Fresh 20: Fail

You Guys, look at this amazing Fresh 20 meal I made.

Just kidding. It's a Freschetta Frozen pizza with some added grape tomatoes and parsley as a garnish to throw you guys off. I posted last week about how awesome Fresh 20 is and how much we love it and how I planned to share some of our meals with you guys and then this week fell apart.

I was a good girl and went to the Franklin Farmers market on Saturday while Josh was out of town to pick up some of our ingredients for the week. Then Sunday afternoon got away from all of us with another epic post-church nap (why are those the best) and we never got the remaining ingredients for the week.

Enter Monday - Felix isn't napping so all hopes of making it to the grocery without a melt down are shot and the rest of the day is history. We wound up at Blue Coast burrito for some Baja Fish tacos and then Tuesday night we sort of just chose an easy route because we had lots of errands to run, Josh was meeting up with a friend and we weren't super hungry come dinner time.

But that's ok. Life is crazy and we are flexible! We used some of the grape tomatoes form this week's menu on our frozen pizza and we have plans to eat up the "Turkey" (read: chicken) cutlets for tomorrow nights meal. Stay tuned. I'm sure a riveting post about cutlets will be coming your way, or not. ;)

The Fresh 20

Food is important around here. In the past Josh and I would end up eating out for dinner probably 3 times a week and even though we are wanna-be foodies, we don't have the budget to hit-up every fusion, french or fancy restaurant in town. So we often times would resort to pizza, chipotle, chick-fil-a, or subs from somewhere quick.

We decided recently that this was NOT a good plan for our waist line or our budget and we wanted Felix to grow up in a home that had meals around the table together, so we committed to eating at home more often.

Now, this was a good idea in theory, but I lacked imagination in the meal planning department and had no knowledge about how to do this in a cost effective way. Often times I would plan a meal the day it was to be eaten and then go out and buy all the ingredients for said meal. Ending up in about 30 bucks spent at the grocery store. We would have left overs, but in my head if I was spending that much on one meal for 2 at home and still dealing with clean up afterwards, we may as well be eating out.

Enter a few weeks of feeble attempts and frustration that led to a random discussion on Sunday afternoon about meal plans, a quick Facebook post asking for some advice and my friend Amanda suggesting The Fresh 20. It was down hill from there.

Being food lovers, busy and on a budget the Fresh 20 was perfect. It compiles a weekly menu (5 nights a week - not the overwhelming 7 like other meal planners) then gives you an itemized grocery list of 20  ingredients to purchase for ALL your meals that week. That's it. 20 items. Some ingredients are in multiple dishes, others are used up on one night. And because the list includes in-season items that you use multiple times throughout the week (so you can buy in bulk) it helps save money  So far our weekly dinner costs on the Fresh 20 has been about 70 dollars or less and many times the meals have leftovers to carry our lunches as well.

Meals like garlic chicken with massaged kale and avacado salad, Grilled sausage pizza with homemade pesto sauce and cantaloupe, or grilled chicken tacos with pineapple salsa are a few of our favorites. I'm loving it. I'm trying new dishes that I would never come up with on my own. And they are WAY healthier than my regular go-to dishes but these are still packed with flavor. I'm hoping to document some of our meals and share them here on the blog. Stay tuned!

How do you meal plan for the week? What are some of your go-to dishes?

Normal

Last weekend Felix and I came back from a 5 day trip to Baltimore to be with my family. We flew in on Saturday (a rough flight with a screaming, over tired baby) and Josh picked us up at the air port. I was so happy to see him. Being apart felt so odd. I was able to cope in the day to day alone with Felix and some help from willing sisters, but I missed my other half immensely.

Saturday afternoon we ate Chipotle for lunch and then took a long family nap. Snuggled side by side. Felix with his leg tossed over my hip and Josh with his hand resting in my hair. It had been such a heavy week apart from one another and when we woke we thought some fun was necessary to bring back family unity. We made soft pretzels with jalapeno cheddar sauce from scratch. It was such an interesting experience  They weren't prefect, but we learned a few tricks along the way and I'm pretty sure we will try making them again sometime in the future.

Monday I jumped back into the grind. Felix had his 6 month appointment in the morning (!) and I started getting the house back in order after a week of Josh living like a bachelor. Honestly, I was surprised there wasn't more of a mess to take care of, but the laundry was piled high, vacuuming was needed and all the bathrooms were in a terrible state. (They were going down hill before I left, so I can't solely blame him.) 

I got the first floor picked up, bedroom picked up, dishes done, laundry started, and I cooked a healthy meal from the Fresh 20. (Pineapple pork with broccoli and brown rice.) All while Felix napped, played with toys on the floor, practiced rocking back and forth on all fours, played in his exersaucer and repeated the process throughout the day.

In the evening we ate dinner, then went on a very muggy family walk. As I was cleaning earlier that day I noticed how stinky Willow was, so we got the bright idea to try and give her a hair cut and bath last night. Let's just say instead of a hair cut, it looks like we gave our dog the mange. Poor Willie-Ray.

Today has been similar, bathrooms cleaned, laundry folded and put away, baby laid down for naps, fed sweet potato, living room vacuumed and I'm planning a grilled chicken pasta for dinner. 

I know this post is pretty mundane. But it has actually been a refreshing few days. Having a bit of normal. Normal mornings. Normal afternoons. Normal evenings. Normal meals. Normal bedtimes. Just normal. How is your start to the week going?