Our Day (yesterday) + Grocery budgeting

Guess what I did yesterday? I made dinner. Now, I make dinner a lot. But this was a nice dinner. And involved a little more than my usual dinners do. And I let Reed help me. We made macaroni and cheese, using my Mom's recipe, although I exchanged the 3 cups of sharp cheddar for 2 cups Colby and 1 cup Monterey Jack. (I'm not such a fan of sharp cheddar...mild is good, but I also like trying the recipe with different cheese.) It was sooooo good and sooooo pretty that I had to take pictures. I have more pictures from that day, including Jaxon's face when he ran outside for his daily viewing of the Choo-Choo that passes, and Reed and Jaxon putting sticky notes on the back of the couch and calling them "NFL pictures." (Football season started last night...) And I'm posting a couple of pictures of Savanna from that day as well.








I'm really proud of us because, just like my bloggity friend Christine, we've been applying a grocery budget, and a menu, and it's working! Or I guess I should say we're following it. We had food stamps before Phill got this job. And we were allotted a huge amount, which we carelessly used every month. But in preparation for not having that luxury, we decided to make a budget of $300.00 per month for our family of five. (Four of which actually eat the food, the fifth gets it in milk-form.) We shop for two weeks at a time, except for produce and bread (and sometimes snacks), which tend to need replacing every week. So we plan seven meals and just repeat them in the second week. And so far it's working well. And we're not stuck with the question of what to make until 7:00p.m., when we give up and just put hot dogs in the microwave. (Which is okay....but gets old after the third night in a row.) We've also budgeted a specific amount--kind of tentative for now, seeing if it will work--for fuel, fun, and household things (diapers, cleaning supplies, etc...). I must have some Planning & Efficiency bones in me, after all! :) Sometimes it's fun to be somewhat regimented. Hmm...spoken like a true Army brat and Army wife.