Restaurant Spending

I NEED TO SAY I AM MORTIFIED BY THIS POST.


I heard somewhere the other day about a "going out to eat" jar. It made me think. There are so many days I say, oh I just don't feel like cooking lets grab dinner, breakfast out. Sometimes we just run up the road and grab a burger or taco those nights run us about $30.00. Other nights we will be out and do a sit down nice dinner, those run us about $60.00. Even these two figures are shocking that's almost $100.00 in 2 dinners. Some mornings I'll feel like bacon eggs and hash browns, so well head out for breakfast, also costing us $40.00.
Last night I finally had the nerve to sit down and look at the bank statements. I looked at the 2 I see online dated from Jan 14th to Feb 22. I added up all the eat out food purchases. And our total was $628.87. I know that is HORRIBLE. To think that is just days over 1 month, we have been eating like that for years, in 1 year we have been spending $7536.00 give or take. I mean that's $3885.00 for the Bahamas and $3761.00 for Disney World. Two extravagant vacations. It is also 9 van payments at $780. each.
We too started our eat out jar, last night. We started with $40.00 now we just have to decided on how much and when to add money.

Does anyone have an "eat-out plan"??

I need to check out Dave Ramsey, I have heard his plans work wonders. If we are spending that much on food out I can only imagine what some of our other spending adds up to.

Rachel and Family

Dresses are for girls!!

Annabelle loves to wear dresses. As I say this I'm reminded she has 2 dresses and 2 skirts. I am and never have been a dress girl. It is hard for me to buy dresses knowing she will need tights, leggings, or shorts underneath. Makes more sense to just buy pants.
So she is always excited when dresses are bought for her as gifts. This one her Aunt Jessie got her for Christmas. The weather was finally nice enough to wear it the other day. Really she is excited about the dress, not so much getting her picture taken.

In a day or two I'll post about our evening at the park. The kiddos had so much fun. Lance got the camera for a few minutes, so there are some pictures of me (that never happens)!

Rachel and Family

Not such a baby anymore

As I went to wake Landon up from his nap on Friday afternoon, this is what I found..

Landon can now pull himself up into a standing position in his crib. He can also do it holding on to his walker in the living room. He is pretty good at it. He is fast in his crib up one side, sit down, and up the other side. He is also sitting by him self. He hasn't mastered crawling yet, he might just be a walker like Annabelle was.

Our baby is getting big.



Time for another one I guess.....


Rachel and Family

Ducky Jamas

I love that fact I have been able to use almost all the clothes from when Mathew was born with Jacob and Landon. The other night we realized that may no longer be the case for the Ducky Jamas.

As you can see we have tootsies poking out. Time for new Jamas! And that means it's time for me to dig out the bins and grab the next size clothes. Now if only I had organized the closet as Lance was putting bins away. Yep, that's two rows of bins.

Here's to a long Saturday morning!

Minestrone Soup???? Stew???

I never imagined all the ways to make Minestrone Soup. I have never eaten it, so too see so many ideas was a bit overwhelming. I have a total of 3 cookbooks, I hope to grow that collection in the next few years. So, I tend to rely on google for most recipes. I also heard about http://www.foodgawker.com/ from a friend. Thanks Amanda!!! I like to look at that for color, I don't like to make a recipe I can not see, know what I mean?


So the other day I decided to buy some veggies, in hopes I would try to make Minestrone soup. I tend to get scared off easily so I have other ideas so I don't waste the veggies. But this time I stuck with it and made my Minestrone. I'm sure you recall I mentioned in other posts I do not measure ingredients.




I started off with my leftovers from dinner 2 nights ago, a chunk of Roast( maybe 2lbs) and extra beef broth.





1/2 can beef broth


chunk of roast


3 carrots


4 smaller Russet potatoes (peeled and cubed)


2 celery stalks (sliced as you like)


1/3 white onion (chopped)


1/2 bag frozen peas


6 oz can of tomato paste


24 oz water



Place all items in crock pot. I cooked from 10am -5 pm on high temp. I took out my chunk of roast at 1pm so it wouldn't become too soft and shred, but it was long enough for the soup to gain the flavors. Normally you would add pasta when it is time to serve, but of course my plans didn't turn out.....

Here comes my twist. When Lance got home he saw the chunk of roast and asked why it wasn't in the soup. I explained and then he added well it already looks like vegetable soup so why not make it a stew. So stew it was. And when we sat down for dinner that is what it tasted like. Very good flavors, just not what I wanted to make.

Anyone have ideas on how to keep it Minestrone and Stew?!!!

In hopes for better soups!!

Rachel and Family!

The weight issue

So this post is just me ranting about my weight.



Ok you had far warning! I weigh to darn much. I know 4 kiddos , I should be worrying about other things. But all I am worried about now is , not wanting to get undressed everyday to shower. It disgusts me. Lance says he doesn't care as long as I'm happy. Well that's the problem I'm not happy. All the rolls, and bumps ugggggg. So I weigh in at 187. We have started to go to the gym every night, to get some weight and cardio workouts in. I use the elliptical every morning at home. I hope to start going to a yoga class, that scares me. I just want to be down 50 lbs. I have not set a "by this date" yet. I don't want to fail, but maybe Oct time frame?!

I need to find more healthy recipes, and snacks. Any suggestions?

Ok enough of my whining, back to the kiddo world.

Thanks

Rachel and Family

Dishes, dishes, ok I'll do the dishes

We have been very lucky over the last few years to be in on-post housing that has been renovated and has a DISHWASHER!!! I HATE washing dishes by hand. It could be because I had to as a child/teen, my parents didn't own a dishwasher till it was my sisters and brother time to start doing the dishes. But oh well life goes on I grow up and have a family and needless to say we EAT! So there are times when the dishwasher is full and I don't want the next load waiting in the sink for me. So I start to scrub away. Well I have tried a lot of sponges. Normal pads, scouring pads, the "fill the handle with soap" brushes, and have never been happy with the results.

We have the non-stick pans so I can't use the scouring pads or it will scratch the pans of course. About a month ago I found THE PAD. It has these little beads that scrub without being harsh, and it has a sponge side too.

I know the little things that make me happy. If it makes my life easier it make me happy!!!!

Here's the pad:

Have a GREAT day!!

Peaches and Sneezes

Today started like any other day. I woke up, got Annabelle and Mathew out of bed and fed them. Woke up Jacob, fed him. Lance came home between PT and work, so change and stay with the little boys. I took Annabelle and Mathew to school. Came home got Jake dressed. Woke-up Landon was feeding him Peaches, and then he Sneezed. I saw a little twitch in his nose and though nothing of it, till my face was covered in those same darn Peaches! Poor guy didn't know what to do, so he just started playing with the drops that landed on his tray. No worries we are all okay!!!

Have a wonderful Thursday!