One of the activities that we have participated in this summer is Swim Team. The original intent was that both Kendall and Lily would both compete this year, however that quickly changed at the first meeting where Kendall “sank” in the pool. So Lily has been on the Welcome Waves Swim Team this year.

Swim Team practice are 4 days a week, with a choice of morning or afternoon practice. Most days, Matt takes the 3 little kids to the morning practice starting at 10:30am, they usually arrive home around 1pm. Lily has been working really hard on swimming, she has also realized that with her goggles she can actually see where she is going. I have watched as she made huge improvements. In her very first meet, she only swam one event, 25 freestyle, her time 1:26.80. At the end of the regular season, 4 weeks later she is swimming in 3 events and probably could an 25 meter backstroke if she was not so tired after 3 events. Her swimming is so much appropriate and faster, her time 47.53! Difference of 39.27 seconds!

Tonight at the ending pool party, Lily was recognized as the Girl Most Improved for the age 10 and under! We are so PROUD of here! Here is the picture of the award:

It literally has been years since I have made plans for New Year’s Eve. Normally,going to bed by 10pm is the top of my ways to celebrate, other years it is sitting and watching the ball drop on the couch. This year turned out to be a little bit different.
I honestly can’t say whose idea it was, but a group of people from our church met at Chick Filet for dinner and then we headed to a movie. This was a very different group as it include a couple that is older who have grand kids, a couple with one son, who is an young adult, another family that has teenagers and young adults, our friends the Pierces and us. The movie was pretty good. I even got to watch all but 10 minutes which was my one and only bathroom trip. The little ones are learning to really watch and behave, I am even optimistic that we could go once a month to the movies if we wanted. The movie was longer than we expected so as we left the parking lot at 9:45pm all three of the little kids were asleep. We arrived home and I actually fell asleep while watching the news. No ball drop for me!

Today (New Year’s Day) was spent at church and sleeping. I wrote about  my goals for the next year last night so today I am trying to slowly starting working on them. My thought is that if I start slow then I will not be overwhelmed and just give up!

It is the end of the year.. well almost with 3 days left in 2011 I wanted to share a couple of things that you can do to decrease your tax liability.
This is the one that we are taking advantage of, a tax credit for the year when you purchase energy saving items for your home. Check out the list here Energy savers. We have already purchased 4 windows and plan to purchase the additional ones we need to finish the house on Saturday. According to everything I am reading we will get a credit of 10% of the purchase price. We should be closed to the $200. This credit is non-refundable but will be taken off our tax liability.
Next is a simple one- make a donation of money to a charity. We have been doing so all year. I heard a statistic that 40% of all charitable contributions are made in December.
Third- This is another simple thing, donate clothing,toys or household goods that you don’t need or have replaced.  If you chose to donate make a list, by doing so you can claim the most value for your items. I have a box of clothing that is marked yard sale, instead I may go ahead and make the donation to simply empty out the close.
Fourth- If you have any outstanding medical bill, the more you pay in one year the more chance you could use this on your taxes. My understanding is that you can only count medical expense you pay out that are more than 17% of your income.
Finally- Make an extra mortgage payment this month or simply pay your January payment in December. This will increase the amount of interest you pay out for the year.

Do you have any other tips?

I was able to spend all morning in Lily’s classroom today. It was nice to meet her friends and watch how she interacted with peers and teachers. I was surprised to learn from her teacher that even in our small area, the teachers are really placed under pressure not to “celebrate” Christmas. In the past the entire month of December would be a time to talk and learn about all things Christmas. But I could not find one single “Christmas” item in the hallway or on her classroom walls. Lily’s teacher went on to explain they are given two parties a year and today was one of them.  She arranged the classroom into 6 stations and each group spent about 15 minutes in each area. I was helping with the Reindeer cookies. I may add to these pictures later, another parent promised to send me better ones, since I only had my phone today.

Reading Center

Christmas Bingo-Lily won 3 times

Reindeer Cookies- eaten on the spot

Stocking with picture

Reindeer bag with reindeer food

Gingerbread house-Lily ate all the candy off by the time I got home from work

Quiet, rest… these are the things I find myself desiring more often these days.

 I realized early this year that I was not going to be able to “do” all the things I usually do in regards to decorating for Christmas. Or I should say that if I did then I would not be able to enjoy the important things like making memories with the little kids and enjoying the wonder and awe. So in an effort to scale back, I only put up my snow village and a Christmas tree.  I don’t regret that decision even when Lily asked last week, when we were going to get our yard stuff out.  Of course, we have been super busy, in fact I am fairly certain that each night since the beginning of December has had an activity or something that needed to get done. I know I have not sat down and an entire evening at home in that long.  Things are starting to slow this week, Haley will be at her fathers and we only have one commitment on Saturday that should last less than an hour. My sister in law, who regularly reads this blog, understood that I was having a difficult time keeping up with my devotions; she sent me a small devotional book to help. It has been awesome! I can actually say that I am in week two of daily devotions. On Monday, God gave me a huge reminder that I need to stop and enjoy the season, more importantly enjoy the reason for the season. These words are such a strong pull to me, they keep coming to my head and I am trying to when they do find a way to stop, be still and listen/enjoy.

Isaiah 30:15-“Your salvation requires you to turn back to me  and stop your silly efforts to save  yourselves. Your strength will come from settling down in complete dependence on me—
                        The very thing you’ve been unwilling to do.” The Message

Isaiah 30:15 “For thus says the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel:

“In returning and rest you shall be saved;


In quietness and confidence shall be your strength.”


But you would not, ”   KJV

I hope they speak to  you as well.

I LOVE my Crockpot in fact I love it so much that I multiplied it last summer as my birthday gift.  I purchased a combo of 3 small crockpots!  Using a crockpot saves energy! I also find that it is a great way to get meal prepared especially for a crowd and have everything hot at the same time. My favorite site for Crockpot recipes is A Year of Slow Cooking. I actually started following this site the same year that she cooked something different in Crockpots each day for 365. I have used probably 10 recipes from this site and never been disappointed.

For Thanksgiving this year, I was asked to bring vegetables and a desert to my parents for lunch. Matt and I both like turkey so we chose to cook a Turkey breast as well.  I am a recipe follower so this site  is awesome. I used both the turkey breast and cream style corn recipes . The turkey was  honestly one of the best tasting and moist turkey I have ever eaten. I started it about 7am and we ended up eating it around 6pm. I used my large Crockpot for this. In the sectional, I prepared corn, pintos and sweet potatoes. I did have to soak the pintos overnight. While all these items were cooking I was able to go to both CVS and Walgreens. We still arrived at my parents with plenty of time prior to lunch.  No trouble cleaning up is also an advantage, after lunch we came home plugged back up the sectional and turn them on warm. At 6ish we simply dished up the food for a second meal. I did empty the pots after dinner.  We enjoyed a second round of leftovers this evening for dinner. My plan is to make a turkey pie. So we have really stretch our meals this weekend. Both the large one and the sectional all fit in the dishwasher

Using the crockpot makes roast, soups and appetizers easy as well. I can use find most ingredients in my pantry. The biggest advantage I see to using the crock pot is that I can start a meal and it is ready at dinner time even if we have been extremely busy all day. This usually saves us from grabbing something out to eat or using alot of “quick pasta meals”.  An example is this Sunday, we will be cooking Baked Potatoes for us while at church, easily $30 saved in one meal which pays for the Crockpots each time I use them.

Do you have a favorite recipe to share?

1. God’s protection in the storms of this week. Zach and I were home alone on Wednesday night and it was scary for a little bit.
2. God’s protection in the storms of life.
3. Whirlpool tubs and jets
4. Krispy Kreme donuts…no way any Dunkin Donut could begin to compete!
5. Candles
6. A weekend with few plans
7. Blog- a place to write and remember

I love Costco. I know that some items can be found cheaper by using coupons but honestly I still love going to Costco.  The main reason for this is that I like being able to buy in a quantity that will last our family of seven for around a month and not have 3-4 boxes of each item. I really like being able to come home and “stock” our shelves with the food, knowing I want have to go out again for at least a week.

I am careful when we go to Costco, if we are only buying things we need then I plan that trip around lunch and if we need ALOT then I usually try to take a good list.  My pantry has started to look a little bare lately.  I have been shopping the sales and using coupons but things like snacks and crackers are still disappearing. Initially my plan was to go shopping at Costco last week but between work and quizzing it just did not happen.  Today with the severe weather causing a delay in school today which resulted in me working later than plan, we decided to bite the bullet  and just go to Costco after school. Haley stayed at home and did some of her chores in the quiet.   Matt, myself and the 3 smaller kids were on an adventure. During my hair appointment, Matt took our master list and we tried to make sure we included things we needed but also didn’t forget anything.  The plan was to eat dinner as well. Matt and the kids LOVE the hot dogs and you can’t beat the price. I , however, am not a pizza or hot dog fan but tonight I actually ate and really enjoyed it. I decided to purchase a whole rotisserie chicken. I simply got a fork and knife from the food side and enjoyed the juicy chicken while the kids ate hot dogs and pizza.  Even with purchasing the entire chicken, which will be at least enough for my lunch tomorrow if not that in addition to chicken salad, we spent less than $10 on dinner.  The rest of our trip was expensive around $400 but we were able to purchase the meat for at least 18 meals and other foods for both breakfast and lunch. We came home and separated out most of the meats as well as the cheese. Everything is put away and after looking at my grocery budget for the month I am still right on track with $550  spent so far. I hope that today’s trip will keep up in good supply until Christmas!

I ended up working till after 7pm last night and with Bible Quizzing in Raleigh today, (Saturday), I missed posting the list of things I am thankful for on Friday but here they are a day late…

1. Freedom- Thank you to the Veterans who are have fought and are stilling Fighting for mine!
2. My Job- yes it is taking alot of time and I constantly complain but God has provided me with 2 awesome jobs that are allowing our Family to get back on track and also start to enjoy some things.
3. Computer/Internet- It is so easy and fun to find about anything in the world now with the use of a computer.
4. My parents who even today love and support me in ways that I could not have imagined when I was a child.
5. My car- God provided it last September and it is awesome.  I actually think it is the nicest car I have ever owned and it works so well.
6. Friends who will listen and pray whenever I need them.
7. The Bible.

Hopefully I will get another post up tommorow but …. who knows with this crazy life?

This is a question I have often wondered myself. I do know that I think most of the stockpiles that you see on TV are just over the top. I was reading over some blogs this morning and found a guest post over at Couponing To Disney in which a very nice list was given about what amount of food they felt should be kept on hand in order to have a month supply of food. I changed most of it a bit to be more of what I thought was realistic.  I am planning to use this list to actually make my shopping list. Meaning when I go for a huge stock up trip, I will take a look at this list and see what needs to be added to make me feel comfortable with the items on hand.  I will also use it for a guide of buying things, so if I find an awesome deal of toilet paper but already have the amount noted then unless it is free, I don’t need it.  I am share in hopes it will help someone else.

Dry goods
2 5lb bags of flour
2 10lb bags of sugar
1 boxes of baking soda
1 can of baking powder
1 canister of salt
2 boxes of baking mix (like Bisquick)
2 boxes of Pancake/waffle mix


Canned Goods
20 cans of assorted fruit
15 cans of soup (including cooking soups)
5 jars of spaghetti sauce
2 jars of peanut butter
2 jars of jelly
5 cans of tuna


Freezer goods
2 packs of Hot dogs 
1 pack (20) Hamburgers
10 lbs of chicken breasts cut in various ways
4 packs of bacon
5 lbs of hamburger
2-4 packages of lunch meat
3 2lb bricks of cheese and at least 1 pack of American slices
15-20 bags of a variety of frozen vegetables. 
Pork chops
3 bags of tortillas
2 canisters of bread crumbs- I have been saving all old/odd slices of bread and we process these so I don’t plan on every buying this.



Pantry goods
12 boxes of cereal
5 lbs of rice
30 packs of instant  oatmeal
2 jugs of syrup
1 jar of vegetable oil
1 jar of olive oil
2 cans of Pam spray
4 boxes of crackers
4-6 boxes of Pop tarts


Personal care- In this section, I already have more than what is listed in my stockpile so I use this as a guide of where I need to start actively looking for more of an items instead of grabbing only things on the “best deals list”. But Free means I get it no matter what!
 2 sticks of each persons deodorant
2 tubes of toothpaste
2 bags of feminine pads
6 bottles of shampoo and conditioner
2 bottles of Hair spray
6 bottles of body wash

Cleaning supplies- In this section, I rarely have this much on hand unopened. This is considered the only get it if it is free when we have this much of a supply
2 bottles of hand soap
2 bottles of dishwashing liquid
2 boxes of dishwasher tablets
3 bottles of laundry soap
1 box of dryer sheets
2 cans of scrubbing bubbles
3 tubs of cleaning wipes- I only buy the Kirkland brand so if they are on sale then I grab extra otherwise I buy when we start the last bag.
120 rolls of toilet paper
10 rolls of paper towels
1 bottle of pine sol
1 boxes of garbage bags


Snacks-   I don’t think this is a necessary list, I prefer to keep some fruits on hand for the kids to eat and we usually stock up at Costco at least once every couple of months. This is the exact list I found on line. I left incase you do feel snacks are necessary. With that beginning said, I will add that we like to keep a candy and chip stash in our bedroom.
2 boxes of popcorn bags
6 bags of tortilla chips
2 jars of salsa
5 bags of jerky
35 fruit leathers
2 bags of cookies


Pet supplies
1 20lb bags of cat food
2  jugs of cat liter


Extras
5 boxes of Ziploc sandwich bags
5 boxes of Ziploc freezer bags
20 batteries of each size


Staples – This final list is things that I personally don’t freeze so I buy in bulk if I can and rarely find on sale so I usually purchase at Costco. If  I do find a sale then I stock up with what I can use in a couple of month time or before the expiration date
2-4 gallons of Milk- we are not big Milk drinkers so a gallon last around a week
4-6 gallons of Apple Juice-a months supply
7 dozen eggs- these usually last 2 months purchased from Costco
2 loaves of bread.
5lb of potatoes
3lbs of onions
4-8oz containers of Sour Cream
2 8oz containers of Cream cheese
4 boxes of butter
1 large tub of Margarine.

Do you have any suggestions I should add or take away?