How to enjoy life in a tough economy

I am going to go through many ways to enjoy life and still live on a budget. After being layed off over a year ago, I have learned to change my lifestyle and have a ball doing it. I went from making $62k per year to $330.00 per week and boy did culture shock set in.

TOPIC ONE

The first topic I am going to talk about is everyone’s favorite….EATING. We decided to start cooking again and stop eating out so much. My husband and I are empty nesters, so eating out was just easier than cooking every night. However, when my salary stopped, that all ended.

I’ve always been a fairly good cook, but cooking for two was just hard to adjust to when I was used to cooking for five. But I decided to take a new approach and learn to cook nutritious meals and solve my overcooking problem. My husband doesn’t mind taking lunch from home, but likes hot food, so I cook three full meals a week and he takes lunches I pack in airtight containers and refrigerate. He doesn’t usually take what we ate the night before but what we had two days before to give himself a little variety.

We then have something quick like tacos or hamburgers on the grill in between. I am saving a ton of money and we are eating so much healthier since I try to use fresh vegetables and lower fat meats.

Since I’m not working, I have time to shop sensibly, by planning meals and clipping coupons. I live in a rather small town so I can go to three different stores to catch their sales each week without driving forever.

A great place to find recipes is www. foodnetwork.com, you can literally look up any recipe you want by great chefs! You can usually get a shopping list for each recipe also which makes it easier and it just gives you a more exciting week of what to cook.

Stay tuned for the next topic: ENTERTAINMENT