Productive weekend in the kitchen

Before I get into my actual post, I must first say that my house is a mess. My bathrooms didn't get cleaned this weekend; the laundry is not done; I'm not sure when my kitchen floor was last mopped. I just don't want you to have any Martha Stewart illusions when you read this next part.

(As PW would say, "I'm just keepin' it real.")

Having said all of that, I did have a very productive weekend in the kitchen. We bought a chest freezer and I have officially run out of my current freezer stockpile, so it was definitely time to do some make-ahead-and-freeze meals.

Hamburger, chicken breasts, and pork loin were on sale this week, so I picked up about five pounds of each and made the following recipes this weekend:

Cajun Curry Chicken
Jerk Chicken
Chicken Sate
Sesame Chicken Bites
Porcupine Meatballs
Meatloaf
Sloppy Joes
Hamburger Patties

(This week I will also cook part of the pork loin in the crock pot and then shred it for BBQ sandwiches or pork tacos, and will cut the rest into pork chops and freeze them.)

This combination of chicken recipes seemed to work well because several ingredients overlapped. My kitchen smelled heavenly from the freshly grated ginger and lime zest, although this made me realize that I might want to invest in an actual zester instead of using the stand-up grater.

Most of these recipes made enough for two meals for us, so I currently have about 15 meals in the freezer. Woohoo!

In other news, the potty training has taken a step backwards. I'm not surprised, and won't let this discourage me. At least Kaitlyn understands all of the concepts - now it's just a matter of Mike and I being consistent and reinforcing the behavior.

The good news is that she has no problem going #1 or #2 on the potty, and she prefers to go on the big potty instead of her little one. That works for me - I prefer to not have to clean up the mess from the little one!

More good news: my mom is officially done with her chemo!!! Yay! She'll go on March 9 (which is also my niece's 13th birthday) for a CT scan. Please agree with us in prayer that they won't find any trace of cancer.

Another prayer request: my sister will have chemo treatment #3 on Tuesday. We are very thankful that her second treatment was oh so much better than her first one, and pray that this next one will also go well.

That's all for now... Have a great week!