At the beginning of July, I had a major surgery which then resulted in being on pain medication. I was not allowed to drive for a few weeks, had weightlifting restrictions, and was then a bum for two weeks. With Tyler working and 4 kids home for summer break I did not want to have to take a night to drive as an entire family to the grocery store. I mean, how un-fun is that?! So, I succumbed to having our Groceries delivered, and let me tell you I LOVED IT. For a small fee of $3.99 plus 10% tip our groceries were bagged up, driven to our home, then placed on the porch and voila! Food. Glorious food.
Disclosure
Published August 6, 2021
Updated March 9, 2022
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Groceries and Budgets
Not being able to lift over ten pounds has its perks! Our sons Sam and Matthew then unpacked the Groceries and put them away like pros; what a great learning experience for them! Now they finally know where all the food gets put! No more asking mom 1,000 times a week where x-y-&-z is. How great is that!?
Additionally, I am a big fan of budgets. In 2018 Tyler and I took Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University and, in the process, cut up credit cards, got on a weekly & monthly budget and then got out of debt. Our food budget is divided up weekly and we use cash for everything. So, the issue comes up when I had grocery orders… does the fee and tip count towards our food budget? Nope. That is a sunk cost honestly. Tyler and I discussed it and not having to bring our kids to the store (especially during a massive pandemic) was totally worth the additional cost.
No one wants kids licking carts, touching EVERYTHING, going to the bathroom a dozen times, running around, and my favorite; screaming. Let’s avoid that, folks! I have a 5-year-old and a 3-year-old. I LOVE to shop but bringing them is not joyful. Or peaceful. So, the additional cost of a grocery delivery is seriously the best and totally added to our budget.
Check out Financial Peace University by clicking the link below.
*Not sponsored by Dave Ramsey or Financial Peace University*
Check out Amazon for a full kit for Financial Peace University. The prices change a lot and shipping is fast!
Weekly Meal Plan
This week we planned our meals to be quick and easy with not a ton of steps and prep because this is only the second week I have really been “back at it” so to say. Having Groceries that are easy meals so soon after a surgery sure helped with meal planning and cooking.
Monday: Spaghetti
Tuesday: Chicken Pot Pie with homemade Pie Crust
Wednesday: Pizza
Thursday: Enchiladas
Friday: Chicken Tetrazzini
Saturday: Broccoli Cheese Soup
Sunday: Grilled Cheese on Homemade Bread with Tomato Soup
What We Ate This Week
Monday: Spaghetti is such a quick and easy meal. I have been making it since I was in 7th grade, and I remember in Health class I was one of the few students that had cooked ground beef. This week I used 3 pounds of pork sausage, 2 jars of traditional spaghetti sauce and a package of spaghetti pasta. Sprinkle the top with fresh grated parmesan cheese and you have a super delicious dinner! One of my most memorable meals as a kid was spaghetti with canned sweet corn. Yes, it is simply amazing, and I am more than happy to share that experience with our kids. Click the link below for my spaghetti blog.
Tuesday: I like to make pie crust, but the rolling would have been too much for my muscles and healing, so I totally cheated and bought pre-made crust. And to be honest I am completely ok I did because our family still had 2 awesome pot pies and I got to cook, and no one complained they were not “from scratch”. The kids said they were “the best they ever ate”. Thanks, ALDI, for awesome crust!! You saved my abs from work I didn’t need to do.
Win-Win.
Check out my recipe for Homemade Pie Crust below!
PRO-TIP: crack an egg and whisk with a fork and brush the top of the crust with the egg. It levels up the crust, even when you didn’t make the crust from scratch.
Wednesday, Tyler surprised us with a pre-dinner ice cream treat and then we headed to a local park to hang out. My parents brought us a live trap a few weeks ago so we could relocate a couple of chipmunks that have been causing our foundations and landscaping some distress. They dug under a portion of our driveway and have a tunnel and near our back patio area they are digging next to our foundation. Not cool. So, chippies have to go! It was so cute watching them release it and seeing it scamper away with its cute little tail up in the air. The little bugger just scampered away, frolicking in its new home. Seriously it was just too cute.
It was well past my starting any sort of dinner by the time we left the park, so we just stopped and bought some pizzas from the grocery store. It was totally ok because we had cash on hand in our money envelope to do so! By paying cash we sometimes have leftovers from other weeks so we can do these really fun things, like not needing to cook. How great is that!?
Thursday, I made 2 pans of enchiladas, which amounted to twenty beef enchiladas. I sent Tyler with a few for work for lunch the next day and we literally ate an entire pan. Laughing at dinner, Tyler and I reminisced on how we used to have leftovers for days. Now I have to double our recipes just for leftovers. Click the link below to then get my recipe on how to make beef enchiladas.
Today is Friday and I will be making Chicken Tetrazzini based on my mother-in-laws recipe. It is one of Tyler’s favorites and I am so happy that Chris gifted me with her recipe! It’s SO good! Click the link below for the recipe for Chicken Tetrazzini.
On Saturday I am making broccoli cheese soup, which is amazing and creamy and so yummy! Click the link below for my blog post about broccoli cheese soup! Just make sure you do not make my mistake and not allow your cheese to fully blend into the soup.
Sunday: I will be making our favorite after church meal which is grilled cheese and tomato soup. The last time we made tomato soup we needed 5 cans and had no leftovers. It was not too long ago that 2 cans were enough. Can anyone else relate to your kids eating way more than you ever realized?!! We usually use 1 1/2-2 loaves of bread for grilled cheese with my homemade loafs. Check out my bread blog with the recipe below.
Resting and Groceries
Usually, I make so much food from scratch; cream of mushroom soup, pie crust, pasta, bread, garlic bread, pizza crust, marinara, tortillas… but with recovering from surgery I have been taking it easy. I am so blessed to have the ability to purchase food at such great prices for our family of 6 on our budget of $170 a week. Even buying premade food is so reasonable when I shop at ALDI. I know the quality is there and there is almost no preservatives and additives to the food we eat. That is one reason I typically make homemade; to accommodate not only my food restrictions and allergies but also to avoid the preservatives found in prepackaged foods.
I truly believe in setting a food budget on a weekly basis and shopping for only what you need. Instacart helps me to stay within our budget, buying only what is on my list, and helps save time by offering a delivery or pickup options. Depending on your needs and schedule I highly recommend looking into this service!
This post is not sponsored by Instacart
Happy shopping!
~Monica
p.s. Thanks for sticking with me as I get back into my blogs. This year has been super random and not consistent, and I am so glad that I have an audience that sticks with me. With my surgery last month, I had to take many weeks off for recovery. My doctor recommended that I literally act like a bum for weeks to not cause my healing to go on any longer than needed.
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