Budgeting Woes and Menu Planning

For the last six months or so, my laptop has been out of commission. My dad's been working on it a lot, and finally gave me a new hard drive so that I could have my laptop back while he's working on getting the data off of it.

Anyhoo...

The return of my laptop means the return of my budgeting software. I spent a fair amount of time tonight logging all of my expenses for the year so far. I was shocked at what I found! When we don't budget, we spend an inordinate amount of money going out. I knew it was a lot, and that we should pare down, but WOW!

So *B* and I decided to lay down menus for the week and ACTUALLY stick to them. So here we go:

Tuesday
Chicken, Zucchini, and Mushroom Kabobs

Wednesday
Chicken Tacos Chipotle Style with Succotash

Thursday
Chicken Parmesan with Peas

Friday
Homemade Pizza with Green Beans

Saturday
Barbecued Pork Loin with Yams and Applesauce

Sunday
Mexican Lasagne (featured here) with Succotash

I have had a few leads on summer jobs, but none of them are perfect. I'm still waiting to hear back from the library. I am already committed to going to Camden, NJ for a week in June (for which I get paid). I have been offered a half-summer position at a summer camp at my school. But that still doesn't quite pay the bills. A friend of mine from grad school just said that she can't do evening tutoring anymore, so she offered me her tutoring position about 1/2 hour from my home. While I don't have one specific job this summer, I think we can make it. But it will be tight. I will be SO thankful when all this wedding business is over. Not so much because I'm wishing my life away, but mostly that I'm wishing my stress away :o)