Utah giveaway - Winter Palooza tickets! Great indoor activity THIS Saturday for the whole family.

Time for a fun giveaway!
This giveaway has ended. Thanks everyone for entering!

If you live in Utah you're probably hibernating in your house like I am because of these darn back-to-back snow storms. Today I'm giving away tickets to an INDOOR fun, family event coming up THIS Saturday that is bound to entertain your pent-up kids!

Get all the Palooza info (and discounted tickets) HERE:

Winter Palooza, Come Play!

Saturday, February 2nd at South Towne Expo.  10am-8pm

• Goose Jumps Bounce Houses
• Rockwall
• Ropes Course
• Laser Tag Arena
• Ferris Wheel
• Face Painting
• Glitter Tattoos
• Animal Shows
• Magic Shows
• Game in Ride Trailer
• Princess Festival:Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Beauty and the Beast, Rapunzel, so More
• Heroic Inc: Spiderman, Superman, Catwoman, Batman, Ironman…..on and on
• Star Wars Characters: Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker, 3CPO and other fav’s

Way Too Much FUN in One Day!!

6.00 Discount Tickets at www.WinterPaloozaUtah.com

SO FUN! Entering is very easy, but you'd better hurry because we're giving the tickets away THIS FRIDAY. I am giving away not one, but TWO family 4-packs of tickets. I will draw the two winners Friday, so make sure your schedule is clear to go to the event Saturday before entering!

Click HERE to enter online, or click the widget below:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck, and hope to see you all there!

Easy meal planning ideas to solve your dinner budget dilemmas! Includes recipes and FREE printables!

If you know me, you know I have a love-hate relationship with cooking. The fact that I'm about to have my 3rd kid in 3 years...it's definitely more hate, than love right now.

however...

Whether you love to cook or not, it's one of the easiest ways to either 

A) spend your family into oblivion, or 

B) save your family thousands throughout the years.

I have nailed down some super simple tips and tricks when it comes to meal planning in my own home, and thought I'd share them with you in case it helps solve some of YOUR dinner budget dilemmas, too!

Here's a TV segment I did recently for Studio 5 highlighting my favorite Dinner Budget Dilemma solutions.

Enjoy!

Click HERE to watch the video online, or simply click and watch it below:

Easy Meal Planning Ideas to Solve Your Dinner Budget Dilemmas

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Single, Student, or Working Professional

DINNER BUDGET DILEMMA: I have no time to cook between working and social life, so I tend to eat out/buy food on the go, which really adds up.

SOLUTION: 

• Crock-pot, crock-pot, crock-pot! 
• Every week just choose two or three meals to cook, and focus on the crockpot as your main tool. Toss the food in the crockpot before work or class, set it on low, and 8 hours later you have a hot meal ready and waiting for you when you come home. 
• This will encourage you to come home to the food that is cooking (don't want to burn your house down, do you??) rather than run through the drive-through after a long day. 
• If you have roommates, rotate days where you cook for the whole house. That way you have a home-cooked meal every night, but only have to cook 1 or 2 times per week. This will help lessen your grocery bill as well.
• Schedule time to eat out into your week. Let's be realistic here, people! If you schedule in dinner or lunch with friends 1 or 2 times each week, you'll be able to keep it to a reasonable minimum rather than trying to deprive yourself of eating out and being miserable while your friends all go out without you. No bueno!
• Dinner idea: Toss chicken breasts (frozen is just fine!) in the crockpot, dump BBQ sauce over it (no need to measure!), cook 8 hours on low, and shred and eat on buns or eat whole with rice or veggies. BBQ chicken in 30 seconds! Other ideas: Baked potatoes in the crock pot, crockpot salsa chicken, or taco soup.

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Parent of Young Children

DINNER BUDGET DILEMMA: "By the end of the day I'm so exhausted and my young kids are so cranky, I just don't have the energy to cook, or I look at the clock and it's already 5pm and we need dinner ASAP. So we go for expensive frozen meals or order pizza."

SOLUTION: 

• Plan your meals at least 1 week in advance, keep the plan on your fridge where you can see it. Use our printables below and laminate them for ease.
• Only go to the store 1x per week...no matter what!
• Price-match at Walmart to cut down on exhausting grocery trips (see how I do all this HERE).
• When you buy meat, cook it up and freeze it pre-cooked to help speed up the dinner process (ground beef and chicken especially).
• Set a "theme" for each day of the week. Ex: Monday = Mexican. Tuesday = Tuscan. Wednesday = Chicken, etc. This will make coming up with what's for dinner much easier.
• Don't go to bed until you know what you're going to make the next day, and take the meat out of the freezer the night before. Use your phone to help you with this; whether it's setting a calendar reminder, or simply keeping a meal list. I like the free app Evernote for making lists.
• Prep dinner as early as you can in the day so that by dinner time your cooking process is quick and painless. 
• When you cook, double the recipe and freeze 1/2 so you have a stockpile of go-to meals for those extra busy days.
• Dinner idea: Anything that can be baked in a 9x13 pan (casseroles, lasagna, baked pastas, chicken and rice, etc.). This usually means it can be prepped as early as the night before, and 9x13's are easy to freeze...just stick the lid on, freeze, then pop in the oven - still frozen - when you need a quick meal.

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House Full of Teenagers

DINNER BUDGET DILEMMA: "These teenagers eat me out of house and home! My meal budget has tripled, especially when they invite their friends over!"

SOLUTION: 

• Stock up when things go on sale! 
• Each week plan your meals around what's on sale that week. You can look at store ads that come in the mail (only take note of the front and back pages, the middle isn't worth your time). OR...I prefer to use Deals to Meals because they do it all for you, you can print your shopping list right from the website, and they create meal plans each week that are centered around the items that are on sale that week. It's genius!
• When there's a good deal, stock up like crazy. Stick the excess in the pantry or freezer so you don't have to run to the store and pay top-dollar every time you need to cook a meal.
• Budget: $100 per person per month, including toiletries. Set the budget and stick with it! It will force you to focus on cheaper (but still healthy) meals. You can do it, I promise!!! (see how HERE, see how I track that budget HERE)
• Keep an inventory of what's in your pantry and freezer so you use up what you have before running to the store. See our printables below to help you with this.
• Dinner idea: Stick to "filler" meals that break down and serve lots of people. Ex: rather than serve everyone single chicken breasts for dinner, chop up chicken breasts and make a stir fry filled with veggies and rice. It will stretch your meat farther, which tends to be the most expensive part of a meal.

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Empty-Nesters

DINNER BUDGET DILEMMA: "Now that I'm cooking for just two again, I find myself wasting so much food because we just can't seem to eat it all! We get sick of eating the same leftovers day after day and end up throwing it away. I'm still in the habit of cooking for a big family!"

SOLUTION:

• Plan your meals 1 week in advance, and use your leftovers to go toward the next meal. That way you'll use every drop of the food you cook, but you won't notice you're "repurposing" it.
• When you cook, freeze half so you can have a future meal and keep serving sizes smaller.
• Use allrecipes.com and search for recipes by ingredient to help you use up what you have. You can also adjust serving size in each recipe and it will automatically adjust to scale it down, if you don't want to make a large meal and freeze the excess.
• Avoid buying bulk, stick with sale items at smaller stores. We all love Costco, but you'll probably end up wasting more than you save. 
• Dinner idea: Monday night: Rotisserie chicken and potatoes. Tuesday: Use the same chicken, but serve it over rice and pour a creamy sauce over it. Wednesday: Use the same rotisserie leftovers, but chop it up and make chicken enchiladas, and add taco seasoning to the rice to make mexican rice.

Everyone can use all of these tips at ANY stage of life, but hopefully this helps solve some of your sticky dinner budget dilemmas.

Here are some great printables to help!

To download this 2-week meal planner click HERE

To download this monthly meal planner, click HERE. 

*Note: At the bottom, set a "theme" for each day of the week. Ex: Monday = Mexican. Tuesday = Italian. Wednesday = Chicken. It will help narrow down your "what should I make..." choices!

To download this freezer inventory click HERE

To download this pantry inventory tracker click HERE

To download this meal planning grocery list, click HERE

See a few of my favorite easy recipes HERE, 

and a huge list of 100+ "what to make for dinner?!" ideas HERE. 

Remember, grocery shopping/cooking/eating is one of the simplest ways to either SPEND a ton, or SAVE a ton for your family. The decision is yours, do the right thing and be wise with your meals. Good luck! :)

Frugality Boot Camp 2013 recap. WOW, what a fun day!

I'm sure some of you are probably sick of hearing about Frugality Boot Camp 2013, so I promise that this will be the last you'll hear of it for a while!

(Ok, so promise is a pretty strong word...)

But I have to re-cap what a wonderful time we had, and how much of a success it was this year! I hope this inspires you all to consider coming next time. 

We will be doing one every January, but for those who are out of state we are currently working on webinar versions of FBC so you can join in without the travel expense!

Stay tuned for that one.

For those who ARE local in UT (or the surrounding states) and would like to come, we might just be having another one sooner than we thought since this one was such a hit!

Stay tuned for that one as well!

So, without further adieu, I present to you...highlights of FBC2013!

The preparation DISASTER AREA. We had a blast watching The Bachelor, prepping food, finalizing presentations, and stuffing binders before Camp. 

And yes, as a matter of fact that IS my Christmas tree still up in the corner. I've been a bit busy, don't judge me. ;) 

This year we had to expand! We originally planned on 50-65 attendees, but kept selling out of tickets! We found this larger space and ended up having to cap at right around 90 people! Yahoo! Because of the interest we Mountain America Credit Union's generously let us expand into their gorgeous H. Floyd Tanner building in West Jordan, UT. They were so accommodating, it was THE PERFECT location for FBC!

Pretty swanky, eh?

Our amazing team of volunteers and FBC Crew handled the day like champs. 

Thank goodness for tech-savvy hubbies who saved the day many times!

People started filing in bright and early. I was impressed that there were so many early birds!

We had attendees from all over the West Coast, from Wyoming, to Idaho, ALL over Utah, and even California. I love me some out-of-towners!

There was an amazing energy in the room; the day was a ton of fun! I could feel the excitement people had about changing their financial lives in 2013.

There was lots of interaction, comments, and Q&A throughout the day, which really added positive  discussion (and positive vibes) to all the presentations.

We enjoyed some GREAT snacks, lunch, drinks, and dessert throughout the day, compliments of The Sweet Tooth Fairy, and Amber Creek Counseling.

We enjoyed hearing from amazing presenters throughout the day (read about them HERE).

We discussed everything from...

• The 5 simple steps to completely overhauling your finances.
• How to set a budget
• How to maintain a budget
• How to track your spending, the easy way
• Husband and wife financial roles in the family
• How to "talk finances" with your spouse, in an effective way
• Frugal fashion
• The balance of paying off debt vs building savings
• Grocery shopping, meal planning, and food storage on a budget
• How to set financial goals, stay motivated, and accomplish them
• How much to spend on ______ (a number of things!)
• How to be able to buy ANYTHING you want...in time.
• and more!

Every attendee got a FBC binder full of printouts, info, budgeting tools, and even got pens, a price notebook, and a grocery list pad to put on their fridge (thanks in great part to Office Depot!). They also got exclusive digital tools emailed to them after the conference to help them throughout the year.

Kirk from Amber Creek Counseling taught us tips and the importance of having healthy conversations with your spouse...yes...even about finances. (Remember his fun date nights??)
Jordan Credit Union taught us all about the benefits of credit unions and how they can offer you CASH  benefits for opening accounts with them. This is perfect info when opening your 7 Bank Accounts.

This year the 15+ men headed off to MAN CAMP while the women learned about Frugal Fashion from the fabulous Nick Scott. Always adorable, and always a side-splitting riot!

 A major highlight of the day were the coupons, freebies, and giveaways that were handed out, compliments of Candle Warmers, Sugar Doodle Kids, Money Mastery, Jordan Credit Union, Deals to Meals, BabySteals.com, and The Sweet Tooth Fairy...just to name a few.

 Another perk we added this year was the 30 minute Q&A with presenters and sponsors at the end of the day. It allowed us presenters to get to know the attendees 1-on-1 even better, and allowed everyone the opportunity to get all their questions answered in-depth before heading home.

 It was such a fun, inspiring day!

The best part? 

I didn't go into labor (yippee!) 

Though I'm only 35 weeks I went into early labor earlier a few days before Camp and had to get a shot in the hospital to stop the contractions.
It worked,
my water didn't break during my 3 hour presentation,
(thank goodness)...
and now I'm ready for a nap.

Needless to say, it was an amazing day for everyone, including myself.

And I know you're thinking, "easy for you to say, you're biased." 

Well...you're right! I am! 

BUT

I also know that our attendees feel the same way. 

How, do you ask?

We surveyed all 90 attendees and asked:

1) Their overall satisfaction with the day and how well they enjoyed themselves, and

2) How valuable they found the information/day to be in terms of being able to apply it to their lives to improve their financial future.

 The response? 

Our average rating was 9 out of 10!

Ain't bad if you ask me!

And, honestly, I have to give a shout-out to the most amazing Director of Marketing on the planet. If any of you get lucky enough to correspond with Lindsay, you'll know why I'm pretty much obsessed with her. It would't have been such a success without her!

Oh, and just for the record, she left her 2 year old behind and flew in from NY for 5 days to make sure everything went smoothly last weekend.

Um, amazing.

Check out all the photos from the day here:

Frugality Boot Camp 2013

Once again, I hope you all join us next time. It will be bigger, better, and full of even MORE information than ever. Can't wait for the next one!!!!!

A big thank you to our sponsors who helped make this happen, and helped to keep it so affordable this year. Couldn't do it without you!