Frugal Friday: Money Saving Weekly Recap

This week saw some things on the money saving front.

1.  I researched when to harvest turnips online and found that the best time to harvest is actually when the turnips are about two to three inches in diameter.  My turnips were in the two to three inch category for the larger ones, so I harvested those (and a few smaller ones to use for greens).  I'm not sure if the other turnips are going to grow very big, but I left them in the ground just to see how far they'll get.  I plan to use the ones I harvested along with what is left of my potato crop to make corned beef and vegetables this weekend.

2.  I needed needles and realized that Jo-Ann Fabrics was having a Labor Day sales event, so I went in and used my 25% off total purchase coupon to make the needles a bit cheaper.

3.  I got a personalized price on pasta at Carrs for .98 for Barilla pasta.  I bought 20 boxes.   Between this and the pasta I already have this should be enough pasta to last my family a year.  I used the money out of my regular weekly grocery budget to buy the pasta.

3.  I used supplies I already had in the house to make creamed soup mix and a shake and bake style mix.

4.  I finished my shopping goals for October. They may need tweaking as I come up with other things I need and/or I find I have enough and don't need that certain item.  I'm being really careful with the list as I want to make sure it's dialed in as well as possible.

5.  I baked bread this week and we've been eating it with meals instead of pasta or rice.

6.  I shopped with coupons and with the sales (obviously by the pasta) to make my dollar go as far as it would go.

7.  I mended a comforter this week so far.  I'm hoping to get more mending done tomorrow.

8.  I've been drying tomatoes as they ripen.  I decided dehydrating the tomatoes made the most sense as they are only ripening one to two at a time.  I've got about one half pint of dried tomatoes so far out of my crate of tomatoes, on top of the green ones I've turned into fried green tomatoes and other "green tomato" dishes.

And there you have it.  Some of my frugal endeavors this week.  How did you do?

Menu Plan Monday: Menu for Week of 9/7/15

If anyone is wondering where my "What have I been reading" post is for last month, I'm still trying to figure out which book to mention as I've been reading tons of cookbooks the last couple of months to get inspiration for meals *laugh*.  I just reached over to grab my notepad with the pantry menus on it to combine with other meals I have on yet ANOTHER notepad (am I the only one who still writes lists with a paper and pen?) and realized I have like 20 books currently stacked up between my end table, coffee table and desk.  Oops.

Anyway, onto the menu plan for this week.  I had a pretty good plan in my head at 2:00 am, but forgot to write it down, so I'm kind of winging it now (am I also the only person who has brilliant ideas in the middle of the night and never writes them down?  I hope not).  So, here we go!

Menu Plan for Week of 9/7/15

Monday:  Chicken Sandwiches (my menu plan got kind of skewed last week as my in-laws brought over pizza for my son's birthday, so the baked chicken happened later in the week than planned, thus the chicken sandwiches are tonight :).

Tuesday:  Chicken burritos (use leftover chicken), rice, coconut pudding (this is kind of my own take on a Mexican Hungry Man dinner as I crave them when sick...hold over from when I was younger.  Still getting over this cold).

Ingredient Notes:  Refried Beans from pantry, enchilada sauce from pantry, tortillas from freezer, black olives from pantry.  Rice from pantry, tomato chicken bouillon from pantry.  Vanilla pudding from pantry, coconut extract added.

Wednesday:  Balsamic Pork Roast (crock pot), white rice, green beans.

Thursday:  Shrimp scampi over pasta, steamed veggies, garlic toast

Ingredient Notes:  Canned shrimp from pantry.  Lemon juice from pantry, garlic from garden produce in pantry.

Friday:  Ham and Pork Loaf, fried potatoes, mixed veggies.

Ingredient Notes:  Spam from pantry (well rinsed.  Use for ham), potatoes from garden produce in pantry, canned mixed veggies from pantry (seasoned).

Saturday:  Leftovers.

Sunday:  Chicken pot pie

Ingredient Notes:  Canned chicken from pantry, Cream of chicken and mushroom soup from pantry, canned vegetables from pantry, home made master mix (Bisquick) from pantry.

Desserts:  Leftover birthday cake, coconut pudding, jello parfaits (didn't do this last week as I didn't have the energy).

To Bake:  Bread, pizza pockets, chocolate chip cookies.  Baking day, Tuesday (didn't get this done over the weekend with other stuff going on so tomorrow it is!).

Monthly Goals Updates and This Week's Goals

Well, when it came to last week's goals some of them got accomplished and some of them didn't.  I forgave myself early in the week for not getting the list done as I really did feel awful with this cold.  Luckily I'm FINALLY feeling better this afternoon.  The worst part of the cold was a bone crushing fatigue that came with it.  Usually I'm one of those people who can work through a cold (to the point of driving my husband nuts as he's telling me to sit down and take it easy), but this one really made me sit on my behind a lot and just rest.  

I did get some things done.  I dehydrated the rest of the herbs (seen above).   I made my son's birthday cake, but not as planned.  I was planning on making one from scratch, but this time a 1.25 cake mix by the great people at Pillsbury came to my rescue...thank goodness for Pillsbury and their wonderful peanut free products sometimes.  I got his room done, got the tomatoes picked and worked on the one month pantry heavy meal plan.  It's kind of free form, but I think once I organize from week to week it'll work out just fine. 

After that, the mending didn't get done.  The cranberries are still in the freezer waiting for me to make them into sauce.  The sewing machine did get used, but not cleaned.  The baking didn't get done, so I really need to bake tomorrow or we're going to be down to eating the last ends of the bread and that's it.  I ended up making pizza instead of pizza rolls, which after some consideration I think I'm going to work on making pizza pockets instead.  I think that'll work just fine and I won't have so much rolling and pinching to do.

So, some goals for this week are going to be hold overs from last week.  At least I finally have some energy so I will hopefully be able to get some of them accomplished.


Canning/Preserving Goals:


1.  Freeze any eggs that are still good in 18 pack of eggs.

Carrs eggs are really starting to irritate me.  I will buy a dozen, an 18 pack...whatever...of eggs and half of them end up floating within a week (if an egg floats, it's bad).  This happened on my newest 18 pack of eggs.  Six of the eggs floated, so I'm going to scramble the eggs that sank individually and put them into muffin tins to freeze.  Then I'll just defrost one or two eggs for baking as needed and not worry so much about them going bad on me.

And note to self:  Make the trip to Fred Meyer to buy eggs from now on.

2.  Make SOS Mix (Soup or Sauce).

Jo, one of our blog readers pointed me toward this mix that can be used as a substitute for cream of soups in recipes.  It looks promising and I have all the ingredients.  Best part about it is if it works out I can make a double batch and I'm set for a while on cream of soups :).  Thanks, Jo!

If you're interested in checking out the recipe and what you can do with it, go here.  I downloaded the original booklet she points you toward in the blog post, which also contains recipes.  Pretty darned cool!  I got my home made Bisquick recipe from the Cooperative Extension Service, so I'm looking forward to making this mix and seeing what I can do with it.

3.  Make Pantry Friendly "Shake and Bake" style mix.

For those nights when I just want some breaded wonder to come out of the oven.  And my daughter can shake the bag and "help" ;).

General Goals:


1.  Clean off freezer top.  Move freezer out and clean coils. 

This is just maintenance, but it needs to be done.  

2.  Once top of freezer is cleared, reorganize it to work better for my needs.

Right now the top of my freezer is a mismatch of overflow items.  Packages of razors, tissues, my waffle iron, my canner...there's a bunch of different things I have up there and I keep thinking there's got to be a better way to organize it.  And what better time when it's cleared off!

3.  Work on waking up at least a half an hour earlier.

This is more for me having time to get a cup of motivation down me and some breakfast in my gullet before I have to get the kids up for school.  I am not a morning person.  It's time to work on that.

4.  Download transfer of records form from allergist website, fill out and fax.

I want to get this done with plenty of time to spare as my son's old allergist office is being kind of nasty, so I want to make sure it gets done. 

5.  Bake Bread, chocolate chip cookies (for daughter's lunch), icebox cookies  and pizza pockets.


Sewing Goals:

1.  Make autumn themed table runner.

I keep going through my head what the best way to do a Halloween themed table runner will be, but I do have some autumn colors in different fabric scraps, so I think I'll just make a table runner for autumn for the time being and maybe make another table runner for Halloween later.  

2.  Work on Christmas Gifts

I've barely begun working on gifts and now I'm a week behind.  I have 13 nieces and nephews and that's on top of my own family to make gifts for.  And teachers and therapists and other satellite people.  So, yeah, I start making gifts early. 

3.  Work on mending.

I really need to get a move on this project.  My husband has jeans and shirts that need to be repaired.  I have some jeans with holes in the knees, my kids have holes in different things that need patches applied.  Socks need to be darned.  And now that I have energy, it's time to work on that.

4.  Start working on embroidery on handkerchiefs for Christmas gifts.

I tend to work on embroidery while out in the parking lot when I pick up my daughter from school on therapy days (I prefer to just get there early and sit in the car and work on projects than work on them at therapy and feel rushed getting to the school).

5.  Work on throw pillow for daughter's bed for Christmas (this will be a form and pillow cover).  

This project, if it turns out as well as it comes out in my head is going to be super cute!

And there you go folks.  My goals for this week.  Hopefully I can get some of them accomplished.

Frugal Friday: Money Saving Weekly Recap

This has been a day to cap off a busy and stressful week and I've got tons to do tomorrow.  Anyone want to come and wake up at five AM for me tomorrow and bust hump to get everything done?  I'm sick.  I'd like to call in sick tomorrow *sigh*.

Both kids were home sick on Monday and we had some sporadic absentees since then with my son not feeling great.  I started getting sick right when I really had stuff to do when it came to birthday prep and just generally needing to get stuff done (like baking) and I haven't felt up to doing much of it.  Then it culminated today with both the kids having dental appointments.

Bright side:  I am still doing a good job of cleaning my son's teeth.  No cavities on either child that warranted needing them to get drilled.

Down side:  My daughter, who absolutely REFUSES to wiggle loose teeth (this has been a battle since her first two teeth had to be pulled by the dentist...I think she's lost one tooth on her own by actually wiggling it.  That's it) has two more teeth that have to be pulled because she didn't wiggle them loose and the teeth above them starting coming in wonky because of it.  The real down side is after we get that done it looks like she's looking at braces because she's cross biting due to the teeth coming in so crooked.  On top of her being in the worst mood on the face of the planet from the moment she woke up this morning...I am just plain TIRED.  I thought only one kid was supposed to be your "worry child" and yet...I have two.  Ugh.  Just ugh.

Anyway, despite all of the happenings this week we did manage to find some bright points and I managed to accomplish some things.

1.  We've been getting a lot of rain of late. which with the dry summer we had we also needed.  One such day where we kept getting rain blowing in and out a rainbow went over our house.  And I finally managed to figure out my camera to the point I got a photo of a rainbow to come out (one of said photos is seen above).  I felt so proud of myself *laugh*.

 2.  Along with the rain we unfortunately got to see temperatures plummet at night so that we've had heavy frost occurring more than a couple of nights.  I ran outside when I heard the temp the night before had plummeted into the mid 30's to find my tomato plant thankfully not completely frozen, but the leaves and stems were starting to die quickly, so I harvested every tomato I could find.  Which, turned out to be a lot.  And this was after the bunch I picked for the green tomato relish!

They are now ripening in the above crate (which is yes, my sewing crate for current projects, but it was the only thing I had that I could find big enough to house the tomatoes while giving them good air flow, so that's where the crate remains for the time being) and as they are ripening I'm going to try and process them a bit at a time and put them in the freezer to use for tomato sauce or something later on.  Some of them will probably end up in salads and such as well.  But hey, I have tomatoes!  That's always nice!

3.  I gave my mother-in-law some of the bounty from the garden.  It felt good sharing some vegetable love with someone (I couldn't rehouse the kale like I hoped I'd be able to due to everyone being sick).  After her letting me pick her raspberries I figured it was the least I could do.

4.  I redecorated my son's room for his birthday and managed to make a quilt and a personalized pillow sham out of materials I had around here (with the exception of 7.00 of quilt binding).  He's happy as a clam with his room, so I'm happy.

5.  I cashed in some Disney Movie Rewards points for a Baymax figure for my daughter for Christmas and I got it in the mail this week.  Like most of the movie rewards, it's kind of smaller than I thought it would be, but still decent even though small.  Since she picked out which figure she wanted, I know she'll be happy with it.

6.  My husband called randomly on a radial saw that someone had listed on Craig's List for free and when the guy said he still had it my husband stopped off to pick it up.  Only to find not only was it a nice radial saw, but he got the stand and everything with it.  He was really happy with that freebie!

7.  I was sick all week so I really didn't go anywhere where I would have wanted to spend money, so that's always a silver lining to a nasty storm cloud.

And there you are folks.   My frugal accomplishments for this week, such as they are.  How did you do?

The Birthday Bedroom Reveal (Redoing a Room on a Zero Budget)

Well, despite having to blow my nose about once every three seconds yesterday and having a son home sick, I put together his new room for him.  Mainly because we are expecting guests for his actual birthday later in the week and I didn't want to feel pressured to do too much at one time.  This also allows him to get used to the room before he has to deal with guests too.  So far he loves his new room, so score one for me ;).

So, first here's the room that I had to deal with before...

The shelf above, by the way is actually a toddler bench I got on Amazon for 10.00 when my son was really tiny (like 6 months old or so) in preparation of getting a house so we could give him his own room.  Unfortunately the bench didn't get much use as by the time we found a house and moved to our new place, my son was just too darn big for the bench anymore.  So my husband converted the bench into a shelf for the wall (and yes, it's straight in case you are wondering in later pictures.  I kept taking the photo of the shelf at an angle, so it looks wonky.  Sorry).

The wooden bedside table needed to go.  It's sturdy and we love it to pieces, but my son spent most of his time standing on it to pull all of the trucks my husband put up on his shelf down on top of his head, so it was time for a changing on the proverbial guard there.  There are some things missing from these photos too.  I pulled a gigantic rocking horse out of the bedroom and put it into storage that my husband had made a couple of years ago and I took a huge car race track thingy that my son spent most of his time standing on and put it into storage too.  So, the room wasn't QUITE as sparse as the photos make it appear.

Please excuse the very dirty mirror in the photo.  I was in a hurry and was also sick, so I just left the effort to clean the mirror until after I was done setting up the room.

And now for the after pics!  I'm quite proud of this room.  Considering the ONLY money I spent out of pocket was for 7.00 for some quilt binding for the quilt and 1.00 (that I dug out of spare change we had around here to pay for) for a shelf, I thought I did pretty darned well.

My son LOVES cars (all those moving parts you know), so I went with car racing as the theme for his room.  Formula One racing to be more exact :).

Tadaaa!!!!

 When you first enter the room you see this.  I got this car mat at a used store for 1.00 probably about six years ago.  We've had it in the kid's rooms on and off throughout the years, but my son for the longest time liked to sleep on the floor and since he sucked on a bottle...well there was always a lot of milk and mess on the mat and I finally just threw it into storage because I got tired of cleaning it on TOP of the carpet underneath it.  I pulled it back out of storage, ran the carpet cleaner over it a ton of times to clean it up and now the kiddos have a place to play cars.

Here's the quilt I made for him.  The black quilt binding is where the 7.00 I was talking about went.  The blue border material was a very nice quality twin sheet I picked up at a used store a while ago. When I cut the material up to make the quilt I then used some of the left over material to make a matching pillow sham. 

I then embroidered this design on the pillow sham.  I thought I did pretty well for a gal who is usually pretty inept at drawing machines.

I made a racing themed bunting for the one big wall (it's the only really BIG expanse of wall without anything like closets, windows or shelves interrupting the space).  I used scrap material and ribbon I already had.  My inspiration was all the different flags used in racing (green for go, white and black for the checkered flag, red for warning, yellow for caution).  I thought it turned out pretty cool myself especially since I eyeballed the spacing on the flags as I was sewing along.

The prints on the wall were from the good ol' internet.  I was looking for Formula One types of vintage posters to print off and I ran into these Cars 2 promotional posters.  I loved them, printed two of them off (there are four in the series) and put them in frames that I had in the house already.  And voila!  Formula One themed prints :).

If interested you can find the prints here.  Just page down to the gallery and look for the prints in the mess of photos.  They're pretty cool!

I hope to dig up a couple of more frames at the used stores or hiding around here somewhere so I can print off the other two prints, maybe for Christmas for my son and put them in other areas of his room.

Here's a view of the shelves on the other side of his bed.  The wire shelf was from the used store for 1.00.  There were two shelves there and I had two dollars in pocket change and immediately bought them both.  The picture doesn't really do the shelves justice.  They are pretty well built.  The other shelf I put in my bathroom to put things on to replace the shelf I had taken out of it for my daughter's room.

The other wooden shelf has moved with us since we moved into our previous home (another hold over from the previous owners).  It's rotated around.  Most recently it housed my limited collection of Pyrex casseroles in my kitchen, but I cleaned it off and put it in here instead. 

On top of the shelf I put these.  I had bought some all natural hand made wooden cars at a used store for .25 a piece a long while ago and placed them in the "gifts to be" pile.  They were so cheap because they had pen graffiti from the previous owners (read: doodles) all over them.  I used some acrylic paints I already had around the house from previous projects, looked up Formula One color schemes that would match the colors I had (with a bit of help from my husband) and I ended up with two Formula One cars in American blue and British green.  I think they turned out really nice myself.

And here is the new beside table, of which I'm extremely proud of having come up with this idea.  I had an old barrel that my husband's grandfather gave us years ago.  Originally the two barrels we brought back housed dishes to give to my mother-in-law.  We gave her the dishes but kept the barrels.  This is the bigger of the two.  It originally had a vintage type of wallpaper on the outside of it that had seen MUCH better days.  The paper was flaking off the sides bad and the top of the barrel was rusting.  It had been sitting in the garage taking up space and so I figured I could use it for a new bedside table. 

I wrapped the barrel in white drawing paper (the kind that comes on the roll) and then printed the Mobil logo onto photo paper off of the internet.  I then wrapped as much as I could of the barrel in laminating paper to stop my son from hopefully causing much liquid damage on it.  I tried to match a vintage looking oil drum as much as possible.  My husband thinks I did a pretty good job, so that's good enough for me.

Then came the lid.  I took sand paper my husband had and sanded all of the rust off of the lid.  I then took a can of silver spray paint my husband had and gave the lid a couple of coats (it's a rust resistant paint too, which is a good thing as the lid is going to take abuse I'm sure).

This is probably my son's favorite part of his new room thus far.  Because the barrel is empty he can hit the lid and it's essentially like a big drum.  He LOVES the noise *laugh*.

Next to the "oil drum" is an empty five gallon bucket or "waste oil" container that is currently housing dirty laundry.  Total coincidence that it worked out the bucket would go with the theme, but I'll take it ;).

And above the bedside oil drum is the new contents of his shelf.  I had empty coffee cans that I hated to just throw away.  I looked at them and thought they'd make cool old oil cans if I could find labels to put on them.  I thought I would have to try and draw them by hand, but the internet wowed me again when I found this template and tutorial.  I only printed off the automotive oil labels and only printed off three of them (seeing as how I had three cans).  I put the labels on with packaging tape (once again for protection to the paper to help save them from abuse by my paper eating son).  My husband loves these.  I think it's his favorite part of the decor. 

I then put some of my son's books on auto racing and machines on the shelf and placed his little rubber band run race car on the shelf too.  This gives him less motivation to get into things on the shelf as his trucks are now more on his level in the room below.  He checked out the shelf for a few minutes and then shrugged and went back to playing on his bed. 

On top is his Speed Racer Mach 5 nightlight my husband found at a used store ages ago and a gasoline truck coin bank my brother-in-law gave to my son for Christmas, I think it was last year. 

Over by his closet didn't change much (thus the lack of pics of that wall).  All I did there was take down all of the old and outdated artwork I had hanging up of his and put this piece up of his I had framed.  I always thought it was really cool splatter painting and it reflects the colors of the space well.  So, I hung it up in his room instead of in my stairway.

I always try to incorporate pictures the kids have made themselves into the house and their spaces.  Sometimes the best artwork is the artwork you do yourself :).

Overall, for a non-budget makeover, I thought I did pretty decent.  And my son loves the new room, so double bonus there.

Lesson here folks?  NEVER let being broke dissuade you from at least trying to do something.  Sometimes you might just surprise yourself.

Monthly Goals: September 2015

Well, I am actually rather proud of myself this time around.  Looking back on my goals for last month I accomplished pretty darned near all of them.  So woohoo for me!

About the only things I didn't do was making soap (decided not to waste the shortening right now) and I ran into shorts at the used store for .25 a pair for the kids, so I didn't make them shorts as I didn't see the point.  Course, than the temperature tanked and we've had the heat on at night the last week, so I'm kind of glad I didn't waste the material making them shorts.  And I didn't reorganize the master bedroom yet as I'm still trying to figure out what to do with the multitudes of clothing we pulled out of storage and are currently taking up the one corner of my bedroom where my dresser used to be.  I'm trying to convince my husband to just let me donate the clothes to the used store as clothing pulls in NOTHING at yard sales around here, but we'll see how that goes.

I got my son's birthday gift done (I'll reveal his room makeover hopefully in the next couple of days) despite having a terrible cold the last few days, which I was proud of myself that I got that done.  I'm hoping to feel up to taking pictures tomorrow (and it will be easier if my son is up to going to school tomorrow).  So the rest of this week is going to be goals like getting his birthday cake made, getting kids to a dental appointment Friday (please PLEASE be well enough for that kids) and trying to find some energy to clean up the house as we're having a few visitors over for my son's birthday and my house currently looks like a bomb went off in it.  My son being home sick hasn't helped the house much and ME being sick has stopped me from keeping up with the majority of his ability to make a huge mess.  Not a good combo for my poor house.

The garden is pretty much done for the year.  About the only thing still growing is the turnips, which luckily can withstand pretty heavy frosts without dying.  I don't know how much longer it's going to be before I'm pulling them and using at least the greens for something, but right now I'm in "wait and see" mode when it comes to them. 

The temperature has been tanking down into the 30's at night and when I heard that it had hit 35 one night I flinched and ran out to the garden as soon as I could.  Luckily by that point the tomato plants were only half dead, so I quickly harvested all the tomatoes, and there were a BUNCH.  They are now sitting in a box in my kitchen slowly ripening.  I think as they ripen I might just process them a few at a time into a tomato sauce like state and freeze them a bit at a time.  I think once all the tomatoes ripen I could get a decent amount of tomato sauce out of them. 

So, anyway, the goals for the garden are pretty much done with a few maintenance type of things looking toward next year (composting and such).

So, onto the goals for this month!

1.  Work on Christmas Gifts

This is usually the month where working on gifts starts to take off, slowly, but surely.  I've got a lot of gifts to make and I don't like to feel too rushed to get things done.

2.  Reorganize master bedroom

I really need to work on a floor plan, figure out a more cohesive decorating theme and just get the room done.  It really needs some TLC and I need to stop just treating it like a room I sleep in.  It could be a lot nicer place than that.

3.  Rotate items out of freezer

I, like so many other people, have things that get buried in my freezers.  I really need to start digging those things up and using them up so they don't go to waste.  Seeing how this a month where I'm going to living out of our pantry more, this is also a good month to do some freezer rotation as well.

4.  Make a fall themed table runner

The one stupid and small extravagance I make every year is I go out and I buy one of those plastic vinyl cheapy tablecloths for Halloween and I keep that on until about Thanksgiving and end up throwing it away as the design starts to wear off of it.  I don't really want to waste the four dollars on one this year, so I'm going to try and just make a fall themed and maybe a Halloween themed table runner and that way I'll be able to reuse it every year and not waste the money.  I figure if I go and use a coupon for Jo-Ann Fabrics and find a Halloween material and such I like, I could potentially get off making a table runner pretty cheap.  We'll see how it goes.

5.  Make some more cloth napkins and napkin rings.

6.  Make a couple new skirts for my daughter.

My daughter decided she was going to play "Brave" out on the playground with her friends one day while wearing one of my home made skirts.  Yeah, remember the part with "Curse this dress!" and Merida pops the seams on the dress?  Well it didn't work as well for Armina because her skirt had better sewn seams so she actually tore the fabric on the skirt instead.  We had a long talk about it and talked about ways you could PRETEND to tear out clothing without actually doing it from now on.

The sad part was when she finally told me what had happened and such I just wasn't even mad, although I was disappointed.  I mean she was playing.  Kids do that.  I just wish she hadn't wrecked the skirt in the process.  But c'est la vie.  At least she was wearing leggings under the skirt (I insist on that), so she didn't have more problems from it.

7.  Use crock pot at least twice a week.

It has taken me years to come to appreciate the crock pot, but I'm seriously loving it right now.  It's so nice to have dinner just handled so when we get back from school and therapies and such that dinner is just done.  Or at least the main event anyway.  And it's really helping to tenderize really cheap meat (mainly pork shoulder roasts), which is a definite benefit.

8. Dig out Halloween decorations and put um up!

Halloween is my husband's favorite holiday.  He doesn't get enthusiastic about much of anything else when it comes to holidays throughout the year, so I started a tradition last year where we celebrate two months of Halloween.  My husband gets to watch his scary movies a couple of times a week, we decorate the house and he has a good time.  Since I like Christmas more than he does, I figure it's only fair :).  And the kids have really gotten into it over the last few years too, which gives them one more thing to bond with their dad over, which is wonderful for me to see.

9.   Get allergy records for son transferred over to new allergist office.

My old allergist office is just being...ugh...about getting my son's records transferred to a new allergist we're going to see at the end of the month.  So I'm going to have to print off a release of information form and then go and dig up a fax machine somewhere to fax over the request.  

10.  Work on Mending

It's the never ending task!  I'm half serious as it seems like every time I think I'm close to done suddenly something else pops up that has a hole or tear in it (my husband is hard on clothing in his profession).

So, those are the basic goals I have set for this month.  I think I can get them all done.  Heck, I got last month's list done and it was WAY more to do than this month's goals.

Monthly Shopping Goals: September 2015

Well, when it came to goal setting the monthly shopping goals last month turned out...well not terrible but not great either.  I managed to get some things on my list as I had an unexpected refund check from our insurance company, so I was able to get everything I set out to get from Amazon.com along with some Hershey's syrup in cans for the pantry as well.  I got the rest of the kid's school supplies done and got them underwear.  I skipped the socks until I can afford some decent socks (although their socks will last them a while now that I found the stockpile of dirty socks hiding under my daughter's bed...grumble).  I got the cream of chicken soup, but only four cans of it, not the six I was planning on, but better some rather than none right?

I was able to get the block of cheddar cheese due to some money I got from my mother-in-law buying some cloth drawers off of me and I did get garbage bags (because I ran out).  Other than that the rest of my list from the bulk stores didn't happen last month due to lack of funds.

I have a Home Depot gift card with like 2.00 left on it and was hoping to get water softening salt, but they were out of the blue bags of Solar Salt both times I went in to pick it up.  I'm thinking I'm going to have to spend the extra money for a bag as we're running out of salt in the water softener, which is irritating, but nothing to be done about it.

I also picked up some extras that were on sale really cheap.  The flavored water my daughter brings in her lunches went on sale for 1.25 per six pack last month, so I spent about 20.00 just on flavored water.  My pantry is now swimming in the stuff, but it will be used and since it is normally about 4.00 per package, it was definitely worth stocking up on it.

Blue Bonnet margarine went on sale for .99 per pound when you bought ten of it and various other items (it was mix and match).  I went and bought 10 pounds of margarine.  Due to a Just 4 U coupon I had loaded with a "personalized price" and the computer took off a set amount per pound of margarine for the sale, I was able to get the margarine for .79 per lb. 

In my house growing up my mother used nothing BUT margarine for baking and cooking, so when I was introduced to real butter I thought I'd gone to heaven and bought nothing but butter for years.  Recently, though, I've started changing my tune as margarine is so much cheaper per lb than butter is.  I'm not a fan of anything but name brand "good" margarine (generic margarine just tends to be gross tasting) and I plan to use the margarine in baking and cooking where the flavor wouldn't be too pronounced.  Butter is so expensive when we eat it all the time on mashed potatoes and on toast on top of baking that I felt the margarine was worth the money. I've been using it and so far, so good.  It really is helping to stretch the butter out, which is saving me a LOT.  And 10 lbs of margarine cost me less than 4 lbs of butter would have, so it was definitely cost effective.

I worked both of the above purchases into my regular weekly shopping budget to avoid over spending, which worked well.

This month's shopping goals are going to be living by the adage, "Cheap or not at all".  Mainly because at this point I'm just trying to conserve money for going shopping next month.  In Alaska we get a life saver called the Permanent Fund Dividend in October.  The vast majority of whatever the amount dividends end up being will go into the bank as a GREATLY needed influx to our savings, but we always take some money out of the dividends to go and stock up on pantry stores.  I'm just going to try to hold out for that trip and just make do with what I have pretty much until then.  

So, here we go.  My shopping goals for this month.

Monthly Shopping Goals for September 2015

Regular Stores:

1.  4 cans of Cream of Chicken soup
2.  3 cans of Cream of Mushroom soup
3.  Olive oil (if it goes on sale for 5.00, if not skip)
4.  Cat litter and dry cat food
5.  Popcorn (if it goes on sale).

Other Stores:

1.  Get Water Softener filter and change out (this is around 30.00 for one, but it's a once a year switch out and it's actually past due by about a month now...it's time to get it done).

And past that barring unforeseen circumstances popping up, that's it in the way of shopping goals for the month.  Sad, I know, but that's the way it is.