Doing some meal planning and freezer cooking tonight- I've been a little lax on bringing enough food to work, and haven't done a major grocery run in a month. Tonight I walked to the small local grocery store and spent $26 stocking up on noodles, rice, and vegetables (fresh and canned for quick meals). I picked up eggs yesterday. These are all kitchen staples for me. I buy broken rice- much less expensive, and it tastes the same.

From the current groceries I have/ can make:

1 serving yogurt (breakfast)
1 serving fish sticks
Popcorn, naan bread, ice cream for snacks
Cereal
4 frozen veggie burger patties
1 package frozen soup
1 frozen personal pizza
Fried rice with carrot, egg, and cilantro- multiple meals
Noodle/vegetable stirfry, can add eggs for protein- multiple meals
Cauliflower/potato Indian curry over rice- makes two meals
Microwave spicy noodle bowl to bring to work
Seasoned potato pancakes
Haluski (cabbage dish)
Mexican beans and rice

I have the window open and a load of laundry drying on the drying rack because the weather's nice. I'm having company this weekend, so I'll need to do some deep cleaning on Friday!

March was a mixed month financially, with some unusual one-time expenses (replacing broken items, etc) and a healthy tax refund.


After totaling things up, I have about $150 from surplus March income and $500 in a tax refund to allocate to my goals. The tax refund will go toward the student loan and the $150 will go toward retirement contributions.

Slow and steady wins the race, I guess. Except for buying some birthday gifts, I'll be trying to keep spending down in April to hopefully break the $7000 mark on the loan next month.