Menu Madness

I am thankful for health...and medication!  This week has had me a bit under the weather.  I mentioned before learning that I was not feeling well due to allergies.  I had been working on that when I woke up Tuesday morning with a scratchy throat.  This progressed into a stuffy nose, dry eyes, and intense pain with the breathing.  As I told my mister, "I used to think a stuffy nose was the worse thing ever, then I thought it was the hardship to get a deep breath (experienced with the allergies), and now both of those seem so small compared to both of those, with pain in the chest whenever you took a breath or exhaled".  Long story short, I was at the doctor's getting tested for tuberculosis (a common thing when working with children), and I mentioned this to the doctor.  Come to find out, my enjoying the gorgeous weather was simply making my allergies exponentially worse.



We went home and closed our windows, and I have since stayed inside as much as possible.  This has been hard, as the weather has been perfect.  With the windows closed though, changing allergy meds, getting lots of sleep, taking other medications, I am feeling a lot better- Praise the Lord!  Today was the first day I felt the strength to do some house work.  It feels so good to clean the house.  I have been dusting and wiping everything down, in hopes of getting rid of the nasty allergens causing so many issues.  We expect to see continued improvement!

The mister is back to work today (after his weekend) and besides cleaning, I have been meal planning.  Have I mentioned how much I love this aspect of being a housewife?  I love the challenge and adventure of being creative while on a budget.  I love the fact that when meal planning, it relieves the afternoon stress of "oh no, what do I make for dinner?!" [not to mention, do you have the ingredients].  I have also heard from others that it helps save money when you plan and then buy according to your plans so you don't continue to go back to the store throughout the week.  I plan according to the items on sale that week!

Take it or leave it as you may, but here is a list of what our little family is eating for dinners this week:

Sunday: Zucchini and Spaghetti Casserole Zucchini is on sale this week, and I love crock pot meals because it allows me to relax more on a Sunday afternoon while awaiting my husband's arrival home from work.
Monday: Stuffed Peppers This is a crock pot recipe again because we both work.  There is no recipe, I am just making it up
Tuesday: Sweet Brown BBQ Lime Chicken Crock Pot, again!  I think we will eat this in a sandwich kind of like a pulled pork sandwich.  Maybe add some zucchini Parmesan fries for the side?
Wednesday: Black Bean Soup with Sausage and Spinach  We have some venison summer sausage from our Dad's deer that I have been wanting to use.
Thursday: Balsamic Potato and Zucchini We are working to do a few more meatless meals (meat is expensive!) and this is one stab at it.
Friday: Stromboli This will also be a recipe I make up on the spot using my favorite pizza dough recipe from my Taste of Home cookbook
Saturday: Pumpkin Waffles with Maple Whipped Cream on top I absolutely adore fall, and can't get enough pumpkin foods.