Saving My Sanity With E-Mealz

Before we adopted our 5th daughter in January, 2010, I was committed to cooking from scratch and planning all of our menus a week at a time...at least in a perfect week.  Well last year that all changed.  We adopted Isabelle.  She underwent open-heart surgery in March, 2010, and we spent a full month in the hospital.  After coming home I was trying to juggle the schedules of a college-age daughter, a high school daughter, homeschooling a 4th grader and keeping up with the busyness of a preschooler and toddler.  Add to that keeping up with my husband's busy work schedule and the fact that I also work part-time out of the home, and I had little time left for proper meal planning.

After another emergency run to Little Caesar's pizza, one night, reality finally hit me that something had to give!  That's when I heard about E-Mealz.


(You can click on this banner to read about the specifics.)

I think I heard about it on Money Saving Mom which is one of my favorite blogs.  The cost is $15.00 a quarter, and it includes both a 7 day supper meal plan and a shopping list for the meals.  The best part about it, is it's geared for families on a budget.  We choose the menu plan for Aldi's.  Our menus are based on a family of 6, but our family of 8 eats comfortable from the menu.  The average grocery bill for our evening meals is between $65 and $70 a week.

Each Tuesday the menu is posted along with the shopping list.  The meals are simple and include a main dish and several side items.  Very rarely is there a menu item that our family doesn't like.  The two women that began the meal service have tried and tested all of the meals on their own families, and they are excellent.  If you are looking for a way to save your sanity and help your budget, you might consider trying this for three months.

I must confess that last month I decided to try to plan our own menus again.  After two weeks of an embarrassing number of trips to restaurants because I either failed to plan a meal or was missing an ingredient, I quickly began printing my E-Mealz menus again.  I might try to plan my own menus again once Lily comes home and is done with her open-heart surgeries, but until then...I welcome the help.

I know my limitations!