A Week Without Clutter

I’m in the middle of a Week Without…Clutter. Sort of. My fiancé came up with this one, and it’s more like a Week WITH than a Week WITHOUT. Whatever. The important thing is that my fiancé suggested we do something that I’m always nagging him about.

Fiancé: “Hey, I have an idea for your next Week Without…”

Me: “What?”

Fiancé: “Every time we leave a room, we have to pick up one thing.”

My head: (insert hallelujah chorus here)

Me: Ok! And if either one of us gets caught not doing it, we have to pick up TWO things.

Fiancé: Ok. Or turn off the light.

Me: What?? You should do that normally!

Fiancé: Oh. Ok.

So this week is going very well! I think I do a decent job of cleaning up after myself, but this is a good reminder. And getting to tell my fiancé to clean up is the icing on the cake.

Here’s a little peek into how crazy (or typical??) I am: My mood changes drastically based on three factors: The weather, exercise, and how clean the house is. Not mopped-and-scrubbed-and-sanitized-clean – My standards aren’t that high. I just need the clutter contained. If the flat surfaces in my house (counters, kitchen table, beds, pool table) aren’t covered in mail, clothing, or dishes, I’m pretty happy. The temperatures have been in the 70s this week, and my kitchen has been clear of clutter. If I get myself on the bike, I may reach nirvana.

A Few Recipes & a LOT of Garlic

We’re mid-Lent, which means it’s the time of year when Christians are doing a few “weeks without”. I’ve finished my “Week Without Aisle 11” (paper towels, Kleenex, Ziplock bags, etc.) and I’m currently between challenges.

Although I’m not giving up meat for Lent, I HAVE been getting a little more adventurous in the kitchen, including quite a few meatless meals. My new strategy at the grocery store: Tell my fiancé to “go pick out a couple of weird vegetables”. If you’re curious, here are some of the recent recipes I’ve tried:

Whole Wheat Healthy Pancakes (Momma Hen’s Kitchen)

I topped these with pumpkin butter and walnuts. Yum! Thought this would be an easy recipe, but I had to make a lot of substitutions (skim milk + lemon juice = buttermilk; ground flax seed + water = the little bit of egg that I was short of). Nikki, check the fridge before you start a recipe. Duh.

Quinoa Egg Bake (Whole Foods)

This has become my fiance’s favorite breakfast, so I make it often. Morning is when he struggles most with blood sugar issues, and this recipe seems to help. Plus, I can throw in whatever veggies I have on hand, like a yucca root (see weird veggie explanation above). I also added Caribbean jerk seasoning, which sounds odd, but tastes great in this!

Crockpot Vietnamese Roasted Chicken (Crockpot365) *Meaty, non-Lent recipe*

My first experiment with Fish Sauce! I cooked a single serving of rice in a coffee mug and served the chicken on top of it for dinner. Pretty good.

Hummus (Simply Recipes)

It had been awhile since I’d made a batch of homemade hummus. This recipe is a good basic one. I looove tahini!

Hearty One-Pot Meal Miso Soup (Fat Free Vegan)

This recipe was my destiny. It perfectly used up all of the unusual ingredients I had on hand, including bok choy, edamame, and miso powder. I hope it tastes as good as my kitchen smells right now.

…This list makes me sound awfully healthy, but remember that I’m the same girl who hasn’t made it to the gym in over a month. Also, I may or may not have eaten a spoonful of peanut butter and chocolate chips tonight. Worth it! Plus, since I can’t think of a good segue, here’s the story of my cauliflower incident:

For years, I’ve been meaning to try mashed cauliflower in place of potatoes. People on Pinterest say to try it. My friend April recommends it. Jillian Michaels recommends it! So, after roasting some cauliflower the other night, I thought “What a perfect excuse to use my immersion blender!”. It worked beautifully. Then, I thought “These would be great with some garlic!” …followed by an accident with the garlic powder that rivaled the BP gulf spill. But by then, I’d already spent a good half hour baking and blending. I was eating that cauliflower.

Garlic is not spicy in the same way that peppers are spicy. Garlic is flavorful, but not hot. This was so much garlic, my mouth burned. And I still stubbornly ate a good half cup of it.

Fiance walks in the door: “What’s that smell?”

Me: I can explain!!

I thoroughly brushed my teeth and mouthwashed (is that a verb?...it is now.) THREE times before bed and I still had garlic breath until the next afternoon.

So, aside from lethal doses of garlic breath, who's got an idea for what to give up next??

Wiping the Slate Clean

I’ve had a few slip-ups this week, but I feel like this “week without” has kept a lot of waste out of the trash!

I’m a creature of habit, so I had to hide my Kleenex box from my desk. I stowed the napkins and paper towels away in the kitchen cupboards. I brought a hankie and a towel to work, and those have worked…except for a couple times when I habitually grabbed a paper towel after washing my hands. When I ate fast food this week, I (mostly) remembered to save the napkins and not use them. To be honest, I’m still a little grossed out by re-using the same cloth over & over to blow my nose. I’ve only used it a couple times, and it’s still very clean. But still….it gives me the heebie jeebies, and that’s probably something Kimberly-Clark has worked hard at instilling in me.

On that note, here are new wasteful products that even *I*, a paper/plastic junkie, am appalled by:

At-home disposable paper towel dispenser

…because your bathroom towels aren’t sanitary enough. What?! No. We already use paper napkins, paper tissues, and toilet paper. Paper towels are already in the kitchen. You’ve got feminine hygiene products, Q-tips, cotton balls, and disposable makeup wipes. You’ve even started making automatic shower cleaner-sprayers and soap dispensers. Let me have the towel rack. This commercial makes me angry every time I see it.

Pan-lining paper

It’s not parchment; it’s not foil; It’s parchment AND foil! …Because heaven forbid you have to hand wash a dish. That goes for you, too, crock pot liners! Grease your bakeware & use elbow grease for anything that sticks. (Confession: There’s a soft spot in my heart for Press-n-Seal when my mismatched container lids don’t fit)

Wipes

For every cleanser invented, there’s a matching tub of pre-soaked towelettes. Are we THAT lazy?? I use one tub of Clorox wipes at my desk, and I think we might have some old dried-out car care wipes in the garage. And now I’m feeling guilty about those. Buy some cleanser (or make your own!) and use a dang rag!

Disposable tools

People don’t even mop anymore – they “wipe” their floors with disposable mops, scrub their toilets with disposable brushes, and dust the furniture with disposable…fluffy things.

Convenience is flippin’ WASTEFUL so I’m changing my ways. My "recycle" is pretty healthy, but my "reduce" and "reuse" could use a major tune-up. Use a towel more than once and wash it every so often. Wash a dang dish without a machine’s help. And unless it’s for a baby’s butt, forget the wipes.

*sigh* Apologies. Annoyed rant over.