Day 12: Feeling Acclimated

Today was a good day. I feel like I'm really getting acclimated to the routine. Again, it's no cakewalk, but I think the initial shock to the system has worn off. A few rays of optimism hit me today...

One, my 3 lb. head of cabbage just keeps on giving and it still looks huge. Having those big steamed leafy chunks in my stew have been a blessing. 

Secondly, my breakfast taco refinements have continued to sustain me to where I don't feel a need to add a serving of oatmeal to the meal, so I'm saving that for snack time, with a full sunflower seed and raisin dosage. It hit me today this means unless I'm really hungry by the end of the day, I overbought on oatmeal and will probably have a few cups left over at the end of the 30 days. So now I'm actually thinking of more things I can do with the oatmeal. If you have any ideas of what I can do with the extra oatmeal, considering my ingredients, let me know. Speaking of what you can do with oatmeal... my 4 year old son is at that stage where he's asking where everything comes from. So I was making him some frito pie today, and he asks "Daddy, where does chili come from?" So I started to tell him about the ingredients, and low and behold, rolled oats are in Wolf-brand chili- who knew? Too bad I don't have anything other than beans and oatmeal to make chili with. 

Back to my list of optimistic perspectives... Thirdly, I can see that I've rationed a little too conservative on my raisins and I'm about to have a bonus portion or two in the coming days. 

Fourthly, I was at the end of my 4 day ration of brown rice and I had an entire cup left over, so I used that in my stew today, making for an extra-hearty serving. My wife tasted it and testified that it actually does taste good! Here's the photo:

Last but not least, I got to the end of my 6 day ration of pinto beans at dinner time tonight... and something about the consistency of the beans at the bottom of the tub (kind of smashed) creates a delicious buttery taste when put in a corn tortilla with brown rice. Might be just be my imagination, but it really did taste like butter. 

I cooked my next 6 days' worth of pinto beans tonight, and again I was amazed at how much those little things expand, check it out, before:

And after, it more than doubles:

Prayer focus: Pray for our dairy farm in India. The farm funds much of the budget of the orphanage there. Whenever we can, we direct our funds first into improving, maintaining or expanding the dairy farm so that our funds are then multiplied by the milk sales. Right now we're a bit behind on where we need to be in expanding the dairy farm, and even hitting some obstacles in some critical supply and equipment needs we have at the farm. Pray for successful fundraising and that those so inclined to give would do so generously and cheerfully. 

Estimated Savings for Day 12: Today was a day off around the house, so I don't imagine we would have eaten out. However again I don't know how much of this is because I'm doing so much cooking. So I will at least assume that we might have taken the kids out to lunch just to get them out of the house. In that case we probably would have hit up Chick-fil-a, and I would have enjoyed my usual combo meal for about $5.98. Add that to my normal estimated daily grocery cost of $7, subtract $1 for today's actual cost, and I'm looking at $11.98 saved for my orphanage donation today. That puts my running total at $174.37, which is equivalent to about six months' wages among the poor of South Asia.