weekly check-in

This week was crazy.

• I returned to work after three weeks of vacation to over one hundred emails. 
• The student that is interning with me until June started on Tuesday and I didn't have a work plan ready for her. 
• I spent all day Wednesday interviewing potential assistants for my job. 
• I toured a new school for Kale to start in September. 
• I started two courses for a certificate program I'm taking (one requiring me to drive downtown Toronto during rush hour). 
• I blogged almost every day for the home tour series. 
• I had a migraine on Friday morning that had be hugging the toilet at 2am and struggling through the rest of the day in a gravol induced coma. 

The good parts? 

• I hired an assistant for work. 
• I think I found a school for Kale (more on this in a future blog post). 
• Kris, Kale and I had a visit from our friends Steve & Emily that included Nana coming over to watch Kale while the adults went out for dinner. 

Here's the rest of my weekly check-in: 

#janphotoaday

If you're on Instagram and you'd like to follow me, search "Randalin." 

(TM: routine; MR: childhood; MM: where you sleep; ML: close up; BR: in your bag; BM: something you're reading; BR: happiness)

2012 Declutter Calendar: 


If you're interested in the 2012 Declutter Calendar, you can find it at My Simpler Life. I got off easy this week because most of the days were about cleaning your nightstand (don't have one), under the bed (our bed is on the floor), and cleaning a shelf in the bedroom (did it last week!). Our main task was to clean out our junk drawer and then organize it. I was torn about this one because even though our junk drawer is a total disaster, sometimes we take it out and put it on the floor and let Kale explore it while we're trying to cook. It's one of our main distraction tools in the kitchen! In the end, I stuck with the calendar and tackled the job yesterday morning while Kris was at the gym. I didn't take a before picture because it was down right embarrassing, but I did take an after shot because I'm pretty proud:

I had all of the stuff that needed to be re-assigned a space or thrown out on the counter and decided to let Kale have one last kick at the can. I pulled up a kitchen chair and he went to town looking through it all. While he was amused, I decided to clean out the fridge. It's one of Kris's weekend chores and since he'd let me sleep in for a bit in the morning, I thought I'd get the fridge done while he was at the gym. I was working away and Kale was quite content making a mess of the mess. I was having a moment of "wow, look at me. Clean junk drawer, happy kid, doing Kris's chores. I'm pretty amazing. I CAN DO IT ALL." 

And then I heard a "swoosh" sound and look over just in time to see Kale dump an entire box of cereal on the counter and proceed to cut it up with his wooden toy knife. 

Menu Planning

Since I forgot to take into account that I would be at school one evening and ended up throwing some chicken nuggets in the oven another night when I was still recovering from my migraine, we didn't get through all the meals on last weeks menu plan. 

Review of what we cooked last week (with photos!): 

Garlic Bacon Artichoke Pizza

We've made some pretty amazing homemade pizza around here and I have to say that this one disappointed. It didn't pack much flavour and if it wasn't for the bacon, it would have been a total fail. Verdict: did the trick, but wouldn't bother making it again. 

Honey Glazed Chicken Sandwich

This was great because it was really, really fast. There was no marinading involved, which is good for me since I always get home at 5pm and realize something should have been marinading since 2pm. Verdict: good for a quick dinner. 

Cajun Chicken Pasta

We rarely ever eat pasta with cream based sauces, but I'm glad we made an exception for this one. The recipe was really straightforward and it made enough for us to have seconds and lunches for the next day. The chicken was a tad too spicy for Kale, but he devoured the pasta. Verdict: definitely on our make again list - but not for awhile. It's pretty heavy on the dairy (good if you're trying to pack the calcium into your little one, bad if you have a lactose sensitivity and don't want to gain 8 pounds in one sitting). 

Shredded Beef Taco

This one was an easy sell for me. Cilantro, lime and avocado - pretty much all of my favourite things to eat. This was soooo easy and perfect for a Sunday (because who doesn't love to smell roast beef cooking all day long on a Sunday??). We served our tacos with tomatillo, sour cream, avocado, lettuce, mozzarella, cilantro and lime and they were amazing. The only bad thing was that we were left with a massive pile of beef. Verdict: nom, nom, nom. We'll make this again, but with half the beef. 

What's on the menu this week: 

Quinoa stirfry 

Chicken skillet

Roasted chicken wraps w/ black bean salsa & guacamole

Cilantro and lime fish tacos