My family orders take out more than I would like to admit. My husband works late almost every day, and doesn't get home until 7:30 or 8:00 pm. By that time, I'm in the middle of our night time routine to put the baby to sleep. I don't get to start cooking most nights until 9 o'clock, and then there are chores to do after dinner, which means I don't get a second to sit down until 10. It's always so tempting to just pick something up, even though I already have groceries in the fridge waiting to be cooked.
We either go out to eat or order take out about 2 nights a week, and usually eat out for lunch on Saturdays. That didn't seem like very much to me until I added up our food bills. I estimate that we spent around $630 in June and $750 in July on all of our food. I got those numbers by going through our bank statements, so it's not exactly accurate, but at least half of that amount was from restaurants. In July, we had to buy extra food for June's birthday party, and we bought dinner for our out-of-town guests, so I'm guessing we are usually around the $630 mark. Either way, that number is alarmingly high. I had no idea we spent that much on food.
I'm tired of being wasteful (of food and money), so I decided to challenge myself to not eat out at all for a month. It's going to be hard. I hate eating dinner by myself, and my husband isn't a fan of leftovers, which is all he will get if I do this because I can't wait until 9 pm to start cooking every day. And what do I do with my one year old while I cook? She will only play independently for so long before she attaches herself to my leg and cries while trying to pants me until I pick her up. Somehow, we are going to get through this, and hopefully I will gain some knowledge of how to manage my time better so it's not a big deal to cook at home all the time. I'll post weekly updates of how we are doing, what I have cooked, and how high my grocery bill was.
