Wordless Wednesday- Square Foot Garden

Posted on by
Reply

Above are my “green stock” vertical planters.  We have close to 100 “pockets” planted between the two of these!

Front of house beds- 2 tomato beds and a “cooler” plant below

Tomato bed #1

Tomato bed #2. Marigolds are to help with disease, and I have also planted a row of basil in this bed!

Zucchini on both ends with kale, cabbage and broccoli in the middle with at least 30 bush green beans as well!

These are the beds that we moved behind the house.

sugar snap peas
Watermelon
peppers and squash
Peppers
more peppers
cucumbers and green beads
Green beans, zuccni and marigolds

I am super excited about how everything is growing this year!   My goal is to harvest 100 pounds of food.

This does not include the galloon size ziplock bag that is in the freezer of Kale for smoothies!

 

Monday Menu

Posted on by
Reply

Week two of our busy schedule is here. I also did find out that we will be adding swim team practice and Lily’s job into the mix starting next week.  The good news is that we will be down to 1 ballgame a week and one band concert so things should start to settle out.  In preparation for this busy week, I spent some time in the kitchen on Saturday night. The great news is until Friday all the meals are basically heat and eat thanks to the preparation on Saturday!   The next big food related goal is to organize the freezers……. maybe I can start this weekend if not only 5 weeks till summer!

Breakfast- Saturday- Breakfast bowls with hashbrowns and gravy! Sunday- Cracker Barrel , Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday- eggs, sausage, bagels, bacon, grits, or waffles, breakfast burritos are the current choices available.

Lunch- Saturday- Left-overs from the fridge .. Sunday- Pretzel at outlets for everyone but me. I did not make my lunches ahead this week so lots of left-overs and sandwiches will work.

Dinner- Saturday-  Cowboy beans and cornbread Sunday- Dinner with the family at Haley’s .  Monday-Spaghetti and meatballs (last of the spaghetti sauce I think). Tuesday- Chicken enchiladas. Wednesday- Stuffed green peppers Thursday- Frozen pizza or left-overs . Friday- Steak, mashed potatoes from freezer and salad.

Bring on the week!

Saving on Saturday

Posted on by
Reply

Today has been a very busy but productive day!

Garden/ Yard

  • Used pavers that we had stored to make the boundary for the new Raspberry bed, used the 2 large bags of dirt and 7 small bags of dirt from the greenhouse in the raspberry bed.  We decided to use some stakes and string that we already had as well so we ended up spending  ZERO on the new bed.
  • Purchased 3 raspberry stalks and 25 bare root strawberries from Stark Brother’s nursery for 1/4 of the cost of what I saw locally.  I ended up planting all of these today!
  • Purchased 3 zucchini plants for $1.50 and a 6 pack of marigolds($4.50) from the local farmer’s market and planted these today.

Food/ Meals

  • Made breakfast bowls for breakfast, used left-over KFC gravy on top. We made 15 breakfast burritos and placed them in the freezer to use as a quick breakfast in the coming weeks.
  • Made a batch of cowboy beans in the crockpot.  We had these for dinner, froze one additional meal and have 4 lunch bowls in the fridge
  • Used a pound of ground beef given to us to make stuffed green peppers for a meal this week. I will need to top with cheese before baking. This should be an quick and easy meal.
  • I found 1 pound rolls of sausage priced at $1.99.  I purchased 15 rolls with most going in the freezer for future use.  In comparison the next cheapest option as $3.49 for a roll and this was a sale price. I will likely be stopping by Food Lion again to see if they continue to carry the sausage at this price. If so I would like to collect about 30 rolls for the freezer in anticipation of prices continuing to rise.
  • Used the chicken legs from dinner this week to make chicken enchiladas that even Lily will be able to eat.
  • We have made at least 10 full meals today and did not need to purchase one single item! In fact our grocery spending for the month is at $60!
  • I was able to find a source to purchase a whole cow from this summer. The price per pound it $4.80 which is $1 higher than we paid 3 years ago so I am super excited to finish cleaning out the freezer so we can order the cow!

Zach discovered a water leak under the house this morning. Matt was able to fix with items already on hand. This saved us not only on the cost of calling a plumber but it will also help reduce our water bill as it was a major leak.

Matt purchased new tires for the camper from Amazon ($250 for 4). He took both the old tires and the new tires to a local shop and had the tires mounted for $40.  I am going to estimate this saved over $300 on tires. He did purchase a special tool that he needed. But this will be used in the future as well.

5 Things Friday

Posted on by
Reply

  1. Barely survived this week with 2 ballgames and 2 doctors appointments.  Not sure what will happen next week with 3 ballgames, 1 chorus concert and 3 nights of work.
  2. The garden is growing!  I am super excited to see how everything is starting to take off. I am hoping for a nice harvest this year.  We are spending about 5 minutes a day pulling weeds so far so good.
  3. I want to get a couple of meals made ahead on Saturday in order to make things go a little smoother.
  4. Sunday we have all day plans which include Cracker Barrel, shopping and a trip to Durham.
  5. Lily has finished the spring semester at DDCC, Zach and Kendall have 3 weeks left of school and I have 6 weeks between me and summer break.

 

Monday Menu Post

Posted on by
Reply

This is one of the busiest weeks of the school year with next week even more so.  We are going to focus on eating at home as much as possible but realize that always will not be the case. I am very thankful for the convenience meals already in the freezer and the goal is to have the freezer emptied by the first week of June. However, I did add 6 HUGE frozen pizza, 3 boxes of frozen waffles and a loaf of french bread to the freezer on Saturday.

Breakfast- Saturday- find it yourself, I had a bowl of grits with left-over sausage. Sunday- Pretzel Bagels, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday- eggs, sausage, bagels, bacon, grits, or waffles are the current choices available.

Lunch- Saturday- Everyone but me ate on the boat. I had McDonalds with mom. Sunday- Panda Panda.  I have 2 salads, 1 veggie plate and plan on left-over chinese one day.

Dinner- Saturday- I had left-overs, everyone else had Dario’s after leaving the lake. Sunday- Italian sausage with peppers, onions and potatoes.  Monday- 2 of the pizzas I purchased on Saturday. Tuesday- Taco Tuesday with hard shells, Wednesday- Ballgame food (Zach has a 6pm balgame and I have a doctor’s appointment). Thursday- Chicken legs from the crockpot with a couple of veggie sides. Friday- Broiled fish and zucchini rice.

 

5 Mondays of school left and one of those is a holiday!

April in Review

Posted on by
Reply

The winds of April certainly brought about lots of change.  Matt is now employed full time.  We also enjoyed a 10 escape from reality to Disney.  May is usually one of our busier months so I anticipate full steam ahead to summer and the school break.  We were over budget in several different categories. My intention is to just work through the month of May as it comes budget wise. I will plan to spend some time after we figure out Matt’s pay and do a re-vamp of the budget beginning in June. This revamp will also take into consideration inflation and the price increases that we are seeing.

Groceries– budget amount is $200 until June.  Not Met! $658.81 This does include our Amazon subscribe and save.  I am a little shocked at this amount but I have started to readjust again and instead of buying one item we are out of, buying two instead. I will continue just to monitor this in May but have no clue where we will end up.

Auto/ Gas. My goal is $400 a month.  NOT met! $355 for regular gas and $430 for the trip to Disney.  Matt’s job is a 35 to 40 minute drive so I am going to have to monitor and adjust this amount going forward.  This also includes gas prices as high as I have ever paid so that could be an issue.

Cash Envelope system- Did not work with out trip so it was out the window. Disney prefers cards so that is what we used for ease.

Blogging- 15 post per month. 8 post during April not bad considering we were gone for 10 days.  Hopefully things return to normal and I can get back in a good routine soon!

Exercise days-  We managed to work an average of 7 miles a day at Disney so I am going to count 8 days of exercise. I also have an appointment this week for another shot so that should help. 
 No Spend Days- ummmmm what ? 

April was a fun month but it was also a month of struggle and change. May should bring about a sense of normalcy and anticipation of the summer!

Tuesday Thoughts

Posted on by
Reply
  1. I was unable to find strawberry plants on Saturday in town but did find that Stark Brothers has an awesome sale currently. I am likely going to go ahead and order 25 and plant most in the vertical planter and the remaining ones can be planted in containers. As Matt said then if they all live you can transplant next year!
  2. SInce I am ordering the strawberry plants,, I am also debating trying to grow raspberries in the very shady part of my yard. I seriously have a hard time finding information about growing raspberries but I do know that my kids absolutely love them!
  1. Matt and the kids are planning on joining Haley and David for a day on the lake on Saturday. I am excited because this will leave me with lots of time to work on budgeting and bills as well as heading to the grocery store with Mom without pressure to hurry.
  2. We are attempting to leave our air conditioner off as long as possible! I was disappointed that after returning from Disney we had to run the heat for 3 days. So now the goal is to see how long we can go without using the air. With everyone out during the day and baseball games at least 2 nights a week. We should be able to last until May 15th. This would be an excellent way to save on our electric bill as that is the end of the billing cycle!.
  3. I did not share but on Thursday we made an impromptu trip to Costco which blew our grocery budget out of the water! Ugghhhh

Monday Menu Post

Posted on by
Reply

7 weeks to finish cleaning out the freezer!   I was so excited last week to actually be able to see the bottom of the chest freezer.  I am very hopeful that we will be able to empty within a month just to make things easier for us. I will also begin the hunt to purchase a cow once the freezer is completely empty.  This week we are adjusting to a new routine with Matt’s new work schedule. We likely will move dinner to around 6 pm most days. I also am still working both my jobs so meal need to be fairly simple. The good news is that I spent some time on Sunday preparing for the week so I really feel like we are in a good place. You will notice that we have several meal out this week. Which will likely become the norm with the games and schedules of the next few weeks.

Breakfast-  Saturday- Sausage biscuits. Sunday- bacon and eggs. Monday- zucchini bread  Tuesday- left-over muffins from Monday nights desert and the remaining zucchini bread.   Wednesday- baked oatmeal, Thursday, Friday- choice of eggs, sausage, french toast or pancakes, cereal or grits.

Lunch-  Saturday-Chicken tostitos from the freezer , Sunday- KFC  Matt has 1 salad, 2 hamburgers and left-over pizza and chicken  The kids have left-over pizza, and chicken, sandwich and mac and cheese one day.. I have a salad, pizza, veggie tray and left-overs.  Did you notice that we manage to stretch our meals out to include several lunches!

Dinner-  Saturday-Pizza Sunday- left-overs of choice Monday- steak, mashed potatoes and salad  Tuesday- Spinach ravioli   Wednesday- Crockpot lasagna  Thursday- chicken tacos  . Friday- pork chops and mac and cheese.

Saving on Saturday- Garden Edition

Posted on by
Reply

Matt, Zach, Kendall and I spent most of the day outside planting the garden.  This year we hope to harvest a ton more food than in the past. I have replaced all the horrible soil. I also purchased two vertical planters. My intention was to devote one to strawberries. However, I was unable to fine any strawberry plants last night. So I think we will try to plant some different items and then know next year, it will be devoted to strawberries with probably 3 years until it is full of strawberries and producing like I anticipate.

This year, I decided to try and save money by starting everything from seeds.   I am going to have a master list below.  I have decided to try a variety of items in the vertical planter just to use up some seeds. This will allow me to decide what is a good plant to grow and really since we have the seeds not a waste if it does not work out! We started tomatoes and green peppers inside the first of March. We did lose about 1/4 of out plants while we were at Disney due to a watering problem but we still have more than plenty to enjoy.   After planting all that I wanted and planted to plant in the raised beds I have 2 empty squares. So I may open the Zucchini seeds I have just to plant more.  Depending on how many of the pepper plants live, I may be adding Zucchini and squash seeds as the weeks go on. I would also like to grow some pumpkins this year but not sure about where. I do know to start around July 1st. IF the radish and/or carrot produce well then I will like plant a second time at the end of August as well.  I did purchase several flowers from Lowes but will not purchase any more seeds or plants for vegetables until next year. I need to get these seeds used up and be diligent about what we are spending!

Now in the effort to be transparent as possible. I ended up paying the kids $20 to work outside the whole time with us so $40 and I ordered pizza for dinner $30.  We decided to use paper plates but these are from our camper stash. We had frozen items for lunch.  I don’t regret or feel bad about any of these as I am sore and tired. So there is no way that I could get this much done in a day without all the help that was given!

Things  Planted
1. 35 pepper plants including the one in the tomato bed.
2. 27 tomato plants (I purchased 2 cheery tomato plants because we like to snack on these)
3. 110 bush green bean seeds
4. 5 Zucchini seeds
5. 6 yellow squash seeds
6. 20 cucumber seeds in the raised beds. I am going to try at 12 more seeds in the vertical planter to see what happens.
7. 5 watermelon seeds
8. 3 cantaloupe seeds
9.  30 sugar snap peas 25 seeds and 5 plants ( I had already planted on packet with only 5 plants growing)
10. 24 radishes
11. 50 carrots
12. Basil- packet
13. Dill- pack
14. Paisley- pack
15. Chives- Pack

Now to watch it all grow!