Cooking at home... what a concept!  It's something I've actually been aspiring to do more of lately.  Hubby certainly enjoys walking in the house after work to the aroma of something cooking, thus revealing he won't have to wing it or take me out for supper, and that brings a smile every time.  But something about cooking all these years, well it's never been a favorite thing in life for me.

Starting back as a teenager, I wasn't one to stay in the kitchen and help my mom, who by the way was a very good cook!  Her large family of five kids required that she cook almost every day during her child-rearing years.  While she cooked I would rather play kickball outside with the neighborhood kids.  Of course if she needed help I was there.  But for her cooking was like dancing - easy and breezy and thoroughly enjoying.

When I got married the few cookbooks I received at my bridal shower became godsends!  And I'm sure my mom enjoyed my many phones calls home asking how to cook this and that, as I now enjoy my own kids making similar calls to me.  Dinner did happen for the most part until I had morning sickness with my first child.  Only it was late afternoon sickness, which meant not a lot of cooking those few months!  Following that was just sheer exhaustion of having two babies in 19 months (I know I had it easy compared to some others).  Then the whole elegant cooking thing I tried pre-kids went out the window pretty much until the kids graduated high school.  We got stuck on the few basic foods our kids would eat, and anything creative wasn't received with nearly the amount of enthusiasm I put into creating the meal.  So it was ho hum cooking for a long time.  No wonder our pizza nights and McDonalds days brought such enjoyment!  Those few nights a month of boring dinner reprieve thankfully increased as the kids got older, whether we ate with or without them as their lives got increasingly busy with outside activities.  The downside of all that was the habit of cooking was lost, reinforced with the notion that home cooking requires a lot of time and effort!  Dining out was just so much easier!

Amazing how 25 years goes by like that! (snapping fingers)

Now we are empty nesters and back where we started, cooking for two again.  I'm rediscovering the art of meal planning and enjoying the rewards of it.  I'm trying (mind you I say trying because I don't know how long this will last even though I hope it becomes a "rest of my life" habit) to plan dinners on a weekly basis.  To some this may sound so elementary, something taught in 8th grade Home Ec class.  But for me it's been something I've floated in and out of all my domestic goddess life.  This time around I'm finding the internet extremely helpful as we are eating lower carb no white flour no white sugar just plain healthier foods.  And being the gadget queen that I am, a few of my iPhone apps help keep my recipes all organized and my shopping list handy at all times.  Sites like Sparkpeople and Weight Watchers have been invaluable in finding good user-based recipes that not only meet my dietary needs, but are favorites of their site users.  I'm still learning cooking techniques despite years of cooking... well on and off again cooking lol.  Lots of new ways of combining old favorites.  It's actually fun.  Did I just admit cooking is fun?  Hubby will NOT let me forget that! haha  (love you babe!)  So I plan a few nights of meals a week, because come on realistically I still love eating out!

Can anyone relate?

Hopefully a year from now I can reflect back on this post with many months of consistent meal planning under my belt.  I know of at least one person who will whole-heartedly agree with me! haha

Happy Meal Planning and fire up that stove, if you remember how! 

This past week it was golf and precious time with hubby and son up at PSU.  Halfway through our trip I started getting sick, and four days later my fever has now finally broken from having pneumonia.  Still feeling really bad but just knowing the fever is gone makes me want to try to get out of bed for longer periods and gain some strength back.  So I decided this afternoon to try on some clothes in my closet that were impossible to even get all the way on just two short months ago.  Did I mention I have now lost 15 pounds?!! woohoo!!  The first seven came off during my diet detox where I only ate fruits and vegetables for 10 days.  The rest came off on the "rest of my life" diet, which is basically low carbs with complex carbs being my only carbs, no bread products and limited starchy fruits and vegetables; basically eating eggs, lean meats and lots of vegetables and fruit.  I'm completely off sugar and yes chocolate!  If it wasn't for this illness right now, I would be ecstatic.  So the clothes I was hoping I could get back into are actually too big on me now! WOW  and I can see more muscle tone on me, especially my legs.  Did I mention I joined a gym two months ago too?  So down 15 pounds, a size and a half, getting toned... it feels good.  I really haven't missed all the junk, and even with having to eat out while out of town up at PSU, I was still able to lose just by eating lean and clean.  Maybe I can actually keep this up... I am certainly motivated by these results!  I had to lay back down rather quickly after only trying on a few things, but it sure did boost my afternoon!

My pastor and his wife and our visiting guest ministry stopped by to pray over me too.  What a blessing that was to me!  I'm hoping to wake up tomorrow feeling goooooooood!  For now it's back to bed and my ice chips (too nauseated for food).