly using my meal planning system, although the actual cooking definitely fell by the wayside for most of the summer due to the heat. Instead I tried to plan as many fast, preferably oven-less, meals as possible.

Now that it's starting to cool down I tweaked our meal planning a bit. Soup is sounding more appealing, so I'm subbing out our usual large salad meal for a hearty soup meal. I've also reduced the total servings I aim for each week from 16 to 12. This is because I've been cooking my lunches separately so I don't need to factor them into our planning. When my cooking was sporadic during the summer I couldn't rely on leftovers (quesadillas aren't great the next day) and I kept purchasing lunch, which I hate to do. So much money, so little enjoyment. If I could actually go out to eat I might see it differently but I don't like paying $7 for a lackluster sandwich to eat at my desk.

So, new lunch plan: brown rice + frozen stir fry veg + protein (usually tofu a few times a week and fish or meat a couple times) + stir fry sauce. It's a fake stir fry. And yes, the microwaved frozen vegetables are not nearly as good as fresh would be but this is the fastest, most consistent lunch I've been able to come up with. It takes virtually no effort and hits all the key nutritional groups I need to feel good. All I really have to do is remember to cook a batch of brown rice on Sunday evening and purchase some tofu. I don't even bother pre-cooking the tofu most of the time. This is where it really comes in handy that I can eat the same lunch every day and not get bored.

And my new meal planning structure looks like this:
Soup - 1x per week, 4 - 6 servings
Meat/lentils/pasta - 1x per week, 4 - 6 servings
Easy meal - 1x per week, 2 - 4 servings

I just need to round up some hearty soup recipes, preferably including a few that can be done in the crockpot. I've been searching around and hopefully I can share some as I try them. I love the crockpot, but the most common recipes you find are usually meat based and we try not to eat meat all the time. I'm hunting for vegetarian recipes as well and there are some that look pretty awesome.

More meal planning posts here.

The weekend

If I had realized it was going to be 90 degrees on Saturday I probably wouldn't have committed myself to spending all day in the kitchen.

{kitchen saturday}

{sundried tomato pesto}

{pumpkin ginger bread}

{juiced}

{salted}

It was still nice to get back in there so I won't complain. We had a family birthday party on Sunday (not pictured, because it was a whirlwind) so I was prepping for that by making carrot cake cupcakes and my favorite picnic food, pressed sandwiches (grilled veg + pesto and prosciutto + mozzarella + sundried tomato pesto). Since I was already in there I tested out a pumpkin bread recipe I hadn't tried before. It had a lot of pumpkin flavor but not nearly enough spice for me. I'll hunt out a new one.

Saturday evening we were veritable social butterflies, at least compared to our usual standards. We went to Brendan Ravenhill's new studio opening and ogled over light fixtures. Then we headed to Lily's gallery opening and ogled over her gorgeous paintings. Then we went to a party at our friends' house and hung out until midnight at which point I cried uncle. My stamina has gone way down, guys.

Care package

Way back in August we took that last minute trip up to the bay area to help my sister and her husband move into their new place. What I didn't share at the time is that the reason we ended up going up with them was because my poor sister was suffering through the most miserable morning (and noon, and night) sickness I've ever seen and we didn't want her to make the long drive.

I also wanted to put together a little care package for them, since moves are the worst, even when you aren't feeling terrible. We might be completely grown up, but I'll still never get over the impulse to be an overprotective older sister.

I am far from an expert but I dug around on the internet and then just winged it. All the ginger goodies I could pick up (chews, cookies and tea from Trader Joe's) plus some lemonheads in case the sweet-sour thing could help. Ritz crackers, which I don't think she ended up being able to eat, but hey, you have to try everything! Pretty sure the ginger thins ended up being the biggest success.

I wanted them to have a couple meals in the fridge so I put together my favorite orzo salad, then panicked because I realized it has a lot of garlic which might be super unappealing to a pregnant lady so I added a giant tub of baked mac and cheese. Brownies and candles for her husband, since his birthday was the day after we left and I knew there was no way they'd have a functional kitchen yet (seriously, the timing of this move was rough in all kinds of ways). I packaged everything in a set of the glass snaptop containers that I'm completely obsessed with. Seriously, they are the best and Macy's puts them on sale regularly, so keep an eye out.

I'm happy to report that she's feeling much better now and I'm over the moon with excitement to meet the new baby in March! Expect to see a lot of weekend Oakland trips in the spring.

Year six

I didn't want to write this year either. I actually thought I had a draft where I'd been typing my notes, but no, just this blank page that I need to somehow wrangle my thoughts onto. I thought maybe I'd just skip it, but I can't quite do it. I'm grateful to have posts from each year to look back on even though writing them is hard - years one, two, three, four and five here.

Today marks the sixth year anniversary of Dave's bicycle accident. Last year I had just finished dealing with a crisis and was so, so angry. This year I feel pretty defeated. Nothing is getting better and I'm starting to realize that I have to let go of it a little if my life is ever going to move forward. I've been trying to take steps towards letting go, but it's a terrifying, guilt ridden process. Looking back, I realize that I said I was going to do this last year and I've only been partially successful.

Here's the thing - my default mode is to be a "fixer" in all situations. I can google like a pro, I can make lists of action items and resources and steps to take. But I can't fix this and not only have I exhausted myself trying, I've ended up in a position where all my energy and resources over the last few years have gone towards trying. I just haven't had anything left to invest in myself or my career or my relationships with people I care about, including my parents, which seems ironic, since I spend so much time thinking about them. But a relationship based solely on problem-solving isn't really a relationship, and I'm starting to feel it.

Fixing is comforting. It keeps me busy and distracted. I don't have time to feel sad often because I'm constantly going over a to do list in my head. Appointments and phone calls I should make (when the hell do people who work full time make phone calls when most offices are only open during the hours you are also working? it's a dilemma), places I should check out, strategies we maybe haven't tried yet. My mind is always going and it numbs me out a bit. Sure, I feel frantic and stressed and angry that I have to do all this. But sad? I haven't let myself feel sad in a while. Sad is depressing. Sad is admitting defeat. Sad is something that you can't just fix and I have a hard time accepting that.

So this summer I decided to try just letting myself feel sad. Or angry, or whatever. I would sometimes come home and just lie on the floor in the dark for 30 minutes and listen to music and actually let myself think about my feelings. It was a little bit like being 13 again, but with fewer zits. And yes, it was sad. I was essentially throwing myself a long overdue pity party and not even attempting to distract myself from it. It was uncomfortable and awkward. I am not a lie on the floor and cry type of person but eventually I needed to stop banging against a wall and actually lean into it. Honor the sadness and hope that I could start to move on from there.

I wish I could tell you that I had an amazing breakthrough and am now totally in touch with my emotions and also magically found a solution to this situation. I didn't. I still backslide a lot, and catch myself putting up walls because it's so much easier, this habit, even if it leaves me cut off and angry. I still feel responsible for fixing my parents' lives or at least finding solutions to make them more livable. I'm still terrified because I know that at some point in the near future the burden of taking care of Dave 24/7 is going to break my mom down completely and we should be coming up with a solution in advance of that and we haven't. I don't have the energy. I need to spend a bit of that energy on myself, because I've been paddling in place for the last six years, barely able to get myself to move into a new apartment, let alone contemplate my own future. I keep telling myself that I'll pick up the pieces of my own life later, once I've resolved everything. But this isn't going to resolve. It might only get worse. And I don't know how many years the rest of my life can wait on hold.

I don't know how to get over the crippling guilt I feel when I make the decision to cut back on family time in order to have more time with Dustin, or with our friends, or just by myself. I've tried to do it this year because it's the only way forward I know. The first Saturday I woke up and realized I was going to spend the entire weekend in my own apartment, without any trips down to my parents or any major events, I actually felt at loose ends. What do people do with free time? And had I really had so little of it that I couldn't remember how it felt? The enormous, unbelievable luxury of waking up slowly and doing normal things, cleaning the house and drinking tea and walking the dog and reading a book and doing laundry. The lingering anxiety that surely I was forgetting something because not following a complicated schedule of obligations seemed unbelievable. I'm trying to make sure we keep at least two weekends a month free. It's harder than you'd expect and it's still never really enough time, but it's something.

So this is where I am, moving forward in starts and stutters, trying to rebuild my relationships as best I can, trying to honor the sadness without letting it consume me. I need to spend a little time fixing myself before I can keep on with fixing anyone else. I can't really see my way forward right now but I'm trying to believe that there's a path somewhere. I have to start taking some steps in the fog and just hope that I find it.

Mops, and other exciting things (just kidding! it's only about mops)

I already waxed ecstatic about my Roomba on here, so this post probably won't surprise anyone. Blogs are tough because whenever I get excited I want to share something with you, but I think I'm supposed to be getting excited about wall weavings and fancy new candle scents. And I do like some of those things! But I really, really like gadgets that make my chores easier.

I grew up cleaning floors on hands and knees and while I've tried to make a transition to a Bona type system (which is basically an upscale Swedish Swiffer, in case you don't spend your spare time thinking about cleaning products) I always reverted back. Especially after I bent the handle of our Bona by trying to scrub too hard. I really like to put my back into it, I guess. I needed another solution.

{new friend}

I've had this Bissell floor steam cleaner for a month and it is a game changer. Our floors have never felt so good. It doesn't use any cleaning products, just distilled water. It comes with two pads and they're machine washable (but they have to be air dried, so don't toss them in the dryer. I have no idea what will happen if you do, but I'm not taking any chances).

Basically, you fill it with water, plug it in, wait for it to warm up and then select your steam level. I use level three on my tile floors and level two on the wood. Then you just run it over the floor, not too fast. The contact time matters since you aren't physically scrubbing and you want the steam to have a chance to work. I just run the cleaner along the floor at a slow pace. If you have a stubborn spot, you just hold the steamer in place for 10 seconds or so and it usually steams it right off. The head swivels well so getting into corners and under furniture is easy. The floors feel amazing when I'm done and because it's so quick I end up cleaning them once or twice a week.* I won't tell you how often I was cleaning them before because then you'll be horrified.

The only thing that drives me a little nuts is that there is no on/off switch. You have to physically unplug it to turn it off. This is incomprehensible to me. Every other appliance I own has an on/off switch so it can't be super advanced technology. Backtracking over freshly steamed floors in order to unplug the machine, while the machine itself is still spitting out steam, is a bit of a pain. EDIT - This is my fault for not reading the instructions. You can turn the mop off by pressing the steam level button a few times. It will rotate through each level and then turn off.

One note - some of the reviews are annoyed because you have to sweep the floors first. Um, duh. A steam cleaner is not a vacuum. This is exactly the same process as mopping your floors. Of course it would be nicer if the steamer also sucked up all your hair for you (I'm half convinced that I'm going bald, based on the amount of hair I vacuum up regularly) but that isn't how it works.

* As I write this I realize it 100% sounds like a glowing sponsored post. It is not. To date, I have never run a sponsored post and while I don't anticipate doing so, I would certainly give you a heads up if I did. There are a ton of steam cleaners on the market. We checked out the reviews and the prices and finally ordered this one, which is the most basic model available. Bissell has no idea that I exist, let alone that I'm in love with their glorified mop.

Lemon bar quest

About those lemon bars ...

I love lemon bars but I don't make them often enough to be loyal to a particular recipe. I've had a couple of flops where the lemon custard didn't set up well and I was left pretty disappointed, considering the number of wasted lemons, not to mention the butter.

This time around I went with an Ina Garten recipe and I think I can say it was foolproof and pretty delicious. The lemon custard is fairly firm, probably because it has a bit more flour in it than I'd expect. The shortbread crust is tender but sturdy enough not to fall apart too much. Maybe I've found my one and only? Although I still want to try the Smitten Kitchen whole lemon version. I was afraid to make it this time because I've had a couple of mixed results with the whole lemon tart and I knew I wouldn't have time to make a second batch if the first one failed.

Since these were for a baby shower I wanted them to look as profesh as possible. My lemon bars usually aren't pretty. It's hard to get clean edges or even sizes when you're cutting through a layer of custard. This time I decided I was going for it and tried to be really careful.

{lemon bar grid}

First I chilled the lemon bars overnight. The next morning I cut squares that were approximately 3 inches, with the help of the measuring tape. Then I made two diagonal cuts on each square to get four triangles. I ended up rejecting some of the edge pieces but everything else looked nice and even. You'll have to take my word for it because after I'd spent 40 minutes cutting up lemon bars it was kind of a frantic rush to get out the door on time.

Lately

Whew. It's been a while.

{morning light}

{cooking!}

{lemon bars}

{bow tie cookies}

{helper}

I wish I had something exciting to share but I've got nothing. Just run of the mill life stuff like spending most of my energy on work and distributing whatever I have left as best I can. It hasn't been very picturesque, let me tell you.

A few little things ...

:: I know people claim that we don't have seasons here but I think they're just (much) more subtle. I'm enjoying the fall light, even if the fall weather is slow to catch up. I'm normally loathe to give up summer, but that last heat wave nearly killed me and now I'm grasping at any hint of chill in the air even if it means I won't see daylight for several months. It was cold enough this weekend that I'm looking forward to ending my nearly uninterrupted summer kitchen boycott.

:: Okay, I have spent a little time in the kitchen. I've been basing our cooking nights on the weather report, so I manage to get in there occasionally. Things I have cooked in the past three weeks: one enormous pot of linguine, lemon bars, a double batch of sugar cookies, countless quesadillas. The baked goods were for a dear friend's baby shower and I managed to frost the sugar cookies on my own. Sugar cookie decor is not my forte, but Emily's tips saved me. I think the key is the long, slow mixing. I always beat the hell out of my royal icing, which works perfectly for gingerbread houses but is terrible for sugar cookies. I think I erred on the too-soft side and the icing sort of bled together, but I'm improving!

:: Circe always helps with the vacuuming by lying on the floor directly in your path and then nonchalantly moving out of the way at the last second. I think she's just trying to prove how un-intimidated she is by the whole process.

Not pictured - we had a beloved out of town friend visiting last week and used it as an excuse to eat all the things. I kind of wish we hadn't finally tried Pine and Crane because it was as good as everyone said and so affordable and now all I want to do is pick up their dan dan noodles every night.