since we're on the subject...
I've started something new in the past couple of months and thought I'd share, because its been a time and life saver for me!
I've struggled with meals in general a lot since getting married. I am not the type that loves to cook so much, you will not find me in the kitchen non-stop. Mainly because that keeps me from keeping my home in other areas, or from being a Mom in the way (I feel) I should be. Same reason I don't live on the computer, or spend too much time on any one hobby. Again, personal preference, not necessarily the way it has to be for everyone.
I have struggled with not be able to always get that good, healthy, hearty meal on the table, at the same time (or near the same time) every night. About a year ago, I began praying about it and basically asked God to help me to use my creative side - what little it is... I told Him my frustrations and asked for His help and guidance in the area of better managing my time and especially when it came to grocery shopping and cooking meals. After about 4 weeks of praying about it and doing some reading, asking questions to other wives and talking to Jase about it, I feel like God has answered my prayers above and beyond what I asked of Him!
I have started a new routine of making a meal every day (typically during the mid-morning, afternoon, when at least Kara is napping) but that meal isn't for that night, its for the next night. Hopefully this will make sense... I started off by making 2 meals, in the beginning. The first we ate that night, the next meal was for the next night. Then, the next day I made another meal, even though I already had one made for that night. But that meal was for the following night. Does that make sense? So I've done that faithfully for the past 4 months. If I get behind, I make 2 meals the following night, to get back on track. This basically helps me to rarely fall behind and has left us with very few nights where we were busy that day and had no time to make something to eat.
I know some ladies do the all day cooking, once a month and they make a ton of food and freeze it. I did try that and didn't like it. Definitely didn't work for me. Took up a ton of room in my freezer and actually was a lot harder to cook fresh and healthy food that way. Again, I didn't like it, but it doesn't mean it won't work for another family. Sometimes we want to have things like steak, fish, or lamb or whatever and so I'll make the side dishes the day before and then make the main course that actual night we're going to eat it.
Its worked really well for me and has cleared up a lot of mental stress and feeling physically worn out everyday, when it comes time to the question "what's for dinner?!" I really noticed how much I liked it when we moved and I fell out of that routine for a couple weeks. I was so anxious to get back into it :)
Menu making has been a huge help for me. I make a new menu every week, but only go week-to-week. I have my shopping list organized by the aisles in the stores I shop in (thank you, Jill, for the great idea!) and I try not to spend more than $75 each week. We can typically make it just fine on $50 a week, but sometimes we splurge :) The grocery bill has gotten cheaper, since Kara no longer uses formula, but there's always something I can find to fill the void, sadly.
I've found grocery shopping to be difficult with all 3 kids; I have a hard time focusing and end up coming home either forgetting a bunch of stuff, or buying way too many things I didn't need.
Something that has helped me is to include Ethan and Rachel in the shopping. Ethan is getting very close to learning how to read - he can put letters together and figure out what the word says, like "Apple" so I can say "go grab Mommy 3 Zucchinis" and he knows to look for the letters Z and U and kind of finds it by process of elimination. Its really helped him to feel like he's actually helping me and I like that he's using his brain and learning a lot while we shop. Rachel grabs things off the shelf for me (things I point out specifically) and she'll do things like grabbing 4 apples and putting them in the bag. If I shop with them, this is what we do. It does make the shopping trip a lot longer, but we add it to "school" and chalk it up to good learning :) I'm not sure what I'll do with Jason's new hours. He suggested staying home while Kara naps and maybe having me just take one older child each week. He can stay home with whoever I leave and they can have some one-on-one time. I think I like that idea :)
Anyway, I thought this tagged along well with my previous post. Hopefully its helpful to you in some way!
Comments
I'm curious - how in the WORLD do you keep your weekly grocery budget between $50-75???? Does that include household items like diapers, paper towels, etc? What are you guys eating? :) Does that include your other meals/snacks as well? Do you pack food for Jason at work or does he get his lunches out?
I'm trying to figure out ways to shave off our budget, but the way we eat (organic, mostly meat and veggies, trying to avoid processed foods as much as possible), I'm hard pressed to spend less than $100...frequently it's more. :( Do you do all your shopping at one store?
I'd love to see a sample menu! And the organizing your list by aisles is such a great idea. I do that too and it definitely helps me get in and out in less time.
I don't really use coupons, I just shop at cheaper places. I'd like to get more in the habit of using coupons, if they'll work at the stores I shop at - it just tends to be another thing that takes a ton of my time.
We shop at Costco very minimally. We realized if we bought only the things that were proven to be cheaper there, we saved money. So things like Ketchup, mustard, mayo, butter, eggs, steak, chicken (sometimes), lunchmeat, bread, etc... otherwise everything else comes from stores around here that are cheaper. I rarely shop at Safeway, but I watch their adds, because sometimes they have great deals. I buy a lot of our dairy locally (mainly because you have many options to do so where we live) and I even found a local bread bakery that sells good, fresh made bread at low, low prices. So I might start going there as well.
I was not including household stuff in that budget. We only buy the household stuff like once a month and I do most of that from Target/Costco. Our household supplies from Costco we buy once every 3-4 months, but we do go to Target once a month for stuff like that.
I would say the household bill is around $150 a month, but back when we were buying formula, bottles, pacis for Kara, it was more like $200 a month.
I don't know too many families (our size) that go over $100 a mont, so you're right around the norm. No worries. :) We don't eat a ton of food... we do three meals a day and then for "snack" type stuff we do things like apples, cheese, raisins, celery and peanut butter (all not expensive at all). We are not big cookie, cracker, chips, candy, ice cream people - that saves a lot of money. I don't buy already packaged food, we don't buy much cold boxed cereal at all, I've recently stopped buying canned food and I'm doing my best to make all my things from scratch.
Not sure how long that will last, but so far its been fine. I'm rarely in need of canned food anyway.
I make Jason's lunch every day, unless he's going to lunch with his company, which is rare. We don't drink soda, juice or much alcohol. Jason will bring beer home every now and then, but its not a weekly staple. We've learned from other friends that alcohol is very expensive when you add it to your weekly budget.
Last night we had a baked chicken, some red potatoes and a salad with veggies in it. We also had 4 adults over and 2 kids and they ate with us. Tonight we're having grilled salmon, rice and steamed broccoli and then another night we'll have a casserole (my family loves casseroles) and then one night we typically have a pasta dish, then we'll have fish another night or two and chicken one night and then red meat 2 nights. We've recently upped our red meat intake since moving to WA where we see less sun :)
Even so, I buy the 3 pack of organic ground beef from Costco- its 3 lbs and only costs $10.00 (cheaper up here than in CA) and that lasts us 3 weeks worth of beef, since we only eat it twice a week, sometimes only once. Buying the steaks, ground beef and whole chickens at Costco has saved us quite a bit of money. Unless a notice another grocery store is having an even better sale.
Remember you live in a more expensive City than we do. Gas isn't the only thing cheaper up here - we've noticed milk is cheaper (actually most dairy is cheaper here) bread is a bit cheaper... oh, we don't eat much bread. We use it for sandwiches, but that's all. We do not eat french bread or any type of bread with any of our meals. No bagels; nothing like that. I actually buy very few carbs, I just noticed :)
Anyway, I'm rambling, but hope that helps. Like I said, we have lots of fiends that shop weekly cheaper than we do, so it is possible! I think the norm for a family our size is $45-100 each week. Definitely a wide range, but I think its all quite reasonable. We're all going to be very different.
I should probably add that I'm not a "brand snob" anymore. I did a little research and realized there are some brands that cost more, simply because of the brand name - not because you're getting a better product. Some things are worth it to me to buy the more expensive label (after reading the ingredient list) but some things... you're paying for the name.
I have struggled with the whole meal thing too. It's hard because I have a picky eater and like to cook from scratch which eliminates most casseroles.
I would like to work on getting my weekly bill down to about $100. I used to shop at Winco and some Trader Joe's, but I got tired of that. So now I do Costco and Trader Joe's and once in awhile Winco for what I can't get the other places.
We'll see. I would be interested in hearing more of the types of meals you make. Thank you for sharing all this. It good to hear other suggestions and ideas.
SO when you take meat out of our grocery bill, I think most people with only 3 small kids could do fine on up to $100 a week. It all depends on how you shop and where you eat. I typically make larger meals, so we either have them for lunch the next day or dinner another night of the week.
We went to Costco today and stocked up on all kinds of meat, including fish. My total from now through January was $160 -- so there you. Add that to my other bills :)
I was not including household stuff in that budget. We only buy the household stuff like once a month and I do most of that from Target/Costco. Our household supplies from Costco we buy once every 3-4 months, but we do go to Target once a month for stuff like that.
I would say the household bill is around $150 a month, but back when we were buying formula, bottles, pacis for Kara, it was more like $200 a month.
I don't know too many families (our size) that go over $100 a mont, so you're right around the norm. No worries. :) We don't eat a ton of food... we do three meals a day and then for "snack" type stuff we do things like apples, cheese, raisins, celery and peanut butter (all not expensive at all). We are not big cookie, cracker, chips, candy, ice cream people - that saves a lot of money. I don't buy already packaged food, we don't buy much cold boxed cereal at all, I've recently stopped buying canned food and I'm doing my best to make all my things from scratch.
Not sure how long that will last, but so far its been fine. I'm rarely in need of canned food anyway.
I make Jason's lunch every day, unless he's going to lunch with his company, which is rare. We don't drink soda, juice or much alcohol. Jason will bring beer home every now and then, but its not a weekly staple. We've learned from other friends that alcohol is very expensive when you add it to your weekly budget.
Last night we had a baked chicken, some red potatoes and a salad with veggies in it. We also had 4 adults over and 2 kids and they ate with us. Tonight we're having grilled salmon, rice and steamed broccoli and then another night we'll have a casserole (my family loves casseroles) and then one night we typically have a pasta dish, then we'll have fish another night or two and chicken one night and then red meat 2 nights. We've recently upped our red meat intake since moving to WA where we see less sun :)
Even so, I buy the 3 pack of organic ground beef from Costco- its 3 lbs and only costs $10.00 (cheaper up here than in CA) and that lasts us 3 weeks worth of beef, since we only eat it twice a week, sometimes only once. Buying the steaks, ground beef and whole chickens at Costco has saved us quite a bit of money. Unless a notice another grocery store is having an even better sale.
Remember you live in a more expensive City than we do. Gas isn't the only thing cheaper up here - we've noticed milk is cheaper (actually most dairy is cheaper here) bread is a bit cheaper... oh, we don't eat much bread. We use it for sandwiches, but that's all. We do not eat french bread or any type of bread with any of our meals. No bagels; nothing like that. I actually buy very few carbs, I just noticed :)
Anyway, I'm rambling, but hope that helps. Like I said, we have lots of fiends that shop weekly cheaper than we do, so it is possible! I think the norm for a family our size is $45-100 each week. Definitely a wide range, but I think its all quite reasonable. We're all going to be very different.
I should probably add that I'm not a "brand snob" anymore. I did a little research and realized there are some brands that cost more, simply because of the brand name - not because you're getting a better product. Some things are worth it to me to buy the more expensive label (after reading the ingredient list) but some things... you're paying for the name.
I don't really use coupons, I just shop at cheaper places. I'd like to get more in the habit of using coupons, if they'll work at the stores I shop at - it just tends to be another thing that takes a ton of my time.
We shop at Costco very minimally. We realized if we bought only the things that were proven to be cheaper there, we saved money. So things like Ketchup, mustard, mayo, butter, eggs, steak, chicken (sometimes), lunchmeat, bread, etc... otherwise everything else comes from stores around here that are cheaper. I rarely shop at Safeway, but I watch their adds, because sometimes they have great deals. I buy a lot of our dairy locally (mainly because you have many options to do so where we live) and I even found a local bread bakery that sells good, fresh made bread at low, low prices. So I might start going there as well.
I have struggled with the whole meal thing too. It's hard because I have a picky eater and like to cook from scratch which eliminates most casseroles.
I would like to work on getting my weekly bill down to about $100. I used to shop at Winco and some Trader Joe's, but I got tired of that. So now I do Costco and Trader Joe's and once in awhile Winco for what I can't get the other places.
We'll see. I would be interested in hearing more of the types of meals you make. Thank you for sharing all this. It good to hear other suggestions and ideas.