Category Archives: Groceries

5 Things Friday

Posted on by
Reply
1. I have been struggling with our chickens integration this week.  After spending around an hour each day watching the chickens, yesterday I left the chickens for a couple of hours. Today we are leaving the door open all day. So far so good, at least everyone is alive.
2. The weather continues to be very strange, we have had rain, rain and more rain. The temperatures have remained below average for about two weeks now.
3. I have completed my first two days of the school year. I am happy to report that I feel good and have been productive by completing continuing education!
4. My attempt at expanding our menu has failed 3 of the 4 new recipes that I tried this week are a no go. Zach has even asked that we return to normal food.
5. I am very hopeful that we will finish installing the pickets on the fence tomorrow, We actually started and got several sections completed one evening.

Thursday Thoughts- Every Bit Counts/ Pantry Challenge/Goals

Posted on by
Reply

I talked a little bit on Monday about the changes/ goals I have for the next school year. My goal is to use up  the food that we have both in the freezers and pantry. At the same time, I want to reduce the amount of money we are spending on food as well. My goal in that area is to spend less than $475 a month on groceries. I would also like to put at least $300 a month toward meat purchases next summer.  The final piece of that is that we have to have meals that are easier to fix on some days just because of your busy lives.

After watching a video on You Tube, I decided to start a meal rotation to make menu planning a little bit easier for me. I tried to make a good list of all the items we have to use for meals. Looking at this list I am estimating that I have at least 100 full meals that can be made with the items we already have on hand.  This should be at least 3 full month of meals. So in December, I may need to purchase some additional meats for the remainder of the school year. At that point it should be very easy to purchase what we need as we continue to use up the food we already have on hand. The hard part of this challenge is that we like certain foods and we gravitate to those foods/meals. I am going to have to be very diligent on making a variety of foods using what we have.

Part of my planning was to try a new recipe for each day for the next two weeks.  On Monday I made BBQ short ribs. It was very good and it will definitely be something we do again.  Tuesday was a Beef Enchilada, not a repeat, just not.  Wednesday was chicken parmesan casserole, this one will be a repeat.

I have been canning ALOT this week.  I always want to fill up all the empty jars so that we have plenty of food in the winter and this summer I am successful. I also filled the extra 5 cases of jars that I purchased from Walmart.  I added 10 quarts and 2 pints of beef stock, 18 pints of pears and 6 quarter pints, 2 half pints and 8 pints of pearsauce to the canning closet.

Not  bad for four days!

5 Things Friday- 5 Days of the Week

Posted on by
Reply

I anticipated that this week would be fairly busy as it is between two vacations. The garden has produced as well.  What I did not anticipate was that I would drive to Mocksville to pick up a haul from the local farm stand. See below for details.  I am also listing things I did for “Every bits Challenge” as well. This is typical for the month of August but I return to work so that limits my abilities to do some things everyday. I will use these two weeks as the two final weeks of August. This is different but I hope it is helpful.

Monday- We arrived home, picked about 5 gallons of tomatoes and I spent a good couple of hours outside pruning and working on the tomato plants.  I was exhausted!

Tuesday- I decided to work on stocking prepared meals. I made 4 taco pastas and froze 3 for future use. I made the first double batch of Salsa, so excited to use all the ingredients that we already had.

Wednesday- Braxton and I harvested another pint of blueberries and several tomatoes. I also pulled some weeds. We planted some corns in our new planter box and also harvested potatoes. This was a disappointment as we harvest around 5 pounds of potatoes. I also made sourdough bread.

Thursday- After looking at what produce we had, I called and ordered 50 pounds of tomatoes. Braxton and I drove and we purchased a $10 box of cucumbers as well as peaches, green peppers and a watermelon. After picking up this produce, I have been very busy getting things in jars. Another loaf of sour dough bread.

Friday- working on canning and preparation all day. See the final list below. I attempted to make sub buns for meatball subs. They needed to be a bit smaller.

Every Bit Counts Challenge
Salsa 10 quarts and 17 pints
Pickles – 10 quarts of Spears and 12 pints of chips. Spears are a bit salty on first taste, hopefully this improves with time.
Spaghetti sauce -5 quarts and dinner on Friday

Prepared food
4 Taco pastas
4 Million dollar Spaghetti.

5 Things Friday “How I Spent my Day”

Posted on by
Reply

  1. We have been under a extreme heat warning all week. This means that the heat index is at least 101*  The only way that I am able to keep up with the garden is by waking up super early aka 6:30am and spending at least an hour in the garden. This morning I ended up around an hour and half. I was able to get a second planting of crops done. Pumpkins in the bed in front of the office, cucumbers to replace the ones that did not survive and cantaloupe in place of the bush green beans.  I also finished the chore of wedding all the beds, collecting a 5 gallon bucket for the chickens.  I dead headed our white rose bush, collected the small harvest and heavily watered the beds.
  2. 2 loads of towels were washed, dried, folded and put away.  With everyone enjoying the pool and working, it is not uncommon for most of use to take 2 showers a day.
  3. I have got the third load in the dishwasher, I am working on getting rid of any food that has gone bad. I also packed up everything in lunch containers, made desert and have started working on sour dough bread for the weekend. I have no doubt this third load will be ran tonight.
  4.  In my effort to use the food we have I ended up chopping up 4 items for a Big Mac Salad for dinner, lettuce, red onion, cucumbers and tomatoes.  I found a recipe for Big Mac sauce and then cooked a pound of ground beef in steak seasoning to use.
  5. I was able to pressure can 5 quarts of chicken broth that I made from the chicken thighs that were processed yesterday.

No wonder I am tired~

5 Things Friday

Posted on by
Reply

  1. I have 2 days left before summer vacation! Unfortunately, we are still in limbo with the pool opening. Zach and Kendall have been able to pick up a couple of shifts at other pools but it is stressful trying to get everything arranged. I can’t wait for summer break to start!
  2. I am super excited about the garden this year! We are already getting a harvest and I am planning to continue to plant so that we can continue to get more of what we want. We have gotten peppers, green beans, a couple of cucumbers, dill and a bit of basil, squash and zucchini so far. We will definitely have tomatoes very soon as well!
  3. Matt and I are currently spending around 30 minutes a day in the garden. This is going to increase this weekend for sure.  I am planning to do some replanting and changing this week. First I am going to cut down all the cosmos from this bed.   It is large and pretty but I want to plant another round of squash plants as the squash bugs are winning in the back gardens. When they finally win or when this planting starts to produce, I am going to pull out the squash plants and plant a “row” of cucumbers in the middle of the bed. I really want to harvest and can an abundance of cucumbers this year. On July 1st, I am planning to pull up the spinach and plant pumpkins in the bed in front of the office.  I am also planning on adding a couple of green beans in the empty slots on the greenstalk planters and one additional zucchini in a bed in the back that has not successfully grown anything so far.
  4. I have already started to work on filling up the freezer. This week I was able to get 3 chicken enchilada meals in the freezer. I am also planning to start restocking our breakfast burritos as well. My goal will be to can one item and make ahead at least one item a week. Next week I am hopefully to get chicken, broccoli and rice casseroles made up and frozen for future use.

5. We leave for our “adult cruise in 3 weeks!

5 Things Friday AKA What I did for Spring Break.

Posted on by
Reply

1.We, Lily and I planned a short but packed Disney trip for the end of May, approximately 2 weeks ago.  It is something I am convinced we all need and will enjoy. So, in anticipation of the trip, I am going to save as much money as possible between then and now.  I would love to have $1000 but that is going to be a stretch.  The catch to the saving is that it has to come from extra money, not money that I am budgeting. I have worked out the budget for May already, so this is truly going to be a challenge. One caveat is that money left over from the grocery budget can be counted as savings. In addition, I am also going to say no Amazon buying unless absolutely needed.  I will try and deduct this amount from any savings we get.

2. This is week has been both the kids and I week of Spring Break. I have really really tried to get alot of things caught up and prepared ahead for the next month as well. Which hopefully will help with the goal above. Braxton has been with us for at least half of four out of 5 days this week. He is actually enjoying screen free time!

3. One of the areas I have focused on this week is outside both for gardening and landscaping. I have spent $300ish on additional plants, soil and mulch. This includes paying Zach for lots of hot work applying mulch and helping getting the yard looking it’s best.  I have been able to purchase 2 hydrangeas for $14.00 each on clearance, along with several other “clearance” plants that have helped to completely fill by Greenstalk vertical planters. I found angel trumpet trees on Facebook marketplace. Zach helped me repurpose by painting several older planters with a fresh coat of paint which I think turned out great!

I will give a better garden update on Sunday, but we have not lost any plants from transplanting, and we have a watermelon growing!  I am so pleased. Several hours and bags of dirt went to finishing up the planting space. My goal is to finish all the Spring planting today!  I really only have one area to plant now that the dirt is filled.

4.. The other area that I have worked on this week is cleaning and organizing parts of the house. One was the living room, where we found a 5-gallon bucket of water sealant. Zach used this outside as well. I also moved all the plants outside for the fresh air and sunshine.  The living room is so open now it is amazing!  I also spent time filling and organizing the canning closet. I added 28 jars of beef stock and 8 cans of white beans.

5. I also planned to work on getting our food together for the next 4 to 8 weeks (until Summer break). I actually made multiple trips to Costco and Food lion. I also attempted to use up items in our freezers.  I am proud to say other than 1 lunch at McDonald’s for $10.69 We have eaten at home all week. This is huge! I have made multiple batches of sour dough and frozen some.

Overall this was a great productive week!

5 Things Friday

Posted on by
Reply

  1. The weather has absolute beautiful with highs in the 70s and lows in the 40s.  I have decided to turn off the heating and air unit in order to save money. In the past I can typically turn this off the first of April but even if I need to turn it back on then we are still saving money!
  2. Zach has been having baseball games or practice 5 days a week which means that our evening are even more pushed and busy.  I am learning that for away games we need to have a food option with us and home games we can typically eat at home if something is ready.  Unfortunately, this was an expensive lesson as we ended up spending $65 on a game day for food and entry.
  3. I am hoping that we are able to complete some outside upgrades and maintenace this weekend as we have 5 weeks till our typical last frost date.  I am planning on continuing with my weekly garden updates on Sunday.
  4. Zach’s truck sold this week.  I have decided that we will not be on the lookout for another vehicle until the end of May.
  5. The pantry challenge is starting to work. I heard from kids yesterday that “there is nothing to eat at home”   In reality we have plenty of food but things have to be prepared and made ahead. I have plans to also do some of this prep work this weekend.

Monday Menu Post

Posted on by
Reply

Last week did not go as planned, we ended up cooking and eating different items because of the snow.  Things are starting to pick up around here. We start baseball this week. Looking at the schedule that is 2-3 evenings a week where dinner will be late think 7pm or we will be eating on the run.  I am hopefully that we can at least keep things a little bit more successful with only one night of eating out.  This week we have both games at home which is a 5 minute or less drive so I am going to try my luck and plan to eat at home on both days. I also have lots of thoughts about my pantry challenge, see below for details.

Breakfast- Saturday- Leftover baked oatmeal or breakfast casserole.  Sunday- Banana muffins Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday Friday– find it (breakfast burritos, oatmeal, omelets cereal and milk, French toast sticks, sausage, pop-tarts, and eggs.

Lunch- Saturday-Garlic cheeseburger bites (not a repeat new recipe) Sunday- Gregg’s Monday, – leftovers   Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday- left-overs.  Friday- eat out.

Dinner- Saturday-Pick a soup- tomato basil, chicken stew, chicken and rice and potato soup. Sunday- Left-overs Monday-Beef Fried Rice   Tuesday- Chicken -? This is the baseball game (instapot hamburger helper) Thursday-baked potatoes Friday- Spaghetti

Pantry Challenge
Looking at our grocery expenses for the past two month indicate that we have failed but I am starting to see a difference in our pantry, and I have come to realize that we have a lot of extra food.  I want to be a good steward of this, so my plan is to continue to use this list of goals at least until the end of May just to keep things moving in the right direction.
1.Purchasing items that we are completely out of that are staples such as diary as well as buns or other items that will help use items we already have. Total $662.25  On Saturday, I stocked up on soft drinks for the next couple of month. I also had to replenish our “dairy alternatives”.
2. Use at least one “meal/meat portion of the meal” from the stand-up freezer each week. (This is where most of the meals are)  We opened containers of potato soup and chicken stew that will be used for lunches as well as at least one meal.
3. Use at least 3 jars a week from the canning pantry. Using spaghetti sauce this week along with salsa and chicken broth.
4. Use one item a week from the connivence freezer in my room. I found two unopened pack of turkey and Zach requested on for this week of lunches.
5. Each Monday after menu planning provide a list of how I followed the guidelines for the week.  Done!

Saving on Saturday

Posted on by
Reply

Matt and Zach have been able to finish the deck!  Total spent $0.  I will post those pictures on Wednesday.

Today I split myself several times and actually got a lot accomplished. First, I worked on our taxes. I have always completed my own taxes in recent years with the help of a tax program.  This year was not good we ended up owing 3800 to the Federal government and after some deep digging, I did not find much I could do to change this.

Next up I decided it was a good day to start working toward our garden, so I needed to clean out the greenhouse. I am very happy with the results

Before

After

I was able to “find” 4 5 gallon buckets of dirt that will be put in the tomato beds after they are completely repaired.

Next a trip to the grocery store with mom, I discovered an awesome deal on soda so this is the result

Finally we added a vertical growing space to the raised beds. I did not get any pictures but will try to include in a garden update.

 

5 Things Friday

Posted on by
Reply

  1. The weather continues to be very different.  This week has brought 2 days of beautiful snow (Wednesday and Thursday).  Both the kids and I had a remote day on Wednesday. I had a second remote day on Thursday while the kids had a total day off.  The good news was that it was a very dry snow and mostly melted so we all returned to school on Friday.
  2. Our electric bill was significantly higher than usual this month. It was over $300 to be exact $319.  This is likely due to the cold weather so there is really not much I could do about this.
  3. Speaking of cold, we have realized that both my office and the living room are much cooler than the rest of the house.  We set up small thermometers in both room and have discovered that overnight the temperature drops to 63 degrees in both rooms with the heat pump set at 67* After discussion this is likely not a new problem but something that continues to happen and with the colder temperatures means increasing bills. We have purchased two small heaters to use in these rooms when we are in them.
  4. The 2025 gardening season has started.  We planted pepper seeds and broccoli seeds last Saturday. We actually have a couple of broccoli plants starting. These will likely go outside in the next couple of days.  I am planning to get out and try and straighten out the greenhouse later today. The next big project is to prune both the rose bushes and fruit trees hopefully next week this will be possible.
  5. Kendall and Zach have been participating in a weekly Bible study with some other from our youth group.   They have been meeting at Starbucks but this is expensive and hard to hear. We offered our house and we will be providing drinks and snacks.  This will affect our grocery bill but both Matt and I agree that we don’t want to change this so a higher bill will be the expectation.