Simple And Quiet Words

Jamaican Chicken Soup

The Easiest Teriyaki Chicken

3/4 cup low-sodium soy sauce
1/4 cup honey
1 1/4 teaspoons peeled, grated fresh ginger (from about a 1-1/2-inch piece), grated on the small holes of a box grater
1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts or thighs
Freshly ground black pepper
4 teaspoons vegetable oil
2 medium scallions, thinly sliced

1. Bring the soy sauce and honey to a simmer in a small saucepan over medium heat, stirring often until the honey has completely dissolved, about 5 minutes. Add the ginger, stir to combine, remove from the heat, and set aside.
2. If using chicken breasts, place them on a cutting board and cover with a sheet of plastic wrap. Use a meat mallet or a frying pan to gently pound them to a 1/2-inch thickness. Cut each in half so you have 4 pieces roughly the same size. (If using chicken thighs, no need to pound or cut.) Season both sides of the chicken with pepper.
3. Heat the oil in a large frying pan over high heat until shimmering. Add the chicken in a single layer and cook without disturbing until browned, about 3 minutes. Flip and cook the second side until browned, about 3 minutes more.
4. Reduce the heat to medium, slowly pour in the reserved sauce, and cook, flipping the chicken occasionally to coat in the sauce, until cooked through, about 3 minutes.
5. Transfer the chicken from the pan, letting the excess sauce drip off, to a clean cutting board. Reduce the sauce in the pan over medium heat until slightly thickened, about 3 minutes more. Slice the chicken crosswise into 1/2-inch pieces. Place on a serving dish, top with the sauce, and sprinkle with the scallions.

Daily Musings Of My Life - Janiyah's 6th Birthday Party

Janiyah is the daughter of our mutual friend Jerome. Fun fact, Jerome and his now girlfriend Penny (seen in the pics) reconnected at my 25th birthday party after first meeting in kindergarten! They started dating about a month after that.
Janiyah's party was held at the place where "a kid can be a kid", Chukee Cheese! So that meant pizza, soda, cake, candy, games, prizes and of course, pics with Chuckee!

Daily Musings Of My Life - Liam's 1st Birthday Party

Liam is the youngest son of our mutual friends Ann & Dominick!
The party was held at a gorgeous park and was circus monkey theme. Fun right?
The boys had an amazing time of course since they were surrounded by other kids in their age group and could feast on snacks, soda and cupcakes all afternoon.

WE'RE ENGAGED!

If you aren't friends with either Fred nor me then this will be your first time hearing it.

It happened on February 4th. He came home from work and was holding Kyle when he turned to me and said, "Hey, lets get married, right now. Lets just go down to the courthouse and do it". My response, "ok". 

Be An Awesome Party Host

Hey mommies, and single wives a like! With birthday parties, holiday events, and family bar-b-ques coming up I thought it would be great to give you guys a couple ideas to help you out with that.





1.Set up your guest list.
The first thing you need to do is have a head count of the amount of people to expect. This will help you determine the amount of food, drinks, cutlery and tableware you will need.

2.Set A Budget.
The worst thing (ok maybe not) that happens is over spending on things that you didn't need to. Figure out how much you WANT to spend and try to stick within that margin as much as possible. Try to catch sales whenever you can. Look at your guest list, determine the type of crowd you are expecting. Are they drinkers? Are they foodies? Is it a toddlers themed birthday? Is it your niece's sweet 16?

3.Get your guests to RSVP!
This is going to be especially hard. This will determine your final head count. You can set up a Facebook event page and track your RSVP there, you can send out emails or even a text or phone call can work. In most cases you will have to do a follow up on your RSVP to people who have not responded, to the people who say they will come but really won't and only said yes because they want to be nice (I'm guessing) which is really no help at all.

4.Location, Location, Location.
If you can avoid having the party at your house that would be awesome! Less worry about your friend bringing a plus one who you swear you saw on "First 48". But lets say that you can't afford to rent a space, let's say you actually enjoy having people over to your home to celebrate (like I do). You want to make sure you have enough parking space for your guests, nothing bothers a neighbor more than two things, 1. Noise in the middle of the night and 2. Some random car in their parking space. If you know you're going to be hosting guests way into the night, try to be respectful of the noise level. Talk to your neighbors in advance and let them know you're hosting a small get together. And hey, invite them too out of good measure.

5.Mingle!
There is nothing worst (again, maybe not) than going to a party and not knowing who's house or party it is. If your friend brings their new girl/boyfriend with them or maybe their cousin from out of town that you haven't met, be sure to be pleasant, smile, and try your hardest to not look the up and down in front of them. If your friends don't know each other, introduce them, you're all friends for a reason. Don't let anyone feel left out of the party. No one should be thirsty, hungry or bored.

6.Don't forget to say thank you!
After the dancing is done and your guests are ready to go, be sure to thank them for coming. It's really not a requirement but it makes your guests feel like their presence was warranted and will likely come again to your next event. Send a thank you message the day after to let them know how how much fun you had and that you are happy they could make it. Not only is it a nice thing to do its proper manners. The same principles we learnt and are teaching our children should still be instilled in our everyday lives.

And that's it. Have fun at your next event. If you have any additional tips feel free to leave them in the comment section below.

Mommy xo.

Stay Tight - Single Wife Style

Being a SAHM its easy to slip into the habit of eating poorly and your only form of exercise being house work. Now while you can get a good sweat in cleaning up after your family, your poor diet choices can and will catch up to you. And just as easy as it is to make bad choices, its just as easy to make good choices.

Lets start with the diet.
I love snacking on my kids junk food while they're eating so what I've found that works for me is having my lunch or snack ready at the same time they're eating so I won't feel the need to dip into theirs. Another thing, if you're a tea drinker, sipping on unsweetened green tea will help to curb hunger and burn fat at the same time. A grapefruit in the morning with some black coffee and egg whites is a very filling breakfast. Use zero calorie sugar if you're having a hard time dropping sugar cold turkey. Fred and I have been having fish every night for dinner and having a "cheat meal" or two on the weekends. He's been a little bit stricter than I am cutting out carbs for the majority of the week and opting for a side salad instead. As far as snacking goes, whole wheat crackers are actually yummier than they sound and salmon is the easiest and quickest thing to throw on the grill. I'll try to post my salmon & asparagus recipe before the year ends!

Now on to exercise. If you're anything like me, you can find every excuse in the book to not workout. So what I've started doing were some super simple moves, 20 reps each.
1. Squats x 20
2. Standing Leg Lifts x 20 (on each side)
3. Bridge with Leg Raise x 20 (each leg)
4. Walking Lunges all through out the house
5. Tricep Dips x 20
As the days go by, you'll want to add more to your routine and do feel free to do so. Become the hot mom, be the mom who plays with her kids at the park, be the mom who wears a bikini on the beach (stretch marks and all) *raises hand*!

Track what you eat as well as your steps with the apps that I mentioned in the post immediately before this.
Whatever it is that you want to do, you can do, just do it.

Mommy xo.

Organizing Tips From A Single Wife