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Menu Planning

By Lynn, on April 26th, 2008%

I mentioned a few days ago that I had planned out our menus for last week.  Here’s what we had:

Tuesday 4/22:  Homemade pizza, fresh salad
Wednesday, 4/23:  Chicken and dumplings, fresh salad
Thursday, 4/24:  Lasagne and fresh salad
Friday, 4/25:  Roast (London broil) and gravy, small red potatoes, broccoli, fresh salad
Saturday, 4/26:  Left over roast, macaroni and cheese, green beans (didn’t need), fresh salad

There’s so much food in the fridge for today, I don’t even have to make the mac and cheese today!  It has been so very nice to have meals totally planned in advance and have all the ingredients on hand!  It has helped everyone’s attitude.  Having supper ready at a certain time has helped the children not graze so much; having a hot meal ready when hubby comes home has helped him feel appreciated; and not having to wonder what in the world am I going to cook??? has helped me enjoy my days much more!

So you know what I did this morning?  I pulled out all my cookbooks and recipes and cooking magazines, put them on the table to help me plan a week of menus, and then back on the shelf they went — only more organized than they were before.

Here’s what’s on the menu:

Sunday, 4/27/08:  Breakfast:  pancakes, bacon, eggs (save several pieces of bacon for Monday’s baked beans)
Lunch:  Taco soup (crockpot)
Supper:  Taco salads using fresh salad, tortilla chips and leftover taco soup.

Monday, 4/28/08:  BBQ ribs (crockpot), baked beans (crockpot), fresh salad
Tuesday, 4/29/08:  Salmon croquettes, tabouli (apparently no one in my town carries bulgar wheat), macaroni and cheese, baked beans
Wednesday, 4/30/08:  Bread machine herb + cheese bread, chicken and vegetable soup with egg noodles
Thursday, 5/1/08:  Pinto beans (crockpot), cornbread, fresh salad, London broil (crockpot) and gravy
Friday, 5/2/08 — (always feels like a date night with hubby):  Marinated salmon fillets (they were out — not sure what I’ll do yet), wild rice, fresh salad, carrot cake
Saturday, 5/3/08:  Left-overs

I have put together in one place the recipes I’ll need for the upcoming week and I put together my grocery list while I was making my menu plans.

You’ll notice my planner open.  This week I designed a daily 2-page schedule “spreadsheet” to keep track of the things that are important to me each day.  For this first week, the planner spreadsheet is just hand-written, but next week I plan to type it up so I can print them for my planner.  I want this week to tweak it, so no point in typing it up just yet!

One thing I did before planning my menus is to pull up on line the weekly sales for our two local grocery stores.  That helped me choose the meats to cook.

Now I’m off to the local grocery stores (and to do my monthly Sam’s trip), and I’ve got my perfectly prepared grocery list in hand!

In The Garden This Week:


Queen Elizabeth closer to being in full bloom


Queen Elizabeth bud close up


Star of Bethlehem is blooming


Wildginger (Asarum) — A beautiful shade plant


The beautiful flower of wildginger (Asarum)


A baby praying mantis


The Lady Banks rose is blooming

Orson Welles said, “A third of the food we eat keeps us alive.  The other two-thirds keeps the doctors alive.” 

I think it’s a good choice to shop fresh and prepare meals from scratch.  :)

It’s also cheaper!

Have a Happy Weekend!

Lynn

4 comments   Cooking and Food, Debt-Free Life, Gardening, Weekly Menus

Care to Walk and Talk With Me?

By Lynn, on April 4th, 2008%

I was wondering if you would care to join me for a little walk.  And some talking?

My mind has been so full lately of things I want to do in life. 

Much of what I am doing right now is just a means to that end.  I can wait.  :)   I’m just building up muscle right now. 

L.H. Talbot said

It is the climb that puts on muscle.  Anything worth having is never cheap.  God has no bargain counters for even His poor or weak.  It hurts to fall down, but it strengthens us to pick ourselves up.

Now that’s a thought worth embracing.  I’ve fallen a couple of times, but I’m up and running.

Things I’m putting energy into right now:

  • Visualizing what I want my life to be
  • Putting into action the positive energy that comes from that visualization
  • Taking steps toward a totally debt-free lifestyle

Recent Food Savings:

The loaf of raisin bread I made a few days ago was reaching the end of its little life.  :)   It was still tasting good and no mold or anything like that.  We had simply grown tired of it.  So, I made French toast with what was left of it.  Yum.

I had mine with real maple syrup and a glass of cold milk.

Are you steering your life’s vessel to where you really want to be?

E.E. Cummings said

It takes courage to grow up and turn out to be who you really are.

 Lynn

2 comments   Content Thyself, Debt-Free Life

Debt-Proof Your Marriage

By Lynn, on November 3rd, 2007%

Debt-Proof Your Marriage: How to Achieve Financial Harmony (Debt-Proof Living) is a book I am whole-heartedly recommending to you today.  I have it on my lap, even as I type.  I have been reading it for two days now and I know it will change our finances.  I am believing that it will change the way my husband and I live and spend.

We do not make a lot of money, we are not upper class, but we certainly should be able to survive on my husband’s income.  However, we don’t.  Now, anyone who knows me well, knows that we have had some medical issues that have altered our circumstances a bit.  Still, Debt-Proof Your Marriage: How to Achieve Financial Harmony (Debt-Proof Living) has guidelines that will help a couple have money put up for emergencies. 

My husband and I have talked extensively about my being home full time and working on my home business endeavors.  This would help our entire family.  We have purposed to make things so that I can be home and we will be able to remain afloat (and doing fine) should another emergency arise.  We have tried this before, but this time we are purposed to make it really happen.  Both of us — on the same page — reading this book together and believing we can make it happen.

Mary Hunt has so many ideas that are going to help us do this.  One of the things I have already found in her book — Debt-Proof Your Marriage: How to Achieve Financial Harmony (Debt-Proof Living) — that has appealed to my heart is for wives to honor your husbands as the leader of the family and for husbands to nurture your wives.  She encourages giving from your money first to help others and paying yourself first, some things we need to do much better at!

Anyway, if you are struggling financially right now, spending more than you make, amassing debts that you are worrying about paying, or just starting out without a purpose for your money and without really knowing each others’ spending habits, I highly recommend you put this book in your home library, or go to your local library and check it out!

Leave a comment   Book Reviews, Debt-Free Life

I Am Making a Budget!

By Lynn, on June 11th, 2007%

I don’t have anything exciting to write about today.  In fact, I’ve been downright depressed today over the cost of living.  I am going to have to cut more corners.  I am going to have to make a very strict budget on paper using figures I know we can count on and then stick to it no matter what.

There are just too many bills and not enough money, and yet we do NOT live extravagantly.  What is a family to do?

I was reading in People magazine today as I waited in line at the check-out in Wally World about the Duggars.  Whew.  Their grocery bill was said to be 2,000 dollars a month.   I guess mine seems small compared to that.  I guess.  It’s just costing me so much these days.  What we are able to afford seems so out of proportion to how much time we have to enjoy it.  (We cannot afford much and it seems we work all the time.)

I was in Sam’s Club not long ago and noticed Why We Want You To Be Rich.  The blurb explaining the item said that the rich in this country are growing richer and the poor are growing poorer and soon there will be no in between. 

Scary.

One comment   Debt-Free Life
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