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How to Make Uncrustables

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Let’s talk about how to make Uncrustables and all the reasons you should make them at home!

Yum

What is an Uncrustable?

Uncrustables are a lovely convenience item found in the freezer section of the grocery store. They are pre-made peanut butter and jelly sandwich with crusts removed. Perfect for most of our kids, right?

Yes, but the cost.

I can’t let myself spend $4.18 for just four crustless pb&j sandwiches. Surely it costs much less to throw together a simple sandwich at home, right? Right.

Here’s what you need to make Uncrustables:

100% Whole Wheat Bread: $0.19/sandwich
Natural Peanut Butter: $0.13/sandwich
100% Fruit Jelly: $0.13/sandwich

Uncrustables at the store: $1.05 per sandwich (made with less-nourishing ingredients)
Cost for a Homemaade Uncrustable: $0.45 (made with much better ingredients)

Oh, and you’ll need this handy tool which is a one-time, very worth it purchase.

Don’t waste the crust!!

When I use two loaves of bread to make 20 Uncrustables, I end up with a 10×13 inch pyrex full of crusts. I can’t stand the idea of throwing them out, so I use them to make Easy Bread Pudding. My family loves this and I love that nothing goes to waste!

How to make your own Peanut Butter

Want to make your own peanut butter? It’s truly the most delicious! Here’s the recipe. It’s so very easy to make!

If you don’t make your own peanut butter, look for brands that don’t have hydrogenated oils in them. Those oils are best avoided. :)

The joy of Homemade Uncrustables

If you make Uncrustables, I recommend making many at once so that you get more mass for your mess. :) I make two loaves of bread worth each time I make Uncrustables (which produces 20). Then I freeze them to pull out for quick lunches for my kids (either at home or in lunchboxes at school). Having these ready in the freezer is so handy! And if we’re at home and want to eat them straight from the freezer, we put them into our air fryer for a minute or two to thaw/crisp up. So good!

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The Easiest No-Bake Cheescake

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Ready for the Easiest No-Bake Cheesecake recipe?

This cheesecake is always a hit when I serve it and since it’s so easy to make, I can serve it to guests often.

Ingredient Info

I buy cream cheese at Aldi by the case because it is a great price for great cream cheese (not all off-brand cream cheese is good). So there’s my cream cheese recommendation. :)

Meanwhile, I have learned the hard way that higher-quality whipping cream does not work as well in this recipe. :(  When I used Horizon Organic Whipping Cream, I couldn’t get this mixture to thicken and set up. But when I used regular whipping cream from Walmart, it worked like a charm. So there you go. For this recipe, use low-quality whipping cream. Ugh, who even am I anyway??

The Easiest No-Bake CheesecakeYum

The Easiest No-Bake Cheescake
 
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Serves: 15
Ingredients
  • 2 sleeves honey graham crackers
  • 2 sticks butter
  • 2 8-ounce packages cream cheese, softened
  • 1 cup raw sugar
  • 1 cup heavy whipping cream
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
Instructions
  1. In a gallon sized Ziploc bag, crush graham crackers with a rolling pin.
  2. Melt butter in a small saucepan.
  3. Pour crushed graham crackers and melted butter into a 9 x 13 inch pan.
  4. Stir ingredients together and pat it down to create crust. Set aside.
  5. In a high power blender or using a hand mixer, blend together cream cheese, sugar, whipping cream and vanilla until mixture is combined and thick.
  6. Smooth mixture over the crust. Chill for at least two hours before serving.

This cheesecake is great as-is, but you can also add fresh berries to make it fancier. Or, you can top it with candy bars for a fun treat! (One week, I had a package of a variety of candy bars that I wanted to get rid of so I used them up for a college student lunch. It was a huge hit!)

If you study the above picture, you’ll see that on the left, I used the cheapo whipping cream that actually thickened. On the right, I used good whipping cream and the mixture remained runny. I served it to our guests anyway and it all tasted great. But now you can see what I was talking about regarding whipping cream above. :)

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Do I Still Buy Organic Food?

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Several have asked, so here’s the answer to: Do I still buy organic food?

Does it help answer the immediate question if I first admit that every time I go to Costco I buy a bag of frozen nuggets and a few boxes of frozen pizza?

I spy corn dogs in this Sam’s cart:

But also organic greens in this one:

Organic frozen veggies here:

A mix of organic and non-organic fruit here:

Do I Still Buy Organic Food?

In summary, sometimes I do and sometimes I don’t. Here is some explanation behind my food purchasing decisions:

1. I need to keep to our $1,200/month grocery budget.

With 10 people to feed three meals every day and a rise in grocery prices, we considered increasing our grocery budget to $1,500/month. This would still only be $5/day/person which is very reasonable. But we’re hoping to maintain our budget as it is at $1,200/month, which is $4/person/day.

This decision was made because I knew it was possible. I CAN creatively and carefully keep our budget at this number. And I wanted to challenge myself to do it. So far, so good.

2. I decided to stop overthinking.

This has been tough because I KNOW that organic, grass-fed beef is much, much better than other beef. I know that free-range chicken is better. I know that organic produce is better.

And I also know that all of those cost much more. (Wait, not all. But most.)

If I think too hard about any of this, I feel guilty that I’m not spending time finding allllll the best sources for meat and produce, and that I’m not spending any amount of extra money that it takes to eat the best of the best.

Y’all, I’d be spending $2,500/month if I bought everything organic, grass-fed, and free-range.

Instead, I watch for sales on meat at regular grocery stores and we buy it, cook it, and eat it. I buy some organic produce when the price is right, and I watch for sales on the “regular” produce and eat it without guilt.

IT IS STILL MEAT. It is still fruit and vegetables. It is still real food. It still nourishes us. I have to be at peace with this and God is faithful to provide that peace.

3. My days are very full and my priorities have shifted.

I work to put real food on the table that is wholesome and nourishing. But with this many little ones to care for right now (currently seven kids ages newborn to 9), we also have to compromise sometimes with boxed mac and cheese – the kind in a blue box. We eat fruits and vegetables with every meal, even if it’s frozen pizza. And most of our meals still look like what you see below because I’ve learned to make very simple dishes that don’t take long to prepare.

What do I still buy organic?

  • Fresh spinach and greens – because it’s actually the same price or cheaper than regular
  • Any produce I find that is only slightly more expensive than regular
  • Milk from a farm because we have a good source that we’ve been using for years
  • Eggs from our neighbor
  • Meat only if I find a good price – which happens very rarely – so this barely makes the list

Otherwise, I focus on feeding us:

  • Real food as much as possible – meat, veggies, fruit, bread, milk, cheese, butter, peanut butter
  • Healthy fats – continuing to avoid hydrogenated oils and shortenings
  • Fruits and veggies at every meal
  • Low-sugar homemade baked goods

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You can see some examples of meals we eat here, here, and here.

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What are your current thoughts on eating organic foods?

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How I Shop and Budget for Our Large Family

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Everyone’s family needs and shopping options are different. Here’s how I shop and budget for our large family.

Who We’re Feeding

Here’s one of our latest family pictures, taken at our Boy #2’s wedding last summer. Our two oldest sons are married and on their own now. Boy #3 is a college senior and lives at home while he finishes his last semester. Boy #4 is a high school senior – and just about the time we thought we’d be empty nesters, God started to grow our family through foster care and adoption. The six littles in the picture are either adopted or will be soon. What a journey! You can read more about our family here.

Suddenly that picture is outdated as we welcomed another baby boy into our home early this year. :)

When you take a look at our large family’s overall grocery budget for the month, you might choke on your coffee. It’s large and possibly overwhelming to some. Here’s how we save in other areas so that we afford to buy all these groceries. And here’s a quick breakdown of our eating habits:

  • We feed 4 adults, 3 school-aged kids, and 3 toddlers – a total of 10 people – three meals every day. (Several days each week, one of our former foster sons comes over too.)
  • We very rarely eat out (approximately once every three months if we are on the road somewhere).
  • Our school kids pack a lunch to take to school; the rest of us eat lunch at home.
  • We feed a lot of guests – anywhere from 5-20 extra people per week.

How I Grocery Shop and Budget for Our Large Family

We live in a small town without a lot of grocery store options. So here’s what works for me when it comes to grocery purchases.

1. I hit Costco and Sam’s once per month to stock up on bulk items.

Costco and Sam’s are an hour away from us, so I make a plan for all the kids for the day, then I go stock up once each month. Read here about what I like to buy at Costco and Sam’s. You’ll see that I splurge on a few convenience items like frozen pizza and chicken nuggets. These purchases give me a night off from cooking without making us pay restaurant prices. It’s a perfect compromise!

2. Walmart Pick-Up

In our town, we have two local grocery stores that are rather pricey, plus Walmart. Two to three times each month, I place a Walmart pickup order to fill in gaps for our fresh produce and dairy needs until I can get back to Costco or Sam’s. Here’s a look at typical Wal-mart pick-up orders for our family.

3. Azure Standard

I get a few items every month or two from Azure Standard, and I like ordering items from them that I have a hard time finding other places. Here are some of the items I like to buy from Azure.

4. Local Farm Eggs and Milk

We are blessed to have friends with a farm a few miles away. They supply us with our milk each week. Our eggs come all the way from across the street where our neighbors enjoy raising chickens!

Our Family Eats Well for an Average of $4/person/day.

That’s how I shop, but how about how we eat?

All totaled, we average about $1,200/month for groceries. The great big budget number seems large, but it divides into just $4/person/day (less than that, actually, because we also feed guests from our regular budget). This includes all meals and snacks plus features many high-quality fruits and vegetables. I feel very good about this, especially since this budget number includes packed school lunches and ways we splurge at home instead of eating out. (UPDATE: I am currently working to see if I can keep our budget at this number or if I need to increase it. Stay tuned.)

Here are some examples of meals we eat at our house:

I made this simple Baked Chicken Leg meal for just $0.99/plate. It was a feast with chicken, baked potatoes, steamed broccoli, and fresh watermelon.

After a Costco trip, we often have Chicken Salad on croissants with spinach. We had this with fresh strawberries, raspberries, and carrots. The croissants are a splurge, but this is still an inexpensive meal!

Here’s one of our favorite meals: Smoked marinated chicken thighs – so easy and so delicious. On this particular day, we ate this with steamed green beans, buttered corn, baked potatoes, and grapes.

Breakfast for dinner is always a hit. This French toast meal served with eggs, sausage, and fruit is a favorite. The toast and eggs were flying off the plate and skillet faster than I could keep up!

I watch for mark-downs on meat and buy pork roasts when I can get them for less than $3.00/pound. I like to cook roasts overnight on Saturday to enjoy a meal like this on Sunday after church.

We’ve found that eating a lot of fruits and vegetables actually saves us money! Crazy but true!

More ways we save money:

But wait? You NEVER eat out??

Can you imagine taking this many babies into a restaurant? Here’s what we do instead. <— This post might give you some fun ideas for your family if you’re trying to eat out less. :)

High grocery store prices won’t get us down. What ways are you finding to save at the store?

Coming up next: Do I still buy organic food??

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Why I Make Little Birthday Cakes for my Big Family

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Our family celebrates nine birthdays between the months of November and February. NINE. But that’s not why I make little birthday cakes for my big family.

This post is actually not very exciting. In fact, it might leave you thinking that I’m a big dull dud.

Isn’t the birthday cake one of the best parts of having a birthday?? Isn’t our family kind of huge? Why then would I make one little birthday cake for all of us to share as we celebrate each birthday?

This cake, pictured above, is just a 7×11-inch size. I actually cut this Sunshine Cake recipe in half when making it. This, when I usually quadruple most recipes for my family. :)

Why I Make Little Birthday Cakes for my Big Family

There are so many reasons.

  1. We don’t love cake. It’s fine, but other desserts tend to be loved more by our bigger kids and adults around here.
  2. We almost always have plenty of other treats and sweets lying around during these months so the cake is almost an afterthought. Between Dec. 20 through 31, we have 4 birthdays – with Christmas in the middle of it all. Do you know how many treats get brought home and enjoyed during Christmas? Who needs cake? :)
  3. I don’t give our littlest ones much sugar yet. Their plate of cake looks like this:

See? I told you that I am a big dull dud. Or am I? Both our one-year-old and two-year-old think it’s amazing that they get cake at all. So they don’t know they’re deprived. Shh, don’t tell!

Also, we find that cake dries out quickly, so we want to finish it off during our birthday celebration so it can be enjoyed at its finest.

So there you have it. We make small cakes for birthdays. We all enjoy a little and that’s that. No one complains and in fact, everyone is very happy.

Awww, Keith’s second birthday. We had pumpkin pie instead of cake that night. Because pumpkins are a vegetable. Amen?

P.S. As an aside, I always bake a cake instead of buying one made and decorated at the store. I’m not a good decorator, so sprinkles are the extent of our extravagance around here. But I can’t make myself spend $25 on a cake when I can make one for $2.50. And my kids think sprinkles are beautiful. :)

What’s your birthday cake tradition at your house?

Enjoy These Cake Recipes!

  1. Banana Cake
  2. Blueberry Coffee Cake
  3. Breakfast Cake
  4. Peanut Butter Breakfast Cake
  5. Pumpkin Breakfast Cake
  6. Carrot Cake
  7. Chocolate Cake
  8. Lemon Pound Cake
  9. Peanut Butter Cake
  10. Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cake
  11. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cake
  12. Red(less) Velvet Cake
  13. Strawberry Shortcake
  14. Zucchini Cake
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Breakfast Cookie Cups – Perfect for Grab-and-Go!

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I turned my breakfast cookie recipe into Breakfast Cookie Cups. This is genius.

Not that Breakfast Cookies aren’t already convenient as a quick grab-and-go breakfast or snack option. But somehow having them in cupcake wrappers and baked in a muffin tin makes them even easier. Maybe they’re less crumbly? I dunno, but I really like them this way!

My kids are loving them, however, for our littlest, I skipped the chocolate chips to avoid extra messes. (How do they end up with chocolate chips melted onto their bottoms every time, I don’t know. So chocolate chip-less Breakfast Cookie Cups for all who are two and under at our house.)

Breakfast Cookie CupsYum

Breakfast Cookie Cups - Perfect for Grab-and-Go!
 
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Author:
Serves: 18
Ingredients
  • 1 cup melted butter
  • ½ cup honey
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 2 cups whole wheat flour
  • 2 cups rolled oats
  • ½ cup raisins or chocolate chips
Instructions
  1. Mix butter, honey, eggs, salt, cinnamon, baking soda, and vanilla.
  2. Stir in flour and oats.
  3. Fold in raisins or chocolate chips.
  4. Scoop heaping tablespoons of dough into paper-lined muffin tins.
  5. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

I double this recipe every time I make it simply because these freeze well and they are great to have in the freezer to serve as needed.

TIP: Add 1 cup of peanut butter to these if you want to add some protein. No other adjustments necessary.

Here are a few more great ideas for grab-and-go breakfasts:

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February 2023 Groceries and Meals We Ate (Big Family Food!)

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Here’s a look at our February 2023 groceries and meals we ate that month!

February 2023 Groceries

We’ll start with a look at my grocery shopping trips this month. First, on the first Sunday of the month our entire family was able to worship together in Lincoln (where Asa, Justus, and their wives go to church). It was wonderful to be together, and we headed to Costco after church so we could eat lunch and shop. There are 16 of us now (including wives and a girlfriend) so lunch at Costco was slightly nuts. But cheap. How else can we feed 15 people for $32? (Baby opted for his bottle instead of a hotdog.)

I tried to capture a pic of all of us walking into Costco. Grown-up kids, little kids, Daddy – everyone holding a baby or a little hand…

I spend a solid $731 that day and got home with a great big haul of groceries. Sausage, chips, shredded cheese, frozen fruit and corn, maple syrup, honey, fresh greens and spinach, butter, rice, yogurt, cinnamon bread, creamer…

Coffee, applesauce pouches, yogurt pouches, peach cups, yogurt cups, half and half, cream, sour cream…

Chicken nuggets, carrots, apples, coconut oil, mozzarella, salad mix, frozen tilapia, cantaloupe, granola bites…

Many of the snack-sized items I got to help supplement our school kids’ lunches (even the splurges cost less than paying for a school lunch).

Four of our foster kids qualify for WIC benefits, which is a huge perk as it provides us with a small amount of fruits, vegetables, cheese, eggs, milk, cereal, juice beans, bread, and formula each month at no cost to us. I snapped this picture of the groceries I’d gotten with two of our WIC cards and wasn’t able to take pictures at home because all the babies wanted to be held at once since I’d been out. ;)

Mid-February we were in Grand Island for Malachi’s soccer games. I ran into Sam’s to get “just a few things” which for us means that I only filled one cart. :) :) :)

I spent $161 on food that day.

At the end of the month, I had a chance to go to Costco and Aldi. I came home with this after spending $304 on food. How did I get away with all these groceries for so little? Just before I went to Costco that day, I received an email that included my Costco Reward Certificate. It covered almost all my needs that day. SO THANKFUL!

At Aldi, I got strawberries, blueberries, clementines, bagels, pretzels, ketchup, sausage, grass-fed beef (on sale!), brown sugar, cottage cheese, and cases of:

  • Chicken broth
  • Salsa (2 cases!)
  • Pears in 100% juice
  • Peaches in 100% juice
  • Corn
  • Cream Cheese
  • Mac and Cheese ($0.50/box – a great convenience at a low price)

Since I stocked up so much at Aldi, I only needed one cartful at Costco. I got shredded cheese, applesauce, yogurt pouches and cups (on sale!), chicken (x3), butter, sour cream, broccoli, apples, greens, chicken nuggets, pizza, blackberries, guacamole cups, avocado cups, white queso, mandarin orange cups, half and half, red grapes, green grapes, caesar salad mix, and croissants.

After a Costco trip, the boxes are the best!

We are settling in with a new baby, I’ve had extra foster care meetings and appointments this month, and overall, we are pretty tired. Happy, healthy, joyful, thankful, and tired. So I decided this month to simply buy what we needed without overthinking and then get back to sticking to a budget later when I’m more rested and able to think/plan more frugally. :) These days sure are sweet though.

Keith loves his baby brother…

So. About that grocery budget.

I am realizing that I will soon need to increase our grocery budget.

I am having to rely on some convenience foods right now, and eventually, I can cook more from scratch and save more money. But even with that, I’m realizing that my budget may need to increase soon. Had it not been for our Costco Reward money, I would have gone FAR over budget this month. And there’s not much I feel I can do about it. The kids are only going to eat more as they continue to grow. Plus, for goodness sake, I am feeding 10 people three meals every day.

Stay tuned for an update on that once I have time to sit down and figure out what makes sense for our family. I’d love to hear your thoughts on what you feel is reasonable to spend per person per month on food. :)

Meals We Ate in February

Ready for the fun part?! Here’s a look at some of the meals we ate in February!

Someone gave us some Italian Bread loaves so I used them that night to make Pizza Boats. I served them with fruit and fresh spinach. (Some of my kids dip their spinach in ranch, some just eat it plain, and one of them dips it in ketchup, ha. Whatever gets the spinach down, I say.)

I hadn’t made this Cheeseburger Mac in a long time and it really hit the spot! I made it on a day when we were having trouble with our kitchen sinks draining properly. So I served our dinner on these disposable trays we had accumulated somehow.

What does our kitchen look like when our sink drains are messed up and I can’t wash dishes??

The sippies and other bowls and cups you see above are actually clean. I had taken them upstairs to our bathtub and washed them because running out of clean sippy cups isn’t an option. Matt worked all afternoon and solved the drain problem. It’s always good to be reminded to be thankful for the opportunity to wash dishes!

There was a box of free zucchini when I went to a WIC appointment for our girls, so I brought some home and made a double batch of this Whole Wheat Zucchini Bread. I shared two of the loaves with a family going through intense health issues. The other two loaves got eaten in two days at our house.

Here’s a little peek at our 2-year-old and 1-year-old sitting at a little table that we’ve had since our big boys were little. They were eating a breakfast of banana, yogurt, and zucchini bread bites.

I had a roast in the freezer so I slow-cooked it one day with potatoes and carrots.

I made 6 pounds of meatballs one day (recipe coming soon). I froze 4 pounds of them and baked 2 pounds for dinner that night with mac and cheese and steamed broccoli.

Here’s a look at six of our littles around the table eating meatballs. :) :) :)

When Baby#11 was born, someone gifted us an amazing pizza gift card. We took advantage of this one night when the pizza place was offering a special! That was a great night off of cooking for me!

I had picked up some Uncured Beef Smokies from Costco, and the kids were super excited. I poured barbecue sauce on them and slow-cooked them all afternoon. They were…so-so. :) It was a nice, convenient dinner but none of us gobbled these right up.

The day I made those smokies, the kids had the day off of school. One of our daughters-in-law was at our house helping for the day so we made a huge batch of Cream Cheese Cut-Out Cookies for Valentine’s Day.

One day in February it got up to 60 degrees, which is crazy for us in Nebraska! I took advantage of the weather and smoked a bunch of brats and hotdogs for dinner.

We took some to share with another family who had just had a loss in their family, then we enjoyed these with baked beans and carrot sticks.

One night I made a big batch of Cheeseburger Soup, but added noodles instead of potatoes. We ate our fill that night, then I added sour cream and cheese to the leftovers to create a casserole to eat another night.

For our school kids’ Valentine’s Day lunch, I made and packed them a heart-shaped quesadilla. :)

For dinner on Valentine’s night, I made Chicken Pizza Bake and took a few minutes to cut the pepperoni into hearts. :)

Here’s a look at a Saturday morning breakfast for all the littles that they enjoyed after watching a show (so I could wake up slowly with our baby). Sausage links, apple slices with peanut butter, yogurt, pumpkin muffins, and cinnamon toast.

I don’t remember what we ate for our main dish this meal, but I snapped a picture of Brayden and Keith eating pear slices and spinach with ranch while they waited on the rest of their meal. This is often how I feed the kids: give them their fruit and veggie to eat first before filling up on the rest of the meal. We have fewer food fights this way.

I put White Chicken Chili in the crock pot one morning and we enjoyed it that evening with Applesauce Bread. If you haven’t tried this easy chili recipe before, you must. It’s delicious, and it also takes no effort to make!

On another day, I made regular chili. We didn’t eat it, but instead, I filled two gallon-sized freezer bags with it and froze them both. I had browned several pounds of ground beef so it made sense to create something with the cooked meat before stashing it away. Chili it was! Now we have two meals ready to thaw and eat at any time! OR, I can use some to make this amazing Chili Cheese Dip.

Lunchtime each day can be a bit of a “thing” for our 4-3-2-and 1-year olds. They are all so little, and lunchtime is almost naptime, so we’re all a little bit tired at this point in the day. So, I’ve taken a break from giving them leftovers (Matt, Elias, Malachi, and I eat those up at lunchtime though!) and I’ve started giving them more “snacky” items. Here’s an example of a day I fixed their plates with pepperoni, cheese cubes, avocado cups, crackers, and applesauce. It was a hit!

After my final Costco run of the month, we enjoyed their croissants with chicken salad, grapes, and strawberries.

The older boys weren’t home for lunch that day so we actually had leftovers. I turned them into Chicken Salad Melts with cheese and ranch, which we baked the next day after church and ate with tomato soup, smoothies, and chips and salsa.

Here’s a peek at a marker board I moved into the kitchen. I’ve been writing down meals as I plan them for each day so that our 7 and 9-year-olds can read it instead of asking me over and over what we’re eating. It’s served as an added blessing that Matt knows what I’m planning and starts helping with prep without asking what needs to be done. :)

Completely unrelated to food, but worth sharing is the picture of our silverware drawer after our four year old cleaned out that part of the dishwasher. We are starting to get our 4-7-9 year-olds more involved with household needs and he is very capable of this task. Who cares that the silverware is all messy in the drawer? Not me!

We made breakfast for dinner that included biscuits, sausage/cheese eggs, pears, and blackberries. It was simple and the kids loved it!

I made three lasagnas one afternoon, freezing two and saving one to eat during the week. You’ll see that meal in March!! :)

How’s your budget looking? Care to share how much you spend per person per month? (I’m currently at $120/person/month but need to consider increasing and would love some input!)

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Easy Hot Food to Pack in School Lunches

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Are your kids ready for a variety in their lunchboxes? Here are some easy options for hot food to pack in school lunches!

My school kids aren’t big sandwich eaters, so I’ve already gotten creative as I pack their school lunches.

Here are some of the non-sandwich cold lunch options I often send with them. I’d already done the cost breakdown for these when I originally put together this list here, so I left the cost estimates just for fun. Notice how it saves a lot of money to pack a lunch for school!

1. Bean and cheese quesadillas, carrots, strawberries $1.78

2. Cheese and crackers, summer sausage, grapes, spinach cupcake (no frosting), cottage cheese and pineapple = $2.49

3. Pumpkin muffin, cottage cheese and pineapple, clementine, almonds = $1.43

4. Tuna salad with crackers, fruit cup, cheese stick, spinach cupcake (no frosting) = $1.83

5. Chips with cheesy bean dip, grapes, spinach cupcake (no frosting)  = $1.43

6. Leftover pizza slices (with spinach “hidden” on top), clementine, banana = $1.34

7. Bagel with cream cheese “sandwich”, ham, apple = $1.72

These lunches have worked great for my kids! But a few weeks ago, I picked up some nice thermoses at Costco, so now I have the option of sending a hot lunch too. I love the variety this adds to my kids’ lunchboxes. I also love that they can eat leftovers for their lunches, which cuts down my prep time!

Easy Hot Food to Pack in School Lunches

I put these items in a saucepan the night before, then warm the food while my kids are eating breakfast. I transfer the hot food to their thermoses and send them on their way. Hours later at lunchtime, the food is still hot. Amazing!

Here are some of their favorites that I’ve sent so far:

1. Beanie Weanies with grapes and a muffin

2. Mac and Cheese with a fruit cup and a banana

3. Chili with a little bag of cheese and a little bag of fritos for them to add to their chili, plus a clementine or fruit cup

4. Taco Soup with a little bag of cheese and a little bag of fritos for them to add to their soup, plus grapes

5. Chicken Noodle Soup with a spinach cupcake (no frosting) and an apple

6. Spaghetti with a cheese stick and mandarin oranges

7. Tomato Soup with a straw to slurp it up :) plus a cup of cottage cheese with pineapple

8. White Chicken Chili with a little bag of fritos for them to add to their chili plus fruit cup or grapes

9. Ham and Cheesy Potato Casserole with grapes and a muffin

Extras for lunch boxes

  • Notice how my kids’ lunches are short on veggies?? Yikes, I know. They don’t eat raw veggies and I have to give them dips and ketchup to get their hot veggies down at home. So we work on veggies at dinnertime and eat as many of these smoothies as we can! :)
  • These spinach cupcakes sort of get some veggies in them during school lunch, so I make them and baggie them individually for the freezer.
  • Also, when I make any soup, I add a lot of veggies to the broth. So they are getting veggies that way if they take soup in a thermos.
  • Need muffin recipes for your kids’ lunchboxes? My kids love it when I send a muffin. Here’s a huge muffin recipe list.
  • Fruit cups (peaches, pears, or mandarin oranges in 100% juice) cost more than canned fruit, but I do appreciate the convenience they provide for school lunches. Also, when I add up the cost of any meal I pack for the kids, it still costs less than a school lunch typically costs. So the splurge is worth it.

What hot lunches do your kids enjoy at school?

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How to Save Time Washing Dishes

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Want to save time washing dishes?

I’ve shared with you before that my kitchen looks like this much of the time:

This is not because I rarely wash dishes. This is because we have a very full house, thus creating many dirty dishes throughout the day.

I fill the dishwasher to the max at least twice if not three times every day.

When you cook meals at home, there’s no getting around having dishes to wash. I don’t like buying and using paper plates unless we have guests (especially now as prices for paper products have gone up).

But I do have a few tips that help our dirty dishes pile just a tiny bit smaller. I certainly don’t need to waste time in the kitchen if I can help it!

How to Save Time Washing Dishes

1. If I can, I skip the mixing bowl and mix food directly in a baking dish.

This doesn’t always work, but here’s an example of what does work! If I’m making something like cornbread or brownies, I find that I can put all the ingredients into a 9×13-inch baking dish, stir it up, then spread it to bake.

My 4-year-old helper likes this method too.

This also works with just about every casserole I make.

2. Roll biscuits directly on the pan.

Instead of making a mess on my countertop or on a cutting board when I make biscuits, I spread flour on my cookie sheet, press down the dough, cut the biscuits, and bake.

3. When I cut fruit or veggies with a knife, I rinse the knife and put it in the dish drain to use again.

Fruit like apples, bananas, peaches, and such don’t make a knife super dirty. The same goes for veggies like sweet peppers and cucumbers. Save time and dirty dishes by rinsing it off and using it again the next time you need to cut something quickly.

4. Re-use saucepans for melting butter and oil.

If I’m melting coconut oil or butter on the stove for baking, I often leave the pan on the stove to reuse later if I plan to do more baking that day. It just makes sense!

Granola Cookie

5. Use muffin liners.

In my experience, it takes an extra long time to scrub individual muffin tins after baking muffins. Instead, I use liners so that the muffins pop right out and the pans just have to go through a quick rinse.

6. Make multiple batches at once.

This not only saves on dirty dishes, but it also saves time and energy. Every time I make anything from casseroles to muffins to bread to cookies – I multiply the batch at least by two but often by four or even eight! I find that if I’m going to get out ingredients, spend time reading a recipe, and dirty some dishes, I might as well get the most from my effort!

We eat the first round, then I freeze extras so that all I have to do later is pull out food and serve it or bake it and serve it. This way, I only do the prep dishes the first time around. After that, there are no extra dishes!

What helps you save time washing dishes?

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January 2023 Groceries and Meals We Ate

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Here’s a look at our groceries and meals we ate in January!

The first part of January is a bit of a blur and I didn’t cook much because our church family brought meals to us for over a week. Why? Because this happened:

We were blessed to welcome home a baby sibling to some of our current foster/adopted kids. This little guy is so sweet and gets at least 4,000 kisses every day.

January 2023 Groceries and Meals We Ate

With a newborn in the house, it didn’t work for me to make my normal monthly trip to Lincoln for a big grocery haul from Costco and Sam’s. So instead, I opted for two big pick-ups from Walmart. The first one was the largest I’ve ever ordered!

This order cost $750.
I got chicken, hamburger meat, ham, lunch meat, frozen hashbrowns, $150+ worth of fresh and frozen fruits and veggies, shredded cheese, cheese slices, sausage patties, salad kits for Elias and Malachi, cream, butter, sour cream, bread, buns, bagels, and chips.

I also splurged on some convenience items since Matt and I aren’t getting quite enough sleep at night right now. This has been well worth it so that when our hands are full we can have Malachi bake some pizzas or throw nuggets into the air fryer.

When I got home from the store that day, none of our big kids were available and Daddy was holding Baby, but all six of our other littles pitched in to bring in groceries and put food away. It was so cool to see them all so eager to help! Even our 1-year-old got in on the action. (I couldn’t get a good picture of all of them helping because they were all moving around and trying not to trip over bags!)

It took over an hour to put all the food away, but we sure were stocked up again!

Instead of putting away all the meat I had bought, I decided to make a few meals to try and get ahead for the next couple of weeks.

I put an entire package of chicken thighs into a big casserole dish and made Pizza Chicken (forgetting the cheese before placing the pepperoni, oops!). I put this into the fridge to bake that week. That made dinner so easy that night!

My 7-year-old helped me crack about 2 dozen eggs into baking dishes. I whipped them, then baked them in the oven for half an hour. I put cheese on top right away, which melted. Then I built 23 egg, cheese, and sausage breakfast sandwiches for our freezer. This has been awesome for early before-school breakfasts for five of our kids!

Meanwhile, instead of freezing the 5-pounds of ground beef I had brought home, I cooked it in a big pot. I packaged it up in separate containers, one for tacos later in the week, one for whatever I needed in the future (which I froze), then I added chili ingredients to the rest of the meat in the pot. We ate the Chili with grapes and strawberries for lunch after church the next day. SO EASY and nice to come home to a hot meal ready to eat.

A few nights later we baked our Pizza Chicken, which I served with broccoli, corn, strawberries, and oranges. While waiting for their plates to be fixed, six of our littles stood at the counter and finished off an entire 5-pound bag of oranges! I couldn’t keep up with slicing them! :)

One morning for breakfast, I toasted some bagels and served them with Warm Chocolate Soother. I forgot to take a picture until the kids had almost finished eating everything.

I spent a few minutes one morning slicing 3 pounds of cheese for easy snacks.

A super easy meal one night was BBQ Chicken Legs, baked potatoes, and peas. This tasted soooooo good!

All month long our family passed around a lovely variety of illnesses. One night when Malachi finally had an appetite again, I made him a plate with warmed pumpkin muffins with melted butter, a sliced apple, and a peach cup. Best thing he ever tasted, so he said. :)

I invested in a handy gadget to make our own healthier and much less-expensive Uncrustables. My daughter-in-law, Eva, spent some time helping me make a bunch for the freezer so I can pull them out for kids’ lunchboxes.

She threw all the scraps into a pyrex dish and I used them to make Easy Bread Pudding. This was so great because nothing went to waste and then I had breakfast ready to bake the next morning!


Mid-month, our kids had two snow days home from school. We took advantage by making some extra fun foods. I had some pre-made pizza crusts in the freezer, so one day I let all the kids make their own mini-pizzas.

The next day we made these Snowflake Quesadillas.

When the four littlest were napping, I trudged outside and got a big bowl full of clean snow. We made Snow Ice Cream, which was sooooo much fun because Grandma was there to join us for a few days! The littles had never tried Snow Ice Cream, and they loved it. I made a bowl for Elias and Malachi also, which was extra fun because it reminded them of their childhood days. :)

Matt and I were blessed to have a night away at a church retreat (we took Baby with us) while Grandma and big brothers/sisters-in-law and a few others came to help hold down the fort. It took a lot of effort to prepare for our get-away so I was thankful for the bag of Chili in the freezer which I thawed and warmed for a meal the night before we left.


I also put in a second Walmart pickup order for the month so everyone would have easy food to eat while we were gone.

The retreat was wonderful and everyone back home had a great time with their caretakers. We brought home a huge bag of miniature candy bars (leftover from the snack table at the retreat), so I used them up one Sunday when we served a meal to young adults at church. Candy Bar Cheesecake anyone?

Prepping for the meal was made easier because one of our daughters-in-law has been coming once a week to help me. She helped me prep three huge cheesecakes on the Friday before the Sunday meal. So thankful!

Sunday meal and fellowship, a fantastic time!

I’ve been using my crock pot more since Baby came, and Spicy Ham and Potato Soup is one of my favorite easy meals to make in the morning. It cooks itself all day and is ready to eat at night.

I had picked up a 7.5-pound pork roast that had been marked down to $1.69/pound. So I put it in the crock pot to cook one day and then shredded it to pull out and use for these meals. Have you tried this yet: Make 5 Meals with 1 Pork Roast?? I love this inexpensive meal deal!

I had also found a great mark down on ground beef so I cooked it all and made a big batch of Sloppy Joes.

Maybe I’ll never pay full price for meat again?? It’s pretty great to find these deals!

Another markdown I found was these 1/2 pound burger patties. Even with the markdown, it still felt like a splurge to buy these. So I used them to make Hamburger Steak one night with mashed potatoes and veggies. It was a higher maintenance meal (with toddlers tugging on my legs) so by the time I had the meal completed, I didn’t remember to take pictures and I was reminded why I stick to Simple Meals right now. :) :) :)

On the last Saturday of the month, I made a huge pile of pancakes and scrambled a dozen and a half eggs. I don’t make pancakes much anymore so the kids (and the hubby) were thrilled!

The Uncrustables Eva had earlier in the month made were such a hit (and so nice to have in the freezer!) that I made twenty more at the end of the month.

Therefore I had a lot of crusts again and made another Easy Bread Pudding to bake on a Sunday morning for everyone to eat before church.

It was a great month with great eats!

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