Monday Menu.

No picture this week because I'm just tired of trying to find good lighting for pictures and stuff. It's a bit frustrating and I have been having enough stuff making me annoyed and frustrated. I have been having a difficult couple of weeks. So, I'm just going to make this post completely simple.

Sunday was scheduled to be pizza night, but the weather was too humid and warm. I just picked up some pre-cooked pulled pork and made Cuban sandwiches for lunch. I am probably going to be using the leftover pulled pork in Beloved's lunches this week.

Monday morning is going to be French toast with fruit. Lunch is going to be sandwiches for the guys and a salad for myself. My goals is to get back into the habit of eating salads for lunch. Dinner is going to be hot dogs with potato salad and fresh veggies. I'm tempted to cook them in the crockpot with some chili sauce. I'm not decided on the matter.

Tuesday is going to be a cereal day for breakfast. Beloved is going to be having sandwiches for his lunch (he requested turkey). I am going to be having some leftovers (if there is any) and a salad. If there are no leftovers from Monday's dinner, it will just be a salad. I may possibly do the spiced eggs on a bed of kale. It depends on how motivated I feel to be cooking tomorrow afternoon. Dinner is going to be hamburgers with tater-tots and a tossed salad.

Wednesday is going to be the leftovers from the french toast or I'm going to do something with eggs and toast. Beloved is going to be having another sandwich for lunch. It may be ham or it may be turkey, it depends on what he is in the mood for. I'm out of the sandwich style cut dill pickles but I don't think he'll mind much.  I am more of a fan of pickles than he is. I will be having a salad. I am going to try to make that thai chopped salad that I have on my cooking page on pinterest. I keep meaning to make it, I think this week is going to be the time I finally make it. Dinner is going to be chicken curry with rice, naan, and saag paneer.

Thursday is going to be waffles for breakfast. I have some fruit filled ones that I'm looking forward to. Apart of me says I should have whipped cream, but I think I'll be just fine with out it. My lunch is going to be a salad, or curry leftovers. Beloved is definitely getting curry leftovers. I'm going to do my best to make sure he has an extra portion of saag paneer. Dinner tonight is going to be crockpot tacos with fresh salsa an guacamole.

Friday's breakfast is going to be pop tarts. Lunch is going to be a taco salad for myself and sandwiches for Beloved. I'd try giving him something like taco salad but I know that's not exactly his thing. I may throw some corn chips and guacamole into his lunch though. Dinner is going to be pasta salad with teriyaki meatballs. I found a recipe for how to do it in the crockpot. Though calling it a recipe may be a bit much. It's premade meatballs and teriyaki sauce cooked on low for 6-8 hours. I'm also going to have fresh veggies out to round out the meal.

Saturday is going to be another morning of scrambled eggs. The kids apparently seem to love them. Cuddle Bear was six different kinds of proud of himself for helping me cook them for breakfast yesterday. I think he's going to be real happy to help out next Saturday too. Lunch is going to be something take out when I am out doing grocery shopping. I have a feeling that there are not going to be any leftovers from dinner Friday night. Whenever I make meatball anything, it goes really fast because the guys love 'em. Dinner is going to be macaroni and cheese. I'm going to give the kids apple slices to go with it. Beloved is going to be out doing social things that evening, so I won't be worrying about dinner for him. And the kids don't get to pick out dinner things that often, so this is kinda a special little 'mom and me' kind of thing.

One thing I have to add, menu planning has cut about $50 out of my grocery bill when I first started out doing it. As I have refined it over the last several months, it has lead to the bill going down to about $100 less than what it was towards the beginning of the year. Making Beloved's lunches for work has cut down a whole lot on food waste, which made me pretty happy. It has also helped cut down on how much money gets dropped into buying lunches and food from restaurants.

My goal is to get my total food budget down to $200 for the month, on average. This requires making some changes to how I am handling somethings. I have discovered, however, that packing lunch for Beloved is not as difficult as I thought it was going to be. I am cautiously optimistic that I can apply that type of preparedness to summer meals when the boys are home from school. I also want to do some food preservation this year. While the initial investment may be requiring some planning, I think if I do it right, I can cut down on some of our winter food budget and maybe even limit how much off-season produce I buy. And, when it is winter, off-season produce is kinda expensive even at stores like Aldi's.