Money & Minestrone Monday

Here’s to a new week, happy readers! Hope you had a great weekend. Let’s start the week off right by discussing saving money and eating well!

Back on September 26th, in my blog called "Map Your Month Monday", we talked about setting goals, and one of those goals was to try and save $100 during October. Well, that would mean saving about $3.22 a day, and if you have been keeping up with that goal, today you should have the tidy little sum of $54.74 set aside for a rainy day! Not bad! And if you haven’t been doing that yet, you can start today. If you can put away $3.57 between now and October 31st, that will be $50 more than you had today. Not bad, considering Christmas is only 68 days away, and how great would it be to have some set-aside funds to pay for those gifts instead of going into debt by charging your holidays? If you could put aside $5/day between now and December 3rd (the first Saturday in December), you will have almost $250 to use for holiday gift-giving. Who knew?

Also, wouldn’t it be nice to save some time and money in the kitchen? Here’s a great recipe I found on the Prevention Magazine website that costs about $2 per serving. Not only that, but you make it in a slow cooker (so you can have it cooking while you’re out running errands or at the office), and the third hat trick winner of this recipe is that you can freeze it and make a put-aside meal for later. There is a wonderful site called “Organized Christmas” (which I highly recommend, just click on those words to go there), and one of the things they suggest is to start putting aside meals in the freezer so that during the crazy days of December, you will have a load of inexpensive, ready-made homemade meals to serve your family, so you will have less time scrambling for meals, and more time to just relax and enjoy your holidays.

Wild women, it’s time to exercise your planning muscles today – go forth and get cookin’ and savin’!!!

Blessings,
Linda

P.S. Please be sure to share this blog site along to your friends!!!

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Classic Minestrone Soup

Prep Time: 20 mins
Cook Time: 8 hrs 0 mins
Total Time: 8 hrs 20 mins
Serves: 10
Average Rating: 4.5/5
Come home to this hearty Italian Minestrone soup simmering in your crock pot. This well-rounded meal is low on calories and fat. Canned beans and frozen spinach add convenience, along with fiber and protein. Sub in whole wheat pasta to add even more fiber.
Ingredients
2 cans (14.5 oz each) low-sodium chicken or vegetable broth
1 can (15 oz) red kidney beans, rinsed and drained
1 can (15.5 oz) cannelloni beans, rinsed and drained
3/4 tsp dried Italian seasoning
1 pkg (12 oz) rotini pasta
2 cans (14.5 oz each) diced tomatoes
6 carrots, peeled and thinly sliced
1 bunch scallions, thinly sliced
1 pkg (10 oz) frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed dry
Directions
1. Place broth, beans, tomatoes, carrots, scallions, and Italian seasoning in 4-quart or larger slow cooker. Stir to combine. 2. Cover. Cook on low 6 to 8 hours. 3. Prepare pasta according to package directions. Add pasta and spinach to cooker and stir to combine. 4. Cover. Cook 15 to 20 more minutes, or until heated through.


Nutritional Facts per serving

CALORIES 257.1 CAL
FAT 1.4 G
SATURATED FAT 0.3 G
SODIUM 369.5 MG
CARBOHYDRATES 48.1 G
TOTAL SUGARS 7.1 G
DIETARY FIBER 8.3 G
PROTEIN 12.3 G