The Challenge

As you can tell by the lack of posts my little challenge kept me busy.  I didn't do as well as I hoped but I learned a lot.  Here are some things I learned, am going to change, etc.

: : We like natural peanut butter and I want a better stash on hand.  I can make endless things with this stuff.  Time to start stocking up on it!

: : We are starting a Friday Pizza night.  I grew up having Pizza Hut every Friday night (especially during football season).  I loved this tradition and love the fact of having one meal set and planned each week.  The Pizza choices will be different each week.  Sometimes delivery, homemade, tortilla pizzas, english muffin pizzas, and even dessert ones.  I will keep you posted on this.

: : I love my storage of grains.  Love love love it!!  Now, unfortunately, it is time to restock.  At least now I know what I use the most of.  We are set on Hard Red Wheat (for a couple of years at least) and short grain brown rice.  We need more soft white wheat, oats, steel cut oats, and brown basmati rice.  I would love to get some of these canned but for now I plan on buying 25 lb. bags and then putting in my 5 gal. buckets that I keep in my pantry.  We go through it so fast it is so much cheaper to do it that way.

: : Crackers-- although they aren't soaked or homemade they are a great staple to have around.  We had peanut butter and jelly cracker sandwiches, cheese and crackers, peanut butter and pickles on crackers, etc. when we ran out of bread.  Very handy.

: : It is nice that we don't use so much dairy anymore.  I bought two small blocks of  raw cheese at the farmers market almost two weekends ago and we still have a tiny bit left.  We also use rice milk and have a stock of that.

: : Saturday mornings will be our cereal mornings (unless daddy has that morning off which is unlikely).  We usually have hot breakfasts throughout the week so cereal is a real treat for my kids.  I need to replenish my stock since we used a lot of what we had for breakfasts and treats.

: : My recipe for faux kettle corn is a perfect and easy thing to have on hand.  My kids (and neighbors) love this treat/snack and I feel so good that I know they are getting something good for them while they are thinking it is a treat.  

: : Fruits and greens are easy to stock up on for smoothies.  The freezer is my friend and I am grateful for our stand up freezer in the garage.

: : You have to take the time to be prepared but it is very worth it.  I hope I can make better progress next time I challenge myself.  I am thinking December may be a good time to do it- and that will leave some extra money for Christmas.  We shall see.

New stuff to come soon- once my two toddlers stop teething. :)