One Step at a Time

After feeling completely overwhelmed for the month of September and going into October, I finally am feeling better and actually have a desire to get things done. Hallelujah! (I think kicking the strep helped and possibly even a sinus infection.)

As I've looked around the house, I realize that I have a lot of project in-the-works. Mom - does this sound familiar? :) So, I decided that I needed to complete one at a time, as much as I was reasonable. So, right now, I am spending time to get the can rotators completed.....I need about 25 of them. Whew! It's quite a bit of work and I have to let the glue dry before putting the cans on. Needless to say, I'm learning a little bit of patience.

At the same time, I've gotten Halloween costumes done (luckily not a ton of sewing this year) and I have to get two birthdays planned and executed. Ah, October, such a busy month for us. But I love it and wouldn't replace it for anything. The kids really enjoy it and I love watching them have fun.

Next, I'm hoping that I'll be able to repaint the living room, entryway, and hall. But we shall see what's in the budget for new paint. I'm excited that I have a plan though. I created a 'mood board' inspired by this website: http://moodboards.younghouselove.com/ and am looking forward to seeing it come together. It's been a fun process of discovering what Leon and I like and hoping we can find something that will look good together.

I can't believe what I used to get accomplished......I've got to find my groove again. :)

Small Accomplishment

Today, I had a small accomplishment. I really needed it.

I've been working on getting more food storage, but we need to organize it a little bit better.....have you seen the cost of those metal rotating shelves? Outrageous!

We have metal shelves, but they don't rotate. I came across this http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/2009/02/16/build-your-own-can-rotating-rack/ and thought "hey, I can do that."

And I can. And I did. It took a lot longer than I would have liked, but I have made eight of them and they are more efficient than just stacking the cans (space or rotation). So after days of working on them (not continuously), I'm feeling accomplished.

Although, I need to make about 12 more (at least). :)

Whoa - This is Hard!?!

Okay, being at home is challenging! This summer was so great with the kids. We really did well, but now that we are back in school - forget about it!

I've come to the conclusion that I'm not good at this stay-at-home Mom thing. I love, love, love being part of a bigger machine that produces a finite goal in which there is recognition. Yeah, NOT what you get at home with repetitive tasks and constant needs with less than gracious receipt.

Which means only one thing.....I need to get inspired!

How do I go about doing that?

The Wisdom of Food Storage

In my religion, food storage and self-reliance has been taught for years. It can be a daunting task to store food and water for you family for any length of time.....one-month, three-months, twelve-months.

But let's throw out the religious aspect - for giggles.

Having food storage provides peace of mind.

What kind of things are in food storage? Food for meal preparation, water storage, non-food items, and a few extra dollars, etc.

So, let's take a hypothetical situation that your tire on your all wheel drive van goes flat. Little do you know, that with an all wheel drive vehicle, you have to replace all four tires at the same time. No matter what!?! Seriously? I had no idea.

So, four new tires can be anywhere from $250 to $500+. If you don't have a good reserve, which we sometimes do and we sometimes don't, then where is that money going to come from. We don't have credit cards, so it can't go there (good decision on our part). Lucky for us, when these types of situation have come up, we can pull that amount from our food budget.

.....BUT only because we have food storage in the garage. Without that, we would have been up a creek.

Not to mention it's Sunday night at 6PM and you just ran out of toilet paper. Hmmm, sure is nice that we have some in the basement and don't have to break the Sabbath to run to the store for that item. Or better yet, a child gets sick and you have medicine on hand. So many little examples where food storage really comes in handy.

Just putting a little thought out there.....

3-Month Menu Planning and Food Storage

The last few weeks, I've been dedicating my time to planning and organizing a three-month menu. So, where do you start? I have done this before and pretty much just did one month and multiplied the ingredients by three months. But that's not how we eat - the kids (and me) get too bored.

I found a website through a friend (thanks Teresa!): http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/2009/06/29/babystep-3-three-month-food-supply-revised/ - halfway down the page, there is a spreadsheet. I started to populate the spreadsheet that they provided, but I wanted to change it slightly.

Note: I get overwhelmed by too many choices. What should I make for lunch, snacks, dinner? How many recipes should I keep readily available? What ingredients should I have on hand? etc. etc.

First step: I grouped the lunches, snacks and dinners by each day of the week so that I could narrow down my choices for each day. For now, this is how I have everything broken out:

Monday

• Lunch: calzones (or similar item such as Pizza Muffins)
• Snack: fruit or yogurt
• Dinner: chicken or fish

Tuesday

• Lunch: canned items or soup (ravioli, spaghettios, chicken noodles, beef stew, etc.)
• Snack: granola
• Dinner: noodles

Wednesday

• Lunch: meat (corn dogs, hot dogs jellyfish, chicken wings, etc.)
• Snack: frozen treat
• Dinner: soup or salad

Thursday

• Lunch: sandwiches
• Snack: chips & dip
• Dinner: beef or pork

Friday

• Lunch: wraps
• Snack: sweet treat
• Dinner: pizza

Saturday/Sunday

• Lunch: leftovers
• Snack: leftovers
• Dinner: casserole or big dinner (like roast)

Second step: I have about 110 recipes, including a couple breakfast recipes. It allows you to put in the recipe ingredients so that you can do a total for shopping. This is the most time consuming part, but it's nice to have them all in one place. I'm seriously thinking about getting rid of most of my cookbooks. (I also made individual recipe cards so that I don't have to flip through books, but that goes a little far and isn't required at all.)

Third step: By adding all these recipes, it allows me to have a variety of recipes per month without duplicating everything three times. I added an additional calculation that would let me duplicate a single recipe for the ones the kids like a lot (like lasagna).

Conclusion: Now I have a quick and easy way to figure out my grocery shopping list AND to know what I should have in my food storage. I'm pretty excited about this because I've had a hard time getting started (once again, overwhelmed with where to start and too many choices).

Here's a quick screen shot of what it looks like. I love it! (I'm not consistent, but love the results when I do it.)

New vs Used Clothing

So Derrick will never want for a piece of clothes again.......but the older three boys will keep me shopping. We have three boys born within 3 1/2 years of each other. And the youngest of them was born looking like a football player and hasn't changed since. Needless to say, some years they all wear the exact same size shoe, pant, or shirt.

This past year, Michael grew 9 inches and NOTHING fits!

Corbin and Kohner now pretty much wear the exact same size everything......and there is a 3-size gap between Kohner and Derrick. I now have 4 bins of clothes in the garage that Derrick will inherit.

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Michael needed new clothes because the uniform changed for the charter school he is attending. It is amazing what you can find. We have some friends in the ward who dropped off clothes their son had grown out of. Kid-to-Kid is a fantastic place to find clothes. And who knew how much great stuff the D.I. has!?! I've shopped there over the years, but usually for knick-knacky things or cheap toys for the kids. But I got an awesome pair of shoes for Corbin and Kohner for $5 and $6, and a tie for Michael for $2. You can't beat that!

It's incredible what we were able to accomplish for ~$75. I have many friends who are incredible at shopping at thrift stores and finding bargains. I have to confess that, for many years, I had a hard time walking into stores let alone wearing clothes from them. I am TOTALLY over it now and I have a lot of learning to do!

It's been fun showing the kids the difference between our receipts. They are amazed at what we can get.

Budget Crunch

So, we have now had our first real budget crunch since quitting work. After repairs, real estate fees and marketing, and additional costs for the kids, we have been at the end of our pay check. Which is awesome! A few reasons why this is awesome:

1. This is now the exception to the rule.....we used to live like this all the time - when both of us were working opposite schedules and our marriage was falling apart (we are still grateful none of our kids were seriously injured or died during this time).
2. We were prepared.....I knew there would be a time that I would be between commissions and we would be very tight on our budget. I was just hoping it would be a little further out. BUT we have plenty of food in our freezer and on our shelves in the garage. So, it's really easy to cut back on our food budget to stretch our dollars.
3. I've received some great advise.....like Morning Moo's powered milk is probably some of the best powered milk out there. I got this from a random woman who happened to be shopping bulk supplies at Macey's one day. She graciously answered a barrage of questions from me when I started to think about food storage. My kids happened to agree with her recommendation.
4. This offers an opportunity for reflection and resolve.....If anyone knows me, they know that I'm constantly doing little mini-corrections. The next few days will be great for me learn a) what's missing from my pantry, food storage; b) what I have that the kids will actually eat; c) what they love and I will need to make sure we have on hand. This is pretty cool.
5. My resolve to make real estate successful will increase.....there's nothing like telling your husband that we will be okay if I quit my job because I'll bring in commissions. And then not doing it. :) Granted, not everything is in my control, but I have really not pushed myself. Time to kick stuff off - which is great timing now that the kids are getting back into school.

There you have it, we've started on this adventure and three months into it, have already hit our first major s t r e t c h. The key is what to take away from it. Right now, it's faith that there is a greater plan out there for our family. And when we are through this - how to set ourselves up to not repeat it.

Life is full of lessons to be learned. And as my brother would say, "You can pick your trials or the trials will pick you." I kind of like being more in control of my life and choosing the areas that we will struggle in.