School starts again tomorrow, and I have to say... I'm sort of sad! I had a lot of fun with D and F! (D went back to work today).
We managed to pack a lot into the winter break. Today was another basketball practice; the coach's daughter is one of F's best friends, so she came home with us after practice. We stopped at Starbucks on the way back from taking F's friend home because we got a gift card from the family of the girl we take to basketball practice during school. F got a strawberry cream something. She's still got one more drink left on the card; after that - no more Starbucks unless she wants to buy it herself.
When F was at practice, I went to Sprouts and bought the rest of this week's groceries. I did not succumb to the pretty "christmas pretzels" that were on sale in a barrel by the register. I still have a third of a cake in the freezer from Christmas dinner!
The meal plan for the rest of the week:
- posole and a salad (leftover posole will go into the freezer)
- leftover cock-a-leekie pie from Christmas (I put it in the freezer) with salad
- roasted veggies and rice
- grilled cheese and tomato soup
- sausage/lemon pasta (I need to think of something green to go with that - maybe peas)
I am toying with revising my meal planning technique. Right now we do one chickeny/turkey dinner, one thing from the freezer, one potato or egg thing, one bready/cheesy thing and one fishy thing. I am wondering if it might help with the budge to divide it up differently: one mexican thing with tortillas, one thing using rice, one potato thing. I don't know. I need to think about it.
Meal planning is always even more important when F has practices, and for January she has both basketball and soccer (indoor!).
Meanwhile, I am going to go make the lunch plan for the week for me and F. I've always planned F's lunches, but mine (even though I take my own lunch from home every day) are a little more free-form. I'm going to try planning for me, too.
Meal Planning in the New Year
January 3rd, 2017 at 01:44 am
January 3rd, 2017 at 02:41 am 1483411304
I'm a huge cheerleader for meal planning since experience has taught it solves a lot of problems for me. With a flexible plan in place, I easily list what is needed so that even DH can stop at the grocery if driving is too treacherous. I usually can 'piggy-back' one meal onto another by making enough rice for two meals for example [steamed rice Sunday becomes chicken fried rice Tues. or a casserole, added to home made soup or even dessert rice pudding]
We've had a 4% increase in food prices as our currency value dropped. Our new Carbon tax, has just added another 4% as gas increased to $ 6.30 a gallon when converting currency. I had been able to hold the line by sticking to seasonal, sale items. If your family is amenable to an ethnic meal it's fun for the cook to try out new ideas. Also by know what I'm making for dinner as I walk through the door, takes away OMG what'll I make!
January 3rd, 2017 at 04:03 am 1483416205
I feel like I do the same old stuff all the time, except with the soups I sometimes throw in Cajun red beans and rice or a chicken/sausage gumbo Nola style!
January 3rd, 2017 at 12:39 pm 1483447173
January 4th, 2017 at 03:14 am 1483499695