Meal plans and the week ahead

I'm a little late posting this, as we've been in Grand Rapids for the weekend. We went to an absolutely beautiful wedding last night for one of my college friends - it was so much fun! This morning we got up and headed out to my BIL's and SIL's church for my nephew's baptism. What a wonderful thing to witness. After church, we went over to their house to have lunch and visit. It was great!

Tomorrow, I will hopefully be going to the dentist at some point. I've got a bad toothache. I think one of my crowns is loose or something. At least I hope that's all it is and I won't end up needing a root canal or something. I need to get fitted for a bite splint finally, too. I grind my teeth while I'm sleeping something fierce and I think that is what is causing my crown issue right now. Or maybe its the jaw clenching, who knows. Life has been really stressful lately... which makes the grinding and clenching even worse.... between Kevin's hurt back and his not being able to contribute much at home, to work being really crazy. I need to just relax, I guess. Anyway, hopefully my dentist can squeeze me in on Monday, if not then Tuesday. I can't take this pain much longer. As much as I really hate taking any drugs, the only way I can function is to keep ibuprofen in my system constantly. Otherwise, the pain is too bad and I can't concentrate on anything.  Update:  I went to the dentist...  Good news is I don't need a root canal!  It turns out I grind/clench my teeth so badly that I've worn a small hole in my crown so I need a new one... and the severe pain was probably caused by a really bad night or two of grinding/clenching and inflaming my jaw tissue.  Bad news is I have to wait two weeks before I can get a new one.  Looks like I'll be living on ibuprofen for a bit longer.  At least the pain is decreasing a bit each day as the inflammation goes down. 

Anyway, we don't really have any plans till Thursday, when I'll be going to my friend Destiny's baby shower. I need to drop our milk jars off at Dianne's too. Friday is my flex day. I think we might hang out with Kati and Tony again. If our pool is up and running finally, they may come over and swim. We may also go raspberry or blueberry picking. Or we may have a peach canning party.  Scratch that, not sure what I was thinking... the canning peaches aren't ready yet... won't be for another month, probably.  We'll have to talk this week and figure things out. Saturday afternoon/evening, we might be are having our friends Paul, Justine and their kids over. We haven't seen them in about 3 years since they moved out of state. But they recently moved back to Michigan, so we're excited to hang out with them again. Saturday night, we're all planning on going to a wakeboard tournament at a local private lake.

Our blackberries should start ripening this week, so I'm hoping to get a few quarts, at least, in the freezer. We've got tons of them on the bushes, plenty for fresh eating and freezing. I finally was able to freeze a good amount of our raspberries last week.... Carson normally eats them up fresh before I have a chance to freeze any, but I was able to get a few quarts in the freezer finally. I should be able to get about the same this week.

This week, I'll be freezing lots of broccoli. I'm also going to make and freeze some garlic scape pesto. And I'll be freezing more cherries and will start freezing some blueberries. I might pick up a half-bushel of peaches to can, as well. And maybe I'll do a batch of raspberry jam, too. We'll see how the week goes. I'm sure I'll come up with more, but that's all I can think of right now.

So here's what I'm thinking for meals....

Breakfasts:

• Scrambled eggs; sausage links
• Smoothies
• Yogurt with fruit
• Hard boiled eggs
• Omelets with veggies and cheese

Lunches and snacks:

• Leftovers
• Egg salad avocado boats
• Butternut squash soup from the freezer
• Creamy cucumber salad
• Hard boiled eggs
• Crispy nuts
• Kettle corn (from our out-of-town guest bags from the hotel stay this weekend)

Dinners:

• Grilled pork chops; roasted beets; steamed broccoli; grilled peaches
• Paleo tuna cakes; green beans sauteed with butter and garlic scapes; corn on the cob; raspberries, mulberries, and blueberries
• Chicken fajitas on the grill; avocado; sour cream; tomato
• Stuffed tomatoes; steamed broccoli and beans; applesauce
• Leftovers for K&C; S eating at baby shower
• Grilled burgers; grilled zucchini; roasted beets; grilled peaches
• TBD.... possibly Greek food if Kozaks like Greek...  We're going Greek... Chicken souvlaki; grape leaves; tomato avocado cucumber salad; greek salad; fresh fruit salad; and Kozaks are bringing baklava... yum!