Dinner prepared for the work week

Some of you may know that I do most of the cooking at our home. I was home first and had plenty of time to prepare dinner. I was lucky that I had a short commute to work and I got home early in the afternoon so I could relax a bit before tackling dinner.

I recently started a new job that is has a longer commute than before. Most days it is close to an hour for me to get home. The last thing I want to do when I get home is spend 30-60 minutes preparing dinner. Amanda has a long commute and work day so it would be no different for her. So after a bit of thought I decided to try preparing all of the dinners on Sundays, so all we have to do on weeknights is pick the meal we want, heat it up and prepare a vegetable to go with it.

      This is the second week that we have done this and it has worked out great. It takes a little planning and it takes about 2 hours to get all of the meals prepared, cooked and put away on Sunday. However we have enough food for all of our weeknight dinners and many of our lunches. I feel that I save at least a couple of hours a week and when we get home dinner really is a 5-10 minute job at most. I feel this is a great way to prepare great tasting meals and it is a great deterrent from us picking up take away after a long day. Who knows how much money we are saving by not eating out. If you are struggling to find time each day to prepare dinner maybe this is something to consider for your family.

Have you ever cooked several meals ahead of time like this?

 

Her Cleanliness ID and an App to Help

I was on Facebook a few weeks ago and saw an ad for a Huffington Post Article titled "There are 4 Types of Organized People - Which One Are You?". 

Click here to read the article.

I read the article and instantly knew which was me. I was the second one that the article called "Organized and messy". The bullets were what really sold me. They said...
For example, a person in this category might find themselves...

• Ignoring the laundry that's been piling up on the floor because laundry day isn't until tomorrow.
• Having their lunch made the night before, but skipping the whole making-the-bed thing in the morning.
• Filing away important papers in a binder that then acts as a coaster for the next week.

OMG!!! It's like they know me! haha

I always make my lunch the night before, but I do not always make the bed. Everything has a place in the house, and eventually we will put it there. I'm not fussed if everything isn't pristine and perfect. Things will get done when they get done.

And that has become infinitely easier since a friend introduced me to a new app - Tody. 

I absolutely love that, thanks to the app, I no longer have to remember when I last cleaned the microwave or washed the windows. Tody does all that for me! Here's how it works...

You start by choosing a room in your home (they have a premade list) or you can click General for rooms/areas they don't have built into the app. 

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For each area of your home, you add tasks that need to be done and how often you want/need to do them. This is all customizable based on your home and what the app calls your "attitude towards cleaning".  

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That's it! Once you have items programmed in, the app will remind you when those items need to be done. It shows up in a list that you can see organized by cleanliness or by room. You simply tell the app when the task has been completed and it will reset the clock for that item. If you complete the task early or late, the app just adjusts the schedule accordingly.

I love Tody! It helps me stay organized, our house is cleaner, and I no longer have to remember when I last cleaned the stove hood or garbage disposal.

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If you buy the Tody app, I would love to hear your thoughts. Do you think this is something you would use/need? What do you think?

Happy Cleaning,

His and Her Home Repair Saga, Day 7 + a Giveaway!

Home Repair Saga, Day 1
Home Repair Saga, Day 2
Home Repair Saga, Day 3
Home Repair Saga, Day 4
Home Repair Saga, Days 5 and 6

Progress!! If you read yesterday's post, it probably seemed like the project had stalled a little over the weekend. And it had. But yesterday things got moving again, which is great news! 

The day started off slowly. The guys cleaned up the massive pile of dirt and concrete since it was going to rain last night and that would mean sludge and grossness. It took a couple of hours to clean up it all up. Then they waited for the brick mason....and they waited...and they waited.

The brick mason wasn't going to make it here yesterday, so the guys made a command decision. What decision you ask?

Well...

The door is finally in!!! 

 

Still a lot to do but - THE DOOR IS IN!!!

Isn't it pretty? We chose one with the blinds in the door. Love that feature.

The guys tried to clean up a little because we had some bad storms last night.

So much prettier to look at than the plywood.

Today is going to be brick work (supposedly - though I'm not holding my breath), siding, plaster work inside, and finishing touches all around. I am so glad that when I go back to school tomorrow, most of the work will be done (just one section will need to be primed on Saturday). We made it! Finally! It feels so good to be so close to the finish line.

Yay for construction being done! As part of our celebration, head over to our friend Jessy's blog, The Artsy Cajun. Today is her birthday - HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! - and we are helping her celebrate. A bunch of cool bloggers donated some pretty awesome prizes. There is a lot of good stuff being given away. Check it out!
 
Happy Tuesday,

His and Her Home Repair Saga, Days 5 and 6

Home Repair Saga, Day 1
Home Repair Saga, Day 2
Home Repair Saga, Day 3
Home Repair Saga, Day 4

Friday morning, the guys were here before 8 to continue working. I could not see anything they were doing, but I could hear them working and talking.

I hated not being able to see and having no natural light in the room.

I could hear them mixing concrete, removing the jacks, and doing some other hammering, drilling, and sawing. There were some hiccups during the day so the door did not get put in. The new concrete foundation was laid and everything was made ready for the brick mason to come on Saturday.

This is what the back of the house looked like Friday night. It looked a little bit like a war zone.

It's like a concrete pool...

...stretching across the entire back of the house.

See what I meant - disaster area. I just want to go and start cleaning things up. I won't, but I want to.

Saturday was a slow day. Our contractor came by and got things set up for the brick mason. The brick mason came by and saw what the guys had done and was confused. Apparently, they had two different visions. He said it wasn't a problem and left to get more supplies. He didn't come back. I called our contractor later and asked what was going on. He explained that the brick mason needed more supplies than he originally thought and it was too late in the day to start.

The deal now is that they will all be here Monday to add the bricks and stairs, put in the door, replace the siding, and clean up the backyard. Tuesday they will fix the interior plaster and handle all the finishing work. But - if I have learned anything through this process it's that contractor's timelines can change at a moment's notice. We will be flexible, but hopeful that it all gets done before I go back to work on Wednesday.


Happy Monday,

His and Her Home Repair Saga, Day 4

His and Her Home Repair Saga, Day 1
His and Her Home Repair Saga, Day 2
His and Her Home Repair Saga, Day 3 

Yesterday was an intense day. I think that is going to be my word for it. As I was texting family and friends some updates during the day, I found myself using words like "scary" and "unfair" a lot. Here's a recap of day 4...

-The guys started early by removing what was left of the brick on the outside.

-They then took out the concrete where they will need to build the new footer.

-Then they started to take out the door. 

Bye, bye door!

Bye, bye frame!

-This is where it got intense. While taking out the door, they found more water damage then expected, some surface mold, and a 3/4 inch difference between the left side of the door and the right side. 

Lots of water damage on the left side.

Lots of wood rot on the right side.

The mold is on the side of the wall...the rest is water damage.

-The insulation underneath the door was not done correctly - they only put in about half the amount that they should have.

-There were rat droppings --- but no rats! Praise for that! (Our neighbor said that they found rats in her house a few years ago and put down poison. She never heard anything else about it. We think that's connected to our issues.)

Have I ever told you guys how much I hate rats?!?!

-They built a new girder, replaced the subfloor, and then did the part that had me the most terrified. The jacked the right side of the door jam (the part about 2 feet away from our brick fireplace) up so that it was level with the other side. I could hear some cracking and popping from the walls while they jacked. I was a nervous wreck! We do have some small cracks, but nothing major. Thank the Lord!

The jack was much smaller than I thought it would be.

-They reframed the opening for the new, smaller sliding glass door. Then boarded the place up until today's work begins.

We went with a 6 foot door instead of 8 feet like we had, so this is going to get dry walled and sealed shut.

All boarded up for the night. The door gets put in tomorrow.

Here's the exterior view of the work from yesterday.

This one is holding up the left side.

This is holding up the right side.

Still a lot to do but a lot of progress has been made.

Rats + water + mold = chaos! Not the workers, they were fine, but chaos for me. I paced, baked, questioned, watched, photographed, and paced some more. It was more damage than they were expecting, but it is fixed. The rotten wood has been replaced and the new door gets put in tomorrow. I am optimistically going to say that the worst is behind us.


Since this will go up while they are working on the house again, maybe you all could help distract me. What are your fun weekend plans? Tell me all about it so I can focus on you guys instead of the work.


Happy Friday,

His and Her Home Repair Saga, Day 3

Home Repair Saga, Day 1
Home Repair Saga, Day 2

The contractor and demo guys were here yesterday and work started! Yay! ....... Well, yay for the fact that the work started, but not so yay for all the problems they found.

We already knew that it was going to be bad, but it is worse than they originally thought. Here are some of the phrases I heard today while demo was being done:

"Shew! That's messed up!" 

"Why would someone do that?"

"This doesn't make any sense."

"Hmmm....that's weird."

They started by taking out the stairs.

"This door's gonna fall." 

"It [the sliding glass door and frame] should stay up. I mean, I think it will. Yeah. Well, maybe".

With a tone of sheer awe and shock, "They didn't even use the right sand [underneath the stairs]."

"I don't want this thing [sliding glass door] falling on me and if we demo those bricks, it's going to [because the builder built it on the brick skirting instead of on boards like they are supposed to]."

"Here, let me see your camera so I can show you something." I handed over my camera, he took a photo, and gave it back. I asked what I was looking at and he said a rotted piece of wood where the steps were connected to the house. The second guy reached out, took a fist full of wood off the house, and crumbled it to dust in his bare hands. My heart stopped beating for a second. I had to sit down.

This is the photo the demo guy took.

 The contractor was here last night to check on materials for tomorrow and he said to himself, "It ain't sittin' on nothin'." The "it" here is the back of the house. He then had to prop it up with some cinder blocks and a board because the back wall of the house had sunk a little since the guys left (less than 7 hours earlier).

"Even the porch light has not been installed correctly. There's been water leaking in around it because they messed it up."

"It can't get much worse than this." (I don't know if this is reassuring or scary. I'm going to choose to feel reassured. Or at least try to be.)


Here are the photos of day 3...demo day - aka Completely Stress Out Amanda Day!

This is where the stairs used to be. See all that lovely water damage?

The other side of the board is not as damaged - thank goodness!

This is how the contractor held up the back of the house until the morning.

The entire view.

*phew* Lots of demo and lots of stress. The contractor met with me this morning to talk about how he is going to fix the structural issues with the house. He came up with an idea that I actually understand - a first for me in home improvement - but it has upped the cost by a considerable amount. I am so happy that this is getting done, but my anger towards the builder who didn't take any care or concern for his quality of work is starting to grow.


Which contractor phrase is your "favorite"? Mine is the "They didn't even use the right sand" because the way he said it cracked me up. You have to smile right? It messes up less makeup than crying. :)


Happy Thursday,

Her Super Saturday Snapshots - House Decorations

Typically Sean is the one who handles the post for the Super Saturday Snapshot linkup. I decided to jump in today because I have some pics I wanted to share with everyone. I had the motivation bug bite me on Saturday and it stuck around for quite a few days. I wanted to get some things done around the house that we had talked about for a while and just hadn't gotten around to. Here's what we did...

I made my first burlap wreath! I love it and it now hangs in our downstairs bathroom. The room did not have any decorations before so the sunflowers really help to brighten and decorate the small space. You can see the reflection of the wreath in the mirror which is pretty cool. It looks like the wreath is much bigger and it helps to make the space feel fuller and more decorated.

While we were cleaning out our catch-all room, we found this beautiful crystal vase that was a wedding present from my parents. I wanted to put it on the mantle, but it seemed odd to just have an empty vase on the mantle. We went to Michael's to get the sunflowers for the burlap wreath and I told Sean to start putting his talents to work. He used to work with a fabulous floral designer (really, his floral arraignments are like design features) and I wanted him to put some of those learned skills to work. He chose autumn flowers because Michael's had put those out already and this is the arrangement he created. It's beautiful and I love it! It adds height and color to the mantle and a boring corner of the living room which is perfect.

While we were in South Carolina visiting my sister a few weeks ago, I found the letter "I" in picture three and the art in picture two at the local Hobby Lobby (I cannot wait for us to get a Hobby Lobby in this area!!). I love them both and I am glad they have been hung up in the house. Picture one is a collage I made based on a Pinterest pin I found. I blogged about it here.

After we moved a table of my grandmother's from the upstairs catch-all room to the living room to use as an end table, I found this basket inside. It is a gift from a friend who passed away a few years ago. What a treasure! I planned to use it for my knitting WIPs, but wanted a liner. Sean put his sewing skills to good use and I have a liner. It's perfect!

We have a glider rocker in our living room but it was never anything too exciting and it didn't really match our decor anymore. We checked out a new fabric shop that a friend told me about and found this awesome upholstery fabric. Sean was able to cover the cushions and now the chair looks brand new. It fits in perfectly now.

Thank you for stopping by and seeing all of our little projects. Leave a comment below with a link to your Saturday Snapshots so I can visit back.


Happy Saturday,

Her "Love-y" Photo Collage

Two years ago I found this pin on Pinterest...

(Click here to go to the original post.)

A few weeks ago I was looking at my Pinterest account and thinking about how I had pinned all of these fun things to do around the house, but hadn't done any of them. Motivation knocked and I answered. Here's my version of the pin...

Sean and I live in the same town that we married in, which happens to be my hometown so I knew I couldn't follow the original exactly. I found a frame at Michael's (on sale - score!) and went from there.

Here's what I decided to do...

Step 1: I went to Google Maps and typed in the name of my hometown. I took a screen shot and then opened Paint. I clicked "Control + V" to paste the map's screenshot and cropped the map to include just the areas I wanted to see. This is what it looked like when I was done.

Step 2: I repeated Step 1 for Sean's hometown. Thank goodness Google Maps is global. This is what Sean's hometown map looked like.

Step 3: I wanted a quote about love traveling across miles and I found the perfect one on Goodreads after a Google search. 

I found a free clipart image of a heart, saved it to my computer, and opened it in PicMonkey (love PicMonkey!). I added the quote, played with the font, and came up with this.

Step 4: I decided to add a wedding photo to the collage as our fourth image. We hung it on the wall in our living room with other photos of our family. 

I love how this turned out! I am so glad I decided to go back through my Pinterest account to see what I have pinned over the past few years. I wonder what other great ideas I have lurking in there.


Have you created something inspired by one of your pins? 


Happy Pinning and Creating,