2 for 1

Hello, my name is Lindsey.

And I have a problem.

I am a scarf hoarder. 27 at my last count.

I had grand plans for the #purge11 challenge. I have plenty of things kicking around that are completely useless. Like my hairbrush, for example. I have a pixie cut. I haven't used my hairbrush in approximately two years. I did throw it away, actually, but I didn't count it toward my 11.

Considering the surplus, I opted to donate 11 scarves. It was tough, but I kept a few for spring, a few for fall and a handful of warm, wintery ones. Now they all fit properly on my scarf hanger. From now on, when one comes in, one goes out.

I really think we should do #purge11 once a month.

Then Allie, being all sneaky like, challenged me to make out with my husband. Please don't judge the state of my marriage by the fact that someone who knows us well felt compelled to challenge us to be affectionate to one another. The fact is, with two small kids, full-time jobs, long commutes, a home to look after and plenty of responsibilities, it's hard to find time to gaze lovingly into each others eyes as much as we once did.

In the interest of keeping this blog PG rated, I completed this challenge, and I'm happy that I did. This is another one of those challenges that really needs to be on the ol' to do list regularly. After all, it's just like riding a bike. Riding. Get it? Hahahahahahahaha. Man, I'm funny.

OK, girl, you're up! Since we're talking about get-fit goals lately, I challenge you to add YOUR lunches to part of next week's meal plan. Come up with some great protein and fibre rich snack options and when you're packing the family's lunches, be sure to pack your own -- one for each of the five work days next week. It's easier said than done for mamas to put themselves first occasionally -- now's your chance!

Down the rabbit hole

#ditch 11 sounded like an easy challenge. Pick a room or an area and find 11 things to purge.

Only purging is never just that easy for me. It always ends up being a much bigger thing then it needs to be and while I love the end results I sometimes get overwhelmed with the middle of the process. You see, once I start purging one area I usually end up in a purging rabbit hole. It is the thing all purgers both love and hate about purging. It starts simply enough. You pick a room and start looking through things and making a keep and get rid of pile. Then suddenly you have a pile of things that you aren't getting rid of but that belong in another room or spot. So you move them to that spot only to look at that spot and think "since I am here I might as well move these and these". Then before you know it you have 4 rooms completely torn apart with piles of stuff that you honestly can't remember what is what!

I decided that the room I would pick for this challenge would be the kitchen. I picked this room for three reasons - A. With a fairly open main floor I could work in the kitchen while the daycare was open as I could still see and hear the kids. 2. Shayne and I talked about doing this room over the holidays but we never got around to it. It drives him crazy so I knew that I could get him to help me. 3. My hernia has been really bothersome the past few months and is getting worse which means I need to limit my lifting and lugging. With the way the cupboards were organized a lot of the stuff I used a lot was in a bad spot so was hoping with a little purge I might be able to move some things around. My plan was just to do this cupboard. As you can see it has a lot of stuff in it and in order to get to most things I need to take stuff out, get what I want and put everything back in.

Shayne took everything out and since it was cleared out, he took the time to clean all the shelves (bonus for me!). One of the first things I wanted to go was gather up all the medicine and put it in a basket. But then I remembered we had medicine in the bathroom too which drives me crazy because I never know what is where. So figured I should put it all in one spot which means getting everything out of the bathroom. Which means, you guessed it, cleaning the spot in the bathroom that had the medicine. See what I mean about how quickly it becomes purging and cleaning another spot? One item in and already I am in the bathroom cleaning it out when I should be IN THE KITCHEN!

This was what it looked like when I started.

And this is what it looked like when I was done. Now that it is done I am glad I did it but it just goes to show how quickly I can get off track. Back to the cupboard I was suppose to be doing. We had everything laid on the counter so I could easily see things i knew we needed to keep, throw away or put elsewhere so I started making piles. Then I started thinking about where I could move things so that I could get to the things I used more often. This lead to other cupboards being cleaned out, cleaned up and moved around. It took about an hour and a half in total but I think the results are so worth it!

This is the cupboard that started it all. Looks pretty good don't you think? Here are a few more pictures of other cupboards that got a small makeover.

And the challenge? I think it is fair to say that #ditch11 was a success. It looks more like #ditch111!

This has given me the spark I need to start purging different areas and rooms in the house. My challenge to myself is to spend an hour a week purging. Could be a room, a cupboard, photos, my computer, anything. But after a year that would be 52 hours of purging that I have done. Can you imagine how little extra stuff you would have laying around if you did that?

Since you are gearing up for what could be a crazy few months I want to leave you with an easy challenge for this week. #nakednecking is your weekend challenge. Okay, you don't really have to be naked but you do need to make out with your husband for 15 mins. And not total, in a row. Put the kids to bed, light a candle, turn off your phones and make out on that big ole sofa you have.

The depths of the deep freeze: a horror story

Well Allie, I'm basically a detective right now ... because I have solved the mystery of the disappearing Tupperware. It's been held hostage in my deep freeze. For months. In some cases, years.

To be thorough, let's inventory this properly.

Starting with bread products:
1 dozen salad rolls, white
1 dozen salad rolls, whole wheat
1 loaf cinnamon raisin bread
1 bag poppyseed bagels
3 bags English muffins, white
1 loaf of some weird chocolate cherry bread that was given to me for free
1 bag of ciabatta buns
6 raisin rolls of some kind that I don't remember buying and I definitely wouldn't eat
4 random chunks of a baguette in a Ziploc bag

Meat:
1 large package stew beef
6 chicken breasts
1 dozen hot dogs

Frozen foods (yes, it's all technically frozen, but this was purchased frozen):
2 cans iced tea concentrate
1 box vegetable spring rolls
4 bags fruit
4 popsicles, 2 freezer burnt and 2 edible

The best part:
17 somewhat unrecognizable containers of homemade food

SEVENTEEN.

Have mercy.

My best guesses -- yes, some is still good -- include corn chowder, vegetarian lasagna, meatballs, pulled pork, mac and cheese, chilli and unidentifiable crap like this:

Seven items went back downstairs. SEVEN.

To say that was cleansing for my mind, body and soul would be an understatement. So. Then, because that just wasn't enough fun, I decided I better do the kitchen freezer, too. Smaller haul, of course. It's also been cleaned fairly recently so it wasn't quite so out of hand.

Without giving the whole rundown of this mess too, suffice it to say there are some ... unnecessary extras. Like a half-eaten carton of some rainbow-magic ice cream. And since my youngest ditched dairy due to allergy, my kids haven't eaten ice cream. For FIVE MONTHS. Lord.

Now, since we're on the topic of purging, my next challenge is for both of us. #Ditch11 things that we have been holding on to but really don't need. I've read a lot of purging articles lately -- 'tis the season to resolve to do things! -- and there are lots of ideas out there to get us started, like this, this and this. You go first!

How to screw up a perfectly good Sunday

Today is the day I both love and hate. The day I look forward to and dread all week long. The day that can either make or break my week and my budget. Today is meal planning and grocery shopping day. Let me just be upfront with you and tell you I hate grocery shopping. With a passion. It is one of those things that I hate to do whether it is a $5 order or a $500 order (and yes, I have had a few $500 orders in my lifetime!) Yep, it is grocery shopping day. The OCD side of myself loves it because I get to clean out all the stuff in the fridge that needs to be thrown out. I get to go through the pantry and freezer and try and clear out some of the stockpile I have, which believe it or not, I love to do. Then comes the part I don't like. If I was to be honest with you, and myself, I would say that it isn't the act of grocery shopping itself I hate. It is all the work before and after that has me in a fit of rage most times. I feel like a good part of my life is spent figuring out what to make, how to make it, getting stuff to make it and then making it only to have to start all over again the next day.

As Lindsey mentioned in an earlier post, part of the #challenge for this month was to try and use many of the groceries we already had in the house and limit what we bought at the grocery store. The second part of that #challenge was to try and keep our spending on budget and we both gave ourselves a budget for the month. My budget, if I remember correctly, was $150 for the month. Lets just say that I am pretty sure that is a challenge I am going to lose seeing as this was my receipt for this weeks groceries.

To be fair, I am feeding a family of 4 adults as well as running a daycare for 5 little people. And this week I have company coming on two of the days so the meals I make that day need to stretch a little further. I think that I really set an unrealistic goal for myself as far as what I would spend grocery wise for the month. If I could try and keep it to $400, $425 for the month for both my family and the daycare I would consider that a victory. Part of being able to accomplish that will be continuing to make sure to use up stuff I already have in the freezer and pantry and getting creative with what I have. I also need to start going to the Superstore later at night (I shop at Sobeys faithfully) and looking for their 50% off deals that they often have on things like meat, bread and even some produce. I did well this week with meal planning and trying to make recipes that not only used a lot of stuff I already had but that were fairly easy to make and prep. I am feeling a bit down in the dumps (typical for this time of year for me) so spending an hour or two a day prepping and cooking isn't something I really want to do this week. We are trying to adapt a more vegetarian lifestyle so meat is only in one of the meals this week. This is a huge challenge for me as most of my go to recipes include meat but the cost of meat is so high right now that I just can't afford to continue to buy it like I use to.

How did I do Lindsey? Did I meet my #operationmealplanning challenge? Your challenge for this week might not be as much fun for you. Your challenge is the #deepfreezechallenge. That is right, your challenge will involve your deep freeze. I want you to try and empty it out and make a list of everything you have in it. Throw away what can't be used, bring up the stuff you can start using right away and planning meals around the rest of the items. Since I do have a bit of a heart I will give you a week to get this done seeing as you have a crazy full plate and, because I am an awesome friend, I am also happy to come out and help you with this challenge.

#operationmealplanning

I'm not going to lie, I looked up BHBK (see Allie's post below) on Urban Dictionary and I still have no clue what it stands for.

UPDATE: I just figured it out! Before Husband, Before Kids! Man, I feel like a genius right now.

The task was to do something for me. Believe it or not, I'm sitting here thinking as hard as I can, and I can't even remember what I did last night. I know my husband was coaching basketball and I put the kids to bed on my own. After that ... zombie mode. I watched reruns (you saw her description of me - does Allie know me or what?). It was a quiet evening. I am, however, guilty of having spent some of my evening cleaning up the house and prepping lunches for the next day.

Allie gets it though. Our wifehood and motherhood takes over by times and it can be challenging to find "me" time. That's part of the reason we've started this blog - to give us a no-excuses place to stop, think, feel and write. It'll sometimes be amazing and other times it'll be mindless dribble - we admit that upfront. The truth is, we're busy. Some of it is self imposed and some of it unavoidable.

A big part of what we do is feed our families - we deal with much of the shopping, the meal planning and tackling the allergies.

Most importantly though, we do it all on a budget. One of our #challenges for January is to eat all of the stockpiled food in our respective houses. We're both guilty of buying things because of sales or points promotions and the excess gets a little out of hand sometimes. To make it even more cost effective, we swapped a few things we had excess of. For the rest of the month, we've set low budgets for fresh produce and the rest of our meals will be compiled of our staples, frozen and forgotten meals, and creative odds and ends.

My goals:

- Cook more of my own dried beans. I'd like to eventually stop buying cans altogether.

- Waste less. I've nominated Monday night as eat-the-leftovers night.

- Spend wisely. Buy only what we need for a given timeframe instead of falling prey to sales.

What are your plans of action for #operationmealplanning, Allie?

The two wives

#challengeaccepted Lindsey!

Jacob and Isaac call her Mom, Mike calls her wife, friends call her Linds and her mother calls her Lindsey. Cook, baker, banker, chauffeur, secretary, referee and maid are also things she is called or as we like to call it, being a wife and mother. Her passion is writing and she has been lucky enough to make a career out of her writing and even spends a few scared minutes of her free time writing (and I am not just talking about grocery lists or honey do lists!). Lindsey loves many things including coffee, reruns of her favorite shows, Pintrest, DIYs and most of all, that magic time between 9:30pm and 11:30pm when she gets uninterrupted sleep on the couch. She laughs loud, loves hard and will do anything for anyone, anytime.

 What can I say about me. Unlike the commercial with the man who is the "most interesting man in the world," I, Allie, am the most uninteresting woman you would ever want to meet [Editor's note from Lindsey: Allie is full of it at this moment. She is fascinating and engaging, hilarious and truly kind. Not to mention oh so interesting]. Pop culture is my thing. Love celebrities, gossip on celebrities, pictures of celebrities....you get the picture. I am the person you turn to during a movie or show and ask "how do I know that person?" and I am quite proud to say 9 times out of 10 I can usually tell you without checking IMDB. I am happily married to a man who didn't know any better when I asked him to marry me (thank god!) as I came out the winner in that. We have two kids who are as different as night and day - my daughter wants to see the world and all that it has to offer and my son....well I am convinced he would live with us until he was 50 if we let him.

Ok Lindsey, you are up. Your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to spend 30 minutes tonight doing something you want to do. Something that has nothing to do with cooking, cleaning, work, kids, husband, house. Something that you might have done circa 2003. You know that time...BHBK. Psssst...bonus point if you can figure out what BHBK means. You have 12 hours to complete this challenge. #12hourchallenge

#challenge accepted

Did you ever see that episode of Friends when the guys bet the girls that they know them better?



That's basically how we operate. We need motivation to get stuff done. Who doesn't like a little friendly competition? Like #laundrychallenge. It's amazing how much easier it is (or how obligated you feel) when there's someone else on the other end of a phone call or text message who is going through the same pain and can commiserate with you when you're folding 85 pairs of socks.

Allie, now it's your turn. Post by tomorrow and introduce us to our loyal followers. #challengeextended