Sunday, October 26, 2008

Menu Plan for October 26 through November 1st



This week is another crazy week in the lives of the Davis’s. I am so excited about Halloween on Friday. I have a special menu plan that I have included just for Friday. I was thinking how fun it would be to have pumpkin food all day for Halloween. We will see how the kids and the hubby like that one. We are having lunch at a friends that day so it is only pumpkin for breakfast and dinner. Enjoy a wonderful week.

Menu Plan for October 26 through November 1st

Sunday: Roasted Whole Chicken, chicken brown rice and spinach salad
Monday: Chicken Tortilla Soup (my hubby loves beans in his soup) and a salad
Tuesday: Turkey Meatloaf, special tomatoes avocado salad
Wednesday: A Special Salad inspired by CPK
Thursday: Frozen Chicken Catatore (don’t you love freezer meals)
Friday: Breakfast Pumpkin Chocolate Chip bread (oh who am I kidding, it is cake, just say it) Dinner will be chicken and Penne in a Pumpkin sauce with a salad (obviously, we are not going low carb today.)
Saturday: Veggies and more Veggies…salad…I am thinking that we won’t want any carbs or any fat on Saturday…especially no candy, but I could be wrong. I think a salad sounds good. We will see. This meal is a little up in the air right now, depending upon our week.

Friday, October 24, 2008

GROSGRAIN MINI STORE OPENING NOVEMBER 6!!!!! AND BIG PREVIEW GIVEAWAY!!!!





Wow! This talented designer is opening up a store. I can't believe our luck. Please check out the store on November 6th and click on the title above to go directly to her blog that started it all. She is giving away these adorable toddler outfits. I only hope that I am able to win for Big A.

GROSGRAIN MINI STORE OPENING NOVEMBER 6!!!!! AND BIG PREVIEW GIVEAWAY!!!!

Jen's List of Eight Things

I typed this out a while ago when someone tagged me and for the life of me I cannot remember who tagged me. It was difficult to come up with eight things for each and on one I just couldn't. :) Enjoy reading a little more about me. I realized that I need to spice up the content of my blog. These days I am just posting things like menu of the week or other bloggers contests. Things have been so busy. It is difficult to make the time to do the things I have to do let alone do things that I enjoy like scrapbooking or blogging. Well I hope everyone is doing well. Happy Friday!

If you have not been tagged...you are it.


Jen's Favorites in Eights



8 Favorite TV Shows
1. Grey's Anatomy
2. Brothers & Sisters
3. The Closer
4. Private Practice
5. Bones
6. Dancing with the Stars
7. Find Your Style (HGTV)
8. The New 90210 (yes, I watch it…I admit it…I think it brings me back to being a teenager 



6 Favorite Restaurants This one is difficult…we really don’t get out too much!
1. Wild Ginger
2. Main Street Bistro (back in Cali)
3. The Cheesecake Factory (this has to be my favorite chain)
4. Sushi Zen
5. Great Harvest Bread Company (my second favorite chain )
6. Arnies (a great local place that looks over the sound)



8 Things I did Yesterday
1. Worked
2. Exercised
3. Laughed at my daughter
4. Kissed my kids
5. Snuggled with my hubby
6. Got registration stuff ready for MOPS meeting
7. Spent time with God
8. Cried (read a very moving blog)



8 Things I Love About Fall
1. The leaves changing colors I love this!
2. The crispness in the air
3. Pumpkins
4. Going to the Farm and picking out pumpkins
5. The colors of fall
6. Harvest time
7. Celebrating my anniversary
8. The holidays just around the corner



8 Things I Look Forward To
1. Having no one in diapers (someday,right? Big A is almost there)
2. Kissing my children goodnight
3. Laughing with my friends and family
4. Date night (this needs to happen a lot more regularly)
5. My kids birthdays
6. Simplifying my life…reusing, recycling and repurposing
7. Teaching fulltime and having my own classroom again
8. Living off the land (starting my garden, composting, buying local produce, dairy and meat/poultry)



8 Things I Wish For
1. A cure for cancer…all illness
2. Economic stability/financial stability
3. A simpler, happy life
4. Happy, Healthy, loving children
5. No debt
6. A new body…pregnancy has taken it’s toll on my body and my spirit
7. That I would be able to enjoy the moment, live in the moment

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Marie-Therese Gown GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!



Marie-Therese Gown GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!

Okay first of all this is amazing! I can't believe how talented she is at sewing these amazing creations. What a beauty her daughter Lilly is in the costume. I think Big A would love this costume. She would also look just darling in it, very southern. If you have a little girl who needs a costume or loves to play dress up this gown is up for give away over at grosgrain. Please check it out, or don't and give me a better a chance at winning it for Big A.

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Menu Plan Monday: Our Menu for the week of October 19th


Well here it is Sunday and I actually planned our menu this week. We celebrated our five year anniversary this weekend. We even were able to get out without the kiddos. It was so much fun. We ate at a wonderful restaurant and then just dilly dallied home. It had been almost a year since we had been on a date. We both realized how we really need to make date night and with that each other a priority in our relationship.

We took a little hiatus from our diet modification of no bad carbs and have slowly let a few creep back into our diet. This week we are going to go back to limiting our carbs, mainly focusing on eating lots of fresh veggies, low glycemic index fruits, low fat and higher protein foods (i.e. no pasta, potatoes, rice, flour laden foods, all the good stuff like bread). In one or two weeks we will slowly incorporate whole grain carbs back into our diet. We just feel better when we eat lower fat, lower or no sugar and less heavy carbs. It is a matter of healthy, weight loss and just feeling better about ourselves. Anyways, this is why the menu looks like it does. Plus, I scored today at Costco and purchased a 2.5 pound bag of fresh spinach for $3.99. This is why the focus of many of our meals is spinach. I couldn’t resist. I guess sometimes a healthy diet isn’t always more expensive. We really are focusing on just eating healthy. Of course my kids still eat plenty of whole grain carbs and a few white flour carbs, but they are kids. For the most part they also eat pretty healthy.

This week on the menu:
Sunday: Salmon Salad with grilled salmon and fresh spinach
Monday: Grilled Chicken and Spinach Dish (I am still searching for a recipe)
Tuesday: Chopped Salad kind of like California Pizza Kitchen
Wednesday: Turkey Meatloaf with a side of spinach
Thursday: Grilled chicken salad
Friday: Egg, spinach, mushroom, goat cheese frittata
Saturday: Grilled veggies, sausage and a salad

Sunday, October 12, 2008


I have been falling down on the menu planning. I think everything sort just caught up with me the last few weeks. I am finally starting to get in a bit more a groove between going back to work, MOPS stuff and now I am getting my Professional Certification (Don’t ask…it is not a happy topic). I am hoping to stay on top of things a little better, but I have a new motto when it comes to life, “Progress, not perfection.” We had a great speaker at MOPS on Friday and I was encouraged to look at my life and what striving to be perfect is doing to me and others I love. I will never be perfect, but I can strive for excellence in all that I do and progress in what I am aiming for. The Lord has really encouraged me in this area. I am not going to instantly be supper mom or quit trying to be the best I can be, but I will give myself a break, acknowledge the progress that I do make and most of all look to Him to help me with it all with excellence.

My meals this week are once again focused on low carbs, but not no carbs. We have slowly added less refined or processed carbs back into our daily diet. I still try to have a few meals that are really low carb every week, but a few that are just healthy good meals. I am working on just feeding my family healthy, delicious, low fat, easy meals. We will see what I can do. I will be attempting to alter a new recipe this week. We will see how that goes. I hope everyone has a wonderful week.

Sunday: Turkey Salsa Meatloaf, Coconut rice and Fiesta Veggie Mix (frozen, but it is better than no veggie)
Monday: Freezer meal already made Enchilada casserole (hubby is home with the kiddos without me, I am at my first Pro-cert meeting)
Tuesday: Indian Chicken, Indian Cauliflower and a salad
Wednesday: Grilled Chicken Salad
Thursday: Curry Chickpeas and Veggies, brown rice
Friday Night: Pork Tacos (crock pot), taco fixings, broccoli and Spanish brown rice (company tonight)
Saturday Night: Dinner out! Hubby and I celebrating our 5 year anniversary  The kids are with Granny and Grandpa  This is a different post that I hope I will make time for.

Shenandoah Costume GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!




Shenandoah Costume GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!

Kathleen has been at it again and has created this adorable period dress Halloween costume. It is just gorgeous and I so hope Big A can wear it this year for Halloween...that would mean that I would win this little dress, but you should still enter and see if you can win it for a little girl in your life... go visit grosgrain and see all of her beautiful creations.

This is what the designer has to say about the dress:

The time period of this this costume is set in the 1800s somewhere around the civil war- hence the Shenandoah reference. I used a light olive green taffeta material for the dress. To billow out the bottom the skirt is tiered and I added a crinoline slip. I added black braided trim all around the edges of the skirts and around the sleeves as well as a contrasting white lace trim around the wide pilgrim collar and bodice.shenandoah costume

But what I think makes this so great for Halloween is that the sleeves and skirt are long enough so that you can wear a sweater and jeans in case the temperature drops for the big night (which always seems to happen here in Pennsylvania). The white billowy undershirt is sewn into the dress and the oversleeves are sewn with a wide tapered cut allowing tons of room.

Thursday, October 2, 2008

Red Riding Hood Jacket GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!



Red Riding Hood Jacket GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!: "This giveaway is for the jacket only. If you like the sweater dress they are still selling them at the Gap for kids. It's on sale for $30, but I found a better, cheaper one online at Old Navy for $20. I bought the knee highs at Gymboree. Believe it or not, it's hard to come by a pair of knee high socks. It seemed as though they were all a girl could wear when I was growing up."

Grosgrain is at it again. This time she is giving away this lovely jacket. Check it out at her website. I am sure you must know someone who would love a cuddly, soft jacket like this one. :)