I have started Week 2 of my new Menu Plan/Grocery Budget. I am enjoying the challenge. Last night dinner was boring but I got nutritionally creative. We had leftovers: soup, homemade bread – kneaded on my Roul’pat, baked on my Silpat – (an OK recipe, not great, probably won’t post it) leftover hummus, pickles, fresh picked blueberries. Not bad. Heathly.
Tonight was breakfast for dinner. Scrambled eggs, maple chicken sausage and homemade biscuits – kneaded on my Roul’pat, baked on my Silpat – with homemade blueberry jam. I really enjoyed eating the biscuits with blueberry jam. It was delicious and very satisfying. (Usually I don’t like to eat what I cook. I wonder what is different now?) Dinner tonight was delightful. L learned how to use a knife properly, and C actually ate! I told the kids that dinner was my favorite moment of the day 
We were all laughing and smiling. No tv, no tantrums. Everyone was dressed and stayed at the table for the whole meal. It was a miracle.
I started the week with $100 cash. I spent roughly $50 at 2 different Farmer’s Markets over the weekend; bought chicken, butter, honey, meat, fish, eggs and veggies for 3 meals. Today I took $48 cash to Trader Joe’s for the rest of the week’s groceries. I did it! Almost…I went over by $1.02. Not bad huh? I am very proud. So, except for some cheese I need later in the week, we are set for groceries for the week. It was very liberating to leave Trader Joe’s with only one big canvas bag of groceries, having spent 1/3 of what I usually spend. One trip from the car to the kitchen, no extra bags to store.
One thing I am struggling with is how to factor in bulk food. For instance, I bought blueberries, honey, lids, jars, pectin and lemons to make blueberry jam. I am not going to count $16 worth of blueberries and $14 worth of honey, along with the other jam expenses towards my weekly budget. Once I figure out how much a jar of blueberry jam cost me to make, I will figure it into my monthly budget. So, that means I have about $14 left in this week’s grocery budget….because I used grocery cash to buy the honey on Saturday. Cheese, here I come!
Tomorrow I am making raspberry jam…having picked 7 1/2 pounds of them today. I think I will use smaller jars, a pint of jam is a lot! I hope to yield roughly 8 pints or 16 half pints. I’ll try to start posting my costs soon. Numbers are hard for me….getting up with C every few hours for the last 2 years has cost me some brain cells, among other things.
