31 Days In My Kitchen // Day 1: An Intro & Goals

Good Morning, and Happy October! I told you Sunday about the 31 Day challenge I'm taking part in and guess what? This is it! It's here! Let's get started!

I've wanted to join the other 1200+ bloggers in this adventure for at least 2 years. The first year I heard about it, I was too new at blogging and didn't feel ready. The second year, Ollie was only, like, 6 weeks old. I was hardly getting a daily shower let alone time to blog every.single.day. I'm happy to announce my showering is much more frequent and, as a result, I finally get to join the 31 Dayers!

With plenty of time to brainstorm, I came up with a lot of ideas as to what I could write about for this whole month. There are so many subjects that I'd love to dive into and learn more about. But for this month, I had to choose just one. Practically speaking, I needed a subject that wasn't so broad that I'd be floating around in wanderland all month. Something not too focused that I lost writing material after a couple weeks. A subject that wasn't so time consuming that I couldn't research and write about it. And, of course, I wanted to write about something I enjoy! So I narrowed it down to a couple choices and then asked a few friends what their thoughts were...

Unanimously, cooking on a budget won the vote. Yep, for the next 30 days (let's consider this my first post of 31..*wink*) I will share with you what I'm cooking for dinner, how I strategize my weekly meal plan, and how I do so with a tight budget. This is an area in my life that I'm already trying to be more organized with, so a commitment to write about it will be a perfect motivator to get things in order. I'm really excited and I hope you'll join me on this adventure!

My goals for this month are to:
Gain a clear, practical understanding of how much we spend on groceries each month
Create a meal planning system that works for me and my family
Get in the habit of pre-prepping dinner during nap time
Encourage and inspire you with new meals for your family

Through the month, you can come back to this page and see what I've been writing about. Each day that I post a new entry, I'll put the link here. Wow, I'm feeling so organized already! :)

October 1: An Intro & Goals (you're here!)
October 2: Where I'm Cookin'
October 3: Southwest Turkey Meatloaf
October 4: Spicy Beef & Black Bean Chili
October 5: Coconut Banana Bread
October 6: Breakfast For Dinner // Cheesy Bacon Biscuit Pull Aparts
October 7: Nothing To Do With Food
October 8: Chicken 'Alfredo' Bake
October 9: {Delicious} Healthy Pumkpin Bread
October 10: Roasted Veggies // Dice Toss Bake
October 11: I Made It!
October 12: Mmm..Pizza
October 13: Chocolate Chip Cookies (or, lack thereof)
October 14: Spicy Sausage Pasta
October 15: A Few of Ollie's Faves
October 16: Vegetarian Stuffed Shells
October 17: I can't tell you what we had for dinner tonight. I'm too embarrassed.
October 18: Date night!! Mama doesn't have to cook!!
October 19: Vanilla Pudding Chocolate Chip Cookies
October 20: [a witty title that has nothing to do with food and everything to do with our week]
October 21: Happy Birthday Caroline!
October 22: I fell asleep with Ollie at 8pm!!
October 23: General Tso's with Coconut Rice
October 24: Family Movie Night..Camillo said no laptops! :)
October 25: Broccoli, Ham, & Pasta
October 26: Weekend Burgers
October 27:
October 28: Checking In
October 29: A HappyCandido Giveaway
October 30:
October 31:
November 1: Isn't it Lovely?

Are you joining the 31 Day Challenge? Say Hi and leave your web address in the comments, I'd love to follow along with you!

xoxo
Joy

ps. I designed this button with the A Beautiful Mess app for iPhone. I love their fonts and doodles for your photos! If you don't have the ABM app on your phone yet, please go check it out!