Welcome to the Friday 5!
Every Friday I will highlight 5 things I am currently loving. This can be anything from habits that are currently serving me, clothes, apps, people I am currently loving, podcasts, food, mom hacks and everything in between!
What I am currently loving:
Williams Sonoma Spatulas
After having one red spatula from the dollar tree for most of my adult life, I asked for a set of good spatulas for Christmas a few years ago. Honestly, I just wanted a matching grey set to put in a container on the counter for show. I thought it would look really pretty. So my mother-in-law got me this set from Williams Sonoma. And not only do they look amazing on the counter, I absolutely love them. I use them way more than I thought I would, and the quality is amazing. I’ve had them for almost 5 years and they still look brand new. I didn’t realize there would be such a huge difference in quality, I thought a spatula was just a spatula, but these really are great. The variety of shapes and sizes come in handy, I have used every single one of them a ton.
Camp Chair
This is another great Christmas gift from my mother-in-law. Matt is notoriously one of the hardest people to buy for. We have stopped exchanging gifts all together because he is impossible to buy for. Especially after I try to give our families ideas for him. Matt had been in the market for some good camp chairs for years after our cheap ones from Academy didn’t survive a camping trip with my friends a few years ago. Yes, I went camping, but that’s a story for a different day. He’d been reading reviews on amazon and really overthinking the purchase but hadn’t pulled the trigger. I knew his mom would research it just as much and find us a great set. And man did she deliver. I would not have survived quarantine last year if not for these chairs. They stay in the garage ready to go and I drag one into the driveway anytime the girls are wanting to play outside. I keep the pockets stocked with extra sunglasses, sunscreen, bug spray and baby wipes. They are amazing and extremely comfortable.
Cooking Two Meals at Once
What does meal prep mean to you? Well, until recently, when I thought of meal prep, I thought of cooking enough chicken and veggies for the week ahead. To make multiple meals with precooked protein, precooked roasted veggies and maybe some sweet potatoes or a batch of quinoa. All cooked, packed and ready to go. And then a few weeks it dawned on me, I can make an entire meal ahead of time, it doesn’t have to be just these 3 things precooked. So that’s what I’ve started doing. If I have the time to cook dinner, I have the time to cook 2 dinners. It’s blown my mind how easy this can be, at least one night a week I will cook two meals. Or at least cook all the parts of a meal, so they can be thrown together the next day. Like tacos or spaghetti is always good in a pinch. I will cook the meat, boil the noodles, prep all the extra stuff while tonight’s dinner is cooking, then tomorrow night I just have to set everything out to make tacos or spaghetti. Pizza is another great one for this too.
Simple Mills Pizza Crust
Speaking of pizza, homemade pizza is one of our favorite things to make with leftovers or just on a random weeknight when I don’t have the brain power to come up with another meal. This Simple Mills pizza crust is my FAVORITE to use when making pizza. It’s made with clean, whole ingredients, not full of preservatives or cheese to hold it together and it is so easy to make. It has such a good flavor, even Matt and the girls love it. Recently, I made this pizza and just subbed the regular crust for the Simple Mills crust and it might be one of my favorite meals recently. If you are looking for a healthy pizza crust, this is it. I stock up on all the Simple Mills products when they go on sale at Whole Foods, so I am almost always ready for a weeknight pizza!
Armchair Expert
It’s been a while since I recommended a Podcast and I have found myself listening to episodes from this one over and over again. I almost never play the radio anymore. Armchair Expert is hosted by Dax Shepard with Monica Padman. Shepard was one of the first celebrities to go into podcasting and I think it might really be the best thing he does. He is so good at interviewing the guests on his show, he comes prepared and is sincerely inquisitive into their lives. I find the conversations fascinating, he is able to interview them with it feeling like more of a conversation than an interview and it almost always becomes a therapy session for them both. They have all kinds of guests from actors, authors, athletes (I just listened to the one with Chris Bosh), politicians and experts in random fields. One of my favorite episodes is one with Monica Lewinsky. I don’t know why, but I thoroughly enjoy just listening to these conversations. Dax is funny, witty and brutally honest which always makes for a good show. There is almost always some bad language and usually some heavy topics, so it wouldn’t be appropriate with kids in the car. But it’s one of my favorites when I am alone.
I hope you found something helpful or inspiring in this week’s Friday Five! I’ll have 5 new favorites to share with you next week, have an awesome weekend!
