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Friday, March 28, 2008

Back from a Long Winter's Nap

Don't I *wish* I was back from a long winter's nap!

No, nothing of the sort was happening
just a busy life combined with a complete and total
lack of ambition when free time did appear.

So today we'll play a little catch up, shall we?
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Monday was the last day of spring break.
After whining like a mad dog about hating to cook
and not wanting to plan a menu,
I planned a menu.
And this was a good menu week, too!

A couple of new additions to our menu:
Dutch baby apple pancake
Whole grain breaded baked tilapia

The apple pancake was a huge hit.
The kids whined a bit over the tilapia
but they all ate it.
After it appears a few more times,
they'll get to liking it.

Tomorrow night will be the first time to fire up the grill
since winter really kicked in.
We'll be having the Evans' super secret fajitas,
with red beans and rice and all the fajita fixings.
Again, something that hasn't been in our rotation for a while,
so I'm excited to be eating something new.
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I also need to find new recipes for some foods
that I have in the freezer.

I stocked up on whole roaster chickens (.88 per pound)- I froze two
93% ground beef (1.99$/pound)- I have four bags of two pounds each, frozen.
ham steaks (.79/lb)- I have four ham steaks, individually frozen.

So there is no need to buy any more meat for the next three weeks, really.
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My kids eat a ton of fruit.
This has become one of the things I buy most of at Costco.
This week (Thursday) I bought a large bag of bananas (I think 4 pounds?),
a large container of fresh pineapple spears,
a large box of plums
and a large bag of pears.

I put out half of the bananas and they have been consumed.
Half the plums have been consumed.
Two pears thus far have been eaten.
Our family (+1) ate half the pineapple spears with dinner.

That is an impressively frightening amount of fruit being eaten!
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Our "Life in Budget" continues to go beautifully.
As for this week , we are fully credit card debt free.
What a feeling that is.
We will get statements and they will have zeros on them!

Mostly following Dave Ramsey's plan,
we use cash envelopes (or sections of wallet) for 1- groceries, 2-miscellaneous and 3- Leeann blow.
For me, grocery stores I only buy groceries. I buy no HBA stuff there.
Miscellaneous can mean a lot of things. It can be HBA stuff I might get from Target or Walmart. It can be dog food. It can be stamps. It can be money for the kids for the Scholastic book fair.
But what it can't be is regenerated before its time. So when it is gone, it's gone.
Leeann's Blow is money that I can use or spend just on myself: going out to lunch, buy a book I want to buy etc. Funny thing is, I just don't buy things often. I had almost all my blow money from this half month until today, when I gladly went and bought some special gifts for Trey's teacher's birthday. She is a remarkable, caring, fantastic kindergarten teacher. She has had a rough year this year but has been there for the kids each step of the way and we just love her.
So even though I didn't spend it on me, it was what I wanted to spend it on and it made me happy. So there!
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Such randomness.
So what did you think of this post?
Did you like seeing what it feels like to be in my head?
Did you hate it?
Does it make you think I must be really boring?

Drop me a comment and let me know what you think about my stream of consciousness...and I'm not even drinking....!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

What is HBA?

Anonymous said...

I, too, am wondering what HBA is.

nicrogers said...

I three am wondering what HBA is. I think your stream of consciousness post is great. Seems somehow familiar to me. I am not sure why?? lol ANyway, I also want to know how much you have in your three sections, blow, misc. etc. And what are Evans super or whatever fajitas and red beans recipe? Oh and I just stocked up on whole purdue chickens. .69 a apound baby! I only got three though because two weeks ago I bought 40lbs of boneless skinless chicken breasts for .50 a pound (it pays to know people). Also, we just got a side of beef so our freezers are full! The only thing I don't have is pork because we didnt get a piggy this year. But between all of the recent chicken and beef purchases(all organic and hormone free by the way) and the turkey and ham I got free from the grocery store(not organic but free so what the heck) we are pretty well off in the meat department.

We go to Sams and I have been buying this large package of baby spinach there every week. It is like 3 or 4lbs and organic. It only cost I think 4.99 so a great deal and it lasts for about 2 weeks. I have been making salads every day. I love it with sliced red onion, a hard boiled egg and mushrooms. Yum! I just throw my meat on top of it and it is so good.

Leeann said...

Hi ladies!

HBA means house and bath, or home and beauty type products. So, I don't count paper products (paper towels, toilet paper) or things like shampoo etc as grocery items. This is mostly because I seldom buy them at the grocery. Now that I am paying more attention to coupons though, if an item is on sale for a good price AND I have a coupon, I will go ahead and buy it there and just count it in the grocery category.

Hope that clears it up!

Leeann

The Amazing Trips said...

That's fantastic to be credit card debt free. What a relief! We just refinanced at a much lower interest rate and didn't have to make a mortgage payment for the month of March. It was SO nice having the extra $$ in the bank that my husband and I are now extremely motivated to pay off our house, ASAP.

Financial freedom is definitely where it's at!! :)