Our weekly meal plan! 15th - 21st June!! #MealPlanningMonday

Happy Monday! I hope you all had a good weekend. We had a great one which involved a lot of football, F1 and a family meal out yesterday. Becky is working next Sunday on Father's Day, so we thought we would celebrate early. We had a lovely lunch at the pub and then visited another to watch the Barcelona Grand Prix. It was a great afternoon.

Last week's meal plan went really well! We stuck to it all the way until the weekend, even eating all the meals on the right day. The only reason we didn't have the meal on Saturday is because we decided to have a break from ordering Gousto boxes as they just don't have enough meals that we fancy to make it worthwhile ordering. We just seem to be eating the same ones on repeat, so I am going to have to put my thinking cap on and come up with the meals myself even though this week we have quite a few meals we've had from Gousto in the past and I have just bought the ingredients myself! Anyway on Saturday we had a huge prawn salad and garlic bread. It was delicious!

This is my last normal week of being home alone as next week Ellie leaves college! Where have the three years gone? It feels so weird that soon neither of my girls will be in education! I have spent a good part of my life doing school runs, dealing with teachers, helping with homework and things like that. It's the end of an era. Why do they have to grow up so fast!

On the menu this week we have:

Monday - No idea!

I am going to pick something up while I am out in town. It turns out I am the worst daughter in my family as the girls have already bought their gifts for Father's Day and I haven't. I've not even got a card yet. I hope I can find something good for my dad while I am out. Eek!

Tuesday - One Tray Sticky Hoisin Sausage Traybake!

Even though we're not getting the Gousto boxes delivered, it doesn't stop me using their recipes. This one is a good one! Roast sausages, potatoes and peppers coated in a sticky Hoisin glaze. Tray bakes are one of my favourite type of meals because you can just shove everything in the oven and let it do its thing.

Wednesday - Ham, eggs and home made chips!

I have a couple of joints of gammon. I will boil it and we will have it with fried eggs and home made chips. I discovered over the weekend that gammon is the cured pork you buy before it’s cooked and once you cook it, it’s then called ham and just to confuse things even more, it's mostly all just called ham in the US. lol

Thursday - Pea and ham soup!

I am going to make use of the leftover ham and make pea and ham soup as long as my family hasn't eaten the ham straight out of the fridge over the last 24 hours. This is what my family call Shrek soup as it looks like a melted down Shrek!

Friday - A takeaway of some sort!

Friday night is an easy night for me. I don't cook and we order takeaway. Last week we ended up getting chip shop again. Stu and I had burgers and Ellie had her usual Doner kebab wrap and fries.

Saturday - Red onion and bacon tart with baby potatoes!

This one is inspired by a Gousto recipe for Bacon and Leek Tart that we had years ago and it’s stuck with us ever since. I decided to make our own and Red onion and bacon tart became a thing. Ready-made puff pastry, a layer of soft cheese, topped with red onions and smoky bacon. I will make a little extra so I will have some for lunch the next day because it’s just as nice cold.

Sunday - A help yourself evening!

I have no plan for today and everyone can just help themselves to whatever they fancy. Last week we ended up going out for lunch, which was a nice treat. This week we will be staying home.

What are you eating this week?

A photo every day for a year! 7th - 13th June Week 24 of #Project365

Happy Sunday!! I hope you've all had a lovely week and are enjoying your weekend! I've had a bit of a meh week and have been feeling pretty grumpy! The weather wasn't great and my body was playing silly games which left me feeling run down. It's fine though, I have pulled myself out of my mood and I am feeling much better now.

Yesterday was all about me getting the house in order because I have been pretty lazy when it came to the housework over the last week and things had started piling up. It turns out there really wasn't that much to do once I got Ellie to collect all of her belongings from every room in the house. How one person can leave a trail of stuff everywhere! lol Today we're celebrating Father's Day a week early because Becky is working next weekend. We've got a couple of nice things planned for Stu and the girls are paying, which makes it even better from my point of view.

Now for a photo every day!

158/365 7th June

A single poppy appeared in my garden, in the flower bed where it's supposed to be. I love poppies. They look so delicate and almost paper like. They always remind me that some of the prettiest flowers don't last very long. This one definitely didn't. We had some heavy rain and by the next day it had gone. The petals were scattered all over the garden. Hmmf.

159/365 8th June

I have no idea what these are! I grew them from a seed and according to Google, "this leafy green is a Brassica vegetable, likely cabbage, broccoli, or brussels sprouts in their early growth stages." I didn't plant any of those things. Either I was sent the wrong seeds, somebody has been sneaking into my garden planting vegetables or Google is totally wrong. I'm going to leave them alone and see what happens.

160/365 9th June

It's Tuesday which means one thing Costa Coffee and my usual Chocolate Fudge Frappuccino. I know I should try something different every now and then but when it's a once a fortnight treat and I don't want to risk getting something that I don't like.

161/365 10th June

This was the start of watching at least one football match a day, with England's friendly against Costa Rica. I did think it was going to be rained off as the pitch was like a swimming pool as the coverage started.

162/365 11th June

Waffle fries for tea or pizza waffle fries as we call them. My family loves this meal. These were the waffles before they were topped with tomato puree, onions, mushrooms, salami, pepperoni and lots of cheese. There were no leftovers with this meal!

163/365 12th June

Woah, we're halfway there. Woah lemon on a pear! Just one of my funny t-shirts. People will usually glance at it, look away, then do a double take before reading it properly. Then comes the smile. I love little silly things like that.

164/365 13th June

You would think my eldest was about 6 years old with the things she buys. This turned up yesterday, a Squishy Dumpling! I saw it and turned into a concerned parent because I had actually read an article about them the other day. Some have apparently caused problems because they can burst and the contents can be harmful. I gave her a little warning speech, which she probably ignored after the first few words but I tried!

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This week my Word of the Week is: Football!! #WotW

This week my Word of the Week is:

If you know me at all, this week's word was always going to be football! The World Cup is finally here and I am loving it already. For the next few weeks, you will be able to find me sat in front of the TV watching match after match. I don't even care what teams are playing. I'll happily sit and watch football from morning until night when the World Cup is on. I am even planning on recording some of the matches that are being shown during the middle of the night and hopefully avoiding seeing the scores beforehand.

I have been watching football all week, with the friendly warm up matches been shown. On Wednesday, I was ready for England's match expecting kick-off at 9pm only for them to postpone it because of a storm. It was chucking it down at one point and the pitch looked more like a swimming pool than a football pitch. By around 10pm it was clear. I don't know what sort of magic they worked but it was impressive!

Of course, I'll be cheering England on. Supporting England is part of the fun, we always seem to do so well until we don't. It is a rollercoaster of emotions being an England fan. I always find myself rooting for the underdog teams too. I love seeing countries make history. Cape Verde are one of the teams I'll be keeping an eye on because this is their first ever World Cup. Just qualifying is a massive thing. Curaçao is the smallest nation ever to qualify for a World Cup and has less people in it than the nearest big city to us. Then there are teams like Haiti and the Ivory Coast where their fans have been unable to travel into the US after their visas were denied. It feels unfair that so many fans won't be able to experience the tournament in person. I also have a reason to support the Netherlands. Stu drew them in a sweepstake at work and if they manage to win the tournament, or even finish second, there is money to be won.

One of my favourite things so far hasn't even been the football itself. It's been seeing everything happening around the tournament on social media. I have spent far too much time watching videos of teams arriving, fans celebrating and countries sending their players off in style.

Brazil's plane set off with their plane being baptised, Turkey had what seemed like the longest convoy escorting their team, Norway's players dressed as Vikings for photographs and managed to look intimidating and hilarious at the same time and Senegal had a special dinner with their country's leader before leaving. I love it all! It shows just how much the World Cup means to people.

The American advice videos on TikTok have also been making me laugh. There seem to be hundreds of videos aimed at England supporters warning them not to walk to the MetLife Stadium as it's illegal and dangerous but I understand why fans want to. From what I have read, the train ticket prices before the World Cup cost around $12.90, which is roughly £9.50 but since the tournament arrived, some prices have jumped to around $100, which is about £75. Football fans already spend enough money on tickets without those sneaky price rises.

Another thing I've been wondering about is how everyone is coping with the heat. The players are fit but even they look like they're struggling at times. I've seen clips of players pouring water over themselves and wearing cooling scarves packed with ice and then we have the water break half way through each half. The fans must be finding it hard too, as some of the stadiums are not exactly shaded.

How has your week been? I hope you have had a good one! I am of course linking up with Anne who blogs at Raisie Bay to join in with her Word of the Week linky!

What I have loved this week! Week 24. #FridayFavourites

Happy Friday! I hope you’ve had a good week. Mine hasn’t been the worst but it hasn’t been the best either. It’s been one of those weeks when lots of little things have added up and made me feel a bit meh. The weather has been all over the place. We had hail here on Tuesday, which felt very silly for June and then five minutes later the sun was back out pretending like nothing had happened. Add in cramps, bloating, feeling tired and grumpy. It has not been the best but there have still been plenty of little things to enjoy and I’m linking up with Erika and Andrea to share them.

Sport!

This week has been brilliant for sport! I started the weekend watching the F1 qualifying and then the race on Sunday. The race itself was chaos in the best possible way. Max Verstappen didn’t even make it around the first lap, George Russell was collecting time penalties like Pokemon cards and every driver seemed to be speeding in the pit lane while treating the track like a Sunday drive. The race was stopped near the end because the track was breaking up. Eek! You expect better from Monaco! I've checked and from now on until the end of the season (apart from the Las Vegas one) they're all on an afternoon here! Yay! Then there’s football. I’ve really enjoyed watching the friendly matches in the build up to the World Cup over the last week. They’ve got me in the mood for the tournament and I have a whole post about it tomorrow.

Home made pizza!

We made homemade pizza on Saturday and it always tastes better than shop bought or even a takeaway pizza. The best thing about it is that everyone can have whatever they want without any arguments. I had BBQ sauce, mushrooms, onions, sweetcorn, smoked sausage, pineapple and cheese on mine.

Hot Honey!

I said I wasn’t going to get on board the hot honey food trend but it happened. On Monday we had hot honey, bacon and fried eggs with pancakes. It was a Gousto meal we’ve had before and we love. The sweet, salty, spicy taste just works. I didn’t think honey needed improving but adding chilli was the answer all along. I’ve also become obsessed with the Walkers Hot Honey crisps. I bought a big pack and managed to eat all five packets during the week. On Wednesday evening, I went to get another packet and then realised I’d already eaten them all. I could have cried.

My blanket!

I never thought I’d be sitting under a blanket in June but here we are. Ten minutes ago it was grey, cloudy and raining and now the sun is out again. It’s not freezing, it's just colder than I would like for this time of year! I just went with it, I had my heated cushion on my back, a nice cup of tea and pretended that this was all normal. lol

Flowers in the garden!

Father's Day gifts!

I am loving this stage in life where the girls are old enough to have their own money and online shopping accounts to buy their dad gifts for Father's Day! It has been funny hearing about their shopping adventures. Ellie went off with her friend last week to get something in town. She couldn't find what she wanted so she ordered something from Amazon and Becky did all her shopping online. She said she was only getting a couple of things but got slightly carried away and there were a few packages delivered this week. Oops.

Little things that have helped me through the week!

Even though I felt a bit run down, there were lots of tiny things that helped make the week better: laughing with my girls, fully sticking to the meal plan, not getting caught in the rain, good food, making plans, hot showers, drinks from a coffee shop and a fantastic audiobook, I have an hour of it left and I don't know how it's going to end! Eek!

What have you loved over the past week?