5 Things for June 2021

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The state of me, grilling recipes to take you into summer, what’s coming up, my favorite bullet journal items, and an adorable picture of my cat, Apollo.

Hello, all.

The State of Me

I can’t believe it’s already June! My flower gardens are bursting with life, daughter is about done with school for the year, and we’ve already had a heat wave. 😮

Like my surroundings, I’ve been coming back to life as well. I had some serious late pandemic malaise. (How about you? I know I’m not alone.) Executive dysfunction, trouble concentrating, lack of recipe inspiration, and then my camera started giving me trouble. But things are looking up around here!

We are all vaxxed! 💉 (Including daughter who’s 16 and got jabbed the minute our state opened it to her.) This is awesome and reduces my stress levels so much.
We visited my parents for the weekend. And hugged.
All sorts of plans for visits with the in-laws and other family over the summer.
I now have new batteries AND a new charger so I’m back in business taking photos of my food.
Spring! This is my favorite season. Seeing all the green and the flowers has soothed my soul.
I’m back browsing farm stands, farmers’ markets, and grocery stores. I get so much inspiration just looking at food and thinking about how I would want to cook it.

5 Grilling Recipes For Summer

I have a number of delicious recipes in my Grilling and BBQ category and more coming up soon! Here are a few of my favorites, hitting a bunch of different dinner ideas.

Balsamic Marinated Chicken – Juicy and simple!
Zucchini Salad with Lemon Ricotta – Perfect as part of a light summer dinner.
Breaded Pork Chops – If you haven’t grilled breaded meat, now is a good time to start.
Spanish Swordfish Kebabs – I love these with Romesco sauce!
Skirt Steak Gyros – Fast and delicious.

What’s coming up

I’ve been doing piles of recipe testing around here and scribbling all sorts of ideas on my notepads. While of some of these ideas will need more testing, I have several ready to go. Here are five of them:

Rhubarb Cream Scones – I cut rhubarb from mom’s patch for these. Sweet and tart!
Grilled Steak and Broccoli Salad – Add some brown rice and blue cheese dressing for a bowl meal.
Chicken Spiedies – A upstate New York tradition for the grill.
Blueberry Cheesecake Bars – Got these all tested up a while back, now it’s time to take photos!
Mai Tai Cocktail – Two secrets: buy orgeat and make your own sugar syrup.

5 Favorite Bullet Journal Items

For me there is something about putting pen to paper which centers me and lets me think. I write all my recipes in a big, 5-subject notebook and keep my calendar in a journal. While I’ve tried prefab calendars, they don’t have the flexibility of a blank page. Which I can fill with anything. From a recipe inspiration list, to a vacation checkoff, to my weekly to-dos.

Before I get to the list, I have one bit of advice. Don’t spend much time looking at ‘bujo’ inspiration sites. It’s all WAY too complicated to keep up week to week. Keep it simple.

Leuchtturm1917 Dotted Journal – There are other similar ones, but I love this brand. And I go with dotted since it’s easy to set up layouts the way I like them. And you can get them in all the colors!
Pilot G-2 Gel Pens – I got a few multi-color packs (including sparkly ones) since it’s just fun having all sorts of colors to work with.
Uni-Ball Signo Pens – These are fine pointed, smooth, and perfect for jotting down my daily to-dos. Also in LOTS of colors.
Sparkly Stickers – Stickers and washi tape are how I have fun with my journal without spending all sorts of time on fancy layouts. These stickers are especially fun.
ALL the Washi Tape – Yes, I love it. It’s great for adding color to pages, marking out my month layouts, and for tabs on pages I want to refer to later.

Pet Corner

This month’s pet is Apollo. He’s my spicy/shy boy who likes to yell at us and complain while also hiding from everyone else and hovering just out of petting reach. Unless I’m in my chair with my legs up. Then he’s a snuggle boy.

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– Stay Safe, Annemarie