Another consumed sewing and shop week on the horizon so I better get a head start today if I want it to have anything to do with positive outcomes. Shaping, building and monitoring my Etsy shop has been stealing me away from almost everything lately. And since I've had this ongoing struggle with managing my time-some tasks I have under control, while others still seem to go haywire on me. A lot of it has to do with a little procrastination and prioritizing on my part. See, I wake very early, like an hour and a half before offering my first obligatory prayer of the day. That time is divided into a shower/hair maintenance, offering supererogatory prayers, then onto reading and arabic studies in a relaxed little corner spot on the floor in the living room where I feel cozy, spiritually secluded, inspired and somewhat scholarly until time for the actual prayer. I must start most days in this way or I will feel lost and guilty about doing anything else (sewing included).
From there it's preparing breakfast for us and then seeing the husband off to work. Somewhere in between breakfast and getting him out the door is where I usually run into procrastinator (should've been high priority) number 1..."Why didn't I iron his clothes the night before?" (shaking my head)
Okay, so he's off to the office, the kitchen is then cleaned, bed made, bathrooms cleaned or freshened...after this is when I should go back to bed for an hour to rejuvenate myself and senses because if I don't-I will soon feel totally drained but too involved in the studio and online to slow down. Last week, I did very well and was very proud of myself and felt very healthy and well all because I made myself take a nap each day. Getting the rest your body needs is so important and when I implemented that into my schedule I cannot begin to tell you how much better a Sabina I was-I was more cheerful and playful, less stressed. Only thing that slowed things down was that I had only a few dinner meals in the fridge so I ended up laboring in the kitchen.
Since I prepare everything freshly for us, the necessary freezer cooking for me is very time consuming. When I began to implement freezer cooking into my plans some months ago, I sought advice from others on Youtube, here on Blogger and wherever else I could find info and many bragged about cooking for the month in less than 1-2 hours (or something like that), what I noticed is that they were using already prepped canned and jarred foods to pull everything together-which is fine, but it's been about a year since I've bought a jar of marinara and a good sauce takes time and we are big on eating nutritious meals; therefore, my freezer cooking time is an entire day and maybe part of the next, but still worth it to have a couple of weeks off from slaving in the kitchen when I'd rather be sewing in the studio ;)
Oh! and since I got this thing, I haven't had to buy anything bread that's including panko crumbs which I get by rubbing 2 slices of day old bread together from a 2lbs loaf. I store the coarse crumbs into a dry clean canning jar and chuck it into the freezer (works great for me). I do what I can to cut down on hidden chemical preservatives in foods, this way I know what's in everything we eat.
(As for snacks, we rarely buy those from the store as I make our cookie doughs (we're cookie lovers, especially the husband), bake some and store the rest in the freezer.
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| Try my recipe, you will love it! (click to enlarge) |
We rarely buy chips, pretzels and things like that either, instead we eat banana chips and we have an air popper to make popcorn when we want it and of course, there's always fruits and veggies.
This week we're eating more seafood meals (easy, I cook the day of) and less poultry so I am going to freezer cook other foods to help speed along processes like tomato sauces and pastes for soups, pastas, quinoa and pizzas. am going to cook a pot of pinto beans also to make bean/quinoa/cheese burritos-all will be stored into the freezer for quick grab foods.
And you know what? I've discovered that not everything needs to be stored in the freezer to preserve as things I place in the rear of the fridge shelves preserves foods to almost freezing (sometimes frozen).
I'll pop back in to share more methods.
In other news I've been pinning my new Etsy items on Pinterest, and recently I saw that some users were repinning and joking my cloth pads (other pad brands too). I was a little disappointed at first, but quickly thought, "well hey, thanks for repinning, more free advertisement for me" ^_^
Here are my latest shop items
I love to make odd, fashionable accessories, like this cotton ruff collar in yellow.
and this one in black that's lined with tulle.
and this is my latest organic bamboo velour pad hand dyed in another seashore scene.
well, I better get back to the kitchen (gotta stay ahead of the game); enjoy the recipe and stay tuned, this week I have a new video sewing series to bring to you and a quick tutorial that's sure to light up your life!
