The best laid plans of mice and men...

Well, this week sucked.

Pardon my French, but it truly did.  This week was my first back to work.  I was to go back on Wednesday and work through Friday.  Difficult enough when you have to leave your baby for the first time.  Made more difficult by the fact that my husband was called to jury duty on Tuesday, selected for a jury, and asked (forced) to serve on Wednesday.  I thought maybe that was the end of our troubles.

And then, Wednesday night.

My husband was violently ill.  I was ill as well - but not as bad as he was.  The next day, we both stayed home - him downstairs, and the baby and I upstairs (with my eldest at school).  That night, I sent my husband to the hospital by ambulance for what turned out to be massive dehydration.  Friday was better for everybody, though I still wasn't the best.

To make a long story short (too late), our Saturday cooking/shopping day didn't go as planned.  We weren't able to go to Costco until about 5pm, didn't get to Meijer at all, and then I was ill again.  On Sunday, I got to Meijer and we started the cook-a-thon, but then I was ill again.  I have now figured out that, unlike my husband, I didn't "take it easy" after I was sick, and until I do, I will keep getting sick.  So I'm taking tomorrow off, and hoping for the best.  Meanwhile, my poor husband has the task of trying to finish all of the meals on his own. 

We had thought that it would take us one day to do all the shopping and cooking.  What we now know is that shopping won't take that much longer than normal, assuming that it's well planned, but it almost has to be done on Saturday, with all of the cooking being done on Sunday (and maybe even some on Saturday night).  This takes awhile.  In part, because we have two kids, so one of us always has to be with them, and in part because this is a LOT of meals.

So, the meals are made (or pretty close at this point).  I'm not sure if we'll start cooking tomorrow or not, but I'll keep you all posted.  I will also do a post with the recipes, shopping list, and approximate cost for all of these meals.  Suffice it to say that so far, we are definitely saving money with this approach!

Getting Started: The Story Behind This Blog

It all started because of my son.

You see, I had to go on bedrest for five weeks, and before long, I had been out of work for three months.  During this time, my pay was cut back by quite a lot, and will continue to be for the duration of this school year.  Because of this (and Christmas, and a basement remodel), we are literally living within our means with barely a penny to spare.  Add to this that I'd like to lose weight and stop eating out so much, and you have our reasoning.

It was on Pinterest that I got the idea.  A SAHM posted about how she made meals ahead for the month.  Her idea of making a month of meals, though, was to make six up and freeze them.  I'm no mathematician, but 6 does not equal 30.

I got to thinking: if I used her recipes, found more, and used some of my own, maybe I could come up with 30 crock pot meals that could easily be prepped in one day and frozen.  Then, the day that you want to use them, you pop them out of the freezer, let them sit for 20 minutes, and then put in the crockpot and leave for the day. 

The response I've gotten to this idea is overwhelming to say the least.  I'm going to try, then, to do this every month for a year.  If I can do this, I will have a different menu every month that is easy, healthy, and yummy.  And also?  I'll only have to massively cook one day a month.  12 days a year!  How great would that be?

If you dare, come along on this journey with me.  I'll post my meal list and my shopping list later.