What I Spent, What We Ate | I’m under budget. Whee!

Wow it hurt my brain to remember what we had but it's fun to post so here goes :) Monday: refried bean tostadas with pork Tuesday: ground beef zucchini stirfry Wednesday: chicken enchiladas Thursday: cinco de mayo party, brought pineapple empanadas Friday: pasta for bible study Saturday: bbq chicken, sweet potatoes & baked beans Sunday: dinner at church!

This week, here are our meals:

Monday: Panini sandwiches with carrot sticks, cucumber slices and fruit salad Tuesday: Macaroni and cheese, salad Wednesday: Korean crock pot chicken rice bowls Thursday: Turkey burgers, roasted potato wedges, apple slices Friday: Probably get a pizza?

I'm still spending more than I'd like since, for now, I physically can't cook much. Some ways I've tried to reduce the outflow: Buying cut-up fruits and vegetables. I hate spending the $, but to eat healthfully at home it's the best workaround I've found. Open to others... Bringing grapes, bananas, and snow peas to work as snacks since they don't have to be cut up. Stretching out restaurant leftovers. I love a rice bowl and honestly, they're mostly rice. Adding some chicken and veggies of my own helps stretch it out to another meal. Scrambled eggs in a microwave via coffee mug - am I the last to know?? Eggs without trying to lift and clean a skillet! The hubs had a rare afternoon home (it's his busy work season). He made homemade pesto with basil from our garden. We also grow scallions, thyme, and the peppers are going in this week.

Somehow I managed to get through this week without shopping at all - in fact, I haven't shopped since last Thursday and that was only for produce and some dairy. Wow! That is Crazy for us:)

We ate well anyways: -Spaghetti, marinara, homemade meatballs, sautéed zucchini -turkey burgers and hot dogs, Cole slaw, rosemary fries, watermelon -homemade tomato soup and grilled cheese, fruit -nachos before the school concert - take away pizza, veggies and ranch from home

Will need to shop this weekend I suppose and I believe roasters are on sale this week so that's what we may be having tonight:) after an expensive April I hope to keep our budget in check this month - $800 for the month would be great!!!

I am so lucky in that my husband will uncomplainingly eat the same meal until we finish it, but this week really taxed his good humor. Monday morning I decided to make soup from leftovers in the freezer and cupboard supplies. Into the pot went four cans of diced tomatoes, a half a bag of meatballs, about 3 cups of pasta I had made to excess and so put the extra in a freezer, two cups of shredded frozen zuke from last summer's garden, onions frozen from last summer's garden, and some left over basil pesto from last summer's garden. And two heads of garlic. A few spices and it ended up tasting terrific...only by the time the pasta swelled some more I had to add two more cans of diced tomatoes to keep it a soup consistency. We have eaten this soup every night since Monday and will finally finish it tonight. I made different bread or rolls every night, in an effort to change things about a bit, but at this point we are just taking one for the team. But it does mean the only cost for groceries this week was a gallon of milk and six lemons for my homemade iced tea that keeps me away from pop--so, I guess $8 for groceries this week does ease the pain. (We still have 61 cans of diced tomatoes left! and 109 cans of tuna...they were on sale months ago for less than 40 cents a can each and I got a bit carried away. My husband put our bed on wood blocks so we could store the cases under our bed. The only thing my long-suffering husband said when he saw my haul was, "Well, I am glad poop was not on a really good sale.")