Home for the BBQ Necessities

Summer time of course rhymes with BBQ!  

As soon as the nice days came along, we got hooked into BBQing.  After living in a condo for four years, and not being able to BBQ, we were so excited to finally be able to grill our meats, fish, vegetables, and host parties and have fancy romantic dinners out in the back yard.  And after a very necessary deck cleaning and a front yard fixing, we were so ready to enjoy the outdoors.

We quickly gathered a few items to use to BBQ ~well that Hubby uses, since he is the pro in this domain!!~ and as for everything else, I like finding a "home" where everybody in the same family stays together! ;)

Organizing Food Storage Containers and Lids

Since I do not have a lot of counter space, I work as much as possible on keeping a clear counter.  Optimizing the kitchen cabinets to the best of their storing and organizing abilities is one of my most important tasks, and the corner carousel is definitely getting there.  On the top shelf, I have my kitchen utensils organized in metal mesh letter tray, and the bottom shelf is filled with food storage containers and their lids as well as the pots and pans lids!

I used to have the containers piled into each other, on top of each other, in a cabinet, with the lids on the side, sometimes if possible staked into a larger container.  

Of course, the one container I needed was the one all the way in the back most of the time, and the lids would fall all over the place, on the floor, etc.  I had enough of that mess, as you can imagine...

Better Organization

Storing Kitchen Utensils in a 3-Tier Letter Tray

How a metal mesh letter tray unwanted in the office becomes super handy in the kitchen...

Upright Utensils

Since I do not have many drawers nor much counter space, I store the cooking tools in a cupboard right by the stove.  I had them standing up in a basket, but this one used to fall over a lot from the weight of all the utensils and/or as it bumped into a metal hook.  It was getting frustrating.

French Friday ~ Une Idee de Rangement et Une Recette Facile et Saine

De retour pour un petit Vendredi en Francais...  

Evidemment, il est deja tard par chez vous et il risque d'etre Samedi quand vous vous mettrez a lire cet article... Oh well...

Besoin de rangement pour rassembler des petits objets eparpilles?

Recyclez une boite a chaussures en jolie boite de rangement.

Envie d'un diner equilibre' et super facile, mais vous n'avez pas d'idees?

Cuisinez des blancs de poulet avec un melange de petites carottes et poireaux.

Sauteed Carrots, Leeks and Chicken a la Francaise

Healthy Recipes

Like with my Quiches or Crock-Pot Veggies and Salmon recipes, this one simply starts with whatever vegetables I may have in the fridge that day.  Then, add some protein, and we have healthy dinner.

Ingredients for 2 persons

6 Carrots          2 or 2 Garlic Cloves              2 Chicken Breasts

2 Leeks            Butter, Olive Oil                    Herbs de Provence, salt, pepper

Directions

1. Peel, wash and slice the carrots.

2. Peel and half the garlic cloves.

3. Place the carrots and garlic cloves in a heated pan with one teaspoon of butter and a tablespoon of O.O.  Sear the carrots on high flame until they become brown.

DIY Storage Box ~ Lonely Shoe Boxes Find New Purpose

Instead of throwing out shoe boxes, you could reuse them and make pretty storage boxes out of them.  

We'll always need a specific place to put special items!

All you need is a shoe box, wrapping paper and glue.

Le Tour de France is Home!

Today Le Tour de France's final destination was Le Grand Bornand: One of the many mountains around my home town Annecy, and one of the ski resort I used to go skiing... ~Oh how I miss that...~

Stage 19 ~ via le.tour.fr

No-Bake Choco Treat 3minute-Recipe

Do you ever have a craving for a chocolate something after dinner, or throughout the day too?! 

I do, and last night, I needed something quick and easy to make, to eat right away!!  This is what I came up with.

*Just as a friendly warning, some of the pictures are not too appetizing, I admit... But trust me, the result will be worth it!

Ingredients:

-1.5 cup Graham crackers

-2 Tablespoons Peanut Butter

-1Tablespoon Nutella

-5 squares Hersey chocolate bar

-Butter

-3 big Marshmallows (or 10 small ones)

-Parchment paper

How to Make Your Own Reusable Stencil

I recently made this Chevron clipboard and wanted to make my own reusable stencil.

Chevron Design Clipboard ~ Tutorial and a Free Template!!

**New today at Life In Positudiness: Opportunities to advertise your products and/or promote your business for a small fee or swap buttons for free!!! Visit the Advertise Page**

Yesterday, I shared with you how to make a two-colored striped clipboard.

Today, let's explore how to make a trendy chevron one!  And if you're good, I'll even give you a Chevron template to make your own stencil for this project!! ;)

1. Clean the clipboard off of any dust particles.

Design Clipboard Tutorial

You may have seen my Organizing Nook which I use to organize the daily material we receive in the mail.

I use 4 cheap clipboards and painted them in 4 different ways to embellish my wall.

Province ~ Restaurant Review

The Province restaurant is in the hotel Westin Downtown in Phoenix, AZ.

The place was beautiful.  I loved the modern yet comfy interior design.

A whole lot of nothing

I got nothing for you today on Life In Positudiness ...

Because, This is how my day went: 

10am - going to my gym which I just joined to take my very 1st class "dance it off": so pumped!

10:30 - class starts! so happy to be here, this is great! I'm finally working out and doing something for myself!! YEAH!

11:00 - sweating, working my butt off and loving it! Woohoo, you go girl!

11:13 - last combination, reminds me of my dance classes: I'm kicking my left leg front and back while jumping on the right leg, now we are turning to do it on the other side. And front and jump and .... My toes kissed the floor and before I could even be aware of what was happening... Bam!! My butt hits the ground.

House Tour and Social Media

I finished posting the pictures of our house.

Take a look on the page called "House Tour" on the top bar, or just click here!

Don't expect anything fancy, our house is very simple, but we love it! We are truly lucky to have it,  and that's all thanks to our wonderful landlord!

J'ai enfin termine' d'ajouter les photos de notre maison, cliquez ici pour faire le Tour!
Ne vous attendez pas a quelques chose de grandiose, notre chez-nous est tres simple, mais on s'y sent bien! On est vraiment chanceux de l'avoir!!

The Roaring Fork - Restaurant Review

Back to our trip in Phoenix/Scottsdale, AZ, another of our favorites.

The Roaring Fork... The name itself is pretty appealing, isn't' it?!  It makes you want to know more about it.

This restaurant is situated in Scottsdale, AZ.  It was about 5 minutes away from our resort, The Phoenician. ~They have 2 other locations: Austin Stonelake, TX and Downtown Austin, TX~

My Husband's father had told us to go there for its delicious and cheap appetizers, during the Happy Hour! ~Check out their menu~
We dinned at the Roaring Fork the first night of our vacation... And we loved it so much, we went again our last night!
We ordered the same plates each night, per Dad's recommendation! ;)

From top to bottom: Kettle of Green Chili Pork, Green Chili Mac&Cheese, Fish Tacos, Beef Tenderloin Sliders, Pork Wings

French Friday #2 - Un Coin Organisation

Bonjour, 
Nous revoici pour une edition speciale en francais!!
Cette semaine, je partage avec vous mon petit Coin Organisation.  Le reste de mes articles etaient plutot des photos de notre maison, donc vous pouvez regarder de vous meme!
Ici est l'evolution de notre Salon/Salle a manger et ici le Bureau/Lounge.


Vous etes vous deja retrouve' devant une pile de papiers que vous avez recu par la poste?  Est-ce que vos documents s'empilent sur une table, dans une boite, sur votre bureau... ?Vous etes vous deja sentis surpasses par tout ces papiers a ouvrir, lire, payer les factures, classer les documents importants...
Des fois, on n'a simplement pas le temps de s'en occuper tout de suite, et la pile s'accumule, oublie de payer une facture a temps, d'envoyer une lettre avant la date limite, ou on egare quelques unes.  On espere que ca n'arrive pa souvent, mais avec nos emplois du temps si charges... et bien ca arrive parfois.  Et les consequences peuvent meme devenir stressantes...  

Living Room/Dining Room Transformations

This Winter's setup

Office/Lounge Transformation

On the side of our house are two small connected rooms, and the furthest one in the back gives us access to the deck. 

We needed one to be an office, and ... weren't to sure what to do of the second one!

Oh and by the way... All the furniture you'll see in both of these rooms ~except the Ikea library that I somewhat created myself~ are hand-me-down's from our friends and family.  We can't really afford nice fancy furniture yet, and we are so grateful to have such generous people around us to help out!  Plus, it's a lot of fun to find ways to make something new and practical with something old.

Organizing Nook

Today, I was invited to write a post on an all-about-craft blog, Kreative Creationz. 
In my guest post, I discuss the sorting system I created for Hubby and I.  This Organizing Nook includes a frame which serves as a dry-erase board for our to-do list and the weekly menu  ~write on the glass with a dry-erase marker and swipe it off when you need to!~, as well as 4 clipboards to organize documents.

The Organizing Nool explained

To each board its category: 1. To Read / 2. To File / 3. To Pay / 4. To Mail

Read all about it here!!

**Also, see how to make a chevron clipboard  ~with a reusable stencil~ and a striped design clipboard.**

Restaurant Review - Elements at The Sanctuary

My Husband and I have a few passions in common.  One of them is traveling, another one is eating!  When we go on vacation, we have the best time combining both.  We like to experience the local foods and look up great restaurants in that area.

On our First Mini Honeymoon, we dove in the tasting experience and gave our taste buds a whole new sense and definition of deliciousness.

During this month of July, every Monday, I will take you on a foodie journey to our five favorite restaurants around Phoenix, AZ.

This week, we are going back to Elements, the restaurant in The Sanctuary Camelback Mountain Resort and Spa.

The restaurant itself was stunning, very modern, high class, a wide open area.  But the best of it was the view.