Hunger Action Month

Did you know that September is Hunger Action Month?

Now you do. In 2013, 20% of American households participated in SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. A household qualifies for assistance when the household is at or below 130% of the Federal Poverty Level, at this time 100% is at $11,670 for a household of one person.  Working 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year equals less than an hourly minimum wage ($5.6/hour).

I knew about Hunger Action Month but I'll admit I'd never really educated myself until this year because The Junior League of San Antonio is partnering up with The San Antonio Food Bank to eradicate childhood obesity in San Antonio.

In the spirit of this partnership, Junior League of San Antonio is going orange (the symbolic color of Hunger Action Month- #JLSAGoesOrange) and challenging it's members and the community to participate in the SNAP Challenge. 

Obvious question: What's the SNAP Challenge? 

Answer: It's a challenge to live on $4.50 a day for food. This is per person, not household. Why the $4.50? It's comparable to the daily food budget of a snap participant $1.50/meal. 

Of course I got Justin to join me, partly cause I wasn't sure I could shop for one person for $22.50 for 5 days worth of food for just me. I'm pretty sure I spent that much at happy hour in the last month. On drinks alone. 

So $45 seemed more manageable for 30 meals. Read that again. 

Turns out there are pros and cons to buying for two. One loaf of bread is enough for 8 lunches, but I needed enough for 10, so I needed another loaf. How do I stretch that loaf out so that I'm spending my money efficiently? We're having sausages for dinner this week. All week long. So things like that would pop up while shopping.

I ended up spending $45.48 on food.  I feel pretty good about that.  I did a lap around the grocery store to assess my options because, honestly, I rarely pay attention.

And I came home feeling pretty good.

My Receipt:

What all those lines translate into:

 

 The fixings for our chicken salad sandwiches:

What we'll be seeing more of this week for lunch:

The menu for the week will basically be...

Breakfast: 2 eggs and 1/2 banana (Justin will likely have coffee that we already have in the house. I can go without)

Lunch: Chicken salad sandwich made with canned chicken breast, celery, almonds (I bought almost 60 cents worth from the bulk organic section) and mayo.  The sandwiches also have some mustard we already had in the fridge, a slice of swiss cheese and spinach. And a half a green apple!

Dinner: A sausage or bratwurst that will be cooked on the grill and likely wrapped in a slice of bread.  We'll split one of the containers of chopped broccoli pieces and maybe each get 1/2 slice of swiss melted on our portion.  I also have butter in the fridge, but I feel like the mustard is already a "cheat" of sorts. 

Snacks: I used the tiniest pieces of celery for the chicken salad so there's enough piece left over for us to enjoy with a tablespoon or two of peanut butter. And we have the yogurt which can be a daily snack or maybe dessert. 

I have stuff going on in the evenings on Wednesday and Thursday and then a friend coming in to visit on Friday, so I will likely eat dinner out of the house, but I went all in when it came to the grocery store trip and already know what I could have done to cut the 48 cents. I bought two 8-packs of yogurt and could have just bough two individual yogurts, but the bulk mentality that usually resides prevailed and so it goes.

While I'm excited about these tiny successes, I have to admit that thinking that hard about every grocery trip seems like a daunting task. But let's see where the week takes us. 

It's been too long, but I've been busy.

It's been too long since I last posted. And I'll readily admit that there's not enough hours in the day combined with the fact that I was too tired to divide my attention between watching Scandal and writing blog posts.  Some things just deserve a person's full attention.

Ya know?

Along with my commitment to JLSA (winning JLSA 2012-2013 Board Member of the year! what?!)

Justin's first JLSA meeting EVER!

                                               

The award!

helping a dear friend raise funds to beat blood cancers ($130,000+ for the LLS Man and Woman of the Year competition),

Justin, Bryce, Erin and me celebrating Team Bryce!

focusing on my running (which has gone past a jogrun to an actual run),

Beach 2 Bay half marathon relay team: Coastbusters (Lake, Erica, Matt, Mireya, Justin and Me).

#AintFraidOfNoCoast.  We finished in 4:43:21 with an avg pace of  10:48.

                                   
going to community events at awesome places like SAMA,

Justin, Elizabeth and me holding art we liked. Duh.

                               
keeping my Mom happy on Mother's Day (don't knock the bowling),
                                      

and visiting my best friend, Amy, in San Fran,

They have happy hours at places with views of things like the light show on the Bay Bridge. (Me, Tori and Amy) #LivinsEasy

                                   
I've also maintained my sanity by watching TV that makes the hubs retch (no pics of the poor programming choices or pics of Justin looking ill are necessary).

But I also go to Scorpions games with him, so you won't hear any real complaints.

They won!

So that's a quick recap of the last month.  What's new with you?

Inaugural JLSA's Resolve for a Better SA 5K

Alternately titled: One of the many reasons I haven't posted much in the last year.

This morning the Junior League of San Antonio held it's inaugural Resolve for a Better SA 5K. Behind the name- it's still fairly early in the new year and getting healthy/being active is a common resolution and making a better SA is what JLSA is all about.

I was fortunate enough to be on the planning committee for this (in addition to other responsibilities for JLSA), but when you believe in something you make it happen.

And did these ladies make it happen. It helped that we took a couple of 5K planning trips to Port A, that really got our gears turning, and we all completed the audacious 12 races in 12 months. So we've done our race research.

At our last run- Color Me Rad, from left to right: Our fearless leader Mireya, Erica -Communications Extraordinaire, Kristen- Master of Volunteer Coordination, and Me- "We can always move the table later" Ariana

We had a veteran community runner in our midsts and he posted about the run on a Runner's World Forum. Thanks to Scottydog for supporting our event! You can read his post on the forum here.

Thanks to everyone who came out to support the event (almost 300 registered runners and walkers), signed up to fundraise and donated to those who fundraised!   You are helpling JLSA support over 60 Community Agencies with volunteer time and money. Things like this don't happen without people supporting them and awesomely patient spouses who let them get planned.

City Solve San Antonio- Winners

My friends and I entered a Photo Scavenger Hunt for fun.

Four unassuming young women from the Junior League of San Antonio.

For fun we solved the clues, ran around downtown and Southtown San Antonio in the rain and took multiple pictures with all teammates in them.

I fell behind the group as we ran towards the finish line, but saw the cute couple team, The Tortoise and The Hare, behind me and knew this was no time to walk.

Must keep jogrunning.

We ran into the back porch of The Friendly Spot to check in at the finish line and there was no one else there.

We were the first team to get there and we maxed out the bonuses to further reduce our check-in time.

We couldn't believe it. We just didn't want to be last and we had no clue where we were in the game because teams could go to whatever spot they wanted in whatever order they wanted. All 68 teams.

And we came in first. Can't you tell by the smiles on our faces?

Miami Championships here we come?!