meal plan Sept 25-Oct 2

It surely has been a loooong while but I am slowly getting back into to things.

Looking at the fridge today I realized hey I need to go shopping, headed to check out the freezer, wow look at all that meat.....
Ding ding light went on- meal plan around what I have a shop for the missing pieces.

Wed~
 D. chicken sausage, asian veggies stirfry, fried rice
Thur~
L. leftover dinner ^
D. tacos- beef & bean, corn on cob
Fri~
L. tuna & cucumber on sandwich or cracker
D. pork tenderloin, broccoli, sesame & soy fried pasta
Sat~
L. hotdogs, chips, carrots
D. drumsticks, rice, beans
Sun~
L. burgers, fries, celery
D. flanksteak, salad, garlicbread
Mon~
L. leftover dinner ^
D. porkchop, rice, broccoli
Tue~
L. sandwiches, chips
D. chicken breast wrapped in bacon & asparagus, alfredo pasta
Wed~
L. leftover dinner ^
D. beef stew, potatoes mushrooms carrots etc., toasted hamburger buns

All meat I had on hand and worked around rotating them.
Pasta, rice and bread (sourdough-sandwich-hotdog/burger buns-tortillas) are always in stock & on hand
Broccoli, corn on cob & asain stirfry mix are always in the freezer.

Breakfast items are pretty basic and always on hand- eggs,bacon, cereal, oatmeal
Snack items are mostly fruit & cheeses

I do bulk make and freeze waffle sticks & muffins for quick grab in the morning or after school

~Tasty Tuesday~ Breakfast

Breakfast Burritos & Egg Muffin Sandwiches

(premake 12 at a time)

You'll need:

vacuum seal storage bags

paper towels/napkins

Ingredients:

6 tortillas

6 english muffins

1 dozen eggs

6 slices bacon

6 slices cheese

6 sausage patties or canadian bacon circles

salt & pepper

It took about an hour to bust out the 12 items and about $10 so that's under $1 each morning for a hot fresh burrito or sandwich. Take one to work, take out of bag, pop in the microwave wrapped in paper towel. maybe 30-45 seconds, time varies, try it a few times to get it right.

Burritos~

Warm up 6 tortillas, place 1/2 slice cheese in the center of each,

Cook up 6 slices bacon, place a slice on top of each tortilla w/ cheese,

Scramble up 6 eggs, scoop out evenly between the tortillas.

Fold two sides in slightly and roll tight, wrap with paper towel,

place in bag, seal, label and freeze.

Egg Muffins~

Open the 6 muffins, place 1/2 slice cheese on each,

either cook up sausage patties and place on cheese,

or place a slice of canadian bacon on cheese,

Fry up an egg at a time, place on meat,

Close sandwich, wrap with paper towel,

place in bag, seal, label & freeze

Enjoy!!!

Tasty Tuesday ~ $5 & 20min Pasta Dinner

This is so simple & easy to change,

great for cleaning out the pantry or freezer,

don't mind the first picture (i forgot to take the ingredients picture before hand)

Everything pictured here totalled under $5 and was on hand

Alfredo Sauce $2

Pasta free with sauce

Mushrooms $1 half package

Green Beans $.50 half a bag-frozen

Slice and saute mushrooms as the green beans or defrosting for a minute

add green beans to mushrooms- sprinkle with salt,pepper,garlic & parsley

add in Alfredo and 1/2 a jar of milk

Boil pasta as per directions

toss into veggie/sauce mix

if you have canned green beans those could work, or even 1/2 a bag of broccoli,

I've added left over chicken or turkey too, mix & match get creative

Enjoy!

Menu Monday 8/16

Maybe I could start keeping track on here.
Whatcha think?

Well this holds yesterdays meals too :)

Sun
b-pancakes & sausage
l-cream cheese, lettuce, salami roll ups w/ celery, cucumber, carrot, pickles
d-spaghetti w/ red sauce & garlic bread

Mon
b-cereal
l-chicken noodle & grilled cheese w/ carrots & celery
d-pr beans over rice w/ tostones

Tue
b-eggs & bacon burritos
l-sandwiches, eaters choice either pb&j or tuna w/ carrots, pickles
d-loaded baked potato & pork chops w/ tomato cucumber salad

Wed
b-poptarts
l-mac n' cheese w/ hotdogs celery sticks
d-loaded egg sandwiches on rolls w/ veggie bean soup

Thurs
b-cereal/poptart
l-egg salad sandwich
d-pasta w/ tomato & oil, garlic bread

Fri
b-cereal/poptart
l-soup & grilled cheese w/ carrots & pickles
d-rice, salmon, asperagus

Sat
b-egg bacon tacos
l-creamcheese & salami roll ups w/ cucumber salad
d- burgers & fries

Sun
b-pancakes & sausage
l-mac n cheese w/ hotdogs & celery sticks
d-deli sandwiches on rolls w/ chips & salad

There are also 3 snacks a day available
eaters choice, we just watch out for no daily double ups to be fair to all
Apple
Orange
Banana
yogurt
applesauce
nuts
chexmix

Shopping day

Shopping day with A today.
It was nice to spend a bit of time with him alone.
During the few minutes he was in the dressing room a few things flashed at me that I was acting/talking like my mom did when I was a teen.
He didn't say anything rude or mean to me & seemed quite content with my thoughts or opinions on the clothing pieces.
We did go through and discussed budget & taxes, fitting & sets.
It went well, he picked a bit out, tried them all on, put back what didn't fit or look good, then went through and added everything up.
He was $8.34 over his budget but got the ok from hubby & I and walked out with a few bags of great looking clothes.

meal planning GF dinners.......

..........& no one seems to notice.
I'm Gluten Free all the time, the hubby & kids are not.
So to sit & eat together for dinner I choose to make the whole meal GF.
I was doing two dinners off the same meat/veggie but that was getting old & time consuming.
Here's my way of planning out dinners so that no one seems to notice & there's no complaints.
I rotate out the main item in this order
-GF Pasta
-Salad
-Potato
-Rice
So the next 8 days look like this
-tomato, zucchini, mozzarella over pasta
-chicken caesar salad
-steak, broccoli & baked potato
-corn beef & corn over rice
-homemade tomato sauce over spaghetti
-steak um salad
-pork chops with potato & onions
-bulgogi over rice
I try to mix up the type of food when planning, we are such a mixture in this house that I try to get alittle bit of everything in our meals, plus we all enjoy food way to much & I'm really lucky not to have picky eaters.
Looking above you see Italian, Asian, American, Puerto Rican.
The plus side too is that all ingredients are in the fridge/pantry already so no more shopping to accomplish this.

got to be kidding, right?

But I know the Dentist isn't.

J & L both went in today for their cleanings,
we knew each would need a crown on their back bottom right molar,
what we didn't know was both actually have 5-6 cavities each!
Seriously.

Poor J already had a bad traumatic crown event when he was 3. I don't know how he'll hold up for 2 visits, one for the top fillings and one for the crown.

Today was L's first ever real cleaning and she did excellent she even sat for xrays. L is 3 now and they say they want to just put her to sleep and do all 5 fillings and her crown at once.

Oh my our copay isn't pretty, totalled up for 3 visits is tipping $1,000.

Our snowball to the visa will have to be on hold for a few pay days.

a try at

Meal Planning...........

I'm so used to just having a food budget but with our house not selling yet we're now down to specific meal planning.

But it's working so far.

I'm writing out actual lunches and dinners.

Last weeks menu was created using up our pantry/freezer items and then shopping for what was needed to make them into a meal.

Granted I also needed breakfast- which was easy with 3 boxes of cereal and 2 dozen poptarts but I needed to think of snacks & hubby's lunches which would differ from the kids and I due to him not being home when I cooked.

But over all not to shabby at $120 last week with plenty of cereal,potatoes,eggs,snacks & hubbys sandwich supplies leftover for this week.

So my grand total for this weeks 5 lunches & 5 dinners was $43

Can you believe it! I was so ecstatic when I looked up to pay.

Please note:

meat will be skipped every other night but beans are replacing it.

Nobody complained last week- which was nice,snacks are the biggest hurdle for the kiddos but slowing they seem to be getting that snack is snack which is at about 2:30 - 3:00 between lunch & dinner. Not after breakfast, not after lunch, not after dinner, or even at bed time.

I'm very interested to see what this totals out to on food for the 15 days, normally we spend $300 every 15 days, so far we are at $163 with 8 days to go, but then I have to remember that we had stuff left over from last month, so my true budget/value/cost will be the next 15 days following payday.