I was wondering if one of you gurus would be willing to help me out at bit the next couple days, either on here or email/PM.

DH gets laid off this Friday. I've been off work since August from pregnancy complications. DH will be going back to work Jan 7th, but we are unsure if the company is going to try and get out of unemployment payments- they are not calling it a layoff, but a "stop-work", and DH will be on call (if we get bad storms and tree bring the powerlines down, he will get called into cut the trees etc so the power can be put back). He is supposed to get holiday pay, but we are unsure if it will be lump sum or not - if not, then he won't get UE.

I JUST started making menus. This is my second week. Last week I spent $50 for the whole week, last night we spent $60 for this coming week. I know I can do better, but the whole "freak out" factor has me thinking this whole thing is way overwhelming. The whole pregnancy thing has me spazzing out, I'm trying to be optimistic, but yeah, I'm freaked out.

We are UTD on all bills, but neither of us have CC's. DH has some money saved, but most of that will probably be used to pay this month's bills. He wants a number to make his budget up for the next month.

(We have already informed the families/friends not to expect presents from us, and we are not getting presents for each other. It's not an expense we can justify right now. )

Please???? Tips, How-to's, simple instructions, ideas? I'll be doing a lot of searching, but I just am feeling clueless right now.

Help!

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Im sorry to hear all this..

My suggestion on planning/menus is to shop according to sales and what you already have on hand. If you have left over meat, make it into another meal. It will go farther that way than just eating warmed up meat.

Left over roast can be made into soup easily by adding 2 cans of veggies and some seasonings.

bean soup, soak navy beans in water over night, put into pan add sliced carrotts, diced onions, and ham.

Scalloped potatoes and Ham, 1 box of potatoes and a little ham goes a long way.

Pasta and rice are staples we grew up on.

Tuna noodle casserole~ noodles, 1 can tuna, 1 can cream of mushroom soup.

Special speggetti~ cook noodles, combine in large baking dish, 1 can sauce, mushrooms, onions, green peppers, cooked hamburger. Top with shredded cheese and bake until heated through. My mom always made sliced cheap bread into garlic toast too.

Buy genaric on things that don't matter, crackers, chips ect... Shop at aldi's and save a lot when you can.

I hope this helped..

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Life may not be the party we hoped for, but while we are here we might as well dance!

I'm sorry to hear about this. Try making a price book. This has helped me. I've also tried to cut down on the amount of meat we use. I've also stopped buying some of the convenience items we use. Instead of buy canned manwich and the noodles n sauce I make my own. It isn't any harder, it's cheaper and it's healthier for us without all that salt. I make menus up also. I rotate them by making the same stuff every few weeks. I jsut try to change the recipes. Instead of baked chicken I'll make barbqued chicken. One night we may even have breakfast. I felt bad at first but I was doing was was best for our family and I was making sure that my family had a good meal in front of them so the guilt left. My family doesn't care what they eat as long as I feed them. Good luck with all and I hope the best for you and your family.

Janice

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mom to Eddie 15, Natalya 11

I'm sorry to hear about your situation, I know it must be very difficult for you and your dh right now. Here are some tips I came up with:
1. Plan your shopping list by what is on sale at the store, match sales w/coupons if you can
2. Plan some easy meals like breakfast night, soup and sandwich night, spaghetti, pasta is always really cheap
3. Try to use less meat, maybe 1/2 pd of ground beef instead of a whole pound
4. You could consider making a trip to your local food pantry for staples
5. Try to cook from scratch as much as possible and buy less convenience food items

I hope this helps you.

Definately sign up at a food pantry and/or your local church for food assistance.

The company can't deny paying unemployment benefits as that is for the state to decide. Apply for unemployment anyway and see what your state office decides. If he ends up working, you won't get - or need - the benefit. If he doesn't, you will.

As far as surviving for now, make a complete inventory of the food you already have on hand. You can do amazing things with just a few staples. Be creative. If you are trying to figure out how to use up something in the pantry, post again and let us help.

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"I've been rich and I've been poor but independently wealthy is where it is at."

Thank you ladies, especially for the meal ideas.

One thing that we are extremely lucky is that we do have a lot of red meat on hand. DH got 4 deer so far, and is going to be spending a lot of time hunting as season lasts until Jan 1st here. I squirrel to a cow). Right now, we have about 250lbs worth of deer burger and deer steaks. Since we still have extra "tags" left there is no cost to him trying to get more deer for the freezer. It will get him out of the house and off my toes at least!

I forgot about pasta. I know the dollar stores sell pasta around here. I've already got some good ideas from that. Thank you!

I thought I was doing real good the last couple months, cooking from scratch and making good meals with not much...then this hits. Gah!

THANK YOU!

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It'll be ok. You can make stew out of the dear meat also. Make some homemade cornbread or biscuits to go with it and it will be wonderful. I would type in deer meat at allrecipies.com and see what comes up. Also try typing in deer meat recipes in google and see what comes up.

Wow - realized I managed to butcher my post when I was making it!

"I squirrel to a cow)." = We save money because I can do all our meat processing - I can butcher anything from a squirrel to a cow. Around here, it costs $75 or more to have a deer "cut up" and made into burger and steak - which I do for free, for us. The 4 deer have cost us $50 total in deer tags, and about $30 for Foodsaver bags (got those a while ago).

I'm just happy that we can get 250lbs of good red meat for $80 and about 8 hours total of my time. I'd say we buy less than 10lbs of beef of any sort a year.

I'm just glad this crunch hit AFTER we got it all set to go in the freezer!

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Food Ministry and Hunger Relief: Angel Food Ministries

They do have this in Michigan, I checked the website. But I'm not sure if any of them are close to you. It costs $25/month. But you do get a good bit of meat. Just thought maybe it could help you. We have done this and the food, although not namebrand, is good. You could make bbq one night by just cutting meat into cubes and putting sauce on it. Serve with bread and choice of side. Or hamburger bun pizzas. Take bun put sauce on and top with your choice of meats then cheese. Put in oven and melt cheese. I'm drawing a blank on anything else.

OMG!! There is one in the town about 5 miles from us!! I would have never guessed!!!!

THANK YOU!

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