Monday

ei34 · September 29

How was everyone's weekend? Wishing all a smooth week!

ei34 · September 29

My weekend was really great. The back to school BBQ was fun (although a boy in DS's friend group who's often a terror, was a terror. DS stays away from him as best he can but phew). Saturday was apple picking, cleaning, and prepping for the week, and yesterday was mass, lots of bike riding and my brother visited. Really tasty dinners both nights - the kids are getting into that late childhood eating mode, willing to eat a wider variety of food, and bigger appetites, I'm loving it.

Work has been kind of dumpster fire-y, but par for the course type stuff, nothing new.

MNNEBride · September 29

The weekend was pretty good. Friday, after work, I ran some errands and then picked up supper.

Saturday, we had friends over. I made an apple crisp from apples gifted by another friend. We are planning a trip to the Alabama shore in 2026, so I wanted to make some reservations with them. She is also helping me at the craft show in November, so we discussed pricing and such.

Sunday, we watched the Vikings game from Ireland bright and early. We had planned to go out to a friend's property to pick up some jam and pumpkins they are selling. DH wanted to ride along. He was in a mood and got mad about something. He thought I "looked at him funny". It was crazy. He wanted to go home after the pumpkins, so I took him home and did the rest of the errands myself. He was better when I returned home 2 hours later, but had snarky comments the rest of the night. Some days are tough.

This morning, I discovered I have a problem with Outlook mail at work. Emails I've sent from a shared inbox haven't gone out. IT ended up having to rebuild my entire Microsoft 360. Fun times. It's almost done updating all my email files. Hello Monday!

ILoveBeachMusic · September 29

Weekend was ok. The celebration of life for our friend was very nice and very him. Lots of laughter and tears. Sunday we had church and I drove up to Chicago and will be here until Thursday. So my week will consist of taking picking up the boys from school and reading a lot! That's fine with me.

VarunaTT · September 29

The weekend was good. I finished up a few loads into the car and I'm down to THREE boxes. One is to go to mom's, the other 2 are books/comic books/games that I'm selling/getting store credit for. I have some stuff to pick up from a friend's that I shipped there and some stuff that was smaller coming to this address. I'll finally be settled down, in time for it to get cold, I suppose. The rest of the time I just made myself sit down and relax. I did get my covid and flu shot Saturday morning. I had to take a nap that afternoon (solid 2 hours, I was surprised), but other than sore upper arms for a few days, I've had no other issues. Had my hair done as well with a plan for growing out the color.

I finally went grocery shopping and cooked in the new kitchen. It's a big change, just having a studio kitchen. VERY limited counter space. I've bought a cutting board top for the flat top stove, to double my counter space basically.

Hopefully this week goes by smoothly.

Casadena · September 29

Weekend was busy! Traveled last week, got back Thursday. Went to a baseball game with my dad on Friday, H and I went to the ballet and dinner on Saturday (my birthday present!) and yesterday was just groceries/hanging out at home. I'm TIRED.

This week H is at a conference this week and my mom is coming to hang with G when he's off for Yom Kippur this week. Looking forward to being home for a bit.

CharmedPam · September 30

I’m so sorry he’s having these mood swings on you @MNNEBride, big hugs to you for taking it so well. I also came into my office and my entire office suite was wiped out! And all my programs I use. When I walked in from 6 days off, no one was in the office and that happened. Not something I wanted to experience mid way through a buy out!
@VarunaTT, that must feel great though, small kitchen or not, to have your own space now!
@ei34, apple picking! I forgot it was that time of the year because it’s been so hot. I need to find some time and get out there! I don’t eat many apples but a nice baked cinnamon apple dish sounds great right about now

ei34 · September 30

@MNNEBride hugs your way, you put up with so much and I'm sorry

@CharmedPam it was a lot of fun. The orchard also has some vegetables including potatoes, DS loves veggies and doesn't eat fruit so it's nice that he has something to pick too (pick = dig out of the dirt). We enjoyed mashed potatoes on Saturday and apple pie on Sunday

short+sassy · September 30

@VarunaTT, I have a small kitchen also. Here are some kitchen organizational products I have found especially helpful and space saving.

I don't know if you have room for it, but I have a little kitchen cart with a top that can be folded out to be a counter. I'm roughly guessing the countertop when folded out is 3' long by 12-18" long. The bottom has two shelves and a bottom bin that can be used for storage. It fits against a small 18" wide piece of wall between my back door and the opening for my laundry room. I don't remember where I bought it or I'd send a link.

Dang! I just checked Amazon to see if I could find something similar. They have kitchen storage carts that small, but none I could find with the fold out counter. That's the best part! I can fold the ends of the counter down when I'm not actively using it, so it fits in that 18" weird, little wall space.

These are for kitchen storage:

This is a magnetic spice rack that hangs from the fridge. It has four shelves and each one holds about 12 normal-sized spice bottles. You can also put two small ones on top of each other and they aren't too tall to fall out. I was worried about the weight it could hold, but it is made of metal. I've had mine completely filled for four years and that's never been a problem. None of the metal pieces are showing wear.

There are also other configurations for magnetic shelving on fridges at Amazon.

Amazon.com: 4 Tier Magnetic Spice Rack | Strongly Magnetic Spice Shelf with Utility Hooks | Refrigerator Spice Storage | Kitchen Storage Rack for Placing Seasoning Bottles, Plastic Wraps or Garbage Bags (Black): Home & Kitchen

One wall of my kitchen has no cabinets. Since we also have no pantry, we've attached two metal 7' shelving units to the wall to hold that kind of stuff. I use this two "pull out" shelf organizer for soup/bean type cans. Each shelf holds 8 cans, 4 on each side. The shelves pull out smoothly and easily. The top shelf is open on the top, so taller items can be placed in that one.

This is the one I bought, currently $22:

Amazon.com: madesmart 2 Tier Organizer, Multi-Purpose Slide-Out Storage Baskets with Handles, Pack of 1, Plastic, Clear : Home & Kitchen

This one is similar and a better value. It's 2 for $30:

Amazon.com: madesmart 2 Tier Organizer, Multi-Purpose Slide-Out Storage Baskets with Handles, Pack of 1, Plastic, Clear : Home & Kitchen

short+sassy · September 30

@VarunaTT, weird, I don't have an edit button for the post I just did.

I wanted to correct the sizing I gave for my fold out counter. It's 3' long and 12-18" wide. I accidentally put "long" for both of those dimensions.

levioosa · September 30

@VarunaTT I second Short+sassy. I have a foldable island. It's pretty small when folded in half, maybe 5-6 inches wide and 1.5 feet long. It folds up to be small enough to slide in between our wall and the fridge. We don't have a lot of counter space either but it's so helpful for days when I'm baking or throwing a party and need more counter space.

VarunaTT · October 1

I'll look; most of the racks with the foldable counter I saw were too wide. The space between the fridge and stove is only 9" wide, which also kept me from a narrow trashcan there. I do have the magnetic shelves on the side of the fridge and bought hooks to hang oven pads, measuring spoons and cups, and a few other things. I'll look into other suggestions, thank you! The weirdest thing is no drawers. I have a utensil organizer on the counter and then some storage shelves under the sink for the other utensils I have. I've also pared down my kitchen to "this really is the way you cook now" and got rid of some specialty things I've hauled places for years, and almost never used. I did have a tear over my Cusinart food processor, but I kept reminding myself someone else would use the heck out of that thing and that's better than sitting in storage with me. I did keep my stand mixer though, I just couldn't let it go.

short+sassy · 1:08PM

VarunaTT said:

I'll look; most of the racks with the foldable counter I saw were too wide. The space between the fridge and stove is only 9" wide, which also kept me from a narrow trashcan there. I do have the magnetic shelves on the side of the fridge and bought hooks to hang oven pads, measuring spoons and cups, and a few other things. I'll look into other suggestions, thank you! The weirdest thing is no drawers. I have a utensil organizer on the counter and then some storage shelves under the sink for the other utensils I have. I've also pared down my kitchen to "this really is the way you cook now" and got rid of some specialty things I've hauled places for years, and almost never used. I did have a tear over my Cusinart food processor, but I kept reminding myself someone else would use the heck out of that thing and that's better than sitting in storage with me. I did keep my stand mixer though, I just couldn't let it go.

My city's library system has all kinds of great things you can borrow, including small kitchen appliances and tools, even power tools.

If your local libraries have something similar, it could be a good stop gap in the meantime for if you occasionally need a special pot or kitchen appliance.

I keep meaning to check mine if they have a Ninja Creami. I've heard such good things and especially want to try making my own no-sugar-added ice cream or yogurts, but I don't have room for something like that. It would be perfect to borrow one occasionally and make big batches.

levioosa · 1:59PM

short+sassy said:

VarunaTT said:

I'll look; most of the racks with the foldable counter I saw were too wide. The space between the fridge and stove is only 9" wide, which also kept me from a narrow trashcan there. I do have the magnetic shelves on the side of the fridge and bought hooks to hang oven pads, measuring spoons and cups, and a few other things. I'll look into other suggestions, thank you! The weirdest thing is no drawers. I have a utensil organizer on the counter and then some storage shelves under the sink for the other utensils I have. I've also pared down my kitchen to "this really is the way you cook now" and got rid of some specialty things I've hauled places for years, and almost never used. I did have a tear over my Cusinart food processor, but I kept reminding myself someone else would use the heck out of that thing and that's better than sitting in storage with me. I did keep my stand mixer though, I just couldn't let it go.

My city's library system has all kinds of great things you can borrow, including small kitchen appliances and tools, even power tools.

If your local libraries have something similar, it could be a good stop gap in the meantime for if you occasionally need a special pot or kitchen appliance.

I keep meaning to check mine if they have a Ninja Creami. I've heard such good things and especially want to try making my own no-sugar-added ice cream or yogurts, but I don't have room for something like that. It would be perfect to borrow one occasionally and make big batches.

Yes! I found about about our local Tool Library the other day and I thought that was so cool. Why would we want to defund libraries

VarunaTT · 4:18PM

short+sassy said:

VarunaTT said:

I'll look; most of the racks with the foldable counter I saw were too wide. The space between the fridge and stove is only 9" wide, which also kept me from a narrow trashcan there. I do have the magnetic shelves on the side of the fridge and bought hooks to hang oven pads, measuring spoons and cups, and a few other things. I'll look into other suggestions, thank you! The weirdest thing is no drawers. I have a utensil organizer on the counter and then some storage shelves under the sink for the other utensils I have. I've also pared down my kitchen to "this really is the way you cook now" and got rid of some specialty things I've hauled places for years, and almost never used. I did have a tear over my Cusinart food processor, but I kept reminding myself someone else would use the heck out of that thing and that's better than sitting in storage with me. I did keep my stand mixer though, I just couldn't let it go.

My city's library system has all kinds of great things you can borrow, including small kitchen appliances and tools, even power tools.

If your local libraries have something similar, it could be a good stop gap in the meantime for if you occasionally need a special pot or kitchen appliance.

I keep meaning to check mine if they have a Ninja Creami. I've heard such good things and especially want to try making my own no-sugar-added ice cream or yogurts, but I don't have room for something like that. It would be perfect to borrow one occasionally and make big batches.

I had bought the Creami for me and my mother b/c I could justify it for 2 people. I meant to put it in the garage sale for $150 firm and if it didn't sell, it was the universe telling me i could keep it. Well, I had put it in my friend's house for safety and completely forgot to bring it out, so I still have it. I love it. I'm still struggling on how to make the high protein ice cream. The first go round is good, but once I but it into the freezer again, it's going to crumbles. I think I need to change my protein powder. I don't have the ones that were recommended, so I'm trying that next. I have made non dairy coffee ice cream and limoncello, both of which were delicious. It makes me happy and I'm keeping it.

For big batches, you'd need multiple pint containers and have space to freeze them all for the 24 required hours and then store after blending. Some of them also need to be reblended once you've started eating.

short+sassy · 7:19PM

@VarunaTT, thanks for the tips and info about the Creami! Especially on my "big batch" plan, which sounds like it might not work out unless I own one.

It's hard to find no sugar added ice cream in a flavor other than vanilla. But I recently discovered a brand (Rebel) at Walmart that's pretty good and has all kinds of flavors! But it's $5.50 pint. Argh! My thought process has been, "Surely I can save money if I learn to make it myself." That's been my motivation.

It's not high in protein, though. But that would be another great bonus, if I can figure out how to successfully add more protein to mine. I'll take your advice to jump straight to the recommended ones.

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