Today I sent my kids to school wearing raincoats and sun glasses. Not because it was raining and sunny but because I knew they would not think there was anything odd about wearing these things together and it humored me. Does that make me a bad Mother? I need to know if I should add it to the list. Sorry, I did not get a photo because it would have humored you as well.
I have been thinking for a long time that it would be great to have a service where once a week I was just emailed a menu for the week along with a grocery list and thus not have to think about these things. I need someone who can figure out healthy things that my family is willing to eat and won’t cost me a lot of money. I search for such a service online – surely I am not the first to wish for such a thing – but my search resulted in nothing. Then I received the family edition of Real Simple Magazine and waa laa – 5 websites that do exactly what I wanted. Of course there is a fee involved but it is pretty reasonable and most have an reduce trial period rate. I have finally gotten around to viewing all 5 websites and I am pretty excited about trying out one of them, at least for a trial period. For you surfing enjoyment below is a list of the 5 websites:
http://www.thescramble.com/
http://www.morethyme.com/
http://www.dinewithoutwhine.com/
http://www.savingdinner.com/
http://www.dinnerplanner.com/
They are all interesting. Some are defiantly better than others. See if you can guess which one I am going to try out.
A shout out to Eric’s mom who instilled in him the gift of – when you don’t know what else to do… clean. This means that whenever Eric is left home with the kids and begins to miss me, instead of doing his school work, he cleans the house instead. YAY for cleaning men. And also clean men.
My mechanism for getting through missing someone is to play stupid video games or watch hour upon hour of meaningless TV.
The best purchase I made for the Festival of Faith and Writing was not a book. Instead it was a pair of Dr. Scholl’s gel inserts for my shoes. OH MY WORD!!! Not only did my feet not ache at the end of the day that horrible dry skin on the bottom of my heels has actually softened. I think one more week of wearing and my heels will be as soft as a baby’s bottom. Now I just have to go buy a pair that I can wear with sandals.
Today we are doing a mock Kentucky Derby race at work. (Yes we will do anything to get people to bring in food.) My horse’s name is Sunriver. I am hoping I picked a good one. There are prizes at stake.
Ok enough rambling for now. I will try and post later and let you know how my horse fared
7 comments:
Beth, can you just tell me which of these sites is the best?! Since you've already checked them out, you could save me the time. I SO need this service! My method is basically to buy a lot of food, and then every night figure out what things go together to make a meal. I'm actually fairly successful at this, but I know I could be more efficient with a little planning. I will watch for your answer! :-)
Lynne, I am not sure I can recommend one specifically for you but I will give you the low down on how I chose for myself. Dinewithoutwhine and dinnerplanner did not appeal to me. They were casserole heavy and my kids do not like casseroles or sauces. I was looking for something more meat and potatoes. That said, savingdinner seems to be too much meat for me. I do need a little variety. I liked both thescramble and morethyme. I liked the sample menu on thescramble but the flexibility of morethyme also appealed to me. So I am going to do the 15 day trial period at morethyme to see if this helps my dinner planning at all. If after the trial period I feel like this is something I can adapt to then I will try out thescramble for a month. After the trial period for thescramble is over I will make a decision between morethyme and thescramble. So maybe you will want to stay tuned and see what my experience is with these two services.
Beth
My horse - Sunriver - came in 16th place. :(
I will definitely be watching for the final decision!
a bunch of my mom friends use thescramble, and really really like it.
i don't cook, so i have no opinion
Let me just say that this post reminds me again that you are Definitely One Of My Favorite People In The Whole World.
And as I was reading it, and saw the websites you listed, I thought to myself, "Oh, I have to tell Lynne to look at this; I wonder if Lynne reads Beth's blog?" and then I went to the comments section, and there she was, and there she was again, and she was there Before Me.
That's what I get for having a stupid paper to write. That's what I get.
Thanks for the links. I have to tell Rachel....
What do these websites do? Do they tell you what to buy for these meals or do they do the shopping for you and bring it to your door? Amy Beukema from Mass. has a website that she goes to and posts her grocery list and they shop for her and deliver the groceries to her door. For a fee of course, but she hates to grocery shop so this works for her. I'm to lazy to go to the web sites so you will have to tell Father and me what this is all about. Maybe retirees can use this service also.
Mother Ruth
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