Tasty Treats Tuesday - Pumpkin Butter

I have not tried this recipe yet but it sounds delicious...maybe if I post this, my mom will make it when we're in Nebraska since she stalks my blog! ;) (I think she's stealing my recipes before I can make them for her!)

On the blog linked below the recipe, there are many ideas for using pumpkin butter and other pumpkin recipes. A friend from church introduced me to this blog ran by her friend. I think her friend is reading my mind! I looked at it today and Lemonade Coconut Cake was today's recipe. oh boy! (hint, hint, mom!) My two favorite dessert options are pumpkin and lemon but not together.

Pumpkin Butter
by Julia Mestas
Adapted from Gina's Skinny Taste
1 can (29 ounces) pumpkin puree
1 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup water
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground nutmeg
1/8 tsp all spice

Combine all the ingredients in a saucepan over medium/high heat and bring to a boil. Once it reaches a boil, lower the heat to low/medium and simmer for about 45 minutes stirring frequently.

Remove from heat and enjoy some immediately (becasue you won't be able to wait for it to cool) and save the rest in an airtight container in the refrigerator.
*I stored it in an old applesauce container I washed and saved, it worked perfectly.

How long will this last in the fridge? Not long because you will find yourself adding it to toast, oatmeal, maybe even your coffee?


FROM: http://fatgirltrappedinaskinnybody.blogspot.com/2010/10/pumpkin-butter-and-its-many-uses.html

A non-edible Tasty Treat!

I know it's Tasty Treat Tuesday and I missed last week. I've been wrapping up several things and know I need to finish our Maui trip too!

Anywho, since we're trying to be healthy, I thought I would pause for a tasty non-edible treat. This is a new website, Varolo, I found that's starting soon. It pays you to watch ads and from what I can see, it's a little more in-depth than youdata.com and has a better referral program than even swagbucks! (totally different than swagbucks so it's nice to have another site to make a little extra cash from!) Take a look and if you're interested, please sign up under my link.

Click here for a short video and to sign up. :)

Thanks!

Can you see why he's our Little Koala?

Maui - Day 2

Day 2- Thursday, May 13, 2010

Thursday was a fairly mellow day. We woke up around 3:30am due to the different time zone. (Hawaii is three hours earlier than Phoenix, 5 hours earlier than CST) We had a good laugh as we decided to go grocery shopping and by 6am, we were in full shopping mode to finish up our list of what we needed for the week. We then walked around the hotel grounds and had a devotion outside before heading to the free breakfast orientation.





We wanted to book a luau and go to the aquarium so after a little research, we went ahead and booked them through the hotel along with a whale/dolphin watch that Aunt Cindy was interested in. We then left for a little drive for what was promised to be THE best banana bread. The road changed to one lane and included many hills and sharp turns. It was slightly nerve-wracking at times! We arrived in Kahakuloa Village and easily found Julia’s Banana Bread stand. We tried a sample, enjoyed it, and bought two loaves. (While it was good, we later found another banana bread stand that Walt and I agreed was our favorite.)





As we made our way back to Ka’anapali, we made a couple stops mentioned in our book, Maui Revealed. We used this book in 2007 and brought it along used it this time with a few updates from their website. One of those stops was the Olivine Pools and we had a picnic lunch there.




We ended our leisurely day with our first dinner in the condo. We enjoyed sloppy joes, salad, lots of veggies, and Maui onion potato chips. Getting up led to us going to bed early plus we had a busy day the next day!

Maui Banana Bread

It's Tasty Treats Tuesday!

Before we went to Maui this year, I was on a mission to find a really good banana bread recipe. My requirements for the recipe beyond great flavor was simplicity especially real ingredients that I have on had when I have a plethora of very ripe bananas. Other recipes can be nice but I try not to always have sour cream and such on hand. (You can freeze very ripe mashed bananas too for future banana bread if you can't use them all.)

During all of the reminiscing about our trip, I realized that the banana bread we ate the morning we left for our trip was not this recipe. That was a recipe to use up an excess of sour cream I got on sale with coupons! This is a recipe I discovered around the time we went to Maui but didn't make until after we were back. Unfortunately, I cannot remember where I found it. :( I have made it several times for a few events and for our enjoyment tweaking it each time.

Our favorite way is with the 1/2 butter/ 1/2 coconut oil but it is still delicious with only butter. We haven't used the macadamia nuts in it yet. I'm a no nuts added banana bread fan...although m.nuts would probably be fabulous! When not using stone ground whole wheat as much as possible, I personally only bake with unbleached white flour. This recipe might be okay if you didn't have the unbleached white flour so don't let that deter you from trying this recipe.

Maui Banana Bread

Makes 2 large loaves, 3 regular loaves, or (48 mini-muffins and 6 mini-loaves!) Great recipe to halve or double...that was a LOT of batter the one time I doubled it...oh boy!

*½ pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened (or ¼ lb butter AND ½ cup coconut oil)
*2 cups sugar
*4 large eggs
*6 medium very ripe bananas, peeled and mashed (I've always found this number/size is not set in stone...I've used anywhere from 4-8 depending on the size of the bananas...all come out great!)
*2 ½ cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
*2 teaspoons baking soda
*1 teaspoon salt
*½ cup chopped macadamia nuts (optional)

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F. Grease two 9-inch loaf pans. Sometimes I sprinkle a little sugar after buttering the pans. It creates a nice sugar crust that has received many compliments.

2. Combine the butter (or butter/coconut oil) with the sugar in a large bowl. Using electric beaters, beat the mixture until creamy and pale yellow. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, then add the bananas.

3. Sift together the flour, baking soda, and salt into a medium bowl. Add to the banana mixture and stir until incorporated. Mix in the nuts if using. Divide the batter between the two (or more) prepared pans and bake for 50 to 60 minutes, or until a wooden skewer inserted into the center of one loaf comes out clean. Let each loaf cool in its pan for 10 minutes before removing from the pan to place on a wire rack. Let cool completely on the wire rack.

If using muffins or mini-muffins, bake according to your other muffin recipe directions but keep an eye on them. I will say that mini-muffins of this recipe are just cruel to the taste buds. You need more of it's great taste!

Tasty Treats Tuesday - Amazing Meatloaf

When we got married, Walt informed me that he didn't like meatloaf. (That's putting it nicely...he couldn't stand his mom's meatloaf.) After convincing him to try THIS version, Walt is now a HUGE fan of meatloaf. To be able to make something he enjoys better than his mom's version is a dream for a wife!

Brown Sugar Meatloaf
Ingredients: Serves 6-8

• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup ketchup
• 1 TB Worcestershire sauce

• 1 1/2 pounds lean ground beef
• 3/4 cup milk
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper (optional)
• 1 small onion, chopped (I used 1 TB dried chopped onion flakes)
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 2 garlic cloves, minced (or ½ tsp garlic powder)
• 1 TB Worcestershire sauce
• 3/4 cup finely crushed saltine cracker crumbs

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.

If you have time to let the meat marinate: Mix the beef through the saltine cracker crumbs in a medium bowl and refrigerate anywhere from one hour to one day. If you don’t have time to marinate, no worries. Shape the meat into a loaf and place in loaf pan. (If you don’t use lean ground beef, place two pieces of bread in the bottom to soak up the grease.)

Mix the brown sugar, ketchup, and other 1 TB of Worcestershire together in a small bowl and spread on top of loaf.

Bake in preheated oven for 1 hour or until juices are clear.

(A faster cooking version is to do mini-loaves in a mini-loaf pan. Cook for 30 minutes at 350 degrees and then check the temp with a meat thermometer. (or cut one open to check if it’s done) Cook up to 15 more minutes if needed until juices run clear.)

(This recipe is adapted from allrecipes.com's Brown Sugar Meatloaf)
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Brown-Sugar-Meatloaf/Detail.aspx

Maui - Day 1

(Posted quite late but better late than never...)

Day 1: Wednesday, May 12, 2010 (Aunt Cindy's 75th Birthday!)

In honor of our trip, we started the day with a wonderful breakfast at home of homemade Maui Banana Bread (I'll post the recipe on a Tasty Treats Tuesday), cottage cheese with pineapple, and some fresh grapefruit from some friends at our Weight Watchers meeting. The best part of the morning was our flight did not depart PHX until 10:45am. It's the best when your flight is not too early so you don't have to wake up early but since you're going to Maui, you can't help but get up early because during that first bathroom visit of the day, you think I'm going to Maui TODAY! (Who can go back to sleep after thinking that?)

Our flight was wonderful. Walt told the flight attendant that it was Aunt Cindy's 75th birthday and not once but twice she mentioned it over the intercom!

I wonder why these people look so happy? :D

We made Aunt Cindy wear this silly sign and pink ribbons all day which she turned around and got me back two days later on my birthday and made ME wear it all day!

We arranged for Aunt Cindy to get a lei greeting at the airport. Lei greetings aren't standard unless you book through some travel agents who throw it in. For this trip, we found that all travel agencies were quite a bit more than the deal we found online. Since Walt and I have had multiple lei greetings, we decided to forgo it to watch and enjoy Aunt Cindy getting hers. She was so surprised and couldn't believe all the surprises that day! We told her they weren't done yet!

Everything went so smoothly and we got in much earlier than scheduled...over 15 minutes early...around 2pm. Our luggage was delivered to baggage claim quickly and we were one of the first batches on the belt. Walt went to hop on the shuttle bus to get the rental car while we went to baggage claim thinking it could take awhile with such a large plane of vacationers! We decided to go ahead and hop on the shuttle bus and meet him at the car rental place and we were there so quickly that we got on the same one as Walt! When we got to the car rental pickup, they apologized for not having our reserved vehicle and gave us an upgrade to an SUV for free! We knew it would be more gas but with all the driving around the island that we planned to do, we were very excited. (On a side note, the back seat of the SUV was so nice and spacious with air/sound controls that we all wanted turns throughout the week riding in the backseat!)

While Costco is right outside of the airport, we had a couple errands to run beforehand. First, we were picking up a pecan pie and a banana cream pie from a highly recommended local bakery that we found online. Pecan is Aunt Cindy's favorite and since I don't like pecans, we also got a banana cream pie. This was also a surprise and we could tell Aunt Cindy was excited. We had asked her what her favorite cake was a few months prior because she loves to make cakes for everyone's birthday. We were surprised to learn that she's not much of a cake fan and pecan pies are her favorite! Another suprise as Walt thought her favorite pie was chocolate!

Ooops...a little smooshed! Still tasty!

We then headed to find a farmer's market on the south side that was open in the afternoons to see what fresh produce we could get before grabbing produce at Costco. Unfortunately, we couldn't find the farmer's market...we found a "flea type" market with a scant selection of less than appealing produce so we hopped back in the car and headed to Costco. (We hit an amazing Farmer's Market later in the week close to our condo and seriously were amazed that the other one wasn't the same as they were advertised by the same store...oh well...more on that later!)

Before arriving in Maui, we had made a grocery list and meal plan with Aunt Cindy of what we wanted to prepare in the condo for the week. So when we went to Costco, we kept track of what they either didn't have at Costco or what wouldn't be practical for us to buy in larger quantities with only three of us. We ended up getting many things for a great price at Costco. They had the same honey roasted turkey breast as they do in AZ for the SAME price...only $3.85/lb! Very affordable in everyday life, let alone in Maui! We picked up several fruits and vegetables including a Maui Gold pineapple! Our only regret was not tearing into it for a few days and realizing how TASTY it was! Seriously better than any junk food!

After Costco, we loaded up and headed towards our resort to check into our condo. We were staying at the same resort that we stayed at for Walt's 40th birthday. (We figured if you find something you like at a great price, why risk going somewhere else? With condo rentals, you never know what you're going to get.) One of the many things we enjoyed about staying there was that while it was a condo with a fully-equiped kitchen, it was also still in a resort setting with beautifully landscaped grounds. There was a restaurant, gift shop, spa, fitness center and everything you'd find at a resort. The best part of all was the resort was right on the ocean.

To start our vacation off right and because it was Aunt Cindy's 75th birthday the day we arrived, we went to dinner at Bubba Gumps on the water in Lahaina at sunset. It was wonderful! (We went for Walt's 40th birthday too when we were there last.)


Aunt Cindy getting sang too and our beautiful sunset view...too bad it was cloudy that day!

We turned early pooped but happy that it had been such a wonderful travel day and full of blessings. It was sweet resting our heads on our pillows knowing we had a whole week ahead of us in Maui!

To Be Continued...

Tasty Treats Tuesday is back!

I love The Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond. If you don't know who she is, click here right now. I'm not as big a fan as Amy E who's amazing MIL took her to MEET Ree at a book signing and faithfully checks TPW's blog for new recipes everyday but I like her lots. :) I love to peruse the cooking and photography sections. (I just had an idea...I need to add her to my blog roll so I can see when she updates!)

Anywho, back to the tasty treat...this weekend, we made her The Best Baked Beans Ever for a BBQ-themed get-together.

Here's the recipe and what I did. You can be entertained with how Ree cooked the recipe here.

Quick Southern-Style Baked Beans
Serves up to 18

8 slices bacon, halved
1 medium onion, cut into small dice (I used a small one.)
1/2 medium green pepper, cut into small dice (I put in a whole large one.)
3 large cans (28 ounces each) pork and beans
3/4 cup barbecue sauce
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup distilled or cider vinegar (I used apple cider vinegar.)
2 teaspoons dry mustard or 2 tablespoons Dijon (I used dry mustard.)

Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 325 degrees. Fry bacon in large, deep sauté pan skillet until bacon has partially cooked and released about 1/4 cup drippings. Remove bacon from pan and drain on paper towels. Add onions and peppers to drippings in pan and sauté until tender, about 5 minutes. Add beans and remaining ingredients bring to a simmer. (If skillet is not large enough, add beans and heat to a simmer then transfer to a large bowl and stir in remaining ingredients). Pour flavored beans into a greased 13-by 9-inch (or similar size) ovenproof pan. Top with bacon, then bake until beans are bubbly and sauce is the consistency of pancake syrup, about 2 hours. Let stand to thicken slightly and serve.

Difference in directions: I simmered the onions in the bacon grease for 5 minutes to get them well cooked before adding the green pepper for a few minutes. Then at the point that you would put it in a pan for the oven, I put it in the crockpot and simmered for about 8 hours. It came out great and I received several compliments.

Homeless No More

We have decided to keep Willow! When I returned from Omaha in August, I had no allergy issues like I did when we first brought him in. He's a very sweet cat and he lets Grissom be the alpha male!

I have a confession...

I love reading blogs. I come to my blog everyday and peruse my blog roll of friend's blogs and get so excited when I see below a title where it shows something was posted only hours ago! (instead of days)

One day last week I thought to myself, why hasn't anyone updated their blog since yesterday? and then I saw my last blog post dated July 31! Oh boy! They, as in nearly everyone on the list, has updated several times since I have! So this week, I plan to get back in the game including posting about many long overdue events April! Maui details are coming! Thankfully, I took notes while we were there so some of it is still a bit fresh! :)

Meet our Foster Cat

Around New Year's Eve:




Meet Willow, our foster cat. He's been hanging around our house for about a year. I snapped the above pics of him around New Year's. He used to just hang out during the day for a few hours on our back patio and was never seen in the evenings or weekends. This led us to believe someone just let him out during the day while they went to work. About 5 months ago, he started coming around more and more for longer periods of time. Walt actually saw him and didn't think he was a figment of my imagination! (This is why I have pics of him around New Year's Eve because Walt never got to see these cats that I talked about!) We noticed he started getting thinner and thinner and in May, we realized that someone was no longer feeding him. We started out with just water but then felt sorry for him and started giving him food. While he wanted the food, he wanted our attention and affection even more! It was bittersweet...loved his affection but sad that he was clearly starved for affection in addition to food! He has a friend, Langston, who comes around wtih him. (yes, we name the stray animals in our neighborhood!)

Why do I call him a foster cat? We want to make sure he fits in well with Grissom and my allergies. I am allergic to cats but have no reaction to Grissom even without being on allergy meds! I had a few issues when we brought Willow into the house and we've been getting Willow cleaned up and his undercoat groomed and it's gotten better. We're giving it 30 days and we'll decide if we'll keep him. If not, we'll find him a new home. He is growing on Walt and I though! After several days of keeping him in a bathroom away from Grissom, his first night free, he hopped on our bed like a dog ready for bed. It was the sweetest thing.

Before letting him in the house, we took him to the vet and got confirmation that he is a neutered male. He is healthy and the vet estimates that he's 3-4 years old.
How did we come up with the name Willow? In staying true to our CSI naming for felines (Grissom), Willow is named for Catherine Willows! If you're savvy, then you know that Langston also came from CSI for Ray Langston! :)

Willow's first night inside...7/21/10 (He definitely has the Siamese-talking gene!)


By the toilet seems the safest.


Peeking at Grissom


Thanks for the tuna!


Enjoying the couch.


Watching The Office reruns with us on his second night.

Admiring God's Creation in Maui

Maui Sneak Peak

There would be more but having computer issues! I'm thankful it is still operating at least!

Testing 1...2...3...

Two weeks ago, I got a camera as a good combo gift! It was my Valentine's Day, Anniversary, Birthday, "Yay, you made your WW goal", generous birthday and anniversary giftcards from my mom, around $200 in amazon/paypal giftcards from swagbucks, as well as rebates and cash back rewards! Walt also offered to have the amount we budgeted for his anniversary gift contributed too...what a sweetheart! I didn't want him to go empty-handed so I found him a fabulous over-sized mug in his favorite color (orange) and an updated picture of us in a nice frame for his office! (Scored both with great sales and a 30% off coupon at Kohls for only $6 total!)

I've been checking out books and DVDs from the library and doing research online to see what type of camera to get, what accessories, and how to make the most of what you buy...trying to soak up the information like a sponge as well as comparing notes back and forth with my friend, Michelle, who ordered the same camera on the same day. I still have a lot to learn but am enjoying the process overall. Whenever I start to feel overwhelmed, I remember Walt's advice to just learn one new thing each day. I can't wait to play with my photos in Photoshop Elements but wanted to post a few now. Many of you know I took a last-minute trip to Omaha for 10 days to help my mom out so nearly all of my test subjects are cats and flowers...all but one!

My mom and grandparent's kitties.


My mom loves this one...her cat is the one in focus. :)


Contemplating life...


Dirty look for catching above contemplation!


Cat #1 on back deck


Cat #2 on back deck


The last of my Omaha feline models! LOL! (My mom loves Siamese cats and her cats try (and have succeeded) to take this toy on her desk.)


Tulips in the front yard.


One lone tulip by a purple flower bush...with all the rain, he was quickly gone so I was grateful to snap a few pics of him.


Our favorite kitty was glad I was home!


On the stairs being silly.


My Welcome Home/Happy Anniversary white rose...the theme from our wedding.


Now for my first human model...the adorable Jacob! Proud parents are friends of ours from church, James and Kristie. Jacob is turning six months old this week! I took so many pictures of him yesterday that I could post one a day for a year! Here are a couple for now. (My computer is a bit slow uploading now so I'll try to post a few more later this week.)

So proud of his two front teeth!


I dare you to try not to smile or say awww while looking at this shot!

Couldn't do it? Neither could I!

Tuesday Treats - Faux Italian Sausage

I love this recipe. It's easy for when I need Italian sausage but have none on hand. (not to mention it's so much cheaper and better for us to make faux Italian sausage out of lean ground beef than to buy the pork variety!)

I have experimented with varying the salt, cumin, and pepper. It's really personal preference! I left the ingredients as the original for you to experiment but have altered the directions.

Ground Beef or Turkey Sausage

Ingredients:
•1 pound of ground turkey or very lean ground beef
•1/2 teaspoon of salt
•1/2 teaspoon of garlic salt
•1/4 teaspoon of pepper
•1 teaspoon of cumin
•1/2 teaspoon of sage
•1/4 teaspoon of basil
•1/4 teaspoon of oregano

Directions:
1.In a small bowl, mix salt, garlic salt, pepper, cumin, sage, basil and oregano.

2.In a large bowl, mix together the ground beef or ground turkey with the small bowl of dry mixture.

3. Mix until evenly distributed. Use this as you would any bulk sausage. If forming into patties, keep them very thin, especially if you choose turkey for your main ingredient. Patties that are overly thick may seem too dry, as both turkey and lean ground beef contain less fat than regular sausage

NOTE: This "sausage" is best when it can sit in the fridge at least overnight.

I've used this in spaghetti sauces and on homemade pizzas. I've also heard it's good in breakfast casseroles!

Thanks to http://breakfast-recipes.suite101.com/article.cfm/homemade_sausage_from_lean_ground_beef_or_turkey for the recipe! (They also have a breakfast casserole on this link. I've made a similar one with oregano and regular pork sausage. Yummy!)

Mental Note Mondays

"Sleep is the ultimate luxury! It's free and makes life so much more enjoyable!"

Don't I know this after this weekend! Great time but sleep deprivation in full effect! Bad mattresses, loud night owls/loud early birds, snorers, being away from home, staying up too late, etc...phew! Still a great time!

Last weekend and this weekend

I will be missing my boys this weekend! Our church is having their annual women's retreat up north and I'm very excited to get away with such wonderful ladies and hear what the Lord wants us to learn!



While I'm gone, Walt will be munching on what's left of what I alluded to yesterday.


Easter 2010

Tasty Treats Tuesday - Dry Ranch Mix

Okay, I know it's Thursday but I'm going to start a new segment called Tuesday Treats. It sounds much better than Thursday Treats! So consider this two days late or five days early! :)

Walt loves my homemade Copycat Hidden Valley Dry Ranch Mix. A batch lasts us at least 6 months. The past few weeks, we've had a super easy and cheap treat to take to a friends' house, our Friday night fellowship, as well as to enjoy over Easter. Kroger stores (called Frys here) had a sale on Smart Balance butter and sour cream. I had several coupons for $1/1 on the sour cream so long story short, I got several 16 oz tubs for $0.39 each! One Friday, I was pondering what to take to our group and the thought hit me to take my ranch dip. Now the dry mix was already mixed and in the pantry and so it was a quick and easy $0.39 dip! (versus at least $2.50 for the premade dips) Add a bowl of carrots and potato chips on sale and super easy!

To copy the recipe on the packets in the store, simply use 3 level tablespoons (or 1oz/30g if you have a digital scale) and add to 16oz of sour cream. Add more to taste but best to wait a few hours before adding more so the flavors have a chance to meld!

Hidden Valley Ranch Mix - Copycat Recipe
Makes 42- 1 tablespoon servings
(I usually halve this recipe and this recipe is very forgiving so if you don't have quite enough for the whole or half amount, make it anyway, write the spice down and how much you're short, buy it, and add it later...I do that all the time with my italian seasoning and such! Today when I made this mix, I didn't have all the parsely flakes and it still tasted great!)

Ingredients
•15 saltine crackers
•2 cups dry minced parsley flakes
•1/2 cup dry minced onion
•2 T Dry dill weed
•1/4 cup onion salt
•1/4 cup garlic salt
•1/4 cup onion powder
•1/4 cup garlic powder

Directions
1.Put crackers through blender on high speed until powdered.
2.Add parsley, minced onions, and dill weed.
3.Blend again until powdered.
4.Dump into bowl.
5.Stir in onion salt, garlic salt, onion powder, and garlic powder.
6.Put into container with tight-fitting lid.
7.Store dry mix at room temperature for 1 year. (I usually label what it is and when I made it to eliminate questions later!)

For Dip:
3 TB of mix
16oz sour cream.
(Mix and let chill in fridge for a few hours or overnight.)

Bonus...for Salad Dressing:
•1 tablespoon Mix
•1 cup Mayonnaise
•1 cup Buttermilk
(makes 1 pint)

Thanks to Group Recipes for this great recipe: http://www.grouprecipes.com/38070/hidden-valley-ranch-mix---copycat.html

Easter Baskets aren't just for kids!

Do Nothing Day

Saturday was our monthly “Do Nothing Day.” A do what day? It’s a day that we started in Texas after being so busy and we wanted to just DO NOTHING on a Saturday and not feel bad about it! We were only able to implement it one Saturday before life got pretty hectic and then we relocated to Arizona. We’ve been talking about how we need to bring it back and so in February, we picked out a Saturday in March and eagerly looked forward to it.

You all know how much we love to travel but this Do Nothing Day is more refreshing than many weekend trips we’ve taken. Why? Because you don’t spend any money or energy to get away. We give ourselves the day off from working out, cleaning, and going anywhere. Quite frankly, we spend most of the day in our jammies and it’s not being lazy because this is our objective for the day!

We have really ramped it up and our bedroom has become a hotel room the night before our Do Nothing Day! Walt brings up his coffee pot and something for breakfast that doesn’t have to be chilled. We sit in bed like we would at a hotel, with books and a laptop without a rushed agenda and it’s nice. (With palm trees and mountain views from our bedroom, it's not too much of stretch to feel like we're on vacation!)

Every month to prepare for our Do Nothing Day, I work a little harder during the week to clean the house so I’m not thinking of everything I think I should be doing…it’s already done. I do the laundry on Thursday/Friday including fresh sheets on the bed (the best when sleeping in!), ironing so that everything is ready Sunday and the next week. (I do this every week anyway so it’s not a big change.) On Friday, I make something that we can eat on Saturday night so I don’t have to cook and clean up on Saturday. I usually try to make something different than what’s on the menu for Friday night so it feels special!

Ironically, our last two Do Nothing Days have been very productive. In March, we perused books, discussed what activities we want to do and what meals we want to cook when we take a trip in May with Walt’s Aunt. This past Saturday, we did a lot of research on SLR cameras and lenses. So not only did we meet our goal of doing NOTHING, we also got something else done as a bonus!

I know that it may seem like because we are childless that makes it possible but I will still implement this when we are blessed with children. The goal is to spend time together as a family away from outside pressures. We’ve declined events because of our Do Nothing Day scheduled and in Texas, we changed our Do Nothing Day to a different weekend because something truly warranted our time that day. As with weight loss, debt reduction, and everything else, I truly believe where there is a will, there is a way. Even if for certain seasons, it’s only every other month, it’s worth the effort!

We are looking forward to our next Do Nothing Day scheduled on May 1st!

Mental Note Mondays

Whatever cat started the "Puss in Boots" look and passed it along to all the other cats should get paid royalties. It works. Everytime.





Grissom gives the "Puss in Boots" look often but quickly hides it when I try to take a picture of it.


I almost got it here in this fuzzy photo but no such luck! (Taking pictures of cats without the harsh flash can be very difficult...I think they know it too!)