New Week! New Start!

I love Mondays! I love the fact that there's a whole brand new week ahead of me.. unsullied and unspoiled and more or less a " blank slate" that hopefully I will make some sort of success of!!!
Having said that, I truly believe that you can " start over" at any time, any moment.. there's no need to wait for Mondays, New Years or any other special time to be able to take a look at where you're at and if you're not going in the direction you want to be, turn right around and start heading that way!!!
Today was an especially nice Monday as I was able to make it to work and I felt pretty good! I'm not going to forget about taking a bit of extra care with my health this week but it felt totally awesome to be able to finish my shift and come home still feeling like I could tackle some household chores as well! My shifts are pretty short actually. I work either 7.30 am till 1pm (morning shift) or 1pm-6.30pm(afternoon shift) usually.. that's only 5 1/2 hours at a time. Rarely I'll do a bit longer but never as long as what most people have to do each day! So I'm pretty lucky!! As well I work for really kind, nice and generous people who are my friends. And my workmates are the same.. all really great people and friends outside of the workplace too.
I'd really like it if I didn't have to go to work at all outside of the home all the same. There's just SO many things that I would like to do each day and I always seem to run out of time.. so not working I imagine would give me those extra hours.... but having said that, I do enjoy the social aspect of my work and also I think it's really better in the long run to work even if it's only part-time for a few other good reasons...it's good to have the extra money, you can keep up whatever skills you have, maybe learn new ones...gives you a sense of being of service to others than your own family... that sort of thing.
Today at work I had a grilled field mushroom and fried onion sandwich with Djon mustard for lunch. It was yummy (and vegan!) :) For breakfast I just had a piece of toast and vegemite mainly cos one of my tablets has to be taken with food. I'm not a breakfast person. I prefer to eat something about 10 am. For dinner tonight, I'm going to make the vegetable crepes I mentioned in my menu plan last week. Oh, I didn't mention yesterday that my husband went out for dinner last night, as it was our neighbour's birthday and we were invited to join them at a restaurant to celebrate, but I didn't go as I wanted to stay home and not give anyone my germs...also make sure I was well-rested and recovered enough to go to work today.... My husband came home and said he had ordered 6 oysters Kilpatrick(his favourite) and a chicken parmigiana and as well he had cake that my neighbour's daughter brought for dessert. I enjoyed a fettucine with garlic, mushroom, olive oil and spinach leaves at home....that was absolutely delicious ( and vegan!) :) I cooked up the mince I talked about and it made two containers which I put in the fridge to cool... and you know what? I'm going to freeze them for another week. All this week I'm going to cook vegan! And guess what? It's time for another menu plan!!!

Meal 1 : Chickpea and spinach curry ( must hurry to use all the spinach before it goes bad!)

Meal 2 : Lentil and rice dish ( I read about this yesterday while browsing.. it's a Middle Eastern dish... can't recall accurately its name at the minute... megadurra or something..will check it up and post tomorrow..)

Meal 3 : Vegetable pie... with a pastry bottom and mashed potatoes on top!

Meal 4 : Rice with tofu, vegetable and cashew stirfry

Meal 5 : Vege patties and salad

Meal 6 : Sanitarium vege roast with baked vegetables and gravy... yum yum! There'll be some leftovers for sanwiches too! WIN!

Meal 7 : Pasta with lentil or split pea sauce

There are THOUSANDS of tasty vegan dinners waiting for me to cook them! There's seven of them right there!

Happy Happy New Week everybody!!!

Gone Down Hill

Guh! I am REALLY sick today.. I thought yesterday maybe I was improving a bit but last night was even worse than the night before. I was glad I had made a doctor's appointment for this morning. I thought last night I was going to rupture my aorta or something! Anyhoo, I'm all intact and armed with the appropriate medicine for pneumonia, yup, that's what the chemist kept talking about when I said I had a chest infection. He came out to speak with me about the prescriptions I had filled and how I must make sure to get the repeat and take them ALL... with pneumonia. I guess a "nasty chest infection" can mean that or at least be the last stop before that develops...the doc said my right lung was full of muck.. I've had pneumonia before, twice and pleurisy once as well, I can't remember what it feels like.. was too long ago.
Soooo, can't write much today, I don't feel up to it. I'm on track with my menu though! Cooked the fettucine carbonara today with the bacon and mushrooms and threw in a handful of spinach leaves for some greens. Yes, I went shopping today! Well, it's a week tomorrow that I went shopping last but I plan to shop Thursdays, that's a better day for me and since I had to go in today to go the doctor I thought it may as well be today. But I do plan to make Thursdays my weekly shopping day. Other than today I had a no-spend, no-drive week!!
Spent quite a lot at shopping - $217. That's about my average. But I got my 7 loaves of bread, 7 tins of dogfood and all the things on my can't -do- without list. This means I should not have to go to the shops again till next Thursday whereas usually I'd be back there Sat, Mon, maybe even Wed again to replenish... I got a pair of pyjamas in there as well. $12.99. I only have one pair and I think with all this illness I could use a second pair.
I drank the rest of the garlic soup for my lunch today and ate the remaining fried rice. For breakfast I bought a healthy juice from the juice bar in town. Haven't felt very hungry today which is unusual for me. Which means I MUST use up the avocado I found today in the fridge for a sandwich tomorrow before it goes bad. I had planned to eat that for afternoon tea today but I just didn't feel like it. Wasn't up to taking my dogs out today either :(
Hope tomorrow's a better day healthwise!

Today!

Already I changed my menu that I posted earlier on today! See what I mean??? The change involves the curry I had planned to cook today with the piece of rump. I decided to make a casserole instead. That way have used up the steak, some potatoes from the bargain bag I got for $2 ( I'm guessing they might be old and therefore on " special" although they seem good still...) some of the big bag of juicing carrots, parsley from my garden and also some brussels sprouts that won't last the week out. Also a half a stubby of leftover beer which makes the gravy very tasty! I have a bread roll that is nearly stale.. I'm going to make garlic bread with it in the sandwich maker... and serve that with the casserole.That will save THAT from being wasted.. I ate the last of the rolls earlier as a toasted tomato, onion and cheese sandwich for my lunch...
Using the more perishable items such as the potatoes, carrots and brussels sprouts means the rice and pappadams I can save for another time....good one Michelle!!!
As mentioned I have cooked a pot of rice for fried rice tomorrow and I have made a cake, a butter cake!