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Chris was paying the bills over the last couple of days and he discovered that we had a little more money in the account than usual. 

So what do we owe this newfound fortune?  Inheritance?  Windfall at the office?  Extraordinary performance on my one (yes one) share of Home Depot stock?  Gas bill drop? 

None of the above.  We have (dramatic drum roll) stopped eating out so much.

First of all, this is a huge big deal for me.  I would go naked in order to eat out everyday.  I love to cook (really!) but I also love to eat out.  I'm not a shoe girl, I don't shop till I drop, I don't buy expensive makeup...  There are exactly three things that I spend a lot of money on: 

1. my kids
2. travel
3. eating out

And not necessarily in that order.

However, so that we can do #2 this year in any meaningful way (it sure costs a lot more to fly 5 people than 2!), we've had to cut some corners.  And that means eating in a little more often.

As savvy as I think I am when it comes to these things, I grossly underestimated how much money we spent by eating out so often.  At one point, Chris and I were eating lunch out every day of the workweek.  Even at the fabulous lunch special prices from the Chinese restaurant down the block, we spent about $15/day.  That works out to $75/week or almost a whopping $4000/year.  Ouch.  And dinner was worse.  Assuming that we ate out three nights per week, which is probably not exactly accurate when we were both teaching and practicing law, that works out to roughly $8000/year.  And that's with my rough estimate of dinner, drinks and tip which quite frankly works out to much more than the $50 I used in my estimate.  Add in bagels, coffee and the incidentals during the week...  Anyway you do the math, it's a phenomenal amount of money to spend.

We didn't go cold turkey by any means.  Just last week, I had a couple of lunches out, and we had burgers at the Ugly Moose on Thursday.  But other than that, we've tried to reduce our overall dependency on eating out.  The results are pretty immediate and fairly amazing.  Even the $200 that I spent on groceries for the last two weeks doesn't approach the amount that we were spending on eating out - and that $200 also includes all of the meals that we were eating in to begin with.

The thing is, you can structure your life to include luxuries like eating out and travel without giving up the things that you love.  Having sandwiches for lunch that I prepared this week means that Easter dinner - which we're having out at a fancy place - isn't painful at all.  I don't have to cook for ten people, which during tax season, I'm inclined not to do anyway, and we don't have to feel like we're blowing the bank on a special occasion.

Another unexpected plus?  I'm finding that cooking at home leads to quality time with my children.  My girls are so excited about helping out, even setting the table (yes, I'm taking advantage of it now because I know that it won't last).  We put the iPod on in the kitchen and dance around while I make dinner.  It's been a lot of fun.

If you're stressed for ideas about what to cook, check out Short Order Mom's ideas here or Kids Dish.