Easy Cooking

Freezer cooking, it is all the rage in homemaking right now! I only have 1 small freezer to work with so I don't have space for pre-made pans and typical pop it in the oven packages. We did store away 16 meals and some pancakes in the last week though and I am looking forward to having less prep in the kitchen in November. Here is a shot of my little stash...

I will start at the top left:

Veggie Soup
Pre-chopped cabbage, onion, carrots, and potato. This will go in the crock pot for 6-8 hours on low with a large can of tomato sauce and water to top it off, seasonings too.

Pork Stir fry
Pre-chopped carrot, cabbage, and onion and a baggie of cut and cooked pork. This one will get stir fried and go on rice.

Broccoli Beef Pasta
Chopped broccoli and cooked and cut beef in another baggie. This one is tossed with pasta when cooked.

Creamy Chicken Potato Soup
Cut potatoes and chicken. This will go in the crock pot for 6-8 hours with 2 cans of cream of chicken and water to top it off, seasonings too.

Then there are freezie pops, great for winter fevers, and about a dozen packets of pancakes for Adam to take with him to work on those 5 am days.

Honestly, We are winging it! I came up with an idea for what to put in each bag and we did it. Will it urn out? Who knows! We have fun experimenting in our kitchen and have really gotten a knack for cooking with whatever we happen have available. What do you like to pre make?

Long Term Goals

Sorry I haven't written in a while, life just happens at lightning speed sometimes! We have been talking long term goals for a few months now. See, we had worked on my staying home for about 7 years. It was a long term goal that started before we even thought of having a baby. I have been home for about 8 months now and I love it! It feels a bit like limbo though. When you achieve a long term goal it sort of leaves you with this "what now?" sort of feeling.

We talked about traveling or the possibility of buying a new house. We just couldn't quite latch on to a goal that meant buying things and spending money. We would still like to travel at some point but there is no urgency to spur us on. It cam to me the other day and I suggested it to sort of test the waters...

"Wouldn't it be cool if you could stay home too? we could run The Crazy Elephant together."

It was like the light bulb turned on for us. Since I have been a stay at home mom (although work at home might describe it better), I have built a pretty good business for myself with The Crazy Elephant. In fact, if we had 0 debt The Crazy Elephant could almost support us as it is now, no changes. So, we made being a stay at home family our new long term goal with the mind set of accomplishing our goal in 5-10 years!

Here is the plan:

Phase 1 - Pay off all of our debt! Adam's calculations show that if I contribute about half of my profits to debt reduction, we should be debt free in just under 4 years...that includes the house! We also are doing a remodel of the shop to really put our best foot forward and re-pricing for a sustainable store.

Phase 2 - Complete any major home improvement projects and buy a car. They are the things we want, not need, but should do before Adam stays home.

Phase 3 - The nest egg! Things happen sometimes and we want to be prepared. We will be making sure we have a nice big cushion.

It feels great to have a long term goal again! I almost wish I could fast forward to see how it turns out, but then I would miss all the fun along the way.