organization – Page 2

Meal Planning Monday – 11th January

I love my freezer. As well as the usual ice cream and frozen veg, I store as much as I can in there. All my butter and any other multibuys go straight in so I can bulk buy when it’s on special offer. I don’t eat much bread so when I bake a loaf, I slice it up to go straight into the freezer to use slice by slice so there’s no waste. I also cook batches of vegetarian meals for me so I just need to defrost something for me and cook a meat version for everyone else. Cheaper food, less waste and convenience – I’ll go for that!

It is important to freeze, defrost and reheat food safely so take care!

This week I’m batch making a vegetarian chilli to add to the bolognaise in the freezer. If I can do one meal a week, it gives me a selection to pull out of the freezer.

Vegetarian Chilli – serves 6
225g dried white haricot beans
125g dried red kidney beans
1 tbsp oil
2 large onions, quartered and sliced
14oz tin chopped tomatoes
3-4 bay leaves
1 veggie stock cube made up into 850ml stock
2 red and 2 green peppers, cut into medium strips
chilli powder to taste
2-3 cloves garlic, crushed

Soak the beans for 8-12 hours or overnight in plenty of cold water.
Drain the beans and rinse really thoroughly.
Heat the oil in a large saucepan and fry the onions until they are just turning golden.
Add beans, tomatoes, bay leaves and stock.
Bring to the boil uncovered, and once boiling, boil rapidly for 10 minutes (very important when dealing with dried beans to kill toxins).
Cover and simmer for 45 minutes.
Add peppers, garlic and chilli.
Cook slowly for 45 minutes.
Remove bay leaves and serve with rice.
I have been freezing this in individual portions for years. I just defrost a portion the night before in the fridge and microwave it until it is completely reheated throughout.

Our weekly meal plan is as follows:

Monday: Jacket potatoes and salad – should have had this last week, but after a day of cleaning and decluttering the kitchen, we had a celebratory takeaway pizza so we didn’t get it dirty again!
Tuesday: Veggie chilli/Chicken and Vegetable Stew
Wednesday: Creamy Haddock and Broccoli
Thursday: Vegetarian Goulash
Friday: Sausages
Saturday: Fish Pie
Sunday: Beef Hotpot/Veggie Bolognaise

Linking to At Home with Mrs M’s Meal Planning Monday. Pop by and see what everyone else is having this week to get some inspiration.

Getting Organised

The Christmas decorations are down, the birthday cards are up, the Craftyguidelets are back at school – it must be time to get the house back in order.

There are so many books and websites to trawl through to plan a declutter or instigate a new housework routine. The Fly Lady will have you shining your sink, tidying to bless your house and “getting dressed to lace up shoes” as part of your new routine. Marie Kondo has her KonMari Method which gives you “the life changing magic of tidying up” and seems to have you assessing every item for sparks of joy and thanking them for everything they’ve done for you, before donating them to the local charity shop. Anthea Turner will make you the Perfect Housewife and will have you buying wooden coathangers and folding towels just so. The different lists, methods and techniques are endless.

Everyone has something that clicks with them, and although I haven’t immersed myself in any of the above methods, I have cherry picked a few ideas which work for me. To save the last minute rush in the morning, I now get dressed before going down to breakfast, so even if I’m signing reading records or getting lost in an interesting news article, I’m at least decent for the school run. I have parted with several years of birthday cards and some Craftyguidelet artwork, as although they spark joy, I’d rather have the room for new memories to come. And if you check my airing cupboard, my towels are all folded beautifully!

My house does need a severe declutter though as living in chaos gets me down. My life is so busy I need to be able to find things easily without a whole cupboard of stuff falling down on me. It would also be great for everything to have a home so at Christmas we aren’t stuffing vacuum cleaner parts in the airing cupboard or losing PE kits in the Christmas decoration boxes under the stairs.

I spotted A Bowl Full of Lemons blog when I was sorting out my Bloglovin feed. She’s written a book which is out in the UK in February, and is running a Home Organisation 101 Challenge. It’s a 14 week challenge with a printable checklist and it starts on Saturday this week. Although it looks like she’s into baskets and drawer liners (that ain’t happening in my kitchen!), the basics appeal to me. First week is the kitchen so I’ll be going in to sort through exactly what is stashed away in the drawers. If you don’t hear from me by next week, send in a rescue party. With gin. And chocolate.

Do you have an organisation ‘guru’?

Meal Planning Monday – 4th January

One of the things I want to get under control this year is my food shopping. Dinners are always a balancing act in our house. I don’t eat meat, and Mr CG is gluten (and onions, leeks, spices, garlic…) intolerant. The Craftyguidelets, even though they have a bit of childhood fussiness, are probably the most normal eaters in our house. I usually cook from scratch because of this. Add to this my volunteering and the girls’ after school activities, planning what to cook for dinner, and having the time to cook it, is a juggling act.

I used to participate in At Home With Mrs M‘s Meal Planning Monday from time to time. After a break, it’s back today (yay!), so it ties in with my need to get discipline back to plan my week’s meals. This will hopefully lead to less food waste, healthier meals, fewer trips to the shops and a reduced spend.

Most of our Christmas leftovers are gone now, but I still seem to have some food to use up including a bit of veg, loads of apples, some sausages and a bit of cheese. I also have a stash of frozen bits and pieces to use up, so this week’s menu is this:

Monday: sausage pasta in the slow cooker (and veg bolognaise from the freezer) – it’s my birthday so I don’t want too much hassle cooking!
Tuesday: salmon, mash and veg
Wednesday: freezer dive
Thursday: tuna pasta bake with sweetcorn (the girls’ favourite!)
Friday: gammon (and quorn burgers)
Saturday: salad and jacket potatoes with cold meat (and cheese)
Sunday: whatever my mum and dad are providing

The apples will go in muffins and I’m sure baked apples will make an appearance at some point. See you next Monday!

If you have any great recipes or books to recommend, please fill my comments with suggestions!

Here’s to 2016

At the beginning of 2015, I resolved not to have any resolutions, not to sign up to any social media obligations like photo-a-day or blog-a-week, not to join in with quilt a month, crochet along etc. and not to heap too much pressure on myself to join in and fit in with the crowd.

To some extent I’ve succeeded in this (especially the not blogging regularly part – oops!) but I’m not quite there.

My aim for 2016 is to get organised. I want to declutter and put systems in place to get my life, head and home in order. I want to complete ‘to do lists’ rather than keep putting things off. I want a crafting area that is inspirational, rather than a pile of work in progress. I want to minimise food waste by planning meals better and shopping smarter. I want to put my health higher up in my priorities.

But for now, I’d like to wish everyone a happy new year and I hope 2016 is everything you want it to be.

Procrastination be gone

Everyone has 24 hours in their day to fill, whether you are Beyonce, the Queen or the greengrocer. You have certain things that you have to do each day such as eat and sleep, certain things that you should do such as exercise, and certain things that you want to do such as play with kittens.At the beginning of last year I bought Leonie Dawson’s Life and Biz Workbook 2014. I wanted to focus my attention on creating an amazing year, and people had said that it was a fabulous planning tool. I didn’t fill in my workbook much, so I thought I’d revisit it this year.

One of the exercises is to fill in a pie chart with how you spend your time and another with how you want to spend your time.My days are so varied, but this is a rough approximation of a typical weekday. I might craft in front of the TV, I might snatch an hour to blog instead of housework, but I don’t dedicate my time to doing enough to make a difference to me. I want a clean and organised house, crafting makes me happy, being prepared for my Guiding responsibilities is important to me, but I don’t make an effort to ditch the procrastination and get on with it. Instead of getting on with my Christmas crafting last year, I organised my Distress ink pads and researched racks to put them on. Very satisfying, something that was nice to have done, but not the urgent task in hand.

This is what I’ve come up with for how I want to spend my day.

I’ve swapped the procrastination for me time, and prioritised my crafting and blogging. I’ve got the TV on as I’m blogging at the moment, but Phil Spencer doesn’t need my full attention.

I need to exercise more. I do about 30 minutes a day during the week but I could and should do more.

I also want to drop some volunteering time. I spend about 4 hours a week at meetings with the Guides and Rainbows, plus the occasional District team meeting or training course, plus my WI commitment. The key word is ‘volunteer’. There is a certain amount of work that has to be done every week, but I need to concentrate on the essentials and know that I don’t have to sort out everyone’s problems as well as my own.

Some days it will happen. Some days it won’t. I know that I’ve probably forgotten things like long baths, reading and shopping, and sometimes my crafting mojo will leave me, but I have to get some focus back in my life.

Is your year still on track?

I’ll do it my way

I have decided that once again there will be no new year’s resolutions (especially not with the amount of alcohol chocolate I have in the house!). There will be no targets, no lists, no must do’s, no swaps, no bucket lists, no giving up, no starting, no using up. I won’t be -a-long-ing with crochet, knitting, quilting, sewing or reading. I won’t do a certain task every day, week, month. I won’t look at someone else and think that I should be like them. I will try and resist doing anything that isn’t essential, compulsory, interesting or downright fun.

I will try and do things My Way*.

*You can thank me later for that ear worm.

That was the year that was ~ 2014

It was a great year for the shop. Craftyguider had it’s best year yet, and I raised a nice sum of money to put into the Guide accounts. I get to meet Theo Paphitis soon to collect my #SBS (Small Business Sunday) award, and I featured in Guiding magazine and the local press. However, I didn’t manage to launch a presence on Etsy, or learn about taking better photos.

I managed to make enough Christmas cards for friends and family, and sold handmade Christmas cards and tags in my shop for the first time. However I didn’t start in July as planned, and had a few late nights before craft fairs frantically making stock.

I handmade a few Christmas and birthday gifts this year, however I didn’t make as many as I’d planned to.

Q and A a Day I kept up to date with my Q&A a day diary (if you count the odd catch up sessions when I missed a couple/few/several days), however the Craftyguidelets didn’t do theirs.

I blogged more than usual, however I didn’t get into a rhythm and get all my ideas off the ground, especially more tutorials.

I worked hard to keep my local Rainbow and Brownie units open and helped to recruit new leaders, however I didn’t manage to get new units to open so that all the girls who want to join, can.

I have completed quite a few magazine kits this year, but not the one a week I wanted to. I have also tackled the magazine mountain and now say to myself that buying more magazines doesn’t make me happy, and the clutter makes me sad when I’m standing at the magazine display in the supermarket. However, the magazine hill is still there.

I haven’t learned how to procrastinate less, I’m still carrying some extra pounds, and the office is a bomb site.

I have learned an important thing this year though. I can’t (and shouldn’t) do everything. I don’t have to fill every available minute in the service of others or dusting the bannisters or attending meetings or making things for the shop. I need to prioritise my girls, my husband, my family and me. All the ‘howevers’ above have occurred because something else came up. A craft session with the Craftyguidelets, making Elsa dresses, going on family holidays, extra time at the park after school, a day out on my own to a craft fair as a customer, not a vendor.

Have a wonderful new year everyone, and I hope 2015 is everything you want it to be.

Louise x

Dear September

Where did our time go September? 30 days and it was all over!

You gave me glorious weather (mostly!) and lots of time in the garden appreciating the wonderful flowers still blooming their socks off. Considering that from February to April it looked like a muddy mess, now it’s landscaped and lovely.

My little Leprechaun turned Imp now has her Brownie Gardener badge for the hard work she put in sowing seeds, thinning out, weeding, watering and finally clearing away. Hopefully she’ll help again next Spring, and her grandparents want to hire her for her skills with a seed packet.

I achieved things, September. This pretty dress for Rainbow Craftyguidelet, some cards, some bunting, and even a tutorial for the book bags I made for the Craftyguidelets’ music lessons. Sales have been picking up with Craftyguider following a bit of promo work, and the big push to Christmas starts now. The Christmas shop is now open. I just need to fill it up a bit more!My Guiding life has started again. Guides and Rainbows are back, and once again I am juggling admin, trying to get as many girls as possible off the waiting lists and into units where they can join the fun, and trying to encourage more volunteers to come forward and help this to happen.I have also started Trefoil Guild which is like the WI for Guiding types. It was so lovely just going to a meeting for grown ups, not being asked to do anything, not being responsible for anything, not feeling guilty for not doing more. I just enjoyed the talk on the fabulous work of Guide Dogs and the puppy walkers. Finally something just for me to enjoy!WI planning has started again for our Handmade Christmas Craft Fair on 16th November. I need to get a shifty on for my stall!

But then just like that it was over September. 30 days of full on busyness and then phwoomp! October happened.

Autumn is here and I’ll be joining in with Miss Beatrix’s #BashSAD challenge to banish the blues of the shorter days. I’m also attempting to complete a whole month of the Fat Mum Slim #fmsphotoaday challenge on Instagram. My house is finally gaining some order after a summer of neglect, the kids are settled at school. Let’s do this October!

What was that? Half term at the end of the month? *sticks fingers in ears and pretends not to hear*

What are you up to this month?

Smash Books

One of my many crafting loves is scrapbooking. I enjoy the process of selecting a photo, working out a layout, choosing the papers, thinking up a title, adding journalling and enjoying the result.

A version of this process which doesn’t take as much time and finesse is smash booking. Whereas a lot of preparation is needed for a scrapbook page, a smash book is more of a ‘bung it in as you go along’ type of process. You go with the flow, pasting in photos, leaflets, ticket stubs, feathers, stickers, notes, new year resolutions and anything else that will glue (or usually in my case, attach with washi tape) on a page. A smash book doesn’t have to be pretty or perfect. Just ‘smash’ your elements in. There are no rules.
I have a couple of smash books by K & Company which have preprinted pages that you can either use to theme your page, or you can just cover them with your mementos.

This year’s summer holiday was to Cornwall, and I took my smash book supplies with me to journal the day’s events each evening before the memories faded. It is much more portable than a scrapbook, and all I had to do when I got back was to add a few photos. Job done!
I have a pinterest board on smash books and scrap books. Why don’t you have a look!

Follow Louise Craftyguider’s board Smash Books and Scrapbooks on Pinterest.

February’s Mission

Aside from my back going twang and the rest of the family going down with the lurgy, January was a very positive month for me. I got lots done, I started decluttering, I’ve been crafting, I’ve gained new skills and things are going well.

I need to carry on this positivity and keep the momentum going. I still have more sorting out to do, particularly my email, and there are always crafty WIPs to finish. I want to set myself another couple of goals for February.
Firstly I want to get my Etsy shop relaunched. I set it up in February last year, listed one item and then abandoned it. Obviously it’s more advantageous for me to attract business through my Craftyguider site as I don’t have to pay fees to list there, but I hope that Etsy will help me reach more people. Hopefully by the end of the month I’ll have a selection of products listed.
Secondly I want to get fitter and start losing weight again. I’m supposed to be following a Slimming World plan but my weight fluctuates up and down because I’m not strict enough. I want to shed the last bit of weight I need to shift, and also get a bit more exercise, in particular, starting pilates to strengthen my back so it won’t go twang again!
And finally, I am going to finish my mending, and sewing badges onto the Craftyguidelets’ badge blankets. I might even get a couple onto mine, but I am 7 years behind so I don’t anticipate on completing this one!

What do you hope to achieve in February?