Guest Post - Jenny from The NY Melrose Family - Lucky Charms Snack

I am so excited to guest post here at Claiming Our Space.  My name is Jenny and I'm from The NY Melrose Family.  I'm a teacher mommy that loves crafts, diy decorating and organization.  I usually have an assistant working with me, who often distracts me from what I'm trying to get done.  Luckily, she's cute and quite a character.  I'm talking about my two year old daughter, Riley.  The snack I'm here to share is for her friends at daycare.  So, here we go!

For Valentine's Day I was inspired by pinterest for Riley's Goldfish Valentine and once again I've been pricked by the pinterest pin.  I want to share Riley's St. Patrick's Day Snack for her daycare friends.  Here's the labels that I made using Microsoft PowerPoint.  It took me a couple of tries because I needed the writing to be upside down so that once they were folded they could be easily stapled.

To Do This Weekend: 3/10-11

First off, don't forget that tonight we

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I have to share that I am torn on this whole Spring Forward business.  I get that it means that Spring is coming, the weather is getting warmer, I get to spend time in the outside/in the garden and all the good stuff that comes with Spring, but on Sunday it means I get one less hour of sleep!  (Don't worry, I am sure I will survive.)

OK, now that I got my dirt kicking out of the way, onto our To Do list.

We did pretty darn good last week. Only two things we didn't get to at all and one thing did partially finished.  I just love crossing stuff off a list. (It really is a sickness...)

This weekend, one hour less and all, is another busy one.

1. Continue working on living room bookshelf (paint second coat on cabinet and trim, get shelves up)
2. Continue work on stripping paint off fireplace mantle
3. Finish organizing crafty corner
4. Take photos for blog posts - crafty corner and sewing machine cover
5. Write up blog post - crafty corner and sewing machine cover
6. Grocery
7. Laundry
8. Cleaning
9. Willow to dog park
10. Lowe's to check on tile, buy brackets for shelves in item 1 and storage tubs for item 3)
11. Finish painting trim in powder room
12. Work on project for D
13. Go to local garden store to get stuff for starting seeds
14. Plant seeds

What interesting stuff do you have going on this weekend?

UPDATE:  Yeah, this was a bad weekend.  I was laid low by a nasty cold and so not much happened.  Here's hoping this coming weekend is better.

Menu Plan: 3/8-14

Wow! We actually followed the menu plan for last week.  Yes, I get the irony of saying we followed the plan we had set out but after the prior week's "forgetting to take main part of our dinner out of the freezer" fiasco, I have learned having a plan doesn't mean things can't still take a 90 degree turn putting you in the ditch.

Now that we are on a roll, here is the menu plan for the next 7 days.

• Thursday:  Cheesy ham & potato casserole with Caesar salad
• Friday:   Crockpot Pot Roast  with potatoes and carrots
• Saturday:  Soup Day!
• Crockpot Baked Potato Soup
• Beef, Barley & Veggie Soup using the Pot Roast leftovers
• Sunday:  FITF
• Monday:  Wasabi crusted Salmon with brown rice and steamed veggies
• Tuesday:  FITF
• Wednesday:  FITF

What's on your dinner menu this weekend?  Anything tasty?

Willow Wednesday

Nothing is better than a sunny day nap.

Lucky Shamrock Pillow - Just in Time for St. Patrick's Day

This project was featured on Skip To My Lou

St. Patrick's Day is right around the corner!  The day when everyone is lucky, and a little bit Irish.  Bring on the Bulmers, the Baileys and coffee, the corned beef, pub songs and the craic!  Can you tell I like St. Patrick's Day?

Now, even though I'm a wee bit Irish, I still thought I needed to bring a little bit of extra luck into my home with a lucky shamrock pillow.  The fact that I got to use some felt was an added bonus.

One thing I liked about this pillow is that I didn't need to do much sewing, just the pillow cover.  The shamrock leaves are glued on.  So this makes the project an easy, and quick, one.  The only sewing I needed to do was the pillow cover.  If you used fusible tape, you wouldn't need to sew a thing.

To Dos This Weekend: 3/3-4

Another aggressive To Do list but one has to have hope that one day everything will get crossed off the list, right?  At this point, if I get half done, I will be jumping for joy.

1. Grocery 
2. Take Willow to the dog park (She is parasite-free and can go back and play with her friends! We are so excited!)
3. Home and Garden Show (Saturday morning)
4. Cleaning
5. Finish working on cabinet in living room (finish filling holes, sand, paint, mount lights and put shelves back up)
6. Write up tutorial post - pillow
7. Take photos for Tutorial post - pillow
8. Put together shelf for basement
9. Finish getting craft corner organized
10. Family Dinner (Sunday afternoon)
11. Laundry
12. Work on project for guest post
13. Put together tutorial for guest post project

What things are on your To Do list this weekend?  Anything exciting?

Menu Plan: 3/1-7

This post should be called Whoops and Yay!

First the whoops!  "The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry," is a perfect quote for last week. I had a menu plan and I had recipes, printed out and ready to go.  What I didn't have was a reminder in my calendar to take important ingredients like the chicken and the pork roast out of the freezer. Whoops! So we swapped out the planned dinners of last week for whatever we could throw together. Yeah, that defeats the purpose of the menu plan so we are going to try to do better about the actual implementation of the meals, like taking big frozen stuff out a couple of days in advance.

Now for the Yay!  This weekend is the first of our "Monthly Family Dinners." After the success of the birthday dinner last month, D and I decided that we would host a family dinner on the first Sunday of the month at 1:30 pm. The invite list is the same every month - my parents, my brother, my great-aunt, D's mom and a close family friend who is like family - and whoever can make it can make it. Meals will be family style so we don't need to have an exact number.

Thursday: Crockpot Rotisserie-Style Chicken

Friday: FITF*

Saturday: Out to dinner

Sunday: Family Dinner Day! Costco Lasagna, home baked Italian bread, Caesar salad, blueberry crumble

Monday: D's fabulous marinated steak

Tuesday: FITF

Wednesday: FITF

The only thing I need to remember to take out of the freezer is the steaks. Hopefully I won't muck that up. :-)

*Forage in the Fridge