Meal plan!

Ok folks!  Here is my April meal plan and shopping list.  I expect to get all of these things for $300 or less.  I grocery shop for most things on the first of the month and return once a week for perishable items only.  If something I need is not on sale at the first of the month and I know it will go on sale, I only buy what I need to make it through the week.  For example, pasta, never pay full price for a box of pasta.
Husband and I eat either leftovers or peanut butter and jelly for lunch every day, so this plan is for suppers only.  We eat eggs and toast every morning.  I have included some basic recipes more so you will know why I am buying the items on my shopping list.  These are in no way complete recipes but you will be able to look up online anything you need, especially the unsloppy joes.  Husband gets mad because I never measure anything, I just eyeball it; therefore, it is impossible for me to write complete recipes.  Also, for complete transparency I am including my complete shopping list.  Some of these items are to send to school for snack and others are for the 2 year old who is allergic to half of everything.  We have stopped drinking sodas in part to save money and also because they are just bad for you.  Husband still has a few 12 packs from February that he is hoarding, but after that, never again!

April
1	M	Pesto
2	T	Chicken Noodle Soup
3	W	leftovers
4	Th	Poppy seed chicken
5	F	Avocado
6	S	Fried Rice
7	S	unsloppy joes
8	M	chicken/broccoli
9	T	beans and rice
10	W	chili
11	Th	Pesto
12	F	Pizza
13	S	Fried Rice
14	S	Chicken Noodle Soup
15	M	chicken/broccoli
16	T	leftovers
17	W	unsloppy joes
18	Th	Rice and Beans
19	F	Pizza
20	S	Fried Rice
21	S	Pesto
22	M	chicken/broccoli
23	T	Poppy seed chicken
24	W	BLT
25	Th	Chicken Noodle Soup
26	F	Pizza
27	S	Fried Rice
28	S	kabobs
29	M	Pesto
30	T	Rice and Beans

Shopping list

1 packages of bacon	1 cresent rolls
1 pounds of ground beef	3 cream cheese
12 pounds of chicken	2 grand biscuits
1 package of sausage	ketchup
one pinapple	mustard
one basil package	brown sugar
1 bell pepper	worcester sauce
1 avocado	rosemary
3 bags cheddar cheese	thyme
4 pesto	bay leaves
7 boxes of noodles	string cheese-snack
1 bag of cheddar cheese	4 peanut butter
6 bag of frozen veggies	1 jelly
one tomato	5-18 count eggs
3 broccoli heads	3 loafs of bread
2 bags of tortillas	30 baby food
6 Zucchini	30 bananas
butter	4 bags of grapes
3 bags of rice	15 cans of pears
2 boxes of zataran	5 milks
mayo
teriyaki sauce
tomato paste
sour cream
2 cans of hormel chili
1 onion
bella mushrooms
3 bags of spinach
2 sour cream
3 frozen pizzas
salsa

Pesto

Ingredients:   Sundried tomatoes, Baby bella mushrooms, Spinach, Butter, Full box of pasta, Olive Oil, Buitoni Pesto, One chicken breast

I buy the prepackaged pesto for about $4 at publix.  It is apparently very easy to make, I just haven’t done it yet.

Cook pasta, grill chicken on George Foreman, cut chicken into very small pieces, sauté mushrooms in butter for about 5 mins add chicken for one min, add spinach and sauté for another min. 

Stir everything together.  I mix a few sundried tomatoes in as I’m serving.

Chicken Noodle Soup

Ingredients:  2 bags of frozen vegetable soup mix, 2 chicken breasts, full box of noodles, rosemary, thyme, water, bay leaves, pepper

This is by far the cheapest item on the menu, it costs about $10 to make.  That is why we eat it every week during no spend months.  Plus the leftovers last us two more nights.  That is 3 full meals for 5 people!

I fill my crockpot up with water, a few bay leaves, and 2 chicken breasts.  Turn it on high and leave it for about 6 hours.  At that point I take the chicken out and it easily shreds.  I get my soup pot and put the chicken, water from the crock pot, 2 bags of frozen vegetables, rosemary, thyme, pepper, and let it simmer for about 20 minutes while the pasta cooks separately.  I add the pasta and it is ready to eat.

Poppy seed chicken  served with green beans sautéed with butter and onions

Ingredients: sour cream, cream of chicken soup, poppy seeds, one chicken breast, butter, ritz

Equal parts sour cream and cream of chicken soup cover left over chicken breast that was cooked in crocket pot with bay leaves and shredded while hot.  Top with crumbed ritz, butter, and poppy seeds.  Bake 350 for 15-20 mins

Avocado

Ingredients:  Crescent rolls, shredded chicken or other leftover meat, avocado,  cream cheese, salsa

Unroll crescent rolls and fill with a little of each ingredient.  Roll up and seal.  Bake per crescent roll instructions.

Fried rice

Ingredients:  2 cups of long grain rice (do not use instant, it is too sticky), onion powder, egg, zucchini, 2 chicken breasts, teriyaki sauce

Follow this recipe and ingredient list to make yum-yum sauce http://recipes.sparkpeople.com/recipe-detail.asp?recipe=158888

First thing in the morning, make yum-yum sauce and cook rice.  Put both items in the refrigerator when finished.  Cut chicken into cubes and place in teriyaki to marinate.

Later that day, scramble 2 eggs.  Put butter in a skillet and add the rice along with teriyaki sauce. Fry the rice while re-enacting your best shogun experience.  Cut the zucchini into one inch slices and quarter those.  Add those to the now empty egg pan with some butter and teriyaki sauce.  Stir the egg and a little onion powder into the now fried rice.

Chicken and broccoli

Ingredients:  one breast of shredded chicken, one pound of broccoli, cream of mushroom soup (following this recipe  http://www.food.com/recipe/homemade-cream-of-mushroom-soup-264191)

Cook broccoli and shred chicken.  Heat oven to 350.  Place chicken, broccoli, cream of mushroom soup and cup of shredded cheddar cheese in dish in the oven for 15 minutes

Rice and beans

Ingredients: zatarans red beans and rice, turkey sausage, onion, green bell pepper

Cook at directed

Pinterest fails

I have a love/hate relationship with pinterest.  It inspires me.  Then it depresses me.  I have had far more fails than successes but still I pin and still I try.  Lets have an example. 
Little Red Hen's aluminum foil silver leaf 

My aluminum foil silver leaf

No comparision.  Her's is wonderful, inspiring, finished!  Mine is peeling, mismatched, aluminum foil stuck on a dresser looking.  No bueno.
Or how about the myth that a sponge with half blue dawn and half vinegar will clean soap scum.  Yeah right.  I just moved into a brand new house aka no soap scum.  I used that brush everyday and something happened all right.  A whole lot of soap scum.

Or baking soda will clean scorch marks off your smooth top.  Sometimes it will but no more than anything else and it is pure ellow grease that gets it off.

Borax mixed with sugar/syrup/etc does not kill ants.

To close, I am not the only one.  Please share your pinterest fails in the comments section. 

Clean room

How do you clean your house?  Do you clean one room at a time or do everything in one day in a major cleaning fest?

I used to clean everything in one day.  Then I would to take a long hot bath, pat myself on the back, and not worry about it until the next week.

Then I had the terror known as Carter.

I say that jokingly...  sorta.

Now, I clean when I can but I never feel like the house is clean like clean enough that I can sit down and not feel guilty.  Take yesterday for example.  I cleaned the bathroom.  Like really, really cleaned the bathroom.  That kinda of clean that some people only do once a year but my father does every other day at his house.  I'm extremely efficient, but it took me about 75 minutes uninterrupted to do this.  Then I walked in my room, sat down and felt like I accomplished nothing because my room is a mess!  The baby woke up from his nap and was ready to eat so I couldn't do anything about it right then.  So instead I made a list of what I needed to do to get things done in there.  The list is 2,000 feet long! 

Let me take a moment to let you know we just moved into a new house August 4th.  I was 32.5 weeks pregnant.  August 9, 10, 11 I was in the hospital in preterm labor.  August 14th the baby was born. 

So I've been trying to turn this house into a home bit by bit.
My problem is our old house had large closets.  Seriously my closet could have been a 4th bedroom.  Our new home has little bitty closets so I have a bunch of stuff I have no idea what to do with.  I need to buy about 3 dressers because we don't own any, because our old closets were HUGE.  However, we lack the $$$. So I have a lot of stuff that doesn't really go anywhere.  I have decluttered to the max, so everything we have, we need.  I have great storage solutions for the boys, just not us.  I found these lovely cabinets.  I want 3 of them to span one wall in our bedroom.  Look down until you see the price tag.  That is why we don't own them.  I don't want to settle on something cheaper I don't love.  I have been advised to get something temporary (thrift store cheap). 
Here is the reason why I don't want to do that...

Remember him, the cute guy.  He would not let me get those lovely dressers if we have already spent money on something temporary, no matter how little money.  He is totally against "fixin' something that ain't broke." 

If you look in the back ground of the picture you can see what I mean.  In the dresser are our summer clothes.  That dresser is actually our buffet from our dining room set.  You see all the pillows stacked in the corner.  Where do you put those when they are not on your bed?  My linen closet is the size of my pinky.  It doesn't even fit all our towels and sheets.  (Yes those are aluminum foil wrapped bunny ears aka antenna, told you we are serious about saving money.  And no we do not have netflix, hulu, or any of the other tv cheats.)  So here are some real room pictures.

So the line on the wall is a Christmas count down for Cade.  I'll post about it later.  As you see we have an elliptical machine, pack and play, and travel bassinet.  Where do you keep these things?  I don't want them in the garage. 
Then we have the chair I need to recover and the printer.

Here we have the car seat's home when not in use and the fancy bedding.

You can see I need a bed skirt but I have an idea to make one...  you will see soon.  Yes, the baby is asleep on there.  I laid him down so I could take these pictures.

There is my vanity that I refinished, that we found on the side of the road.  Yes, I am that person.  It is holding everything I need to nurse and is beside my beautiful but impractical white chair that will be uncovered when the kids get older.  Under the vanity is our luggage.  It either goes there or the pantry....  Awesome choices right?  Also notice the tray table in the middle of the room with books.  It is serving a purpose.  The baby monitor has to be in that location.  Any lower and it will shriek at me.

My goal is to make this bedroom a happy, loving place for my husband and me.  However, it is currently home to unfinished projects and things that don't go anywhere yet.