Monday, January 12, 2015

Frugal week

We didn't eat out at all even though I am sick(head cold into chest cold and hoping it doesn't not go into pneumonia) and would prefer not to messing with food to keep from passing it...Hubby did a little bit of cooking on the worse day. I am hoping I am over the hump.

We only bought milk since the Jan 2nd  when we did our meat buying(sales were good). Since I just opened it this morning I figure we will make it through the week. Hubby bought it on the way home from work at the local grocery store, it's only 2 miles out of the way instead of 30 mile round trip and that saved on gas even though the milk was a bit more in price.We both figured we spend less because he just went in and got ONLY milk where in the city we would have been checking out the sales.

I roasted a turkey that made 4 meals for the week (stayed on menu mostly)and put 2 more in the freezer including over a gal of broth (in different size containers) for other meals.

I mended 3 pants for Pat.

I mended a shirt for Hubby and I changed a jacket he had that was damaged to a vest for him that he can wear.

I mended a sweater for myself.

I made 5 gals of laundry soap. That will last about 3 months or more for us.I wash the bedding and furniture throws quite often since the dogs sleep on my bed and furniture.

I made cranberry juice from last year's cranberries that was in the freezer and made cranberry sauce from what was left of the juice.

I started a soup container in the deep freezer...funny how we stopped all of a sudden of having a couple bites in containers in the frigs after I did that.

I have been making sure the curtains to the south are open on days that it is sunny to help warm the house and closed before it gets dark.

I checked the pantry for what we are low in and what needs used up before it's lost....we had water standing in the pantry at Thanksgiving and I got a feel it cost us with some of the root veggies. Next year we are going to change where we store our root veggies to keep them longer and hopefully not have as much waste.

I started planning our garden....we are looking at year around gardening....big planning of needing covers and etc to do that so I want to have the "buy" list now to have it all way before it's actually needed.

I have a daughter getting married and she asked for me to grow her flowers ...or try to grow as much as I can as I am not into growing flowers (yarrow does well for me and that's about it). SO I need to think about what to plant AND where I am going to plant it because if I give veggie garden space up for it then I have to figure out where to put the veggies so we have our needs for the year met.

What did you do to save money or your time this week?







Thursday, January 8, 2015

What I am doing

or still doing... besides trying to stay in out of the wind chills of below 20° and moan about Pat having to go to school which means I have to go out in wind chills of below 20° to drive him down the 2 tenths of lane because I sure am not going to have him walk in something I wouldn't walk in myself as an adult.

I blended the rest of our horseradish from the garden...end with a mess mid way as I didn't get the blender back together correctly and ended up with horseradish slung EVERYWHERE.

Tried to find some seeds that I want...Excalibur F1 parsnip, Riccia Parsley, Forest Green Mizuna and Amerliore Turnips...striking out so far.

Mending is caught up.

Finances are done plus I reworked the budget to start saving for seeds  and the Scioto Valley produce auction in April.

Checked the groceries...nothing needed....might need milk over the weekend but that should be about it.

One solid week of eating from the pantry.... YES!!!!!

Got to get back to it.

Monday, January 5, 2015

Goals for 2015

Blog more LOL

Eat from the pantry and less eating out...more of clean food eating like we did when I was growing up until tv dinners came along and we ate them a lot when Mother was in the garden harvesting mode.

Waste less food, wear things out, quit buying what we already have but can't find because it wasn't put away in the correct place.

Declutter and condense down what we do have and use.


Keep the mending done.

Get back into routine of my home blessing which is still getting bumped all over the week due to other things...sigh.

Plant a succession garden including into the winter (low tunnel hoop houses since I am in OH)

Save more...a lot more...get out of debt and save more...