Way back in January, I decided to make some New Year resolutions. I feel like this was the first year EVER that I actually was successful in creating a new habit and following through with a goal for a new year. So here’s what the list looked like:
Be more active
Drink less wine
Read more books
Try yoga
Get back into blogging
So how did I do? Well… if I’ve been more active, it’s because I’ve been cleaning pretty regularly. But I do want to start walking this fall as an easy way to be more active. I still don’t read, although I did read a “for fun” book over spring break. I still gravitate to parenting and organizing books though. Someday I will read fiction again! No yoga for me… maybe next year? The one thing I have been successful with is drinking less wine. I decided to only drink wine on weekends or vacations. I have been a “a glass or two a night” wine drinker for years. And it’s not like it was a problem or anything, but I felt like it was often unnecessary calories and honestly just kind of a bad habit. So here we are in September, and I still only drink on weekends or vacations/special occasions. I feel like it was a little hard in January, but it has become a habit, and I’m really proud of myself for doing this!
Now… blogging. Obviously I have not been successful with this one. But recently I’ve been trying to think of ways that I could be successful with it. One thing I’d like to try is blogging on my “off” days. This is the first year of motherhood that I have fairly large chunks of time that both boys are at school. Gerrit is in 2nd grade this year, and Berend is in his last year of preschool doing three full days a week. So what am I doing with my days “off?” Napping for one. I have a massive sleep debt and a bad habit of staying up too late. But when I’m not catching up on lost sleep, I’m running errands and cleaning the house. I would like to push myself into a more normal sleep schedule so I can use my three days a week to do some blogging again. And if you’d ask what I’d like to blog about? I have so many ideas in my head! But my biggest setback is overwhelming myself. I have big plans and no real way to execute them in a timely way. Which leads me to…
…. Just Five Things Mondays! Something I’ve become really interested in and, dare I say, passionate about is my home. More specifically decluttering, organizing, and keeping my home clean. These are not things that come naturally to me (well, maybe the organizing… I’ve always loved doing that), and I’d love to share some things that I’ve learned, implemented, and am still working on. Instead of bombarding myself and whoever chooses to read this with a novel, I thought I’d just pick areas to focus on one day a week. I’m hoping that this becomes a habit so that I can start catching up my blog on my boys, and our life too!
See you Monday! After posting my first Just Five Things, I thought, You know what sounds better? Just Five Fridays. I’m so indecisive… so I’m switching to the end of the week instead. I hope you’re shaking your head at me just like I am.
I’ve been meaning to write this post for months… maybe years! I used to share new recipes that I tried and liked on here a lot when I first started blogging, because learning to cook and trying new recipes was all I really had when we first moved to England. Once I started working and then had kids, I just didn’t have time to post new recipes. But I still try new recipes pretty frequently!
I’ve decided to occasionally share a week’s worth of our meals to update what’s been in our rotation and to give feedback on any new meals we’ve tried and liked, loved, or won’t be making again. At this point in life, we’re still doing two set meals a week: Mondays are always pizza and salad, and Thursdays are always spaghetti and meatballs. I know the kids enjoy and will eat those meals, plus it’s two fewer meals I need to think about! But fair warning… photos of my meals are not actually blog-worthy haha. I seriously just snap a quick photo on my way to the table or at the table. Or a few bites in because I forgot I was sharing a week’s worth of meals. So without further ado…
Sunday
Not every weekend, but some weekends I make more hands-on, complicated, or time-consuming meals because I know Andrew will be home to help with the kids. This was one of those days.
Dinner was Char Siu Bao (Chinese BBQ pork buns) and roasted broccoli. This was a recipe I tried solely because it sounded yummy and the pictures looked good. I didn’t know, going in, how time-consuming it would be ha. That being said, it’s totally worth it. These buns are a really perfect blend of sweet and savory, plus they reheat really well as leftovers. They’re definitely kid friendly too. Once I made the pork the first time, I froze what I didn’t need and got 2 more meals out of it… big win in my book! My roasted broccoli recipe is just broccoli with a healthy douse of olive oil then sprinkled with salt, pepper, and garlic powder and cooked at 400 degrees for 20-30 minutes… depends how crispy you like it!
Monday
Pizza night! Who doesn’t love pizza night? I rotate my pizza schedule: pepperoni, chicken and bacon, pepperoni, Hawaiian, repeat. My boys LOVE pepperoni pizza, but I can’t eat it every week, so I change it up. We serve pizza with salad… but I don’t like making salad haha. So salad-making is Andrew’s job. And if Andrew won’t be home, I buy a pre-made kit. Or just throw together a spinach and strawberry salad.
This Monday night we had chicken and bacon pizza. I don’t have a recipe for it, but I’ll share what I do have.
Chicken & Bacon Pizza
pizza dough recipe (cut in half) 5 oz cream cheese (room temperature) 1 whole head of garlic olive oil salt & pepper soy sauce heavy whipping cream 1 chicken breast, cubed 4 slices bacon 1 green pepper, sliced 1 onion, sliced 2 cups mozzarella cheese
1. Make your pizza dough up to the rising step. 2. Preheat oven to 400F. Cut the top of head of garlic off so all cloves are exposed and peel off excess paper. Wrap garlic in aluminum foil and pour a bit of olive oil on top before closing foil up. Place in oven and bake for 30 minutes. Once cooked, pull out to cool. 3. Heat cast iron skillet over med-high heat. Once beginning to smoke, add a drizzle of olive oil, then add the chicken. Season with salt & pepper and sauté until cooked through. Remove from skillet and set to the side. 4. Add another drizzle of olive oil to the skillet, then add the green pepper and onions. Sauté until softened and becoming charred. Add a generous splash of soy sauce and deglaze the skillet. Set peppers and onions off to the side. 5. Cook bacon (I prefer doing mine in the microwave). Once cooled, crumble and set aside. 6. Bake pizza crust for about 10 minutes. 7. Pull cooled garlic cloves from the paper and place in a bowl. Mash garlic cloves with a fork, then add the cream cheese and continue mashing until everything is combined. Add a splash of heavy whipping cream and mix. Repeat adding cream until you get your preferred “sauce” consistency. 8. Spread sauce over crust, then sprinkle about 2/3 cup of shredded mozzarella cheese over crust. Now add toppings (chicken, bacon, peppers & onions). Sprinkle the remaining mozzarella cheese over the pizza. 9. Bake pizza for 10-15 minutes, then remove from oven to cool.
Tuesday
Tuesday is almost always my grocery shopping day, so I usually try to make something quick and easy. This week I went with Bacon Tortellini Bake. It’s a family favorite and fairly quick to pull together.
Wednesday
This next recipe is way up there for Andrew & me, and I’m hoping the kids end up loving it too. I got this recipe from a friend who shared it on our local cooking group. My only complaint for Greek Meatballs & Orzo skillet is that I never plan enough time for all of the chopping as well as making the meatballs. But it is really delicious and it reheats great! I usually serve it with a roasted vegetable, this time cauliflower.
Thursday
Thursday night is always spaghetti night! It has been a family favorite for years, and it’s one of our weekly meals. I used to make my own spaghetti sauce, but now I just use Prego because it tastes like home. It’s what my mom always used for our Sunday spaghetti lunch. Something I didn’t grow up with was spaghetti with meatballs. I developed my meatball recipe from a mini meatloaf recipe I enjoyed growing up, and this is my current recipe:
Italian Meatballs
1 lb. ground beef 1/3 cup + 2 tsp bread crumbs 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese 1/4 cup olive oil 1/4 cup milk 2-1/2 tsp dried chopped onion 1/2 tsp Worcestershire sauce 1/2 tsp garlic salt 1/4 tsp Italian seasoning
Combine all meatball ingredients and mix well with clean hands.
Lay wax paper down and shape meat mixture into about 24 meatballs. Place meatballs on wax paper.
Heat large skillet over medium heat until smoking. Add a drizzle of olive oil and begin pan-frying your meatballs, rotating frequently. Continue to cook until meatballs reach at least 165 degrees F.
I know a lot of people like to bake their meatballs, but I personally love pan-fried ones. I’m sure these meatballs would be yummy baked as well though.
Friday
This was a new recipe that turned out to be pretty good! Even better… it’s a slow cooker recipe!
I’m always looking for new recipes to try, and it’s always a bonus if they’re slow cooker meals or one-pan meals. Slow Cooker Honey Lime Ginger Pork ended up being delicious! I served it over rice with roasted carrots on the side.
Saturday
I actually ended up NOT cooking this night! We had a block party planned, and I ended up not cooking anything for it.
But since I don’t have a meal for the day, I figured I’d just roll into Sunday and share that meal instead!
Sunday
We had Bacon Cheeseburger Bombs, a family favorite. I’ve made this meal with refrigerated biscuits so many times, but I recently started making my own dough instead.
With the dough recipe, I divide it equally into 12 pieces, fill them with the cheeseburger filling, then let them rise for half an hour-ish before baking. I serve these with curly fries from the frozen food section or a roasted vegetable if I’m feeling healthy.
So there’s one week in the Kiel house at dinnertime! I tried to keep it short and sweet, and hopefully I’ve given you some new ideas to try when you’re planning your next menu.
I’m sorry, B, but I really did not blog much in 2019 or 2020. Turns out that two kids are a lot more work that just one, haha! Here is a short and sweet recap of your life from 18 months up to your 2nd birthday.
Age: 2 years on 15 May 2020 Weight: 26.5 lbs Height: 35 inches Teeth: 17 teeth with another molar close to coming through Clothing Size: 24 months & 2T Diaper Size: size 4 and one size in cloth
Well, since I’m writing this almost a year later, I honestly can’t remember milestones, exactly how Berend was doing in terms of eating and sleeping, or any basic details. I do know that he hit a major language burst before turning two, and it was crazy how much he could say! He was fairly easy to understand too, which surprised me. I know he was counting up to ten and a bit beyond (maybe up to 13?) as well as knowing most basic colors and shapes. I feel like he knew so much of what he knew because of Gerrit!
Sleep… all I can say looking back is that I know he wasn’t sleeping through the night and that he was probably still up every 2 hours a lot of the time. He was taking naps every day, although I’m sure the length varied.
Eating… by 2 Berend was definitely doing well with eating. He’s not very picky, and he normally eats a good amount at meals. He was still nursing around the clock. I know I had planned to night wean him when Andrew got back from his deployment, but when he turned 2, I was still letting him nurse anytime he woke at night.
In terms of memorable events? Well, from November until early March, things were pretty normal. We had Christmas activities at home and on base. We went to Missouri after Christmas to get together with my family… and brought my sister Becki back with us! It was really nice to have that extra time with her, and of course the boys loved it. We made a weekend trip up to Tucumcari, NM to visit a dinosaur museum and explore the town in January. In February we got snow! The boys and our neighbors had so much fun sledding down our driveway. At the end of the month, we made a weekend trip to Amarillo to do another dinosaur outing.
Our trip to Amarillo was kind of a pre-deployment family fun trip for us. Following that weekend, Andrew’s parents came to visit to see Andrew before he left and visit with the rest of us too. It started out as a very normal trip, but by the end of it, COVID-19 was becoming more and more of a concern. I touched on our experience with the pandemic of 2020 here, but basically nothing changed for Berend. He just didn’t get to run errands with me! The last few months before he turned 2 were just spent doing things around home.
I think part of me was hopeful that 1) Andrew would be home for Berend’s 2nd birthday, and 2) things would be normal enough for my mom to visit. Neither happened. Since it was looking like we would have to keep the guest list very short, I went a little over on decorations! Sadly, I don’t have much photo evidence of Berend’s “Two the Moon” birthday because of technological failure, but I have this:
I bought an inexpensive space shower curtain to use as a backdrop in our window, made a little balloon arch, and made a birthday banner. Then I did some moon and star confetti with my Cricut and made some cookies ‘n’ cream cupcakes with galaxy sprinkles. Other than that, I just set up a little moon rock hunt in the backyard (filled Easter eggs covered in aluminum foil) for the kids. It was short and sweet, but in the midst of a pandemic, it was pretty perfect for our little guy.
And since Berend was speaking so well at his birthday, I did a little interview:
What’s your name? Berend
How old are you? 3
What makes you happy? Mama
What’s your favorite color? purple
What’s your favorite animal? penguins
What’s your favorite thing to eat? oranges
What do you like to watch on TV? Monster Machines (“Blaze & the Monster Machines”)
Who do you like to play with? Miah (Nehemiah across the street)
What was your favorite part of your birthday? Happy birthday to me!
Happy 2nd birthday, Berend! We are so proud of the little guy you are. You’re smart, sweet, stubborn, and the best little snuggler. We love you to the moon and back, B!
On An Even Kiel 