Monthly Archives: July 2015

Sunday Menu Planning and other Random thoughts

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I have really enjoy this 4 day break. One of the main things that has happened is that I am finally caught up.  This upcoming week is a relativity slow one for us. Cheerleading is on vacation, so the kids have swim team practice each day and piano on Friday. My work is also slowing down as everyone (all 3 of us) are working this week a regular schedule so I should be able to get home early most days. As I posted earlier, we are growing the stockpile which means lots to choose from when menu planning.

Breakfast-Cereal, Poptarts, grits, toast and breakfast burritos at least one day.

Lunch- Salad (lettuce is already prepared, tomato and cucumbers from garden), sandwiches, hot dogs or left-overs. I am really encouraging Matt and the kids to eat sandwiches or left overs this week so that we can not waste any food.

Dinner– The exciting news here is that I should be able to eat most night with everyone prior to swim practice! First time all summer.

Saturday- Lunch: Potato salad, Mandarin salad, pasta salad, watermelon.   Dinner- Potluck at the pool.

Sunday- Lunch- Leftovers from the week including Chinese, steak or salads from yesterday.  Dinner- Pimento cheese and bacon sandwich on sour dough bread.

Monday- Grilled chicken, sides will be leftovers from the weekend.
Tuesday- Falafel in the crockpot. The plan is to wrap these up and eat at the swim meet.
Wednesday-Salisbury steak, rice and watermelon.
Thursday-  Options include leftovers, shrimp or chicken nachos . (I will make the decision Wednesday night based on what the refrigerator is looking like and my mood.)
Friday- Pork chops, veggie and fruit.

With our garden in full production, the goal is to freeze a small amount each day, eat as much as we want for lunches and not waste any food!

 

Saving on Saturday! Happy Fourth of July

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We spent around 7 hours enjoying the pool today. For dinner, we participated in a potluck which was awesome! Total spent ZERO!

Kendall was so happy to get back in the water, she had not been in since Tuesday, due to her ear infection!
Boys vs Girls water gun fight!
Zach is just hanging!
Yes! They do play together on occasion!
Someone was not happy…can’t remember why?
Savannah is one of our favorite people!
Armed and Dangerous!

Growing Our Stockpile

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My primary area of focus for the month of July is going to be to grow/replenish our stockpile. The only constraint is the $700 food budget.

The rationale behind this decision has several different aspects. First, July should be the month in which our garden produces the most. Next, and more importantly is that we are running low on items that can no longer be neglected. As we made our menu list for the week, we realized that 4 of 7 meals were going to be chicken. Zaycon also notified us this week of a change in the delivery date of our ground beef order, unfortunately this is our week of vacation.

Our first stop was the “local” meat processing plant- Shuler Meats. We ended up purchasing $230 worth of meat. This may seem extremely high but in reality this meat in addition to the chicken we already have will last 3-4 months.  We purchased 30# of ground beef, chicken drumsticks, NY strip Steaks, cube steak, round roast, beef stew and sausage. Looking at the numbers we have enough meat for 47 meals, that is an average of less than $5 a meal or less than $1 a person per meal. Wondering what we did with all this, glad you asked!  We took 20# of the ground beef and fried it up, freezing it in 1# packs for use in many common recipes and for quick meals like tacos and hamburger helper. The other 10# we made into “Salisbury steaks”.

We have also made trips to Aldi, Costco and Food Lion in the last two days as well. Aldi had an awesome deal on blueberries so I have froze several pints of these for future use. I also purchased a couple of bags of dried beans that have been cooked and frozen. Throwing away food is the biggest waste of money in the US, so I ended up steaming and freezing spinach as well as a bag of apples that became fried apples/apple pie filling to prevent their waste.

Out of our garden, we are getting an abundance of cucumbers, I have made several batches of “cucumber relish” and discovered an awesome recipe for “refrigerator pickles” that the kids love so I currently have 3 gallons of these. Tomatoes are one of the easiest items for me, I simple dice and cook we use these for any recipe that calls for diced tomatoes, tomato sauce or stewed tomatoes. I have even been known to add seasoning to these for recipes that call for Italian style tomatoes. I am able to finish and freeze at least one batch ever couple of day.

The final and smallest way, I am growing our stockpile this month is couponing. I am determined to stick to our budget but hope to add a couple of snack foods for future list if the right sale occurs. Do you have any plans to grow your stockpile this summer?

June in Review

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Blogging:  Goal: 15 per month Goal Met!

Weight: Goal:  Met and maintain weight of 175. This goal will be considered met each month that weight loss is achieved and once this weight is achieved, each month maintained is considered achieved.  UGGH! I know it can not have anything to do with the fact that I stress eat nor that I have not been exercising regularly! Ok so it is my fault for this one!

Spiritual-  Goal. I want to spend time reading and or studying the Bible at least 5 days a week for the year. Fail again

Financial Goals-
1.  Pay off all debit by December  2015, except for mortgage.    This goal is actually meet in one sense but not in the big picture. Part of my refinancing the house helped to speed  up the goal.  Currently, the only two debts that we have are the new mortgage payment and starting in September a car payment. I will be eliminating this goal in July because it is no longer a goal.  I am very comfortable with both the house and car payment.  I mostly like will change this goal to funding all budget categories for the month starting in August. Any better/other ideas?

2. Emergency Fund to $2000.  Met. Added $100!  Remember it is baby steps!

. 3. Groceries: Spend $700 a month .Goal Met After much discussion and debate, I increased by grocery budget to $700 beginning in June. I “think” that I am right on target however, I have no proof. I accidently deleted by budget app during a swim meet and was unable to retrieve the information.  We did end up cancelling our Zaycon order for ground beef due to the change in delivery date, which if I am remembering correctly was more than my overage but I can’t be sure.  I do know that in July, I am planning to start restocking our freezers and this will include a trip to the local meat processing plant.  With our new budget in place, this should become a more realistic and achievable goal.

4. Gas: Spend $400 a month with any remaining to be move to Auto fund for repairs.  This is a huge FAIL!  I had a costly repair on the car and van this month. I am not sure how badly I failed as the budget app was the most accurate record.  Another change is that we are reducing this to $350 a month which I may drop to $300 in September. I explain the rationale for this here.

Disney- No progress. This will change in July!

June was one of the most stressful months that I can remember in several years., but as Matt said we survived and even the last several day are starting to calm down.  I hope to be able to focus on our budget more in the next several months and avoid any major new expenses as well. If I learned anything in the month of June it is “God’s timing is always perfect, and much better than mine!”