Azure Standard Order

Let me just tell you that Julie's brand of ice cream is AMAZING! It's quite pricey, organic and I can read every word on the label. I will not order this every time, well maybe I will. Yummy! The hemp milk....EWWWWWW. Almond milk - ummmm not so good, but maybe we can figure out something to do with it. We're learning that my son doesn't do well eating a lot of dairy so we're trying to figure out what amounts he can tolerate.

Anyway, here's what I got:

• 10 pounds organic carrots (remember when I said I'd never buy organic - never say never). Last time we ate 5 pounds within 10 days!
• 10 pounds of frozen blueberries. Eaten plain and used in our healthy ice cream. Shared with a friend
• 3 pounds organic onions $3.40
• 1 coconut...this should be an interesting experiment!
• Dehydrated pears...these are delicious! You can only eat one though because they are so sweet. What a wonderful treat! I don't care for the pineapple, way too sweet!
• Almond meal flour to try out some baked goodies.
• The Rumiano sweet cream butter is so good you can eat it plain. Oh yeah, sometimes I do.
• some mustard, cashews, and spices
• Total with shipping $109.00
• I budget $50 per month for my Azure Standard order. I had to "find" $59 from my cash envies: $20 came from entertainment/kid stuff for the ice cream and the hemp/almond milk. $20 came from my change. $10 I pulled from my "weekly grocery shopping envelopes" and $9 I pulled from my misc. envelope.

I NEVER thought they'd deliver to my neck of the woods so call them today to find out if they deliver in your area!

This is not a paid advertisement for Azure Standard, I just like what I buy from them!

This post is linked to:
Money Saving Mom
Grocery Cart Challenge

Horse Trailer Grocery Shopping

Bought from a horse trailer - there weren't any horses in there in case you are worried. South Dakota grown food:

6 chickens
2 smoked chickens
8 dozen eggs
1 quart of honey
Cost: $73.40

Supporting your local community instead of a big chain grocery store: Priceless


This post is linked to:
Money Saving Mom
Grocery Cart Challenge

Grocery Shopping 7/21/10

• Farmer's Market
• $7.00 for tomatoes and 1 zucchini
• Gas Station
• $10 Homemade Sausage (small gas station/small butcher drops off some sausage! Best sausage around)
• Walmart
• 2 apples $1.44
• 2 plums $.38
• bunch of bananas $.75
• 1 avocado $.78
• 1 honey dew melon $2.50
• 8 oz sugar snap peas $2.58
• 1 cucumber $.62
• 2 limes $.66
• leaf lettuce $1.88
• organic spinach $2.98
• broccoli crown $.37
• $14.94 with tax

Total spent today: $32.00

Tonight we're having a big ole salad with steak on top. I'm trying out this recipe from premeditated leftovers - with a few changes.

Good thing I'm not doing the All You challenge because I'm stocking my freezer with locally grown food! Tomorrow I'm going to pick up a big order... eggs, chicken, honey....I can't wait!

I will have to pick up a 1/2 gallon of milk and possibly a few other things. We have company spending the night so I will grab a bit of money from the entertainment envelope!

My daughter is hiding in the background - too funny. We realized today that they'll be going back to school before we know it (Aug 21). My son (6th grade) is okay with it, my daughter - not so much (8th grade). I'm not ready either! I love having them home even though it means more conflict. I enjoy each day that I have with them!

Grocery Shopping Last Week

I know the kids and I went to the store last week. I know for a fact we bought food.

My awesome kids put away all of the groceries for me (without a picture) because when we got home my vacationing caught up with me and I wasn't feeling great for a few hours. We have been eating, I haven't been updating!

I am placing my Azure Standard coop order today and will pick that order up on Monday.  My order is getting bigger and bigger from them.

This week I get to pick up some locally grown food on Thursday. I can't wait to post it and eat it!

I have a friend and her family spending the night with us on Thursday...you know the friend that you have had since you were 7 years old. Wow - friends for 33 years. Holy cow now that's a lot of years! I can't wait to catch up with her!

Menu Plan and Program

I get tired of menu planning. I get tired of cooking and trying to figure out what to make. I get tired of making the same thing over and over again. I get tired of trying something new and the food not tasting great. Sometimes I just get tired.

Then, I will find something new try and it'll make my life a bit easier for a bit. Here's my latest menu planning find.

Menu Planner 

I took the time to input our favorite dinners, side dishes and breakfasts. Then I printed out all of these options and put them in my menu planning binder. I also printed out blank planners so I can hand write ideas down. The biggest problem that I see is that I can't easily put my menu on my blog with links to recipes.

For now, I'm over my "I'm tired" phase. Here's a very basic menu planner that I created a while back. Regardless of what planner you use, it's beneficial to plan out a few meals. Check your fridge, freezers and cupboards to see what you have on hand.

Dinners will be very boring this week. I'm trying to use up what we have before we go on vacation.

1. Pork Chops marinated in 1/2 lemon juice, 2 T olive oil and 1 t. oregano. I'm still trying to come up with a good and cheap "pantry" marinade!
2. Breakfast for Dinner. YUMMY!
3. Quiche w/ whatever I can find in the house. I add more eggs to this recipe! I need to post my version
4. Chicken with Mustard Cream Sauce (Pork instead)
5. We're on vacation for a couple of days.

We have frozen peas, green beans, broccoli and cauliflower. I need to buy some farm fresh eggs though. I might hit the farmer's market at some point to see if they have anything. Last week they had greenhouse tomatoes and 1 cucumber. If it ever warms up outside maybe my own garden will grow! We have had some lettuce from it and that's it.

This morning I need to make some peanut butter oatmeal so we can eat that for a few breakfasts and then we'll eat whatever we can find the other mornings.

Check out Orgjunkie.com for more menu ideas!

The ALL YOU Grocery Challenge

So I've been keeping track of my grocery purchases in hopes of winning the All You Grocery Challenge. I'm glad I signed up and I'm glad that I am failing. Here is why I believe that the challenge is a failure. You get $25 per person per week.

• You get $25 for a one year old and $25 for a 17 year old boy?
• You get $25 for a one year old and $25 for a marathon runner?
• Area you live in (some places are much cheaper, some places much more - Hawaii anyone?)
• You can't save money from one week and spend it the next week. In other words, you can't use the pantry principle.
• It doesn't take dietary restrictions into account.
• It could be encouraging cheap processed yucky for you food

Here is why I believe the challenge is a success for me.

• I am recording my purchases again with a lot of detail.  I am questioning every purchase that I make. I'm asking myself if my purchase fits in with my priorities. Is my spending in alignment with my goals and values.

I see what they are trying to do and I have no idea how it would be fair. Here is a picture of my freezer because I've been buying in bulk:

It looks like I'm not spending very much money. I've spent $133 so far this month for my family of 4. I make bulk purchases at Sam's Club, Azure Standard, a local rancher for a side of beef and a local butcher shop for a 1/2 pig. 

My grocery budget happens to be $400 for my family of 4, but I don't spend $100 maximum a week. Here's my budget break down:

• $100 for bulk meat purchases
• $50 Sam's Club
• $50 Azure Standard
• $45 weekly (carry over any amount that I don't use)

Again, I'm glad I participated, but it doesn't look like I'll win the challenge. This month I will continue to record everything in detail so I know where my money is going. Maybe I did win after all?

Grocery Shopping

Here's the link for grocery items that I purchased on Thursday. You can see what we bought at the end of this post, but the formatting doesn't copy over!

I've tried every way of grocery shopping...often, weekly, semi monthly, monthly. Weekly trips to the local grocery stores, monthly order to Azure and monthly trip to Sam's Club seems to work best for my family.

I realized that while I love to have a set schedule, it is best to be F-L-E-X-I-B-L-E. Seriously? Flexible? Okay, I can't figure out how to spell that word so help me out! If I can't spell it, how in the world am I going to do it? I don't want to be flexible! Whew - deep breath in, deep breath out. Okay...

I can choose to shop whatever day works for my schedule that week and do all of my shopping in one day. This week Thursday was the best day. Next week I'm going to try not to shop if at all possible because we're leaving on Friday to go on vacation. Or is it to go on holiday? My friend from Canada always said holiday instead of vacation. She's so cute. That had absolutely NOTHING to do with my grocery purchase...just thought I'd share.

You'll see many many stops on my trip. It was SO.NOT.FUN. I do not recommend it. There's another stop that I made that's not on there. It's a store called the Farmer's Market that had just opened for the season. They aren't quite ready yet. Maybe next time I go there I'll be able to eliminate some of my other stops.

This post is linked to:
Money Saving Mom
Grocery Cart Challenge
29-Jun Breadroot Food Co-Op


Sucanat $0.24

1 vanilla bean $1.50

Tax $0.10



29-Jun Sam's Club

6 Peppers $6.98

Tomatoes $5.98

Frozen Green Beans $5.48

Frozen Green Peas $4.88

Frozen Broccoli $4.98

Peanuts $5.76

Fish Oil Pills $12.87

Tax $2.82





1-Jul Walmart

Bananas $0.70

Avocado $0.78

Hot Dog Buns for Brats $1.00

Miracle Whip $1.97

Mayo $1.97

Whipping Cream $2.13

1% gallon milk $2.48



1-Jul Butcher Shop

1 dozen eggs - YIKES! $3.90

** my egg source for $2.00 won't have eggs for two months UGGGG!



1-Jul Lueders

**I realized (again) today just how much I love love love shopping here!!!

** They sell SD items too!



4 corn on the cob - yes, it's a grain $1.60

watermelon - YUMMY for the 4th $3.84

Bing Cherries from Washington $3.26

Asparagus $1.20

** enough for myself and DH - kids don't care for it

1 onion $0.92

Raisin Bran $2.99

Parmesean Cheese $1.89

**for my daughter who wants to make alfredo tonight

** this has gone up in price a LOT! Rock bottom price used to be $1.00 now it's $1.50



BBQ Sauce $0.99

** sometimes I'm lazy :-)

Smart Chicken breasts $5.44

** Still undecided about this. Better than regular chicken breasts, but not as good as pastured chickens

** Question: Can I afford to buy pastured chickens? Can I afford the time to prepare all of the time?

Tax $1.33





1-Jul Valley Corner Gas Station

1 package brat $4.74

** My friend sells/creates labels for a local SD person who sells brats & sausages at this little gas station





Total for week of June 28, 2010



$94.72