August 5, 2013

Tonight was a quick night.  We grilled up hamburgers and cut up garden cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce and carrots for a side salad.  It was yummy of course.

I spent my first morning off work for a few weeks putting together spread sheets.  I am determined to be a little more organized, know exactly what we are spending our money on and exactly how often I have to buy groceries.  My best friend has been doing this a while and she can honestly feed her family of 4 on $36 a week with a $50 budget a month for bulk groceries for the food storage.  That includes all necessary household products and food.  Once I go back to work in sept I will be back to once a month grocery shopping, crockpot meals and lack of time to plan and budget.  This summer has been a great time.  I have read more books and blogs than ever.  I work around 45 hours a week during the school year and while coming home and trying to be a mom I also have to still take care of household chores and basic other life necessities like baths and such.  That leaves no time for planning.  Usually that is when our good eating goes down the drain and I put on weight like crazy.

THAT IS NOT HAPPENING THIS YEAR!!!

Yep, that is my main goal.  I am hoping that i will have a night of work like last year where I sit behind the piano for little kid classes and have time between ballet exercises to double check my meal plans and my grocery lists.  I set up some Google calendars yesterday.  When I told my husband that I would be sending him links to the calendars so that he would know what to help me with dinner each night he gave me that look..the look that says, "Are you serious?"  Yes, yes I am.  I have linked the recipes that I am using to each night and additional instructions for each meal.  He should never have a question about anything...granted, he has to open and read it.  He usually gets home before me in the evening since my work is mostely later evenings during the school year.

I am also starting the long and tedious process of putting everything in our food storage and cupboards in a spreadsheet.  This will include the prices I bought each item for, when I bought it, quantity, when I froze it and if I used a coupon.  I have been keeping track of this in my little black book and taping in receipts for many months.  At least in a spread sheet I can adjust quantities and keep better track of how I am doing rotating the food in the deep freezer.  I am also hoping that it gives me a better idea over time about how often I am spending on certain items, like: dishwasher soap, laundry detergent, toilet paper, flour, sugar, etc.  Those are basic necessary essentials, but if I know how often I go through them, I know which sales I should watch for and timing on when to buy things.

This is going to be a several day process.  I put all the recent information about all the things that I buy in bulk at Costco in the spreadsheet and at Walmart in the computer today.  I started the lists of things in the deep freezer and the food storage racks.  I am secretly hoping to get Russ to help me quickly count things tomorrow after I get the lists in the computer.  We will see.

Other than that, I taught a lot of piano today and didn't get anything else done, but there is plenty more on my list.  I did spend some time looking up reviews of baby eating products on Amazon.  I have decided that I need to buy a Kidsme Food Feeder.  I have been wanting to get something that doesn't make me as nervous to let Remington try chunks of food and I am hoping that this works.  I have a $25 gift card for Amazon that I got through my rewards with Huggies.com.  With replacement parts it will come to $.55 more that my gift card.  If it doesn't work i can return for free.  I will sleep on it and look at it again tomorrow, but I think that this might be my answer to the feeding problems I am worried about.  Madalynn, mostly due to the lack of teeth, couldn't really chew anything hard for a couple years and still struggles with things like carrots at 3 yrs old.  I just hope he can hold it easy.  That seems to be one of the biggest cons in the reviews.

All right, well off to bed to start again tomorrow.  I am going to sam's club with my aunt to get a membership tomorrow and hopefully that means I can start getting their coupons too.  As the week goes on and I make a big Costco trip I will write more about the things that I buy in bulk..based off the needs and eating routines of our family.