Letting It All Hang Out: Home

Showing posts with label Home. Show all posts

Thursday, September 29, 2011

$30 a week for Groceries...

This challenge that I gave myself has been extremely difficult. It's actually kicking my butt! I must say I have been defeated by this challenge in the first week. We didn't have much meat...burgers and brats don't really count as meat to me. We didn't have a lot of bread or veggies. So I've been scavenging for to find things for us to eat.

I did find a good new recipe though for potatoes. Plus on the upside it's super easy!

You take 2 lbs of potatoes (the recipe called for red potatoes but I used regular ones)
Dice them up
Put them in a ziploc bag
Pour in a little bit of vegetable oil (I used olive oil) & shake, coating the potatoes in the oil
Next Pour in a pack of Ranch Dressing Mix & shake, coating the potatoes in the ranch dressing mix.
Put seasoned potatoes in a pan (you do not need to grease it or cover them)
Put them in the oven at 450 degrees
Let cook for 35 minutes or until browned.

I've attached the link to the actual recipe from http://www.food.com/ so you can adjust the serving sizes if needed.
http://www.food.com/recipe/ranch-roasted-potatoes-42564

Now I know that this isn't the healthiest meal but it was all I could come up with.

I broke down and went to the store today and picked up more of the essitials such as; bread, eggs, chicken, and veggies. Like I said before this week kicked my butt! Only spending $30.00 a week on groceries is extremely difficult without a well thought out meal plan AND what really makes it tough is the type of meals I have had to make. I swear I feel like I have gained 10 pounds just from the scrappy and unhealthy meals we've eaten the past 3 days. I hope next week I can do better.

Monday, September 26, 2011

Cutting Food Costs & A Great Tuna Recipe

Recently we went over our finances and it seems like we are definitely going to have to start cutting our costs down. I'm HORRIBLE at coupining, there is no way I will ever be one of those extreme couponers. I just don't have space or the time for all that stuff. I think its great for those ladies who do it but I don't have the patience for it.

So I am giving myself a challenge.

We spend on average $120 every 2 weeks on food and that just includes what we spend on groceries. This excludes all the times we go out to eat. So I think on average we spend about $300 a month on food! $300!!! That is crazy to me, there's only 2 of us who are actually eating food at this time. How do we spend that much???

So the challenge I have set for myself and of course my husband is dragged along into it is...Spending only $120 a month on food, which means only $30 a week.

$30.00 a week for food that includes us going out to eat and groceries. Since we qualifiy for WIC we thankfully do not have to buy formula or baby food for our little man so this definitely helps us out.

I did my shopping last night and I bought...

1 gallon of milk (almond vanilla milk)-$3.50
1 lg pack of tortillas -$3.50
1 18 pck of eggs-$2.25
2 pks of Johnsonville Brats-$2.50 each ($5.00 total)
1 pk of 6 Frozen Hamburgers-$6.50
3 cans of corn-.75 each ($2.25 total)
2 bottles of pasta sauce-$2.25 each ($4.50 total)

Total $27.50

I left room for tax, plus I couldn't think of anything else that I needed for under $2.50

I already had bread, lots of pasta, and dinner sides.

I bought all of this so I can make breakfast for the week, grill out with the hamburgers and brats for dinners, and of course pasta makes great left overs and it's cheap!

One of my favorite meals that is so easy to make is kind of like a tuna salad...we don't really have a name for it, we just call it the tuna stuff.

Take 2 lg cans of tuna (drained)
Mix one can of mixed vegetables & 1 can of corn
Add a Tablespoon of mayo
Mix together well.
Serve on a piece of bread or a tostada. And you've got yourself a great and semi-healthy lunch. This makes about 4 servings so for 2 people you make 2 meals out of it. I also like to add tapito to it to add a little bit of spice!

I won't eat tuna any other way...I think it's nasty unless it's done this way.

YUMMY!!!

Friday, September 23, 2011

Make Your Own Baby Mei Tai

I had a friend of mine show me this awesome blog!

http://www.hobomama.com/2009/02/babywearing-heavy-baby-mei-tai.html

I've been looking for an easier way to carry Scout, especially when I'm out mowing the lawn or walking around where I don't need the stroller. I tried putting him on my back with the little carrier we have now but it's really uncomfortable and it's not made for that. So the link ahead actually showed me an easy way of how to make my own Mei Tai! Plus it also helped that my friend simplified the pattern for me since the one the lady has in this blog is a little confusing for me. Especially after looking at all her pictures. They're all of professionally made Mei Tai's so it was touch to see what she was talking about.

It requires 2 yards of fleece. Fleece is going to be your best best if you do not want to use a sewing machine. If you are good at sewing and would like to make yours a little more unique then I believe any material could work, I would just double check how long the material will hold up. I used Fleece for my first one and it's been working great!

This photo above shows the different lengths, now you can be flexible with these measurements. This can be made specifically for you and your comfort. The next one I make I'm going to make the bottom ties a little wider because with fleece it curls up and makes them a little too thin and it cuts into me a little bit. Also I'm going to add padding to the shoulders right now it's not cutting into me but I could see happening after a while. The middle is long so you'll have to roll it up if your baby is still small.

You'll see I used chalk to mark all of the lines to creat the outline. This was good because I got to see what on the outline needed to be changed.

After cutting out all the edges, I was left with my Mei Tai...but I thought this looked a little plain so...

I took an old receiving blanket that my little Guy can't use anymore. I pinned it around the edges of the already cut fleece and sewed them together along the edges.

Here is my finished Mei Tai! Me and my little guy in the front position.

Me and my little guy in the back position! It's taking him a little while to get used to it but I know I sure love it! It was so much easier and less pain to carry him around like that. The other benefit was if I was breastfeeding I could do this without having to stop what I'm doing. I'm excited to make these now as baby gifts for my friends!

Friday, September 16, 2011

MS WALK

I have recently been feeling the need to learn more about my grandmas and ask them questions that I want to know while they are still healthy enough to answer them. I asked my Grandma if it'd be ok and she was more then happy to do this for me. In fact she'd already started writing about her life and she wrote about my grandpa's life, her mom's life, and her dad's life. I didn't know any of them really. My grandpa died on September 27, 1993 when I was just 10 years old. I remember him being a fun and loving grandpa who gave the best hugs. So I was excited to have the opportunity to read more about him and the person he was.

After reading what my grandma and others wrote about my grandpa I learned that my grandpa was a great man and a selfless man. He spent his life serving those in his ward and in his community. His family although at times probably didn't feel like this were the most important people to him. My grandfather's life was full of hard work, fun, and activities. However, I believe in 1976 he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (not sure if I spelled that right) and it quickly took it's affect on his ability to walk.

After reading about his life I can only imagine how difficult it was for him to have his ability to walk and other functions taken away from him. I read that he wished that they could find a cure for MS and I feel like I now have a new purpose in life besides being a wonderful mom and wife. This purpose is to help this cause. My first step is to participate in the MS Walk on September 24th here in Utah. I am trying to raise $200 for this and I hope I make it happen. I'm excited to go to my first walk like this, I've always wanted to go but I never felt a personal connection, which isn't a good reason but I feel more motivated now to help (it sounds horrible I know!)

I have always felt a strong connection to my grandfather and to have this opportunity to help really gives me something to look forward to. I hope this can become a tradition for me and my family.

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Lesson in Marriage Update

Well after realizing how selfish I've been and going out on a date with my husband. We had a chance to talk about things and I got a chance to hear his side of it.

He didn't see me as being selfish he felt that little guy was just too much for me to handle so I was being more stressed out then usual. I didn't see that at all. I'm grateful that we had this chance to work it out. Life has been so much better for us and I feel like we are back to being a team. I don't feel that wall anymore and it feels so natural again just being together. I'm hoping that we can have more nights alone where we can focus on each other more and not on all the other issues like school work, baby, money, and family.

I am so much happier now and I am so glad we were able to work it out.

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Lesson #1 Of being a Stay at Home Mom

Image via Wikipedia

Well my first lesson as being a stay at home mom is to pace yourself! I treated yesterday like it was my day off. So I felt like it was my only day to get things done. I tried to clean my entire placei, it's not big so it's doesn't take a lot of time. I also detailed the truck and washed it to make sure it was nice and clean for my husband. He stresses when any of the vehicles are pretty dirty, he feels like we're neglecting them (hahaha). Then on top of it I added laundry and all I wanted was to take a nap.

Little did I know that was asking way too much! My husband was pretty much in his own world the whole day and Scout was taking naps at the worst times so I could never lay down and take a nap at the same time. By the time 8:00pm hit I was so tired that I wanted nothing more but to put my little guy to bed and enjoy some quiet alone time. That didn't happen of course, I ended up screwing up dinner and staying up trying to finish the laundry. Once my husband was asleep I finally had some quiet time. I swear I took advantage of it! I ended up taking a nice relaxing bubble bath and I enjoyed a few drinkings, that definitely helped me calm down and realize that for my next day I needed to take it easy and pace myself. I don't have only one day to finish everything I have an entire week. Today has been much better, I've just chilled the entire day and still had time to accomplish things around the house without feeling rushed, it's a pretty awesome experience so far! I hope the rest of this week will be better.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

I'm Startin New

My life is a mess! I swear there are days when I feel like everything is going on and I have no room just to chill and relax. Then there are other days where I feel completely content with my life. Today is one where I am on the fence, I'm happy for my life but I am scared of the changes that are going to happen. If I don't make a change I'm going to end up like this donkey,

My husband and I had a plan that when he got out of the Army that he was going to go to school and get his education. It's going to be 2 years since he started school and we just had our first baby 6 months ago. Well at this point our plan is getting a little off course. I've been working full time, taking care Scout while my husband is studying and I was going to school on top of that. At this point my husband, Marc, has been taking care of Scout while I'm at work. It hasn't been working, in fact my husband has been struggling with his school work. Trying to watch our little guy and study is very difficult. So we have decided that I am going to quit work and we are going to risk it all and live off of student loans.

I am terrified to be making this choice because of this economy and the fact that I have a good job. However, I feel that staying at home with my baby is going to be beneficial not only to my son but also to my husband. This will allow him the freedom to study and to succeed at school, which is why we are here in the first place. Not for me to follow this career a career, I don't even like. So here we go this is going to be one hell of a journey! We'll see where life takes me and see how I handle being a stay at home mom trying to find a way to provide for my family.

Letting It All Hang Out