Category Archives: Saving Money

Random Tuesday Thoughts

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Kendall is finally almost done with cleaning out her room. She was able to reduce the amount of clothing down to the point of everything fitting in her closet!!! This allowed her to move a huge dresser out of her room! Lily decided to take the larger dresser and was able to empty out not only her smaller dresser but also a bigger standing shelf. Lily does want to replace the shelf with a mirror and three shelves but we shall see. I moved the standing shelf to my room and laid it on it side under my jewelry box. This is currently a place to keep all of Braxton’s toys, clothes and diapers! Finally Zach did not want to be outdone so he exchanged 3 small dressers for one from Lily’s room. I am pleased with the extra space that everyone was able to find and we have moved at least five garbage bags of clothing to the building for a future yard sale or something.

I have been able to sell between ebay and Facebook market place 4 American girl dolls and a ton (50) build a bear outfits. We used this money to cover our tickets to the Disney Halloween party in August.

Our August Disney trip is completely paid for including air fare. The only item left to purchase is a gift card to cover food on the trip. Matt receives 3 paychecks in July so we plan to use the extra check to purchase a gift card to use on the trip! Next, we are going to work on paying for our December trip! At this point, we will have the plane tickets covered between credit card miles and airline vouchers.

I will be working in Guam through the end of June due to the school closure. My goal is to take the entire month of July off of work and resume both Davie County and Guam in August! I am so ready for a normal schedule!

I am focusing on controlling the grocery budget this month to under $550. So far we have been way over budget each month!

Matt and I have decided to tackle our master bedroom sink area. We are going to repaint the walls, change out the cabinet and sink for a double sink vanity! I am hoping we are able to complete this project in two weekends but it may take a little longer.

I am starting to quickly lose hope in our garden this year. The weather has not cooperated at all. We should be having warm spring/summer like days but for the past 2 weeks the temperatures have been stuck in the 60’s. I have covered everything I could on the couple of nights of freezing but things are just not growing well. In addition, we are having to water every other day. We have had little to no rain since mid April. I was so hopeful for the garden especially using all the seed packets but now if we harvest one each from our vegetables that will be the break even point!

Menu Planning Monday

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I know that I always do better with a goal and a plan. I am counting down the weeks until my summer vacation begins (6) so in the process I want to get a jump start on what the summer may bring. I realized last year that I needed to use some of my free time to stock the freezers with quick and easy to complete meals for the fall. I need to start planning for fall 2020. We will go from over six months of limited to no extra activities to three kids in three spots/ activities along with my return to full time work. The goal is to get the stocking done before the summer starts! This week, we should be making a large beef purchase and I will be working full steam ahead on cooking. The good news is that I only have one night scheduled in Guam this week and I gain an hour a day simply by working at home. You will notice that we did well this week with only one meal of eating out!

Breakfast– I was able to get a jump start this week by making Sausage muffins on Sunday! I need to make up some baked oatmeal bags and continue to add choices such as French toast and waffles to the freezer when ever possible. Saturday- bacon and eggs . Sunday- Sausage muffins.  Monday, Tuesday,  Wednesday, Thursday, Friday-choice of breakfast muffins, eggs, sausage, pancakes,  cereal or grits. –Still have not gotten around to a baked oatmeal but really do need to make one this week.

Lunch-   Saturday- pizza and ham and cheese sliders. Sunday- Gregg’s (local restaurant) .The kids will have school delivered lunches, Matt has 2 days of chicken sandwiches and 2 days of chill that he made on Saturday. I am going to return to eating at least one salad a week and also continue with some left-overs on other days.

Dinner-  Saturday- Left-overs Sunday- chicken nuggets Monday-Hamburgers and French fries (hamburgers are in the freezer) Tuesday-Taco Tuesday (the plan is to make a crock pot full of taco meat and freeze the left-overs to use in the summer and fall. Wednesday- Sloppy joes and tator tots ( Again made in the crock-pot with the left overs frozen for use later). Thursday-Spinach Ravioli (Lily’s in charge) Friday- BBQ chicken pizza. Zach is in charge.

I will also be cooking and freezing one pound bags of cooked ground beef to use in meals. Next weekend, I plan to make 5 dinner packs of Salisbury steak and several pans of meatballs to freeze. This should use up the 40-50# of ground beef I am planning to purchase. I will also need to purchase several packs of Italian sausage as I would like to get at least one baked ziti in the freezer. Hope you will stay around for the ride and please share if you have a great recipe that you think we would enjoy especially if it can be doubled!

Saving on Saturday

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  • Turning off lights and not using the heat or air condition. We have been fortunate to have a very unusual Spring so far with temperatures the end of March in the 80s and now most of April temperatures around 70. Even with everyone home during most of the month, we reduced our electricity bill by $70 from what was budgeted.
  • I am keeping a close eye on the sale ads. I had actually ran out of 2L of Diet Coke last week but Food Lion, our local store ran a sale for $0.99 on Wednesday and then reduced to $0.79 Friday thur Sunday. I am stockpiling these. My goal is to have purchased a total of 50 by Sunday. These do not go bad and at a saving of $0.90 a bottle. I can give up a little extra space.
  • While at Food Lion, I decided to check the clearance bins at the back of the store. I was shocked to find that they had reduced the price of a bunch of cookies. Most items were between $0.25 and $0.50 cent so I decided to go ahead and stock up. I spent a total of $16 for all of this!

I also headed out to CVS this week to grab some deodorant and shampoo that was on sale. I had an average of 59% saving. I am actually pleased with this as I started out with no ECB and ended with 3.

Menu Planning Monday

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Last week was interesting to say the least. I talked a lot about it here. I will also admit that I am getting tired of meal planning and eating at home. That may have been the reason that we ate out three meals this weekend. Today, I am a little more back in the grove and since it has been finalized I need to stay in the grove until June 15th (last teacher workday). I have a goal in mind. The goal for this week is to get a new normal routine going so we can survive and thrive in the next seven weeks. Overall I want to get a lot done ahead so that when summer arrives and I am not tied to the computer for the majority of the day. We can enjoy the park, the pool, the zoo basically just relax and enjoy! One positive is for the next six weeks the kids have lunch provided by the school. I should mention that we picked up and processed 160# of chicken breast on Friday last week so you will see that on the menu more often.

Breakfast– This is the area that we are going to begin to struggle in probably within two weeks as we finish up the individual cereal boxes. I do have a plan to start stocking up on breakfast food and we will be able to use what is already in the freezer. Saturday- Bagels from a local restaurant . Sunday-Sausage egg crescent rolls and Cream cheese crescent rolls. .  Monday, Tuesday,  Wednesday, Thursday, Friday-choice of breakfast muffins, eggs, sausage, pancakes,  cereal or grits. –Still have not gotten around to a baked oatmeal but really do need to make one this week.

Lunch-  Saturday-left-overs Sunday- Matt and I grabbed Steak and Shake while going to Costco. The kids ate left-overs .The kids will have school delivered lunches, Matt has 2 days of chicken sandwiches and 2 days of hamburger. I am struggling with lunch for me. Monday- Salmon Quiche, Left-overs and at least one day for a salad should get me through the week.

Dinner-  Saturday- Chinese from Panda Panda. Sunday- Left-overs and Chicken Nachos from Amanda. Monday- Chicken and Broccoli casserole. (made last week so heat and eat). Tuesday-Cheese Quesadilla and Mexican Rice (Zach’s night) Wednesday- Grilled chicken and salad, Thursday-Shrimp and French Fries (Kendall’s in charge) Friday- Million Dollar Spaghetti Pie( this will make 2 meals) Lily in charge.

Saving on Saturday

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  • Instead of buying plants from the big store< Lowes, I decided to venture out and try and find a local greenhouse. After a little bit of searching on Facebook. I found one. I head out early Saturday because I heard they have sold out of plants very quickly. Let me tell you this was by far the best decision I have made. Plants were 3 for $1. I purchased 33 plants for $11 or the cost of one mosquito plant at Lowes.
  • Over the past year, I have been collecting different seeds. The reason, I just could not pass up a good deal. I paid as much as twenty-five cent for all the packets. Since we have some extra time with no extra activities, I decided to go ahead and see what I could start from seed. I have been able to successfully start, lettuce, cucumbers, zucchini, cherry tomatoes, cantaloupe, snap peas, peas and watermelon. I have also planted some green beans, dill and basil from seed as well. The only expenses so far has been dirt which I buy anyway.
  • Matt saw on-line that you could start tomato plants from slices of tomato. I was very skeptical because of the way I hear most vegetables are treated. However, we tried it with two slices of tomato and we have tiny tomato plants growing from them!
  • I have been listing items on Ebay for the past month. Originally, you could list up to 50 items a month without a listing fee. Now they have actually changed that to 200 items a month. This past week, I sold 7 out of 10 items! I also received the highest bid for one item. We are still responsible for a fee at the end but for March it was $12.45 so I am still making a small profit on most items and we are cleaning things out as they go.
  • I talk a lot about food and food waste. We have spent a total of $212 so far from our grocery budget. I expect to keep this number under $250 for the month! We are definitely trying to use what we have an still do some adventures eating and cooking this month!

4/10/2020

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  1. This week at home has been more of a struggle for me. I am not sure if it was the fact, I was stressing about some work issues or just this is the fourth week of Covid-19 or my Humira shot. But most likely a combination of all of the above. The good news is that I survived and am hopeful the work stress is behind me as well.
  2. I decided to go out shopping on Wednesday this week in order to avoid the crowds over Easter weekend. Again good and bad news. The good news is that we did avoid the crowds and used pick up for both Lowes and Walmart. The bad news is that it was insane at Lowes. I can’t believe how many people were there. We have spent a total of $77.42 on groceries so far this month. I fully expect to keep this number low this month.
  3. Yesterday, Thursday, the windshield of the van was replaced. It developed a crack from a rock in January and finally reached the point it definitely needed to be replaced. I also will need to get the car inspected and tag renewed this month. I know this will exceed my gas budget even with only filling up once or twice. My plan will be to use some of the gas money from May to help cover the expense as well. I will be at home until at least May 15th so between the two months we should have all the repairs and tags covered.
  4. The weather this week has been beautiful and we have spent a good chunk of time outside preparing the garden. We are expected to have another frost this weekend so if all goes as plan we will be doing a lot of planting next weekend. This also works out with the recommendations by the Farmer’s Almanac.
  5. Speaking of next week it should be a real test of patience and parenting skills. All three kids are out of school for Spring Break. I am off on Monday but have to work the rest of the week. In addition, there is a strong possibility that Guam schools will resume which means I am going to be working both jobs from home. A test of patience is the best description I can give.

5 Things Friday

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  • I think we are all starting to get use to everyone being in the house everyday. Matt and I both are currently working from home. Matt is going in to his office on Tuesday but I should be home through the middle of May! Zach and Kendall are working each morning on school work and Lily is continuing with her online classes. Lily is actually struggling a bit more than I expected because she is used to being home alone and not working around other people all day long.
  • We are actually eating out more than normal for us as we try to support local business. Matt went to lunch on his office day on Tuesday. I actually went into my office on Thursday and stop by our favorite Greek restaurant bring home a late lunch for everyone. Friday, we ordered from the local pizza shop and Matt and I splurged on ice cream to end our date night.
  • On our date night Matt and I ended up at Lowes. I purchased both mulch and paving stones to help work out in the yard tomorrow. My goal is to get most of the not plant work done this weekend and we will start planting in probably a week or so. I am planning to share pictures tomorrow after the work is done.
  • Family walks are a fun way for everyone to get out of the house and get some exercise. We actually walked 3 evenings this week.
  • The weather is still doing crazy swings from 80s to low 30s in just a matter of days. I am really fighting the urge to plant outside and have been bringing in our growing cucumbers and squash in on a daily basis.

Monday Menu Plan

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We discovered last week that a menu plan is even more important than when we are out of the house. We were able to stick to the plan last week except for Wednesday when we ate left-overs. I am very proud to say that we have significantly reduced the amount of left-overs in the refrigerator to a normal amount! I also have been cleaning out some expired food and trying to make sure that we don’t waste. Matt and I both are working from home so lunches are left-overs or sandwiches for us. In an effort to try and develop and stay on a schedule sort of I spent several hours in the kitchen on Sunday. I was able to shred the chicken from Costco, make hamburger patties one set for dinner and froze the rest for quick lunches. Made roll ups for lunch. Hopefully we can stay home and stay on track.

Breakfast– Saturday bacon, eggs and toast. Sunday- Waffles (with an entire batch froze)  Monday, Tuesday,  Wednesday, Thursday, Friday-choice of bagels, breakfast bowls or burritos, breakfast muffins, eggs, sausage, pancakes,  cereal or grits. – Or what ever the school sends. IF I get ambitious this week I may do a baked oatmeal for one morning.

Lunch-  Saturday- Pasta salad with chicken, tomato and cucumber added, Sunday- Left-over from Fridge. Last week the kids had a pizza pocket, hamburger, uncrustable, chicken sandwich and egg roll. Each day they also get at least one vegetable so that adds in. I made pinwheels for myself one day and will eat left-overs or salad. Matt is on his own this week.

Dinner-  Saturday- Left-overs , Sunday- Sandwhich Monday- Hamburgers and tator tots Tuesday-Dorito Chicken ( this is a new recipe) and fried apples. Wednesday- Mandurian Orange chicken and egg rolls, Thursday- Steaks and twice baked potato. Friday-Pizza rolls.

Monday Menu Planning

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Last week was mostly a success but this week brings even more uncertainty as I am suppose to return to work on Thursday but I may be given a work from home opportunity but that is still the unknow. Our school district is delivering lunch and breakfast for the following days. On Friday, the kids got a chicken sandwich, carrots and a banana for lunch. Breakfast was a donut and banana. We will definitely be adding to the breakfast as a doughnut is desert not a meal! Two things, you will notice are different this week. First, on Sunday, I did not cook. I was tired and we need to use up left-overs! We also are trying to continue to support local restaurants when it makes senses. Amanda brought over several meals that would not get eaten at her house so currently we have no more room in the refrigerator.

I was able to spend some time taking inventory in both of my freezers this week. We currently have a list of approximately forty-five dinner meals that are available to us. This does not include any meals of left-overs or meals from our panty. My current plan is to start emptying out the freezers and also stashing back some extra money for meat. I am debating on purchasing a entire cow or just simply restocking at the local butcher shop. I definitely want to wait several weeks till people stop hoarding because I don’t want to pay the inflated price.

Breakfast– Saturday sausage biscuits and hash browns. Sunday- find your own. Mom is not cooking.   Monday- cereal for the kids and I ate left-over quiche. Tuesday,  Wednesday, Thursday, Friday-choice of bagels, breakfast bowls or burritos, breakfast muffins, eggs, sausage, pancakes,  cereal or grits. – Or what ever the school sends.

Lunch-  Saturday- Left overs , Sunday- Left-over from Fridge. Matt has packed 2 hamburgers and 2 brat meals for the week. I will be eating left-overs or soup. The kids have school meals. My kids are really excited for this because they are not allowed to eat at school so I am not sure what they will get or if they will eat it. I plan to report next week on the items they received and what we ended up doing with them.

Dinner-  Saturday- Low country boil with hushpuppies(purchased from local resturant) , Sunday-Boneless buffalo wings (purchased from a local restaurant for $20) Monday- left- overs Tuesday- Sloppy Joes and French fries. Wednesday- Mandurian Orange chicken and egg rolls, Thursday- Baked Ziti Friday-Chicken apple and sweet potato crock pot meal (new recipe).

Monday Menu Planning

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As we start this week with lots of uncertainty and confusion, due to the Cornoavirus. I have three goals. First to try and get the kitchen back together quickly, and second to again develop a good list of what food/meals we actually have. Finally to start to slowly restock the freezer on quick and easy meal. You will also notice that we do not have a kitchen for the weekend due to the new floor being installed. Lots of eating out.

Breakfast– Saturday gravy biscuit from Biscuit King   Sunday- McDonalds   Monday, Tuesday,  Wednesday-choice of bagels, breakfast bowls or burritos, breakfast muffins, eggs, sausage, pancakes,  cereal or grits. Thursday- Spinach and Bacon Quiche Friday-  Cinnamon Roll waffles

Lunch-  Saturday- Left over Pizza  , Sunday- Left-over from Fridge. Monday- Kids- mac and cheese from box, Tuesday- eating out of Matt and I. Girls had soup. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday- left-overs from the fridge. My plan is to make lunch the one meal that I do not cook or at least cook the least. I also want the kids to get use to heating something up if I am required to return to work.

Dinner-  Saturday- Crockpot Chicken and Dumplings , Sunday-Applebees Monday- Spaghetti and meatballs. Tuesday- Steak Fatijis Wednesday- Grilled Chicken, Thursday- Choice of baked potato or baked sweet potato Friday- BBQ pork Roast.