The Monday Memo – Re-opening + Menu Plan

I finally gave in this morning and sewed a few masks for our little family.  Just using up some of the fabric in my stash, but it was good to have a productive and satisfying easy project.  I’ll have to post a photo on Instagram later with all 3 of us in our fabrics of choice.

I hope your weekend was a good one.  On a whim, Josh and I decided to stain our deck, it took us a few hours (toddler wrangling included) and we were so proud of it.  Waking up the next morning after it dried and seeing the spots we missed was a little less than thrilling.  Haha!  We have one more coat to do one of these weeknights, but the time we spent together painting and chatting was really sweet.  We really love working together and I’d forgotten how much.  I’m looking forward to finishing up our deck and making it a pretty place to sit for the rest of the summer.

This week I’ve set a goal to get up earlier and get started before Hugo.  My alarm went off at 5:30am and oh my goodness I was not feeling it, he’s a morning bird like me so I’ve got to get an early start.  But it felt good to sip my coffee in the quiet and read a devotional next to Josh for a few minutes.  I know all of the veteran moms recommend this, but it really does make a big difference.

In case you’re like me and completely burnt out on cooking and meal planning… I’m including my menu for this week.  Easy, gluten free and healthy-ish.  Each meal will be accompanied by a huge side dish of watermelon as it is back in season and we are as obsessed as ever!

Menu:

Spaghetti 

• I try to keep a supply of gluten free spaghetti noodles and organic marinara in my pantry, I add sautéed onion and ground beef to the sauce and then drown the whole plate in freshly grated parmesan cheese.

Quiche

• We had this for dinner last night and it was amazing!  I buy these frozen pie crusts and then added sweet peppers, onion and crumbled bacon to the filling.  Really though, just use whats in your fridge and its hard to go wrong.  This recipe.

Apricot Chicken

• This is a classic, easy dish.  Recipe from Half Baked Harvest.  Honestly, I just use a high-quality french salad dressing instead of making my own, but the recipe option is listed.  Her coconut cauliflower recipe is amazing, but feel free to make mashed potatoes or rice as the side dish.  I serve this with roasted broccoli or green beans.

Tacos

• Tuesday is Cinco de Mayo, so theres that, but I do add tacos to our list every week or so.  I haven’t decided if i want classic beef tacos or this recipe Daphne Oz shared the other day (looks so, so good!) for her mom’s vegetarian tacos.

Homemade Pizza

• I’ve tried a few sourdough pizza crust recipes lately, they’ve been good but not amazing.  We typically use Bob’s Red Mill brand gluten free pizza crust mix and our favorite is to make them margherita style with olive oil, fresh tomato, mozzarella and fresh basil.