8 Days

I am a Mom and a wife that works full-time. My day starts at 6:30 am (if not earlier) and I don’t sit back down to relax until sometime after 8:00 pm. The intention of this post is not to make you feel sorry for me, but to realize that working Moms need 8 days in a week. I also don’t want to take away from the stay-at-home Moms because that’s a full time job too, so I feel they also need 8 days in a week. With that said, the 8th day would be just for the Mom. It would allow Moms to get caught up on things they wish they could do without interruptions. Here is an example…

Last weekend I had high intentions of getting my house completely cleaned, make baby food, grocery shop, paint and enjoy time “me time.” Well I managed to get the grocery shopping and some touch-up painting done. Don’t get wrong, I enjoyed my weekend with my baby girl and husband, but man, I didn’t even scratch the surface on my to do list. So on Monday, I was lucky enough to have the afternoon off. And WOW, that’s only a half a day, but I managed to get a ton done.

  1. Two coats of paint in the hallway (it’s done)
  2. Make 3 batches of baby food
  3. Vacuumed and dusted Morgan’s room
  4. 3 loads of Laundry
  5. Changed the sheets on our bed
  6. Dusted our room
  7. Cleaned the fan in our room (so gross)
  8. Picked up the entire house

I don’t claim to be amazing, but when given the time without interruptions, I was able to get a lot done. Whew. And that was only 4 hours. Imagine if I got the other 20…

Dancing…

Tonight I noticed Morgan dancing in her exersaucer. Which is something new… Now I know kids learn quickly, but every time she does something like that, it just amazes me how fast kids pick up on stuff. She was dancing (bouncing) to the music. And then when she was on the floor, she was moving along with the music coming out of her “piano.” Wow.

What’s for Dinner?

What’s for dinner this week?

Crock Pot Monday: Whole Chicken and mashed potatoes

Grill/Stove Top Tuesday: Burgers with fried egg and roasted red peppers

Ethnic Wednesday: Spaghetti

Leftover Thursday: See Above

Pizza Friday: Pizza with a thin crust, sausage and peppers

Steak Saturday: Pork chops and Rice

On your Own Sunday: Whatever you feel like making

Meal Planning

Recently my husband and I started planning out our meals for the week. We created a daily theme to help us determine what we are having.

Crock-pot Monday

Grill/Stove Top Tuesday

Ethnic Wednesday

Leftover Thursday

Pizza Friday

Steak Saturday

On you own Sunday

We usually plan our meals out on the weekend before and then we head to the grocery store. We only buy groceries for what’s on the menu for that week and that’s it. So far, we have pretty much stuck to the meal plan, with some deviations (things came up). The goal is for us to save money not only on groceries, but going out to eat as well.

Here is our chart… I used a version that my brother-in-law created and modified it a tad to meet our needs. It’s built in Microsoft Excel for easy manipulation.

Do you meal plan? If so, what do you use?

New Trainer

Here is my bike!!! It’s a Raleigh Capri 3.0, 2011 model. I love it. Picked it up at Freewheeler in Grand Rapids, MI. Best bike shop in town!

I recently purchased a CycleOps Mag+ Trainer from Freewheeler along with a mat and block (as seen above). The magnetic trainers are not nearly as loud as what people say/think they are. I have only used the trainer for a total of an hour now (only had it for a few days), but it’s relatively quiet and realistic. I noticed that when I ride indoors vs. outdoors is that I do not have the “coast time” that I would normally get when I ride during the warmer months outside. So I think the trainer is going to push me to be a better rider. Here we go……………..

It’s Time

After sitting on this domain for quite some time (I know all of the other Lesley Lampens out there are sad) I finally decided to start blogging about whatever I want to. Now who knows what I will write about, but I hope to make the posts humorous and light-hearted. I blog quite regularly on my daughter’s site, so most of my time is spent there. I will use this blog as a way to connect with people; connect with those who experience the same level of randomness in their life.