Most of you know that I hate cooking....or at least I used to. Every time a sign up sheet in church came around, I signed up to bring paper products or dessert (dessert is easy to buy). I can go on forever about food that I have ruined trying to make.....jello, boxed brownies, and I've even burnt toast!
Now, don't laugh...this is probably something everyone does....and it is something we are told over and over in Relief Society to do....but I have realized that if you plan your meals ahead of time, and go to the grocery store for the ingredients, it not only saves you money, but creates less stress. One of the main reasons I hated cooking was trying to figure out what to cook. I would think of something to make, but we wouldn't have all of the ingredients and would have to go to the store. Or, we would have all but one, so I would try and do without....and that never tasted good. I think my mom tried to do that, but it was hard with 8 kids. I remember her getting mad at us because we would make something to eat and she would go to make dinner, and half her ingredients would be gone. But since my kids are little I don't have that problem.
I started this little money saver idea about a year ago, when I was pregnant with Gabby. With both pregnancies, I had a Gaul bladder problem. With Charley I just got frustrated a lot about what I couldn't eat. With Gabby, I was determined to eat as normal as possible. I did a lot of searching online and in books for very low fat/no fat recipes.....and with us heading into the last semester of school and knowing that summer Ben wouldn't be working a lot to study for the bar, we needed to save money. At the time, it was a necessity, but now, I like it.
Every Monday I sit down and look at my cook books and on-lone, pick some recipes out, write down what I need to buy, and head to the grocery store. No more headaches trying to figure out what's for dinner, I know what we are going to have, and I know we have everything to make it.
I'm still not an amazing cook, but I'm not horrible anymore! I have no idea why I didn't do this before! It only takes a little bit of time on Mondays to plan everything out, but its worth it!
....we went out in public like this! 
Charley has been sick the last few days. Yesterday she spent most of the day in our bed watching movies and sleeping. However, that night she didn't want to go back in her room. Since she was sick, we let her sleep on our floor. So we put some blankets on the floor and she slept great! My first mistake was not making my bed this morning....because her little bed was still on our floor this afternoon. She told me she was tired today so I put her in her room, and then went to take out the trash. When I came inside I found her in our room on the floor sleeping. We'll have to break this bad habit soon!
We needed to run to the grocery store today. When we came home, I put Gabby on the floor on her tummy facing me so she could see me while I put the groceries away. She started off in the middle of the blanket, facing the other direction. When I looked over, she was like this. She isn't crawling yet, but she sure is scooting around. I'm not sure if I am ready for this yet.
