Pre-made dinner ideas

A friend of mine on FB posted this and it has been on my mind ever since....
http://www.theyatesclan.blogspot.com/2011/11/3-days-for-32-meals-to-freeze.html
I love the idea of pre-making a variety of meals to make our evenings a lil bit easier.  I mean by the time I jot across town after work and get home its 5:45 and most meals take 30-1hr to cook its very late for Cade to be eating. And more than not the lil Tot is hungry right when he gets home from daycare (all that playing is very tiring)!!  Its been great having Evan work from home bc typically he can get things started for us.  And the crockpot is also my BFF.  

As I read thru the post and saw that the total cost was about $450 for all the groceries I also noticed that this woman has a family of 6, we are a family of 3.  Also, I have most these seasonings, and sauces already on hand so that should drive the cost down quite a bit too.  

Her post makes it very easy, she breaks it down into menus by meat: CHX, BEEF, ROASTS, PORK, and she also provides a full printable grocery list with recipes. So I printed this baby out and marked thru what I already had on hand. I read through the recipes and noticed that we had just had some of these dinner items (ie: spaghetti) and or already have some of these things frozen in our freezer (ie: chili, beff veggie soup). 
So I decided NOT to make all of these recipes nor do I have the room for all of them in our freezer.  I decided instead to slow cook 9 chx breasts and shred them up into 3 diff ziplocs.
2 are plain and 1 I added Adobe sauce and bbq with onions to make pulled chx bbq sandwiches. 
Next I browned up 3.5lbs of hamburger plus onions and divided into 3 diff ziplocs. I seasoned one with garlic, one with taco seasoning and one plain.  I figure I can keep these on hand to make tacos, spaghetti-quick and easy bc they are premade!
So while this plan didn't work out for me 100% it did give me a starting point for some much needed Convenience  in my life which is key!

A friend of mine on FB posted this and it has been on my mind ever since....
http://www.theyatesclan.blogspot.com/2011/11/3-days-for-32-meals-to-freeze.html
I love the idea of pre-making a variety of meals to make our evenings a lil bit easier.  I mean by the time I jot across town after work and get home its 5:45 and most meals take 30-1hr to cook its very late for Cade to be eating. And more than not the lil Tot is hungry right when he gets home from daycare (all that playing is very tiring)!!  Its been great having Evan work from home bc typically he can get things started for us.  And the crockpot is also my BFF.  

As I read thru the post and saw that the total cost was about $450 for all the groceries I also noticed that this woman has a family of 6, we are a family of 3.  Also, I have most these seasonings, and sauces already on hand so that should drive the cost down quite a bit too.  

Her post makes it very easy, she breaks it down into menus by meat: CHX, BEEF, ROASTS, PORK, and she also provides a full printable grocery list with recipes. So I printed this baby out and marked thru what I already had on hand. I read through the recipes and noticed that we had just had some of these dinner items (ie: spaghetti) and or already have some of these things frozen in our freezer (ie: chili, beff veggie soup). 
So I decided NOT to make all of these recipes nor do I have the room for all of them in our freezer.  I decided instead to slow cook 9 chx breasts and shred them up into 3 diff ziplocs.
2 are plain and 1 I added Adobe sauce and bbq with onions to make pulled chx bbq sandwiches. 
Next I browned up 3.5lbs of hamburger plus onions and divided into 3 diff ziplocs. I seasoned one with garlic, one with taco seasoning and one plain.  I figure I can keep these on hand to make tacos, spaghetti-quick and easy bc they are premade!
So while this plan didn't work out for me 100% it did give me a starting point for some much needed Convenience  in my life which is key!