Over. Easy?

So our Hunger Challenge is done for the week -- and I went out with a whimper (I think). Mike made an awesome organic meal last night of shrimp, mushrooms, aspragus and mango/feta salad, all within his weekly budget. He shared with me, and I ate the bejesus out of it. I forgot to ask how the portions budgeted out until the end -- each portion ended up being over $7! Whoops. So again, Mike and I had different approaches: he just budgeted $35 for the "week" (5 days) and ate around $4/day most days, leaving more money on Friday for a "big finale"! I budgeted $35 for the week + tried to keep to under $7 within each day within that same budget.

Did I make it doubly hard?

The $7 meal still kept me within my $35. Barely. And then it all kind of fell apart as we each had a piece of chocolate and a little bit of ice cream for dessert. Definitely NOT in the budget. Weak.

This morning I woke up and chose oatmeal for breakfast because I know it's very inexpensive. I did add a little butter on top as a luxury. And it was GOOD. Both Mike and I said this morning how happy we are to have more diversity and not have to watch it so closely. But there are a few major outcomes for our household as a result of this experiment:

1) Mike said he will be spending less money, and

2) I will not be shopping on Amazon Fresh unless it is an "emergency."

I use Amazon Fresh a lot because we are often traveling and have very busy work/social lives. When we recently came back from Vail, we had nothing in the house on Sunday night. I hopped online, and by Monday morning, we had a kitchen full of groceries for the next weeks. No run to the store, no hassle.

Bigger bill. It is definitely more expensive to shop online. Of course. I guess I loved the convenience and it definitely makes our lives easier sometimes. But what is a little inconvenience to have a better relationship with food? Food is already so distanced from us, the packaging, labels, etc., why add another layer with the Internet? Which leads us to...

OUTCOME #3! Today, Mike and I are fixing up the garden and doing some planting. We had talked about going out of town, but decided to stay put and work on creating some food. We did this last year, and it was a big learning curve for the both of us. But we really loved it. I feel this is an appropriate way to spend the end of this week, creating a future harvest for mere pennies, being able to enjoy the work and heart that goes into a garden, dreaming of the future fresh food.

OUTCOME #4! Mike and I are hopping online to make a little Hunger Challenge donation to the Rainier Valley Food Bank in honor of the hard work they do with the limited budget. I thought I understood how hard they work before ... now I realize that I have a lot to learn from them! Sam and Elise and Otis, all the volunteers, I ADMIRE YOU ALL! Thanks for everything you do for our community!

Enjoy your weekend, everyone.