The to-do list

• • Get photos printed – actually print out the photos that are on memory cards and then put them into frames and actually put them up around the house. I also want to update the girls’ albums – something I haven’t done for about two years!
  • Do the small niggly home improvements – Not renovating rooms or anything, but stuff that’s easy to do and would actually make a difference: replace all the lightbulbs that aren’t working around the house (there are many), change old sockets and finally get round to filling in the holes in the walls left behind when we replaced curtains with shutters
  • Get bedding that actually fits the bed – I mistakenly bought a super kingsize mattress for our queensize bed. It was an old bed so we got a new one to accommodate the huge mattress, but didn’t replace the bedding. For months my head’s been falling down the gulf between the pillows and the bedsheets have continually pinged off making it really uncomfortable. For someone that has very broken sleep anyway, it’s bordering on the masochistic. My first to-do list tick. The only thing I’ve hit the sales for. Massive bargains to be had in the world of bedding 
  • Draft a will – Matt and I keep saying we have to both do one. We never quite get round to it. It’s really important when children are involved, so 2016 is going to be the year

• Car maintenance – Get the re-occurring car window problem fixed whilst the parts and labour are still under warranty – second week of January got this to-do ticked off
• Sell more stuff at Mum2Mum Markets and online – I need to declutter and sell anything that isn’t suitable for charity shops. Always nice to make some extra cash in the process; I’ve been quite successful in the past. I wrote about it here
• Expand my recipe repertoire – I’d like to set aside an evening or two with the cookery books to get some family meal inspiration. The meal planner needs updating!
  

  

• Get an additional book shelf – The girls have always had loads of books, but following birthdays and Christmas they have a lot more and they’re stating to clutter. Sofia has a big book case and Maria and Gabriella already have two of the lovely Star Book Ledges from the Great Little Trading Company (GLTC) and they’re great.They are also rather pricey. I need to get at least another one and I am currently stalking the GLTC website in the hope that they are put into the sale
• Make a dental appointment – my dental practice doesn’t ever send reminders. The upshot is, rather embarrassingly, it’s been rather a while since my last visit

The post The 2016 To-do List appeared first on The Parent Social.

If we haven’t had any green veg that day I do some green beans with it, otherwise it’s just crusty bread to dunk. We also love to have the leftovers the next day served with rice.

The children love helping out in the kitchen, but this requires some quite difficult cutting so you may want to just get the older ones involved.

Pork, Chorizo and Cannellini Bean Stew

Ingredients (serves 5) 

• 850g pork shoulder steaks/pork shoulder
• 400g tin cannellini beans
• 250g of cooking chorizo (chorizo ring or several packs of the ready chopped)
• 2  x 400g tins chopped tomatoes
• 2 large red onions
• 4 garlic cloves
• 4 teaspoons paprika

Method

1. Slice the pork into strips and fry off in a casserole dish (which has a lid) until brown all over. Remove from the pan and drain off the fat
2. Cut the chorizo into small chunks (or use the ready cubed) and add to the pan, brown off for two minutes then add the chopped onions, four teaspoons of paprika and the chopped garlic. Fry for a further two minutes until the onion has softened
3. Add the pork back to the pan along with ½ a pint of water and the tinned tomatoes. Season to taste
4. Simmer for one hour on a low heat with the lid on. Then remove the lid, add the cannellini beans and simmer for a further 30 minutes

Check out some other great family meals here

You might also like:

Bake alongs with friends on Zoom 

Easy Taralli Recipe (savoury) 

Fuss-free Food for Children – Salmon

The post Pork, Chorizo and Cannellini Bean Stew appeared first on The Parent Social.

Dining al fresco with spinach risotto – a favourite.

I’d been waking up in the middle of the night and trying to think what meals I was going to make that day. This was probably because it was the only time I could devote any real thought to it. Having decided in the early hours I then had to go and shop for all the ingredients the next day. I was actually doing about four sizeable shops a week. I needed to work smarter…

Enter the Meal Planner!

So I devised a meal planner, it sounds a bit sad and rather regimented, but I was getting totally fed up with being poorly prepared and spending way too much time at the supermarket checkout.

I took an hour out and devised a planner for August. I tried to keep it fairly healthy and varied, but some ‘treat’ meals were included. Also some favourites cropped up a couple of times within the month; leftovers also featured. I kept the weekends free in the name of spontaneity! It worked really well so I created one for this month.

September’s meal planner:

It might be overstating it slightly to say it’s revolutionised my life, but it has made a massive difference. Of course there’s the odd tweak now and then to fit in with last minute plans, but the main thing is I’m not waking at obscure hours thinking about the day’s food and I’m not fussing about trying to cobble something together out of the ingredients I do have, and most importantly I have drastically reduced my supermarket visits. I have also cut down a lot on waste as I go to the shops and buy what I actually need.

I have changed, but being organised has actually made me chill out more. I’d highly recommend it! There are also some great meal planning apps out there.

* By the way, please feel free to share any family meal favourites as I’m always looking for inspiration…

The post I’ve Changed…I’ve Created a Meal Planner appeared first on The Parent Social.