WIS, WWA | one more week of phoning it in

Pork was $1.79 per lb so sliced chops for under the broiler. Made a beef barley soup. Eggs, bacon, and free biscuits.

Got lots of free bananas, desserts, and biscuits in free bread we get for cows. Cows do a run and dance for squash from the garden. Former cows ran for watermelon or bananas.

Made a free craft at library, a huge snowflake with 16 plastic hangers and zip ties. Fun to make and decorate it.

We've been doing planned give-up meals since I had my total knee replacement 4 weeks ago. Hubby has been working long, stressful work hours since my surgery (unfortunate coincidence), and neither of us had time to pre-make and freeze meals in advance. Fortunately, we've been blessed with lovely friends who have brought us meals....so, this week was friend-made chicken shawarma with homemade tsatsiki sauce/pitas/hummus and cucumber/onion/tomato salad, refried bean burritos (hubby made), Wendy's chili + baked potato, taco/rice/black bean burritos from Hot Head Burritos, and friend-made chili tonight. I cannot stress enough how much we have appreciated these meals, and I plan to pay it forward when I'm able.

I am enlisting my daughter to help me remember: Friday: fried deer loin, roasted turnips and beets, and I think something else, but daughter disagrees. Saturday: Chicken breasts, salad, applesauce, breadsticks, cake (a family birthday) Sunday: Bits and Bobs, root beer floats (courtesy of my kids' aunt who likes to spoil them) Monday: Half of us had frozen pizzas, half of us went to a Bible study and had spaghetti and meatballs Tuesday: Deer heart chili Wednesday: Leftover spiral ham (from potluck), cast iron baked potato things (I tried to make one of those pretty potato dishes in the cast iron magazine pictures), and broccoli Thursday: roasted chicken, rice, green beans, and oatmeal raisin cookies (which my girls made while we were gone Christmas shopping). And tonight: various soups we have in cans/leftover and freshly baked sourdough bread

WIS: $9.32 @ scratch and dent, $94 @ Costco, $39 @ Grocery Outlet We shop every 3 weeks or so. The scratch and dent store was mostly purchasing fresh mozzarella @ .49/container, triple threat hornet/wasp/yellow jacket trap pheromone for next year .99/ea. and gourmet starbucks coffee @ 2.50 ea K cups for christmas baskets. Sunday: Chicken Kiev, green beans, butternut squash & green salad M: Instapot Marinara using up homemade V-8, green salad & GF artisan bread T: Elk steak on the bbq, green salad, baked potato W: Breakfast for dinner Th: Shopping day - Clean out fridge chicken stir fry over rice F: Big work outside day - Chuck roast in slow cooker, oven roasted root veggies, cookies from the freezer S: Leftovers ReDeux made into french dip sammies, oven fries and veggies with dip

I was visiting with former co-workers at a local hospital and they asked me to put on a self help de-stress clinic for their teams. A few years ago when the virus first arrived in the hospital and we were woefully prepared for the stress levels and substantial fatigue. I started looking into naturopathic and homeopathic relievers. One very positive method was EFT tapping. Here is a great article and there are many youtubes on the subject. My favorite technique is dry brushing, self tapping and then a detox bath. When I worked at the VA - I was an acute care ICU nurse who specialized in GSW and burns. When we could not regulate the patient's autonomic response, we would utilize dry brushing and tapping. It had amazing results.

Kristen, you took the time to actually make soup and to prepare a Dinnerly meal?? Remarkably disciplined! I would have been eating string cheese and sliced apples, perhaps rounded out by crackers (probably stale), and then topped off by a robust handful of chocolate chips.