Frugal Food: Day One
Ok, ok I said weekly updates, but going through our food and my strategies for food today I realized there is a LOT going on. Way too much information to shove it all into one post! So I'm going to do daily blogs until we get further along and I've explained what I am doing thoroughly.
Today actually started yesterday. I find it way easier to prep as much as possible the night before when the kids are in bed and I can think clearly, rather than trying to make everything from scratch and six little ones needing my attention. Knowing I didn't want to spend any money at the store was extra motivation for me to plan ahead.
So last night I decided we would do this overnight oatmeal recipe for breakfast. We made the oatmeal bowls into little monster faces so the kids would think the oatmeal was green as a fun joke, rather than as a way to add more spinach and kale into their diets. I call it green monster oatmeal, and it was more or less a hit with everyone.
I got all of the ingredients from our current pantry and refrigerator stock. Aren't they adorable?!
Jacob's had a mustache!! >.<
The kids also munched on carrots before breakfast as a snack. Jacob had an extra apple with his oatmeal.
For lunch we had leftovers from yesterday, an Asian-style vegetable stir-fry with black rice. I added some extra cabbage, peppers, canned pineapple and grapes (yes grapes are super yummy in stir-fry, who would have thought?!?) that I had laying around to freshen it up a bit.
After lunch Iakabos went to grab enough grocery cash to last us until the next paycheck, a whopping $80.00 for eight days. The extra fifty cents per day I figure I can find in the spare change laying around the house...
I put the money in our grocery envelope, because the envelope system is awesome. And I created a new envelope called Bulk Food. Our $10.50 per day that I have allotted for groceries, plus the $1.50 per week just-in-case money, will go into the grocery envelope. I'll take out my daily cash each day and go to the store and buy what we need for food.
Whatever is leftover will be put in our Bulk Food envelope. I will use that money to purchase bulk or more expensive items that I can't afford in my daily budget. Today I'm not going to need to go to the store at all, so I just put my $10.50 straight into the Bulk Food envelope and got a head start on that!
For afternoon snacks I had some leftover bean tacos, the kids finished off our popsicles and Jake found a random ice cream cone in the freezer. Lucky...
After all of that was settled it was time to think about dinner, the only meal I didn't prep ahead of time. Last week I bought some tomatoes and quinoa to make stuffed tomatoes for a meal, so I decided to follow through on that before my tomatoes went bad, but I felt ill mid-afternoon and couldn't finish it. So we went to Plan B, a quick pasta dish.
I didn't have any marinara left, just a can of plain tomato sauce, that looked more like soup than sauce... and some oil, herbs and spices. It wasn't great, but it was edible at least! Iakabos also cooked up some ground beef to add to the kids' noodles.
What about Hope; what were her meals? Most days she eats what we eat, just blended and maybe with a few extra ingredients added for more calories or flavor. Today she had what the rest of us ate. If she does get something extra I will add it into my notes; otherwise just assume she's eating like the rest of us.
I know this is super detailed, but I don't want people to think we are going hungry, lol! If we start going hungry I'll definitely up our grocery budget. Today there was plenty of food. ;)
