Here are my Project Life pages for May 2022
I noticed I used very similar pictures in weeks 20, 21 & 22. They were all taken different days, guess it shows that my kitty cats are creatures of habit and apparently I am too, since I keep taking pictures of them - ha ha!
Click on the photos to enlarge
Monthly check in time!
How are the 2022 goals coming along? Let's see....
1)
Daily Bible Reading/Prayer - Fantastic....I have read the Bible for 158 days!! God is so good!!
2) Weight Loss/Eat Healthier/Exercise - Pretty good, but could be better. I lost 3 more pounds last month..I know, not a lot, but hey, the scale is down and not up so even a one pound lose is better than a one pound gain. I'm happy with a loss. (Darn those Trader Joe's Peanut Butter Cups - could have lost more). Exercise...I've been so, so, so, so busy with work, but that isn't an excuse (well, maybe a little). I had planned to start getting up early and going back to the gym this week but my boss is on vacation and therefore I do get up early but have a lot of work that has to be completed by 7 am - current plan is to start back this Saturday.
3) Watercolor - no painting so far this year...that is okay though.
4)
Crochet/Knit - Almost finished with a prayer shawl for church...started a new afghan and loving the pattern for that - easy pattern but not boring - stay tuned.
5)
Personal Journaling - Hmm...not too good there. I "think" about journaling..I "think" about what I am going to write and want to write about but I haven't been putting pen to paper lately.
6) House Projects - I got a couple of things done and managed to maintain other things...going good so far.
7)
Scrapbooking/Project Life - A+ - I am still current with my Project Life pages (will post the May pages - possibly tomorrow) but I have completed LOTS of recipe pages. I'm excited to finally be getting all of my "tried and true" recipes together and to have one book. I have a few more to document before I print them out.
8) Genealogy - Good! I updated a lot of people on my family tree last month and I even located an old photo of my uncle and his family when he was about 4 years old. He is no longer with us, but I sent the photo to my aunt and cousins and they were blown away. My aunt immediately recognized everyone of the siblings. He had 15 siblings!! They were not all in the photo because by then some were married and some hadn't been born yet, but can you imagine having 16 kids !! Yikes!
So how do I feel? Pretty good. I do wish I had done a little painting and I do wish I had exercised a bit more in May but I'm really chuffed that I am current with my Bible Reading and Project Life pages.
How was your May ?
I love soup dumplings...but let's admit it, they are time consuming to make. Also, you typically need a bamboo steamer to steam them. While I have a bamboo steamer, for exactly that reason, I would love an easier and faster way to make soup dumplings....enter Trader Joe's
I found these Chicken Soup Dumplings in their freezer section. There are 6 in a box for $3.29 and there is one serving in a box - which is plenty. It has 250 calories and 7 grams of fat...so for a whole serving, that is not bad diet wise or price wise.
They are called Chicken "Soup Dumplings" not "Chicken Soup" Dumplings - does that make sense? In other words...they are Soup Dumplings (also known as Xiao Long Bao) filled with chicken...not chicken soup inside a dumpling.
You have to be careful eating a soup dumpling. You put it on the spoon, take a bite and drink out the soup and then eat the dumpling. That is challenging for me. What I typically do, is put them in a bowl, cut them in half and eat the soup and dumplings together.
So...here is how they are packaged
And here is what they look like when you open the box
6 cute and perfectly sized frozen dumplings. The best part...they come in a steamer package. So all you do is cut off one corner and pop it in them microwave for 2 minutes.
Then they come out...looking almost like they looked when they went in...but just not frozen
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Verdict: Delicious and filling. They are a great light supper, especially after a long day when you don't feel like cooking, but you want some good comfort food.
Danger...Danger...Will Robinson!!! These Trader Joe's mini Peanut Butter Cups are SO GOOD!
They come in Dark Chocolate and Milk Chocolate. I'm more of a Milk Chocolate kind of girl so got a container to give them a try...I won't be buying these again. Not because they are bad, but because they are AMAZING and I could eat them all day long.
If you have good self-control, help yourself to these next time you go to Trader Joe's. If you find peanut butter cups challenging to resist - don't buy these...you will become addicted to them. Seriously!
Note: Container says the serving size is 3 pieces and there are 13 servings - so roughly 40 in a container.
I made a recent trip to Trader Joe's for a particular product and ended up picking up a few things. The employee at the check out commented on every purchase I had made (except for one) and said "Oh, you picked all my favorites" and proceeded to tell me why she liked each item and even how to prepare some of them. She was super friendly!!
So...I decided to do a product review on some of them.
First up...Almond Croissants.
Now...I have had the Chocolate Croissants before and they taste so similar to the ones I have had at the French Bake Shop in Las Vegas. I had never seen the Almond version before so decided to give them a try.
It is really cool how these bake up. You lay them out the night before (or at least 9 hours before you plan on eating them) and you let them rise overnight. Here they are from the frozen state. They look puny and flat and you you might be thinking - "uh...I'm not to sure about this"
It is impressive to see how much they rise.
The packages says to bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes. My experience with the chocolate ones told me to go with 20 minutes and I am glad I knew that. They were just the right amount of brown.
They have sliced almonds on top and some kind of almond (maybe marzipan) filling (which seeped out a little bit while baking).
Verdict! Very easy to bake, impressive looking, but a just a little bit on the sweet side for me. I would get them again, especially if I were to have overnight guests.
I was researching a marriage announcement articles in July 20, 1935 edition of the The Palm Beach Post for some Geneaology research and I love browsing old newspapers. It is interest to see ads and how much things cost and the front page headlines.
Sometimes I come across some old recipes, which are pretty interesting too.
Well...I came across this one. Back in 1935, married women were generally referred by their husband's name instead of their first and last name so the article references Mrs. R.H. Dicken.
Apparently, Mrs. Dicken's recipe was so good in 1935 that Better Homes & Gardens magazine awarded her a certificate of endorsement.
Now I like eggplant so thought..I might try this until I saw two words...POTTED MEAT
Eggplant with Potted Meat??? Sorry but that does not sound appealing. I wonder if anyone besides Mrs. Dicken every tried it?
As promised...here are my Project Life Pages for April.
A nice person in a Project Life Facebook Group - showed me how to display my layouts as they are meant to be shown (as a 2 page spread). You can click on the photos to enlarge.
This doesn't include special pages I did for my family's visit. Perhaps I will post those another time..we shall see.
I did find a typo on one of these pages (and have fixed it in the app so the final printed page will be correct). I also realized that I posted a picture of my flower card twice (different pictures) - the card brought me some comfort so I felt it was ok to include it twice.
