Sunday is usually my “prep for the weekday”. My husband works Sundays so I have time to myself to get things prepared for dinners, our lunches for the week, start on laundry, make sure uniforms are clean and ready and gear up for daycare for the coming week. The whole family comes to dinner on Sundays too, so it’s a busy day!
This last Sunday was especially busy! Granddaughter Brooklyn had an ice skating show Sunday afternoon.
Isn’t she just the cutest Tinkerbell you’ve ever seen?! They are not very clear pictures. The plexiglass at the rink is pretty beat up from hockey! You can see that she is quite good though! Especially for six years old! We are all so proud of her! She has a competition coming up in March in Montana. She will be practicing hard for that.
The Ice Show went longer than I had anticipated Sunday evening so I was really glad I had put a roast in the crockpot for pulled pork “Frito Burritos” as Brooklyn calls them.
My pork roast was a bit small so I put a small beef roast in another little crock pot. (I have three! I don’t feel you can have too many crock pots!) I put some beef broth over both roasts and a bit of salt, pepper, chili powder and cumin and turned them on low for the day. I put some rice in my rice cooker (An invaluable appliance!) and turned that on before leaving the house.
If you don’t already have a rice cooker, click on this one to check it out on Amazon!
When we all met back at the house for dinner the roasts were ready and so was the rice. My girls helped cut up some olives and tomato while I warmed up some black beans and refried beans and shredded the roasts. We got out the hot sauce, sour cream, jalapenos and the FRITOS! We wrapped all that up in giant burrito size tortillas. YUM! I wanted to get pictures but it was gone too fast!
Menu planning is vital for a well-run house. It is important for your budget, your health and for your sanity! When you plan ahead you can avoid having to eat out. I didn’t know that the ice show would go so long but I knew I wouldn’t be home to prepare something so I used my crockpot. Had I not planned ahead we probably would have had to order pizza. That would definitely not be good for the pocket-book.
After a long day at work, no one wants to try to figure out what to make for dinner or run to the store at 5:30. The drive-thru seems like a good option at the time but your health and weight will pay for that.
To save money, be healthy and have peaceful evenings, take a few minutes out of every week to plan a menu.
Take stock of what is in your freezer and pantry. Try to use things you have first. Check out your grocery store’s ads. Buy meat when it is on sale. My grocery store’s ads come out every Wednesday so that is the day I make my menu for the next week, Sunday-Saturday.
Look at your calendar, what do you have going on? Do you need to plan a crock pot dinner? Is everyone going to be eating together? Is there a night it’s just you and you can have leftovers?
Check the weather for the week. I am very much a “what do I feel like eating today” sort of person so weather is something that I look at when I make a menu. If it is raining and cold I am not going to want a salad for dinner. I am going to want soup and I know this about me, so I plan for it.
I use an awesome tool for menu planning. I have been using a computer program, Cook’n for all my recipes for a very long time and I absolutely love it! You can import recipes with a click of the mouse and drag and drop them into your week or month’s menus. I highly recommend the program. They also have an app for Android and IOS that is super convenient! The company has been around since the early nineties and has only gotten better over time. Their support is great too! I seriously couldn’t live without this!
It makes menu planning fun! Please check them out here:
http://www.dvo.com/index.php?CID=blondie
Whatever you use, whether it be a computer program, App or a pad and pencil, just use it! Plan! It will save time and money and it will give you and your family peaceful dinners together. Take a few minutes so that you can spend more time doing what you love with who you love.
Here is a link to the Neato Frito Over-Stuffed Burritos that we had for dinner on Sunday! Check it out! They were amazing!
The Self Cleaning House 