Jan 4th 4:20 pm this week's to do

I am sitting here at the dining table by candle light watching the snow starting to fall. Grass is brown and not covered as the last few days have been warm and we've had rain.  I have 2 towels still out of the porch line, the drying rack is full, both sock racks are full of kitchen hot pads and towels, and 2 walkers are over vents holding aprons and towels to dry. BUT except for the Christmas tree skirt the Christmas stuff is washed. When it is dry I will box it up. Monday I will run the vacuum and get all the throw rugs done and boxed up also. That will be the last of Christmas.

I flipped out the thick bath towels for the thinner ones for winter. Since we seem to have damp weather where I can't hang clothes on the line weekly the thick ones dry too slow on the drying rack.

This week I am going to be canning winter squash. The basement is staying too warm and we will be losing it if I don't get it done as I found one today that was bad. I still have 3 spag sq... or 4 I can't remember that we will need to get in the frig and eat them as they can't be canned.

My 5 gallon bucket that holds homemade noodles is empty so I need to get noodles made. By making them now I can make a quick meal later of them.

I have some veggies getting old so I need to make some veggie stock so they don't go to waste.

I have hamburger to make Salisbury steak, country fried steak, taco meat and sloppy joe. I might cook some plain to help with making casseroles.

I have to make some sour dough starter. I need sour dough bread for garlic soup and I need bread dough for pigs in the blanket. Might as well make that with the sour dough also.

I need to cook some bulk sausage for pizza, calzones and casseroles.

Finances are caught up until the 8th.We started following the money chart from Mediumsizedfamily.com

  http://outmywindowtoday.blogspot.com/ also uses this chart. It helped her get her house paid off so I am hoping we can use it to pay for the newer to us truck when we find one.

I will also can the leftover  of Sara Moulton white chicken chili (I used turkey and great northern beans). Won't be a biggie since I will be canning squash also.

This week I will also move the chair( and clean it) I always sat in at Daddy's into the front room where the Christmas tree was. He had bought a chair for me so I could touch the floor when I sat to visit with him. My brother made sure I got it  when we cleared the house. I will have figure out a different place for the Christmas tree next year. I have Mother's in my bedroom as she was a good 2-3 inches shorter than me.

We are doing well on the pantry challenge as we are in our second week. We are also focusing on eating at least 80% real food aka from scratch.

Doing well in the no spend and looking forward to marking off squares on the money chart.

I am also trying to do stretches on my yoga mat every day this month. That is on top of my daily 10,000 steps and 4 trips on the staircases since I decided to not spend the money on an elliptical or gym membership.

I also am doing a reading challenge from https://modernmrsdarcy.com/

This month I am reading the trilogy of The One from Nora Roberts.Hubby bought the last book for me for Christmas.

I will also read Starting Over by Jackie Clay *Backwoods Home magazine*

I am also checking my seeds and deciding what to plant for fresh eating. We really missed having eggplant and fresh salads. I will be buying my "stock up" goods from the Amish and the auction.

Best get doing the evening routine.