After much planning, shopping and saving, my freezer is packed to the gills with freezer meals or quick and easy meals. It took me nearly all week last week to finish my freezer meals. I did 7 different chicken casseroles and 8 beef casseroles and one eggplant casserole. All of these cost me less than $200.00 to do. It was much more difficult to do it this time now that I have a 1 yr old underfoot. However, it was well worth it. It will be so nice to save so much money through the next few months as well as saving time for dinner!
While doing all of these meals, I did slice my finger pretty good. That made it a little more difficult to finish cooking and cleaning up my messes but I'm on the mend.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Friday, September 19, 2008
Good News, Bad News
The good news is... my husband got paid today. The bad news is...since he is a teacher, they only pay once a month. It's hard enough to go down to one income muchless to only get paid once a month. Last month, we spent more than budgeted for groceries. Now, some of those were great deals that were worth spending a little more over the budget in order to save a lot in the long run.
Since things will be tight this month and it's a huge adjustment for us, we've done several things to help ease this transition. One of the 1st things we did was to put aside a little cash for "ICE" (In case of emergency) expenditures. This could go for gas, food, diapers, etc... that we might need if somehow things get tight before his next paycheck. Secondly, I've got 14 meals planned and will freeze these. Cooking in bulk saves a lot of time and money. If you haven't done this, try it with a few things first. I like to shop/cook the meat on one day. Shop for other items on another day and throw everything together on another day. It's so nice to choose what's for dinner in the morning, put it in the fridge to thaw and not have dinner to worry about in the evening. I also make a list of every meal that I have ingredients for or that are in our big freezer. I like to post this to the side of our fridge so it's easy for me to access it when I'm planning meals. In addition to this, I keep a white board/calendar on our fridge and update that with meals as well. These are just a few things that have helped us to keep better control of our grocery spending when things are tight. I also keep a "staples" list of things like; salad, sandwich meat, cheese, bread, etc... which I purchase almost weekly.
Our next step will be to revise our budget. Now that we know how much we have to work with this month, we need to create our new-est budget for September/October. I hate doing the budget - it depresses me but afterwards, I feel so much more in control of our finances.
What are things that you do to help when things are tight?
Since things will be tight this month and it's a huge adjustment for us, we've done several things to help ease this transition. One of the 1st things we did was to put aside a little cash for "ICE" (In case of emergency) expenditures. This could go for gas, food, diapers, etc... that we might need if somehow things get tight before his next paycheck. Secondly, I've got 14 meals planned and will freeze these. Cooking in bulk saves a lot of time and money. If you haven't done this, try it with a few things first. I like to shop/cook the meat on one day. Shop for other items on another day and throw everything together on another day. It's so nice to choose what's for dinner in the morning, put it in the fridge to thaw and not have dinner to worry about in the evening. I also make a list of every meal that I have ingredients for or that are in our big freezer. I like to post this to the side of our fridge so it's easy for me to access it when I'm planning meals. In addition to this, I keep a white board/calendar on our fridge and update that with meals as well. These are just a few things that have helped us to keep better control of our grocery spending when things are tight. I also keep a "staples" list of things like; salad, sandwich meat, cheese, bread, etc... which I purchase almost weekly.
Our next step will be to revise our budget. Now that we know how much we have to work with this month, we need to create our new-est budget for September/October. I hate doing the budget - it depresses me but afterwards, I feel so much more in control of our finances.
What are things that you do to help when things are tight?
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
My newest blog
I have a couple different blogs. This one is different. This one is solely dedicated to those things that my husband and I are doing to get out of debt. About 2 years ago, I tuned to Dave Ramsey's radio show. Since then, it has changed our lives! This site is mostly a place for us to log and track our successes and trials in our quest to become debt free. We are by no means experts in this, and we are still learning so much about this process. Each week I hope to update this (if not more frequent) and will post a new scripture and new quote from Dave Ramsey.
My goal is to put our goals and sucesses down "on paper". If someone else can use this information to better their lives as well, then that's just a bonus.
My goal is to put our goals and sucesses down "on paper". If someone else can use this information to better their lives as well, then that's just a bonus.
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