Weekly Menus

I actually have been keeping this up I just haven't posted here!  Sorry!  This weeks menu is pretty much made up of items that we have in the freezer.  We are only home a few days before I am off to Dayton again!

Enjoy

Stobe Family Weekly Meals

Disney Trip Review!!!

Prior to Arrival:
We booked a last minute trip to Disney. We used Mouse Made Simple and decided to stay for 4 nights at the Port Orleans Riverside. We were going to do two days at the parks. One at Animal Kingdom and one at Magic Kingdom. We took advantage of the Give a Day Get a Day promotion and volunteered a few weeks before our stay at the Boys and Girls Club of Lorain County. We were only there for a few hours and had two free tickets to the park. We also chose to use the Disney Dining Plan. This included 1 quick service, 1 snack and 1 table service per night of stay. This worked out really well for us.

We booked three character dinners: 1900 Park Fare with Cinderella, Crystal Palace with Winnie the Pooh and Donald’s Safari Breakfast. We were pretty happy getting these as we were only a few weeks out. A few days before we left we were watching the weather and it didn’t look great on Saturday when we had planned on going to Magic Kingdom. We decided to move all our reservations around and lost the Crystal Palace, but we were able to still go to the other ones. The weather also looked very cold so I had to repack everyone from shorts and t-shirts to pants and long sleeves.

Day 1:

Departure:
We had a 4:45 am wake up call Thursday morning. We were up and out of the house at 5:45 on our way to Orlando. Check in was pretty easy and we were on our way. We bought CJ a seat because he is such a squirmer. We also brought his car seat. This is the first time we had done this. He did great. The only issue was him kicking the seat in front of us. I was worried about this and I did the best I could, but I think the guy in front of us was a bit annoyed. Oh well :)

And this is where things went south. We arrived in Orlando and followed the signs and what we thought we heard to catch the shuttle. Jim was heading into the Orlando office for work. We got him all checked in for his Alamo car rental and headed outside to catch the bus. Well we were in totally the wrong spot. The guy was really nice though and said he would drive us where we needed to be. I think he saw all the stuff I had to carry by myself and felt sorry for me. Jim headed off to work for the afternoon and I was on my own. Once we actually got to the B Terminal where Magical Express was the check in was pretty easy. We were first in line for our bus and had to wait about 10-15 minutes for the next shuttle. I got the kids and all our stuff (our two pieces of luggage went straight to the resort which was really nice). I had two kids, a stroller, carseat, camera, diaper bag, and two other carryons. Yeah, crazy I know! We got on the bus and the driver said it would be about 30 minutes. Perfect. It was getting close to lunch and CJ just pooped his pants. We were in the first row. As we pulled out I knew things were going to be going south. Our driver was going about 20 mph and everyone (including other Disney busses) were passing us. Then he proceeded to just drive around and around and around. We see him miss the turn to our resort and then he gets the map out. Long story short it took us over an hour. The kids were crazy and CJ stunk to high heaven. After we finally got to our resort he told one of the passengers that that was the route that he supposed to take. Uh I don’t think so. We don’t go by the same thing 3 times. Don’t thing that is in Disney’s efficiency plan. So we go to check in and the kids were crazy at this point. Our room wasn’t ready, but they said they would text me when it was. I went to change CJ and came back. I thought well maybe I would buy the extra day for the park for Savannah. Well I can’t find the cards for our room. I went and told them that I didn’t get them. So they were looking all around. Well they ended up being in the stroller. They fell out of the binder. Jim called to check in and I just broke down crying. I was so stressed at this point. But I think it helped because the rest of the day was better. I dumped our stuff with the concierge and took the kids to lunch. Lunch was pretty good and then we headed to the playground. Thought I would let them run some of the extra energy out. We played for a while and then I thought I would head back to the front desk to check on our room. As soon as I got there we got the text. Woo hoo! We could get into our room and take a nap. They accommodated our requests for building 85 in Port Orleans Riverside. We also asked for ground floor and adjoining rooms with Jim’s parents and all were met. We got to the room and all went down for a rest. Of course within 15 minutes of laying down our luggage arrived, but the kids went back down. Jim’s parents arrived around 5 that evening and Jim started to make his way back. He got lost and was a bit cranky. He didn’t make it back in time to meet us in the room so he met us at dinner.

We had reservations at 1900 Park Fare at the Grand Floridian the first night for the Cinderella dinner. We decided to drive since Jim’s parents had a car. Well I started out by telling them the wrong directions. While they do have great signs here at Disney they do not make it very easy to turn around if you do miss a turn. Well after all of that we finally made it there and Jim was waiting for us. We put our name in as we had a reservation and were seated within minutes. Savannah was all dolled up in her princess outfit. They took a picture of all of us and we were seated. We did not get in the main dining room, but it was fine. We saw Cinderella, Prince Charming, the evil stepmother and the two step sisters. While I did bring my camera I totally forgot the kids autograph books. Looks like I will be signing those myself  The hard part with character dinners is you really can leave your seat all that often as you might miss someone. Dinner was pretty good. Nothing fancy, but good. CJ went to town with the mac and cheese. Savannah loved all of the characters and even danced with one of the stepsisters. We didn’t end up buying the picture ($29.99), but it was pretty good. We all had a few desserts and were done. We had a 7:20 seating and it was nice being there a bit later. It started to clear out as we were leaving which was nice. We drove back and headed to bed as we had an early wake up call.

Day 2:

In the middle of the night our power went out for about an hour. For a family that always sleeps with fan it was soooo quiet! The kids slept through it, but I was awake until it came back on. Still not sure what happened, but I think there were quite a few places that were out listening to people talking. The alarm went off at 6:20 as we were at the bus stop around 7 am. We had a 8:05 reservation with Donald at the Tusker House in Animal Kingdom. I left a $5 bill and two toys in the room before we left with a note to leave them for the kids from Mickey. I will get to that later.

We arrived at Animal Kingdom early and were the only ones on the bus. We turned in our Give a Day Get a Day vouchers for a day pass and got volunteer buttons. People were thanking us all day for helping out. Was kind of nice. They let us into the park a little before 8 am (the park doesn’t open until 9). It was really chilly! We all had layers on and the kids even wore their hats. We headed all the way to the back of the park to the restaurant. We again got our picture taken with Donald and in we went. We had a table in one of the side rooms and it was nice and big. Was really for 8 so we had plenty of room. They told us when the characters were at one of the tables to not go anywhere. We all headed up to the buffet and picked up tons of goodies. The food was really good here for breakfast. The Mickey waffles were the best! Once again the characters were great. CJ still wouldn’t go to any of them, but Savannah loved them. This time I remembered to bring their books to sign. We saw Mickey (which was a surprise and was great!), Daisy and Goofy. Savannah loved it. After breakfast we headed straight back to the Safari. There was really no wait so we actually ended up riding it twice. I rode on the right side the first time and the left the second. Most of the animals were on the left so CJ and I got a better view the second time. We then went around Animal Kingdom for the day. We took the train to the back of the park and saw Pocahontas, Rafiki, and Jimeny Cricket. It was great because there weren’t any lines to see them. We saw two shows – The Lion King and Nemo. The Lion King was great! CJ took a nap through Nemo. We used one of our snacks and got a pretzel. Savannah got ice cream of course. Jim’s parents took the kids for us and Jim and I rode Everst. The wait was 25 minutes. It was pretty cool because you go up this big hill and think you are going to go down only to show that it is a dead and then you go backwards. It was a nice ride. After that we headed back and didn’t last for the parade. It was a long day. Savannah fell asleep waiting for the bust (which was less than 5 minutes and wasn’t full). So both kids had about 40 minute naps today and did pretty well.

We came back to the room and I was all excited to find what Mousekeeping did with the toys I left. Well I came back and no towel animals, no toys and no $5. Hmmm, where did that go. I called the front desk after dinner to complain. She asked how much the toys were worth. I said they were only $1 each, but it was more the fact that she took them and the money. She said she would talk to them the next day and get back with me. She called later that night telling me she would credit our account for $10. So that was nice, but now the toys I brought for the rest of the week I guess will just be from me and not Mickey  We ended up just doing a Quick Service at the hotel. We all had made to order pasta and it was delish! Also had Apple Pie ala mode for dessert. Yummy!

Day 2:

Well today was kind of a bust. CJ awoke at 6 am! That was quite early for another night of not sleeping very well. We just played around in the room for a while and then around 9 am he fell asleep. We let him sleep until a little after 10 when we were going to catch the boat to Downtown Disney. When we left the room it started sprinkling. By the time we got to the boat it was pouring. We were so excited when we booked this resort because they had a boat. Kind of disappointed because we didn’t really get to enjoy it. It was cold and rainy. We arrived at Downtown Disney and headed straight to lunch. We had lunch at Earl of Sandwich. It was very good just busy as everyone was trying to get out of the rain. We ended up only hitting a couple of stores and calling it a day. The kids weren’t cooperating and it was just nasty out. We took the boat back to the resort and stopped at the dining hall for a snack. We headed back to the room and a nice surprise was waiting for us. Mousekeeping put these really cool towel animals in our room. A nice makeup for yesterday. We all took a nap and then it was ready to head to Animal Kingdom Lodge for dinner. We had a 4:40 reservation at Boma which is an African Themed Buffet. It was really good. My favorites were the Carrot Ginger soup, FaFa (sweet and mashed potatoes together), and all of the desserts! We walked around the grounds afterwards as they have animals all around. What a neat resort. We headed back to our room and called it a night.

Day 3:

We were up early to head to Magic Kingdom. We headed to the Quick Service at the Resort and had breakfast before we headed out. We went to the bus and got to MK before they opened. It was kind of neat to see the show they put on as you were waiting to go in. Jim’s dad was able to get a handicapped pass due to his neuropathy. This was key with the kids as we didn’t have to wait in any lines! We took the train to Frontierland and rode a few rides. Then we headed to the back of the park around 10 am to see the princesses and fairies. We got through the Princess line pretty quickly, then Jim’s mom got in the Fairy line which we were told went slow. They weren’t kidding. It was sooooo slow! We waited in the Mickey and Minnie line and came back and still waited close to 30-45 minutes. Not sure the fairies were worth it, but Savannah enjoyed it. We then had lunch and rode a few more rides. Oh and there were strollers everywhere!!! And watch out for the stroller fairies. You may leave it in one spot to go ride a ride and come back and it is in a totally different spot! Sometimes very hard to find. CJ fell asleep during one of the shows so it was nice. He got a good hour or so nap in which helped us not have to leave the park. We watched the parade at 3 pm and headed out of the park to the Wave in the Contemporary. This was the only sit down dinner we at that wasn’t a buffet. It was nice to be served and the kids did pretty well. After dinner we headed back to MK rode one ride and then it was time for the fireworks. We had a great seat for the fireworks. Savannah loved them, but CJ not so much. We actually got out of the park much quicker than I thought we would. We were on the first bus back to the resort. We finished packing up and were in bed by 9:30. We got up early the next morning as we had to drop of our bags for check-in by 8 am. It was so nice and easy. You could check your bags and get your boarding pass right at the resort. What a convenience! This worked out great. We were on the bus and at the airport in plenty of time. Security wasn’t bad and we were on our way back to Ohio. All in all we had a great trip!

Weekly Menus

Even with all the craziness of the weekend, the meal planning continues!

Here is this weeks menu

Stobe Family Weekly Meals

Savannah's a star!

One night while I was at class, Jim took the kids to a HS Girls basketball game.  He went with a coworker and her girls to watch the game where her husband was reffing.  There was a photographer from the paper there and he took a picture of the girls cheering.  It ended up in the paper today.  Savannah was so excited!

Crazy Weekend!

Well this weekend was supposed to consist of my dad and Ann coming up for a visit and Jim and I getting a date night on Saturday. Well neither of those ended up happening. With the weather on its way, Dad decided it was probably not the best idea to head up. Glad he made that decision as the weather really did get bad.


Friday morning started out as a normal Friday…Savannah went to school, CJ had gymnastics and a haircut. CJ went down for his nap and when he got up he was very irritable. I went to change his diaper and he freaked out. His one testicle looked different to me. A bit swollen and higher. And he just didn’t want me anywhere near it. So I called the Dr. to see if they could maybe get us in before the end of the day. Well I guess when there are any issues with the testicles they don’t mess around with it. If there really was an issues I guess they only have hours to fix it. So off to the ER we went.

Once we got there the nurse saw what I was talking about and so did one of the Drs. Then the supervisor came in and pretty much told me I was crazy. She said it was moving up and down just fine. By now Jim had joined us at the ER and she was explaining why she was going to send us home when CJ proceeded to throw up twice. And due to the color she said well now you are going to be here for a few hours. They were going to give him an ultrasound and an xray. They thought he may have Intusseption which is something with his intestines. They ran the tests which were no fun and they also started an IV. They had to poke him 3 times to find a vein. Boy does he take after his mother.

In the meantime, Jim and Savannah went home so she could have dinner. Jim was going to come back up if they decided to keep us. So another Dr. came back and told us the tests looked pretty normal and we probably could be going home. Then her supervisor came in and said that most likely we were going to be heading downtown as they now thought they saw something on the xray and were leaning more toward malrotation. Which is when the intestines twist or something like that.

So Jim sent Savannah off to a neighbors (thanks Meg!!!) and met me at Fairview. It was close to 11 by the time we got the ambulance to transport CJ and to main campus. Jim had to drive and meet us there in the middle of the horrible storm. Cj did surprisingly well in the ambulance, he just hung out and took it all in.

When we got there we went right to the room and waited for the Drs. They checked his vitals and then came in to tell us they were going to run some more tests. They intubated his nose because they were going to give him some barium and watch it go through his system to make sure all was ok. As soon as they did that and we got up to head to radiology he yanked it right out. He really didn’t like it. On our walk over there we saw one of the Clinic’s robots. It was pretty cool. They just roam the hospital taking things like trash, etc to various places. CJ thought it was pretty cool. We got to Radiology (who was called in from home just for us) and she said that she thought the xray looked normal. So she said she was pretty positive that the test they were running was going to be normal. Since he pulled his tube out she asked if he would drink the stuff. I said sure hey may. Well she didn’t tell me that he had to drink it while in the machine with us holding his arms and legs. So that didn’t go well. So she intubated him again and off we went. There were 3 of us that had to hold him down. It wasn’t fun at all and he just kept saying “Mommy Nose” “Mommy Nose”. It was so heartbreaking. But I guess the good news was that he was normal and all was good. We headed back to the room and CJ was looking everywhere for the robot. It was pretty cute.

We got back to the room and the nurse said the Dr. would probably come back in once he read the report. Well that didn’t happen. It was after midnight now and we were all tired. The three of us laid down on the pull out couch and tried to get some sleep. CJ was in the middle with his IV tube so I was worried most of the night that he would roll over and pull it out. So I didn’t really get much sleep. The next morning the Dr. that called us downtown came in to see us. He said that the report was normal and that he must have just had a virus that settled in his body.

So the good news is CJ is fine and probably just had a cold, the bad news is we had to spend a day at the hospital! At least we are done paying with our deductible for the year!

On Saturday we came home around noon and proceeded to take a 4 hour (and much needed) nap. He has been fine since just a bit of a runny nose.

A little off track....

Well I can see easily how quickly a plan can derail!  But the good news is that with this meal planning I do have options to move things around so that is good.  So if you look at this past week's menu vs. what you maybe saw last week it was quite a bit different.  We had a busy week this week so went back to some old classics for us that are easy to make.  I think you might see a lot of that these next few weeks while I am studying for my PMP exams.  Between that and some busy weekends.  On a positive note, we just booked a trip for Disney with the kids!  That is going to be so much fun.  Now the research begins.

Spent another $100 at the grocery this week which I thought was high given I had most of what I needed for the week.  But I did buy pop and meat which might have driven up the price a bit.

Well enjoy again!

Stobe Family Meals

Another one bites the dust!

Another week down.  I feel like the weeks have been going by so quickly these last few weeks.  I guess that isn't a bad thing since we are in the middle of winter.  We had another pretty good week of meals.  None that we totally hated so that was good :)

Last night I organized a girls night out at Cooking Thyme which is our local version of a place like My Girlfriend's kitchen.  We had 13 ladies come and make approx. 6 meals each to then take home and freeze.  The good thing was most of those meals you could split and get 2 meals out of them which is even better.  So you will see the next few weeks where we are starting to eat those so there won't be a recipe.  I do have an appetizer recipe for you though.  I made this Thai Appetizer pizza to take last night.  It was really easy and so yummy.  Also a nice twist on your normal veggie pizza:

Thai Appetizer Pizza - Pillsbury

Also here are our meals for this week.  Just got back from the grocery and spent $90 this week.  So not too bad.  You will also notice this week and for the next 5 weeks, Jim and the kids are on their own every Wednesday night.  I am going to be sitting for the exam to get my PMP Certification (Project Management Professional) and I have a review course.  Of course it has to be out on the east side in the middle of winter!  Hope the weather cooperates.  Wish me luck, I haven't studied for anything since the CPA exam!

Stobe Family Weekly Meals (just so you know I can now upload and keep in excel vs. converting to Google docs.  To get the file click on the download button in the top left hand corner)

Another week down.

We just finished up our dinner from Week 2.  This was another successful week and one with a few adjustments.  Due to a few of us not feeling tip top, we moved a few things around.  I have become a bit of a nazi around the meal planning and spent some time this afternoon putting more recipes into the database.  Still have lots more to add and will probably do some more tonight after the kids go to bed.

We had the potato curry tonight.  I added shredded chicken to this recipe to give it some protien and also used olive oil instead of Ghee. Be careful when you add the mustard seeds, they pop everywhere! May want to add after you put the potatoes in. I wish I didn't put the chicken in. It didn't need it at all. I really liked it, but Jim did not. So don't think it will end up in our rotation. Plus I think it makes more like 6 servings. This was a lot of food. At the last minute I decided that Naan would taste good with it so ran to the store to grab some. The kids don't eat much bread and they both loved this. Will need to get some more.

This week we have a few things going on so the menu isn't too crazy and our grocery bill came back down to around $100 as well.  So that is good.

Enjoy this weeks menu - Stobe Weekly Meals

Week 1 Complete!

Well we got through the first week of meal planning and I have to say what a relief it was to come home and realize I didn't have to think about dinner.  We also didn't go out to eat one night last week.   We usually go out at least once so that alone should help with my waistline.  Although that new Drive Thru Diet at Taco Bell looks like it should work (yeah right!).  Who believes that stuff!

Well anyway, my reviews for week 1 recipes are attached below along with our Week 2 menu.  A little diversity this week which lead to my quite a bit larger grocery bill.  It cost me $156.82 this week.  Now the spices for the Indian dish cost me about $20 alone!  But now that I have them we should be good with those.  This also doesn't account for our trip to Costo where all of our chicken and beef comes from.  Just ended up being a bigger week this week.

Enjoy!!!

Stobe Family Weekly Menus

New Year's Resolution

So as you can see I haven't updated this blog since May.  Haven't been too good about updating.  Since most of our friends and family are on Facebook, I have been posting there instead.  So I decided to change up this blog a bit and make it more about my New Year's Resolution.

My New Year's Resolution this year is to plan our family's weekly meals each Sunday.  I have started to put all of our recipes into an Access database.  (Thanks to my sister who already had one started from her wedding cookbook.)  I added a bunch of recipes I had in my email inbox and am already at over 200 recipes.  I plan on letting Jim pick out some recipes for the week and/or run a random to pick them for us.  Yes nerdy I know, but kind of fun.

With a little inspiration from the movie Julie and Julia and friends asking for our menus, I decided to update our blog with our menus each week.  Now don't be expecting to find recipes that Julia Child would make.  Our tastes are pretty midwestern with an emphasis on Mexican.  We love Mexican and eat it weekly.  So it will be nice to see how we mix it up over the year.  You also won't find any seafood here.  Jim and I aren't seafood fans.  What you will find though is the Weight Watcher points that are associated with each recipe.  I am working to get back down to my weight pre-CJ.  Yeah I know he is almost 2 years old, but what can I say haven't been too motivated.  So hopefully this weekly menu planning will not only help our pocket, but our waistlines as well.  I also plan to write a review of each recipe and any amendments I make.

So does anyone have any predictions on how long I will keep this up???  I hope I can do it for the year, but we will see.  I am sure there will be weeks we don't do well, but it seemed so easy at the grocery store today.  I bought our entire weeks meals and only spent $70.  Will be interesting to see if our grocery budget decreases this year.

So feel free to "borrow" any of our recipes and enjoy.

Happy New Year!!!

Stobe Family Weekly Meals