Menu Plan Monday ~ September 3

Gosh, planning meals around a new healthy eating plan is hard work! Normally I just follow my standard formula to come up with a menu plan and it is so simple to just plug meals in. I may have to rejig everything come next week, but for this week, here's what's on the menu (Hubs is on afternoons this week, so its just me and the kids):

Monday ~ Spaghetti Bolognaise (portion controlled for me, especially the pasta!)
Tuesday ~ Fish & Chips (this is 'easy' food - boxed frozen fish. A crumbed variety for the kids and plain for me, served with potato balls (kids), microwaved spud (me) and vegies or salad)
Wednesday ~ Beef Fajitas (I'll turn mine into a Fajita Salad of sorts)
Thursday ~ Sweet Corn & Chicken Soup (Asian-style stirfried vegies)
Friday ~ Beef Stirfry (noodles for the kids, just meat-n-veg for me)
Saturday ~ Baked Fish & Vegetables (if I can get some nice fresh fish on the day, with noodles) OR Individual Frittatas (I just discovered a killer Frittata recipe last week...awesome)
Sunday ~ Marinated Steak (microwaved spuds, vegies)

Great news on the grocery shopping front though. Hubs had to return a DVD to Blockbuster this morning and two shops down in the strip there is a fruit and vegetable shop. So, armed with my shopping list, I breezed in and out and spent just $25 for TONS of fresh produce. The same things (if I could even get them, and that's debatable!) in the supermarket where I do my weekly shopping would have easily cost me $40-$45. The incredibly frustrating part about that though, is that I don't drive, plus we're a one-car family, plus my bus route doesn't swing by this particular strip of shops (unlike most other errands I need to do) - so getting there each week would be difficult. But I'm just content to have saved money today, and as often as I can have darling Hubs drive me for a big stock up :)

The rest of the grocery spending today was lower than normal too, which was nice. I already know why - the vegetables were lower for a start, but also there was a lot less junk in my cart due to the 'healthy eating' thing. Normally there'd be a few packets of snackfood for the kids as well, and though I did spend a little on snackfood yesterday, September's Financial Spring Clean will see that figure drop dramatically here on out as I bake more. Oh, and I spent a large chunk of money on meat this week, but still came out smiling. I'm tracking all of this (and all the other expenses) on my trusty Household Expenses Tally Sheet.

The money that I mentioned earlier this week came through even earlier than we were told, bringing our bank balance around to a healthier figure, LOL. We're about to start paying an additional $150 per fortnight toward the home loan again - we did this for quite a while in the beginning but various large expenses took a large chunk out of our bank balance last year and we've been struggling to maintain a 'buffer zone' ever since. Thankfully with the money coming in this week, we're just about there. Of course, having said that, we have several medium sized expenses on top of the bills that really need to be taken care of, so this feeling of 'abundance' remains fleeting!

I'm An Organizing Junkie has loads of other Menu Plan Monday participants :)

Cheers,
Lizzie