Budgeting: Grocery Store Edition

I don't know about y'all but I am always looking for ways to save money. We spend some serious money at the grocery store. I literally feel like I could just hand over my check right to the because seriously. It is a little ridiculous. Food is EXPENSIVE and there is no way around it. We don't meal plan because it ends up being more expensive for us. Yes, I am that weirdo that spends way more meal planning that I do winging it. I am probably doing it wrong and that's why it is so expensive but I just give up on it. I am by no means an expert but I am going to share two tips that help me stay under budget or right on and some meals that are in our rotation. Do we go over budget sometimes? Absolutely! Are we under sometimes? Yes, definitely. I try to keep our budget at $100 a week but it includes diapers, wipes, toilet paper, toothpaste, soap/shampoo, etc. when we run out during the month.

Plan and Guesstimate
I LOVE FOOD. Giving myself a $100 budget for food for four people used to stress me out. In my head I see myself and the kids starving to death because we don't have food. Am I being dramatic? Absolutely. I just LOVE food, ha! When it comes time to go grocery shopping I make a list of things we need and want then I guesstimate what they cost. Most things we buy regularly so my guesstimate is pretty close. Another thing that I do is I either round up to the dollar or add a dollar for tax. This makes my guesstimated total higher than my actual checkout total usually but then I get so excited because I was under! Woohoo!! If our list exceeds our budget I start cutting things- never anything we NEED. If we need it, I will go over budget sometimes but I try to stay under when it is possible.

Name brand vs. Off brand
Some people are very serious about only buying brand name things. I don't have a problem buying the off brand. There are a few things that I will not buy off brand- macaroni and cheese and chicken nuggets (Great value ones we had last time were ORANGE. Blech!!), Little Crunchies by Gerber, and Huggies Natural care wipes. We use Parent's Choice diapers. Many people are against this and I was with y'all. I loved Pampers! However, for half the price we gave PC a try and we love them. We haven't had any issues at all with them and I love the money we save buying them.

Meals
We are a simple family. We don't have these extravagant and fancy meals. I don't have the time to devote to preparing them and cleaning up the mess after and I find it is more expensive. If you are one of those people? Awesome!! I am a firm believer in you have time what you make time for and cooking/cleaning the mess isn't my choice. I like trash tv much more ;) We usually have ground meat, fish, and chicken in our freezer at all times. We are a huge chicken family. Huge. We eat chicken in one way or another at least three days a week. The other days we will have ground meat or fish. We really don't eat out too much because it gets so expensive! We eat tacos, hamburgers, shepherds pie, meatloaf and mashed potatoes, grilled chicken salad, chicken salad, grilled chicken, chicken and potatoes, fish, red beans and rice, and pork chops occasionally. For lunch Ryan brings a sandwich and snacks. The kids and I will eat a pack of those $1 noodles or rice mixes and some type of meat- chicken nuggets, hot dogs, or lunch meat.

So, tell me, What is your weekly/monthly budget on groceries? Do you meal plan? What are you eating? Do you have things you buy specific brands of?

Abram Ryan: 9 Months!

I can not even believe that we are only three short months away from your first birthday! On one hand it seems like you have been here forever, but at the same time it seems like you were just born yesterday. I can't even imagine our lives without you and you complete our family! This month you are up to no good, ha!!

 

(These pictures are terrible but he literally would not stay still long enough for a picture. Such is life. )

You are weighing in at 16 pounds and 6 ounces and 26.5 inches long, which puts you in the less than 5 percentile. I think you are just a small little guy, just like your bib sister. You are eating 4-5 ounces every 3-4 hours, starting to stretch to 4 hours. You eat three meals a day and at least snack twice. You are a bottomless pit! I fear your teenage years- you are going to eat us out of house and home. When you are eating your three meals you prefer foods you can feed yourself but you tolerate purees still. Solids that you are eating are blueberries, bananas, any type of pasta, little crunchies, wagon wheels, and puffs. We go through a container of each of the baby snacks. You definitely don't play when it comes to food. If we sit down to eat, you must have food or you throw a fit. And waiting for your food you fuss and slam your hands down. It is hilarious and obnoxious, ha! You are wearing size 2 diapers and 6 months clothes, with some 9 months thrown in there. Your shorts you fit in 3-6 months because your waist is teeny tiny- just like your sister.

You are so much more ambitious than your sister ever was and I blame that on second kid syndrome! Between wanting to keep up with her and being set down more, you keep up. You are a pro at your walker- constantly slamming into my legs when you want food, running to the stove and fridge, and stealing fun sticks (fish sticks) right off your sisters table. You have been standing on your own much more lately and you even took two solid, solo steps the week before you turned 9 months! I would not be surprised one bit if you are walking by 10 months. You are a very proficient army crawler but this last week you decided that crawling on your knees is much better.

Sleeping was a little iffy there for a while. You were waking up anywhere from 2-5 times, for no reason at all. It was seriously exhausting! Then daddy told me to let you fuss it out. Well, that worked for you! Hopefully I am not ruining this but it is working for you and the best part is that you never even fully cry! Sure makes the mama heart feel better. The first night you were up four times, the second once, and the last two- none! That is a huge improvement. You sleep about 0-:30-8:30ish. You nap three times a day- at 9/10am, 12/1pm, and 5:30/6:30pm. The first two are usually about two hours and the last one is about an hour.

This month you were started on Zantac for reflux. You started spitting up a good bit more, weren't interested in your formula (drinking 3-4 ounces tops!) and having reflux at night. Your angel care monitor has been going off every single night which has been worrying me. We mentioned it to your doctor and he wants to do a sleep study, so we are waiting for them to call and schedule that. You are such a joy, sweet little man! I can't wait to watch you continue to grow. You are special!!! <3

Abram Ryan: 7 Months

Abram Ryan,
You are 7 months old my little mister! I can't even believe it! It seems like you just came into our lives on one hand, but on the other it feels like you have been here forever. You fit into our family so seamlessly and easily and you complete us! I never knew I wanted a baby boy until I had you. Now I want ten more of you, ha!! Love you AR. You are our baby boy always and forever.

 

 

 

 

You are weighing in at 14 pounds and 5 ounces, around 26/27 inches. 

Abram Eats: Round Two

Whenever Lexi was a baby I decided that I was going to make all of her food for her. I really enjoyed doing it, it was cheaper, and I knew exactly what was going into it! It was a win all the way around for me. So when we started talking solids for Abram I knew that I would make his food also. Lexi was a great eater but AR? Puts her to shame. That boy can eat! Lexi kindly nicknamed him 'Pickle Fish' and it fits him because of his love for food. When Lexi turned about a year old I discovered the ease and convenience of baby food pouches. They were easy with a capital E! I loved just being able to grab them and go. And they had some really great combinations that Lexi really seemed to enjoy. In fact, that may have been my favorite part of them. Those little pouches can get pretty pricey when they are running you $1-2!! I shopped around and would never get them unless I could get them for $1 or under, which happened pretty frequently. With so many brands out there someone was constantly having a sale on them. You can't beat that! When I heard about the Infantino Squeeze Station even before I was pregnant with AR I knew I just had to have it! I stalked it for months. Researched it for months. I just could never pull the plug for some reason. For Mother's Day this year this is what I asked for. I have really been looking forward to making pouches for AR and Lexi so it seemed like the perfect gift. My mom said she would get it for me so she just sent me the check- she isn't tech savvy and for some reason it was really hard to find!
I went to go buy it and then I stumbled upon this one. I hadn't heard of it until it was on Babysteals.com but it is also a breastfeeding system- which is genius!! If I would have known it existed, I may have gone with it. Talk about time saving. Well, they also make a food system Kiinde Foodii Starter Kit. After researching it a good bit I found that it was about the same price but seems to have better reviews. I was sold. Bonus? Nordstrom.com sells it so free shipping and returns, yeah buddy! I was excited! I ordered it last Wednesday and it arrived exactly a week later. Kind of a long wait but that is what you get for free shipping, and two of those days were a weekend, so no complaints here. When I opened it, this is what all it had:

The starter kit has the Squeeze bottle to fill the pouches, 2 spouts, 1 spoon, and 10 pouches to get you started. I bought 40 additional pouches to fill to go with the starter kit.  Any questions for me?? Feel free to ask away! I would love to help if I can!!

I filled the initial ten on Monday and here are some of my thoughts. I like how easy to figure out it was, it was basically self explanatory- fill the squeeze bottle with food, insert top into pouches, and fill. However, it was a pain to fill the pouches! I had to take it apart a couple times just to get them filled to a decent amount of food. I am definitely going to keep buying and filling them because they are cheaper and they aren't awful to fill. However, I don't know if I would buy it again. I am interested in the Infantino Squeeze station!! I wonder how it compares.

*I was not compensated for this post, just looking to help other moms interested in making their own pouches!

Mom's Night Out: The Movie

From the moment the commercials hit the internet I knew that seeing Mom's Night Out was a must!! It just looked like such a great faith based movie that encourages. Lately, I have been in the trenches with mothering. I am having a hard time finding a balance between kids, work, marriage, life, cleaning, and everything else going on. Lexi has been having a rough time transitioning to being with a  sitter two days a week and it has been rough. She is going through separation anxiety bad. Also, I think she is experiencing some jealousy over her baby brother. It seems kind of late to me, I mean he is almost 7 months old, but she never had any problems until as of late. She has also just been acting out in general. Trying threes to blame? I am sure they don't help. With so much change going on in her life, her world being completely rocked, could I blame her? Heck no. But it has been tough! Daily I go to bed wondering if I am enough for her. If I am screwing my kids up. If someone else would be a better mother than me. I am SO BLESSED to have these beautiful babies. I can't even imagine screwing them up- that would be my fault! God entrusted these children to me. He chose ME to be their mom. And most days? I don't feel worthy. God knew what he was doing though and I trust him.

This movie was probably the best movie I have ever seen. EVER. Maybe it is because it was exactly what I needed? Maybe it was because I haven't had a night out with friends since Abram was born? Maybe it is just because this is the season of life I am in? Maybe because I could relate to every word Alison (Sarah Drew) said. All I know is that I laughed so hard that I cried and I cried because I felt like Bones (Trace Atkins) was speaking right to my heart. He told me exactly what I needed to hear. Seriously, if you do nothing else for yourself- go see this movie. You will not regret it. I am trying to convince Ryan to go see it with me this weekend. It was that good!! I wish I had unlimited funds to buy all of my mom friends tickets to see this movie. I can not stress enough just how good it was.

Sibling Love

When I was little and growing up I always knew that I wanted two kids. That was my golden number- I couldn't see myself with more or less than two kids. Looking back that was probably because there were only two of us. After Lexi it took me a really long time to even consider a second kid. Not because I didn't enjoy being a mom but because she was a hard baby. The biggest blessing ever, but the poor kid had a rough first year! Once we decided to have a second baby there were so many thought and emotions involved in it. It is a huge decision! However, it is hands down one of the best decisions we have ever made. The love that Lexi and Abram have is priceless. I find myself melting at least three times a day over how obsessed they are with each other. Siblings make everything better!! Lexi is the greatest big sister ever and always helps as much as she can. Abram just adores Lexi. Anything that she does to/for him is perfect. The age gap for us, was perfect! And once Abram was born and the older he gets the more I am convinced that I need more. So for now? Our story isn't finished! I am so blessed to have Lexi & Abram and if God doesn't want us to have anymore, I am perfectly content with that. But if he opens the door for more? I am in, ha!

Abram: 5 Months

Oh, My little A-man how you are growing so quickly. It is so cliche to say but I have no idea where all the time is going! I feel like you were just born and here I am planning your first birthday. Slow down, little dude!

Here you are when you were born:

You weighed in at 6 pounds 11 ounces.

Here you are for your 5 month photo shoot:

 

Weighing in at 11 pounds and 10.5 ounces and 24 inches long. You are a tiny little guy. We are trying to put some weight on you so we have started supplementing 2 oz after you nurse. We are also trying to get you nursing at least every 4 hours, even through the night. Which is so exhausting but if it helps to fatten you up a bit, I am okay with that. You are wearing size 3-6 month sleepers because of your length. You wear newborn and 0-3 month pants- teeny tiny waist like your sister! We finally moved you on up to size 0-3 month onesies. You wear size 1-2 shoes, though you have a pair of newborn that barely fit you still. You are wearing a size 1 diaper, but we just bought you 2s to move you up because they were getting snug. You are still just drinking breast milk and formula. Your doctor doesn't want us starting solids for a good while, though I think we may try next month.

Sleeping habits are so much different with you than with your sister! You sleep in your crib every single night. You go down anywhere from 7-9, up around 1-2, then up for the day at 6 every single day. You don't let mama sleep in, ever. You are a belly sleeper! We put you on your belly with your wubbie and Melvin the moose and you are out. I feel safe doing this because we have the Angel Care monitor on you at all times sleeping. We finally stopped swaddling you around 4 months and haven't looked back. You take 2-4 naps during the day, all ranging in duration.

You are a roller already! You roll from back to belly with no issue at all and scoot. It is so cute. You look like a whale when you do it, ha! You puff out your belly and put your arms and legs up and turn yourself. It is pretty funny. Not too much interest in crawling but you aren't put down too much and I think you may skip crawling. You are definitely more interested in standing. You are sitting supported but I think you may be getting close to sitting on your own. Probably within the next month or so. You are a talker, my son. You are welcome for that trait. You just babble and babble and babble, it is already a challenge to get you to stay quiet. You say 'mama' now- which to me is crazy! You only say  it when you are really mad and I am sure you don't know what you are saying but it is clear as day, just 'mama'. So sweet! You are a mama's boy to the core. You have had two ear infections, which is no fun. No teeth yet but teething like a mad man!

Sophie Giraffe is probably your best friend. We thought your sister liked her but she has nothing on you. You eat that giraffe up! You also like your fish teething toy but we lost it at daycare, so it is basically a goner. You aren't a huge fan of your jumperoo yet, but you can't reach the floor just yet. You are okay with your bouncer, high chair, and rock n play.