Tag Archives: strawberries

Life Hacks

Posted on August 11 by Jillian416 • 0 Comments

I believe as moms and busy individuals, we are always looking for a quicker, safer, better way to do things. As I’ve gotten busier over the last year, caring for another human being, I’ve looked for ways to make things easier on myself and I wanted share some of my favorite life hacks here.

My Top Life Hacks

We love berries in my house, every week I buy strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and blackberries. The thing is, we weren’t getting through them all in a week and I was starting to just throw them out, if I purchased them on Sunday by the following Friday there was mold growing in them. We were wasting SO much money in produce, enter the vinegar bath! I found the Food Lush article one day when I was randomly scouring the internet for a way to stop the growth of mold, I tried it after the next shopping trip and I can tell you it really TRULY works! I currently have blueberries and strawberries in the fridge from last Sunday’s shopping trip and they are free from mold and still taste amazing.I know you might be wondering whether you can taste the vinegar after you’ve washed the berries in the vinegar/water solution. Absolutely not! The mixture is so diluted that after a quick rinse, you can’t taste a thing but the delicious berry taste.
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More berry hacks! As mentioned above, we love berries but there is nothing more frustrating than cutting off the stem of a strawberry and losing so much of the fruit or having the hard crunchy part left behind. Try using a straw, you push it through from the bottom and it pops the stem right and any crunchy part right off. Easy peasy!
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I always buy lettuce, I’ll have a salad or two but the lettuce gets gross and slimy in just a few days. I went on a hunt for a way to keep lettuce fresher longer. Try this – wash and thoroughly dry your lettuce, lay a paper towel on the bottom of the container you’re putting the lettuce in, put the lettuce in and then lay another piece on top. This works! My lettuce lasts so much longer, but check out this post on AndreaDekker.com, the lettuce in her pics is 2 weeks old and it looks fresh from the store.
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Tis the season for iced coffee, but stopping to buy it every single day can get pricey. Making it at home is much more affordable, but making it in the morning and pouring hot coffee over ice just makes it watered down and taste lousy. Try making coffee ahead of time, pouring into an ice cube tray and freezing for the next morning. This way, as the “ice” melts, it not watering your cup of Joe down.

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5. And finally, because we all need more brownies in our life… How to make a single serve brownie in a coffee mug. Yum!

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Your turn!

Have you tried any of these, have they worked for you?

What other life hacks have you used to enhance your life?

Filed Under: All About Me, Daily Updates, Food & Recipes

Munchkin Meals #3

Posted on August 8 by Jillian416 • 0 Comments

To see where Munchkin Meals originated, be sure to visit Brittany at A Healthy Slice of Life.

When feeding Emmett on Wednesdays, I look for easy, healthy options. I make an effort to serve him the very freshest of fruits and use only whole ingredients in his food. There are times when that just isn’t possible, but I would say 7 meals out of 10 are made healthfully. We buy him 100% whole grain breads and farm fresh eggs, organic milk and mostly organic fruit and veg. Rarely does Emmett have foods high in fake sugars, or even regular sweets, like cookies or cake. We treat foods like those as foods meant for special occasions. I want him to grow up knowing that foods that taste the best are those that are good for him. I say all this, not to brag, or to say I’m better than any other mom, I say it because I am a full-time working (outside the home) mom, and I work hard to ensure Emmett eats a balanced diet. I’ll admit that I am incredibly lucky to have a husband that is a partner in this endeavor, and is there assisting in any possible way.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, there are two main reasons that I believe Emmett is such a good eater. One is that he is a breastfed baby, so he was (and continues to be – we’re going on 13 months!) used to different flavors. Breast-milk can taste different depending on what I’ve eaten that day, so he was used to a variety of flavors right off the bat. The second, is Baby Led Weaning (BLW). Emmett was introduced to real whole foods from the very first moment he had solids. We never bought one jar of baby food, and he’s pretty much always eaten what we’ve eaten. With BLW, the baby is in charge of what goes into their mouth from the get-go, they have the control which leads to happy confident eaters. After seeing its effects on Emmett, I believe that it works.

For breakfast yesterday, Emmett had one scrambled egg, a piece of whole grain bread with sunflower butter and a mixture of blueberries, blackberries and strawberries. He didn’t eat much at breakfast, but I never worry about whether he’s eating too much or too little because I know if he’s hungry, he’ll eat.

Lunch was some leftover cheese ravioli with tomato sauce, carrots and blueberries.

This kid LOVES blueberries, I don’t think I could get him to stop eating them, even if I tried.

Snack was some water and Wegmans colby jack cheese (no pic).

Dinner consisted of a baby panini! Seamus made it on the smallest slices of the rosemary, olive oil bread with some provolone cheese and some ham, watermelon and broccoli which I did not get a picture of, sorry.