Emeals Review & Paleo Bacon Wrapped Shrimp - sponsored

This post is sponsored by eMeals, read last paragraph for more info.

Save 15% Off Your Order at eMeals.com! Use code Dinner15.

I first heard about eMeals several years ago when going through a Dave Ramsey Financial Peace course. It sounded like an interesting idea but in life's busyness I forgot about it. A while later I was looking for a way to save money on food and streamline menu planning and I found a deal on groupon so I signed up. You can read my review from that time here. I was reintroduced to eMeals when they sponsored a giveaway for me last year for my 1 year blogiversary. I realized a few months ago that it could really help me with something I have been working on. You see my family and I are trying to transition to a paleo style of eating (if you haven't heard of that I will talk more about it in a later post) and I didn't have the slightest clue how to do that. I couldn't even think of one meal that fit into the parameters. I knew that eMeals paleo meal plan and grocery lists would help me transition with ease. I have since found many other resources as well but I wanted to tell you about this one. 

eMeals is a super awesome meal planning site. They provide you with a weekly menu plan and categorized shopping list. The shopping list is set up to be easy to shop aisle by aisle in the store. You can get your menu plan on their website, have it emailed to you, or get it through their ipad or iphone app.

Not interested in paleo? They also have tons of options for the meal plans. They have classic, clean eating, paleo, low carb, slow cooker, low fat, low calorie, portion control, simple gourmet, Mediterranean, natural and organic, gluten free, and vegetarian. Whatever diet or food lifestyle you choose for your family eMeals can help you by providing meal plans to simplify your planning. You can find out more about the meal plan options here.

If you made a New Years resolution to lose weight, eat better, or get more organized eMeals can help you. Also they have a New Years, New You challenge going on right now which offers a 1 week menu either clean eating or paleo for Free!

If you want to save money eMeals can help you because having a plan helps prevent impulse buys at the grocery store, and helps prevent waste because you are using the food you buy.

If you want more time eMeals can help you because you don't have to spend time making a menu, or trying to decide what you can make for supper with what you have (or run to the store for a missing ingredient).

If you have small family eMeals can help you because they offer each meal plan for 2 people as well as for families with 4-6 people.

If you want to spend more time together as a family, eating home cooked meals, eMeals can help.

If you need suggestions for lunch and breakfast, eMeals can help you because you can add a lunch, breakfast, or dessert plan onto your regular meal plan (this is an additional cost).

If you have trouble keeping on task at the grocery store or want to send someone else to the store eMeals can help you because the grocery lists that go with the meal plans are very user friendly and easy to hand to anyone to pick up your groceries.

Basically eMeals can help you!

Oh and you can save money right now -  Save 15% Off Your Order at eMeals.com! Use code Dinner15.


Anyways, on to the recipe. This recipe and picture are provided by eMeals. I haven't tried it because I don't have any bacon (I know I am a paleo failure for not having any bacon :) ) but I want to. It looks sooo yummy!

Bacon Wrapped Shrimp With Garlic Oil

18 slices of bacon, halved
36 large shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 tablespoon honey
1 teaspoon water
½ teaspoon ground black pepper
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons sliced garlic

Cook bacon in a pan until it is cooked but still soft and pliable. 

Combine honey and water in a large bowl. Add shrimp, and toss to coat. Sprinkle with pepper. 

Wrap one piece of bacon around each shrimp. Divide shrimp evenly among 6 skewers. 

Preheat broiler. Place skewers on a baking sheet; broil 3 minutes per side or until done.
Combine oil and garlic in a small saucepan over medium heat. Cook 4 minutes, or until garlic begins to brown. Drizzle over cooked shrimp, and serve additional oil alongside shrimp for dipping.

Doesn't that sound delicious?

This post is a piece of my being a part of the eMeals blogger network. I was provided a free meal plan to facilitate this review. The links are also affiliate links. Buying a meal plan through my affiliate links will not change the price for you, but it will help support my family so I can continue to provide free content on my blog. If you are a blogger and are interested in joining the eMeals blogger network email me or post a comment and I will get you info for how to sign up.

The $1 Date

I am going to tell you about a super fun and affordable date that Mr. Random and I had. Most of the time we have pretty standard dates - dinner and a movie, an arcade, the mall, etc. But every once in a while it is fun to step out of the box and do something a little different. One way to make a date a little different and more fun is to have a theme.

The theme for this date is $1. There are many ways that you could go with this date anything that is $1 fits in the theme. For us the date was broken up in 3 sections.

Section 1 - Dollar Menus
Mr. Random and I decided to become connoisseurs of dollar menu burgers. The plan was to hit every type of fast food restaurant that has a dollar menu and try their basic burger to see which ones were the best. When we got going we realized that we would have to drive all over the city in order to do that so we just picked one area that had several different dollar menus available.

We ended up hitting McDonalds, Wendy's, Rally's, and Taco Bell. Technically Rally's isn't a $1 burger but it is less than $1.50 so we decided it fit in the category. And yes, I know that Taco Bell doesn't have burgers, but we decided to think outside the bun because we thought we needed at least 1 more food to make sure we got enough, plus we really love their empanadas. We also planned to hit Burger King but for some reason they were closed that day so we didn't get to try them :(. Wendy's is not in the picture because after eating there we decided we needed to eat the burgers at the same time so it would be a better comparison.

Our Findings - Rally's was by far the best burger! If you only have a little money and you want a good burger go for Rally's it is worth the little extra that they charge. (This is not in any way sponsored by Rally's, we were just having fun :) McDonald's was by far the worst burger, they really need to step it up they are falling behind the competition. We always like Taco Bell, so it was good, and obviously not a real comparison for burgers :). Wendy's was ok, not horrible, but nothing compared to Rally's.

Section 2 - Dollar Shopping
We picked 3 stores (we would have picked more but we ran out of time before section 3) and our challenge was to find something there that we wanted for $1. We ended up eating in the mall food court so we first looked for a store in the mall that we could buy something for $1 (Do you know how hard that is?). We ended up at Bath and Body Works and got a hand sanitizer for me for $1.50 (a little over $1, but the mall does not have tons for $1). Then we went to Target and browsed their $1 section and we each found something that we wanted. I got a flexible ice cube tray and Mr. Random got a toy to play with Ryan. Last we went to Dollar Tree and our challenge there was to find a snack that we both agreed on to use for section 3.

Section 3 - Dollar Theater
We went to the dollar theater to watch a movie. This was kinda a cheat because it now costs $3 each, but it used to be the dollar theater and we all still call it that so it works :).


So that was our $1 date. We had so much fun, and it was very affordable!


Have you ever done a $1 date? What other activities can you think of for $1?

How I Planted My First Vegetable Garden Sponsored Post #MiracleGroProject

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Miracle-Gro for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.


I am not a gardener, or at least I didn't used to consider myself to be. As a matter of fact as a kid I used to detest gardening in any and all forms (I have never been a huge outdoor person, I don't care for the bugs, and heat, and getting dirty). My mom on the other hand was a huge gardener. She actually enjoys gardening; I think she finds it therapeutic or something (I don't get it). And of course she forced us kids to help her in her gardening endeavors (which we all hated). Which is why I was surprised this summer when I decided that I needed to grow a garden. When we bought our house a couple years ago I planted a few tomato plants (I eat tomatoes like they are candy, so it was a necessity for me, worth the inconvenience and work). Last year I didn't get any tomatoes planted (despite the fact that I had some free plants given to me) because I had a young baby, and I am a procrastinator, and I didn't find the time to get around to it during the tomato planting season. I really missed out, but my mom being the good mom that she is did share some of her bounty with us :). Well this year I have been reading some books on saving money and trying to cut down on our grocery costs and I decided that I need to save some money on produce (without cutting down on our produce consumption, I am not willing to cut out the healthiest category of food). So I decided to try out this gardening thing for myself (I think my mom might have fainted, not really, she's smart, she knew I would come around eventually :)).

This year I have planted squash, zucchini, tomatoes, pumpkins, watermelon, green beans, and peas. I also planted some fruit bushes, but that is a different post. I know super ambitious, possibly too much for getting started, especially since I am pregnant, but oh well. A lot of people recommend starting with herbs, but I really don't use that many herbs and spices, so that would be a waste of money for me, not saving money. The reason that I chose those vegetables to plant is because they are my favorite veggies and I want to be able to eat plenty of them without worrying about the cost. (And with the squash and zucchini, Mr. Random doesn't like them at all and I feel bad about spending our family's precious produce money on veggies that only I eat, but I didn't want to have to live without them). The pumpkins and watermelon I am doing because someone gave me free seeds a couple years ago so I thought I'd give them a try.
Here are the steps that I have gone through in my ambitious project of planting a garden:

1. Pick my seeds. I had some free seeds that I got at church at few years ago, but there were several other plants I wanted to try so I picked up some seeds on one of my Wal-Mart runs. I read the backs of the packages and looked for ones with good descriptions, that didn't require too much work, and didn't cost too much. I don't have time to start plants inside then transplant them outside (also we have almost no sun coming in our windows so it is almost impossible for me to do so, I did try with tomato seeds last year) so I made sure to avoid any seeds that needed that. For the tomatoes we bought plants at a local farmers market. I am not sure why, but my mom always buys tomatoes as plants instead of seeds, so that is what I do too.


2. Prepare your garden area. There was an asparagus patch already here when we moved in so when I planted the tomato plants a couple years ago we expanded that area. This year we expanded that area again. Mr. Random, wonderful man that he is, took on the task of digging out all the grass down past the root. Trust me, trying to do that while 6.5 months pregnant with my back and hips acting up would not have been good, so he was very, very nice and did it for me.

 Yes, the dirt is still piled up beside the garden killing off our grass, did I mention that we are procrastinators? Maybe the dead grass area will join our garden plot next year :)

3. Plan where to plant your plants. We only dug a small garden plot and I didn’t want to use it all up with trellises so I planned a little creatively (I had some help with the creative planning by my mom :)). By the time I got around to planting (procrastinator alert!) it was a little late in the season to be planting peas, because they can’t handle the heat (my mom told me that, I have no idea when things should be planted, other than what the little map on the back of the seed packet says :)). So I started thinking about whether there was anything I could do to still have them grow well. The front of our house is shaded by two huge trees and is always several degrees cooler than the back yard. Unfortunately that means that it is also full shade, but the side of the porch is partial sun and still has the benefit of being cooler (I think) so I decided to plant them there. It also has the benefit of the poles that the peas can climb up (although when taking the pictures I noticed that there is a decent stretch of concrete between the ground and the porch poles, hopefully the poor little plants will be able to find it, I will help them out if I can :)), and will be fun and easy to pick from. The green beans also needed something to climb and can tolerate the heat so I started looking for a good spot for them. As I was looking around the yard I noticed that there was plenty of chain link fence that would be great for plants to climb. So we planted the green beans along one side of the fence. The rest of the seeds we planted in the garden plot in rows or hills or whatever you want to call them.

 The side of the porch where I planted the peas

 The chain link fence where we planted the green beans

 The garden plot - squash and zucchini in the first two rows, tomatoes in the back right corner, pumpkins and watermelon in the back left corner

4. Dig holes and plant seeds. I have to admit that we did not completely follow the directions as to how far apart they were supposed to be planted. Hopefully that won’t cause a problem, if it does, oh well.

5. Water like crazy. There were several days that we had rain, I didn’t worry about watering those days, but if it had been a couple days since it rained or I watered I tried to get out there and water again.

 Little Man likes to help me water, he stole the hose from me :)

6. Watch plants grow. I enjoy going out there and seeing intentional plants coming up out of the soil. At first I wasn’t for sure if the plants I was seeing were intentional but now I am pretty sure (and my mom confirmed it :)).

 Squash and Zucchini plants, I cannot remember which is which, I guess we'll find out when they grow :)

 Tomato plants

 I am pretty sure that the plant in the middle is a green bean plant

 I am pretty sure that these are pea plants

7. Weed. I wasn’t sure which of the plants were my plants and which were weeds. My original plan was to just let everything grow and see which ones produced fruit and vegetables (I think my mom just about fainted when I told her that, I could practically hear her thinking that she taught me better than that, but all she said was something about picking the weeds so they wouldn’t take all the nutrients, oh yeah, that’s why you weed, totally forgot that :)). So since I didn’t know for sure which were which I asked my mother-in-law (who is also an expert gardener) when she was here the other day.

 The bigger intentional looking plants are not weeds, the smaller plants that are mostly in the back left are weeds

8. Fertilize. I don’t remember if my mom fertilized her plants or not. I know she had a compost pile so she probably used that. For me I would normally not worry or even think about fertilizing (I don’t know if I should think of it, but I wouldn’t). However last year we had a pretty bad drought that seemed to leave our soil not very nutritious for our plants (the reason that I think this is because several of our bushes did not do as well this year as in previous years). Also I am worried about this year with the planting is that the plants will wait too long to produce their fruits and vegetables. Since I am expecting Little Man 2 at the end of August I would like for the plants to produce at least some before then, and I will try to keep up with picking them after he comes. Because of those reasons I think I might try using some fertilizer in the garden to kinda help it along (we’ll see if it works :)). I also found out by reading the fertilizer bag, that this step probably should have come after preparing the garden, before planting the plants, but oh well, live and learn, this whole process is a learning process.


This is my gardening project this year, and I am really excited about the possibility to eat produce that I have grown (yes, mom, I did say that, go ahead and say “I told you so” :)). It seems that I am not the only one who is embarking on this growing adventure this year. Miracle-Gro has organized a community of gardeners to share their wisdom and stories and show their green thumbs. They have started The Gro Project to encourage those of us who are beginners to try a gardening project and enjoy the benefits of plants in our lives. If you are stuck for inspiration you can check out all the fun garden projects on Miracle-Gro’s pinterest page. You can follow them to keep up on the new inspiration.  You can also check out other tips, videos, and advice from other gardeners on the Miracle-Gro website. You can see what The Gro Project is about with this video: .

For my project I would need to use a fertilizer formulated for the outdoors like LiquaFeed All Purpose Plant Food Advance Starter Kit, but if you are growing plants in a pot (most of these plants could be grown in a pot if you don’t have garden space) you can use Shake’n Feed All Purpose Plant Food and Moisture Control Potting Mix.


What do you think? Are you going to grow a garden this year? Any plant related projects on your to-do list?

Friday Fascinations 4 and 5 Feature Party!

Ok, as I said in Friday Fascinations 6 - My Week last week was crazy busy. Because of that i didn't get the features up from Friday Fascinations 4 - Pizza Grilled Cheese. Since it is now time to post the Features from Friday Fascinations 5 - Vacation Update and Water Damage I have two choices 1) Write two separate feature posts and post them both the same day or one day apart, or 2) put all the features together and have one big feature post party! The second one sounds more fun to me so that is what I am going to do. Enjoy all of these fantabulous featured posts! Of course there are even more awesome posts linked up in both parties so go over and see them. And don't forget to link up your projects in this weeks party Friday Fascinations 6 - My Week.
Oh and I have to say I selected each of these features separately and based on the post. I didn't realize until I wrote this up that there are some posts from the same blog. I guess I found some new blogs to follow :)

For those who are featured get yourself a button!

<a href="http://domesticrandomness.blogspot.com/"><img src="http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/ii521/RandomlyFascinated/Buttons/FeaturedFFbutton.jpg" width="175 height="175/" /></a>

Friday Fascinations 4 Features

Favorite Building Projects

Call Me PMc linked up a DIY Shoe Rack that her husband made. It looks great and pretty easy!

 

With a Blast linked up a DIY Kitchen Storage that is completely awesome! This would be great for small kitchen with no pantry. We have a decent size pantry and I am still wishing I had this just because it looks so easy and convenient!

Favorite Sewing Project

And Who Says You Can't linked up a Scarflette that she made from a poncho. It is so cute!

 

Favorite Cooking Projects

Mommy's Sweet Confessions linked up some Homemade Caramel Apples that look absolutely scrumptious! She also shares how she learned that sugar and water can not necessarily substitute for corn syrup :)

Growing Up Gabel linked up some Homemade Blueberry Doughnuts that are absolutely adorable and also sound very yummy. I love how she uses the heart shaped pan. So cute!

Favorite Random/Other Post

One Creative Mommy linked up a DIY Watering Can made from a Milk Jug. What an awesome use for a milk jug!

Friday Fascinations 5 Features

Favorite Food/Recipe Posts

Mommy's Sweet Confessions linked up some Microwave Sweet Potato Chips that look yummy! I love sweet potato chips but I don't like how greasy homemade pan fried sweet potato chips are. This looks like it could be a good substitution.

Healthy Branscoms linked up Healthy Meals on a Budget. They have some great ideas to make healthier meals and still stay within a budget!

Favorite DIY Fix

One Creative Mommy linked up a great way to Repair Scuffed Shoes. This is a great idea to extend he life of a favorite pair of shoes!

Favorite Kid Posts

The Domesticated Princess linked up some Sidewalk Chalk Paint that looks like a lot of fun! Flinging sidewalk chalk paint would be a great way to spend an afternoon.

One Creative Mommy linked up some Splash Art inspired by Jackson Pollock. This looks like so much fun that I want to do it for me :)

Thanks for coming to the features party! Go on over and check out these great posts!

Bridal Shower Games (& free printables)

I love showers. I love the games and the food and the celebrating of a marriage or new baby or whatever. I know that there are many women who don't care for showers or games, but I do enjoy them so I was thrilled when I got the chance to throw a shower for my sister. I took my time looking up ideas for all aspects of the shower, pinning my favorite ideas, pulling everything together and putting it into one cohesive party. One of the major parts of a shower is the games. I found several ideas that I liked. I used ideas from Wedding Bee and Elegant Labels and I changed them to fit my ideas for the shower. I planned 4 games for the shower. We only had time to do 2  of the games because my sister's mother-in-law to be had plans for after the shower and asked me to cut it short. But I thought that I would go ahead and share all 4 with you so you can use them if you want.

The files are word documents so you should be able to change them to fit your needs. I edited the documents to take out the names. You can put in names for bride and groom. These are for personal use only. Please keep my web address on them when you print them so I get my credit and other people can find these printables if they want them.


Purse Game

There are many versions of purse games out there. I got the idea for this one by combining an idea from one of the sites above and a game that was used during a jewelry party that I hosted.  I used this as kinda an introductory game at the beginning of the shower to draw everyone together. In this game you give everyone a sheet of paper. You can use this printable or just give them a blank paper and have them write out the letters (I did that because my printer was low on ink). I used my sister's and her fiance's names and his last name, but I changed it for the printable, you can use any words that you want. Anyways everyone then starts going through their purse looking for things that start with each of the letters. You will want to put some sort of time limit on it (I think we did 10-15 minutes). Then whoever has the most items wins. You can have a few small prizes (I got mine at dollar tree) to hand out to winners. Print the Purse Game




Bridal Shower Bingo

This is a really simple game and does not take very much more time than you are already taking when opening presents. The only reason that I didn't go ahead and so this one is because I couldn't get it printed off. In case you haven't seen this before the way it works is that each person gets a bingo sheet. They fill in each square with things they think might be in the presents that will be opened (blender, tongs, wisk, towel, wash cloth, etc). The center spot is a free spot, you can put in the couple's names or just leave it Bride and Groom. The people will have a couple squares that they know for sure because they can put down their present. This game takes down some of the awkwardness for the bride of opening presents, when she opens a present she can say who has ____ on their card and then everyone is busy looking at their cards (Yes I know this from experience :). This is also great for baby showers. It is absolutely wonderful for parties that people don't know each other well, because like I said it takes away the awkwardness. You can give a prize for the first bingo, or the first several or whatever you want. Print Bridal Shower Bingo


The Story of the Bride and Groom

This is the game that we ended up not having time to play. I got the idea from my mother-in-law. For my bridal shower she did a really fun game where people were in groups and they wrote a story about how Mr. Random and I met and how our lives would go. The game was played like wasted paper with one person writing part and then passing it on to the next person who writes another part and so on until everyone has written. That game was super fun, and this printable can easily be used for that. But I wasn't sure that that game would work well for the group of people I was expecting, so I adjusted it a little. I made up this sheet and I was planning to give each person a sheet (or if you don't want to print it off you can just have each person divide the paper in 4ths and title each section as above). Then each person is to write out a story for each section. They can write the actual story of what happened or they can make up a wild and crazy story. I was planning to give prizes for the most accurate, the brides favorite, and the most funny. Print the Story Game


Know the Couple Game

This is a pretty basic game. I got the idea from the Wedding Bee link above. I made this game to include both the bride and groom because the shower included people that knew just my sister or her fiancee. I figured everyone would have a chance of getting 1/2 of the questions right and they could have fun guessing on the other half and getting to know the bride and groom better. Basically to play you give each person a paper (either this print out or a plain paper that they number 1-22) and have them fill it out or read the questions to them. When everyone is done give the correct questions (the bride and groom were both there for the shower so I had them sit at the front of the room and answer the questions interview style, it worked out really well). The person who got the most right gets a prize. You can adjust the questions to fit the couple better if these ones do not apply. Print the Know the Couple Game


Bridal Shower Things
This game was kinda an extra game that I planned if we had extra time. It would have been more of a game for people who wanted to hang out after the present opening when the people who have plans left, but it just didn't work. The way I planned this game was to make a cross between The Game of Things and Apples to Apples (Two extrememly fun games). The materials needed for this are small strips of papers for people to write on and pens or pencils. Everyone gets several strips of paper. You announce a category such as things you don't do at a wedding, things you say at the altar, things you see when walking up the aisle, things you don't say to your mother in law, things you don't do on your honeymoon, etc. I had planned to write up a list of categories but hadn't gotten around to it so I was going to wing it. Everyone writes up a response to the category and passes them to the bride. If you have a small group you can play like things and go around the circle guessing who wrote which response (let me know if you are interested in more info on that way of playing). If you have a larger group play like apples to apples and the bride picks her favorite response. I wasn't planning to do any prizes for this game, but you could award points and whoever has the most points gets the prize.



What about you? Do you like bridal shower games? What is your favorite or least favorite bridal shower game?


I am thinking about making up a simple bridal game kit to sell on Etsy. Leave me a comment if you would be interested in this so I can get an idea of the possible interest.


Linked Up To:
A Pinch of Joy, While He Was Napping, Claiming our Space, Cornerstone Confessions, Frugal Girls, Blissful and Domestic,