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It's amazing how quickly your mindset can change in such a short amount of time. Two days into this $2 a day challenge, I find myself amazed at how much we will spend on some things without even thinking about it. On the way to work this morning, I passed a half-empty Big Gulp container that would have wiped out my daily food allowance. Not much further beyond that was an empty fast food bag containing the remains of a feast that probably cost what we're restricted to for almost three days. Not that I'm a complete master of restraint myself; My ever-present battle with the Dark Lord of Colombia reared its head first thing Monday morning when I made the executive decision that beverages, and specifically coffee, "don't count" in this challenge. What can I say? I'm a weak, grumpy man in the morning. Our second trip to the magnificent, cost-cutting Aldi netted us some more essentials for the week: bread, potatoes, onion, and beef. We found some recipes for shepherd's pie and tacos that should give us a couple meals out of what we've purchased so far. That puts our remaining balance for the week at $11.39. It's also amazing to see how creative you can get when you have a limited set of ingredients to work with and that early-evening sugar craving kicks in. After a good hour of scouring the internet for a cake or cookie recipe we could work with, we settled on this spritz cookies recipe. We also decided that we would deduct $1 for our allowable budget in exchange for small amounts of certain ingredients, such as baking powder, sugar, and salt, that over time would last months and could usually be factored into a long-term budget. So with our tasty, crumbly little bites of goodness baked and rationed for the week, we should be able to stave off the sugar cravings. We're looking to be in pretty decent shape, despite the fact that we've already had the conversation discussing what the first thing we will eat at midnight on Sunday will be.
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