Organization Challenge - Christmas

White Christmas

I thought we would take a break from our usual Monday organizing challenge to work on organizing Christmas. It's only 18 days away!

Hopefully you already got your December schedule worked out during Week 2 and your house clean during Week 3 so all we need is a little fine tuning.

This week's goals:
1. First and foremost enjoy your family and the hope and anticipation of celebrating the birth of Christ. Don't let the details get in the way.

2. If you haven't already, get those Christmas cards addressed and mailed. If it just doesn't happen this year, that's OK too. You can always send out a New Year's family newsletter or even Valentine's Day cards. :)

3. Finish your Christmas shopping. Browse online before you go and make a list of what you want to buy for whom so you don't wander aimlessly around the store (unless of course, that's what you enjoy doing like I do when I'm shopping with friends). :) One great gift idea for grandparents is a photo book. I recently received this one that I ordered from Photoworks and it is gorgeous! They currently have the books on sale for 25% off but I think you'll have to order ASAP to get one in time for Christmas. Snapfish and Kodak Gallery also have really nice photo books.

4. Gather all your wrapping paper, tape, ribbon and gift bags into one place so you can get to them easily. It's a good idea to wrap things as you buy them, but I usually end up wrapping everything in one marathon session.

5. If you've been buying gifts all year long and have them hidden all over the place, gather them together to see what exactly you have and what you still need to get. I have a few little things that have been hiding out in my gift/linen/extra toilet paper closet for years because I keep forgetting about them.

6. Plan your meals. Here is a nice Christmas menu planning checklist (can you tell I love checklists?)

Let's have a great week and remember what it's all about!

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.
Luke 2:11

New Recipes

I'm having fun this weekend trying new recipes. Hope you are all having a good weekend too!

Cinnamon roll recipe here. This is a big recipe so I took some to my neighbor and I have several pans in the freezer. It will be so easy to pop a pan in the oven for a special weekday breakfast without the work. I froze them already baked and iced and they can be reheated in the oven at 250 for 15 to 20 minutes.


Enchilada recipe here. My family loved these! It takes awhile to get them assembled, but it's not hard and it's worth it!

Muffins and rumors of muffins

There have been whispers and rumors floating around town about wonderful pumpkin muffins made only with two ingredients: pumpkin pie filling and spice cake mix. I've never had these muffins or seen the actual recipe, but being the risk-taker that I am (OK, go ahead and laugh, I know you want to) I decided to try and make these muffins with no recipe in sight.

The only problem.. my store was totally out of spice cake mix and the only pumpkin pie filling available was in the big can instead of the regular size. I hear there is some sort of pumpkin shortage. Do you have regular size cans at your store? Anyhoo, in the spirit of the brave kitchen pioneers who have gone before me, I decided to try and double it (because of the double amount of pumpkin) and substitute gingerbread mix for the spice cake mix.


I have to admit I was a little worried while I was stirring the two ingredients together. I kept thinking that surely I needed to add eggs or milk or something! It was a pretty thick mixture and I poured it into 2 muffins pans (to make 24 muffins).

I decided 350 degrees sounded like a god temperature and baked them for about 25 minutes. They were sure smelling good in the oven!

They turned out darker than regular pumpkin muffins (because of the gingerbread mix) but they actually looked edible when I pulled them out. I let the kids be the first guinea pigs and try them out. Nobody passed out or gagged so I figured they couldn't be too bad. :) I thought they turned out pretty good, but not as good as the muffins I make from this recipe. I think it was the heavy clove and ginger taste from the combination that was a little too much for me. I'm not a big clove fan; I don't even like Chai tea.

Overall I think I will try them again, but next time I'm hoping I'll be able to find the spice cake mix.

Have you ever made something similar? How did they turn out?

The Family Supper

We try to have supper together as a family as often as possible. It doesn't happen every night of course, but it happens more often than not. We sit around the table, hold hands while Mike asks the blessing and then eat a meal that's usually homemade. There's nothing magical about having a meal together as a family, but it gives us a great opportunity to come together at the end of the day and connect with each other. As the mom of the family, it's up to me to make the family supper a priority, and it's worth it. The time together is precious and is a portion of how our family builds its identity. We have had so many memorable conversations and joke telling sessions around the supper table over the years that we still talk about much later. Here is a list of conversation starters if you need a little push to get things going.

Getting a meal on the table every single night isn't easy I know. That's why it's so hard isn't it? The dailiness of it... Planning is the key. Somehow you aren't surprised are you? One suggestion I recently had from a friend who is a very busy church secretary is to put your roast (with all the potatoes, carrots, etc.) in your crockpot at night before you go to bed and put the inner part of your crock pot in the fridge. She then sets it out on the counter first thing in the morning to let it warm up slightly then places it in the crockpot on low. That keeps the stoneware part from cracking due to a sudden temperature change. She also uses disposable crockpot liners that she buys at the grocery store. These really help with cleanup after the meal. Now how easy is that? Wouldn't it be nice when your family walks in the door to smell something delicious cooking? I have supper in my crockpot right now. Let's have some wonderful time with our families this week. :)

Organization Challenge Week 3

How did last week's challenge go for you? Did you get your schedule all planned out for the month? I don't have meals planned out for the month, but I did get out my planner and write down all of our appointments and commitments.

I also found a really cute 2010 planner at a local book store. If you're going to have to look at it every day for a year, you might as well get a cute one right? :) Mine is just like this one only smaller so it will fit in my purse. I love that it has a place for phone numbers and note pages in the back. It also has a couple of small pockets that I will probably use for things like receipts or grocery lists.

This week's challenge is to Organize your Cleaning Schedule.

The goals for the week are:
Make a list of all the chores that need to be done around your house. I have mine on note cards which you can read about here. Break them down into weekly, monthly and seasonal. It's a good idea to share this list with your family (and hopefully get them involved). Most husbands and children have no idea how much work is involved in cleaning a home.

Look at your weekly schedule and decide what days are going to be heavy cleaning days and what days are going to be maintenance. Lately I have been dividing my cleaning days into "wet chores" such as bathrooms and mopping and "dry chores" such as dusting and vacuuming. Laundry gets done everyday around here (yes, I even did laundry on Thanksgiving).

Take 20 or 30 minutes each day to straighten the house and do a quick "swipe" of the bathrooms. This will keep things from getting totally out of control. You can find a great daily checklist here. You might also want to read how to fake a clean house. It could come in handy if you have last minute guests.

Stay organized:
Get to bed on time and try to write in your journal (week 1).
Check you planner daily and remember to write things down on your to-do list to save yourself the stress of trying to remember everything (week 2).

Find week 2: Organize Your Schedule here
Week 1: Organize Your Mind here.

If any of you are organizing along with me I would love to hear how it's going for you! Remember, this is a process and we don't have to get organized all at once! In fact, I'm pretty sure that's impossible. :)

Leftovers

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving with your families! I think Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday in some ways...maybe because I like to cook and then lap up all the compliments. :)

I got my early Christmas present of The Pioneer Woman Cooks in the mail Friday (ordered from amazon.com) and tonight I made the chicken potpie recipe, except with leftover turkey. Everyone liked it and I don't have to feel bad about wasting all those good leftovers. I think this is the first year that I've had enough leftovers to actually make more than a couple of turkey sandwiches. Maybe everyone was too distracted by all the side dishes and pies to eat much turkey.


What do you do with your leftover turkey if you have any?

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to each of you. I'm so very blessed to have the sweetest, most encouraging readers anywhere on the internet. Thank you for taking the time to visit with me! You make blogging so much fun.

"I awoke this morning with devout thanksgiving for my friends, the old and the new."
Ralph Waldo Emerson