Meal planning

Hello again, In my quest of preparation for the new school year I have discovered the ancient art of meal planning! OK maybe I'm being just a tad dramatic...Well it seemed like something Our grandma's would have done way back when. I never gave it a try because it looked like it would take so much time and I wouldn't follow it anyways because I'd get lazy at the end of a long  day of work and just want to pick something up.

Well I don't have that excuse anymore, and my hubby totally call me out on it too!!! (OH NO HE DIDN'T!) I'll admit, He had a point... It was a good thing, If you know me the only thing that motivates more than anything is a good old fashion challenge. And even though He didn't triple dog dare me, That's how I took it!

I just love Erica over at Confessions of a homeschooler , She is the Martha of Homeschooling in my book. And though I'm not as type A as she is, I totally appreciate all the amazingness she post on Her blog. It's really helped me a lot! She post monthly Meal plans that you can follow or edit your self, The first time I saw this I passed right by. Then I remembered the unspoken triple dog dare... Maybe this would work for our family, maybe this would save money, maybe I would buy vegetable and actually use them before they grew fur in my fridge, maybe this could keep me accountable to cook every meal and not be a lazy butt...The possibility were endless!

So I downloaded and started planning a months worth of breakfast, lunch, snacks and dinner. I know it seems boring & tedious, but it was actually fun!
There were a bunch of ideas for new meal option already provided and whatever I didn't like i changed. The hard work of making a spreadsheet was done for me (thanks Erica) When I was done I sat back in utter shock. A whole month planned! Every meal! I never I had to wonder or hear " Whats for dinner!?!" My shopping list was done and It would totally keep me to my budget! I know this may not be a new concept to some of you uber organized people, But please let me have my moment of joy...

So today was the first day of our July meal plan, 
 as followed:

Breakfast: Morning Muffins, organic milk, fruit

Lunch: Turkey corndogs, veggie chips,organic broccoli and dip

Snack:Organic apples, cheese sticks and crackers

Dinner: Tortilla Casserole, Brown rice and Beans 



I wanted to share our Morning muffin recipe with you. I found it on Pinterest, and you'll find it at Weelicious .
Apple, Carrot, Coconut Muffins. My plan is to find some healthy, yummy muffin recipes and rotate them through out the month. Anyhoo the Kiddo's Loved them!!! They are made with 1/2 cup of honey (No refined sugar!) and you could add applesauce instead of oil.

So if you are meal planning challenged like me, check out these links and get to planning Girl!


Sarah

Homeschooling Newbie

First of all ... If you are reading this you're awesome! Ha ha! 

OK ,OK so this is my new blog and it's dedicated to our first year of homeschooling. I'm pretty excited about it, but its more of an "I'm about to toss my cookies!" excited... Mainly because I've never done this before. Well I guess that's not completely true. I had a wonderful job as a preschool aide at my daughters school. I know, know...why would you quit a perfect job at your daughters Private christian school, the one that gave you an awesome discount on tuition? 

Well my hubby has a really demanding and stressful job at times. I just made more sense  for me to stay home and take care of things for the fambam. I really felt the Lord leading me to homeschool. I was like "What !?! God are you kidding!" To my surprise He wasn't' because my husband was totally on broad.  So It's kind of cool because working with A Beka as a teachers aide, sort of prepared me for this.

I've noticed tons of blogs with all these amazing women sharing ideas and advice about keeping it together with this whole homeschooling deal. I started to think " How cool would it be if there was a blog about someone keeping it "real" in the world of HS ( Homeschooling)
Yes, my best idea ever! Maybe I can help other newbies feel better about themselves! And I kinda want to watch our adventure over the year, learn from our mistakes, laugh, cry, etc.
 I realize I'm probably not the first to do this but even if only one person is inspired by this blog it would be worth it to me!

Ever since I started declaring my plans to homeschool on Facebook, I've had so many friends message me about how to start... Of course I'm thinking " Really? You're asking me?" But I really have learned a lot in the last few months of preparation. I've had some really great veteran homeschooling Moms take me under their wings, and when I find something new to learn, I'm pretty OBSESSED  passionate about researching every known fact about it.

So I'm currently collecting curriculum, Setting up are classroom, and trying to plan our WHOLE year!
Yeah, I know...Summer is supposed to be vacation! Not in my world! It's all good, it's going to be so worth it come September...

Sarah