Dec 1st of pantry challenge no spending.

We have 10 items on the exception list for buying this month . One is getting bumped to Jan, 7 are for Christmas, 1 is distilled water for the humidifier in the bedroom and the last is butter for stocking with the price at $1.99. I might pay a bit more but not much.

This morning we talked over the dinner menu as 2 days will be crammed and the 3rd day Hubby might be out of state with a friend. When the day is crammed is a day we usually eat out.

So this week...
Sunday left over pizza from last night ( Advent)
Monday Soup of choice. He will probably do chili and I will do tomato.(crammed day)
Tuesday Corned beef hash and eggs.(crammed day)
Wednesday Butternut sq, black bean, cauliflower crust pizza (using left over sq from last week)
Thursday stuffed shell or manicotti pasta
Friday oven meal of some kind (Hubby may be gone at which I will probably do something from the freezers that is a leftover) (St Nick's day)
Saturday roast with root veggies.
Sunday (Advent) Leftovers.

We went over the basic grocery list. MY goal is every two weeks. Hubby thinks every 10 days.

Milk ( including to make yogurt so yogurt got taken off)
heavy cream
half and half ( I have dried buttermilk so that got taken off )
cottage cheese (requirement of diet put on by doc)
fresh mushrooms ( canned is high in sodium , I have heart failure), higher is sugar and lower in protein PLUS fresh white mushrooms are the only veggie with VIT D.
colored bell peppers (I can't eat green)
celery
carrots
onions ( am to eat daily)
sweet potatoes (I have plenty of dried , canned and other white potatoes.)

ONE TIME A MONTH
ice cream (Hubby)
3- 6 pk of coke.(me) I get 1/2 bottle a day. Yes I drink room temp flat pop.
2- packages of thick sliced bacon

Other note is I can find tons of info on filling your pantry and how to store it. I can also find some about what winter sq to eat first (spag sq , acorn, followed by butternut and pumpkin) but finding style of menu or how to get it all ate even as a homestead was next to nothing. Then I found one that actually made sense. EVERY MEAL....one from the garden (fruit/veggie) one from the barn (eggs, dairy, meat) and one from the kitchen (food from scratch with grains).

Dec 2nd, we got part of the exception list. I did not get butter today. Aldi's was out. I will check tomorrow at two other Aldi's that are in that area.  Hubby paid for a cheap lunch for the two of us since my appt ran late so we missed getting home for lunch. Not good as we were already having errands after the appt. He usually has granola bars in the truck but he took them out since the truck goes in for maintenance tomorrow. Came in under what we had budgeted for what we bought. Hope to finish it tomorrow when we take truck in for maintenance, get blood work done and take the dogs to vets. If not I will end up finishing it by myself later.
Hubby said something about getting groceries. No need except for French vanilla ice cream for hot buttered rum. It can wait until I need milk also.
This week in honor of Advent we gave E & M 2 gamma lids for their food buckets. The smiles on their faces when they realized what they were was priceless. Both have asked about the costs in the past but with finishing paying off the hospital bills for Baby A, E needing surgery for a hernia in Jan and building a bigger calf barn this summer ... the money was not there on top on the gardens doing poorly and his corn for his animals getting ate by the deer and coons.

Dec 3rd  Hubby rechecked the grocery list we wrote. Bananas was not on it. I am suppose to be eating bananas on a regular bases so they went on the list. Since we dropped his truck off for maintenance on the way to blood work and then to vet (Wilbur and Charlotte shots and Rascal's tumor check , his surgery is the 17th and he will go in the night before since he can't even have water through the night and we are not removing water from the other two. All 3 got nails clipped. Getting nails clipped at $10 per dog removes the $25 per dog office visit so basically we save $45 by getting the nails clipped)...we picked the truck up after we were done at the vet's and stopped at 2 Aldi's in that area...they had called around and at this point everyone is waiting on delivery of unsalted butter. BUT I did get bananas and blueberry goat cheese to replace the cottage cheese. I am a bit tired of cottage cheese. I found a couple recipes for leftover rice I would like to try.I like rice pudding but Hubby doesn't. We had odds and ends left in the frig so we ate those for lunch and supper. There still is grilled butternut left and a baked sweet potato. I will put the butternut on pizza (project fire tv show recipe) and make twice baked sweet potato for another meal.

Dec 4th.
HUMMM I think Hubby is going to be very tired of me saying we are doing a no spend month when he mentions buying something. I had looked up a couple recipes we would like to try, you have to order the cook book ...I think that is fair for the chef as he does put other recipes on the internet for free. Hubby asked how much the book was. I did not check because we are in a no spend month. He wanted to know how much so I told him to look it up himself but see if a kindle version is offered as it is usually cheaper.

 I found a bag of O'Brien potatoes in the freezer so I cooked them and added eggs to make a frittia. Hubby calls it big egg. A friend calls it lazy omelet. It went will with of the rolls I had baked and the cookies M had sent over tonight with green and red sprinkles.The butternut and sweet potato went in the freezer.I said something to Hubby about focusing on clearing at least one freezer so when I had something that needed to be frozen I had room. He was agreeable and immediately mentioned there was breaded chicken and sweet potato French fries a couple bags of frozen mixed fruit and meatballs in the one freezer. Sounded like a hint to me.

I did the finances and realized we had came in UNDER budget last month even though my credit card was higher than normal.I called my GI about needing my biologic prescription refilled ( I have enough to go a couple months since I as sick)and that my insurance will probably request preauthorization again. I will see him next week to talk about whether I should stay at the same dosage or change. Hubby called the one utility about an over charge and got that corrected. I am glad I caught  it before the automatic payment went out.

I decorated the laundry room, hall, both bathrooms, and bedroom for Christmas. I found the Christmas cards so I can get those done.  I still have to clean the basement to move the black frig down so we can put the tree in the front room. That is the job for tomorrow as Sunday is suppose to be decent and dry and that will be good for moving it. I still have to decorate the mudroom, front room, dining room, and kitchen. I would like something for the kitchen porch and the deck. I need to finish the swags for the fence line at the driveway from the branches Hubby cut off the Christmas trees. I found the wire for that today. Hubby said he was putting the lights on the outside tree on Sunday.
Guess that is fair as I do the inside tree.

Dec 5th
Bfast was the left over egg/potatoes and lunch was cheese crackers and apples.
I cleaned part of the basement for the frig to go down. Found 5 packages of paper plates. Some will go to the reunion as we are the ones that provide the paper goods for the family reunion in Sept. I definitely do NOT need more. I also found paper napkins I never buy as we use cloth. Must have been in a box that came from Mother as she was the only I know of that bought paper napkins. Hubby found a very small salt and pepper shaker ... yep stuff from Mother. I was looking for a salt shaker so I wouldn't have to buy a sea salt grinder as I found fine ground sea salt at the discount store  last month.
When carrying out a cabinet that was falling apart and taking up the outside ramp from the basement, I caught the top of the cabinet on the roof (very low roof) and bashed my mouth and gave myself whip lash. I am thankful I did not break my front teeth or make them loose. I iced it so not to get a fat lip and to help with the bleeding. Went from having a sinus headache to a migraine within minutes. Still thankful that is all I got. Hubby did go down and carry out the last part of the cabinet.
We had freezer meal... it wasn't sweet potatoes but home fries, bread shrimp and breaded chicken strips. I used the air fryer for all of it since there was not much of any of it. Added green beans ,yogurt with the last of some cherry pie filling and a topping of grape nuts on it. Hubby is going out of state for the day with a friend so I am on my own for meals tomorrow.

Dec 6th
St Nick's day.Hubby left at 4 am to go out of state with a friend. They are going to go visit another friend in Illinois and do a drop off for one person and a pick up for another. I think half the conversations in this area are started with "I am going to ... do you need anything? That is actually a benefit as those that need something, share the cost of the trip. I grew up in a community that was the same. So to me this feels more like home. I realized this week the Hubby has finally adjusted to it. He was some where to get a tool for his truck replaced (out of his hobby money) and saw a set of tools E had been looking for under E's price point of $600. Not only below the price E was willing to pay it had a couple tools in the kit that E had mentioned he would like down the line but couldn't afford right now. The set was worth over $1000 but on sale for $200. A new style is coming out in Jan.Hubby put in on his credit card and brought it home. He took it over to E and A business yesterday afternoon,E's dad was there also. They were so excited and thankful.Hubby told them he put it on his credit card and the payment wouldn't be due until next month so they had time to pay it back. When E got done with chores last night he brought the money over. He told Hubby all three of them cried after he left because it was going to cut their time with labor in half and for an ENGLISHER to be so thoughtful of them was just something that did not happen much if at all. We do see that often Englishers try to take advantage of them.
Today's meals are oatmeal for bfast, leftover steak fries and leftover breaded chicken strips for lunch, ramen noodles with mushrooms and garlic for dinner since I am on my own. Hubby had banana and granola bars for bfast before he left. His friend brought homemade cookies for a morning snack. They will stop for lunch and dinner. Hubby said if he was hungry when he got home he could have summer sausage,cheese and crackers.

Dec 7th
the menu for this week was a bust. Hubby has only been home at meal times a couple days. Today was another time, he had to leave early because he brought back a saw for the saw mill (cuts logs into lumber) since it was dark when he got home he didn't drop it off. SO off he went , got that done, did the hauling he was scheduled to haul and was home by noon. He was given lunch since they thought he would be late. I had eggs. Within an hour our friends were calling as they needed help patrolling the Christmas parade where we used to live. Hubby went but I stayed home. I already am achy and do not want to walk 3 mile in the dark cold weather. I had a bowl of cold cereal for dinner. Finished up that box. Hubby is moving the refrigerator from the front room (finally) to the basement tomorrow so I moved all the butter I have bought so far to the barn deep freezer and some of the things I use all the time to the kitchen frig. I will be walking down the stairs daily to the basement to get food from the pantry and the 2 other refrigerators. I do not count on the old one to hold anything for any time as it has broke down more than once and would have been gone if I had any say about it. It's good for carrots, cabbage, celery , that type of stuff.
I washed bed linen and throw blankets today after I did the laundry. Was cold but nice sunshine and breeze to help things dry. Only  had to run the dryer for 20 minutes to finish the comforter as I have no place to put it to finish drying. I hope the weather holds tomorrow as I have 5 more blankets and 1 set of sheets to wash yet even though it will be the day of rest.

Tomorrow we go to the store for house and then later this week I will go for what I need for the two dishes we are taking to the Christmas party that we got invited to yesterday. I have what I need for the one. But the other one is cauliflower dressing since several at this party don't eat grains due to their diabetes.