Woman, Independent Parent, Artist, Advocate, Artifical Pancreas.... and EVERYTHING in between.

I am blessed to be parenting two beautiful girls, ages eight and eleven. My youngest nearly lost her life at age six (August 2010) to diabetic ketoacidosis: an often fatal consequences of undiagnosed type 1 diabetes. This is OUR journey: raw and sometimes, uncensored.

Thank you for visiting wishing good health and a cooperative pancreas to you and yours.

Sunday, May 29, 2011

Grocery Shopping

Grocery shopping is practically a full day event at our house.

My daughters are 10 and 7, and can eat me out of house and home.

Things are tight for everybody, especially at our single unemployed parent household. Superstore has specials every couple of weeks where if you spend $250 you get a $25 Superstore gift card. That $25 card can mean the world in between major shops. So I do a major grocery shop every two weeks when I've deposited the child support cheque, and aim to earn that giftcard!

As I was navigating my overflowing grocery cart through the store, I was stopped by an elderly man. He points to my cart and says "by the looks of all that, you'll be my new neighbour in the poor house." I smile, and reply "Sir.... I am a full time resident of the poor house". We both laughed.

I am tired of ALWAYS losing my grocery list. So I've begun carrying it on a full sized office clipboard, can't loose that sucker! It also holds my master meal plan, so that when I see evaporated skim milk on my grocery list, I don't pass it over because I have NO idea what on earth I'd need that for. Tuna casserole Krystin, trust the list. I also have all my coupons and superbucks clipped to the top of my clipboard so I don't loose them either.

After spending 90 minutes in the grocery store, carefully reviewing carbohydrate counts and whatnot, the worst part is lugging the twelve overloaded bags up the stairs into my kitchen single handedly.

But it never stops there! Before I unload the groceries into the cupboards, I discard anything wilted in the back of the refrigerator, and pull the remaining canned goods out from the kitchen cupboards so I can stock it and organize it at the same time. I have canned fruits in one section, canned child-friendly items (zoodles, spaghetti, chef boyardee), and canned dinner necessities (pasta sauce, soups, etc) on another shelf.

I have two freezers. One is for breads, the deep freeze for meats. Whole chickens are my best friends right now. I try to fill the bread freezer with four loaves of bread, hot dog buns, hamburger buns, and packages and packages of tortillas. Everything we need to make it the next two weeks.

I also have two fruit bowls. One is loaded with a miniature watermelon, a bunch of bananas and a fresh pineapple ready to be carved. The other is filled to the rim with fruit cups, boxes of raisins, and a variety of fruit strips.

My red grapes have been washed, and sorted (15 at a time) into snack sized ziploc bags, then tossed into the freezer for a refreshing afterschool snack.

Then comes the diabetes bag, fondly referred to as the "Bag of Hope", restocked with a bottle of water, fruit strips, granola bars, rice crispy squares. I'm telling you, if you have a hungry child, I am the mother you want sitting beside you!

Oh and let's not forget those diabetic supplies. My supply drawer has now been restocked with test strips, and there is a new box of fast acting insulin in the refrigerator, waiting to be pulled out and warmed when a new vial is necessary.

But the best thing is.... when you wake up on a Sunday morning at 8am to beat the chaotic end of weekend grocery store rush, and everything is finally stocked up, divided, bagged, frozen, etc... there's still alot of beautiful afternoon left over. Too bad I'm so exhausted from the shopping experience to be outside enjoying it!

Oh and yes..... I did get that coveted $25 gift card. Just barely, my total was $254.81. To feed three people for two weeks. Fingers crossed they don't devour it all the first week!

1 comment:

  1. Hi there, thanks for the shout out on T2T and we luv the name Rowan too
    I see we also share the goal of shooting for the free gift at Super store I sometimes receive 2 gift cards as we shop for 7, ouch food is getting costly.
    I wish you and your family well!

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