lovin' life... lovin' food

What’s for dinner tonight?

Very soon Raffi will start eating solids, and when that happens I want him to sit with us at the table to eat dinner each night. I need to make two big changes in order to make that happen:

1- Start cooking dinner every night again and
2- Actually sit at the table to eat dinner.

Trig and I have gotten into a really bad habit of sitting on the couch watching TV while we eat. In addition, I’ve been making at most 2-3 good dinners a week and just putting together random things for meals the other nights. We only get takeout one time per month, but even that is too much for me. I do not like any of these habits, and I intend to change them.

Growing up we had a fresh dinner every single night. There was always a fun meal plus salad and bread, usually with a shared apple for dessert. We didn’t eat until 8:30 or 9 PM when my dad got home from work, but every night we sat together as a family and enjoyed each other’s company. How did my mom do it? Once I hit 3rd grade and my brother was in junior high school my mom went to work for my dad. How did she manage working for him, taking care of us, taking care of the house, and having dinner on the table every night?

It is a puzzle to me.

I am still having difficulty managing my time, and I find that it is 3 or 4 PM by the time I check off 3-5 items from my to do list. When I put Raffi in his swing or on the mat alone for awhile I feel guilty for not constantly interacting. I am not sure how to overcome this. With a big move in the next few weeks and me returning to work in one week, it is just a lot to handle.

Anyway, regardless of all of that, I want to make dinnertime a priority. I started yesterday by making a big list and heading to the market while Raffi and his dad hung out at home. They got some quality time and I got to fill my cart at my leisure. Even after that trip our fridge looks like this:

Not too full, but not empty either.

I made a loose meal plan on my phone that looks like this:

Monday: fried calamari, roasted asparagus, 1/2 avocado each, sauteed shrimp, shared roll
Tuesday: homemade chicken tortellini soup (lots of chicken in the soup for protein). garbage salad. pineapple for dessert (having 2 guests over)
Wednesday: Asparagus & boiled eggs. (You steam the asparagus and then chop boiled eggs over it. Simple and healthy)
Thursday: Pasta in a tuna, crushed tomatoes, & capers sauce. Big salad.
Friday: Having friends over. Will go to the market that day.

Before I had Raffi it was easier to make a fresh dinner each night because I would run (literally run) over to Whole Foods a mile away for dinner ingredients each day and would then walk home. I like buying my food as fresh as possible, but I might need to start planning more ahead and buying meats and things for the week instead of only for a few days. As you can see from the above, the dinners get worse and worse throughout the week. It might take some time but my goal is to never have dinners like asparagus and boiled eggs. However, I’ll start with my first goals of getting a new and fresh dinner on the table each night as well as sitting at the table to eat.

Do you cook a new dinner every night? How do you manage to do that with your busy schedule?

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays to all!

Love, Santa & his elves

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