Menu Plan Monday

What a great weekend!

First, let me say how much I am enjoying the return of Summer Hours at work. This Friday afternoon, I was able to sneak in a date with my husband while the kids were still at the sports day camp that they attended last week. It wasn't a fancy date, but we were able to catch a movie without having the added costs of a babysitter. We went and saw Jersey Boys. We really like the music and have seen the show twice on stage. The movie stayed fairly consistent with the stage show, obviously with the added luxury of having actual scene changes. Then, Friday evening - after fitting a quick cleaning of the first floor, we went out to a local Japanese Steak House for dinner with friends. After dinner, we returned to our house and visited for a while, while the kids played together.

Saturday was a complete change of pace from weekends of late, we had no sports until mid-afternoon and we only had 1 game. It was great to fit in a trip to the library to check in for the summer reading program and our grocery shopping before we had to head to the field for my daughter's softball game. After the game, we made a quick trip to Kohl's to take advantage of our 30% discount and redeem our $10 Kohl's Cash that was set to expire. Then, it was an early evening of bumper boats, mini golf and go karts. Aside from my daughter swinging her golf club too far, one time hitting my son in the forehead, it was a good evening. We had dinner at the activity center and then headed to our friend's new restaurant to enjoy dessert - Salted Caramel Cheesecake and Flourless Chocolate Cake.

Sunday was another relaxed day. I found time to get caught up on some laundry, get my hair cut, fill a prescription and do some baking. I made Carrot Cake Cookies, French Bread, Rye Bread, and two batches of Caramel Macchiato Biscotti. I had hoped to make some homemade cinnamon rolls too, but ran out of flour. In fact, I used a gluten free flour mix to make the second batch of biscotti and learned that you really need to use a little more fat with gluten free flours to get the right texture and since I hadn't, they were very crumbly - still very tasty, just more breakage than normal. I also discovered as I finished up my jar of yeast, that I should have been refrigerating the jar once I opened it. I clearly haven't done as much baking lately, because I hadn't had the issue before, but my French bread did not rise quite like it should have. Again, still tasty, just not as fluffy as we were used to. The rye bread seemed fine, but it is naturally a denser bread. Regardless, I was glad to have found the time to bake, I have been considering it every morning for the past week and usually find that I can't quite make the recipe and still get to work on time, so I had been reluctantly deciding not to bake each morning.

We have a somewhat busy sports week, but with only one sport in the mix, it is a lot slower than we have been having. Still, the plans mid-week are definitely quick prep options.

Sunday
Sonora Chicken Pasta

Monday
Tacos

Tuesday
Buffalo Chicken Cheesesteak

Wednesday
Leftovers

Thursday
Hamburgers

Friday
Homemade Pizza

Saturday
TBD

Now that it is summer, the kids are in camp and are packing lunches. Breakfast is generally a bowl of cereal or oatmeal before they head out. For my husband and I, lunch is a quick sandwich, microwave meal, leftovers or something on the go. Breakfast is a banana and a protein shake or bar.

This post shared at Menu Plan Monday on I'm an Organizing Junkie.