finishing the garden and staying frugal

This is one of the pans of tomatoes I have stored under the bed to turn red that I just cooked up for juice. The pan on top is a 9 x 11 cake pan just so you know how big the sheet pan holding the tomatoes is.

I still have one pan of this size with partially turned tomatoes and another of mostly green tomatoes

This is the last of the bell peppers that was stored under the bed to turn also. I dehydrated them.

















I am writing down daily what we are doing to be frugal.It helps keep us focused on saving.

I turned in my coke caps and got a reward and then used the coke caps to make "drums" for the 12 days of Christmas gifts for the kids and grandkids.

I cashed in my swag bucks and my Survey pts to pay for our Subscribe and save at Amazon which saved us $49.33 this month( not including what I cashed in to pay for it) for what is a necessity for the house.

I did a pre-order of Nora Roberts Island of Glass and got is for half of the price when it came out.

I ordered the prime rib (the only thing Hubby asks for at Christmas, it was a tradition from his grandparents that are no longer living). I found it at a butcher shop for $3.00 less a pound if I pre-ordered it.

I returned a glue gun to Walmart that didn't work instead of just tossing it . Yeah,a bad habit I got from Hubby who also has a bad habit of not putting things back and then going and buying more when he can't find it.We are working on that this spring when we clean the garage out.I tape the receipt to what is being returned and put it on my purse.

I turn the printer off after using it. Our old one shut itself off after 30 min but this one doesn't. I give my empty ink cartridges to the local school. They use them to get things so they don't have to increase the taxes to cover more stuff.

I shut my laptop down after I use it and then shut the power strip down that it is plugged into . I found one I don't sit and waste the day on social media and two the electric bill dropped.

We had a few Christmas lights die so we replaced them with LED lights. I also picked up LED light bulbs for the closets we forgot about when we replaced the other bulbs with LEDs.

We are using Gasbuddy to find the cheapest gas  instead of just going to the one gas station. We check the area we are going to be in and what is around us at home.

We used Speedway card to get 3¢ off a gal.

We used Wagner's card to get 19¢ off  a gal.

We used Kroger's card to get 70¢ off a gal.I do the survey to get extra points.

We moved our daughter in one trip (instead of the 3 we feared) with the help of one of her friends that had a trailer twice as big as ours. She had a couple bookcases and some stuff that would fit in her car left. As it costs about $40 to go down and back that ended up being an $80 savings.

We dropped our electric bill another $15 compared to last year.

A friend gave us some candy that they won't use so we will add that to the gifts we give the family.

If I am using the oven I will put a tea kettle of water on the burner over the exhaust and heat my water for tea that way. Takes a while but a slow roast or a turkey in the oven can keep me in hot water  for the afternoon with no extra cost of the burner or microwave. Even a short amount of time will take the chill off the water as our water is cold due to coming from a well.

We are using "scrap " paper for notes and what ever that we get from expired coupons, envelopes and back of letters in the mail.

We ate home except for 2 meals. One meal Hubby's HAM radio group paid for and the other we got the special for pizza that provided meal all weekend. I think we are tired of pizza.

Hubby turned down Directv offer again. Even though it would not cost as any more that what we are spending for the home phone and internet the offer was only good for a year. We have already went through the " let's make a deal" more than once. We will just stay with our antenna.Don't really miss anything except Alabama football and his buddy will text him the scores as he lives down there. We are in OH.

We went to the grocery stores for sales. We got cake mixes (girls use them for cookies since they don't buy flour...I can't imagine not having flour) to give as gifts since they were under a dollar. We got smoke sausage for $1.59/lb . We got sausage for $1.92/lb and ground chuck for the same price.I got butter for $1.99/lb and lg eggs for 59¢ a doz. I got a turkey for 68¢/lb and pork loin for $1.39/lb.Depending on the freezer space I will pick up another turkey and a couple hams. I will get pork roast at New Year's. I got a rack of ribs the other day for 99¢/lb. One rack is all we need through this time of year.

One of us (including the dogs) has an appt every day this week so I plan to cook up some root veggies tomorrow that can be reheated to go with the protein of the day is. Will spend things up.

I know I will be having to buy gas for my car at least 4 more times this month. I usually only have to do once a month.That was figured into the holiday budget.

I am still working on the 2017 budget as we know there will be a change in health insurance (some of it will save us $180/month) but I figure there will be a down side somewhere.

We still have a hospital bill that is outstanding...kind of...the hospital is trying to get the ins to pay MORE because it was a necessity so our bill will be less. I hope we get that bill soon so I can get that done with for this year's taxes.

Blessed  Be