Happy Monday!
Hope you had a great weekend! Mine was spent at home, cleaning. I've been incredibly busy this summer (thank the Lord) with face painting and the house has suffered. Majorly. I shudder to think of my house.......
I hunkered down, did a major clean of the 2nd floor of my house and then I fizzled out.... didn't get it all completed like I had set out to do. But, its okay. It's really OK.
I only left the house to go to the grocery store. Which sucked. Which is why I'm blogging.
One of the things I have learned from other women all over FB, Pinterest and in my social circle is meal planning apparently helps immensely.
Helps take the stress out of the thought of coming home and preparing a home cooked meal for your family.
Helps organize.
Helps keep you within your dietary needs.
Helps you budget your grocery expenses better.
So, I made a meal plan!
I plan for 2 weeks, as I shop each paycheck and (try) to shop for enough to keep us alive during those two weeks.
That never works.
We might actually survive those two weeks without starving and have enough food for a month, but, usually about 6 hours after I have shopped, we are already bored with the food (we are some spoiled asses, I swear) and I have already drawn a blank on what it is I want to cook for the next 14 DAYS!!!!!!
Oh the dilemma.
(as I type this, I truly want to smack myself thinking of those who don't have the luxury of shopping for 2 weeks at a time to feed their families, let alone know what they are going to be ABLE to put on the table that night.... sigh)
Anyways, I decided it was time to get serious about this. I was really slacking on the home front. With a baby in the household who just LOVES her mommy (OK, I can't complain) and leeches onto me the moment I walk in the door at 7pm, a 9 year old who would prefer to eat (homemade) mac and cheese every night and a husband who only knows how to cook (really good) spaghetti and salad, I just kinda threw in the towel and gave into quick and easy meals and 'whatever we have on hand' meals.
Totally blown my diet over the last 8 months and destroyed any effort to lose baby weight.
TOTALLY spent WAY TOO MUCH MONEY on Glory Days take out and emergency food runs to the store over the last 8 months. I mean, we are a family of 4 - and one of our members cant even eat, and I think one month I spent damn near a GRAND on groceries! NUTS!
So... I planned. And it was fun! And easy! And the planner I made is even pretty!
I named each day of the week to help with planning meals....
Meaty Monday: RED MEAT! Yum! Burgers, steak, kebabs, meatloaf....
Try it out Tuesday: try out a new recipe from the hundreds I have to keep things new and interesting!
Water food Wednesday: couldn't think of a fish that started with a W - but this is a seafood day
The other white meat Thursday: this is all white meat - pork, turkey, chicken, alligator.....
F**k it Friday, Saturday-Faterday are days I just really can't plan for. Just no point. It'll never happen.
Sunday-Funday: my shopping/planning/prepping day and the hubby and the kiddo get to alternate weeks picking a meal of their choice to be made.
All of these meals are dinner only.
We aren't much of a breakfast family aside from a pound of bacon, and lunches involve more munching around (or we are at work/school) so I'm planning for dinners only.
And, I'm planning on making enough dinner for leftovers and enough for a full 4th serving for myself to take to lunch the following day (hope it works!)
At the bottom of my planner is my grocery list - according to what I will be cooking those two weeks, I have my shopping list.
The meats.
The veggies/fruits.
The misc items.
Not bad! Looks nice! Looks delicious! Organized! Easy to read! The list looks reasonable and I don't get that sinking feeling in my gut and wallet! This is going to work!!!!!!!!!!!!
Until I get to the store checkout.
After strictly following this meal plan and list (only purchasing about $30 of additional items because the hubby accompanied me on this trip - MY tip to all meal planners - don't shop with hubby and kids!!!!!) I blew my budget.
I blew it by $125!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This was actually one of my more expensive shopping trips!!!!!!!!
WTH!!!!!!!?????????!!!!!!!!!!!!
I thought this was supposed to help :(
All in all, I still believe this will help.
I think I need to just budget a bit more than I do and that's that. I don't want to feed my family food from a box. I want to feed my family fresh meat and veggies and fruits. It's going to be more expensive. That's the bottom line.
I think this was a reasonable menu and list.
The most expensive meat purchase was the 4lbs of shrimp at $30bucks, but hey.... I mean.... whatever, it happened, they were on sale! Promise!
I think this will help take some stress off my shoulders.
I think while I suffered from shock at the grocery bill all at once, if I take into account the lunches I WON'T be purchasing for the next two weeks ($100 at the LEAST savings there) and that I WON'T give in during the week to fast food or take out when I already have food in the house and then at the end of the month look over what I spent on food not realizing it, it's not that bad.
And the fact that I have an AMAZING menu planned with GREAT dinners for the next two weeks that are made of whole, healthy, organic foods within my dietary needs - that makes it all worth it.
Maybe this WILL help!
