Let them eat raisins and onions

First of all, I'm so sorry that I haven't posted the Back-to-School Sew Along pictures and winner yet. Part of the reason is that I haven't had a chance to take pictures of my own kids wearing their new stuff yet. Coming soon, I swear.

The school year has hit me like a ton of bricks and I am officially now one of those moms that dashes from the elementary school to the preschool to the PTA meeting to soccer to ballet. Oh, and then somehow work has to get squeezed in.

And I thought we were kind of a low-key family! Ay caramba. I can't imagine doing this with more kids and more activities.

At some point, we all get hungry, but my regular rounds of meal planning just aren't happening right now. I adore diving into cookbooks and visualizing how recipes will turn out and what I can pair them with and how the house will smell ... mmm .... But I haven't been making the time to do it right now, so we end of congregating in front of the fridge and the pantry wondering what won't make us sick if we put it together in a pan and heat it up. 

Complicating things is that I had to comfort a sobbing 5 year old tonight after she discovered where hamburgers come from. The conversation went like this:

Bo: "Mommy. What do cows give us, and I don't mean milk. I already know that."

Me: "Well, the cows are killed and we eat their bodies. It's called beef. That's how hamburgers are made."

(Bo curls up into the fetal position and starts wailing.)

Bo: "Cowsies! Cowsies! The poor cowsies!"

(Continues for 20 minutes. I interject at some point to introduce her to the words "vegetarian.")

(More wailing and then she sits up suddenly.)

Bo: "Hey, Mom. Will you sew me a backpack?"

And so it goes when you are 5. 

I cracked up when I spotted this photo taken a year ago as I prepared dinner for friends and needed somewhere to put a very whiny almost 2 year old:

I think there are people who cook like that every night. God bless them. My back hurts just looking at that.

But this was the result that night:

Lately our meals have looked more like this:

Pancakes and water. Quick! Someone fill out the application for Mom of the Year. Yoo hooooo! I'm right here!!!!!

So I'm considering signing up for one of those automatic meal planning services. I just need to take the thinking out of cooking. I need someone to tell me what to make, what to buy and where I can catch the next flight to Bermuda.

Here's a roundup of some online meal-planning services. Has anyone tried them? Any recommendations? Any good ones I missed?

e Mealz ($5/month)

Relish ($7/month)

Eat Clean Meals ($19.95/month)--This one was started by a friend of mine from high school and its sample recipes look the best to me of all of the services, but it is more expensive than the others. 

Dinner Planner ($5/month)

Cooking Traditional Foods (free)

(Thank you, Alicia and Sommer, for recommending a couple of those on the Penny Carnival Facebook wall today.)

Or, I could have used the time it took to write this post to choose seven recipes from a cookbook and make a grocery list based on it. Brilliant. 

 

Comments

[Pauline]

I LOVE that 'baby-in-a-back-pack photo'! You really are a super-mom! : )

[kate]

Were you TRYING to make your daughter a vegetarian with that answer?? ha! I thought for sure she was going to sit up and ask for a hotdog for dinner. ;)

Your food looks amazing. I think I need details/recipe for those fig/blue cheese (?) bits of yumminess.

[nis]

We have *completely* fallen off of the dinner planning bandwagon...and it was one of my true sanity (and budget) savers so WTH? I am haaaaating dealing with the grocery store lately so I guess maybe that is where some of my "eh" is coming from. We are making whoopie pies today for my bday, though, so I gotta get crackin' on the rest of the "real food" list. :) xoxo

[Kristin]

Ok, so its months later. I'd just like to say that because of this post I got e-mealz. So worth it.

I also found this today and thought I'd share: http://www.easy-meal-planning.com/healthy-meal-recipe.html