My favorite Christmas to-date

Spider man, Shopkins and Trolls, Oh my!  These were the gifts that filled our living room this Christmas. Wyatt is actually more into Batman, but didn't seem to mind all of the Spiderman things he got. In fact, he was overjoyed with every single gift....except the underwear.

This was definitely my favorite Christmas yet, since being a little kid myself. Both of my children were finally old enough to understand the whole Santa thing and get excited about it. Rylee's imagination as she discussed Santa and the North Pole all month long, was just precious. She made me such a believer, I almost forgot I had a job to do Christmas Eve night.

We spent Christmas Eve day with my family at my aunt's house as we have done since I was a kid. We had a delicious lunch, opened presents, and enjoyed each other's company. My two favorite moments from the day, were my 5 1/2 year old niece's reaction to the "fake" glasses she got from Grandma (she's been asking for them for months!!).  "I CAN SEE!!!", she said when she put them on. My other favorite moment was when myself, my husband, my brother and sister-in-law decided to show our kids that we used to dance to songs like "Bye Bye Bye".  Being goofy was a lot of fun! I'm so glad we got it on video...my brother is a great dancer (wink, wink)!!!  You can see the video on my Facebook page.

Around 4:30 that afternoon, Rylee learned about the Santa radar and saw that he was crossing the ocean to the United States.  She started to excitedly panic that we needed to get home, QUICK! She had her coat and shoes on before the rest of us even knew what she was talking about. Once we finally left about an hour later, she watched the sky intently, looking for the sleigh. I remember doing that exact same thing on the way home from my aunt's house as a kid. Both Rylee and Wyatt fell asleep in the car by 6:00 and stayed asleep once we got home.  I was worried about how early they would wake up in the morning.

After James and I had everything set up and went upstairs to go to bed, I decided we needed to block off the stairway, so the kids couldn't go down without us in the morning.  I knew they would be very excited to see if Santa came and probably wouldn't even come into our room to get us....and their reaction is just something I did not want to miss!

Okay, so they easily could have gone through this, but I figured it would at least be a reminder for them to come get Mom and Dad first. 

Rylee ended up coming to our room around 4:45 am. She was, as I predicted, bouncing off the walls with excitement as she woke us up.  We told her we wanted to wait for Wyatt....that didn't go over well. After making her wait for 30 minutes and still no signs of Wyatt waking, we decided to go ahead and take her downstairs....a little kid shouldn't have to wait to see if Santa came, we thought.

She was delighted to see the presents, the full stockings, the empty cookie plate and milk glass. We played with her gifts from the day before while we waited for Wyatt.  About 20 minutes later I heard him stirring. I went to his room and he sat up and asked, "Did Santa come?!"

By 6:30 we had all of the presents opened. Wyatt's reaction to all of them was priceless. He was very vocal as he opened each gift. Lots of "Wow!" and "I always wanted this!". All day long he told me, "Wasn't it so fun opening presents this morning?!?!?!"

Rylee, having not asked for much, liked all of her gifts too. She had a couple of very enthusiastic moments and remembered to say "Thank you" right after opening each gift (she even thanked Santa for his gifts).

Last year, I can recall that the kids didn't really care about their gifts about 30 minutes after opening them. This year though, the toys were played with all day and are continuing to be played with today. Yay!!  We got 3 new games from Santa, for the family.  They are all active games that require you to get up and move. We've played each one multiple times...that was probably the best gift!  It was nice to have new things to do together as a family. I even laughed so hard, I cried during one game!

Pancake Pile-up is a pretty fun game for young kids (and their parents too)!

I'm already sad that Christmas is over and am making notes for next year. I know these years of magical Christmases will be few, but I'll cherish them for now. So much fun seeing Christmas through a child's view.

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas too!

It's the most wonderful time of the year

I love Christmas. This year, the holiday season has been especially fun as my kids are both old enough to understand it now and are participating so eagerly. I also love the fact that Rylee, who had a super long wish list last year and assigned a toy to everyone who buys her gifts, has decided to just be surprised this year.  My heart melted a bit when she said that. To make sure she didn't change her mind, I threw away the toy catalogs that came in the mail, before they made it into the house. Being surprised is fun, I think. And there are so few surprises in life anymore.

Speaking of surprises, I welcomed mother nature's surprise snow this morning!  Okay, so maybe it wasn't a surprise to anyone else, but James and I had NO IDEA that it was going to snow. In fact, we had planned to take down the trampoline today before the snow comes....oh well.  The snow makes it feel even more Christmasy now.  Though, I really didn't mind the slightly warmer weather we had the day before.

I got a little carried away with my Christmas decorating this year, I think. It's been fun though, and James has been enjoying helping with it too (I think). I've wanted ice cycle lights on my house for as long as I can remember and I finally got them this year!  Thank you, James!!

I couldn't resist decorating multiple trees this year either. We of course have the tree with all of the random ornaments that have been given to us, or made by us. I've always wanted to have a red and gold tree though, as well as a white and silver one.  So, I bought two more. Additionally, I have two smaller trees that I just put lights on and nothing else. I love a dark house being lit by nothing but the glowing Christmas tree lights.

Basement tree.

Dining room tree

Living room tree

Basement fireplace

Living room fire place

We are a little obsessed with black and red checker print this year

Yes, I already have presents wrapped. I'm 98% done with my Christmas shopping.  I didn't start until November (which was late for me), but I got it all done in just a couple of weeks. This was the easiest year I've ever had with Christmas shopping.  I loved it this year. The only problem with being done early is that now of course Wyatt is asking for things that we didn't get him.  Hopefully he'll enjoy them all the same.

We kicked off our holiday season with a trip to the Festival of Trees and Lights and Disney on Ice the day after Thanksgiving. This was our 4th year to attend the ice show and mine and Rylee's 2nd year doing both.  I think this will be our tradition going forward.  It's such a fun way to start the holiday; not to mention the quality family time we get to have together.

This past Friday night, we participated in our town's annual holiday festival, where we watched the tree lighting, listened to carolers, filled a bucket full of cookies in the cookie walk, and saw Santa and Mrs. Claus arrive on a fire truck. Neither of the kids like Santa, so we just watched from afar. It's such a neat event for a small town.

I've already had one holiday party. A work party with a gift exchange that was a lot of fun. Despite my gifts getting stolen from me a dozen times or more, I still went home with a movie theater gift card I'm excited to use! I even won $15 on my scratch-off lottery ticket that our director handed out.

This week will be busy with holiday events. My good friend and I will be baking Christmas goodies for our 2nd annual bake day and then we are hosting James' family over the weekend. On Sunday, James is taking his little princess on a formal date to see The Nutcracker ballet for the first time. I'm not sure which of the two of them is more excited!

I'm hopeful that this month will go slower than November did and we will have plenty of time to take in the holiday. I'm trying to be mindful of each day and enjoy the season's many blessings. After all, it is the most wonderful time of the year.

I hope your holiday is off to a great start and you are able to enjoy all of the blessings the season brings as well.

Merry Christmas! 

Thankful to be a lunch lady

As I've been reflecting the past few days on things I'm thankful for, I of course think of my family, friends, home, etc.  However, one new thing in my life has been at the top of my mind.

I know I wrote about being a lunch lady a few posts ago, but I really am incredibly thankful for my job. A few weeks ago, I took on a new role in the kitchen.  I'm now the clerk, depositing lunch money into accounts, contacting parents when accounts are low, scanning lunch cards as the kids come in to eat, etc. As I was asked begged to take this position, I just didn't think I could possibly take the job, because it would mean going from the 12 hours a week I was working, to 30 hours. I loved my very part-time hours!  In fact, in my first month, one of my supervisors said, "Don't worry, you won't always have to work the 12 hour/week shift."  To which I replied, "But I love it; I don't want to work more than that."

As the time to decide came to an end (there were several interested parties scheduled for interviews the following week), I made a last-minute decision to take the job. Today, I'm so thankful for the way things just work out!  I've been in my new role just a few weeks, and while it's still new and exciting, I don't think I'll ever regret taking it.  Sure, the 2.5 times more hours I'm working have been exhausting, but I know I will build up stamina and it won't seem like a big deal at some point (I hope).  As luck would have it, I also started an early morning (5:40 am) fitness class the same week I started these new hours, which isn't helping.

My new shift starts at 7 am. I'm usually the 2nd car in the parking lot in the morning. But what I love about this, is being one of the first faces students and staff see every morning as they start to trickle in.  I get to greet them all with a cheerful "good morning".  It's a small thing, but that means a lot to me.

One morning, a 4th grade boy came up to me at 7:30 and said, "Do you want to know what my goal is?"  I said, "Sure, Connor, I'd love to hear your goal." He proceeds to tell me that his goal is to have a smile on his face every single day for the rest of the year.  Of course I smiled and told him what an amazing goal that was and what a great gift he would be giving to others as he looked at them with his giant smile.

A couple of days later, Facebook was a sad state of negativity (right after Trump was elected president).  I drove to school that morning feeling so sad for everyone who was being so negative (and extremely glad that I don't care an ounce about politics). And guess who came to my thoughts as I sent positive vibes to all of the negative people??  Connor.  So, when I saw Connor that morning, I told him, "Connor, I thought of you this morning on my way to work."  He gave me an inquisitive look.... "You did?!?!" he asked.  I told him that I wished everyone could have a goal to smile daily just like he did.

Already, the kids are touching my heart. I get several hugs daily. Yesterday, one sweet little girl brought me a chocolate Hershey kiss.....now, THAT made my day!!  Normally I would eat chocolate the second it's handed to me.  Not this time.  This time, I looked at the candy and knew that it was meant to be a reminder of how lucky I am to have such a special job.  I put the candy on my desk in my office to serve as a daily reminder.

I have learned so many of the kids' names in the short few weeks I've been in this role. Being able to call them by their name, or have them call me by mine, makes my relationship with the kiddos feel so much more special.  And while I was so hesitant about working more hours, being in the building for most of the school day allows me the opportunity to see some of the kids (including my daughter) multiple times a day. I feel like a part of the community within the building now. It's a great feeling.  I never dread going to work. Working in an elementary school has so many more ups than downs and it feels like all of the adults in the building are all there for the same reason......and it isn't the pay.

James and I have had many conversations in the past few years about how much more important it is to love your job than to make a lot of money.  This job is a true testament to that for me.  I made 2.5 times more money at my last job before I became a stay-at-home mom than I'm making now.  But, I don't do this job for the money and I wouldn't take a corporate job for more money again.

Today, as I was out and about with my husband and kids while so many others were working, I thought about what a great job I have in terms of days off.  I only had 2-3 weeks off a year with my corporate jobs.  Working in a school, I have summers, Thanksgiving break, Christmas break, spring break, snow days and all of the in-service days off.  I also get some paid time off as well (surprisingly, quite a bit). It's really a perfect job for a parent who wants to be home at the same time as their kids. I get done at 1:15 every day, so I still have a couple of hours to myself before the kids are done too. It couldn't be more perfect for me. I'm so thankful for this new role coming into my life.

I'm also still writing for the magazine, though I had to cut back on the number of articles I was writing each month. I've had a really great fall, meeting some wonderful people with this job and getting to do some really fun shoots.

I got to go for a ride in this car!

This was a remake of a photo taken years ago...I enjoyed this one a lot!

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!!  I hope your holiday is spent with those you care about and you have many things to feel thankful for.

Google Drive

I've been meaning to write a post about our love for Google Drive. Today a friend asked for recommendations on a place to keep track of family stuff, and I decided now was a good time to write this post.

James and I started using Google Drive several months ago and it has changed our life!  It started out as a way for James to remember events on our calendar better...something he has always struggled with (I think it's a guy thing). He asked me to start using it with him so that we could both view it, add to it, etc. I did NOT want to at first!!  I LOVE my paper calendar!  I like to write (like with a pen -- the old fashion way), and I also like that I can view my whole month with a paper calendar.  Additionally, I copy from my paper calendar for the next year, to see what happened each month and remind myself of things that may come up the following year. So, I was super hesitant about switching to an electronic calendar.

After several months, I have been converted and I really do like it.  I love that we can share the calendar and both view it, add to it, etc. We put EVERYTHING on it!!  Appointments, days off, library book due dates, birthdays, reminders for anything and everything, etc. I also have the option to place things on there that he can't see, which is nice because sometimes my reminders don't affect him and it would just be one more thing to pop up for him that he doesn't need to be made aware of.

One really cool thing about Google calendar is that my "super smart" phone will ask me if I want to put this on my calendar any time it sees words like "meet", "get together", "appointment", etc.....this could be in email, facebook, etc. Anytime I get an evite, it asks if I want to place it on my calendar and I can do that with one click.

I also like that you can set reminders for however early you would like to be reminded. I believe you can also snooze your reminder if you need it to keep reminding you. And unlike a paper calendar, I can place events on it for a year or two into the future.

In addition to the calendar, we also use Drive for lists, such as groceries. This comes in handy when one of us runs into the store and can check to see if the other person added anything to the list.

The other thing we use Drive for on a regular basis is our budget and spending tracker.  We created a budget/spending tracker on a spreadsheet in Drive and we add our spending to it instantly. So, as soon as I get into my jeep after making a purchase, I immediately place it on the sheet.  I don't have to worry about remembering to do it later, or keep my receipt.

Within Google Drive, you can share documents and folders as well as keep some private, if no one else needs to be able to view it. It's really a great digital "keep all" place.  James and I definitely feel much more organized since we started using it. If you are looking for a new method to keep organized, we highly recommend Google Drive.

Grocery Budget

James and I finally got on track again with using a budget to manage our finances.  We are on our 5th month now. We expected our mortgage to be the biggest expense each month, but we never would have guessed food would be the second biggest sucker of our money. We rarely eat out, we both get free lunch at work, the kids aren't home for lunch.....what gives?!?!?!

Neither of us are "foodies" and both understand that food is just fuel for our bodies, so we eat pretty light.  We rarely make meals for supper, and when we do, it's usually just one main item and then we hunt in the fridge for something to have with it. Also, James brings home leftover food from work quite often, and sometimes we eat on that for multiple days.  Yet, we still think our food expense is ridiculous every month!  We have found that we actually spend less than a lot of families do, but it still just seems outrageous.  Sure, food is a necessity, just like shelter, which we have no problems paying for...but ugh, we just hate spending money on food.

This past summer we started shopping at Aldi. It's possibly our favorite grocery store now.  Actually, no, I still like Hy-Vee best....but the amount of items I get at Aldi for the same amount of money at Hy-vee is almost double.

I'll admit, I totally judged Aldi.  My whole life, I thought Aldi was a dirty store for poor people (because poor people must be dirty??). You weren't going to catch me in that store, no way!  But then I slowly started hearing people talk about Aldi more and more over the past 3 years. When James' co-worker talked to him about Aldi and gave James some of his food to try, he came home and told me we needed to check it out. I still wasn't so sure.  So, naturally, I sent James in first......

James was doing some cost comparison of Fareway, Hy-Vee, Walmart and Target anyway, so he was more than happy to add another store to his rounds. After his visit, it appeared that all the gossip was true....Aldi IS CHEAP!!  So, I decided to go check it out for myself.  I went inside with no plans to buy anything, just wanted to take a look.  I was very surprised at how nice the store was and I found a lot of their labels to be even "prettier" than the other stores. Okay, I'll give it a shot!

So, we tried just a few things the first couple of times we shopped at Aldi. We loved everything we bought, some even more than the other stores (chicken nuggets!!).  Their $5 take and bake pizza is one of our favs...it's bigger than other stores and so good!  To save a dollar, we buy the cheese pizza (because the rest are $6), and use whatever we have at home for toppings.  Yes, we are THAT ridiculous!

Anyway, we are now fans of Aldi and cannot wait for the new store in Ames to be finished!!  If you haven't been or are still a skeptic....try it out!!  Just don't forget to bring your own sacks and a quarter to use a cart (you will get your quarter back - these are ways the company saves money so they can sell items for less).

One thing we do not do to save money is use coupons. Pretty much the sole reason for this is that most of the items we buy never have a coupon.  We tend to stick to produce, meat, dairy and a few freezer items (you know, all the expense stuff in the store), non of which seem to have coupons. We also usually favor the most expensive item of a kind, like yogurt...the one with the most protein and least amount of sugar is always the most expensive!

The past 5 months since tracking our expenses, we have spent approximately $575 each month on groceries. We budget for less than that and always go over (so what good is our budget, right?!?!). We are hoping that this was just a summer time thing and we won't spend as much during the winter.

To track our spending, we have been using Google Drive. One nice thing about this, is that we can enter our expenditures as they happen. We both have the app on our phone and just enter any money we spend immediately after spending it.

Tell me, what do you do to save money on food???  Specifically, how do you save on snacks for the kids?  I feel like half of my grocery bill is kids' snacks.....which we could really limit if we tried harder. I also tend to splurge on some things.....like pumpkin pie ice cream for $5 (when all the other flavors are $2)...but hey, it's seasonal and it won't be there the next time I go! I do try to go to the store just once a week, but when something unexpected comes up, or we feel like having something that wasn't on the menu for the week, I will occasionally go multiple times in a week. Plus, if I shopped at Aldi, I still have to go to another store to get the items they didn't have. I try to stick to my list (and I always write my list in order of the aisles so I don't have to go back and forth), but almost every time I buy something that was not on the list.  I think grocery shopping is just always going to be a necessary evil.

Loess Hills getaway

This past weekend James and I traveled over to the western part of Iowa, an area we aren't terribly familiar with. I follow an Iowa photography page on Facebook and have seen some beautiful photos of the Loess Hills over the years.  Back in August, James and I decided to go check these hills out and hoped October would be a pretty time to go.

We dropped the kids off at Grandma's on Friday after school and headed west.  We arrived at our destination, a Bed & Breakfast I had reserved back in August, around 7:30; it was dark out. We chose a B&B because we had such a great experience at the first one we stayed at 5 years ago.  Also, I couldn't find much for hotels in the area, and this particular B&B kept popping up on my internet search.  I never did see any photos of the place, but read some of the reviews, which were all good.

So, as I mentioned, it was dark when we arrived and this is what we pulled up to.

EEEEEKK!!  I was like "Oh my! What is this place?!?!?" There was also a lovely run down old gas station next door.  Beautiful.

I hopped out of the jeep and a lady wearing sweats, her disheveled hair down, hollered out to me in a smoker's voice, "Are you Emily?"  I wasn't sure I wanted to answer.

We stepped inside and she showed us to our room at the top of the stairs. The room was very......old???  The furniture was antique. I knew from my reading about the place on the car ride there that this was an old hotel. I didn't imagine that the furniture from the old hotel would still be inside of it!  Okay, that's a little harsh...it's not the original furniture, but it felt like it could be.  Anyway, aside from the bed being really hard, the rest of the room and bathroom were just fine for the two nights we would be staying.  Although, we found out shortly after arriving that there was a smoking room below us and unfortunately the smell rose up to our room.  There were air fresheners in the room attempting to mask the smell, but that almost made it worse at times.  I wasn't sure I was going to be able to sleep...but I did, and the next night I barely noticed the smell.

In the morning we went down to breakfast.  The hostess had asked us when she showed us our room what time we wanted breakfast in the morning and what we'd like to eat.  We were surprised to have these options as the first B&B we stayed at told us what time to be at breakfast and just served us the meal they prepared. The hostess looked much more "put together" in the morning, with her hair braided nicely. She served us a wonderful breakfast of fruit, eggs, ham, bacon and french toast with homemade jams. We enjoyed our breakfast with another couple who was staying at the B&B. They gave us pointers on places to go that day, which we were grateful for as we had ZERO plans!

Yes, me, the planner, I had ZERO plans for this trip!  We both agreed on the way there and again on the way home that "plan-less" was so much more fun. We just showed up and allowed the trip to take us where it would.  We may have missed some popular sight seeing things, but we felt that the things we did were just perfect for us. All I had on my agenda was "see the hills".

The first thing we did was drive to Hitchcock Nature Center. It is a beautiful park in the Loess Hills with lots of hiking trails.  We played around in the lodge, learning a little about the hills and the animals who inhabit them. James made this sweet note in one of those things you push pins through:

Then we climbed the look-out tower where we could see out for miles above the hills.  There were a couple of volunteers up there with binoculars, monitoring the avian activity. That was interesting to watch.

After that we hiked out to the end of one of the ridge tops and back.  It was an "easy" hike. We only saw a couple other hikers on the trail.

While both of us could have stayed at this park all day, we left and headed to our next stop. On the way there, we decided to grab a bite to eat, as it was lunch time and we'd been burning our breakfast off hiking. We used the navigation system in the jeep to help us find some restaurants.  We decided on a local bar and grill, and grabbed a couple of barstools in front of this guy:

We shared a light lunch and then headed to the lavender field I wanted to see.  Unfortunately, most of the lavender plants were no longer in bloom :(  We walked around the cute little gift shop and then sat on a bench under a pergola outside for a little while. When we were ready for more exercise we headed to the last stop of our day, Preparation Canyon. We hiked one short trail down to a creek and then hiked back up to the top. My knees were starting to complain, but I wasn't ready to be done.

We drove through the park some more and came across the place I've seen in pictures many times, that I was hoping to visit in person (although I didn't do any research ahead of time to find out where it was).  It's a scenic look-out spot on top of a ridge. The neat part is that you can walk out onto the ridge quite a ways and see out across the land the entire time.  It was so beautiful and we were there at the perfect time!  It was late afternoon, so the sun was moving to the west and was just the perfect color of gold.

I could have spent the entire rest of the day on this ridge top.  I told James I wished we would have brought a picnic supper.  We didn't encounter anyone else on the trail with us. In fact, we were shocked at how few people we saw all weekend. I was so glad we found that spot (and so randomly too). This was my favorite part of the weekend.

My second favorite part came after that.  We were driving the back roads, headed out of the park, when we came across some birch trees.  I have been wanting some birch branches (for decor) for months, and, as they are just not plentiful in our area, we have not been able to find any.  I even asked in a garden store where I could find some and was told they are so rare around here. So....I told James that whatever he had to do, we were leaving with some branches off those trees. As we turned the corner, to our amazement, we saw a pile of recently cut birch branches!!  The problem was, they were all too long for the jeep.  BUMMER!!!!  BUT..... we were only about 5 miles away from the B&B and we happened to know that the owners were wood workers..... So, yes, we went and asked them if we could borrow some saws :)  Long story short, I have birch branches now :) Thanks again, James!

As it was nearing supper time and neither of us wanted to go sit in the stinky B&B room, we decided to check out the local (and only) restaurant/bar in town...with the longest name ever. This town was so tiny, there wasn't even a gas station in it. I was surprised at how nice and big the restaurant/bar was!  Not only that, but tiny town means cheap food!  I got a cheeseburger and a side for under $4! We sat on the bar side of the place and enjoyed watching the locals come in and out.  It was fun to see everyone visit/heckle with each other, given that they all know everyone in town.  We didn't even find it odd that there was a small boy (maybe 4?) sitting up at the bar....seemed normal for that place (I mean that in a good way).

Night #2 was just fine and we had another amazing breakfast Sunday morning. This time it was just the two of us. We told the hostess to surprise us.....she made waffles with apple pie filling and whip cream on top, eggs, bacon and fruit. We talked to the hostess for an hour and learned much more about the old hotel, the town (which used to be a big rodeo town until the railroad stopped going through it) and things she's learned about running a B&B.

All in all, we had a great weekend and are very glad we went.  We wouldn't change a thing about it. Even the sketchy B&B turned out to be a great story! We made some fun memories, enjoyed each other's company and got some exercise amongst beautiful scenery!

Freezer meal prep

I've loved the idea of freezer meal prep groups ever since I first heard of them.  I had several opportunities to join some groups in the past, but every time I decided I could make my meals cheaper and I didn't join. Last month, a friend attended a meal prep event at Hy-Vee and raved about it.  My mom asked if I wanted to sign up for the next one.  I thought about it, but still felt that I could make the meals cheaper. After discussing it with James, I decided to at least try it once.

Last night was the event I signed up for. It was way better than I thought it would be and I already can't wait to do it again! In just one hour and $77 spent, we had 7 meals to take home. I normally spend $65-$85 a week on groceries, so this really wasn't terribly expensive. Plus, my kids won't eat anything I brought home, so James and I will get more like 14 meals out of it, as each one serves at least 4.

I was very impressed with the set up. There were 7 tables (one for each meal). Each table had all of the ingredients needed to make 14 meals (there were 14 people there). 2 people worked together at a table to bag the 14 meals.  My mom and I had a pretty easy one.  We measured and poured 6 ingredients into a bag. Some people had to stir things together or patty up burgers, which took longer, but we were all still done in an hour.  All of the veggies (onions, peppers) were already diced for us when we got there.

After all of the meals had been made, the staff subtracted any ingredients we didn't open from our grocery total and divided the total by the number of people there.  We just paid for the groceries used (nearly all of them were hy-vee brand), plus $10 just for attending the event.  To have that many meals prepared in just an hour and not have to do any meal planning, grocery shopping or dicing veggies, was worth the $10 for sure!!!  One lady we talked to said she has been going to these every month and she and her husband eat the meals for several weeks, cutting her need to meal plan and grocery shop.  The time savings alone is very valuable to some of us!

I'm excited to try the meals now.  The dietician leads the event, so the meals are mostly healthy. She also gives suggestions of healthier sides to serve with the meals. There are some ingredients in the meals that I have never tried before, but so I'm eager to see what I think of them.