Homemade Meals for Busy People
Fast meal · Help for busy moms · Meal planning

Homemade Meals for Busy People

RefreshHer1 Comment

You’re busy.  I understand!  Life gets crazy, doesn’t it?  But I firmly believe that supper at home is possible, even in the midst of busy lives.  All it takes is a little creativity and some good planning.

The recipes I’m sharing are all on my blog, but sometimes when you go looking at a list of recipes it’s hard to know which ones you could make in a hurry, so I thought I’d make a list this week of some of my favorite meals that are quick.

Let’s start with Breakfast.

  • The homemade Pop Tarts  (pictured above) can be made with purchased pie dough if you opt out of the homemade dough.
  • Baked Oatmeal can be made the night before and baked off in the morning!
  • Make a stack of pancakes or waffles on the weekend and freeze them.
  • Pre-cook a pound of bacon until it’s half way cooked.  Put it into a freezer bag and put it in the fridge.  When you need it for breakfast it will take half the time necessary.  You could cook it all the way done, too!
  • Double a batch of muffins and freeze them .  That way everyone doesn’t get tired of blueberry muffins because you’ve had them for three days in a row. 
  • Breakfast burritos can be made ahead of time. These are so good! Scramble eggs.  Add cooked sausage, bacon or ham.  Spread on tortillas.  Sprinkle with cheese.  Wrap tortilla in Saran wrap. Place in fridge.  When needed, heat at 30 second intervals until warm.  Add salsa, if desired.

Lunch:At home:

  • Pizza crust in the freezer is a huge help.  Take it out at breakfast so it’ll be ready to bake off.
  • English muffins can serve as pizza crusts, too.  spread with pizza sauce, cheese and other toppings.  Broil.
  • Grill extra chicken at supper and use the extra for wraps or chicken salad.
  • Chicken or veggie Quesadillas

At school or Work:

  • Corn Dog Muffins 
  • Tortilla filled with veggies and cheese.
  • Homemade Lunchables.  Making lunch for children that is appealing is all about doing it creatively and in small portions.  Get a divided lunch container or use cupcake liners.  Put crackers in one, pepperonis or salami slices in another.  Add grapes, blueberries, strawberries or orange segments.  Other “little” items you could add – Grape tomatoes, baby carrots, celery and peanut butter, 
  • Freeze crustless sandwiches.  Peanut butter and jelly work great.  Just put peanut butter on both pieces of bread; it’ll keep the jelly from making the bread soggy.

Supper:

I hope this list helps you the next time you’re in a rush for a meal!     With love from my country kitchen.

Gifts · Valentine Treats · Valentine's Day

Last Minute Valentine’s Day Ideas

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This is a repost of an old post written to especially help men get an idea of what to do for Valentine’s Day.  My husband is the BEST at gift-giving, and you’ll find 10 ideas down in this post!  

This is the week of Valentine’s – I guess we’re all aware of that. If you have a Valentine, I trust he also realizes that! No slam is suggested in that statement, it’s just that not all men think about these things before the day arrives. So, I thought it might be appropriate to start out today by giving a word to the wise for Valentine’s. If you you or your Valentine could use some suggestions of things to do or gifts to give, read on!

Love is kind. I Corinthians 13:4

Sweet treats are always a good thing for Valentine’s Day! Last weekend I made a recipe of brownies then after they were completely cooled, I cut them in large squares. Using a small heart shaped cookie cutter a cut a heart out of the middle of the brownie as you see in the picture here. I forgot to take a picture of the finished product, but then I made up a butter cream icing, tinted it pink and filled in the heart with the icing. You could use canned icing too in your favorite flavor. I then wrapped each brownie in waxed paper and put them in cute little boxes and shipped them off to my two girls who both love chocolate! The cut out hearts make nice little bite-sized treats too!
 
Love seeketh not her own. I Cor. 13:5

Some of the other little gifts I put in the pillow pocket have been:

Two gel pens with the note – You are my “write” man!
A recent picture of us made into a Valentine Card.

“How much do I love you?”
(attached to note)

An OLD picture of us when we first started dating!

Another thought would be to go to Pandora (or Amazon music) and make a play list of music you loved while you were dating, and have it playing when you eat supper or when he gets home.

I’ve asked my husband to share some good ideas for dates and/or gifts for Valentine’s Day. He’s very thoughtful and creative and gets an A+ in this department! Here are his Gift suggestions for men to give their wives:

Ways to say “I love you”
1. Use a dry erase marker and leave a love note scribbled on the bathroom mirror or leave love notes in her purse, dresser drawer, on the fridge door, in her car or by the coffeepot.
2. Write in your own words 10 reasons why you love her and leave it attached to a dozen roses, a box of candy or a piece of jewelry.
3. Wash and vacuum her car; leave a love note on the steering wheel.
4. After the children go to bed, order a personal pan pizza and have a pizza date in the bedroom with candlelight and romantic music.
5. Invite your Sweetheart to Starbucks for a peppermint mocha. While there, play a board game or two and pay no attention to anyone else but your spouse.
6. Make her some chocolate covered strawberries. Pick up some strawberries at the grocery store and in the baking department, find chocolate that is microwaveable. Dip the strawberries in the chocolate, chill and serve on nice plate.
7. Schedule a manicure or a pedicure at a local spa. She needs the time away and the pampering will do her good. Pay for the treatment over the phone so all she’s responsible for is to show up.
8. Instead of going out to eat, order carry-out. Serve it up on your best tableware, have candlelight, and soft music. Be creative and have fun. If you cook, fix her favorite and in either case, clean up too!
9. If you go out on date, you schedule the babysitter, choose the spot, and treat her like a lady by opening the door for her, escorting her into the restaurant, and talk only to each other. Tell the waiter you’ll call him/her when you need them. Every couple needs a quiet date in a corner booth w/out any distractions. Both of you sit on the same side of the booth with your back to the crowd.

See why he gets an A+? 🙂 Oh yes!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

 

Coronavirus · God's character · God's Love

Why Is God Allowing this to Continue?

RefreshHer1 Comment

You may have heard me say this before, but I was blessed with a wonderful dad.  However, he did disappoint me from time to time.  I don’t know how he could’ve done it, but that’s the truth.  He just disappointed me!

When I was a child, there were times when I was sure he was going to take our family up to the frozen custard stand where we would all get sweet treats.  But I can’t tell you the number of times when we were in the car and I was sure he would pull into the little parking lot of that building, and he would drive right on by! How could he do that to a child?

As a little girl I could’ve come up with two conclusions – 

  1. He didn’t have the power to do it. No money for a 50 cent cone?  Nope.  That wasn’t true. He had a good job and was wise with his finances.
  2. He didn’t love me and didn’t care that I would suffer without that custard.
    Nope.  That wasn’t true.  He proved his love for me in much greater ways by his sacrifice for my real needs.

I never did accuse my dad of either one of those things.  You know why?  I knew him.  I had spent time with him.  I learned what he was like, and he was neither powerless nor unloving.  I simply learned that I could trust him.  I learned that in the time that he knew was best for me and my family, he would take us to get ice cream.  If he didn’t do it now, I knew there was a better reason, and I was okay with that, simply because I knew him.

I recently had someone accuse God of those two accusations in regards to the Coronavirus, saying that:
He either can’t stop it, or
He doesn’t care about people suffering.

The only answer to give a scoffer of God is God’s Word –  the written explanation of Who He is.  He has the Words of life. 

There are so many explanations I could share, but I just read this passage in Exodus 13,

 When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter.

“No, of course He didn’t lead them the shorter path,” an scoffer might say! 

 “He took them out to the wilderness where they would wander and not have food and water!  He doesn’t care!  He loves to see people suffer! Or maybe He isn’t able to help.!”

Any time we come to a question about God, why He’s doing something or doing nothing,  we must look to His character for the answers. We have to learn what He is like. Is He just mean-hearted?  Is He not powerful enough to change things?  

In this situation, we need to keep reading.  The next verse says, For God said, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.” 18 So God led the people around by the desert road toward the Red Sea.[

Did you catch it?  There was danger on that closer/easier path! It would have been easy for the Israelites to think that the Via Maris was the best way to go; but the dangers of the way were too great, though they could not see them.  It was the road where Egypt’s military outposts were. God knew the people of Israel were not ready to face this yet (lest perhaps the people change their minds when they see war, and return to Egypt).

God anticipated the dangers they could not see. 

Based on that verse, what do we learn about our God?  

  • He is providential!  He saw to things ahead of time and protected them from those dangers that they weren’t even aware of!
  • He is a God of love.  A God who didn’t love them would’ve let them get entangled in any kind of danger.
  • He is righteous.  He led them correctly.  He cannot do a wrong thing or have the wrong motive as you and I would!  Why?  Because He is righteous.

Refresh your trust in a loving, providential and righteous God. As a child, I could trust my father because I knew him. We can’t trust a God we don’t know. Draw to Him and learn of Him. We might not understand His ways, but we can come to know His heart.

Next week I’m going to expand on that last sentence. I hope you’ll come back for the conclusion!

In the meantime, wash you hands and remember He is in control.

Appetizer · Side dish

Creamy Homemade Hummus

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Creamy hummus. I learned to love it when we went to Israel. Not only does it taste great as a dip, it actually has lots of good health benefits. I had only purchased it in the store until I recently watched Girl meets Farm on Discovery plus. She made the process look easy…and it really is! It’s a little time consuming, but most of that time is just letting the Chick peas soak overnight! There is very little hands-on time! (I have some lovely pictures of my hummus that I hope I’ll get to finally upload for you to see how creamy this recipe turned out!. In the meantime you can go to my Instagram and see my pictures there. You’ll find me at RefreshHerblog.)

Like any recipe, one benefit of making it yourself is that you can control all the ingredients, adding what you like. The other blessing is the cost. As I figured it, it was at least half the cost of purchasing it, and maybe even a third! This recipe cost me about $3 total and it made a huge bowl of hummus!

My notes: The recipe calls for one cup of chickpeas – I went ahead and cooked the whole bag at one time, then I froze the other half so the next time I need hummus, the chick peas will be ready to process!
This is a basic recipe that needs a little flavor. Adding a sprinkling of paprika on top is good, or adding in sun-dried tomatoes or roasted red peppers would also be good additions!

Here’s the recipe from Girl Meets Farm ~

Creamy Homemade Hummus

Ingredients

1 cup dried chickpeas

1/2 teaspoon baking soda 

3/4 teaspoon salt, plus more to taste 

1 tablespoon lemon juice 

1/2 cup tahini 

2 cloves garlic, optional 

1/4 cup cold water 

Olive oil, for serving 

Finely chopped onion (for topping) or onion wedges (for dipping) 

Chopped fresh parsley, for serving

Fresh pita, for serving

Directions

  1. In a medium bowl, cover the chickpeas with enough water to reach 2 inches above the height of the chickpeas and soak them for 12 hours.
  2. Drain and rinse the chickpeas and place them in a large saucepan with the baking soda and 1/2 teaspoon of the salt. Cover them with 1 to 2 inches water and bring the water to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to low, cover the pot and simmer until the chickpeas are very soft, about 2 hours. Drain them, let them cool slightly and then transfer to a food processor.

Add the lemon juice, tahini, 1/4 teaspoon salt and the garlic, if using, and blend until very smooth, about 1 minute. With the motor running, drizzle in the water and continue to blend for 1 more minute. Taste and add additional salt to taste. Transfer to a serving dish and top with a drizzle of olive oil and some chopped onion and parsley. Serve with fresh pita and onion wedges and enjoy

You can serve hummus with vegetables or dip pita bread in it. I found lots of recipes using hummus here. If you haven’t tried it, I encourage you to try it with the veggies and then branch out.

Are you a hummus lover?

Valentine Treats · Valentine's Day

Valentine Memories To Keep

RefreshHer6 Comments

It feels like I am in a constant state of purging. As I wipe out a drawer, straighten a closet or decorate for a holiday, I’m forever finding things that need to be tossed. But there are some things in a family that will be kept forever, and those are the memories of times together. Those days that maybe were ordinary, but made just a little more extraordinary by doing something a little special.

As Valentine’s Day approaches, I’m reminded that over the years we have had some special days in our home on February 14th. We always did something as a family first. Of course our girls received a card from us and often a little box of Whitman’s chocolates too. I usually fixed a special dinner and set the table in red or pink. We would have a dessert together as well, then it was bedtime for the girls so Mommy and Daddy could spend time together.

Our girls grew up knowing that we loved each other. I had heard that the best thing a wife could do for her children was to love their daddy. I had witnessed this in my own home when I was growing up, and I know very well the security it gives. My daughters might not have particularly liked going to bed early, or not being included in the evening’s plans, but they grew to appreciate why those things were so.

As you implement your Valentine’s plans for next weekend, I encourage you to plan for time together as a family, AND be sure to set aside time for you and your husband alone. It is the biblical thing to do. My husband would always tell our girls when we went away for a date, “Your mom and I are going out to make a better home for you.” Your children may not like it now, but they’ll be glad for the sweet memories of a happy home that you’re creating. Those are the best kind of memories because they can’t be put in a box and sent on their way to the trash or to the Goodwill – they’ll be in their hearts forever!

Needs some ideas?

This cake! So easy and my favorite chocolate cake on the planet!

Here’sa post about some simple chocolate and sweet treats!

You can find some budget-friendly gift ideas here.

A-Z ideas are in this post!

Refresh every member of your family this Valentine’s Day!