Frugal Friday

There's nothing more frugal than growing your own, is there?  One of my goals for the year was to get my vegetable garden back up and running.  Unfortunately, with the ground as cold and wet as it has been this spring, I haven't been able to get anything into the ground.  (We actually had frost Tuesday morning - two weeks AFTER the last frost date for our area.)   So, enter my Pot Garden!  I have planted the herbs I rely on most heavily in my kitchen in here.  Thyme, Oregano, Dill, Rosemary, Cilantro, Basil, and Chives are planted in the big pot.  Not only can I use the herbs from the pot throughout the summer, I can pick and dry herbs and save them for use during the rest of the year.  In the little pot next to the big one, we've got some Lavender growing.  We like to pick the buds and make tea with it, and dry it to make sachets to put in with our clothes to make them smell better than any dryer sheet ever could.  Off to the left of the pot you can see my Black Eyed Susans - they are literally growing like weeds - and off to the right, you can see the weeds.  Technically, they're violets, and I love the pretty purple flowers they produce, so I don't pull them.  They're "ambiance".

The kids are all home for a few days before the scatter to the winds again.  We went down to my Mom's house yesterday, and had a wild and raucous time with my nieces.

The ceiling fan in the Master Bedroom is now installed and working - just in time for the summer heat to settle in.  I really, really hope it helps keep the room cool!  The fan in the living room makes a huge difference in the livability of that room with the thermostat set higher.  Hopefully, this will have just as big of an impact in the Master Bedroom, and eventually will impact the bottom line on our electric bills!

This little mouse cookie appeared at lunch recently.

I made a gigantic pot of pinto beans this week.  We had pinto beans with cornbread for dinner that night.  The next day, I mashed them down a bit, and then made a lot of burritos and enchiladas and froze them.  The burritos were made with gluten full tortillas and then wrapped individually in waxed paper and saved for later.  The enchiladas I wrapped up in corn tortillas and packed them up in packs of two with enchilada sauce.  These are intended for my lunch for work.  I had hoped to pack them with arroz, but every time I make a huge batch of arroz, everyone ends up eating it all.  What can you do?  Honestly, I'm glad they like my cooking enough to eat it!

We are planning on having a cook out with the kids Sunday afternoon.  We have some dead fall around the yard that needs to be taken care of, so we're going to burn it down in the fire pit and roast marshmallows.  At least, that's the plan.  It's been so wet that I'm not certain the wood will actually burn.  We might end up roasting our marshmallows over the gas grill by the time all is said and done!

Frugal Friday

Somehow, at the end of National Library Week, it only seems appropriate to highlight how the library can help you keep within your budget - no matter what your age.  In keeping with this thought, I'd like to highlight the many, many services that are provided at your public library.  Keep in mind - your taxes pay for these services - USE THEM!!

The Top Ten Ways Your Library Can Help You Save Money:

1) Toys, Games, and Science Kits for Check Out. 
Seriously!  When my kids were little, we checked out toys every week.  Let me tell you, it saved us a bundle.  Little kids get bored with new toys easily.  We were able to bring home 3 new toys, played with them until they were no longer new and exciting to the kids, and then go back and check out 3 different toys.  Literally, that saved us thousands of dollars.

As they got older, I loved the fact that we had science kits available for check out.  Each kit was centered around a theme, and it had several books, a book of science experiments, and the equipment necessary to carry out the experiments included in the card.  We were heavy users of those kits up until the youngest was somewhere in middle school.

On the ALA's facebook page, I read an article about a library that has added telescopes to their collection for check out.  I don't care if I don't have little kids any more, I would definitely be checking out a telescope for my own home use!

2) Media 
Depending upon your library system, the type of media available varies greatly.  Most systems carry books on tape or CD.  Some carry Play-Aways.  (MP3 players that contain books.  Very cool way to listen to books - my daughter loved listening to these on the bus on the way to school in middle school.)  Most systems carry DVD's.  (Even better - those DVD's carry a one week free check out as opposed to the overnight check out from Red Box that's going to cost you a buck or two.

One of the library systems around us carries video games for check out.  Just the games, not the consoles.  Talk about saving money!  Not having to buy those games saves a lot of money! 

Note- Beware the steep fines on overdue media items.  Make certain you return them by their due dates!

3) Books
Lots and lots of books!  On every subject, and for every age.  Need I say more?

4) Internet 
Computers and Wi-Fi connections are available at most libraries.  Looking to save money on internet?  Sign up for free e-mail through one of the free sites out there (Google, Yahoo, etc.), and then use the library to check your messages and surf the net.  Probably not what you want to do on a daily basis, but if you are desperate to save money, this is an excellent option.  There's a bonus in some parts of the country, too.  Most libraries have high speed internet.  We were still on dial up - nothing else was available until 2012.  We got broadband in 2012.  Still no sign of Fiber Optic cable in our neighborhood, but our library is wired with fiber optic cable, so I go to the library when I need a high speed connection.

5) Job Search Tools
Looking for a job?  Start here.

6) Programming
Offering programs to people of all ages is one of the most important services a library offers.  Libraries are known for their programs for children and youth, but libraries also offer some fantastic programs for adults.  Book Clubs, Courses offered by the Master Gardeners, Literacy Classes, ESOL Classes for Adults, Arts and Crafts for Adults, to CPR, the list goes on and on. 

7) Digital Content
Audio streaming and e-books.  It's a quickly growing field in the library world.  You can check out digital materials the same as you can a book.  After your check out period is over, your material just disappears off of your device.

8) E-Readers
This is a very new service.  Some libraries have e-Readers available for check out.  Each reader is pre-loaded with books of a similar genre.  I've only seen a handful of library systems that are actively using this service, and I'm really curious to see how this works out.

9) Summer Reading Programs
Not just for little kids anymore, everyone gets to participate!  The little kids participate in the game with incentives along the way.  Here in Maryland, you write a summary of the book you most recently read and then enter a drawing.  Five years ago, I won a pretty snazzy basket filled with new books and some swag from the New York Times!  It made my day!

10) Databases 
When we were kids, we'd go to the library and hit up the reference collection.  Nowadays, that reference collection has moved online.  You can access thousands of electronic records in the comfort of your own home - and in your jammies - if you have a library card.  These databases are copyright protected, and a large portion of the libraries' annual budget goes to database subscriptions.  Not sure how this works, or even where to find it?  Head over to your library and ask a librarian!  They'll be happy to show you all that is available for you. 

Having fun isn't hard, when you have a library card.  -Marc Brown

Frugal Fridays

The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.    -Robert Burns

With oldest child home for the week, I had plans.  Big plans. He was to spend time with his grandmothers.  (check).  He wanted to visit one of the Smithsonians.  (check).  He needed to get a haircut.  (check).  I wanted to make several double batches of food for him to take back to school with him in order to cut down on the amount of prep time for meals for him.  He frequently comes back late and hungry.  I thought I'd help him out a little bit by making double batches of his favorite foods this week and then sending him back with the other half.

Here was the plan that I set in place:

Monday - Taco Salad

Tuesday - Pulled Chicken BBQ

Wednesday -Have dinner with Grammy

Thursday -Moroccan Chicken

Friday - Lasagna 

This is what actually happened:

Monday - I made a double batch of taco meat.  Two pounds of beef, Two big bags of frozen corn, 2 cans of black beans, two onions, and all of the affiliated spices.  It filled a large dutch oven.  Keep in mind, daughter is a vegetarian, so she had a separate pot full of taco goodness.   We had two heads of lettuce, cheese, a bag of Fritos, and a jar of salsa.  I had my serving, and noticed that husband and oldest kid kept hitting up the taco meat.  Guess what?  End of meal, and we had less than one cup of taco meat left.  No lettuce, no cheese, no salsa, and no Fritos.  

Tuesday - I picked up one of the large value packs of chicken thighs.  It filled my 6 quart crock pot.  Several hours later, the chicken was finished, and I pulled out the bones, shredded the chicken, saved out the broth and added BBQ sauce.  At the end of the meal, we had less than a cup of pulled chicken left.  (Are you noticing a trend here?)  The kid had also demolished 2 bags of frozen vegetables (heated) and two baked potatoes.  

Thursday- Moroccan Chicken.  Again, a double batch.  Again, I filled a dutch oven.  Since this recipe is made with couscous (wheat), I made a separate smaller batch for myself with quinoa.  Daughter has class on Thursday night, so she ate her brown bag dinner there.  This time, things changed.  There was NOTHING left at the end of the meal.

Friday - Lasagna. This might actually be the one meal he does get to take back with him.  I made two pans last night - I did everything but bake it.  One pan went into the fridge for tonight, and one into the freezer.  Since the second pan is frozen, I think he'll actually have some to take back with him.

We take him back up to school tomorrow.  We're planning on making a big batch of Salmon-Pasta salad for him and leaving him with the leftovers before we head back home.

Makes you wonder about what he's eating, doesn't it?

Not exactly a frugal week, but if it had worked out as planned, you see how this would work - cook 4 days, and have meals for 4 other days.  I thought we left the eat everything stage when he graduated from high school and stopped running cross country and track and field!

Short Cuts to Home Cooked Meals

Everyone knows, it's healthier and cheaper to make your own dinner from scratch every day.  Meals for a large family easily come in under $20.  BUT - everyone also knows that making meals from scratch can be time consuming.  When you're hungry and in a hurry, that doesn't bode well for a home cooked meal.

Everything cut and measured for dinner.  Just dump and go.

If you're willing to invest a couple of hours over a weekend, you can easily get yourself ahead of the game, so that dinner is quick and easy, even when you get home from work and have to turn right back around and be out the door in an hour for soccer practice.

These are simple and easy tricks that I've been doing for years, long before the internet was a "thing". Now that our kids are grown and we have more time, I still find myself prepping for the week ahead of time because most nights, I really don't want to chop a bunch of vegetables.

Go shopping early on the weekend, and get your vegetables for the week.
By early, I mean early - before 9 am, if possible.  If you frequent farmer's markets, you know that earlier is better as far as finding the best produce.  The same goes for the grocery store.  Get out there early so that you can get your weekly shopping done and get on with your day.

Pre-Prep as much as you can.  This means you need to have some idea of what you'll be eating for dinner each night.  If you're not certain what you're going to eat each night, pre-prep the vegetables you tend to use over and over again.  Mince the garlic and store it in an airtight container.  Same goes for onions, celery, and bell peppers.  Each one gets stored in it's own container.

Cook once, eat twice.  This is my mantra.  There's a movement out there called "Once A Month Cooking".  Basically, you give up two days a month to prepare all of your meals for the month.  One day is for shopping, and the second day is for prepping, cooking, and freezing.  I remember when I did once a month cooking.  It was nice to have all the food ready to go, but I was exhausted at the end of my two days.

Peppers are cut, spices are measured.

On Sunday, roast two chickens.  (The oven is going to be on anyway.)  After dinner, pull the chicken off of both carcasses and put them into freezer containers in the serving you will use for a recipe.  The bones go into a stock pot - either to make soup for another night during the week, or to make broth to freeze and use later.

Are you making a lasagna or casserole for dinner?  Make two.  Serve one for dinner, and then freeze the other one for another night.

If I know what I'm making for dinner, I will cut all of the ingredients and assemble them together so that all I have to do is dump it into the pot and cook.  I've even gone so far as to measure all of the spices and put them together in a container to make assembly go faster and easier.  (I've been known to leave post it notes on the veggies so the husband or kids can start it.  See those peppers?  I left the ingredients and cooking instructions on a post-it note on top of the container.)

For my lunches, I'll assemble salads in a mason jar a couple of days in advance.  I've found through trial and error that you really don't want to assemble one of those salads more than three days out - they get a little wonky after that.

Crock pots are wonderful resources.  Put food in, 8 hours later, you have a meal.  But if you're like me, cutting food on my way out the door can be overwhelming.  Enter crock pot freezer meals.  Assemble all of the ingredients in a bag, and freeze.  Pull it out of the freezer and put it in the fridge the night before, toss it into the crock pot first thing in the morning, and dinner is DONE.

3 prepped meals, ready for the freezer.

You can follow my Freezer Cooking Pinterest page here. 
My Slow Cooker Pinterest Page is here.

For our dinner tonight, I pulled a package of pre-cooked shredded chicken and pre-cooked black beans out of the freezer.  I am going to mix them up into two separate pans of enchiladas.  One vegetarian and one meatatarian (without cheese).  I'm planning on having rice on the side.  Last night, while I had time, I mixed up the spices for everything into separate little mason jars.  I'll dump the spices directly from the mason jars into our protein mixtures.  Since we are gluten intolerant, we'll use corn tortillas.  I'll be serving this with a light salad of some kind.

What do you do to help speed up dinner preparation in your house?

Frugal Friday

Something out of Poe - a flock of Ravens sitting in the branches of the trees.

After the last two weeks, I'm beginning to think that the title of this week's post should be Profiligate Friday, or Flout It Friday.

If you recall....  I had set up February as our personal Nospenduary Challenge.  I couldn't wait!  I thought for sure I'd get a major debt paid off at the end of the month.

At the beginning of the month, I took the van in for an oil change, and it ended up needing $1500 in repairs. "No problem, we can cover this with cash from the emergency savings."

Last week, daughter woke up with a hugely swollen face.  Two courses of antibiotics later, and she will have a root canal on Monday, followed by a Crown a couple of weeks later.

The fun of seeing if the tooth was viable was that we had another set of x-rays taken, and ended up with a referral to an oral surgeon to have the wisdom teeth removed.  All 4 of them.  Fortunately, that won't happen until April, so we've got some time to save money for that.  Insurance doesn't cover much in the way of tooth extractions, so save, save, save.  I can't find a clever way to make March into Thrift.  Maybe Miser Month?

With the exception of those BIG ticket items, we did not spend any additional money this past week.  I made a huge pot of chili on Sunday for the Super Bowl.  The leftovers were repurposed into Taco Salad.  I tried a recipe for Jerk Chicken that I found on Cooking Light's Website.  I served it over lettuce to make a salad later in the week.  We had pancakes for Shrove Tuesday, and we went out to dinner one night with friends.  It was a Panera meet-up, so we were able to use a gift card we had been given for Christmas.

Oh, wait, I almost forgot - I returned my library books ON TIME - so there were no late fees!  I've got to get better about returning those books on time.  10 cents here and 20 cents there adds up after a while.

More boxes are brewing in the basement.  Husband has Monday off of work.  He's going to take them over to Goodwill.  Last count was 200 items in those boxes - and we've got more to go before I send them out.  It's really, really nice to see that junk finally leaving the house!  I've started setting aside a pile of things to see if I can sell them on E-Bay.

I hope you enjoy your weekend and enjoy time with your sweetheart!

Frugal Friday

The horrors of it all!  It's snowing again!  Honestly, it only snowed for 10 minutes - and you can see how big, fluffy and beautiful the flakes were!  It was a sweet little storm, and now it's over!  (FYI, I took this picture out of the back door of our building, looking down towards the ravine.  The parking lot is off to the right. Our weather forecast through the weekend and into next week is a pretty nice one!  These passing flurries are going to move through, and then the temperatures warm until we get close to 60* on Tuesday.  El Nino years are always crazy weather years.  30" of snow and then 60* temperatures 10 days later. 

As far as spending money this past week, I didn't.  We were snowed in.  I did fill the tank up on the Civic yesterday.  The cost of gas has dropped so low that I was able to fill the tank for less than $20.  Great for my pocket book, but I keep thinking that there's going to end up being some kind of big economic hit for these low gas prices down the line.

A casualty of one of the many potholes on the road.  I don't know if you can tell, but this is the van, and the tire is shredded.  The car is literally on it's rim on the parking lot.  We had only been having an issue with the a/c and the defroster before this happened.  This wonderful little piece of luck added $500 onto the bill.  *sigh*  No Spenduary here we come!!!!!  Funny thing - as husband was driving this to our mechanic to get it fixed, the blue smoke was just pouring out of the wheel well. Because of all of the snow on the roads, and the insufficiently cleared shoulders, he had no place to pull over the car to change the tire.  The very first safe place to stop the car was in the parking lot of our mechanic.

The shelves of our local Wal-Mart in the hours before the storm.  Seriously?  Considering we have 5 grocery stores in town to serve a population of thousands, HOW did we manage to keep running out of meat?  And laundry detergent.  Laundry Detergent was the other thing that we kept running out of.  We must have a whole lot of clean laundry in our town!

Meals were simple this week.  Chicken and Rice.  Tacos, taco salad.  Pancakes, scrambled eggs, fajitas, and baked potatoes.  We worked our way through all of the veggies in the crisper drawer, with the exception of the turnips.  I need to find something to do with the turnips.

The first couple of days we were home, we worked on cleaning out the big, messy room in the basement.  It's still a big room, but there is significantly less mess in there now.

The next day, we worked on shoveling snow.  The last two days we were home, I finished up the scrapbook for 2015. We moved middle child into his dorm room on Tuesday, and his classes started on Thursday - they were originally supposed to start on Monday.  He was ready to go back to school!  I was more than ready to go back to work once the roads were open again!

I hope this finds you well and warm, and with plans for a fantastic weekend with your family!

Frugal Friday

First of all, keep those of us on the East Coast in the direct path of this blizzard in your thoughts.  I live in the part of Maryland that is already under a Blizzard Watch.  Cool - it's been 6 years since we've last been under a blizzard watch!  For those of you who live in naturally cold climates, take a look at this video of what happened in Washington DC on Wednesday night when we had and inch - you read that right - ONE INCH - of snow, and you'll understand why we're all concerned!

View More: Eye Opener 7am News|Live News|More News Videos

 (Depending upon how this loads, you might have to click on the link.)

Dinners this week were easy - spaghetti with homemade sauce, pizza made from the leftover homemade spaghetti sauce, thirteen bean soup, burritos made from the leftover soup and the leftover rice we made for dinner last week.  Nothing spectacular, but nothing that required grocery shopping, either.  We had all of the ingredients on hand in the house.

Photo: Bettina W.

Our biggest plan for this storm is to work on husbands quilt that his Mom gave him when he graduated from high school.  It's a tied quilt, and it's made from used blue jeans.  We need to replace the batting and the backing.  We had all the materials around the house except for the darning needles.  I ran out and picked up a couple more needles so that we can all work on tying this quilt together.  I'll post next week about the process.  I'm not looking forward to sewing the edges closed.  If anyone has any suggestions on a "quick" way to do that, I'm open to them all!

On the getting more crap out of the house front, daughter and I went through the pile of stuff in the basement and pulled out her stuff that she wanted to keep, but didn't need out right now.  We packed up old soccer trophies, stuffed animals, and other mementos from elementary and middle school, and tucked them safely into boxes and tucked them into the basement.  We took care of over 100 items between the two boxes and a trash bag.  I'm going to claim only 100 things for this week... Combined with the 73 item total from last week, that's a total of 173 items cleaned up and or taken out of the house.   I have hopes of getting the big, messy room in the basement cleaned out before we get dug out from this storm!

An adorable Little Free Library!

One of the most crucial things we will be doing during the storm is keeping the basement steps cleared of snow.  When that snow starts to melt, it could easily come into the house under the door.  Husband and I stopped by Home Depot last night and found some big pieces of sturdy corrugated metal to prop over the basement stairs today. (at an angle)  Hopefully, this means we won't be shoveling over a foot of snow up the steps from a walk-out basement every couple of hours.  Trust me, that gets old really fast. 

In other news, we headed up to visit oldest child last weekend.  We met several of his friends, had dinner at a great Vegan restaurant, explored the town a little bit more, and spent some awesome time together!  His school has a fantastic weather wall, that shows real time weather around the world.  It's very, very awesome.  I need one of those in my house!

We dog sat this little cutie 2 weeks ago!  Photo: Bettina W.

We dog sat the greatest little dog ever.  His parents were taking their girl back to school - so it was just a one day - 6 hour - commitment for us.  We took him out for a long walk, went to a coffee shop and got him a snack, and took him home with us to watch some football.  (Can you believe that the coffee shop actually sells organic dog treats?  And they welcome well behaved dogs in their store?)  We had a great time with him, but we were glad to give him back!

One last note - I'm writing this on Thursday night, timed to open on Friday morning.  As of tonight, most of the gas stations in our area are out of gasoline, and our stores are out of milk and toilet paper.  I'm so glad I hit up the grocery stores earlier this week!

If we have power, I'll post this weekend.  If you don't hear from me, you know our power went out, and I'll update you on things once the power comes back on!  If you're one of the millions of people living in the "bulls eye" of this storm - stay safe and warm this weekend. 

Frugal Friday

This has been a productive week.  I don't know about frugal!

The oldest child went back to school this weekend.  The weather was frightful when he and his friends drove back home.  They got back safely.  Classes began on Monday, and he is in the midst of getting into new classes, buying new books, and learning new material.

50 items in this box

The kids all celebrate birthdays this week.  Yes, three kids born in the same week in January.  How's that for not even trying?  We went out to dinner to celebrate with the youngest two and several of their friends. (Not quite frugal, but an awful lot of fun!)

We sent a birthday package to the oldest child this week.  A couple of new sweatshirts, some food, and a little extra cash.
We are planning on going to visit him this weekend, if the weather holds out.  Driving over two mountain ranges, you never know what kind of weather you can expect.  I sure hope we don't get trapped up there!

The quest for cleaning out the house continues.  The picture on the right shows this weeks' box of donations. It has 50 things.  Combine this with last week's box of 23 items, and we've got 73 items OUT of the house this week - not counting the very large number of items that went out in the large green trash bag last week.  Progress, progress, progress.  The goal for the year was 1200 pieces of crap.  Only 1177 to go!

I'm starting a class for work this next week.  It's three CEU's.  Even better, it's free!  This will count towards my library certifications, but I don't know that it will count towards my teaching certificate.  I am still on the hunt for an inexpensive 3 CEU's for my teaching certificate.  Finding this should be a hoot!  I wonder what wonderful new thing I'm going to discover?  I wonder WHERE I'm going to discover this wonderful new thing?

I hope you've had a wonderful week, accomplishing many frugal things!  If you did meet your frugal goals, go ahead and share them so that I can live vicariously through your frugality!

Frugal Friday

After a warmer than normal Christmas season, winter has finally struck the Mid-Atlantic region.  We've been waking up to temperatures below zero, with morning wind chills hovering around 0*.  Brrr.... I was spoiled by the warm weather.  This has been a big shock to my system!

The kids start heading back to school this week.  BOOOOOO!!!  Oldest child leaves today, classes begin for him on Monday.  Honestly, it's been great having them home.  I've really enjoyed it.  They really do get along well with each other, now that they are young adults in their 20's... Let's not think too much on their younger days.

My plot to throw out or get rid of 23 things a week hit a snag when I took my first bag of stuff to the local thrift store and was turned away.  They are overwhelmed with crap right now.  (I guess I'm not the only one who set the resolution to get rid of stuff!)  So, the bag of stuff is out of my house and in the trunk of my car, but not actually gone.  Instead of counting that bag, I'm counting the very large black plastic trash bag I filled with stuff.  I lost track of  how many items are in the bag.  I think it's safe to say that AT LEAST 23 things were in that bag.  If we want to get picky, I threw out at least 23 items every day between the day after Christmas and trash day yesterday.  So, that's 12 days, times 23 things = 276 items.  Seriously?  I hope this gets a little more challenging as the year goes on.  I hate to think that it's going to be this easy to get rid of stuff.... you know, that I have THAT much trash laying around the house. 

Dinners this week have been simple.  We've finished off the Christmas Ham, and have been happily chomping away on some new delights.  We tried a Cuban Rice and Bean Recipe that you can find here.  I had a freezer meal that was a Teriyaki Chicken Mix in the chest freezer.  I cooked it for dinner one night, but we were not terribly big fans of it, and had A LOT left over.  I saved out the chicken and carrots from that mix, and threw away everything else.  I re-purposed the chicken into a White Chicken Chili the next night.  Let me tell you, that white chicken chili more than made up for the disappointment of the Pineapple Teriyaki Chicken.  I have one more Teriyaki freezer meal in the freezer.  I think I see another white chicken chili in my very near future.

I made a big pot of bean soup last weekend (Split Pea soup).  I tossed the leftovers into a casserole dish layered between corn tortillas and enchilada sauce and topped it all off with leftover salsa from New Year's Eve.  I know it doesn't sound all that good, but either we were really hungry, or it really was good because we didn't have any leftovers!

The kids made a batch of pizza dough yesterday.  We pulled the roasted tomato sauce that I froze earlier this fall to top it with.  It was beyond phenomenal.  (They were kind enough to make a batch of gluten free dough for me.  I didn't have to make it myself this time!)

Having fun with Siri...

I did find an awesome sale on beans at Harris Teeter.  10 cans for $6.  Over the course of the week, I stopped by 3 times and picked up 30 cans of beans for $18.  I'm a happy camper! That's a lot of quick meals for us!   While I was there, I also picked up rice.  Rice is always a phenomenal price, and I was happy to find  pounds for  .

The heat is back on, so our low heating bills for the year are over.  The name of the game now is to save as much electricity as possible over the next couple of months until the weather warms up again.

As you read this, we are heading into the marathon birthday season.  Husband's birthday has already happened, and all 3 of the kids have their birthdays over the next week.  How did we ever manage to have all 3 kids in a week of each other?

Frugal Friday

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Foggy morning today!

Other than a wicked sore throat, this has been a great week!

Middle Child is in the middle of finals right now.  I packed a picnic lunch and stole him away from campus for a couple of hours earlier this week.  We have a favorite spot by the Jones Falls near an old mill where we like to picnic.  We've had some fantastically warm weather this week, and I really enjoyed spending an hour outside with him, shooting the breeze and watching the river flow by.

Pumpkin Enchiladas

I finally made the Pumpkin Enchilada recipe that I shared earlier this week.  Good Lord, that recipe is HOT.  It's fantastic, it's tasty, and I'll make it again, but I will cut the spices down by more than half.  I think I'll divide the spices in half, and then half again.  So, when it calls for 2 tsp of ginger, I'm going to add 1/2 tsp. of ginger.  Let me reiterate - the enchiladas are amazing.  They are great.  But as the recipe stands, they are really spicy hot.

We have almost finished cleaning out daughter's room.  Now that she's transferred back to the Community College, we need to move her college dorm stuff into her room.  And we need to get the various assorted crap out of her room.  I've been surprised at the memories we've found - like a photocopy of a comb that we made on our new scanner/printer five years ago.  I can't wait to get the very last of the junk out of our living room so that we can get our Christmas Tree and decorations up!

I tried something new, too.  Have you ever heard of Zaycon Fresh?  It's a different way of buying food.  Zaycon sells food online - and you pick it up from them - in your car, in a parking lot.  (It brings a whole new meaning to the phrase "fell off the back of a truck" doesn't it?)  Seriously, the food is fresh, high quality - bought directly from the farmers.  It is sold in large quantities, by the case.  You pick up your case from the official Zaycon truck in a parking lot and take it home.  You don't even have to get out of your car.  You take it home and freeze it, and *BAM*  you have high quality meat waiting for you in your freezer.  I have bought chicken through them, and now salmon.  The prices are phenomenal, and the quality is excellent.  I will continue to buy red meat from our local farmers, but I really a Zaycon.  I can am happy with the quality of the Salmon and Chicken.

I did make a couple of things with the Can You Cook from Scratch challenge that I posted earlier this week.  The first thing I made was a pot of chicken soup, which helped immensely with the sore throat.  I also made a chicken salad with more celery, mayo, paprika, ground mustard, and some pickles that I had on hand.  I love chicken salad.

I bought 10 pounds of potatoes back before Thanksgiving.  I used several of them to make Latkes on the first night of Hanukkah.  We are not Jewish, but the Jewish faith is integral to Christianity. We always make Latkes on the first night of Hanukkah as we talk about the miracle of the oil in the temple that lasted for 8 days.

I hit up the Pennsylvania Dutch Farmer's Market this week.  I picked up spices!  Look at those spices!  I also got a couple of Gluten Free Whoopie Pies.  I may have paid almost as much for my Whoopie Pies as I did for all of the spices, but my, oh, my, it was great!!!  It's not often you find fresh baked gluten free goodies!  (It's the little things.)

The Historic Colored School House.

To top off my story of the week, I had to share my story about Saturday.  I spent the afternoon at the Historic Colored School House, listening to the birthday reminiscences of a gentleman who is celebrating his 95th birthday, and attended that school from the time he was 6 until he turned 10.  It was a very gentle reminder of how much our world has changed over the last 100 years.  When he began school, it wasn't common for any man, of any color, to finish the grades and graduate from high school.  Life was very different in those days than it is now.  As we approach the beginning of a new election cycle, and hatred and fear begins to rear it's ugly head, it does pay to look back at the past, at our history, and learn from our mistakes and celebrate the progress that we've made.  

Frugal Friday

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The train station downtown!

I didn't go Black Friday shopping.  In general, I don't like crowds.  I had searched through the sales fliers Thanksgiving morning, but there was absolutely nothing that I felt we need enough to go out and fight the crowds.  I know a lot of people pick up excellent deals on Black Friday, but I'm not willing to leave my family and head out to fight crowds just to pick up a bargain.  With kids grown and out of the house, I want to spend time at home with them when they are home.

I did go out and support our local businesses on Small Business Saturday.  I went down to the Historic District, and bought a few things - chocolate bars for my chocolate addicted sister in law, snow grabbing shoe-hugger things for the kid who lives in snow country and walks to and from campus daily.  I even signed up for a yoga class at the sports store.  I saw lots and lots of friends, and kids who have now grown into adults. I had lunch in one of the cute little restaurants, and I spent some time down by the river.  It's a beautiful river when it's low! (And deadly dangerous when it's high.)

Sunrise at the stoplight.

The turkey has continued to nourish us long after Thanksgiving.  Turkey Pot Pie, Turkey Soup, and Turkey Pumpkin chili, as well as lots of turkey sandwiches and a wonderful turkey-cranberry wreath made from crescent rolls.  (I couldn't eat the wreath, because of the gluten, but the boys really loved it!)  Have you ever tried a turkey cranberry wreath?  You can find the recipe here.  It's a link to the Pampered Chef recipe.  I don't get anything back from the link.  I just really, really like the recipe, it's quick and easy to make from things on hand, and it looks beautiful!

My new favorite snack.

I didn't actually go grocery shopping this week.  We've been busy finishing off turkey leftovers.  However, I did get the bargain of the year.  I had an appointment with the store nutritionist.  I'm serious about getting and staying healthy, and I think that the nutritionist can help me figure out what I need to do in order to help me lose weight.  For a one hour session, I paid $20, and received one on one advice that correlates to my goals.  I tried some new and unique food that takes the edge off of my hunger and is easily portable.  I found "perfect portion" bags.  She took me through the store and showed me new and different healthy food options that I hadn't found before - because they live on the top shelf and the bottom shelf.  We set up a goal for daily caloric intake, and I began a food journal.  At the end of the session, when I went to pay my $20 to Customer Service, I received a $20 gift card from the store to use on my next trip.  Whoa, wait, what?  I exchanged $20 in cash for $20 in gift cards and an hour of my time?  I feel like I'm the one getting paid here! 

I hope that you are enjoying your Christmas Holiday Season!  Find ways to spend time together with your family, and spend some time building some Christmas Traditions together. 

Frugal Friday

We bought our turkey early in the week, and cooked it on Sunday.  We celebrated Thanksgiving on Thursday with my family, but by cooking a turkey early in the week, we were able to have the best part - leftover turkey- all week while the kids were home!  Since oldest child is headed back to school on Friday, we wanted to make our favorite leftover dishes while he was home to appreciate them!

You would think that eating turkey all week would slow us down come Thanksgiving dinner, but no... it really didn't.

Oldest son got his haircut with a free to new customers coupon that the barber shop handed out when they opened last month.

We made several trips to the library.  We picked up lots of books, as well as some of our favorite television shows and movies on DVD that we can't find in reruns or on Netflix.  I finally found the second book in the Game of Thrones series - A Song of Fire and Ice - on CD so I can listen to it in the car.  It's a pretty massive set of CD's, too.  I had no idea that one case could carry 30+ CD's.  It's bigger than the book itself.

My mother in law made a quilt for my husband years ago before he went off to college.  It's a denim quilt - made of old blue jeans and lined with an old sheet.  The last 32 years has taken a toll on that quilt.  The batting and backing are torn beyond repair.  While the quilt is tied, and lends itself to be easily torn apart and fixed, I do not have the space to stretch it out and tie it together.  Even worse, my sewing machine is not a heavy duty machine - and it is not strong enough to sew the layers together once I finish.

Enter a friend of mine who hates to piece but loves to tie.  We are switching projects.  She is going to tie the quilt together for me - and sew the edges.  I am going to piece her quilt and sew it together for her.  (she hates the miniscule seams involved with piecing.)  I don't have to cut, just sew the top together.  She'll tie it herself.  I swear, I am getting the better end of this deal!

The Festival of Trees to benefit Kennedy Kreiger is this weekend.  I found a discount code, which will take $2 off the ticket price for each person's admission.  I love the Festival of Trees!  It's a wonderful way to get into the holiday spirit, and everything goes to benefit the kids at Kennedy Kreiger. 

(Okay, so I didn't save a lot of money this week, but the kids are home.  What do you expect?)

I hope you are enjoying your time with family!

Frugal Friday

So, I didn't spend a lot of money this week. 

We've eaten through the leftovers in the fridge and made space for the kids coming home.

Husband is in desperate need of some new shirts for work.  So, he's getting new shirts for Christmas.  They were on sale at Kohls.  I used the coupon they had sent me to get an extra 15% off of my purchase.  He got 3 new dress shirts, and I got Kohl's cash and a coupon for 20% off of my next purchase.  I see a pair of dress pants for one of the kids in the very near future!

We got our electricity bill in for last month.  It came in under $200, which is much less than it was this time last year.  Unfortunately, it's been warmer this winter than last, so I don't think this is an accurate comparison.

Daughter's semester is over today, and she is coming home tomorrow.  About a month ago, she called her employer that she worked with over the summer, and she has her old job back, beginning the Monday after Thanksgiving.

Starting tomorrow, I have all of my wonderful kids coming home.  I know this next week will in no way whatsoever be frugal - but I'll have a great week with my wonderful munchkins!

I hope everyone enjoys time with the people they love over the next week.  Whether it's a phone call, a dinner, or a week together, take advantage of every single minute of your time.

Frugal Friday

It's time for the fun and excitement called "How I saved a few dollars this week"!  Husband and I have a debt we are trying to get paid off.  Every single penny counts when you're being charged interest on a debt, so everything we can save is going to debt repayment.  Our goal is to have this paid off by the end of April.  Sooner, if at all possible.

Bushel of Winter Squash  $30

source: Facebook/ Dorans Chance Farm

One of my favorite farm stand stores is closing for the season on Sunday.  This week, they've been running a special on winter squash.  You can pick up a half bushel of mixed winter squash for $15.  Wash them in a light bleach solution, and store them in a cool place, and you've got winter squash well into January.

I picked up a full bushel of winter squash for $30.  What am I going to do with a full bushel of winter squash?  Stick with me this winter, and you'll find out!

Just look at all of those brilliant colors!  Aren't they gorgeous?

Christmas Presents for Grandparents
This one gets harder and harder every year.  What do you get for older people, who already have everything that they need?  I used to take my Mom out - for tea, a movie, or just shopping.  Since her colostomy last year, Mom is struggling with the bag and all of the assorted issues that go with the bag.  She no longer likes to go out of the house for fear her bag is going to break and cover her and her surroundings with feces.  (Get those colonoscopies, people.  This doesn't have to be your story.)  Last year, I bought her elastic waist pants and larger shirts that would fit over the bag without binding.

This year, daughter made her a birdhouse for her back yard.  I bought hundreds of flower bulbs for spring flowering bulbs, and on Thanksgiving Day, the kids and I are going to plant them in the back yard.  We mostly picked up daffodils, but also some crocuses and snowdrops.  I'm planning on just naturalizing them in the yard.  They'll pop up early in the spring, but by the time the lawn needs to be mowed, the bulbs will have died back and she can mow them down without a problem.  I put together a picture collage for her - a small ornament from Shutterfly with pictures of the kids that she can hang on a wall, the fridge, or use as a bookmark.  (I'm planning on using mine as a book mark.)

My mother in law is a tougher bird.  I've made things for her in the past, and she's thrown them out.  Sometimes, while I'm still there.  So, I've given up on making things for her because, honestly, I don't want all of that time that I spent making something just tossed in the trash.  The least she could do is give it to the Thrift Store.  I really need to put on my big girl panties and get over that.  She loves reading about history, so husband picked up two new historical books that the author was giving away at a festival.  I also put together a small collage of pictures of the big kid events this year.  She can hang it on the wall, put it on a table, or lose it in one of the many piles of stuff she has in her apartment.  My husband will be taking her out - just the two of them - to lunch and a movie sometime before Christmas.

E-Bates
My E-Bates check for last quarter came in this week.  I'm $10 richer!  That $10 paid for a good chunk of the second half bushel of winter squash!  The other $5 came from quarters in the coin jar.  It's nice to think of dinner coming out of spare change, isn't it?

Pumpkins
Our office had been decorated with some cute little pumpkins for the past month or so.  My boss was getting ready to toss them in the trash when I decided to salvage them.  There's not a lot of them - 6 small little pumpkins, but I think that they will taste most excellent stewed into something wonderful!

Smoked Cuban Sandwiches

That pork roast yielded yet another awesome dinner.  Smoked Cuban Sandwiches.  Technically, this wasn't a smoked roast, so I guess this would technically be called a Roasted Cuban Sandwich?  This made a fantastic quick dinner on a night when we had to be out at meetings within 90 minutes of husband arriving home from work.  I use gluten free bread.  I have a few brands that I am absolutely in love with, and I used my favorite thick, crusty roll for this recipe.  I also used the George Foreman Grill to smash the sandwiches down.  It melted the cheese, heated the bread, and made a minimum of mess in my kitchen.  (Important on a night when you have to be out the door 90 minutes after you walk in!)

*Note- because of hubby's dairy allergies, he used fake cheese on his sandwich.  We compromised on the grill and brushed olive oil on the outside of our sandwiches because he didn't want butter tainting his sandwich.  I really don't mind it that way!)

We served this with a salad and roasted potato wedges.

Roasted Cuban Sandwiches

Several slices of pork roast, COOKED and cut to the thickness you like
Ham (I had leftover from the last ham we had that I thawed out just for this sandwich)
Crusty rolls or bread
Mustard
Cheese of your choice - most people use Swiss
Pickles
Butter (or Non-Stick Cooking Spray, or Olive Oil)

To assemble:

Slather mustard on the bread.

Layer the ham, cheese, and pickles inside of the bread.

Press into a heated George Foreman Grill (or use your outdoor grill, with a brick on top of the sandwich to make it flat.)  Heat until the cheese is melted.

Frugal Friday

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Tiger and I enjoyed a glorious afternoon outside on Tuesday.

My apologies for the lack of posts yesterday and the late post today.  It's been a very crazy couple of days!  I had decided that I was going to schedule everything yesterday, and get it all over with at once.  So, not only did I go to work, I got my hair cut, went to the dentist, saw a Personal Trainer (Who's taking over now that I am finished with Physical Therapy.  I feel I can be stronger, and a Trainer will help me get there.)  AND, we're leaving this afternoon to go visit oldest son.... And we needed to do laundry and pack last night.  Very, very long day!  I have links to a couple of recipes - which I've scheduled to be posted tomorrow.  If you click on them today, they might come through as active links... I'm not certain.  I don't know how Bloggers' Algorithms work in that situation.  I guess we'll find out, won't we?

I've been working on my stories from teaching.  I don't know if I'll get them all into a finished book by the end of the month, but I've had a blast revisiting old stories.  When I was teaching, I kept a journal of the things that the kids said and did.  Going back and re-reading the stories has been great.  Some of the stories will never make a book, though.  What's really funny is realizing that the kids I taught when I first started teaching are now in their 30's.  Not quite so little anymore!  


Discounted Produce Rack  $5

Have you ever checked out the discounted produce rack at your local grocery store?  The produce on this rack is all edible and safe to eat, but it's not "perfect".  Our society tends to only want "perfect" food.  Much of the waste that occurs in the grocery industry occurs because perfectly good, not aesthetically pleasing produce is thrown away.  Grocers have recently begun putting this produce out on racks at a deeply discounted rate.  I heavily frequent this rack.  The produce is either eaten within a day or two, or else I freeze it for later.  (If I could eat wheat based bread, I would be cleaning up on rolls and bread in the day old racks.)

2.5 pounds over-ripe bananas                 $1
5 Bartlett Pears that were dented            $1
2 big Portabella Mushrooms                   $1
3 Green Peppers that were turning red   $1
1 pound Kale  (that's a lot of kale)          $1

Hotel Deal

This sounds ridiculous, I know. We are headed up to visit oldest son this weekend.  We used E-Bates to book the hotel, and have signed up for the bonus points program.  We will be earning a little cash back on the hotel stay, and the nights we spend this weekend will be added to the total towards a free night's stay.  (Plus, we get to see the oldest kid!  That's the BEST part about this weekend!)


Cook Once, Eat Twice (or more)

Pork Roast, coated with Zesty Lemon spices.

I made a pork roast on Sunday.  I baked it in the oven in a cast iron skillet, and let me tell you, that was an amazing roast!  We had well over half of the roast left, and I knew then that we would have a couple of meals!
We had two extra meals from that roast, for a total of 3 meals.

Pork Fried Rice

Roasted Cuban Pork Sandwiches




Electricity Hogs

Now that the kids are all out of the house, we've been attempting to track down the biggest electricity hogs in our house.  A couple of years back, we switched our lights to LED's, which took our monthly electricity usage down. We turned our water heater down, and we dry many of our clothes outside.

But we still have several things in the house that have been keeping our bill up.  This month, we've been going after the "phantom" energy hogs.  Turns out that the television is a pretty big hog.  We keep the television, DVD player, etc, plugged into a power strip.  This month, we started turning the power strip off when we go to bed at night, and turning it on if we sit down to watch tv after dinner.  Turns out that having that power strip - and all of those appliances that depend upon the "instant on" feature for us to use our remotes - use much more energy than we had thought.  I've been following our energy report online, and while I don't yet know the final total for this month's electricity usage, I can already see that we are using less energy now than we were this time last year.

You know, every little bit helps when you're saving money.  I'm beginning to suspect that this might be more than "a little bit" by the time we add up the savings over the course of a year.

Grocery Stores

Remember when I told you a couple of weeks ago that we'd had a new Super Walmart open in town?  Well, our existing grocery stores decided to fight back this week, and they sent out some pretty nice coupons.  I'm plotting my trips carefully.  I'm going to focus on buying stuff non-perishable items.  I can always use razors, shampoo, deodorant, etc, and it will be nice to get an extra discount on those items! 

Frugal Friday

This has been a stellar week.  I discovered a Pennsylvania Dutch Farmer's Market down the road from where I work.  The prices were phenomenal, but my BIG FIND of the day was the bulk foods store within the market.  Next time I go back, I'll be better prepared with a list of the spices I need.

Pennsylvania Dutch Farmer's Market:   $7

3 cloves of garlic, 3 red beets, a huge box of ginger, a bag of spinach, and a bag of sweet peppers.
I refilled our ginger jar with this box.  It was a perfect fit!

Cook Once, Eat Twice

This is a nifty little strategy where you cook one big meal or roast one night, and then use those ingredients to make meals on other nights.

This past week, we roasted a chicken and made a big pot of vegetable soup.

From this combination we made:

1) Chicken Pot Pie with left over chicken and the rest of the vegetable soup.

2) Spinach chicken salad with leftover chicken and the spinach from the Pennsylvania Dutch Market.

3) Chicken Broth with the bones of the carcass.  Several hours in the soup pot later, and I had a batch of chicken broth that I turned into broth cubes to use later in recipes.


Laundry

Now that the weather is cooler, it's taking longer for the laundry to dry on the line outside.  Regardless, I'm still drying clothes outside.  I put the wash through at night, after the rates drop, just before I go to bed.  This week, I've been running the laundry outside in the dark.  I have the clothes on hangars, and I've been taking them out and hanging them up by flashlight.  It takes me a good 10 minutes to do, but that spot gets some fantastic morning sun.  Since it's fall and the sun has shifted, it's not getting that afternoon sun that REALLY gets the clothes dry fast.


Snacks

Hands down, one of my favorite snacks is Cranberry Walnut Power Balls.  I found the original recipe here on Common Sense Homesteading.  I've modified it a little bit for my own taste.  I don't like walnuts, so I use chopped pecans instead.  Another problem is that I can never find mini chocolate chips.  So, I use the soy free, dairy free chocolate chips so that the girl can eat some, too.  You know I use gluten free oats in the recipe.




Spice Mixes

We are out of taco seasoning mix.  Rather than buy one of those expensive little envelopes that have some questionable ingredients, I make my own.  I follow this recipe that I found here on All Recipes.  I use an old spice bottle to hold the spices in.  A full bottle usually keeps us in spices for 6 months.


Salad Dressing

I'm thick into the middle of a diet, and that means lots and lots of salads.  Unfortunately, I love salad dressings.  They are expensive and full of additives that I really don't need.  I found a great recipe on All Recipes for Italian Dressing.  I really like this recipe, as I mix up a large quantity of dried herbs and store them in my cabinet until I'm ready to use them.  When I need some dressing, I mix a couple of teaspoons of the spice mix into vinegar, olive oil, and water and shake it well before serving.  (I especially like the fact that I can keep the sugar in, use a sugar substitute, or use absolutely no sugar at all - it's MY choice!)

Thanksgiving

With Thanksgiving fast approaching, I am into my "acquire turkeys" mode.  Our grocery stores run a promotion that allows you to get a turkey for free if you've accumulated a certain amount of grocery points.  We're working towards our first free turkey.  I like to see if I can track down at least 3 turkeys to cook with over the course of the year.  Good thing we have a big freezer!