Sunday, October 22, 2017

Grocery shopping STINKS, but meal planning helps.

One of the worst jobs in this house is far and above grocery shopping. It takes me a really long time to make a menu and make a shopping list. It takes me even longer to shop and I usually forget something, get confused as to what I'm doing, and I always come home angry. Not at the shoppers or the store, but just my own limitations now.

For example, today? Today my cart was so full, literally overflowing, and I couldn't push it anymore. A very nice guy offered to push it for me until I was done. It was really nice and I must have had the "I don't know what to do, I need this stuff, but I can't move it" look on my face. But I came home really irritated because I hate that I need help. I hate being dependent on other people. It's really frustrating and demoralizing for me.

Anyways.

But people wanted me to share my menu for the next 16 days to get an idea about menu planning. Matt's paychecks are bi-monthly, always the 7th and 21st, so on long months with 31 days, the wait for his next check is kind of a pain. Bill paying wise, this is a great set up because I always know what bills go with what check, but when life happens, that's not fun. Matt does a lot of the budgeting, bill paying, numbers stuff now because I'm just not able. And again, really frustrating and demoralizing.

Anyways .

So here we are, our menu. I'll make notes and if you want a recipe, I can give you the link or email you what I do, just leave a comment and your email and I've got it handled!

Crockpot Chili (we had this tonight- delicious! I have more than enough for lunch tomorrow)
Shake & Bake Chicken, Macaroni, vegetable
Tacos
Spaghetti
Meatball subs, pasta salad, chips (I use my leftover spaghetti sauce for this. I put the sauce and meatballs in crockpot, cook all day on low)
Crockpot Cube Steak with egg noodles, and mashed potatoes (for Matt) (This is SO GOOD.)
Lasagna (I make my own)
Burgers, baked beans, macaroni
Crockpot Chili Mac (I found a new recipe, so we'll see how it is. I'll have this cooking so Matt doesn't have to cook as I'm driving to Mayo Clinic for appointments.)
Order Pizza!  (It's a Halloween tradition that we order pizza, plus I'll be coming home from Mayo around dinner time.)
Spaghetti
Crockpot Chicken Tacos (This is AMAZING. It always makes a lot and I use it on a salad or nachos the next day for lunch.) 
Crockpot Beef Stew
Pork chops, stuffing, corn
Steak, scallop potatoes, vegetable
Pancakes, sausage, eggs

So you can see I use a lot of crock pot meals. Tuesdays are sometimes tough because Olivia has dance so I make sure to have dinner done right at 4 when Matt comes home so we can eat together. We almost never get takeout for dinner, that's usually a weekend lunch while we're out and about. We always eat together at the table. Even on days when Olivia has to be somewhere by 5, we're eating right at 4. Every meal will have some leftovers for Matt's lunch next day and for Penelope and Lucy's lunch. Sometimes Matt doesn't bring leftovers and opts for a sandwich instead, and that's cool. I also try to make one dessert in my calendar, so this time I picked an Orange Cake that I found on Pinterest. I had everything except the orange that it calls for, so we'll see.

A long time ago I did a post all about my menu planning (an actual step by step guide on how I do it), so if you go HERE you can see that if this is still confusing.

1 comment:

Lauren said...

Ooh can I have the recipe for the crockpot chicken tacos?? lauren51990@aol.com

-Lauren