Menu Monday - Saturday edition

Saturday - Spaghetti and Homemade Meatballs
Sunday - Hamburger Steaks and Baked Potatoes
Monday - BBQ Pork Chops and Pantry Side
Tuesday - Grilled Cheese and Tomato Soup
Wednesday - Voila Meal
Thursday - Chicken and Dumplins
Friday - $5 pizza, pizza
Saturday - TBD
Sunday - Taco Bar, Homemade Salsa, Snacks
(Super Bowl Party!)

DS and kids joined us for dinner tonight so I threw together some meatballs and we ate them along with some spaghetti and garlic/cheese toast.

I'm going to be working on an extended menu to incorporate some of the freezer/pantry items we have on hand. This will also make it easier as February is my most difficult work month. I also want to avoid the take out dillema that occurs when you come home late and have no menu plan.

Mega Event - Mega Savings

As you've probably guessed, my grocery store of choice is Publix but when a deal is better at another store, I'm game.

Kroger is having a Mega Event this week. Matched with coupons, I found some great deals.

10 packages of cheese .... .99 each after the Mega Event discount
... used 6 coupons for $1/2 .... net price was .49 each
2 packages of Singles ... .99 each after the Mega Event discount
... used 2 $1/1 coupons ... net price of -.01 each
6 cans Hunts Tomatoes ... .49 each after the Mega Event discount
... used a coupon for $1/4 ... net price of .24 per can
2 cans Hormel Chili ... 2.19 used one .55/2 coupons ... net price of 1.95

Total OOP was $10.19 including tax. I saved $38.55 or 79 percent!

Afterthoughts..I think the regular Hormel was only .99 compared to the 2.19 for the "no beams" version. I would have been better off to purchase 8 Tomatoes (and use 2 $1/4 coupons). They were out of the Hormel with beans. Still, it was a great trip. Wish they all could be this good.

Got cheese?

Cheap Meals!

As you can see from my menu posting, we're talking advantage of leftovers and a few cheap/free meals this week.

Monday night we had bbq and brunswick stew. This was brought to us by a relative two weekends ago and waited patiently in the freezer until now. We enjoyed half of what was frozen and we still have more for one additional meal.

Tonight (Tuesday) we enjoyed some leftover Savannah Red Rice (stuffed in a bell pepper and topped with tomato sauce) with some inexpensive cubed steaks. The cost for the steaks and the frozen broccoli was less than $4. Yummy!

Tomorrow night, I have a breakfast style dinner planned. It will probably end up being waffles and sausages.

If you're creative with your use of leftovers, what's not to like?

Ooops! How can I have done this already?

I was catching up on my receipts tonight when I found one from a shopping trip I had forgotten. It wasn't much but it blew my budget. I was just about even before I found this receipt for $51.75.

Growl!

OK, so next week we'll be taking the Freezer/Pantry challenge. Essentials should run me about half of my regular shopping trip and I obliviously won't be saving big bucks but I can get this back under control.

So far this year, I've saved $120.29. Not bad for three weeks in.

Menu Monday

Saturday - Chicken Fingers, Mashed Potatoes
Sunday - Smoked Sausage, Savannah Red Rice (freezer/pantry)
Monday - BBQ Sandwiches and Brunswick Stew (freezer)
Tuesday - Cubed Steak and Buttered Noodles (freezer/pantry)
Wednesday - Breakfast (mid-week meatless - pantry/freezer)
Thursday - Tacos, Spanish Rice, Salad
Friday - TBD

a little blessing

You know it's a good day when a little blessing enters your life.

Here is Ryan. He's our fourth grandchild. Now, we have four under four (3 year old twin girls, a 10 month old boy and this newbie). I keep thinking that it would be a great premise for a reality show...Nana's 4 under 4.

He's just a couple of hours old here and clearly checking out the whole situation.

While the last year has been difficult, the little kiddies are constantly a joy and keep us on our toes.

Welcome Ryan! and Happy Birth Day!

Grocery shopping and the Budget

I had a good grocery trip Saturday picking up a few free items and some almost free things. Probably the best deal was six cans of Hunts Spaghetti Sauce for a net price of only .50 each. These will be great for lasagna or pasta fagioli soup.

I spent $84 plus $7 at BJs for some pork chops. It was $16 over my $75 budget but I'm still $10 under for the year. I was able to add two pounds of ground beef, four meals of pork chops, and cube steak for one meal to my freezer inventory. Add a large beef roast (on sale) and two kinds of deli meat to my grocery supplies.

Kroger is having a meat madness sale this week with Tyson Chicken Breasts on sale for only $1.79 a pound. I may go by and pick up a couple of packages with my $10 balance. That's a great price for chicken breasts.

If you don't see another post from me for a day or two, don't get worried. We're expecting a new grandson any day now.

Menu Monday

I had originally planned to cook a roast in the crockpot for Sunday but there was just too much going on to get that accomplished. The new plan is as follows:

Saturday - BBQ and Brunswick Stew*
Sunday - Mexican out**
Monday - Crockpot Roast
Tuesday -Stuffed Potatoes with Broccoli
Wednesday - leftover Crockpot Roast
Thursday - Lasagna
Friday - $5 pizza

* My MIL brought up several pounds of bbq and a gallon of brunswick stew from my favorite Savannah restaurant. We fed 5 plus 2 toddlers and then put half of each into the freezer.

** We elected to eat Mexican out Sunday night because of all of the out of town guests and my failure to get that roast going. I'll just push that to Monday and bump something to next week.

OOOOH, what the mailman brings....

Monday I received a sample of the new Suave Professionals Shampoo.

Lucky for me, it was a FULL SIZED bottle. Now, that's a sample.

When the going gets tough, the tough get .. baking

It's been a rough week already.

I just finish decorating two dozen cookies. (I baked them last night and iced tonight.) Detailed, decorated cookies are very time consuming. To prepare the icing and then decorate them, it took me about an hour and a half. Add that to the hour it took to mix the dough and bake last night.

That's why specialty cookies are expensive. However, the flip side is that by taking the time to do detailed, intricate work requires patience and concentration. Just like working jigsaw puzzles and cross-stitching, these are good activities to enforce calmness and clear thinking. It's a Works for Me Wednesday.

Works for me Wednesday

How do you eat an elephant?

One bite at a time.

That's how I address many major projects as well as minor ones. Since I work full time, I often do not have the time to finish a project all in one setting. I will often do preparation the first night, the first step on the second night and finish up on the final night. For example, if I am making decorated cookies, I will often gather my ingredients the first night. The second night I will bake the cookies. The third night I will decorate. Less stress, results.

I tackle my menu planning much the same way. I check out the sneak peek and find the coupons on the first night. Once the sale paper comes out, I prepare my menu. On the third night (or day of my shopping), I finalize my grocery list with coupon counts along with a finalized menu plan.

It's a great way to minimize the effort (and stress) and maximize the results.

2010 Grocery Budget

After a quick review of my 2009 grocery shopping results, I was mostly on target for the year.

For 2010, I want to adjust my budget from $96 per week to $75 per week. This $75 does not include any personal care items that cannot be purchased at the grocery store nor does it include prescriptions.

Since DH is still looking for work, I believe that an additional reduction in grocery expenses of $21 per week ($84 per month, over $1000 per year) will help to keep more money in our pockets to be spent as we need. I also want to strictly limit our dining out to a maximum of 1 meal per week.

We will be relying on our stockpile and frozen goods to supplement our spending. I also want to evaluate the items we are purchasing to find if there is a cheaper alternative to the weekly items that normally don't go on sale or have coupons. (Deli meat, milk, bread, etc.) Past attempts to purchase store brand breads has been unsatisfactory. Milk is often cheaper by the gallon but we simply cannot consume a gallon of milk in only a week. I may experiment with purchase of a gallon and subsequent freezing of half. The frozen milk could be used for cooking purposes.

We will continue to have a least one weeknight meal that is meatless and I would like to expand this to two from time to time. I will also be trying new recipes at least once every two weeks.

So far for 2010, I am underbudget thanks to a very lean first week. I purchased meat for several nights during my most recent grocery trip. I noticed that my supply of spaghetti sauce is dwindling as is my supply of canned vegetables. (I'd really like to find some canned goods at stock up prices!)

If anyone has ideas on how to save money on essential items, please leave me a comment with your suggestions.

The dangers of dressing in the dark.....

I dressed as usual this morning and headed off to work. As I walked from my car to the building, I noticed that my socks on my right foot were more visible than the left foot. Hmmm. Upon further examination (I actually looked at my feet), I noticed that I had put on one black shoe and one blue shoe. Since I'm forty minutes from home, I decide to suck it up and just move forward.

I managed to get through the day without incident and to my knowledge, no one noticed except the two people I let in on the situation. It just goes to show you that while we put a great deal of effort into dressing, no one really notices. They may notice a sweater they don't care for or something they'd like to criticize but unless it impacts them, they go about their day without even noticing.

My shoes match now - I'm wearing pink slippers. I don't think I can wear these to work though.

Menu Monday

Sunday - Homemade Vegetable Beef Soup
Monday - BBQ Pork Chops, Rice and Peas
Tuesday - Leftover Vegetable Beef Soup
Wednesday - Waffles (Meatless Midweek)
Thursday - Italian Chicken, Mashed Potatoes
Friday - Sausage and Red Rice
Saturday - Crockpot Roast (or out ?)

We have guests coming in this weekend so we may need to adjust Saturday's dinner plans.

Eat from the Pantry - Snow Day

I'm participating in the Eat from the Pantry Challenge at least for next week.

Partially, this is because we are currently blanketed with snow and we will likely have lots and lots of ice by morning. The driveway was covered with snow at 5pm when I got home and as the snow continued and the temperatures dropped, it just got worse. I can see a large wet area covering the road between me and the exit to the subdivision. This will likely turn to black ice by morning making any travel treacherous. Somehow, I think we're going to be staying a home for a while.

Not to worry though, we have plenty of food to hold us. We might have to substitute non-dairy creamer for our half and half but otherwise, we'll be fine. Normally, I would shop for groceries on Saturday but I'm not counting on it.

For the time being, I'm planning from the stockpile pantry and the freezer for the week. If I can get to the P or over to Kroger for the four day sale, I will. (I'd like to get some of that $1.99 chicken breast!)

I think we'll just watch a movie from our DVD library and play a game this weekend. I have my special project to finish (I'm very close). And then, there's always LAUNDRY. And the tree still needs to come down. I've got plenty to keep me busy.

Procrastination

Typically, tonight I'd take down the Christmas tree.

Ok, I admit it, I'm going to procrastinate. I'm going to wait a while. At least until tomorrow or Friday. Am I bad? Lazy?

Who cares?

Great Meal from the Freezer

Continuing our menu theme of "Finish it Edition," we had barbecue sandwiches (bbq from the freezer, buns from last week), tater tots (half a bag in the freezer). It was quite yummy and a great way to finish some things up. Heating up the meat in a skillet along with the sauce makes it hot, moist and tasty.

Tomorrow we're going to have a C.O.R.N. (clean out the refrigerator night) salad and muffins. I picked up a cucumber tonight at the store. (We had to go get some medicine for DH's cold.) Other than that, everything will be items on hand, out the pantry, fridge or freezer. Another good way to finish things up.

I'm still working on my special project and it's coming along well. It will be time to take down the tree tomorrow. It's gonna be a busy week.

New Recipe (Tomato Soup) Results

My family and I used to love the dry Knorr Tomato Soup Mix. I'd add a can of tomatoes and some pasta to create a delicious hot and hearty soup. Perfect with a grilled cheese sandwich. My DD liked it so much that she would make it for herself at college. We were all disappointed when Knorr discontinued this item. We've tried canned soups but none was as tasty.

I received an immersion blender from DH for Christmas with the explicit idea of creating a tomato soup recipe. I started with a recipe I found on line. I adjusted the seasoning a bit but the main ingredients were the same as the published recipe. It was tasty (DH and I both had two bowls) but it's just not quite there. We're looking for a more distinct tomato flavor. I think I will substitute a can of tomato paste for one of the cans of diced tomatoes. I will also blend the soup before adding the broth and cream/milk. Once I get this recipe close, I'll publish here.

Menu Monday - Finish it Edition

Sunday - Meatloaf and Mashed Potatoes *
Monday - Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese Sandwiches **
Tuesday - BBQ Sandwiches *
Wednesday - Chef Salad
Thursday - Spaghetti and Sausage
Friday - $5 Pizza
Saturday - TBD

* Finishing items already on hand, ** new recipe

I'm working on a draft menu plan for the whole of January and later for February. I hope to incorporate many pantry and freezer items into this plan as well as using up the little bits of things in the freezer.

(update: we subsituted hamburger steak and potatoes with onions for Sunday's dinner)

Remembering 2009

2009 has been a very difficult year for us. While there have been some delightful additions to our life, this year has also been fraught with losses.

January and February were busy for me at work and DH kept busy with his work as well. I was trying to make my $96 per week budget work and I was trying to build a stockpile. I quickly found out that I couldn't get that budget to work during January and February primarly because we ate out too frequently because of my work schedule. We also purchased a freezer in February. That was probably the best purchase all year.

In March, DH found out that he was being laid off. Although we suspected it might happen at some point, we were surprised that it happened so quickly. A bright spot for the month was the birth of our first grandson. He is a delight.

April brought showers and I started my container garden. I had my best grocery shopping trip of the year, saving over $120 on a single trip. I continued to build our stockpile and freezer. April also brought the first of our losses this year. My stepfather unexpectedly died. It was a complete shock.

We were hopeful that May would bring good things. DD moved into her own apartment and finished her first year of teaching. We also suffered a second loss in May when my grandfather died after complications of a fall. He was 95 years old and had not been himself for a while. His fall only expedited the loss.

In June, DH had surgery to repair a back issue. The D and her fiance decided that they would marry. We decided that despite the circumstances of the year, we would take this opportunity to find some joy in life. We started to plan a wedding.

We planned all through July and pulled off a respectable wedding and reception in six weeks. We stayed true to a frugal budget given our time frame. DH continued to heal from his surgery and we dealt with unemployment the best we could.

August was the one year anniversary of my blog. Our garden continued to produce and I continued to fill the freezer with fresh items.

September was filled with rain. We had record levels of rain this year and I think most of it fell in September. Large areas of the surrounding cities were flooded. We did not have any flooding but we did have a small retaining wall collapse. With the help of DS and DSIL, DH was able to rebuild the wall. It was an expense we did not need but it was less expensive than having someone do it for us. I also started making decorated cookies.

We also experienced a third loss this year when my Dad passed away after a short illness.

October and November were filled with finding deals on groceries, small home repairs, and sewing projects. Before we knew it, it was Thanksgiving and thankfully, we had a full house for the event, my first real Thanksgiving in my home.

Christmas decorations went up near Thanksgiving and gave us a festive feeling throughout the Season. We enjoyed our time together for the holidays and I had several days off in late December to re-charge my batteries. Unfortunately, I think everyone had a turn at being sick during the last month of the year.

All in all, 2009 was mostly filled with challenges. It is sincerely my hope that 2010 will opportunites that make it better than 2009 was. I wish you all a Happy New Year.

Weekend Wrap-up

Saturday. I took down the outside decorations. It's been unusually cold here and I would have to go out and do one or two tasks and come right back in to warm up. The wind was particularly wicked. It's all "down" and ready to go into the attic. The tree will come down Tuesday.

Today, I've spent much of the day getting caught up with laundry and washing the holiday linens before they get packed away. I go back to work tomorrow after being off for most of the past two weeks. It's going to be a very, very long five day work week.

I've also been working on a special project this weekend. (Sorry, no pics at this time, as it would spoil a surprise.) My coupons have been purged of all expired coupons and I have a couple of inserts to clip this week. I'm as ready as I can be for the first work week of 2010.

Really the last trip to Publix in 2008

I didn't think I would need to go back to the store before the clock struck midnight but I was wrong, I needed to get some buns for our bbq sandwiches.

So in addition the the buns, I picked up a package of bagles (on sale), some corn chips, a jalapeno pepper, and a half a dozen eggs. Then I spied the display up front of the clearanced items. I got three cans of cranberry sauce (saved .95 each), 2 cans of bing cherries (saved 2.37 each) and one bag of marshmallows (saved .79). I also got two more Phazyme 12 packs - free. In total, my OOP was only $16.03 and I saved $18.78.

That's the way to end the year. I'll be working on completing my savings totals and finalizing a weekly budget for next year during the next few days.